Crazy Days...

Well it has been a few days since I have posted anything. It has been crazy around here. We survived Hurricane/Tropical Storm Tomas without a scratch! We lost power on Friday, the day the storm hit, for about 10 hours and that was it!! We were so thankful! We kept looking at the path of the storm in amazement at how God spared us from so much! The kids were thankful that they didn't have school on Friday, but everyone was back to normal on Monday.

This last weekend was supposed to be our "Team" weekend off. We ended up taking Saturday to drive to Negril. We were hoping to do some cliff jumping at Rick's Cafe. We got to Negril and the waves from the storm were incredible! They were 15-20 feet high! They were crashing against the cliffs and shooting water into the air sometimes as high as 75 feet! Clearly, we didn't do any jumping, but we did sit and just watch for hours! We also went to the West End Lighthouse. It is on the western most post of Jamaica. It was awesome to see the power of the sea from the safety of the shore. The old hymn "I Sing the Mighty Power of God" kept playing in my mind. It was amazing! Sunday we went to Baylife again. I so enjoy going there. Because of the waves, we didn't get to go to the beach after church. I was kind of relieved. I was not feeling great and in a terrible mood. I needed some alone time to get my attitude straightened out. I was able to come back and take a much needed nap. I woke up feeling much better.

In the last 3 months, I have really fallen in love with the staff here at Robin's Nest. They are amazing! I love hearing them sing in the kitchen or with the kids on the porches. They are some of the most tenderhearted people I have ever met. However, there are several that cause me a lot of trouble! One of our night time nurses, Nurse Hedram, loves to trouble me and I love to trouble her right back. The other night I kicked her in the butt when she walked passed me. She gave me a dirty look and kept on walking. Well, she got me back! She came into my room at 5 am on Wednesday morning and told me she needed me for something. I was sound asleep and didn't really know what was going on. She keep yelling for me to get up so I finally found my glasses and my slippers and walked into the bathroom to see what she needed. As I walked in, I noticed that she had one of our dust pans with the long handles. I looked down to see a massive dead rat in the dust pan. She brought it so I could see it! She woke me up at 5 am to show me a stupid dead rat! She is big time trouble! Matt Wiley got her back though! As she was leaving in the truck at 6:30 am, he took the dust pan with the rat and pretended to put it in the back seat of the truck with her. You should have heard her scream! That made my day!

There is a bug going around The Nest right now. Angie is very sick and many others have been feeling under the weather. I haven't been truly healthy since I have been back. I am feeling okay right now, but earlier it was not so good. I think I am reaching the point of exhaustion! I am just so stinkin' tired! Tomorrow should be a pretty low key day though. We have a team of 20 coming and they will play with the kids all day. I think I am going to have the boys play outside most of the day. I am going to spend some one on one time with Abby tomorrow. (Abby has Downs Syndrom) I am excited to spend some time with her to see some of the things she can do. She is a smart little girl! I'm excited to put on my "early childhood special ed." hat. I miss that!

Well I am off to bed! Looking forward to what tomorrow has in store!!

Can't believe it's November!

Well, we are officially into November. I can't believe it has come so fast! Today was a great day! We had a team from Indiana that came and served for a few hours. The best part was that their leader was Gary Crawford! It was soooo good to see him! I was able to sit and talk to him for quite a while. I also got to meet his son, Ben, who is living down here and attending Fairview Baptist Bible College. We got to reminisce about our trip last June. He was telling me about the schools and different places that he was taking this team and so many of them were places that we went. He said that tomorrow morning they are doing devotions down at Catherine Hall Primary school. That was the first school that we went to last June. We laughed because that was also the morning that Gary locked Morgan in the big house at Chattam Cottages. SO many good memories from that trip! I am hoping to go on another trip with Gary soon!! It may be sooner than I think! We shall see!!

We have a couple girls staying at the Nest for a while. One is from Tennessee and she is staying for 3 weeks. The other is from Michigan and is just staying for a week. She looked so familiar to me when she first got here. I asked her where in Michigan she was from but wouldn't have known her from that, but we found out that we had gone to Cornerstone for year together. We probably took some of the same classes. It was crazy.

So I had another first down here tonight. I had to be "dewormed". Thankfully, it is just precautionary, but the medicine was nasty! Nurse Gordon was going around giving it to all the kids and the O'Dells and I had to take it as well. Since we have been here for a long time, we needed to have this medicine. YUCK!

Well, we are watching "Veggie Tales" again tonight! Anna is hooked! It's fun to see the old videos. I haven't seen them in so long. It's fun to see Anna glued to them! Tonight we are watching "Larry Boy and the Fib from Outer Space". Good times!

