Quirey Life

Change of Address

2010-03-08T13:31:00.002-03:00

So from here on out, our blog is at

www.quirey.com

How is that for easy to remember?

The only trick is that you'll have to remember how to spell Quirey.

All new posts will go there and this blog will be left to languish.

A Heads-Up

2010-03-06T20:54:00.002-03:00

Our blog will be moving to a new address very soon. We'll let you know when it's up but in the meantime, things here may look a little wonky.

While I'm here, since I haven't really been lately, let me take the opportunity to tell you that we'll be on furlough in just over a week. Our rough schedule is:

March 16-23 Blackwell, OK
March 23-April 1 Athens, TX
April 2-6 Oklahoma City
April 7-10 Personal Days
April 11-14 Oklahoma City
April 16-23 Winnipeg
April 23-26 Grand Strand, SC (R only)
April 29-May 5 Oklahoma City

All those days are "-ish", as in "we may be in between two places" and all the places are "-ish" as well, which is why OKC comes up so much. OKC is just easier to say, though we'll probably be in Stillwater and Blackwell a little. If you're interested in seeing us, let me know. If you're in Athens, Sharon Hartis is coordinating our schedule so you should talk to her.

Back to School

2010-02-10T15:34:00.001-03:00

I haven't blogged about much ministry stuff lately. Part of that is because of the normal January lull. Not much happens in church life between Christmas and Carnaval. The other main reason is that I'm the mother of a very active toddler. My time is truly no longer my own. I don't get to sit and blog and I don't get to get out of the house to do much else these days. But I'm not the first person to ever have a toddler, so I'm not asking for sympathy, I'm just explaining what's up.

That said, back in January Russ and I took over the children's ministry. Since Heather, intern extraordinaire, is here for a few more months we're not responsible for quite everything just yet but we've been working on some big organizational stuff and some of the week-to-week stuff too.

Last Sunday we had our first event. February is back-to-school month, so we had a party instead of Sunday School last week. We started handing out invitations in December and we ended up with 20 kids, which is about double our average weekly attendance.

We played games like "stick the pencil on the desk".

We wanted all the kids to know that their schooling is important to us and that we support them so we took the time during our worship service to pray over them.

And at the end of the morning (after church) we handed out goody bags to everyone with school supplies.

I hope this becomes a yearly event for our church family. More importantly, I hope that these children truly are blessed in their studies. Most of them have so much to overcome when it comes to schooling yet we know that with proper schooling they will be able to overcome so much! Please take a moment to pray for the kids of ICOS!

2010-02-04T07:07:00.002-03:00

We were tired but we were only halfway done.

We flew to Dallas to meet up with R's side of the family. We had a mini-family reunion at the Holiday Inn Express, with the East Bernard Quireys coming to be with the Blackwell Quireys and, of course, the Brazil Quireys. So we had just about all the Quireys we know in one place. Jackson got to meet his great-aunt Melissa and her family for the first time, and his great-grandparents were thrilled to see him again. We had a great couple of days with the Quireys.

Then we loaded up in the car and went to Oklahoma City. We got to have a few hours with my brother Mike, sis-in-law Jacque and MY NIECE TESSA!!! I was so excited to meet her and she is even more adorable in person. (Jackson may not feel the same way about her. Not yet, anyway.)

We headed up to Blackwell for a few days with Russ's family.

(Not shown: Mike (R's dad) and Nana (R's grandma). Also, I'm not quite ready to consider Matt's mustache a family member yet.)

It was nice to be with the fam for Christmas but by far the most exciting part of this leg of our trip was the SNOW!!

I haven't been that cold in a long time! We bundled Jackson up in layers and layers of clothes and we took him outside. He wasn't too impressed.

He liked it much better this way:

(I DID IT! I finally finished posting about vacation! Good thing, too, since furlough is just around the corner!)

Still More Vacation

2010-02-03T13:34:00.003-03:00

We were in California for a wedding. Sort of. It was the celebration of a wedding that had already happened but it looked just like a "real" wedding. My brother Dave and his wife Liz decided to have a small private ceremony a few months ago but they had a big shindig for the rest of us to enjoy.

It was a little odd for me because I had never met my new sister-in-law, but I have to say that I love her! Liz is a great girl and a wonderful match for Dave. Here they are at the wedding:

It's one of my favorite pics of the day because of the look on Liz's face. I think every bride should look that carefree and happy.

Jackson was the ring bearer. He did an okay job for someone his age. He loved the Christmas lights all around the stage and tried to blow them all out.

And here is the lovely Quirey family. Russ spent hours on his hair!

Wherein We Meet a Large Rodent of Note

2010-01-18T11:03:00.002-03:00

Still updating about our vacation...

So we spent a week in Anaheim with my family. The folks rented a house so we could all stay together ("we" being Russ, Jackson and I, Mom and Dad, my sister Susan and her husband Joel, my brother Dave and his wife Liz and Dave's best man Blair). It was wonderful to all be together again. We stayed up and played games, hung out in the hot tub and let Jackson get to know his family. He loves his aunties and uncles but I think if asked, he would say that his favorite part about this leg of the trip was the foosball table. Yes, we have an addict on our hands, which was confirmed when we got to the Quireys in Blackwell where they also have a foosball table. Thankfully Jackson has many patient people in his life who gladly indulge him. (Liz played with him for almost an hour one day. She's a saint!)

Because we were going to be gone most of December we didn't put up our Christmas tree in Brazil. But we found an acceptable substitute.

That was in Downtown Disney, where we got to spend an afternoon just hanging out and drinking lattes. Yes, folks, that's what missionaries like to do when they come back to the U.S.--drink lattes. We may have lots of good coffee here in Brazil but we do not have sugarfree caramel lattes with nonfat milk.

And of course we had to spend a day enjoying Disneyland. We could have spent more time there but we were happy to even get one day. Jackson had a lot of fun although he really didn't know who any of the characters were. He took a nice two hour nap which let us big kids enjoy some delicious Mexican food. (That's the other thing we do when we go to the U.S.--eat as much Mexican food as possible!)

The grownups had plenty of fun. I got to ride Space Mountain, which is all I really want to do at any Disney park. Russ took my parents and sister to Honey I Shrunk the Audience, which Jackson and I skipped, so that's why they've got these lovely new spectacles on. I'm sure they were disappointed they didn't get to keep them. (And I know that Susan is incredibly disappointed that someone had to hold the camera so she didn't get to be in this picture. I know I would be.)

And we stopped into the home of this guy. It was awesome because there was NO LINE. We just ran through the empty house. Jackson didn't quite know what to think of him but he wasn't screaming, so I guess we count that as a successful visit.

(Hmm...there is some crazy formatting going on here. I'm just going to leave it as is because my son needs to get ready for bed. Just squint and imagine it's prettier.)

2010-01-12T07:55:00.005-03:00

Well, at this point I can say that I am 85% recovered from our whirlwind trip and 30% recovered from the missionary conference. My apartment is 15% recovered (Antônia is on her month-long holiday and I'm feeling a little burnout from having to unpack twice in two weeks.)

I'm starting to realize that I may never get the two hours it would take to sit down and blog about our adventures in one nice cohesive narrative (or even a coherent one) so you'll get it in bits and pieces.

1. The advice that guided me through the whole trip was this: "...I called my mom, who in the 1970s loaded me, my three siblings, and our reluctant father into a van for a yearlong road trip behind the Iron Curtain. “In my travels,” she said, “I’ve found there are three things you can find anywhere: Snickers, Fanta, and Johnny Walker Red. It wouldn’t kill them to live on Snickers and Fanta for a few days. If that doesn’t work, try the Johnny Walker and let them sleep.”" (from the National Geographic Travel Blog)

Jackson is a pretty picky eater and airplane travel isn't well-thought out for toddlers ("Why yes! My child would love beef tips with mushrooms and salad. Except can I sub the beef tips with chicken nuggets and the salad with french fries? And could I get a gallon of ketchup while you're at it?") I read that advice a couple of months ago and it popped into my head while we were traveling. While I never gave Jackson Snickers or Fanta (or Johnny Walker), it helped me remember that the meal choices we were making on the trip were short-term and that he would survive. So for a couple of weeks, there were several meals of cashews and raisins, washed down chocolate milk. Maybe not totally balanced, certainly not organic (gave up on that ambition ages ago!) but it was stuff we could find almost anywhere we went. Later in the trip I started carrying a pouch of Easy Mac "just in case".

I have to say it made me miss Brazil, where I can always find one of Jackson's favorite meals: beans and rice. Especially the rice.

2. Thinking of how unfriendly air travel can be with little ones, on our return trip, Jackson got an upset tummy on the flight from Dallas to Miami. We went through most of what was supposed to be our overnight supply of diapers and were stuck trying to find diapers in the Miami airport. Have you ever tried to find diapers in an airport? Every kiosk sells the same little pack with one diaper and two wipes for FIVE DOLLARS! (And no one seemed to have anything but a size 4!) We were facing having to spend at least $30 on diapers when we looked in one last store. They had 12-packs of diapers and I was so excited. When I went to pay for them, we discovered they didn't have a price tag and they were not going to sell them to me without a price. The clerk suggested I go with the "Little Swimmers" instead. At that point, I was on the verge of tears and ready to offer $50 for them (still a better deal than the other diapers). The Lord heard our desperate prayers and finally their manager authorized them (over the phone) to sell them to us for $10. We bought two bags.

Then we looked for some sort of food choice that wouldn't aggravate his upset tummy even further. Au Bom Pain wasn't going to cut it that day! Tucked away in a remote corner of the airport we found a Cuban cafeteria that had chicken soup and Jello. I have never been so happy. Jackson gobbled up the chicken soup and I (who had been fighting my own stomach ails) went for the Jello.

And of course, as is often the case with toddlers, after our frantic search for diapers, Jackson's stomach was fine on the overnight flight.

3. I don't know how people traveled with toddlers before the invention of the iPod Touch. Yes, I realize the ridiculousness of that statement. We would have survived without it.

But it sure was nice!

Notes from Anaheim

2009-12-15T21:45:00.004-03:00

1. It took us waaay too long to get here. We had several flying delays which extended our trip by 11 hours, then had to wait around LAX for four and a half more hours for my parents' (delayed) flight. Add some more amazing hours and you get a classic trip. But we all made it--Mom and Dad from Winnipeg, Joel and Susan from New Mexico, Dave and Liz from Washington. We wish Mike and Jacque and the girls were here!

2. Our vacation rental is great and just a 15 minute walk from Downtown Disney. Not too shabby! (Thanks Mom!)

3. I hurt my back last night when I bent over to pick up my screaming child. I don't know what I did to it but I'm sure a little time in the hot tub tonight will help!

4. We finally feel like we're on vacation. We never go on vacation. We usually tack our vacation time on to furlough so it just ends up feeling like more furlough. This is wonderful!

5. California is COLD! When we landed yesterday morning the pilot said it was 45. That may seem warm to you (and my parents) but we're coming from Brazilian summer. Salvador never even gets CLOSE to 45 in the winter!

6. I am quite proud of myself: I have been here for almost 36 hours and have only been to Target and Starbucks once.

7. It's awesome to get to meet my new sis-in-law, Liz. Welcome to the family!

2009-12-07T13:12:00.003-03:00

One more post. Good thing, too, because my brain hurts!

But I have not posted pictures of Jackson in a long long time and I just wanted to take a minute to tell everyone what an AMAZING kid he is. I know you think your child/grandchild/niece/nephew/best friend's kid/whatever is cute and smart but Jackson's got them all beat. But I try not to let HIM know that so he can be humble, too.

English Class Christmas Party

2009-12-07T13:00:00.003-03:00

Yet again we celebrated Christmas with our English students in the "North American style". I think this party could also be referred to as "Missionaries-Pig-Out-On-Christmas-Goodies Day". My tummy hurts! So it's hard to post this first picture.

(Truth be told, I didn't really eat that many goodies yesterday. It was more all the days leading up to the party when I was baking.)

The kids helped me decorate. They were really into it this year so we let them decide where to hang things.

We played a gift exchange game that almost ended in a catfight.

Well, not really, but there were tears and screaming (mostly kids, I promise!)

And of course a special visitor stopped by!

Some of the students from the beginner class with their wonderful and beloved teachers.

(Yes, Santa was one of my students.)

This year the party was a little bittersweet because we're not going to be able to offer English classes next year. My plate is going to be pretty full with the addition of the children's ministry responsibilities and my co-labourers in the English ministry, Heather and Travis, are both bailing on me. I pray that in the future we'll find a way to get this great outreach going again!

And next year we missionaries will have to come up with another excuse to do our holiday baking...

Lourdes' Baptism

2009-12-07T12:56:00.002-03:00

Here are some pictures from Lourdes' baptism.

Lorena and Gustavo

2009-12-07T12:38:00.003-03:00

Here I talked about Lorena and Gustavo's reception. Here are some of the pictures from it. The only problem is that I didn't manage to get a decent picture of the happy couple. So here's Lorena and Gustavo's reception minus Lorena and Gustavo:

We had a potluck lunch. Always tasty!

Some of the amazing servants that make days like this possible! We've started using glass plates for all our events which means the workload is greatly increased.

We've all of a sudden got a bunch of little girls at church! They're all just precious...most of the time!

Women's Conference

2009-12-07T12:26:00.003-03:00

(You don't need me to tell you that I haven't been blogging very faithfully lately. Today I'm trying to play catch-up on a lot of things, including uploading pictures, so today I'll be posting a lot of pictures.)

A couple of weeks ago several of us went to the annual state-wide women's conference. Actually, there were women from several states.

There were about two hundred present. The organizing congregation went all out with the decorations.

The meals were especially excellent, with a huge breakfast spread and the hottest pepper sauce I've had in a while at lunch. It looked like it wasn't hot, more like pico de gallo, so I piled it on (I'm not a fan of hot stuff). Big mistake. I wanted to cry. But I dutifully finished my plate.

Transformation

2009-11-29T22:54:00.002-03:00

Quickly, an update-
Our new sister in Christ was baptized at high tide today on the beach in front of ICOS. Her name is Lourdes, and she has two small children. She has been a part of a small group for about two years, and it has been a struggle to give God control of her life! Her husband came to church with her for the first time, and her daughter Vanessa was so excited to hug her mother when she walked out of the waves. We are pumped...

