We pray that all is going well for you all.
The rainy season is in full swing here, which means more mud in the house and fewer days for drying the "tons" of dirty
clothes. But the rains have lightened up a bit this past week. The good news for the locals is that the rains have been well
timed, not to hard, not too few, so the crops are all doing well. Night before last, there was a serious hail storm in Cusco
- golf ball sized! That has never happened before. We went into town the day after it happened and there were piles of hail
all over the place - it looked like snow banks along the sides of the roads.
Usually, it is four-wheel drive time to get into our house, because the road USED TO BE a mixture of clay and animal
droppings. Whenever it rained, it was very slippery and hard to keep out of the ditch the railroad tracks run through, since
the road slanted towards it. But as the previous alcalde (sort of like a mayor) was going out of office, he made one last
effort to spend any budget money that was left over (so he wouldn't have to turn it over to the incoming alcalde) so he started
paving the road into a little community above our house. He was going to stop about 300 yards from our house, but i prayed,
went and talked with him, and he got them to pave it all the way past our driveway - so that we can back out without
sinking into mud! God is so good. As it turns out, our part of the road is the best, because it was done under optimum conditions.
On the other part, they bladed the road down and left it loose to get rained on that night. A few days later, they spread
the rock out, so it is a little bouncy and gets softer when it rains. It is so cool to be able to shift into 4th or 5th gear
while driving home now. Before we pretty much stayed in second and dodged as many potholes as we could.
Just before the end of last year, Sarah, Hannah and Rachel started taking voice lessons. The teacher was so impressed,
she asked them to participate in a year end recital. Sarah made them some costumes and they sang a couple of Christmas carols.
They looked and sounded like angels - (proud papa aside, they really WERE the best!)
We are trying to expand the educational opportunities for all the children this year, and have a music tutor coming on
Saturdays to teach music theory and guitar/drums/zampoņa. We have an art teacher that comes Thursday afternoons, have three
enrolled in accelerated classes in order to be able to catch them up to their grade level, and hope to be able to enroll several
in keyboard, violin and flute classes when the next term starts in February. We have enrolled 12 children in ballet classes
to see how they like it and how well they do. If it works out, we will continue their lessons when school starts in March.
Included in the ballet classes is Joseph. Yes, i took ballet for one summer when i was in high school, but we did it for the
"agility" and to lift the girls in their recitals because we knew the teacher. And yes, i have a good friend that is a dancer
actually has a dance group. But STILL!!!, i had to "deal with" the fact that my son wanted to take ballet lessons. But the
truth is, he is better than most of the girls and after one class, the teacher promoted him to a higher level. (But is still
can't wait till rainy season is over and we can go play more baseball!!! He's good at that also!)
Please be praying with us. We got notification today of a hearing for one of the girls. She is one of three sisters with
us and the parents have made it fairly clear that they only want her back, not the other two. They have not visited consistently
- coincidentally only when there was a hearing about to happen - and when they have visited, if they did anything besides
eat and talk to us, it was only to the younger girl, not to the other two. The psychologist's recommendation was that they
parents undergo counseling before the court even considers giving the children back, so we will see what happens Thursday
afternoon. Please pray with us. The court also passed sentence on the older daughter, saying that she is now officially abandoned
and taken away from her parents. We were not real sure how she would take it - she had no desire to return to her natural
family, but still, to be considered "unwanted" can have its effects. When i told her, she didn't understand at first, because
i was kind of hem-hawing around. When i finally told her straight out, she jumped for joy and hugged me. Please pray for the
other two girls: Marėa (the youngest) and Roxana (the one not really wanted by her parents).
Please pray also that we can get the wall around the property finished. We have had a rash of irate and drunken parents
lately - including one mother-in-law that came storming onto the property yesterday afternoon and started slapping a man who
was sitting out front holding his baby. She as shouting and cursing with the other children right inside the door. We really
need to be able to control access to the property.
Please pray also as we will be talking with an engineer and contractor about adding on this year. Dry season starts in
April and we hope to be able to begin digging for the foundation in March. We want to use cinderblock and brick this time
so as to provide a stronger structure, conserve space (adobe walls are a foot and a half thick), and be able to build higher
(we hope to go to three, maybe four floors). But as you know, all that costs money. We also hope to buy more land this year.
Why build? Why more land? We are constantly receiving requests to take more children. Just today, i got an email from
a peruvian missionary in the jungle who wants to send us four children. The uncle of two of our current kids wants to send
their three half brothers. And that is just a sampling!
Please keep us in your prayers. Our week of 24 hour prayer as a church went well and many had great and unprecedented
times with the Lord. If you would like us to pray for something in particular for you, your family or your church, etc, please
let us know.
Feel free to drop us a line also. We'd love to hear from you.
May God bless you all,
bud, for the tribe
