Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Thank you to all of you who have remembered us back home as the Thanksgiving holiday approaches. Thank you for your well wishes via cards and emails!

We will be celebrating by me cooking for 19 Ticos who we consider dear friends and our Tico family. They are our right hands, so to speak, and work with us and for us at the camp. Without their support, we would not be able to do what we do. This is our way of sharing our American tradition with them.

In the midst of all of this activity, the camp is hosting a Pastor's retreat beginning on Friday evening and lasting until Saturday evening. We expect a minimum of 300 Pastor's and up to as many as 500 to be in attendance. Also joining us for our Thanksgiving meal tomorrow, but coming in for the Pastor's retreat will be the Vice-President of Global Outreach Mission, Len Lane. He will be staying here for a week and we have several meetings to attend with him at the camp with architects, contractors etc. as we prepare for upcoming construction teams.

He leaves next Thursday and on Friday arrives the team from Threshold Church in Charlotte, N.C. as they minister at the camp doing a week-long VBS. Today, we will finish the shopping for the Threshold team, the staple foods since we have so much going on before their arrival. Danielle was a bit embarassed on Monday when we left PriceSmart (our Costa Rican Sam's Club) with four shopping carts full of food.

Needless to say, there may not be too many posts over the next week, but I will see what I can do. On that note, the following are our favorite Thanksgiving verses taken from I Chronicles 29:11-13.

"Yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory and the majesty, indeed everything that is in the heavens and the earth; Yours is the dominion, O Lord, and You exalt Yourself as head over all. Both riches and honor come from You, and You rule over all, and in Your hand is power and might; and it lies in Your hand to make great and to strengthen everyone. Now therefore, our God, we thank You, and praise Your glorious name".

Happy Thanksgiving to each of you, our family, our church family, dear friends and supporters. We cannot express to you how much we miss you during this holiday season, how blessed we feel to have you as a part of our lives, but more importantly a part of this ministry with us! May God continue to bless you abundantly and beyond what you ask for.

With much love and gratitude,
Ken & Sherri, Danielle, Heather, Kyle & Jordie

One step forward, two steps back!

Ken went down to the camp pool early this morning to give it a cleaning since we had a school renting for the day to have a party. He returned to the house rather quickly to tell me that the camp had been robbed again (second time in one week) and that this time they stole the pool pump. (insert eyeball roll, here) Last Thursday in the middle of the night someone used tools to cut themselves into the camp through the fencing, stole the battery out of the camp truck, but before they did that, they shut the power off to the camp at the road! This disabled the sensor lights in the driveway. They also cut and removed the brake lines and stole tools that were in the truck. Last night, they used tools again to cut the lock off the pump house, removed the PVC piping hooked up to the pump, and then tore the electrical wires away from the pump itself. They also followed the conduit lines away from the pump; one is for water to the pump and the other is for the electricity and cut the conduit and pulled the wires out. Not too long ago we had drained, cleaned and painted the pool in preparation for the upcoming short-term teams and also rental groups. It was a lot of work for a week for the team! Without the pump and chemicals (I forgot to mention that they stole those also) it will be difficult to maintain the pool. Our initial phone calls to pool supply stores has the cost of a replacement pump at $1,000. Needless to say, while filing a police report, we were informed that several area businesses had been hit in the last week around the Orosi Valley. The police don't expect it to end any time soon with the holidays approaching and just the fact that there are a lot of people with drug problems in this area. Last week, the police strongly recommended that we not leave anyone at home by themselves, adult or teenager. Please pray for our safety here!

Today, Kyle and I thought something had hit our house when we were inside and we heard a loud, deadening noise. It startled both of us and we asked each other "what or who just hit something against the corner of the house". We found out on the news that we had another quake here with the epicenter only being about 25 minutes away in Cartago.

Tonight, we spent some time putting the finishing touches on Heather's birthday party preparations for tomorrow evening. She will be celebrating her 16th birthday on December 3. In Costa Rica, you have a "coming out" fiesta for your 15th birthday and a formal ceremony led by your Pastor or Priest complete with attendees (equal to a bridal party), a father-daughter dance and lighting of ceremonial candles. We have 60 guests expected for Heather's ceremony tomorrow night as she celebrates her 16th birthday, but in the 15th birthday Costa Rican tradition. I hope to be able to post some pictures over the weekend of this traditional Costa Rican milestone!

Wobbly!!!

