Friday, February 26, 2016

Past Week

I'm having some trouble blogging lately - bad internet mixed with power outages makes it difficult! Here is what has been going on this past week!

Caedmon & Machila studying Science during their lunch break

Working on Mama Dee & Grandpa's house!

Mallory & Rachel are here! These are 2 girls from Rosemont Baptist Church in La Grange, GA who are here for 5 weeks. Rachel will start dental school in August, and Mal just graduated from college (she has been to New Day twice before). We are excited to have them here and are putting them to work!

Love those "welcome back" hugs! The kids kept saying to her, "You remember our names!!"

Doing some organizing in the library!

Rachel is helping a lot by tutoring Misheck in Math and taking over Cambree's Language Arts class!

A Friday at school..Agness & Ingrid

Christina

4th Grade Math with Teacher Darbi

2nd Grade Math with Teacher Hildah

Mweene

And those power outages....our schedule is back..sort of.. some days it's off, some days it's on..we never know! The other night, Blu built a fire and we sat outside, but in the 90+ degree heat, that didn't last long!

Cason's face describes perfectly how we all felt...

Kailyn & Jamee are still here, though I don't see them much1 They spend a LOT of their time biking to Kabanga Basic School and are pouring into the local kids there - what a ministry!

Thursday, February 18, 2016

Fun in February!

We have had some fun this February, especially with our monthly birthday party yesterday!

Kefbert turned 7 on February 11th, Mweene turned 9 on February 14th, and Miriam turned 24 on February 16th!

Little Chimunya (Brian's daughter) thought the water pouring was hilarious!

Emma loved getting wet too!

Hildah loves life! (and pouring water on people)

Jamee getting some Emma love

Jamee getting some more love...by getting water poured on her!

Baby Justin didn't mind the water!

Kefbert's awesome cake and Mr. Incredible!

Teacher Diana got him!

Mweene is fast!

Mweene's Batman cake and cookie

He got a Bible (this is what he asked for!) and Legos!

Poor Miriam - Mulenga got her good!

Everyone got her good!

Love her smile!

Stanley got a haircut!

In Mama Lala's Language Arts class, the kids were on a hunt for their spelling words - come on, Francis!

Cynthia and Muchoni searching...

And the last of our Valentine's pictures..Cambree & Caedmon delivered flowers & chocolate to Teacher Carolyn & Teacher Diana, while Cason was delivering to Aunt Staci!

Headed to English worship!

One last Lusaka meal - Mugg n' Bean for waffles and a giant fruit/yogurt/granola salad!

My 3 Valentines!

Friday, February 12, 2016

Lusaka!

We have had a great and exhausting time in Lusaka! Our kids have thanked us so many times for bringing them, and we have realized that with all the chaos that is our every day lives of ministry, sometimes they need to get away too! Lusaka pretty much equals food, food, and more food. :)

After a day of teaching, a 5 1/2 hour trip to Lusaka, a massive shopping trip at Orca, a home furnishings store, to get The Ark ready for volunteer season and to furnish our new orphan house, a jaunt into Game, a store to buy fans for The Ark and dry erase boards for the school, and what we thought would be a dash into Shoprite to knock out Carolyn & Diana's list and a few more things for the orphan house (stood in line at the checkout for 38 minutes...), and Blu & Caedmon witnessed a mugging....we were exhausted!! It was 9pm when we finally sat down at Curry in a Hurry to eat supper! (the kids opted for burgers from Steer's!) However, it was a highlight when we watched a guy propose to his girlfriend! :)

On Friday morning, we were bummed to wake up to no water, but we got ready quickly and headed across town to our American dentist, Dr. Yoo. I FINALLY got my 2 crowns put in (what a nightmare of the last 8 months of 2 root canals and then crowns!) and we all got our teeth cleaned. Fun times.

Having to wake up early to go to the dentist AND take a Math test while you're there - life is rough.

After the dentist, we rushed over to Immigration where we successfully submitted Mom & Dad's work permits! We then did a little more shopping (Food Lovers, Pizza Hut!, Pep (because Cambree's flip flops broke...), and Toys R' Us, and came back to the Baptist Mission to eat lunch. After that, it was swimming time!!

After much debate, we decided to drive the extra 35 minutes to go one of our favorite places, Sandy's Creations! We loved their nice pool, and it was a perfect day to swim!

They got 2 1/2 hours in the pool!

My paradise...a Malawi shandy and wifi to download 13 new books to my Kindle!

Cason, our wrinkled little man!

After swimming, we headed to The Cake Bar - one of our favorites! The kids got waffles with gelato on top, (except Cambree who chose fruit..) and I had a delicious iced caramel latte! Lusaka food is GOOD.

After that, we did another massive shopping trip to Pick n' Pay for our personal groceries...we finished up at 7:30pm and drove back to the Mission in a rainstorm! Craziness of unloading, getting everything frozen, so that tomorrow morning we can load up and go! Our only stops will be to Game to pick up the 4 new couches we bought for the orphan houses and to Mugg n' Bean for breakfast!

I wanted to detail our time in Lusaka so that you can get a glimpse for what a couple of days in the big city are like for a missionary family - lots of shopping, lots of traffic, and lots of food & fun!

Construction, Fish, and Snacktime!

Here is what was going on around New Day on Thursday!

We have a block making crew working to make 80,000 blocks for the 4 building projects we are doing this year!

Love our hydraform machine and our red blocks! (Bruno is the crew leader)

Blu has it down to a science - the blocks cost us $.18 to make!

Crispin - one of our best (and fastest!) builders. He is also Kelitah & Axer's uncle, Royd & Protashow & Bruno & William & Irene's brother, etc., etc. He is building the Palace #2, but Blu caught him taking a break!

Getting ready to pour the slab for the Palace #2!

We harvested fish! Enough for 7 meals for the orphanage!

Time to refill the pond and try again!

Every day at 10am, the kids get a 10 minute snacktime and a 20 minute recess - Uncle Blu was around to capture some of the fun!

Blu & Cynthia (who is NOT throwing a gang sign, despite what it looks like!)

Blu & Kelitah

Look - it's Teacher Melvin!

The bosom buddies eating snack together :)

Christina & Terry

Meanwhile, I was back in my room grading papers! (Every day at snacktime, Blu brings me a homemade granola bar that we make on Sundays for the week and we enjoy a 15 minute break together!)

Blu with Francis & Emmanuel

Gertrude

Kefi

Lulu

Luumuno

Malilwe