Missionaries Get Spring Break Too!

This week, after the pastors’ conference, we ALL had a break. Not only from work at Global, but also from extra activities at church. I took advantage of the week off, and caught up on sleep the first two days.

Wednesday, I took a day trip by myself to Guanajuato to go to a few museums that I hadn’t been to during language classes, to hang out with the few people from school that I know who were still there, and to have lunch with my GTO family. It was quite fun!

The next days, I hung out in Querétaro with the ladies from my team and we also did a major cleaning job at Global. It was loooong overdue.

Saturday, I got to go to an aquatic park with the Kreveres, Jenn, Checo, and Alan. There wasn’t a lot to do at the park, but sitting around a pool snacking was great for me!!

Me, Micaiah, and Jenn at the water park

Checo, Micaiah, and Jenn in the wave pool

Emil came to QRO on Saturday night, and we went to church and to explore QRO on Sunday.

The arches of the Queretaro aquaduct

Me with Benito Juarez. If you look at a picture of him and of my great-grandpa, you know my family is indiginous of North America!

And that concludes my spring break! It was fun, and I am really ready to jump back into activities at Global and Horizonte! (We planned a few special activities for Global yesterday, and one that I am really excited about is the ‘70’s night. We are renting black lights and a disco ball, and I have a really wretched brown and orange dress to wear… more to come about that in May!)

Three Months, Twenty Days of Good Intestinal Health

I can no longer say that I’ve never been “stomach sick” in Mexico. From the day I came here (Jan. 5) until Sunday, I had perfect intestinal health here, even the times I came for a week in high school! Alas, my record is broken. I ate a HUUUUUUGE meal on Sunday after church, and it was really greasy too, and then Emil and I were walking around QRO, and I started to not feel so good. So we decided to go home. But I knew I wouldn’t have made it… I’m so glad there are lots of public restrooms in QRO Centro! That’s the first time I’ve puked in a public bathroom that I can remember too. Thankfully, I was only sick that evening, and only for a couple hours!

Easter

After the long week/weekend at church, we met again at 6am on Easter Sunday for sunrise service. I actually had to crack out a winter coat, it was cold that early! I think I am just getting used to hot weather though…

I went to Julian and Whitney’s for dinner. There were several other people from church there too…

The girls - Micaiah, Nadia, Gaby, Lluvia, Jenn, Whitney, and me

The guys - Justin, Julian, Adiel, and Gerardo

Now I am ready for a bit of relaxing. Wednesday I am planning to go to either Guanajuato, Tequisquiapan, or San Luis Potosi for a little one-day trip out of QRO. The café is still closed this week as well, but we need to do some major cleaning. I think this should be a less eventful week than last – good before jumping into café life again!

Church Camp for Adults

It should be mandatory!!

This past weekend, we had a pastors conference at my church for all the pastors and staff members of Calvary Chapel churches in Mexico and the Hispanic churches in the States. It started on Thursday evening, and ended Saturday afternoon. It was a great time of hearing reports from the various churches represented, singing, meeting new people, and eating free meals. Hehe! Gaby and I had two girls my age from Merida Yucatan stay at our home those days. They were cool. I met a lady from Vancouver Washington who now lives in Cuernavaca Mexico, as well as many people from Ensenada, Tijuana, Merida, Mexico City, and lots of other places. The people from Baja Norte (right south of California) and Merida (somewhat close to Central America) traveled 30 hours by BUS to get to QRO. Wow. Anyone who wanted to was welcome to stay free of charge in QRO church members’ homes. All the food was provided by our church members – almost everyone pitched in to buy something, making the cost of food and lodging FREE for all. Next year the conference will be in Aguascalientes, a city about 3 hours north of here. I totally plan on going – we only have to pay for the cost of transportation!!