Another friend, DL, who I wrote about last month has returned to Salvador. He was able to live with his brother in the second-largest city in our state and make enough money to pay off his crack dealer. To top it off, the same dealer surrendered his life to God in a local Four Square Gospel Church while he was gone! Some things take decades of prayer to change, but others only a few days. I look forward to more study times with Deraldo (see my note about DL in an earlier post).

Finally, pray for Jeni and Rizzi - I have been studying with them both. One is very close to telling her family about her plans to be baptized, and the other loves talking about Jesus on a weekly basis with me. Pray for them both in the two weeks before we leave for the US. Valerie taught her last English class today, and it was bittersweet. She loves all the students that she has met - over 200 just this year. However, there will be much more responseability placed on us in overseeing the children's ministry. We have many needs but we know who is making our list. Peace, guys and gals.

2009-11-16T08:06:00.002-03:00

Last Thursday we enjoyed some family time on our day off. We're really bad about actually taking days off so it was nice to spend some time together and just relax. We went to the zoo but my camera battery died so I didn't really get any pictures. As soon as we get to the zoo, Jackson demands to see the lions. He grabs my chin and looks into my eyes and says, "Rawr?" (which is his word for lions. He refers to most animals by the sound they make until he decides to start calling them by their "real" names. So dogs are now dogs but cats are be-ows.)

On Friday, we had our next set of meetings to plan for next year. This one was a little better for me, though, because it's the guys that met all day and then different ministry leaders just had to come in to meet with them. This year Russ and I were responsible for the goal-setting for children's ministry since we're taking over the ministry in January. It sure is a lot of work for a ministry that we have not "officially" taken over yet! We're trying to get the curriculum mapped out for the next few months, plan VBS and figure out how to recruit and train some more volunteers. We're headed on our vacation in less than a month and when we get back we'll have the missionary conference so anything that needs to be ready in January needs to get done now.

On Saturday I got up early and headed to the annual city-wide women's conference. Russ was kind enough to take care of Jackson for the day so it was extra-enjoyable! It's always nice to get together with our sisters from the other congregations. We took several of our women with us (we all squeezed into Jenn's tiny car!) and everyone had a great time.

When I got home, it was my turn to hang with Jackson while Russ went to small group. Why has Jackson been home so much? Well, in the past two weeks or so, we have dealt with an ear infection, a cold and headlice. Yes, that's right! Good times, I tell ya! I'm not sure where he picked up the lice (though I have an idea or two) and fortunately we seem to have caught it early enough that we're not having much of a fight. I never had lice as a child so this has been a crash course for me! I find it a little funny, though, because in my Tuesday bible study I asked for everyone to pray that Jackson could catch a break healthwise. Apparently God said no.

Yesterday we decided to keep Jackson home one more day. It was a pretty full Sunday so we decided that I would stay home with Jackson during church and then Russ would trade out with me at lunchtime so I could go help with the potluck and reception we were having for one of our recently-married members. I used the extra time to make my food for the potluck (Mexican casserole and guacamole!) but was surprised when I heard a key in the door at about 11:00. (Church usually ends at about 12:00.) Russ was home early because he felt miserable. Fortunately this week one of our members was leading singing and another was preaching so Russ had no responsibilities in worship and was able to leave. I rushed around to finish getting ready and made it to church about five minutes before it ended. I don't know if it was the holiday weekend or the wedding reception or what, but we had an awesome turnout for worship and almost every single person stayed to eat. After lunch we celebrated Lorena and Gustavo's wedding. They got married a couple of months ago but it was in another city so none of us (except Mary) were able to be there for the wedding. We had a yummy cake and open mic time, which is always interesting but this time was actually pretty tame. After the reception, we had a devotional. Anailson, another Brazilian, brought us a message about prayer. You could tell that he was incredibly nervous but he did a great job. I was so thankful that I got to participate in even part of yesterday. On days like that the feeling of community in our congregation is amazing. I was glad that people like Lorena's husband, Gustavo, and her mom were there to experience what her church family is like.

This morning I got up early so I could put a turkey in the oven. Today we're celebrating Thanksgiving as a team. Matt and Mary Virginia are leaving for furlough in a couple of days and we wanted to be able to celebrate with them. (We're missing Travis and Alicia, who are in Ecuador right now but we'll celebrate Christmas with them!) Some people (including one that I happen to be married to) think it's silly that we're having Thanksgiving so early. No one seems to buy my argument that we're actually celebrating Thanksgiving a month late! (Actually, as an American-Canadian or Canadian-American, or half-breed or whatever you want to call me, I believe it is within my rights to celebrate Thanksgiving as many times I want on as whatever days I want.) So we're off to try not to ruin all the hard work we've been doing to lose weight. Maybe we can all work out after dinner. Or something like that...

We need some prayers for our friend

2009-10-25T18:05:00.004-03:00

Hello everybody- I had a tough conversation with our new friend, DL. He recently came back from rehab and was really getting involved with our church. I have never seen someone actually return from rehab and thank me for buying his bus ticket! He spent a morning with me at the city court to replace his ID so that he could return to work. His big sister was letting him live in her extra room above the house.

He called me after I returned from English class and asked to speak to me personally. I hope you can pray for him from this point in the story. He had gone with another member to hand out flyers for our church in the neighborhood, when two guys on bikes grabbed him and said his old drug dealer wanted to see him. He fled, and hid above his sisters house, but when she saw him she said that four men had threatened to kill him if they found him. We prayed with him, and offered to do whatever he thought he needed to be safe. After considering our offer to make a report to the police or at least stay with another family, he felt it best to leave town immediately; his brother lives a couple of hours away where he was in rehab. He looked like a man who had lost all hope. DL is a smart 46 year old who is trying to make a fresh start. I really hated sending him away, but none of us had space for him to stay more than one night. Please pray that he finds family in another city. We are praying that sometime soon (after his debts are paid) he can return. DL, we are praying for you and for your safety.

Strategy Review, Days 3 & 4

2009-10-24T21:25:00.002-03:00

I didn't blog last night because we all headed out to dinner and it took us over ninety minutes to get a table (it would have taken even longer had a certain teammate not boldly approached the couple that had already paid and was taking up our future table and begged them to move on) so we didn't get home until ten-ish.

That's one reason anyway.

The other problem is that I'm not actually sure what to say about yesterday, or what led up to it.

Sigh.

Okay, I'm going to let you in on something you may or may not have already known: missionaries (and ministers, for that matter) don't always have it all together spiritually speaking. We get distracted, we lose our focus, we neglect our personal spiritual lives. It's really easy, since we're "professionals", to put all our time and effort into our work and convince ourselves that it's all for God and actually be quite far from him. We make decisions based on what we feel is best and don't stop to ask God. We get so caught up in the what that we lose the why.

As we talked about what has happened in the past year, we were frustrated. Things hadn't gone like we had hoped. We weren't seeing the results we expected. Several of us are exhausted by our workloads, especially on Sundays. We all knew that something had to give.

We made our list of what we feel God wants in 2010 and what kept coming to the top was that God wants us to seek Him. The more we talked about it, the more we realized that if we all seek God with all of our hearts, everything else will happen naturally. And if we, the missionaries, are not seeking God first and foremost, how can we expect that from our members or the people we're studying with?

I've got to pause here to say again how hard this is to share. In fact, in the course of this conversation, we discussed how tough it would be to share that we had not been measuring up spiritually. (I even specifically said that it would be hard to blog about!) But I realized that 1. It's the truth and we need to openly share our struggles to be able to conquer them, and 2. We are definitely not the first missionaries or ministers to have this struggle. So I'm sharing it with you. My prayer is that your response would be one of support and prayer as we try (as everyone ought) to truly make God Lord of our lives.

So put God #1. Easy peasy.

Oh, no wait. That's hard. But we're going to try to do it together. I won't go into all the details of how we're going to go about it, but it involves regular study, prayer, worship and accountability. Sounds like a good start, doesn't it?

That wasn't the end of our retreat, though, because we did have to get around to talking about some of our day to day ministry things. But the incredible thing was how quickly all that went once we were all unified in our desire to focus first on God. Conversations that we expected to take hours were had in ten minutes, incredibly tough decisions were made, prayers flowed freely.

This week's strategy retreat was unlike any we've had before. (To begin with, we had less people than ever!) Through our time together, through our conversations, our worship, our times of prayer, we reached a new level of unity. We had moments of discouragement but are now refreshed and renewed in our commitment to serve God and the people of Salvador. I thank God for what He did in our lives and our hearts this week!

Strategy Review, Day 2

2009-10-22T22:27:00.002-03:00

So we continued the strategy review process today. We had a little housekeeping to take care of at the beginning of the day, talking about furlough schedules and other team-related stuff. One thing we talked about was our common desire to recruit new team members, whether interns or full-time. With Travis and Alicia leaving, we have some holes in our team, and while we know we will never replace them, we are still at a point in the life of our church when reinforcements would be welcome.

We also spent a while talking about Travis and Alicia's departure in April and Heather's in June (when her two-year internship ends). There's a lot to be worked out, from finding new ministry leaders to goodbye parties. It's tough to talk about all this stuff because it brings the reality of our teammates leaving to the front of our minds but we're thankful that we have this opportunity to plan and work through it together.

Since it was a tough morning, we took a good break for lunch and headed to our favorite churrascaria (favorite because it's cheap!). It was a little challenging for all of us because of our ongoing weight-loss competition (which is going very well, by the way!) but we all managed to control ourselves. Mostly. There are these really good homemade potato chips...

This afternoon we joined together for worship time. We've been meeting in the "party room" at our apartment building but this afternoon we gathered around the pool to enjoy the cool breeze. It was a welcome change of scenery!

Our final major conversation of the day was the start of building for next year. We all shared what God has put on our hearts about the coming year. We talked about personal realizations and, of course, stuff about the work. It was a time of vulnerability and openness and together we ran the gamut of emotions. But I think when we finished, we were united in purpose. It became clear where our focus needs to be and, more importantly, who we need to be.

So tomorrow it's down to the nitty gritty--we start brainstorming.

It's been interesting going through these meetings as the mother of a toddler. We've hired a babysitter to watch Jackson and we've been dealing with the a kid who's used to having a (mostly) stay-at-home mom be stuck with a sitter from 8-4. Good times! Not only that, but we used to come home from these strategy meetings, order a pizza and crash out for the evening. But Jackson seems to have other ideas, which is how we found ourselves at an animal fair tonight. It was totally worth it though--when he saw the geese and cows he flipped out. I would take him a million times to see that reaction!

Strategy Review, Day 1

2009-10-21T17:51:00.003-03:00

I'm trying to get back in the habit of blogging more. It's hard to consider my daily life interesting to blog about most days but every so often I realize that my life is probably pretty different than many of yours. So today I thought I'd give you a glimpse into some of the not-so-glamorous missionary stuff.

Today we started our annual strategy review. Our strategy review has been an evolution. Before we moved to Salvador, we sat down as a team and wrote a strategy document. I can't remember exactly, but I think it was about 60 pages. Yeah, seriously. It talked about our big goals and dreams and some of the day to day stuff, too. It was intended to give us a starting place with our ministry but we knew going in that it would be a living, breathing document. So every year we sit down and re-examine what it is we're doing and what we hope to do. Does it sound exciting yet?

So today we started by looking at the past year and reflecting on what went well and what could have been better (or in some cases, flat out failed!). I should mention at this point that these retreats require a great deal of humility and very thick skin. (It has taken us years to get to the point that tears at these retreats are few and far between!) Then we considered our church's identity (a family of God) and our values (authenticity, healthy theology, growth and invitation). We asked ourselves, "How are we reflecting these? Are we effectively communicating them to the congregation? Are they sufficient or do we need to change them?"

Finally, we looked at the list of roles that we all currently hold. For each person on the team, we affirmed which jobs they have been doing well. After that, we expressed any hesitations that we may have about particular roles they have been filling. It sounds a little scary and it requires a great deal of trust (and as I said above, humility). But we start that time by first being confessional and admitting our own failings. It's rare that the team tells us anything that we don't already know--though sometimes we think we'd been "getting away with it" a little better than we actually were! From that conversation, we have a short list of some ministries that need to be re-examined and some roles that need to be filled by other people.

An essential element to the day is prayer and worship. We know that all of this is for God and is only possible through God. Taking the time to worship together unites us in purpose and reminds us that we are all here to serve our Lord.

So that was day one. As we get further into the retreat, we'll look closer at our focus and the ministries we have. We'll consider why the ministries exist and how they help us accomplish our goals. We'll brainstorm for new ways to reach out to the lost and to minister to God's family.

Strategy review is a tedious process. As I said, it's been an evolution. But we've found that as we have grown to trust each other more and experienced personal growth that it has become a time of necessary pruning and shaping. We all know that there will be tough conversations, times we don't get our way and moments of great frustration. We may have to give up ministries or roles that are important to us. But we believe it's all ultimately necessary to best serve God and use the resources that have been entrusted to us.

2009-10-20T07:43:00.003-03:00

We have our annual strategy review this week. Four days of meetings. Imagine my excitement. But really we have a lot to talk about this year with Travis and Alicia leaving so I know these meetings are important, even it if does mean leaving Jackson with a sitter for four days and dealing with his crankiness in the evenings.

Russ had an amazing trip to Sao Paulo other than the fact that he got sick and wasn't able to talk or sing. I'm so thankful he was able to participate in the conference. Thanks to Continent of Great Cities for taking such good care of us missionaries! And I was personally blessed to have Debbie (aka Grandma Q) here for the week to help with Jackson. I know that lots of people are single parents and many others deal with their husbands being away for deployments but this was a first for me and I was grateful that Debbie was able to take the time off to come down. We had a superfun week.

And now, just to make (some of) you smile, your dose of dorkiness for the day. It reminds me of a certain band tour top ten list!

2009-09-30T12:01:00.002-03:00

So...

There's a lot swimming in my head right now (probably since it's been ten days since I last blogged!) and I'm trying to figure out where to start. I'll just throw everything at you and let you try to connect it all.

*Big news first: Last Sunday Travis and Alicia announced to the church that they will be leaving in April. Not only that, but they'll be taking their kids with them, much to the disappointment of many! They've reached the end of their commitment and they're ready to move on to another work. We're sad to see them go (my fellow Canadians!) but I know that God will use them to do great things wherever they are. And we still get a few more months with them, so I'm not going to start freaking out about it now!

