Saturday evening our church hosted an informal time with our missionary from Haiti. She came up here to get her son settled in school and plans to return Wednesday. It was most enlightening listening to a first hand account of the situation there. Unlike some of the negative reactions we have all heard here, her husband's reaction went something like this: "Wow! God is doing something big here and we get to be part of it!" She had photos and shared many interesting stories... they live about a mile south of the main sections of Port au Prince. Their house held up but around them walls tumbled and unfinished buildings collapsed as well as electric lines. They had loads of people sleeping on their flat roof outside ... everyone was afraid to go inside for a time. Their cistern held up so they are providing water for their neighborhood now as well as transportation around town for injured people and the medical personnel arriving to help. Our friend hopes to aid with translation for these people when she returns. There is a huge need for that. Other big needs right now are for antibiotics to fight infection and 5-6 man tents to house homeless families. There are many dead... they now estimate it is more that the tsunami...and more wounded...many amputees of all ages....  Loads of aid is arriving and often through Dominican Republic. Age old animosity there has turned to human compassion and they are bending over backwards to help. There will be no school for this year since nearly every school in the city has collapsed. Many children were killed when this happened because even though it was 5PM when the first shocks occurred, the second school session was taking place.  Our missionaries plan now is to start soccer camps and other things for the surviving children to give them something to focus on besides the devastation they have witnessed. It will be a long time before any rebuilding can take place... it will be a long term recovery process. Perhaps the most important thing we can continue to do is pray. God loves the Haitians. He is there right in that situation and He is working. Pray for endurance and protection for the missionaries, medical people and military people who are there helping. Pray against violence and disorder. Pray for healing for the wounded. Pray that God's Word will be clearly proclaimed and that many will find comfort in it. The Red Cross can help the injured bodies but that is a temporary solution. Only God can help the injured souls and that is an eternal solution.

Hello! I have been absent for awhile now due to the inevitable loss of my computer due to an ugly worm virus. This one even disabled my anti-virus software. A very kind husband and wife team from church were able to repair it but not without clearing the entire hard drive. I don't know if we lost anything but we did have things backed up on a separate hard drive (highly recommended!) and they tried to make CD's of all our files before they cleared the drive. Anyway...we owe this couple big time!

We have good friends who work in Haiti. In 2003 when we happened to be renting their house here, my husband took my soccer mad teen son to visit them. One of the things this family is involved in is running soccer camps and that is what they helped with. Our son designed and collected money and printed the shirts so these kids could have a team uniform of sorts. He is biracial but, as you can see, his is the lightest skin in this photo. These kids enjoyed the camp and as a bonus all heard the gospel and studied the Bible that week as well. Now they are all grown up including my son. Some have families now. Where are they? Did some survive? Did some lose property? Did some lose their families? Are some in heaven? Are some not? I know our friends have not yet heard from all their Haitian friends who work alongside them. I wonder if my son is thinking of the people he met there. I wonder how this has affected him if at all. I wonder and I pray.

These are not my favorite people photos of the year but rather a recap using people. I don't think I blogged about some of these events and some months I could not limit to one photo and even then I am leaving things out. I realized looking through the photos I could do a year of wacky photos of Greg or Brian. Maybe later....

Following seedsower, slmret and others, I decided to re-post some favorite photos from 2009. It was REALLY hard to choose but I only allowed one per month...then I changed my mind and decided to allow one per month without people and one per month with people...it still leaves loads of favs out but makes things more realistic especially since xanga only allows me to upload one at a time lately. So these are my choices with no people... enjoy!

January  -   Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

February       -       Fort Myers, Florida

March   -   Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

April   -   Newtown, Pennsylvania

May   -   Newtown, Pennsylvania

June   -   Gibralter

July   -   Warsaw, Indiana

August   -   Newtown, Pennsylvania

September   -   Newtown, Pennsylvania

October   -   Newtown, Pennsylvania

November   -   Newtown, Pennsylvania


December   -   Newtown, Pennsylvania

Since it is already January 5th and I am just getting around to wishing you a wonderful new year.... it does not bode well for the rest of the year...I am already behind! First I thought I would recap the old year...

You took a walk through our neighborhood...now we welcome you to our home! We had a busy time before Christmas decorating and stitching and baking. We got boxes down from the loft and found decorations we had not seen in awhile. We had lovely food and played games and watched a few films. Greg has an extensive collection of versions of the Christmas Carol by Dickens. He even did a sermon on the topic one year.  My mom sent us an African American nativity way back when the boys were small. Since it was the first one I found, I put it on the mantle. The tree has ornaments from America, England, Germany, The Czech Republic, Russia, Bulgaria, and probably a few other places I am forgetting.

Before going to bed, we put the stockings out...they are too heavy to hang up...mostly I included this photo so you could see the gorgeous sofa we got for FREE from a stranger who was throwing it in the trash! Thanks God!

Taking advantage of the beautiful clear day, my husband and I walked around our small town and captured a few photos for your holiday enjoyment. Blessings everyone!

OK! It is the 20th and that is close enough! It snowed all day yesterday and into the night. Our son made it home from College by noon so that was good! Here is what the spruce in front of our house looked like this morning.

We heard some strange sounds...one was our neighbor plowing our long drive without being asked! How nice! The other was bird song...we discovered two wrens got into our garage. They have gotten in before but we have not figured out how they are doing it. I put out some food for them and tried to get a photo. I don't really have an adequate lens to get a good close up shot but this is them.
 

Friday night was the rehearsal and banquet for graduates. Saturday morning was the actual graduation. It was all enjoyable. There were 120 of us in various programs. The speaker (who was from England...appropriate for me who lived there 12 years!) gave us a challenge from Micah to live justly, love mercy and walk humbly with God. I reflected on how blessed I was to grow not only in knowledge but also in spiritual wisdom as I pursued my degree because of the Christian word view that permeated the teaching at my school. It is exactly 30 years since I received my Bachelor of Science in Elementary Education and Bible. It took five years to complete work on this degree...Masters of Science in International Education. The last five months were pretty intense as I worked on the final project. Now.....how will the Lord use it and me?

   Taking my place.....

Walking across the stage...

Me and Katerina...she is my course advisor and she is Belorussian

The is Bethany... she is an administrative assistant in the education department and was in Kandern every summer when I took classes...

With my sweetheart...

Receiving my blue hood from Dr. McCullough... we have known each other for over 25 years...

At the banquet we sat with Bethany's family...Bethany's sister was also graduating...

Here I am on the big day! Marching in........

Hi Greg! Are you having fun with the camera?

Getting my diploma.....

I think Greg was more excited than I was!...

With my sister...

This is my favorite pose....

With Dr. Vasso... professor and friend...and another friend, Jen

Master and Doctor of Education......

All praise belongs to God!