Noemi, me, and Lupita from Merida qho stayed at our house

The band from Merida (minus two members who left early, plus one queretano)

And, not that many people if anyone who reads this blog will know what I am talking about, but, FERMIN CUARTO was at out conference!!!!! I had no idea, but he is the pastor of Semilla de Mostaza Church in Mexico City – yes, the Semilla de Mostaza that has several CDs, it’s like the Willow Creek or Saddleback Church of Latin America. For those of you who don’t know, Fermin IV is a musician who is pretty famous in Latin America – I’d guess 80% of Christians between the ages of 14 and 35 know of him, and lots of non-christians too. It was cool to meet him!

Needless to say, it had been a long week. Before the conference, we spent weeks (ok, so I spent just days) painting, remodeling, and cleaning Horizante. It was great to get to know more people from my church and form lots of other churches in the Republic.*

* Republic = the country of Mexico. When people here say “Mexico” they are most likely referring to Mexico City.

CLoWn$

A scary clown weasling his way into a picture of me and Gaby in downtown QRO. We were laughing so hard - hence the weird looks on our faces!

This Week In QRO...

Well, I seem to be unable to load photos onto this right now, so I'll have to save that for another day.

This week has been busy, but extremely good. Monday, Jennifer from Atlanta came to QRO - she is a college student who will be working with us for 2 months. I have been taking her around QRO so she can get orientated a bit. It's kind of hard to get to know where you're going here! We have also been working at Horizante church a lot this week, as today starts a 3 day pastors conference for all the Calvary Chapel Chruches in Mexico and the Hispanic USA churches. The conference was a good motivation to get people together to remodel, paint, and clean the church.

So today thru saturday is the conference. We're excited to be the hosting church, and we belive that it will be a time of blessing for Horizante and those who attend from all over!

¡Queretaro-o, E-es Mejor!

"Queretaro is the best", we hear on the radio/TV ever 5 minutes... exept in April-June when the temperatures reach 500 degrees and you live by a stagnant pond that is a breeding ground for the biggest mosquitoes EVER. Bug repelent works to fend of boil-sized bites, but it doen's make the mosquito-buzzing noise disappear. Yesterday we bought screen-fabric to hot-glue on the outside of our windows. Screens are expensive, and we are hoping to move this summer, so we're taking the "do-it-yourself" route. I'll be happily hanging screens this evening!

But really, I do like living here! There's lots to do, the people are friendly, I LOVE my job, my family is awesome, and the city is clean and beautiful!

Monday there's a girl named Jennifer coming to work with our team for 2 months. She's from Georgia. We are closing the Cafe for two weeks for Spring Break, so I'll be showing Jennifer around and stuff, and we'll also be helping prepare for the Pastor's conference next weekend.

We'll have at least one girl (besides me) from USA working with our ministry from now until the end of August! I'm pretty excited about that! We also have two short-term teams coming this summer - one small team of adults will be coming from North Point Community Church (our partner church in the U.S.) to help advise on a small group program for Horizante (my QRO church). A second team of 40 yes, FORTY! teenagers will be coming to spend time with the Horizante youth group and re-do our futbol field. So, I think we'll have PLENTY going on this summer, I'm looking forward to it!

A Pirate's Life for Me

Or, life with my Mexican family...

Gaby, my little sister had a school play on friday, and it was just about one of the funniest and cutest things ever! She goes to a bilingual school, and the play was in english. Each grade (1st -6th, Gaby is in 6th) did a short rendition of a Disney movie - Lion King, Jungle Book, Mary Poppins, Pirates of the Carribean...

Here are some fotos of the Pirates show - the one that Gaby was in:

Gaby and her good friend Cinderella.

I love living with foregin families!

Speaking of foreign families, my catracho family had 2 birthdays recently, Papi and Ronald. Delmer turned 52, and Ronald 20. I called them both on their birthdays, which is pleasantly not any more expensive to do here than from the States. Ronald is in seminary in Siguatapeque, and seems to be loving it! And, going home every weekend to see the family and special friend Ingrid! I also got to talk to Suyapa and Franklin on Delmer's birthday, that was wonderful! Suyapa is looking into how much it would cost to come to Mexico, and how easy/difficult it is to get a visa for here!!

So, this lovely picture of me is for the birthday boys!