*Since they're leaving it leaves some big holes in our work especially with the children's ministry and Russ and I have decided to take it on. We're really excited about it. We had the opportunity to do some work with children together when we interned in Nova Scotia so we know that the combination of my planning skills and his craziness really works!

*Poor Jackson can't catch a break. He's been fighting a cough for at least three weeks now and he's finally getting better. But now he's having some crazy skin problem that required a trip to the dermatologist this week (and some very expensive creams to put on it). And now we think he may have pinkeye. Blech. I have no doubt that if we lived in the US he would have had swine flu by now.

*R's mom Debbie arrives on Saturday morning! We're all super-excited to see her. Russ will only get a couple of days with her before he heads to a conference in São Paulo but Jackson and I will have a fun week of Grandma-time.

*Jackson and I are headed to see the Backyardigans Live on Saturday. This is our first such outing and I'm really jazzed about it. Well, not so much. I know that Jackson will think it's AMAZING and that's why I'm going. That boy has a serious thing for Uniqua.

*I hosted my English bible study this week and I discovered a yummy new recipe--Maple-Pecan Danish Coffee Cake. It's made with Bisquick, which we don't have here but I make my own baking mix with half whole wheat flour. And it calls for maple syrup, which we also don't have, but I did happen to have a bottle of Griffin's Butter Pecan syrup so I used that instead. It was absolutely delicious. HOWEVER, something happened overnight and it disintegrated so it was unservable. That left me with some very tasty scraps in the kitchen. Oops.

*While I'm sharing recipes, I can't forget this one: Pumpkin Spice Lattes IN THE CROCKPOT!! You see, not all of us can just run to Starbucks to grab some deliciousness whenever we want but we can make it at home! (I make it with artificial sweetener because of the whole weight-loss competition thing but it's still pretty good!)

2009-09-20T19:26:00.000-03:00

Today was as always a full day. This morning we had several of our "long-lost" members in attendance, people who haven't be showing up lately. And we were thrilled to see one of our former members and his family, who we haven't seen since the move. Antonio is blind and it's just too hard for him to get out to our new location. It makes us sad, because they're wonderful people. Jackson fell asleep during the FIRST SONG at church today, which has never happened. He woke up about ten minutes after church ended. Then we ran to the mall with Heather to get a bite to eat. Heather and I tried a new salad restaurant. For those of you familiar with Brazil, you can imagine my excitement to get a "Tex Mex" wrap on a whole wheat tortilla with low fat Ranch dressing. After lunch we headed back to the church for English class. Today we had more sign-ups which brings our grand total of students for this term up to 71! Amazing! It seems to be an enthusiastic bunch and I look forward to getting to know them. After class, it was back home to make dinner and play with Jackson. Sundays are always full, always crazy and always a blessing.

Monday

2009-09-14T09:44:00.002-03:00

I just wrote in an email "It's Monday morning and I already feel behind." and it couldn't be truer. I feel like I've got so much work to do, things that I've been putting off or had to put on the back burner while I tended to other things. The past month was a little chaotic for me because the hotel where we'd been planning on having the missionary conference backed out, leaving me to scramble to find a new one. Many prayers and price quotes later, we have a new place. But it meant my to-do list was completely thrown off for a few weeks.

So now there's today. There's a lot going on--yesterday we started a new term of English class. We had 40 students with no advertising whatsoever, just word of mouth, and I know there will be more next week. At this point we've done our basic course enough that our curriculum is set so the main work is administrative and getting to know our students. I pray that God will show us ways to enter into our students' lives.

Thinking about prayer, I need to ask you all to pray for Salvador. The city has been experiencing some violence and everyone is terrified (understandably!). Several buses have been set on fire, at times full of passengers, and several police stations have been attacked. No one from our church family has been a victim of the violence but some have been affected by it. And the whole city is scared. So please pray for an end to this violence. Pray for God's protection for His children and that all would come to know Him, which is the only true solution to our troubled world.

Sigh.

7 de Setembro

2009-09-07T19:05:00.004-03:00

Today is Brazilian Independence Day. We decided to make it a weekend for the church family to be together. Yesterday after worship we had a potluck followed by a devotional.

Then today, about thirty of us headed to the beach. We had tables and umbrellas reserved and we sat and talked and ate and swam and chased kids. The weather was just perfect--not a cloud in the sky! Here are some pictures from today:

Here's Russ with our lunch--a big red fish, slightly battered and fried. Amazingly this was the smallest size available. We didn't mind too much, it gave us more to share.

Lucas and Cristina, two of our members.

Russ and Jackson flying a kite.

There were several chess matches. I would have never thought to play chess at the beach.

We rented this pool for the kids to play in. It kept us from having to chase the kids down every five minutes.

Washing the Dishes

2009-09-06T18:41:00.003-03:00

When we first got married, we were both in college and we divided a lot of the household chores. We decided that I would cook and that Russ would clean up after dinner. I'm not the best housekeeper in the world and washing dishes is pretty low on my list. It was our system for over nine years. At times it was a bit of a challenge for me, since Russ wouldn't always do them in a timely manner, but he would eventually get the job done and I rarely had to touch a dish. When I did, I had a hard time not feeling a little resentful, though my problem was less with Russ than the task itself.

A couple of weeks ago we decided that in this season of our family life, the time had come for me to start doing the dishes. I wasn't thrilled about it and only suggested it because I knew it was the right thing to do for our family. And so for the past two weeks, I have faithfully done the dishes, leaving a clean sink at night and even treating our cleaning lady to a clean sink a time or two!

Yesterday as I stood washing the dishes for the umpteenth time that day (we had a potluck at church today so I spent yesterday cooking) I realized something. I didn't feel at all resentful. The once-hated task has become part of my routine and I do it without thinking about it.

So what's changed? For me, the "why" has changed. Now when I do the dishes, I'm doing them as part of my conscious choice to do what is necessary for my family. It's not a burden someone else put on me; it was my choice to take it on.

Hmmm...it seems to me that there's a word for what I did. It's a word that's often maligned and misinterpreted but I'm going to go ahead and use it anyway: submission. Are you still with me or are you cowering in fear of the s-word? When we choose to submit, it is an act of love and comes from a desire to do what is best. No resentment necessary!

Obviously, when the topic of submission comes up, most of our minds run to the subject of women in the church. But, as I was reminded yesterday as I scrubbed pots, we are given the opportunity to submit and transform our attitudes all day long. It's yet another way to follow the example of our Master.

2009-08-31T11:41:00.003-03:00

This morning Jackson and I walked to the mall, a good 25 minute walk. It's not a particularly hot day but it's cloudy so it's just kind of steamy. When we got to the mall I let him out of the stroller to walk around a bit. He ran to a TV display in an electronics store. We stood watching for a minute. As I was standing there, I started experiencing a delayed sweat. I often don't sweat while I'm outside but instead once I get into the cool again my face starts sweating buckets. And that's what I was doing, in the middle of the mall. All of a sudden a Skate Canada commercial came on the TVs we were watching. It was the weirdest thing--sweating profusely while watching figure skating!

(Sorry for all of you who are disillusioned by my admission that I do, on occasion, sweat. I promise most of the time I just "glisten", as a proper lady should. But when you live in Brazil, sometimes you just can't help it!)

Yesterday was a bit of a break for me since we didn't have English class. It was, however, our monthly ladies' lunch and class. This month we had two of our members, Veronica and Jaciara teach, which would have been awesome except that Veronica is my number one lunch maker. I decided to make lunch this week to help her out. In the process of cutting up tomatoes for the beans, I sliced my finger open and now I have a bandaid on the tip of my finger which greatly interferes with my typing skills. I'm using my backspace key a lot today! Anyway, they did a wonderful job teaching--they were both really nervous--and it was one of those classes where everyone ends up crying, which for a ladies' class is usually a good sign!

Another Sermon Done

2009-08-30T22:40:00.003-03:00

It was a slow start to worship service today, because a 10-K race turned around RIGHT IN FRONT of our building, so all the buses were locked in traffic until well after our normal start time. Still, there were over 2,000 race participants which was impressive.

I got to preach about service today; it went well. A sweet sister said it was the first message from me that she could completely understand! Happy language learning, i guess.

Finally- my son was in my arms when I dropped a juice box and it splattered across the white tile floor. Unprompted, he looked at the mess and said "dang." Way to go Okie! Maybe I should watch my mouth....

Seven Quick Takes

2009-08-28T08:05:00.003-03:00

1. Jackson has been sick this week. Nothing serious, just a fever. The only way to keep him from running around the house is to plunk him in front of the TV. So it's been a couple days of Blue, Dora and the Backyardigans for us. Good times. He's feeling much better today. No TV!

2. The team weight loss competition is going well. Everyone has noticeably lost weight. Sadly, Russ and I have yet to place in the weekly top three losers but I'm glad to rejoice with those that do.

3. Speaking of that, this week I made this soup and I am madly in love. The flavors were really balanced and the pumpkin gave it a really smooth texture.

Since we can buy very little canned stuff here (a blessing, really!), I used dried black beans, homemade pumpkin puree, fresh diced tomatoes and homemade chicken stock. Maybe the recipe would have tasted different with all canned stuff.

4. We recently bought our tickets to go "home" for Christmas, except we're not going to Winnipeg. I'm only a little sad about that, because instead of freezing up in Canada, we're going to meet most of my family in Southern California to celebrate Dave's wedding. Not bad at all! Then we'll do a week with Russ' family in Oklahoma, with a day or two in Texas thrown in. It'll be a lot of travel for just two weeks but I can't wait!

I do have to say, though, that this trip is 95% about family. While we'd love to see all of our peeps, we want to focus on our families. We will, however, be taking a furlough a few months later and will be happy to visit with you then!

5. Sunday was the last English class of our ten-week course. We handed out about 30 certificates to people who had 80% or better attendance. Now we get a couple of weeks off and we'll start again!

6. The weekly English Bible study I attend started up again this week and I'm glad. I've really missed it. I've decided Jackson is too big to bring with me anymore, so figuring out what to do with him is a bit of a challenge. Too bad his grandmas don't live closer!

7. We went to the zoo last week. I've been meaning to do a separate post about it but just haven't gotten around to it so here's a few pictures:

(They're growling at a panther.)

The zoo was certainly the smallest I've ever been to and the habitats were certainly not very elaborate but it was free and Jackson loved it so I have a feeling we'll be going back often. And it is a BRUTAL walk (built into a huge hill) so it's awesome exercise, too (especially when pushing a stroller and wearing a backpack, not to mention carrying a toddler).

Pictures from Team Retreat

2009-08-22T19:00:00.004-03:00

Okay, I promised pictures from our team retreat WEEKS ago, so here you go:

As usual, we played a lot of cards. Jackson is already learning some mad cribbage skills. He's not very good at Rook yet since we usually played after the kids were all in bed. Oh, and we also played a ton of Ticket to Ride.

The beach, the beach, the beach!

This is Joelia and Nadir. I love them. They were our babysitters for the retreat and having them made such a difference. They went for a walk with Kelton and they found the Hugest Coconut Ever. But the coconut water from a fruit like that isn't very tasty. You want a little one that will be nice and sweet. But it was crazy to see!

Joelia and Nadir were amazing with the kids and gave us a chance to catch our breath.

With this many kids around, we tended to eat in shifts. Here's Jackson and Samuel. You can see the different in their personalities here!

As the kids get bigger, we're starting some new traditions. We had a team talent show (I'm going to spare us all the embarrassment of posting pictures of the actual "talents"). Kelton was our excellent MC.

And we followed up the talent show with a game of Ring Around the Rosie.

Finally, I think the kids' favorite time was when we got out the parachute. (Okay, maybe the grownups enjoyed it a little, too!)

7 Quick Takes

2009-08-07T08:35:00.003-03:00

A blog I enjoy reading has a regular Friday activity: Just post seven short items, they don't have to be connected at all. I feel the call to blog but don't have anything major to say, so I thought it would be a good day to try it. Here we go!

1. The chicken fajitas were pretty good. The cilantro-lime coleslaw was AMAZING. Even Russ loved it, and he's not a coleslaw eater. The rest of the week's menu ended up less than exciting though I did make beans in a pressure cooker for the first time and was quite pleased with the result. (We are going to have to get our stove fixed before I can use the pressure cooker again. The heat is just too high.) So many of our meals were centered around the beans I made. We had fajita "bowls", then I refried the leftovers so we could have them for another meal.

2. Next week we're spending the week with Jerry and Lynn Jones. They're going to present their marriage seminar to us and then help us learn how to teach it. It's an amazing opportunity and something that can potentially become a great way to help families here in Salvador.

3. Yesterday I was incredibly frustrated when someone I've been trying to do business with essentially flaked out on me. It was a major disappointment because it's to do with something really big. At times like this, it's hard to keep from getting angry and doing or saying things I will later regret. The world tells us that we have every right to be mad and vent. But I've got to keep a cool head and just move on.

4. Jackson has a major Cheerio addiction right now. He calls them "rice", which is a little confusing, because he also calls rice "rice". I don't know why he started doing that. I keep the Cheerios in a big glass jar that used to have rice in it and in fact says "RICE" in big letters on the side. So it was a little weird when he started doing it but I am under no illusions that he's taught himself to read at 17 months.

5. Speaking of Jackson and his vocabulary, watching him develop is awe-inspiring. Yesterday's word of the day was "baseball". It's now what he calls the Wii when he wants to play. He watched Kelton and some of the daddies playing in real life on our team retreat and now the video game seems too make more sense to him. He used to just swing indiscriminately but now he waits for the pitch and then swings. Yes, this generation is differrent.

6. I am really struggling to keep my church work part time. The challenge for me is that much of my work is done on the computer so it's always available for me to work on. When Jackson and I are home, it's tempting to sit and work while he plays (or watches Backyardigans).

7. I'm making cinnamon raisin quinoa to go with lunch. Yum.

A Fun Idea

2009-08-05T10:49:00.002-03:00

I just sent this email out to many of our supporting churches. Then I was thinking about it and realized that there are lots of people who might be interested in this who aren't connected with our main supporting churches. So why don't you give this a look and prayerfully consider it!

Hello dear friends of Salvador,

Our team is looking at hosting a supporting friends and church campaign next summer. This campaign is for all of our friends, family and supporters who are interested in serving the church here in Salvador. The idea is to combine the efforts of individuals, families and smaller groups from churches into one larger, more effective campaign. Our team receives lots of visitors each year who love us and love the church here. We feel that to combine the efforts of the individual visits would utilize those who come to serve in ways that are most useful to the church here in Salvador. You could come and serve with others from the US and Canada in a way that would leave a lasting effect on your Brazilian brothers and sisters.