Movin' & Shakin'

Wow! What a crazy few days! I don't know where to start! God has been moving and shaking things up down here. He is proving that he is sovereign and his timing is perfect! He has allowed some amazing things to happen and I am anxious to see what is next! I would love to be able to give you all the details, but that will have to wait! Please continue to pray for direction and discernment.

Like I said, it has been crazy down here! We had a team from Lutheran Church of Hope (Joel & Angie's home church) here this last week! What a blessing they were! It was amazing to see how God used them in each of our lives in different ways. We got to go spend a few days with them at a resort. It was nice because it was over my birthday! I had a fabulous start to my 27th year. Sitting with the O'Dell's by the pool, being spoiled by my new friends and having a real day off! God is good!

Well, I am worn out! What an emotional roller coaster this last week has been! I need a good night's sleep! Going to bed at 8 pm is never too early here!! I know I have gotten behind at this blog and I am going to try my best to get back into the habit of writing on a regular basis!

Jhanelle's Funeral

October 16, 2010

What a day! We had Jhanelle's funeral today. This was my first experience at a Jamaican funeral. I wanted to go because of Jhanelle, but I also felt like I needed to go for Quest as well. I did not get to be at his funeral so it was good for me to be able to go and grieve for him as well. It was a beautiful service. Joel, Angie, Chad, and myself took Damille, Chavar, Shaquille, Lungpheng, and Dean with us. We were all surprised when we walked in and saw the size of

the casket. It was about 3 feet long and a beautiful pink. There were lots of people there to say goodbye to Jhanelle. People sang, read scripture and remembered Jhanelle's beautiful smile.

Our kids sang Jhanelle's favorite song, Jesus Loves Me. They did such a good job. Joel was asked to give a remembrance. Talk about emotional! I know that Angie and I were both losing it. He loved that little girl!! When the service was done, the pal bearers (Joel was one of them) carried her little tiny casket out of the church to the back where her grave was. It was a cement box partially in the ground. Jhanelle's aunt had painted the inside beautifully. It was pink and had some amazing pictures on the walls. Once they put the casketdown in, they covered the top with a sheet of plywood and began cementing the top. We stoodthere singing as they did it. Once they were done, we walked across the road to Jhanelle's moms house. They had a feast of food for everyone that had attended the funeral. We stayed and talked to Jhanelle's mom, Joy, for a while then headed back up to the Nest. Something pretty amazing happened during the service. The pastor presented the gospel and invited people to give their lives to Jesus. About 15 people stood wanted to accept Christ as their Savior, including Jhanelle's mom! It was amazing! So neat to see how God uses difficult circumstances in our lives to bring glory to himself! Because of one little girls death, 15 people now have eternal life! He is so good!

When we came back up to the Nest after the service, we came back to no power. So frustrating! We were going to have the kids watch a movie and eat popcorn for their incentive, but the TV doesn't work when we are running on the generator. So they played a few quiet games and then headed to bed. I went down to O'Dell's for a bit to hang out in the dark. I called Becky and talked to her for a while. It was so good to talk to her! I miss her so much! I also got totalk to Laura for a while. We are trying to make plans for Thanksgiving so we can see each other. I haven't seen her since last Christmas! I miss her!! Well, that's enough for now. In the morning we are heading to Bay Life again! I am excited! Then we are off to the beach! Hopefully it is a great beach day! We haven't had a Sunday beach day in too many weeks!

Another day...

October 12, 2010

Well, we went a full day with power on Monday (10/11). It was the first day since September 28th that we had a full 24 hour period with electricity. We were praying for 2 days in a row, but it didn't happen! The power flickered around 9:30 this morning and went out completely at about 7:45pm. It is still extremely disappointing when the power goes out, but I was very upset tonight because I had a load of laundry in the wash machine! The washer doesn't work when the power is out, even on the generator! Thankfully, I had put it in early enough that it was on the last rinse cycle so at least they were clean! I got to take my sopping wet clothes out of the machine and wring them out by hand into the bathtub. I know most Jamaican's do their laundry by hand because they do not have the luxury of a wash machine. I am learning to be thankful for the "little" things that we take so for granted at home.
Yesterday I stayed in bed almost all day. I have been fighting this sinus/upper respiratory junk for about 3 weeks. Joel gave me some antibiotics on Sunday night and after 2 full days on them, I am feeling much better. I had the strength, energy and patience (almost) to have school today with Dean and Ian. They were very well behaved! I bribed them today with a movie! They got all their work done and were on their best behavior for the majority of the day! It is getting better!! Then this afternoon while they were watching the movie, I got to spend some time planning for the rest of the week. It was a productive day. However, while they were watching the movie, I also got my calendar out to start looking at possible return dates and started having an anxiety attack. It was a rough one that lasted for several hours. Thankfully school was over and I could get away for a little bit. I came back to my room and hid out on my porch with my computer. I got to talk to a couple very good friends who encouraged me and helped me calm down. I have not had this high of anxiety in almost 2 years! Hopefully in these next couple weeks with Chad and Dina coming, I will be able to get some fresh perspective. Speaking of Chad and Dina, Grandpa Chad comes tomorrow! We are all pretty excited that he is coming. We won't tell him that though! :)

