Day Care part 2

We were able to squeeze some hours into our day to headback to the daycare with some of the youth to add some finishing touches. Here is a sweet picture of the little ones taking a nap while we put posters up. Here we are with workers from the daycare
This is not a word for word translation. Amelia is one of the workers at Amor Y Esperanza daycare. She is the "manager" of the daycare. Here she expresses her gratitude to all of the Youth who helped make the daycare beautiful. She shares that she only imagined 10% of what we did. Her hope was that we would paint the walls maybe two colors. She never envisioned such intricate work. She and the rest of the daycare crew were very grateful. She said the kids walked in the next day in awe of all that was done! Priceless! The directors of Amor y Esperanza shared that every year that a missions team comes to work at the school, which is in another bldg from Kinder-6th grade, Amelia always asks if its there turn. And Amelia always walks away disappointed because the answer is, not this time. But the director said that God taught them that good things come to those who wait because the work they got was amazing!

VBS Video

VBS is a very common summer activity in the states but it is not here. This is the first VBS that the church Dios es Fiel has ever done and they were very excited that the Mckinney group was going to be here this summer! This is a video of the little kids during scripture memory time. It was so sweet to hear them all in unison reciting Gods word.
The VBS has had between 62-70 kids come. Some churched and some unchurched about 70% are from the church Dios es Fiel and the rest are from the neighborhood! We pray that this connects some of the parents from the neighborhood to the church in some way.

Sunday at church! Our church is a non denominational church but a bit more upbeat in the music since music is very important in our culture. Here you can see the praise team and a young group of teens on the dance team. It was an amazing service I was glad the team was here to experience church in Latin America. The speaker was calling the congregation to restore their family relationships. At the end he said he was going to pray for the families in the congregation. As he prayed you could hear sniffles and people crying throughout the room and all of the sudden on their own people just started coming down to the front of the church. At the end of the prayer the pastor asked if someone in the congregation was related to any of these people up front to come down and give them a hug and encourage them. They came down and we could see and hear reconciliation happening right before our eyes. It was the beginning of a huge step in a lot of families.

Mckinney Youth MIssion Team

The group standing at the Equator line. After planning and praying for months for the teams they finally arrive! We finally had the first glimpse of that love and labor come together today as we were busy at work doing VBS and painting. The team arrived on time and with no flight complications. That is a miracle in itself, ha! Those of you who have flown to Quito before know what I am talking about.

Grocery shopping for the 21 young kids we will be hosting this week.
Our church Dios es Fiel on Sunday
First day of VBS during craft time
Memory verse time
game time
snack time
The group had a very busy day. After VBS we headed over to the daycare in the projects that the group is going to paint and redo. If you look closely here at this picture you can see the state of the daycare.
Though we were all exhausted at the end of the day its so exciting to see how God is using us!

Ministry right up my alley- Avant Garde Fashion Show and Spa

One of the things I love about my job as a counselor is that we have two groups that we work with: young ladies called Girls Only! chats and mothers called Mujeres y mas. With both of these groups our goal is to equip, encourage and educate one another. Spurring each other on in our walk with the Lord as women. So this week I got to plan a Mother and Daughter Spa Day and Avant Garde Fashion Show. The fashion show the ladies had to use crepe paper and tissue paper to make their outfits. We had a salon come out and provide their services while we did a fashion show

and had some get to know each other activities for moms and daughters. It was sooo much fun!

This picture below are some of the counselors that I work with!

We got it!

Thanks you all who joined us in prayer that we would find a car. We finally got one! Yea! Though it already got hit. That was very frustrating but a lesson on Materialism for us. We have it parked at the school since we live here and someone (we think it was a taxi or the gas truck) hit it really bad. The bumper came off and they put a dent in it. Ben was able to rig the bumper back up so it doesn't look as bad anymore. Going grocery shopping is so much more manageable now!

Mr. Tuten is Loved!

This was supposed to be a surprise party for Ben but of course asking 6th graders to keep a secret is pretty much impossible. It was a pool party and cook out!

The kids felt that it would be sooo sad to celebrate your birthday with out a pinata so one of the moms went out and bought one for the party.