Dates: JULY 5-13, 2010 (not including travel days)

Costs: Your costs would include your plane tickets, food, lodging, and transportation

What will the campaign do?: This campaign will focus on evangelistic outreach to our neighborhood, physical labor working on our church building and homes of our members, and a special event reaching out to families.

What we need right now from you: Right now we need to find out if there is enough interest from our supporters to host this campaign and start working on the myriad of details.

If you are interested in coming for this week of service next summer we need to know ASAP. Your response is not a commitment but will let us know if we should go ahead with this campaign. We would also like to know your level of interest, from “That would be fun, maybe”, to “I think we might really like to do that”, to “Sign me up, I’m coming!” So if this is of interest to you please respond back to me (porter AT missionsalvador DOT com) or to the missionary family you support.

We know that the Salvador mission team has a great cloud of witnesses praying for us. As a team we would like to thank you for all that you do to keep us here on field serving the Lord in this way. We would love for you to come and see first hand what God is doing here in this marvelous city and take part in His work.

In Him,

Jennifer Porter

Showdown

2009-08-04T18:18:00.000-03:00

Our team has decided to have a showdown of sorts. We're all needing to shed some pounds so we've having a biggest loser-style competition. Everyone is getting into the competitive spirit. We started on Sunday and will go until American Thanksgiving.

I'm trying to cook good food for our family and I have a bit of an addiction to food blogs. Throughout the next couple of months, I'm probably going to be posting links to many of the recipes we try, not so that this blog becomes a food blog, but to share the yummy stuff we eat and also so I can keep track of all the stuff I've made.

Like for breakfast this morning, we ate baked oatmeal. It was crazy delish. Jackson is absolutely nuts for anything with dried fruit in it.

Tonight we're having crockpot chicken fajitas with a spicy cilantro-lime coleslaw (I've already had a few bites of the latter and it's AMAZING!)

Anyway, I'm sharing our challenge with you all so you're not all of a sudden confused by all the recipes I'm posting and, more importantly, to add even more accountability. It's one thing to try to lose weight; it's another to do it and actually TELL people about it. It drives me to succeed even more!

p.s. We're not just eating better, we're working out, too, which is why my abs are killing me and I have HUGE blisters on my heels.

Recipe for a Team Retreat

2009-07-30T19:42:00.000-03:00

2 babysitters
6 miscellaneous pool "floaties"
1 big green lawn, suitable for running around
3 days worth of awesome food (including this and this
Rook cards and Ticket to Ride
2 hammocks
10 lbs of junk food
1 broken toe
trips to the beach, as needed

Combine all in a big house. Garnish with a silly talent show, bubble-blowing and a giant parachute.

Pics to come.

VBS Night Five

2009-07-20T11:42:00.004-03:00

Night Five was all about our relationship to God's creation.

Here's Diana cutting out an egg carton flower

in the class she and big sis Piedade taught about recycling.

Here are Heather and Ana Paula

and Ana Paula helping the kids do leaf rubbings.

Finally, there was Cintia (or the back of her head, anyway!)

and her mom Cristina, who talked about plants and helped the kids plant their own seeds.

At the end of the evening we had a slideshow with pictures from the week, which we showed again yesterday during church. We also took time to recognize everyone who had helped out during the week--about 25 people, which for a congregation our size is huge! Thanks again to Heather and Alicia for all their hard work and to everyone who joined us in prayer!

Pause

2009-07-18T16:47:00.003-03:00

I still haven't uploaded any pictures from the last night of VBS. It was our biggest night yet and the kids got to show their work off to their parents.

Oh, but that's not why I'm blogging.

I wanted to say that yesterday, my mind was MILES away. 6592.8 miles to be exact.

This was happening:

That's my "baby" brother, Dave and his new wife, Liz. (Liz is the one in the white dress.) And that's my dad behind them.

Dave and Liz met while touring with the African Children's Choir, though they are neither African nor children. They've been off the road for a few months and now they've started out on a new road together. Metaphorically speaking, anyway. They will be living in Washington.

So that's where my mind was. I wish I could have been there but it just didn't work out for us to get up there in time for the wedding. Sigh. But I'm sure my parents, grandmother and sister did a good job representing the Turner side.

So, Dave and Liz, congratulations! When are you coming to Brazil?

VBS Night Four

2009-07-17T12:11:00.004-03:00

I still don't have pictures from night three. I'll post some when I do.

Last night was about our response to God's creation.

Jenn taught a class about praise.

Heather's class was about people in different countries. Specifically she talked about a far away land called "Texas". She made strange food (Ranch dip) for the kids to try.

There were a bunch of letters from kids just like them that live in that exotic land.

In another class they talked about love.
These three, Andreia, Ana Paula and Viviane, threw glitter in everyone's hair and told us we were blessed. I'm glad I'm not the one who had to clean up that classroom!

There was an enormous bowl of Jello for snack time.

And I have to mention that Heather has been doing a great job with the singing.
See? She's got joy like a fountain!

Tonight is the last night and the kids will be doing a special presentation for their parents. Please pray that we will be able to follow up on the relationships built this week!

VBS Night Two

2009-07-16T11:45:00.004-03:00

Tuesday was night two of VBS. I am just now getting around to posting because I had some health issues yesterday. I also didn't get any pictures of last night but I'll try to steal some from Alicia or Heather...

They learned about birds and painted with feathers.
This is Ceara, Travis and Alicia's little girl. Isn't she grown up?

Most of the teachers have been our young professionals. This is Gabriel, he's kind of a gentle giant.

In another class they learned about seeds.
This is Leia. She's not even a member--she's Heather and the Porters' Portuguese teacher and she had helped translate all the materials so she helped out. It's been a good opportunity for her to build relationships with some of our members.

After the lesson, the kids painted with vegetables and fruit.

Jackson is too little to go the classes so we make our own fun. I let him paint while the kids were busy listening to their lesson. It was his first time painting and he had a ball!

There was another station but I didn't get any pictures of it. Oops.

The highlight of night two was snack time at the end. It was a special night for a special girl.

This is Alicia, daughter of our church secretary Andreia. She's got a huge smile on her face because she came downstairs to discover this:
All her friends waiting to sing Happy Birthday!

The kids are having a great time and every night we have new kids show up! Please pray that our last two nights will be even better than the others!

VBS Night One (or part of it, anyway)

2009-07-14T09:01:00.004-03:00

This year we're having our first full-scale VBS. Heather and Alicia have been planning for months and they've really done a great job. The theme is "God's Creation" (so poor Heather has been subject to many stories about when we did a creation VBS at Mayfair). Here are some highlights from the first night (We skipped out early because JT was being a toddler so I only got pictures of some of it):

A little parachute fun!

Jackson thought it was great and jumped right in!

Space. Jenn talked about the planets...

and then the lights went out and the blacklight came on...

for a little fluorescent crayon fun!

(I wish I'd had more time to play with my camera to get decent pictures of this!)

Cintia and Lorena taught about animals

I'm sure they did an awesome job but we had to leave before they got going.

But the star of the show was Piedade. She taught about sealife.

Piedade actually lives across the bay on a large island, but she spends a lot of time here in Salvador helping her daughter who's a single mom. She got really into her lesson and managed to come up with all kinds of great sea creatures to show the kids.

When anyone asked, "Where did you get all this stuff?" she would just say, "On the island." as if that were enough. Everyone, kids and adults alike, were so impressed and intrigued by the stuff she brought.

Tonight there will be new centers with new surprises. Please pray that we don't have rain like we did last night. Pray that kids from our neighborhood will show up and that they will get a glimpse of our God through the lessons and through the way we act.

Independences

2009-07-02T09:13:00.004-03:00

Today is Bahian Independence Day. The state of Bahia celebrates Brazilian Independence later in the year, but it took a few extra months after Brazil's independence for Bahia to be fully free of the Portuguese. Some might say it's because of the Bahian tendency toward procrastination (which, after four years of living here I certainly would be the first to admit that does sound like a valid reason). The truth is that Salvador was the first capital and a major fortress and it was the last Portuguese stronghold. (Feel free to make your own spiritual application at this point--it would make an excellent sermon illustration, I think!)

Bahian Independence Day is flanked by Canada Day and American Independence Day, so our team always celebrates with a Red, White and a Little Bit of Blue Party. (Bahia's colors are also red, white and blue.) It's an excuse, as are all our parties, to make all the food we miss. So yesterday it was banana pudding, coleslaw, potato salad, strawberry pretzel salad, deviled eggs, and so on...

This year we were also blessed to have a number of visitors, bringing the total number up to 27. We've got Dan and Becky still, Matt's parents and Mary's mom are here and Scott, Rachel and Chris Perkins from Abilene made a quick stop here on their way down to the inauguration of the new church building in Itu.

We managed to wrangle all the kids for a picture. This was quite a feat, as it seemed all afternoon there was always someone sleeping, nursing or crying. But we finally had everyone awake and happy-ish and we acted quickly.

Somehow we even got a group shot!

********************************

If only life were all parties and fun. We also found out yesterday about an accident that happened in Bolivia. A bus carrying youth from the church in Cochabamba rolled, killing three girls and injuring everyone else. I got to know the women of the team that works with that church a couple of years ago and I can't imagine what they have ahead of them as they deal with the aftermath. The team has set up a blog with more information and ways to help. Please join us in prayer for our brothers and sisters in Bolivia.

The McClures!

2009-06-26T11:07:00.003-03:00

Jackson is all tuckered out.

This week we've been blessed to have our friends, the McClures, with us. We worked with Basil back in the day at Mayfair, in Oklahoma City, and he was our college minister before that. Basil and Rachel were missionaries in Brasilia so every few years they bring back their boys, Matthew and Joshua, to see where they're from.

We had a great week, though it just flew by! Yesterday was definitely the best day. We took them up to Praia do Forte, where we enjoyed the beach and tidal pools and, of course, the sea turtles. It was Jackson's first time to really get to enjoy Projeto Tamar (he was asleep last time). He loved it.

But if Jackson could talk (in complete sentences), he would tell you that his favorite part of the McClures' visit was Matt and Josh. They were his new best buddies, and he loved having "big boys" around to climb on and play Wii with him. It was fun to watch Matt and Josh, who we've known since they were little guys, take care of our little guy. (I still can't believe they're 15!)

It was amazing to spend the week with such special friends. As I write, they're packing up their bags to head to the airport.

But we won't have much time to miss them! Tomorrow morning we're headed BACK to the airport to pick up Dan and Becky Rogers, from Eastern Hills Church of Christ in Athens, TX (our sponsoring church). We're thrilled they'll be staying with us for the next few days!

Hotel Quirey is open for the summer!

Babies, Babies (NOT MINE!!!)

2009-06-19T10:40:00.004-03:00

This afternoon we're headed to meet our new teammate, Paisley Diana Mabery, who was born yesterday morning. We're so excited for Matt and Mary Virginia and new big sis' Aubry!

In the meantime, I got these new pictures of my ADORABLE niece, Tessa, who I seriously want to devour.

I can't believe I'm going to have to wait until DECEMBER to see her! By then she'll practically be in college!

Here she is with her daddy:

Ack! I can't take it!

Though it's not quite enough for me to want another one of my own yet!

Tonight

2009-06-17T21:17:00.002-03:00

Tonight I am thankful for:

* A wonderful trip to a (different) grocery store today, where I discovered lychee drink, pecan chocolate chunk cookies and chocolate croissants.
* The mountain of tortillas that Russ and Randy spent the evening making. They're for a fajita night we're having next week with the McClures.
* Jackson.
* Our WiFi is finally set up in our apartment. (Thanks, Randy!)
* Russ.
* Time with good friends talking about things that matter and things that don't.
* Pizza Hut Super Supreme Pizza. Sometimes it's worth the splurge.
* Pizza Hut Mozzarella Pizza. See above.

Showing Off

2009-06-16T14:43:00.001-03:00

Here's a little video of Jackson being his adorable self.

Most Days

2009-06-15T21:46:00.001-03:00

Most days I can pretend I live There. I go to the mall and eat at Burger King. I open my cupboard and find muffin mix, Girl Scout cookies and all kinds of other treats. I sit in my air-conditioned apartment and watch a movie. Our car is relatively big and it's filled with normal kid stuff--car seat, stroller, sippy cups.

But some days, like today, I go to the grocery store and remember that I'm Here. There's no regular flour, only self-rising. There aren't any hot dogs. The diapers that we've been trying to find for a week still aren't in stock (and are not to be found in any grocery store around) and we have to settle for another brand. All the shelves have been rearranged; no one would necessarily notice several items missing. But I notice. With the shelves rearranged, you're never quite sure if the missing item(s) are ever coming back.

And I think, This would just never happen There.

I'm not There, I'm Here. And I'm happy to be Here.

And I know that in the long run, these are tiny sacrifices--there are people all over the world experiencing real suffering.

But some days, like today, I feel a little sorry for myself.

Camp

2009-06-12T22:09:00.003-03:00

Tonight we had a really fun LST party. The theme was "camp" and we started by roasting marshmallows and hot dogs.

Usually Brazilians eat hot dogs cooked on the stove and covered in all sorts of interesting toppings (mayo, parmesan cheese, corn, peas, etc) so this was a little unusual for them. But they adapted well.

We used a grill that is made from the drum of a washing machine and umbrella guts as our roasting sticks. It was quite a sight. There were lots of people all dressed up headed to the restaurant up the street. It was certainly some interesting church advertising!

Then we went inside for some silly games and fun. The pinatas were a big hit. The Sunday school kids made them to help out LST. It's awesome that the kids are already learning how to help support other areas of the church.

Finally, no camp experience would be complete without singing. Here is Justin leading a song I know very well from my camp days:

Tonight's party was a lot of fun and was well-attended. I'm sad that there's only one party left! Things always seem a little dull after LST leaves!

(This post was by Val. I don't know why it says this is Russ.)

Slices of Life

2009-06-07T18:52:00.007-03:00

I'll try to catch you up on the past couple of weeks and let you see what life is like these days...in pictures!

Here was a Sunday morning a couple of weeks ago. Here was the sight at the front of the room:

In my defense, Jackson had slept in and only woke up as we were getting in the car. And in Jenn's defense, little boys in shorts and boots are the cutest thing ever.