Sunday

October 10, 2010

Today we went to a new church. We attended Bay Life Baptist Church. It is a sister church of Hillview Baptist Chuch. I was able to attend a Sunday evening service at Hillview when I was here with our youth group in June 2009. It is pastored by a guy from the states. It was almost like being at church in the states. It was so nice! We took a pretty big group of kids and they were very prepared for us with a great "Junior Church" program. It was nice to be able to sit through a service without worrying about what the kids were doing. It was also nice having a pastor that I could understand the whole time. All of the other churches I have been to here have had Jamaican pastors and I have a hard time following them because they go back and forth between English and Patois and I end up missing most of it. Another nice thing was that it was only and hour and a half long service! Worship and everything! Other places it is closer to 3 hours and that is too long! I hope we can attend BLBC more often!
We came home right after church today because it was raining. No beach today. It was kinda nice though. I have not been feeling well at all so it was nice to come back and sleep for a few hours. Please continue to pray that whatever this is that I have will go away. It just keeps hanging on and I can't kick it! I am sick and tired of being sick and tired! We have power again at the Nest. Hopefully it lasts for a while. It has been such an emotional roller coaster with the power. I feel like every time it goes out I just want to cry! In fact, during church today right before the message, we were singing "Shout to the Lord" and all of the sudden the power went out. I lost it! I couldn't sing because of the tears. I know that their power had nothing to do with our power, but I was just overwhelmed by it. Thankfully it didn't effect the rest of the service and when we got back up to the Nest, we had power! God is good!! Even when we don't understand his ways or what he is doing, he is good! Sometimes we have to deliberately choose to believe that he is GOOD and have faith when we don't understand. Oswald Chambers said, "Faith is the deliberate confidence in the character of God whose ways you may not understand at the time." I can honestly say that I have not understood God's ways very often in the last month, but I am choosing to have faith in his character and who he says he is. He says he will never leave me or forsake me. He has my steps planned and is guiding and leading me through them. He walks with me in the valleys. He is my help. He makes all things work together for my good. For HIS glory, not mine!

A new day...

October 9, 2010

It has been an emotional couple of days. I haven't had the energy physically or emotionally to write in a while. Things are looking better. This last week went pretty fast. The boys did okay in school, but I was very glad for Friday to come. I spent a lot of time talking with Angie this week. There were a couple days that were really REALLY tough! I don't remember what day it was, but Monday or Tuesday, I was ready to pack my bags and go home. I can't tell you exactly what was going on but I was done. I was exhausted from the previous week and didn't think I could do it any more. I began to question if this is where God really wanted me. I have received many emails and encouraging words from so many people that knew I was struggling. They have been such a blessing. I have decided to not make any major decisions until I have had time to rest and talk to some pretty important people in my life. I know that I will be in Jamaica until November 23 and I am praying for God to give me clean directions for the days, weeks and months beyond that.
After the rough week, I needed some time away from the Nest. I didn't get to go "away", but I did get to spend the afternoon and evening with the O'Dells. I am beyond blessed to have them and be included in their family. We had family night, made pizza, chocolate chip cookies and watched a movie. It was such a fun night. We laughed until our stomachs hurt and tears were running down our faces. I so needed that time with them. Sometimes when I am down at their house, I seriously forget that I am in Jamaica. It is our little "America" in Jamaica. I came back up to the Nest about 10 pm and spent a few minutes with Nurse Hedrem and Bornell. They are my 2 very favorite staffers here. They are double trouble and they know it! I love spending time with them. They think it is funny to talk to me in patois because I don't understand them. I try to listen but usually end up just standing there with a blank look on my face. Bornell will laugh at me because she knows I have no clue what she said. She will say to me, "Katy, you have lived here long enough. You should know!" I am catching more, but I still struggle to understand what they are saying most of the time! Well it is a beautiful Saturday here. I don't know what is going to happen today but I am going to enjoy the day and all that God has in store for me here in Jamaica!!