Last night I experienced a first! At some time between midnight and 12:15 our dog, Luna, began to bark loud enough that she woke me up. I noticed that the front gate to our home was making a clanging sound. I got out of bed to see who might be trying to enter, but when my feet hit the floor, I had difficulty standing still. I felt unsteady and as though my body was swaying from side to side. I spent most of the day with a terrible migraine headache and knew that my blood pressure was up from the pain in my head. While the headache was gone, I figured I must have gotten out of bed too quickly and was dizzy. The barking of the dog and clanging of the gate had no impact on the rest of the family! Needless to say, in Spanish class this morning I mentioned to Marjorie that I hadn't felt very good last night and explained my apparent "dizzy spell" to which she broke out in laughter! She informed me that we had a 7.0 earthquake in the middle of the night and I wasn't dizzy at all; that's just what it feels like when you are in the middle of one! While it was not any "dish-breaking", "pictures falling from the walls" event, it was about a minute of a constant trembling, but strong enough that I needed to plant my feet apart from each other and lean into our bedroom wall for support! A lot of our neighbors slept through it much like my family, but then some were able to confirm to my family that I wasn't crazy, as they had experienced the same effects! Marjorie says that in December we will feel more frequent tremors and not only did we have Spanish class today, we also had a lesson in earthquake safety! Well, we've mastered the "hurricane" procedures, now it's on to earthquakes :)

Busy Days and Perspective

The last couple of days Ken, Kyle & David have been working on building the above stage inside the Celebration Center of the camp. This morning this picture was taken of them putting down a second coat of paint. This stage is in preparation for an upcoming Pastor's Conference that is being held in Jardin Sagrado the last weekend of November. It is expected that 300 to 500 Pastor's will be attendance during the weekend, coming from all over the country. The church that is planted at the campground will also be able to use the stage as well as rental groups who have special services. While David & Katherine were visiting our house last night, it dawned on all of us that lately, a lot of our pictures on our blogs were just showing us working around the camp and not doing a whole lot of ministry. A lot of the work that we have been doing lately is for rental groups, upcoming short-term missionary teams that will be coming down from the U.S. and Canada, as well as the day-to-day maintenance and operation of the campground itself. It's a lot of hands and knees work! I am thankful that all of us at the camp are on the same page as far as reaching out into our community and that we have a strong drive to reach outside the gate of the camp! None of us ever wants to be so "caught up" in the administration of the camp, that we are too busy ourselves to serve outside of it. While cleaning the pool, building stages, cleaning cabins, bathrooms and all of the other things that we do to keep the camp "running" so that other ministries, whether it be Tico groups or short-term teams may carry out their ministries is ministry, we too, have a need to minister to others...it is why we are here! On November 27th we will be ministering to our camp employees and their families by serving them Thanksgiving dinner prepared by Katherine & myself. Costa Ricans do not celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday. What better way to share our tradition with them and what better time for them to hear from us how thankful we are for each of them and how they serve us! School gets out in mid-December so we are in the process of planning a family activity day at the camp. Our weekends are booked with rental groups from now until mid-March and between Dec. and mid-February we will be hosting four short-term teams. Please continue to keep all of us here at the camp in your prayers as we serve and as we reach out to proclaim the Good News of our Savior!

Children's Ministry Supplies

With the summer over, fall begun and an influx of short-term missions coming December through February; it was time for me to get to work on the task of reorganizing our children's ministry supplies. What I already knew was that "there's some slim pickin's"! Right now I am updating our inventory list and my wish list for a team coming in January.

Heather snapped this picture of me going through the odds-n-ends of it all. Hopefully, I will have everything reorganized and put back in it's place tomorrow since we have a rental group coming in on Friday...yikes!

Celebration Center wall sealing

Many of you who have been reading the blog know of our partnership with God Festival. Tomorrow, God Festival was bringing its 100+ volunteers to the camp for a day of ministry...to each other. The gate to the camp was going to be closed and locked and all of the physicians, dentists, hair stylists, pharmacists and the many volunteers who help them were going to serve each other. The camp was going to be made available for them to set up in, to swim, play a fun game of soccer, fellowship and we were going to be providing their meal to them. Unfortunately, in other areas of Costa Rica, there has been a massive amount of flooding caused by the rainy season as of late, and God Festival had to cancel with us. God Festival has been on the TV for the last three days begging for donations of clothing and food to allow them to meet the needs of those people devastated by the flooding.