But let me call your attention to something else in the picture:

It's Jackson's latest fixation: microphones. He will walk to the front during any event and try to get the mike. Sometimes, if I'm teaching English or whatever, I'll let him hold it for me or even talk into it. I might just be encouraging it.

We had a small groups party that evening. We had an international-themed potluck, which consisted mostly of American food that we missionaries had made. Then we had a time of worship.

But that's not the most accurate picture. This is more like it:

You may be starting to notice a theme here--Jackson is quite a character.

Here's his "please-oh-please?" face:

Seriously, who could resist?

And if, somehow, I manage to say no, this face appears.

And then it breaks my heart and I give in anyway. Which is probably how I ended up with a kid that loves chips and salsa.

We've been having LST parties every week. Two weeks ago the theme was "birthday party" and we did typical birthday party things.

Like act like big dorks. But I'm not dissing Randy. I played this game too and won a box of yummy Canadian chocolate.

Jackson, of course, did his own thing.

Last Monday we took the LST "kids" (seriously--they get younger every year!) to the beach. Jackson had a great day--we finally found something that can wear him out.

Well, it didn't really last long. He was just resting, it turns out, because before long, he said "Bye!" and took off.

And he still had energy to play in the sand.

Last week's LST party was all about card games:

Russ made his own fun.

I guess I know where Jackson gets it from!

That brings us to this past Friday night. Yesterday at church we had a baby shower for Mary Virginia and their due-any-second-now-but-hopefully-won't-show-up-for-another-week baby, Paisley, and then we went out for lunch with Heather's parents for Heather's birthday. But, alas, I discovered my camera battery was dead the first time I tried to take a picture yesterday.

And I forgot to mention that Saturday night our small group finally resumed meeting. They're such a blessing to us and I want all of you to be praying for our friend, Genivalda, who is so close to becoming a Christian. Pray that God will remove whatever is holding her back from entering a full relationship with Him.

So that's what we've been up to! Our life seems to be a lot of big days followed by recovery days. Thankfully we have been blessed with a child who can handle our crazy life!

Didn't She Ramble

2009-05-29T11:03:00.003-03:00

I know as I'm sitting down to write that my time is short; Jackson has been napping for a while and he always seems to wake up when I start to write.

For the most part, life has been normal. We've had some sunny days this week and have actually found a mason to take care of the church roof. LST is going strong; though the rain has been interfering with people actually showing up. Tonight is their second party and the weather looks good so hopefully we'll have a good turnout.

I'm in one of those modes where I've got about eight million things on my mind and on my plate and I spent my time jumping from thing to thing, seemingly never actually accomplishing anything. Today my excuse is that I'm tired because we had to get up early and take Jackson for some bloodwork, but I did the same thing yesterday so that excuse won't really hold up.

And this post is ending up way too stream of consciousness for my taste but I feel like I've been a slacker when it comes to blogging and I'm trying to atone.

My mind is, among other places, in the U.S. right now, with our teammate Matt, who lost his brother this week, and with my cousins, who lost their mom. I keep looking for words for them and keep coming up short. I have spent a great deal of time in prayer for them, knowing that it's the one time when I don't have to worry about the words. Thank God for His Spirit who communicates what we're unable to.

(That last sentence took me two hours to write because, as predicted, the little guy woke up from his nap!)

June will be an interesting month. The team has lots of visitors coming--Matt and Mary Virginia's parents (the baby will also be showing up in June!), Heather's parents, our dear friends the McClures and one of the ministers from Eastern Hills and his wife (also good friends!). I think there's a few other people showing up, too! Add to that the ongoing LST campaign, our big June holiday of São João and a new term of English class starting and you can see what a big month we've got!

I don't really have anything else to say, so I'll go for my default closing--a picture of Jackson!

The New Hood

2009-05-18T10:02:00.006-03:00

It'll probably take me a couple more weeks until I have some decent pictures of the new apartment. We're relatively settled but we still have a lot of hanging to do (pictures, shelves, etc.) and that's all the stuff that really makes it look and feel like home. So while you wait, here are some pictures I took from our balcony.

Here's what you see when you look left:

I left this picture kind of dark so you could appreciate the sunset. If it were lighter, I would point out the following things in the foreground:
-on the left is a clube that we hope to join soon. They have pools for swimming lessons, tennis courts and lots of other great places to work out. It's a private club
-next to that is a Volkswagen dealership. This will come in really handy when we win the lottery and want to buy some new cars.
-beside that, on the far right, is a big grocery store. It takes Jackson and me all of three minutes to walk over there.

When you look directly down and to the left, you see this:

It's kind of a crazy intersection but it's all one-way streets so it's not really too bad.

There's a magazine stand where people tend to gather.

We see this guy every afternoon.

He's a recycler--he digs through the trash and pulls out recyclables and turns them in for money. It's a tough but honest way to make a living. This guy is awesome because he is very conscientious with the trash. He goes through it all carefully and puts it all back when he's done. Not all recyclers are so kind--often they leave the trash strewn on the sidewalks.

Here's the view to the right:

On the next corner there is a little strip mall called Babel. There's a place to have açaí (AKA the Brazilian super duper miracle fruit, or whatever they're calling it these days!), a salon, a copy shop, a pizza place and a little ice cream store that has been closed for the past couple of days (we're a little worried!).

Finally, this is what you see when you look straight down:

Nothing too exciting. That's the drive in to our apartment, the front gate and our pool. Jackson and I haven't had a chance to try the pool out yet since it's been so cool and rainy but we're looking forward to the summer months!

We love our new neighborhood!

Joys

2009-05-14T09:50:00.002-03:00

I used to think that the "joys of parenting" consisted the mere fact of having a child. I'm learning that there's so much more to it than that.

Sometimes the joys of parenting are seeing your little guy back to his old self after being sick, when he finally feels like playing again, when he laughs and smiles and actually wants to eat for the first time in several days.

That is joy.

Cold and Flu Season

2009-05-11T08:46:00.002-03:00

"Winter" has arrived. I say winter in quotes because, with lows in the 70s, this is certainly nothing I would have previously categorized as winter. But it's cool and damp and even a jaded Canadian like myself uses this opportunity to pull out what I normally think of as "furlough clothes": lightweight long-sleeved sweaters, layered t-shirts, slightly thicker dress pants. (It has to be pretty cold for me to actually don socks; even if it were, I don't really have shoes that you can wear with socks!) The locals, for the most part, find this weather incredibly cold, as would you if 65 were the coldest you had ever experienced in your life.

With winter comes cold and flu season. All the little kids are sniffling/sneezing/hacking up a lung and some of their parents are, too. Such would be the case with JT and me. We've spent the past couple of days cooped up at home, watching the same couple of Backyardigans/Hi5 dvds over and over and OVER again. (Confession: we did escape for a couple of hours yesterday so I could go out to lunch for Mother's Day.) And my supply of stickers is greatly depleted because they're one of the few things I can count on to help Grumpy McGrumperton's mood.

He seemed to be feeling better yesterday but early this morning he seemed to be worse. Now he seems to be doing better; he just has that annoying cough. I, on the other hand, am definitely feeling worse but my mommy is 6,000 miles away so I guess I'm just going to have to buck up.

Tomorrow our LST team arrives and I just found out that one of the guys is from Winnipeg. It's kind of funny, though, because I remember him best as not much old than Jackson. Hopefully Jackson and I will be better soon so we can partake in all the LST fun!

Easter

2009-05-08T15:52:00.000-03:00

It's cold and rainy, Jackson's sick and we're exhausted after a long week of "team therapy" (a tune-up week with Jerry and Gail Heiderich). The incredibly heavy rain is causing all sorts of problems around town, including mudslides and roof collapses. Though our apartment is high and dry, we're struggling to keep the church building from being completely inundated with rainwater. Our roof seems to have decided that it's done and is no longer accepting patch jobs. But it's virtually impossible to do anything about that until the rain lets up for a few days, not to mention the fact that every mason in town is working overtime fixing everyone else's roofs!

I'm still trying to catch up on last month's posts. Here are some pictures from Easter:

Jackson dressed up for church

Egg decorating party at the Maberys'

Jackson and Val decorating eggs

The kids following their egg hunt:
Aubry, Jackson, Ceara and Calen

(We called it the first ever "Naked Egg Hunt" because we had stripped the kids down to dye eggs and never bothered to dress them up again.)

Anniversary Service

2009-05-04T15:54:00.003-03:00

I'm making up for lost time here!

On April 5, we had our third anniversary service. We had about 100 people join us for worship and a few more show up for lunch. (Isn't that a nice problem to have? I know lots of churches that are constantly trying to figure out how to get MORE people to stay for lunch!)

Here are some glimpses of the day:

Potluck Lunch (heavy on the beans and rice)

Some of our gorgeous girls!

The ICOS Family

BACK

2009-05-04T14:00:00.006-03:00

We're back from our trip to Maceió. When I was growing up, my family went to church gatherings in exciting places like Weyburn, Saskatchewan and Carman, Manitoba. Jackson is enjoying a different experience.

There were close to 200 of our brothers and sisters from all over the northeast (and a few brave souls from the south).
Twelve of us from ICOS made the trek, which we had been told was eight hours and ended up taking fourteen. It was a tight squeeze in the car but we were happy for the chance to have some more time with some of our church family.
We stayed at a camp right on the coast that was just gorgeous!

It rained most of the weekend, so that meant I was stuck carrying JT around but even the gloomy weather couldn't keep us from having a great time! We met lots of new people and had a chance to see some friends that live far away. JT made more friends than any of us!

I called this post "Back" for two reasons--1. We're back from our weekend away and 2. WE'RE BACK ONLINE!!! Our internet connection is up and running and is going at an amazing speed! I am so thankful to be once again connected with the rest of the world!

Radio Silence (or something like it)

2009-04-28T19:06:00.002-03:00

This is not a "I'm so sorry I haven't blogged" post. I've written a few of those in the past and I know them well.

No, this is a "I'm so frustrated that I haven't been able to blog" post.

We moved into our new apartment almost three weeks ago and we're still waiting to get our internet working. In theory we have service but no one has been able to make it work yet. So we wait.

In the grand scheme of things, it's a small problem. Nothing like famine or slavery or even swine flu.

Nope, this is what we call a "first-world problem".

But it's really irritating.

Hopefully things will be resolved in the next week or so. It'll be over a week, likely, because we'll be too busy in the next few days to deal with it.

We just did five days with Ron and Georgia Freitas from Continent of Great Cities to talk about strategy stuff.

On Thursday we'll load up the car and head up to the town of Maceio, which is about 500 kilometers away. We're going to a gathering of people from churches all over the Northeast of Brazil. There are 12 people from our congregation going, which amazingly is the exact same number of seats (including tiny flip-up seats) in the two cars that are going. It's going to be a long ride! But we're really looking forward to it.

Then we get back and we have our annual team dynamics session with Jerry and Gail Heiderich.

There's more stuff than that, but hopefully I'll have internet by then and will be able to tell you about it. See? That's faith!

In the meantime I ask for your prayers:
-as we travel.
-for the TWENTY people signed up for our church's new theology course.
-for our internet issue.

See you guys next week!

SOS Bible Study

2009-04-07T17:58:00.000-03:00

Every Tuesday, Jackson, Heather and I load up in the car and head to a bible study. It rotates from home to home but usually it's out in Lauro de Freitas, a town that touches Salvador, just past the airport. It takes us about 45 minutes to an hour to get out there.

The study is with a group of women who know each other from the American Society, though some weeks Americans are definitely in the minority! It's a real mix of ages and religious backgrounds, too. Many of the women live in Salvador because their husbands work for Ford (so I always feel a little awkward pulling up in my Chevrolet!). We get together to study, pray and share each other's lives (and it's a great opportunity to speak English, too!)

This year Heather and I decided it would be worth making the weekly trek to participate in the study. I could say that it's worth spending that much time on the road and giving up more than half my day to be a part of the study because there are some women there who are searching for deeper answers. And that's true, but I'm not that noble. I go because it's a chance for me to take time out of my normal routine and be in the Word. I go because it's nice to be around such a diverse group of women who all share my love of the Lord. I go because it's nice to be around some women who have already been new moms and they have wisdom to share with me. I go because it's a drink of cool water in my week, a chance to listen instead of teach, to be served instead of serve, to sit instead of run around and put out fires. (Though I do spend much of the study chasing Jackson around, keeping him from destroying their beautiful homes--Ford execs seem to have higher salaries than missionaries do!)

Here's a picture of most of the group:

I thank God for connecting me with these women! They are a blessing to me!

(And though Heather and I joke about it, our purpose in going is not to stop at our Mexican restaurant on the way home, though it is an additional reward!)

Bear with Me!

2009-04-06T10:06:00.003-03:00

I'm working at switching over to a different layout. Please be patient with me as I make changes! (I rarely get to do anything in one sitting anymore!)

2009-04-05T19:15:00.002-03:00

Oh hallo! Did you think I'd forgotten about this blog? I've been a little busy. We're moving THIS WEEK. (My teammates don't necessarily believe me because this is the third week in a row we've said we're moving but the new apartment is finally ready.) Later this week I'll blog about today--our church's third anniversary service. But in the meantime, here are some pictures from the Quireys' visit last month.

We took a couple of days off and headed out to the beach. There was lots of time for flying kites,
and hanging out in the hammock.
When we got back to town, Jackson had fun with his new bike

and swimming in the pool at our apartment.

We had a great time with R's folks and it was tough to see them go. We know it won't be too long before we see them again but we miss them terribly!

Finally an Auntie!

2009-03-26T17:57:00.002-03:00

I gotta share! I'm finally an auntie! This morning my niece, Tessa Delaney Turner, was born to my brother, Mike and his wife Jacque. Isn't she just perfect?
And look at all that hair!

I was just talking to Mike and he held the phone up to Tessa so I could hear the little noises she was making in her sleep. So adorable!

It made me pine a little for the days that Jackson was that tiny; especially since we've entered the fit-throwing years.

But don't get your hopes up--it didn't make me want to run out and have another one right away!

In the meantime, I'll praise our Creator for yet another fearfully and wonderfully made child!