I really enjoy seeing how much the students love Ben! God has really gifted him as a teacher and I praise God that he has followed that calling. When they sing Happy Birthday here they add Cha, Cha, Cha at the end!
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Farewells, the life of a missionary

I have never been good at goodbyes but it seems like my life has been full of them. When we accepted our calling to Ecuador as missionaries we knew that this would mean that we would have many farewells because such is the life of a missionary. Well our first on this side of the world came this week as we had to say goodbye to one of our really good friends a couple Dan and Emily and their newborn that we had connected with in such deep ways. It has been very sad to do this because it came a lot sooner than we imagined. More are to come at the end of the school year as I say goodbye to my senior girls I disciple and other missionary teachers who are going back on furlough or transferring.

Sharing some of our Easter traditions

The whole plastic eggs, easter baskets and bunny thing hasn't hit Ecuador yet which is good b/c Easter is not commercialized its celebrated pretty much only as a religious holiday. Well we shared some of our non-religious and real of meaning of Easter traditions with some Ecuadorian friends at a picnic.

They were quite amazed at the whole boiling eggs, dyeing them and hiding them tradition. They thought it was quite odd but still joined in the fun. After having them find the eggs we gathered around and shared the Easter story using the Resurrection Eggs that we have used for the past couple of years as a family. They were amazed that there were little treats to discover in each egg as I told the story. It was very fun!

My daughter wants to learn how to pray.....

This past week the Lord gave me an opportunity to lead a mom and her daughter to Christ. I volunteer at a childrens gov't hospital every Wed. We go and give them coloring pages, cookies, balloons and share a bible story. At the end of doing this with one little girl I was getting ready to pack my stuff and walk away when her mom calls me back and says "my daughter want to learn how to pray" as I walked over I am thinking "wow she's ready" this little 10yr old is hungry for more. So I shared the gospel with her and mom and they both said they wanted to give their life to Christ. At the end she said she was rejoicing and I said so is God! Praise God!! If you remember pray for Lizzette that the Lord will heal her little body soon.

Your kids work -at work in Quito, Ecuador!

The school coordinated a day for the teachers to help us with Operaton Brown Bag in making 150 lunches (thanks to all of you kiddos who sent us your art work and $1 to fill the bags) and passing them out. We also had a group of students from a club called Peer Helpers making the sandwiches. The day we gathered to make the lunches was a beautiful sunny day but the day we planned on passing them out it was raining horribly so Mari and the kids ended up staying at home but Ben and about 8 other teachers went out in the rain to pass out the bags in Historic Quito (which has a lot of street kids).

They loaded the lunches in plastic bags and went out in the rain. The 2nd picture is a little boy shoe shining. This is a very common job for little boys to do all over the city to make money. The group stopped and gave him some lunch. The 3rd picture is a guy just sleeping on the sidewalk and the girls put a lunch by him so he could have it when he wakes up. One of the teachers shared that when they handed someone a lunch they said "if you only knew the depth of our hunger and he took the lunch and said a very typical phrase that people say instead of thank you "Dios te page" God pay you. Ben came home and said he didn't know what that meant but just nodded and smiled. We were very thankful as a family that we could pass out so many lunches out at one time. We normally do it by ourselves so we don't get as many passed out so this was a blessing.

Avenue Naciones Unidas Street Video

These are 3 videos of a major street a couple of blocks from our school. I wanted to give you all an idea of the area around our home. The name of the street is Naciones Unidas (United Nations). The videos were taken at about 5:30 p.m., so there was a lot of traffic and noise. We walk down this street very frequently to go to the grocery store or one of the many malls along the way.

This video is at the intersection of Naciones Unidas and Los Shyris (pronounced Shitty's). The park at the corner is Carolina Park, the largest park in Quito. It's easy to find on any map of Quito. We have enjoyed many picnics and jogs in this park.

This is the intersection of the street that goes in front of our school, 10 de Agosto (pronounced Dee-Ace Day A-ghost-o for those of you trying to learn Spanish), and Naciones Unidas. Many major streets here are named after important dates. I think the August 10th is Ecaudor's independence day, but don't quote me on that. You can't see our school in this video, but it's really close. Again, lots of traffic. It has taken Ethan a while to get used to us pulling him across the street so that he doesn't get run over. At first he would pitch a fit because we were making him run across the street. Thankfully, he's gotten much better, although it is still sometimes a struggle. I'm not sure if you can tell, but the sidewalks are not stroller-friendly. We originally brought our double stroller, but quickly realized it is useless here. Thankfully, this little umbrella stroller has been perfect for all of the curbs and bumps. Thank you Reeves for the stroller!