Team Banquet

2009-03-24T15:32:00.003-03:00

The day before the Quireys arrived we had our annual team celebration. This year marks the fourth anniversary of our arrival on the field, so we celebrated with FOUR-leaf clovers, a la St. Patrick's Day. Randy and Jenn had just arrived home from furlough a couple days before so it was our first time to have the whole team in one place again in several months. The kids had a great time running around together. Look how big they all are!
(L to R: Aubry Mabery, Ceara Sass, Calen Sass, Jackson Quirey, Samuel Porter, Kelton Porter)

It was weird that now Jackson is one of the kids that's running around and screaming! He had a great time--parties are his thing! Here's our party animal in action:

The team banquet is always a great time to reflect on the past year and celebrate all that God has done!

We've Created a Monster!

2009-03-22T17:40:00.002-03:00

Sorry I haven't blogged this week. We've been enjoying our time with R's parents. I'll post some pictures of their visit later this week.

I just wanted to share about how well our English classes are going. We started up again last week. Today Heather and I had made 50 copies of our handouts and that wasn't enough! This year we decided to formalize the classes a little more. So for the past two weeks, we've taken registration forms from everyone who wants to participate. Today I counted up all the registration forms and we have 71 people in the beginner class alone! Then there were at least 20 people in the intermediate class upstairs! That means 90 people are coming to our church building every week to participate in English classes! What an amazing connection to the community!

God is blessing this ministry beyond our wildest dreams. I am thankful for Heather, who has joined me in teaching the beginner class, and Travis, who teaches the intermediate class. May we find a way to turn these contacts into deeper relationships!

(FYI, enrollment for the beginner class is now closed! We're thrilled to have 71 people but it's also incredibly overwhelming!)

Perks

2009-03-06T20:17:00.006-03:00

We have sacrificed in many ways to be here in Salvador but the job isn't without its rewards. We try not to talk about this stuff too much because we hate to make it seem like we're down here just hanging out on the beach and enjoying the tropical weather. But every so often, we get a chance to kick back and call it work.

Our team is hosting next year's missionary conference. One of the first things on our agenda is finding a location. We've spent time scouring hotel websites and on the phone with all sorts of people trying to find a place that will meet our needs affordably. But sometimes, you've got to leave the office to really get the job done.

So Thursday afternoon we loaded up the car--four adults and two toddlers (and their huge seats!)--and headed across town to the ferry boat terminal. This was definitely pushing it for our car. We had to get in the car in a special order. Kids first, then Russ in the driver's seat, then I would climb between the front seats to get to the middle seat in the middle row, then Matt in the back door to climb up to the back row, then Mary Virginia would close the back door and get in the front. We were quite a spectacle!

And don't ask me the Portuguese word for ferry boat, as you simply call it a "feh-hi bow-chi" (a Brazilian Portuguese pronunciation of ferry boat). The boat took us across the bay to the island of Itaparica. We drove the length of the island (about 25 minutes) and then across a bridge that took us back to the mainland.

The hotel was what's called a hotel fazenda (farm hotel). It's a working farm, with all kinds of animals, but it's also on the water so there was a beach, too. In other words, if you look one direction, you see this:

and when you turn around, you see this:

It was a working trip so Friday morning we got up and met with the owner of the hotel about the possibility of having the conference there (pray that she decides to lower the price for us!) but we still had time for a swim and a little horseback riding!

After lunch, it was back to the ferry boat. This time we lucked into riding on the newest of the fleet, which offered an air-conditioned cabin. We chose to sit on the top deck to enjoy the view and the breeze.
It was a nice little getaway in the middle of the week and the best part was that we got to call it "work"!

p.s. Jackson seemed to have a great time, even though he was running a bit of a fever. He and Aubry have fun running around together and there were so many new sights!

The Mighty Hunter

2009-03-04T14:03:00.001-03:00

So with all the craziness of the combination of Jackson's birthday and his burn, I totally neglected to mention one major thing: he's walking now. He took off the day after his birthday party and is practically running now. I think he really enjoys the freedom that comes with walking, especially since it means that he can get away from Mom and Dad!

Which is what happened yesterday morning when he and Russ were playing downstairs. He took off around the corner and Russ found him with a new toy:

This officially makes Jackson a better hunter than Samson is. When there are lizards in the kitchen, Sam just barks at them.

(Speaking of Samson, the poor little guy has some sort of internal fungus. He's got to take medicine for 21 days and be given special baths, etc. Oh, and we're not supposed to let Jackson touch him. How to you keep a one-year-old from touching his puppy?!)

2009-02-23T17:08:00.002-03:00

Jackson is doing much better now. He had his last visit to the plastic surgeon today (no surgery, just monitoring the healing) and now we just have to wait for the scabs to heal. Thanks to all of you for your prayers and praise God for His healing powers! The body of a little guy like Jackson is amazing--easily hurt, easily healed.

We're right in the middle of Carnaval. Every day over three million people fill just a couple of miles of street. We're far from the action so we're just enjoying the peace and quiet! Next Sunday we'll have a kick-off breakfast at church and everything will start up again.

2009-02-20T19:44:00.003-03:00

Here's a little video of the happy birthday song. It's a little longer here--and they even skipped a verse!

Jackson's First Birthday

2009-02-20T19:26:00.001-03:00

Jackson's First Birthday, originally uploaded by russandval.

Okay, one last picture so you can get a sense of the decorations. These are some (just SOME) of the rental decorations. You rent them as a package, otherwise I might not have chosen some of this stuff. It was kind of cool, though--a little replica of a farm complete with electric lights.

Confession

2009-02-20T19:19:00.001-03:00

Jackson's First Birthday, originally uploaded by russandval.

I have a serious balloon addiction. No, really.

Okay but for real, they like you to order the balloons by the thousand. Then they figure out where to put them all. Kind of fun, really! And I've always dreamed of having a balloon arch!

The Cake

2009-02-20T19:18:00.001-03:00

Jackson's First Birthday, originally uploaded by russandval.

One of the members of our small group does cakes. I told her the theme and this is what she did. She did a great job and it was delicious.

Birthday Party!

2009-02-20T14:50:00.001-03:00

Jackson's First Birthday, originally uploaded by russandval.

Again? Really?!

2009-02-18T16:10:00.002-03:00

Yesterday I was going to write all about how wonderful Jackson is and how much he has added to our lives as a birthday tribute.

Instead, at exactly the same time that one year ago Russ was driving me to the hospital to give birth, he was driving to a different hospital to take Jackson to the ER.

Don't freak out--he's fine. He poured a hot cup of coffee all over himself and was burned on his face, chest and "inside his diaper" (one day the kid is going to be old enough to read what I've said about him online so I'll leave it at that!). But he was pretty miserable and it made yesterday kind of tough.

We've had to take Jackson to the ER a few times in the past year, but never when he was screaming like this. And with the location of his burns, I was holding him in my arms rather than putting him in his carseat. It was raining and traffic was bad. So when I looked at the clock and realized what we were doing exactly 366 days ago I got an eerie chill.

I was praying pretty hard.

We made it to the hospital okay, Jackson was seen by a nice doctor and, before we knew it, we were home with a patched-up kid.

I've heard it said that when we receive something we have prayed for, we should make sure to thank God at least as many times as we asked. Yesterday's events reminded me I'm a little behind.

But I've been making up for lost time ever since!

(We took Jackson back to get his dressing changed today and he's doing much better. It'll just take a little time to heal.)

How to Throw a Birthday Party

2009-02-14T07:52:00.006-03:00

We decided that for Jackson's first birthday we would throw a "typical" Brazilian birthday party. I'd never planned a Brazilian birthday party so it was definitely a learning experience. I figured I should pass on my new found knowledge.

Before we get started, I need you to know two things:
1. This party was considered a "small party". Seriously.

2. We had help in paying for it. Some of our family members gave money to use for the party instead of toys. I felt like I needed to make that clear since some of you help pay our bills!

Oh, and I say this is a typical Brazilian birthday party, but it may be that this is just a typical party in Salvador. I don't know what they do in the rest of the country but here in Bahia, it's how we roll!

How to Throw a Birthday Party
1. Decide what size party you will be having. As I said above, our party was considered small. It helps that we don't have any family in the area. We did our best to limit our guest list or it would have easily been over a hundred people and we just couldn't afford that! As it was, we pretty much invited the whole church. It's important to know that when you give someone an invitation, you are inviting their whole immediate family (and occasionally other people). That's why it's so easy for the numbers to balloon out of control.

2. Find a party planner. In our neighborhood, there are tons of shops that handle parties. The level of involvement the planner will have is up to you. Some planners will do everything--decorations, food, furniture rental, moon bounce, etc.--and some will only do the decorations but will recommend people to handle the other stuff. We went with the latter. Each shop has party decorations to rent and party favors and themed paper goods for sale. When you go in, ask to look at their theme books. They'll have albums and albums of pictures of past parties.

3. Pick a theme. I had already picked my theme (farm) before my visit to the shop but some of the most popular ones are Hello Kitty, Winnie the Poo, Backyardigans and any sort of superhero. Once you pick a theme, you don't that that many more decisions to make regarding the decorating. The planner will have done this theme a million times and most people just go with the standard setup. Then there's me--I insisted on going with a color combination for the balloons that she had *never-in-twenty-years-of-decorating* used for a farm theme. Oh well, it seemed to work out. Your planner with go through all the possible elements and you can add or subtract at will. We were able to cut a few corners here by picking up the decorations ourselves and doing our own centerpieces.

4. Choose the food. I use the term "choose" loosely because there isn't much choice. You'll be serving sweet and savory snacks, all "finger-food". We opted to use a local bakery instead of a catering place and bought our drinks from Sam's Club. I have a party planning book that gave me an estimate of how much food we needed per person but we quickly ran out of the savory snacks. No one seemed to mind too much.

5. Enjoy! The day of the party, your responsibilities include looking beautiful and making sure the kid is in a good mood for the party. Unless, of course, you've decided to make your own centerpieces, use the bakery for your food instead of a company that would have delivered it, buy huge mylar balloons that need to be taken to the mall to fill, have the cake made by someone who lives across town and doesn't have a car, and live thousands of miles away from your family. Then your day might be a little trickier. Hopefully your teammates will show up early and help finish putting together centerpieces, glue the take-home craft, walk the dog and get the baby dressed!

So that's a party! And ours was a simple party. We could have opted to have a trampoline or a moon bounce, or even to have had it at a special "party buffet" where everything, from food to entertainment is taken care of.

Later I'll post some pictures from our actual party!

Hrm. This post was originally going to have photos but I guess I'll have to save them all for the next post.

A Quick Update

2009-02-13T23:25:00.001-03:00

Why did I worry? They came! There were even people I didn't know! We had about 50 people come celebrate Jackson's first year of life. It was a lot of fun and I took Jackson upstairs for bed at around 10:00. Tomorrow I'll share pictures with you!

Jitters

2009-02-13T16:17:00.003-03:00

So I'm sitting here, three hours before Jackson's birthday party, and I'm freaked out. I hate throwing parties. Well, that's not entirely accurate. I love planning for parties, decorating for parties, making food for parties, all that stuff. It's the actual moments just before the party I hate.

You know that little voice that says, "I wonder if anyone will show up!"

And see, a few years ago, that really did happen. I had planned an awesome bridal shower for my best friend and NO ONE CAME. (Well, she and I were there, as was my dutiful sister. But that's it.) Everyone had really good excuses but it didn't change the fact that we sat and waited and waited and no one ever came.

That's what I remember every time I plan anything. My one failure. Amazing what the enemy finds to make us doubt ourselves.

I'm sure tonight will be fine. At the very least, I've got my dutiful teammates to show up for this one!

2009-02-11T10:36:00.000-03:00

Sigh. My baby is turning one in less than a week! We're having a big shindig this Friday night to celebrate so I've got birthday on the brain. I know that at some point in the next week or two I'll sit down and wax poetic about my amazing little guy, as well as share pictures from the party, but in the meantime here's a month-by-month look at the past year with our JT.

New Class!

2009-02-08T19:46:00.002-03:00

I don't know if you've been paying attention but our team has grown a lot in the past couple of years. A few weeks ago, we decided it was time to start a class for our babies and toddlers. I have dreamt of teaching Cradle Roll since I was a little girl, partly, I think, because my mom was the Cradle Roll lady. The rest of my desire to teach this class is probably the opportunity to spend class time singing little songs and having snacks. Life could be worse, I tell you!

So I've been working at getting our class together. I've been tracking down props and translating songs. This week, our baby chairs arrived so we had our first class today. The curriculum is far from ready but it was just Jackson and Aubry so I mostly sang English songs.

They were both in foul moods but a handful of Cheerios turned things around. (Incidentally, I'm trying to figure out what on earth I can give them for a snack. We can't get Cheerios here, nor can we get Goldfish. I've been trying to find some sort of no-added-sugar snack that they can have but I'm stumped. Any ideas? At home Jackson eats a lot of rice cakes but they're expensive and hard to keep around from one week to the next.)

Overall we had a lot of fun. I think after we've had a few more classes they'll really start getting into it.

Here are the two sweetest kids in my class this morning:

A Little Smile

2009-02-08T19:07:00.002-03:00

So tonight we were checking out at the grocery store. Jackson was sitting in the cart next to the groceries waiting to be bagged and was reaching out for anything he could grab. Since he was contained, I wasn't paying too much attention to him and was focused on the cashier ringing things up. All of a sudden he put something in my hand. It was cool and slimy and pinkish. What could it be? I looked around and saw the watermelon. It couldn't be the watermelon, I thought. It's in plastic wrap.

But upon closer examination, I discovered he had slid the plastic wrap aside and was taking chunks off the watermelon quarter. The boy loves his watermelon!

2009-02-06T16:58:00.002-03:00

It's been a busy week. As far as church work goes, January and February can be mind-numbingly slow because everyone heads out of town for vacation (the members, not the missionaries!). We use this time to get other things accomplished.

For example, yesterday we (the three of us plus Matt and Mary Virginia) piled in the car and headed out of town to scout out locations for next year's missionary conference. We drove a couple hundred kilometers and visited several hotels. It was quite a fun day and we found the most AMAZING chicken couscous in this tiny town about an hour away.

Today we started the adventure of looking for a new apartment. Every year, our rent is increased by the rate of inflation. That means that an apartment that was quite affordable almost four years ago when we moved here is now in a completely different price category, not to mention the fact that the exchange rate plummeted within a month of signing our original lease! We love our neighborhood and hate to leave it but our support does NOT increase according to the rate of inflation every year, so now it's time to move.

Apartments here are individually owned so looking for an apartment means scouring the classified ads on the weekend and calling on the ones you like. You can also search the different real estate websites to find listings. Today we visited four different apartments. For most of them we just visited the realtor's office and signed out the keys. There were a couple that definitely seemed worthy of consideration. In the next couple of days we'll make a point to drive by them at night to see how the area seems after dark. Keep our apartment search in your prayers! We have a couple of months before our rent will increase so we're not in a huge rush but it would be nice if we could get it done before church life picks up again!

Five

2009-02-02T12:19:00.006-03:00

1. I can't believe Jackson will be turning one in just fifteen days. That's all I'm going to say about that right now or I will get all teary-eyed and sappy.

2. This morning's dose of perspective came through a story from a friend whose husband had finally found a job but was unable to show up for the job because they had absolutely no money for bus fare. They had spent the last of their cash on medicine for their sick baby. She went to the homes of four of their neighbors and no one had the two dollars they needed.

3. Russ is off getting the car fixed. Last Wednesday our front bumper was ripped off due to a "parking miscalculation" and the next day we were rear-ended in traffic. Poor car!

4. We had our team Super Bowl party last night. I didn't watch any of the game but had a nice time visiting with the girls while the kids played. And of course, I enjoyed the food!

We went all went home at halftime and I didn't even stay up to finish the game. I'm getting old, I guess!

5. Speaking of Super Bowl food, I made deviled eggs last night. Usually Jenn brings them but since she's on furlough I volunteered. I boiled a dozen eggs and when I started peeling them, I noticed something odd. And it just kept getting odder and odder.

Here are the yolks from twelve eggs. Notice anything?

Here are the whites:

THEY WERE ALL DOUBLE-YOLKS! It was kind of creepy but I didn't mind too much since the yolks are my favorite part!

Monday Morning

2009-01-26T10:34:00.002-03:00

I like Mondays to be quiet days. For people in full-time ministry, Sunday hardly feels like a day of rest. And when you have a little one, Sunday is especially hard as naps and mealtimes get thrown off. So in many ways, Monday is more of a Sabbath for me than Sunday (or Saturday) is.

At least that's the plan.

This morning, however, JT and I woke up at about 6:45. We played for a bit and then Russ got up. I suggested we head out to our neighborhood delicatessen where they have a great little breakfast spread. Russ needed to take the dog out first, so he ran downstairs and told me to just meet him at the front gate. We got to the gate at the same time and discovered a friend of ours waiting for us. He was in the neighborhood, wanted to say hi and our doorman had told him that Russ usually takes the dog out around then so he had decided to just wait for Russ. He walked with us to the deli and then went on his way. We enjoyed a nice breakfast, picked up some fresh bread and headed home.

When we walked into the apartment, I notice the clock on the microwave said 8:20. "Wow!" I commented. "I feel like we've already done so much today!"

Turns out, it was just the beginning. Soon Antonia came for the day. And the exterminator showed up. And a teammate needing a favor. And the water delivery. And someone called needing Russ to go unlock the church building. And another teammate called with some news. And and and.

By 10:30, my apartment was feeling like Grand Central Station!

So now it's 11 a.m. and I'm desperately hoping that this is not my day of rest. If this is my Sabbath, what will the rest of the week look like?!

Furlough 2008: Back to OK

2009-01-19T10:02:00.000-03:00

We definitely took the long way from Athens to Oklahoma City! We spent one night in Frisco with our friends Ron and Georgia Freitas. Ron and Georgia work for Continent of Great Cities--they helped recruit us, train us and have been taking care of us on the field. We seem to have a routine now when we visit them: the boys go for a LONG bike ride and Georgia and I go to Ikea. A perfect day for both of us. We also got to drop by the CGC office and say hi to the rest of the staff. The new office is definitely an upgrade from the old Abilene digs!

From Frisco, we made the long and perilous journey to Denison (okay, so it was neither long nor perilous but I was just trying to jazz things up a bit!) where Basil and Rachel McClure live. Basil was one of the ministers at Mayfair when we lived there so he's been our minister, mentor, coworker, friend and personal chef. Any time we get to spend with them is an incredible blessing. (Well, the one negative aspect is that every time we see them, their boys have grown up so much that we feel incredibly old!)

We rolled into OKC in time for church on Wednesday night and spent a couple of days with the old Mayfair gang. The timing was perfect for Jackson to go to the Fall Carnival. It was so different being on the "mommy-end" of things!

Then we headed back up to Blackwell. We spent a week hanging out with the fam. We took Jackson to the pumpkin patch and then on Halloween, his grandma Debbie got to take him trick-or-treating.

That weekend, Uncle Matt arrived from Delaware. This was our big chance to see him and we used it as an opportunity to take some new Quirey family pictures.

After worshiping with the crew in Blackwell one more time, we went back to OKC to finish up our time. I've got to say, I think we could be in Oklahoma City for our whole furlough and still leave feeling unsatisfied! There are just too many people to see and some very dear people that we just can't get our fill of!

We got to go to Homecoming at Oklahoma Christian on our last weekend. I got to see some of the old Honors Program gang and Jenny and the kids came down from Nebraska to see us one more time. (Jenny, you're still my hero for making that trip alone with three kids!)

Our time on furlough was such a blessing. Furlough is always a mad dash for us and doing it with JT in tow was even more work, but it is always worth it. We love getting to see our friends and family, make new friends, worship with those we love, eat familiar food and enjoy a little down time. Our next furlough will be in 2010 and I'm already looking forward to it!

I did it! I finally finished blogging about furlough! You didn't believe I really would, did you?

Missionary Conference

2009-01-10T11:47:00.002-03:00

Getting to the conference was indeed like The Amazing Race. We tried to sleep a little the night we left but I only slept for about twenty minutes. I caught another 20 or so on the flight. We landed in São Paulo at about 6:30 Monday morning and we took off running to catch a 7:00 bus. Well, I took off running to figure out where to catch it while Russ waited for our bags. That bus took us to a bus station where we bought tickets for a bus leaving in 10 minutes. We headed downstairs to the gate but I guess taking the elevator took too long to get down there (JT was in the stroller) because the bus had already left. Fortunately it was easy to get our tickets changed for the next bus which was only an hour later. The extra time gave us a chance to have a little breakfast. At 11:00 we rolled into Itu and found our way to the hotel. (A bit of a challenge, since we weren't able to get a hold of the person who was going to pick us up and we couldn't remember the name of the hotel! Russ tracked it down and we ended up taking a very expensive taxi all of four blocks.) A quick lunch and then it was time for all of us to take a nap. I managed to sleep for...you guessed it: twenty minutes! I left the boys to sleep and wandered around the hotel, enjoying the peace and quiet.

The conference was awesome. Don McLaughlin, the main speaker, did an amazing series on the book of Hebrews. It was so awesome to just get to sit and learn for a change. The women's sessions were taught by Cindy Roper, a communications prof at ACU, and were about intercultural communication. The guys' sessions were taught by Steve Allison and I'm not entirely sure what the official theme was but it had something to do with learning to express their feelings and not be such jerks or something like that. All I know is that for the first time ever, the women's class didn't involve crying and the men's class did!

Itu (pronounced E2) is a cute little town and we had a little time in the afternoon for sightseeing. They're known for having big things so we got some giant souvenirs.

We spent one afternoon at the "Chocolate Farm", a cute little place full of yummy shopping. We picked up some chocolate (duh!) and some salami. The farm part was beautiful and there were lots of animals for Jackson to see.

It's such a blessing to get together with all of our missionary colleagues. We have so many common experiences and we have a lot to learn from each other. But we also have a lot of fun together, which was most evident at the talent show on Thursday night. I'm happy to say that Russ and I won second place with our act, winning a "trophy" of a giant Q-tip (one of those Itu souvenirs!).

I love getting to go to the missionary conference because we get to travel to new parts of the country. But somehow we walked away having volunteered to host the conference in Salvador next year! It'll be a lot of work but I'm looking forward to getting to show off our part of the world!

On the Road Again!

2009-01-04T15:26:00.002-03:00

Didn't we just get home? I swear we just put away the last suitcase last week. But tonight we head out again on another (much shorter) adventure. It's time for the Missionary Conference, held this year in the town Itu, which in the state of Sao Paulo.

We didn't purchase our tickets while we were on furlough and thought we'd be okay buying them when we got back, nearly two months away from the trip. Boy, were we wrong! The only flight available leaves at 3:00 AM!!! We fly to Sao Paulo, take a bus to another airport in another city and then take a bus from there to ANOTHER city. Sometimes life feels like The Amazing Race! Then again, on The Amazing Race they're not dealing with 10-month-olds!

We're spending the rest of today taking turns playing with Jackson and napping. And I guess at some point I need to pack, though I'm not too stressed about it!

It's going to be a long night, we're going to be ridiculously tired and Jackson is probably going to be all cranky when everyone meets him tomorrow but I don't even care. Getting to spend the week in the company of our colleagues, sitting at the feet of our speakers and worshiping in English will be so worth it!

Year-End Video

2009-01-01T13:42:00.002-03:00

I wanted to share this video with you that our teammates put together. It's an excellent summary of our year. Well, that's not entirely true--it would be an excellent summary of our year if we were featured in it. Unfortunately, we were on furlough while they were doing the interviews and editing it so you'll just have to look for us in the pictures. (Seriously, there's no hard feelings, but I like giving them grief about it!) Enjoy!

Furlough 2008: Athens, TX

2008-12-31T23:19:00.001-03:00

Wow, I'm such a slacker these days! I wish I had some interesting excuse but I don't. So one of my "goals" for the new year (much more motivating for me than "resolutions") is to catch up and stay caught up in my blogging/emailing/sending out newsletters. Yes, techincally it's not the new year yet, but I figure this is just as good at time as any to start. So back to telling you about our furlough...

From Kansas City, we drove down to Athens, TX, making a quick overnight stop in Tulsa to stay with Don and Donna Millican. We spent a month or two living with them when we were fundraising so it was great to get to visit with them again.

We arrived in Athens on Saturday night and Russ preached the next morning. I took Jackson to the nursery and happily stayed to play with him (by that point I'd heard THE sermon several times). I want to take a moment here to say how much I enjoyed being in the land of church nurseries and cradle roll classes. Jackson loves getting to hang out with other kids and he really loves singing (Our kid loves singing? Go figure!). And Mommy? She enjoys the break! Some of my most precious furlough memories are slipping into the pew next to Russ after making sure Jackson was settled in the nursery and being able to focus solely on worship.

Jackson and his "Tia" Candy

Back to Athens: This time we stayed with Gary and Candy Landis, who took care of us like family. Candy insisted on babysitting for us one night while we went to one of our many dinners. And Gary and Candy live on Cedar Creek Lake so the week was filled with fishing and trips on the Waverunner in just perfect fall weather.

That's not entirely true. The week was filled with eating, eating, eating--we just squeezed in time for the other stuff! It's always the same: when we get to Athens, the sweet folks at Eastern Hills have us over or take us out for meal after meal. I think we both gained a few pounds that week. Not that I'm complaining! There are some awesome cooks at Eastern Hills!

Time on the lake and desserts aside, I have to say what a blessing Eastern Hills is to us. Russ and I spent so long trying to find a church that would oversee our work. We had raised the majority of our funds but still lacked that critical piece of the puzzle. It's quite fitting that this time we stayed at the Millicans right before we went to Athens, because that's where we were living when we heard about this church in the middle of nowhere that was interested in us. At that point, we were happy to have any church willing to sponsor us but even now, we are constantly reminded how blessed we are to have this church. Whenever we are back in Athens, we're reminded how wonderful the members, staff and elders of Eastern Hills are. We spend our time with our family at EH in both deep spiritual conversation and laughter, which is just the way I like it! Every time we visit, we leave marveling at the goodness and faithfulness of our God for providing us with such a great church!

We spent two Sundays in Athens and then got up Monday morning and headed to the Dallas Metroplex for more adventures...

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-25T09:10:00.003-03:00

We've got a little lull in our Christmas celebrations and I wanted to take the opportunity to wish everyone a merry Christmas! We've had two out of three present opening sessions (one via Skype with the Quireys, one by ourselves) and we're waiting for the Turners to wake up so we can open more presents with them watching the webcam. (I have to say that I'm tempted to call and wake them up--for old times' sake!--but I know they wouldn't be as amused by it as I would be! Anyway, it means Jackson has time for a nap before we talk to them.)

Christmas is one time when the differences in our `family traditions are blatantly obvious so we have had to reach a compromise. Last night we had Christmas eve dinner Quirey-style, with maple-glazed pork and roasted vegetables. This morning we had more of a Turner-style breakfast with french toast, bacon and mandarin oranges. (Although for the breakfast to be truly reminsicent of my childhood there should have been many candy canes consumed as well!)

We'll spend the rest of today enjoying new traditions, like going to the pool. The weather's been unseasonably cool (Oh no! 85! Could it be?!?) and rainy but today looks like it'll be a little better.

Whereever you are, whoever you get to celebrate with, may it be a wonderful day, full of love and blessings, as all over the world people are stopping to remember our Savior's birth!

Sunday

2008-12-23T11:56:00.005-03:00

I'd like you to meet Geraldo and Maria Lucia.

One Sunday morning a few months ago, they were sitting outside when we got to church. He had definitely been drinking (it was nine o'clock in the morning) and it was obvious that they had both had really hard lives. They disappeared but a couple of months ago they showed up again and started coming regularly. Geraldo started studying the Bible with Randy and Maria Lucia sat in from time to time.

Midweek, we found out that Geraldo had decided to be baptized. We were so excited. The baptism was scheduled for Sunday after worship.

But that's not all--on Saturday, Maria Lucia decided that it was time for her to be baptized as well!

So that would make a great ending to the story. But there's something else...something HUGE!

You see, Geraldo and Maria Lucia are a sweet couple and they've been together for a while. But they'd never gotten around to getting married. As they thought about their new lives in Christ, they realized that their living situation wasn't what God wants. So they decided to follow up their baptisms with a wedding!

We had some decorations from a previous wedding and Jenn picked up some flowers and cake and we threw a nice little wedding together. Geraldo and Maria Lucia were so blown away by the way they were treated. They couldn't stop thanking us. I told them that now that they're part of our family in Christ, it's our job to take care of them!

Please join us in prayer for our new brother and sister. Pray that they will strive to honor all the commitments they made on Sunday. Pray that we can find ways to help keep them strong in their faith and their marriage.

One other cool thing about Sunday was that it was our ninth wedding anniversary! It's hard to believe nine years have passed already! (I would post some old picture of us but I can't seem to find one on our hard drive.)

2008-12-18T07:50:00.003-03:00

While our friends and family have been dealing with snow, ice and sleet this week, we've had our own flurry of diapers and Pedialyte, trips to the pediatrician and emergency room, BRAT diet and probiotics. My fingers are crossed, but I think he's on the upswing now. Don't worry, it's nothing serious--looks like just a run of the mill case of diarrhea.

But I have the luxury of saying that. As "rich" people, living in a developed area, with health insurance and immediate access to hospitals and doctors, a case of diarrhea is, for the most part, inconvenient. If Jackson lived another life, it could have killed him.

So last night, as I changed yet another diaper, all I could think was how blessed we are.

Prayers Answered

2008-12-09T11:41:00.003-03:00

When we left Brazil to visit North America, one of our biggest requests for prayers was the falling exchange rate. Our dollar had slipped from over 2 reais = 1 USD to less than 1.50 reais per dollar, and we were all wondering how long we could pay our bills and rent a church facility. I checked today, and we are sitting just below 2.50 reais = 1 USD. It is really amazing, and we are all holding our breath to save and save for the drop we assume will come before presidents are inaugurated and oil production is cut. We thank all of you for your prayers; our money has not been worth this much since the month that we signed our apartment lease almost four years ago! We are cautiously optimistic that we can make the next 12 months count in our giving and in our saving. Thanks to all who gave extra and even beyond the special contributions to help us stay here in Salvador.

Another small blessing is that our McD's has started serving breakfast! There are no pancakes, but it still makes us smile to have some option beyond yogurt and corn flakes. We made our first trip to a newly-opened Outback steakhouse this week, and it was awesome. Anyway, enough about how life is starting to resemble our former home country. We miss everyone during the holidays, especially our families. We love and thank God for the grandparents that make the biggest sacrifice - distance and time away from our son. Egg McMuffins and cheese fries cannot take all the hardship out of being foreigners here, but it does help us get through the tough times! Keep those prayers and letters coming!

Christmas Party

2008-12-07T16:58:00.001-03:00

Today we had our English Class Christmas Party (a.k.a. An Excuse for the Missionaries to Make/Pig Out on All Their Favorite North American Christmas Treats). We had about 40 people show up for the party, which also serves as our wrap-up for English classes for the year. I have to say I'm looking forward to having a couple of months without English class to consume my Sunday afternoons and Wednesday nights! We had fun celebrating the season with our students. The party marks the beginning of the Christmas season for us; next Sunday will be even busier with our churchwide Christmas picnic and children's play. There will also be a youth Christmas party and a staff party. It's a busy time but we enjoy it!

In other news, Russ, Heather and I had an exciting treat last night: Outback Steakhouse! It just opened this week so we braved the crowds to go partake in a bloomin' onion and free refills. It wasn't cheap but I would gladly do it again!

Thinking of money, the exchange rate right now is awesomely in our favor. We've asked you to pray about it in the past so now we ask you to turn those into prayers of thanksgiving! And while you're at it, my mystery skin issue is back. One of our members, who is a doctor, saw it today and is now on the case. We think it's some sort of allergy but it's elusive so it may take a while to figure it out. In the big picture, it's not a huge problem, but it is definitely inconvenient and uncomfortable (not to mention that it's a little embarrasing having scaly hands and/or swollen eyes, depending on the day!). So please be praying that we find an answer soon!

(posted by Val--I don't know why it's saying this is Russell!)

Timing

2008-12-04T10:07:00.004-03:00

Isn't it amazing how God seems to send us little reminders throughout the day to help keep us on track? His timing is uncanny (what else do you expect from someone both omniscient and omnipotent?) and I have to admit that a couple of times this week I have not just been reminded but humbled.

Sunday morning Randy was finishing up a sermon series entitled Being a Servant in a World of Bosses. The message was about how we need to find ways to help people everywhere: those in our immediate vicinity, people here in Salvador and people throughout Brazil and the rest of the world. As he was concluding his message, we heard some loud voices in the doorway. It was a group of about a half dozen men and one women, all noticeably poor and most quite noticeably drunk. One of our members greeted them at the door and invited them to come in and sit down. They not-so-quietly sat while we finished our worship time.

A couple of minutes after they arrived, I heard noises coming from the kitchen. Several of us stay on Sundays for a communal lunch so I went back to see who had started cooking. I discovered Leandro (recently baptized) and Lurdes (still working on her!) cooking away.

"Oh good," I said. "You've started lunch!" (Often we don't get lunch ready until 1:30 or later and my English class starts at 2:00, leaving me with very little time.)

"No," Leandro said. "This food is for the people who came in. They're hungry and we can't let them walk away that way! This is our chance to serve."

What timing!

And then today: I was in a mood this morning. Nothing was where I needed it to be. No one was doing what I wanted them to do. I was especially annoyed at our maid, Antonia, for no particular reason other than the usual list of petty annoyances. (Anyone who has had a maid in Brazil will understand!) But today it was just too much. I was grumpy and short with Russ, Jackson and Antonia.

I decided to go take a shower while Russ tended to Jackson. When I got out of the shower I went to do some work in the kitchen where Antonia was also working. As we worked she started telling me how much she appreciates the way we treat her. She said that she thinks of us as "Mom and Dad" (even though she's a few years older than us and has two kids!). She was just marveling at our kindness, how we brought her and her boys back gifts from furlough and how we share things we don't need/want anymore with her.

Again, that timing! I was so humbled.

I'm trying hard these days to be who God wants me to be, to leave behind all the worldly values that seem to have rubbed off on me. God seems to be taking me at my word and giving me plenty of opportunity to stay on track!

edit: I need to say that I am truly grateful for Antonia and the help she is to me, as well as for the monthly help that someone gives us to employ her. We "survived" for our first couple of years without a maid so I truly appreciate the blessing she is, especially now that we have Jackson. There are days (like last week) that I am frustrated with the way she chooses to do things but I wouldn't trade her for anything!

Just to Make You Smile

2008-11-25T20:42:00.002-03:00

I'm working on my next post about furlough but I'm also hard at work cleaning our apartment. Apparently I'd never really gotten it back in shape after I was on bedrest so it was pretty bad. But I'm gradually making progress!

In the meantime, you can enjoy this little clip of Jackson laughing. Katie, this one's for you!

Furlough 2008: Kansas City

2008-11-23T17:07:00.004-03:00

When we said we were going to Kansas City, we were frequently asked, "Who do you know in Kansas City?" and "Oh, do you have a (supporting) church there?". The answer was a resounding NO. We had no family, friends or supporters there and that's exactly the way we wanted it. While we love spending time with all the people who love us, it was important for us to spend some family time together just relaxing. (We did discover a college buddy of ours lives in KC so we made an exception for him which paid off big time when he helped us find great BBQ!)

It's hard to say what I enjoyed most that week. I had a phenomenal pumpkin pie concrete. But as a family, we probably most enjoyed the College Basketball Experience and the zoo, even though Jackson slept through a good part of it! So here are a few of the highlights (minus the pumpkin pie concrete--I didn't take a picture of it!):

The College Basketball Experience

The Kansas City Zoo

(Can you tell I'm in love with my new collage tool?)

Furlough 2008: The Carolinas

2008-11-22T09:00:00.004-03:00

Okay, back to furlough. We had a lovely couple of days in Raleigh with my Grandma Turner. Jackson absolutely loved her little dog, Buster. I believe that Buster counts as Jackson's great-uncle, as he is Grandma's baby, making him my uncle. But no one in the family seems to agree with me on that one (especially my dad, who doesn't seem to want to consider a dog his "brother"). Jackson and Buster were about the same size so they played well together.

That Friday we drove down to the Myrtle Beach area. We love getting to spend time with our friends at the Grand Strand church. On Saturday night we got to visit with one of the small groups and Russ preached Sunday morning. We enjoyed some AWESOME Mexican food with our hosts, Chuck and Barbara, and then headed back to Raleigh. The next day we spent a little more time with Grandma and then flew back to Kansas City.

When we set our furlough schedule, I tend to think in terms of what is possible and not what may or may not be a good idea. As it was, I felt like I edited the "possible" but I think that next time we'll do even less and try to spread it out more. This leg of the trip we covered around 3500 miles in about a week. That was way too much. Fortunately we had vacation coming up.

Bats in my Bedroom

2008-11-15T07:03:00.002-03:00

Well, I guess we have been gone awhile when our teammates have to chase bats out of our house before we return! Our son now proudly displays two teeth (bottom front), and we both have the tired faces to prove it. We are still dealing with the heat and the time change, so please keep us in your thoughts...

Ketchup

2008-11-12T16:20:00.000-03:00

Well, we're back in Brazil. As many people have kindly pointed out, I barely blogged while we were stateside. But now we're home and getting this blog up-to-date is on my to-do list. It may take some time, though, because Jackson is infinitely more mobile than when we left and we're frantically babyproofing of our apartment. To tide you over, I thought I'd share these pictures with you. We had them taken at Portrait Innovations our first week of furlough when Jackson was almost seven months old. (I highly recommend Portrait Innovations!) Now he's almost nine months and it's amazing how much he's changed in the past two months.

Furlough 2008: Winnipeg, Raleigh

2008-10-02T17:42:00.002-03:00

I can't believe I didn't update from Winnipeg. We had a wonderful time with my family. My younger brother and my sister and her husband came to town, as well as all my grandparents. Jackson had a great time getting to know the family. It was also such a blessing to get to see my extended family again--all the people at the church in Winnipeg who are my surrogate aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents.

Monday, we left Winnipeg and headed down to Kansas City. It's amazing how different it is to travel with a baby! In the past, the trip to KC would have taken us one day. With Jackson, we spread it out into an easy two days. Then yesterday morning we got up early and flew to Raleigh, NC. We're staying with my Grandma Turner for a couple of days and then are headed to the Myrtle Beach area.

We all seem to be holding up okay. Jackson still doesn't like long days in the car. I think that he doesn't understand why he can get out of his carseat on the plane but he can't in the car. He's so mobile now that being confined is torturous for him. We make sure to give him lots of opportunities to work his wiggles out when we stop. Thankfully we don't have too many more long driving days ahead of us--just a lot of short ones!

Our Family is Lots of Fun

2008-09-23T22:16:00.002-03:00

We said goodbye to the 90-year-old great-grandfather today, as he left for Ontario. The American great-grandmother left earlier this morning. I (Russell) was one of those lucky people that grew up with one of my great-grandparents, and to see my son playing with six of eight was very special. We are thankful to everyone, including our team, who let us come and share Jackson with all of his family. We still have a week in Winnipeg as the leaves turn yellow, then it is back to America for the final month of travel. Patience to all who wait for our visit. We are having so much fun.

Furlough 2008: OKC, Stillwater, Blackwell

2008-09-13T10:47:00.002-03:00

This is just a quick update while JT sleeps in. We got in Tuesday after a long day of flying. Jackson did so well. He got waaay more sleep than I did on the plane!

In OKC we got to: go to Target, go to church at Mayfair (Jackson's first time going to class!), go to Bunco with the girls, enjoy many meals with friends, get family pictures done and sleep a bunch recovering from the trip. And JT started crawling full force.

Then yesterday we drove up to Stillwater where R's mom works. She showed off the grandbaby and we ate at Hideaway Pizza and did a little clearance shopping at Old Navy.

Then we drove up to Blackwell, R's hometown. We all went out to the Kay County Free Fair. Jackson loved looking at the animals and we ran into lots of people we knew. I had an Indian taco and a funnel cake which made me happy, though today I wish maybe I had only had ONE fried item.

Today we'll hang out at "Grandma's house" (weird to call it that!) and tomorrow we'll go to church here in Bwell before heading on the big journey north.

A Little Stressed

2008-09-05T18:25:00.001-03:00

Jackson, originally uploaded by russandval.

I'm going nuts trying to get ready for furlough. Russ and I were pretty good at packing our stuff up and heading out the door. Now we've got an additional person to worry about, a person who likes to take up our time during the day to keep us from getting stuff done and who, just this week, has decided that he doesn't like sleeping that much. Oh and he's got a cold. But we'll get it done and get on the plane on Monday whether our suitcases are full or not. (Anyway, aren't we supposed to leave for furlough with empty bags so we have room to fill them up?)

Several people have asked if we'll be coming their way or not, so I thought I'd post a rough schedule for everyone. I hate making our schedule because no matter what I have to leave people and places out. But we only have six weeks of furlough and two weeks of vacation and I love you all but we need our vacation time!

And this is a rough schedule--there are some travel and personal days I'm leaving out.

Sept. 9-Sept. 12 OKC
Sept. 12-14 Blackwell, OK
Sept. 17-29 Winnipeg
Oct. 1-3 Raleigh, NC
Oct. 3-6 Myrtle Beach, SC
Oct. 11-20 Athens, TX
Oct. 24ish-Nov. 10 Blackwell/OKC

So maybe we'll be near you, maybe not. We really would love to see as many people as we can but we're also trying to be aware of our limitations with the little guy. Drop us a line if you want to try to meet up!

Today

2008-08-29T16:42:00.002-03:00

Today we took Ceara back to her parents. We had a fun couple of days with her but it was nice to take her back. Having two under two was a bit much for me, especially the diaper part.

Today we did a little more of our pre-furlough shopping. Loaded up on coffee (to take with us) and dog food (to leave for Samson).

Today we got hit by a 20-foot sign that flew off the back of a truck. Thankfully Russ was paying attention and managed to swerve, avoiding us getting totally clobbered by it. It did take out one of our mirrors and left a big scratch on the side of the car. I was not paying attention and it hit the side right beside me. It definitely shook me up a little. But then we laughed and laughed at the absurdity of it.

Today I keep trying to finish my lesson for the women's class on Sunday and it just doesn't seem to be happening. Maybe I should do that instead of blogging!

Welcome!

2008-08-28T13:35:00.003-03:00

Jackson has a new friend! Last night Travis and Alicia's new baby BOY, Calen Xavier, was born. We're taking care of Ceara while they're in the hospital so today we took her up to meet her new brother.

She wasn't quite sure what to think at first but soon she was fascinated by him.

Now there are six kids on the team; four of them born within the past year or so. It's a whole new world!