Since God Festival cancelled early in the week with us, it meant that the rest of the week and the weekend were free and open at the camp. Ken decided to begin working on the walls of the Celebration Center in preparation for the construction teams that will be coming down from the U.S. and Canada in January & February '09. Our architect here in Costa Rica recommended that the gaps in the concrete walls be filled in and sealed with epoxy. It's a bit of a messy, and smelly job. While the team here was disappointed that we would not be able to serve our friends with God Festival this weekend, we are thankful for the oppotunity that this has afforded us to get to work on the walls!

Please do keep God Festival and it's volunteers who are working hard and long hours throughout this weekend in your prayers as they minister to the flooded, remote areas of Costa Rica proclaiming His Name in deed and in truth!

Luna (en espanol "Moon")

This is an "old" addition to our family back in June. Her name is Luna, but because she looked like a black bear when we got her, we commonly call her "Luna Bear". She was given to us when friends of ours found out that we had picked out a puppy at an animal shelter here in Costa Rica for the kids. When we went to pick up that puppy from the shelter, she was no where to be found. Our hearts were broken because we had picked out a name for her, paid for her initial shots, and even bought her a collar. We are not exactly sure what "really" happened to her. Luna was living in our friends housing development with her mother and her brother. Unfortunately, her brother has since been killed by a car. Luna has a strong personality and it is hard to break her of her "old" habits of living on the street, like she still loves to "pick the trash" and if she gets loose you can pretty much bet your in for a long walk to try and get her back, like to the next town! Like with all "puppies" she views me more for play and Ken as her disciplinarian. Thus, when Ken leaves the house, she goes crazy jumping on the furniture and when I try to get her off, she barks at me and thinks I am playing! We often tell her that she doesn't need her BIG EARS since she doesn't listen anyways! Most of the time, Luna is just sweet and fun. In fact, the friends who gave her to us say her biggest problem is that she is "rotten"...from being loved! That's not a bad thing, right?

Singing in Espanol!

Well...I wasn't kidding when I said that Heather was "moving right along" in Spanish lessons! Here she is on the newly formed Youth Praise Team singing worship songs in total Spanish. It's hard enough for Ken & I to make conversation, but to keep up with some of the faster paced worship songs in only six and a half months is a real accomplishment! Ah, to have a mind that can catch on so quickly!!

Youth Group Fundraiser - Costa Rican Style!

Here's a picture of Jordan adding the last tamale to the pot of steaming water.

After stoking the fire, Ken lifts the full pot of water on to the fire.

Here, Jordan is poking slices of carrots and sweet red peppers in to the tamale.

Here's just a couple of members of the Youth Group who are making the tamales by hand preparing them to be sent down to the fire for cooking.

While the tamales are being put together, Ken, pictured here with Mario, an elder from the church have cut (with a machete) banana leaves from the banana trees at the camp. They have a very small fire built. Ken is placing the whole banana leaves over the top of the small flame for two reasons: first, to kill any insects and second to take out any moisture from the leaves. Once he finishes drying this side, he will flip the leaf over and do the same to the other side and then allow it to cool. The leaves are then taken by wheel barrow up to the kitchen where the whole banana leaf is cut down into smaller, squares (you can see those in the above pictures). The base of the tamale is a cornmeal paste which goes on top of the banana leaf squares, followed by a tablespoon of rice, a slice of carrot, three or four peas, two slices of red sweet pepper and then a tablespoon of cooked meat (we used chicken), but the Tico's use all different combinations of vegetables and meats to make tamales. The tamales are then wrapped very neatly in the banana leaves and tied with string into a neat package. Two packages are stacked up on top of each other and then string is tied around the entire bundle (which you can see in Jordan's hand adding the last one to the pot). Once they hit the hot water in the pot, the cornmeal begins to expand inside of the bundle as it cooks. How do you know they are done? When the once green banana leaf has turned black!

Tamales are usually cooked for special occasions and not eaten as regular food. A couple of months ago the camp cook, Isa, made over 100 when a distant relative in her family died. They were taken to the church to be shared with everyone who attended the funeral. Tico tradition is that you make your "best" tamales at Christmas and they are given to your family and close friends much like our tradition is to give Christmas cookies. We have been told to expect a lot of tamales at Christmas!

For this fundraiser, we made and sold 180 tamales! They sold for 500 colones or $1 a bundle. This will help send the Youth Group on a weekend retreat at a different campground, since they regularly meet on Saturday nights at our campground and they like to feel like they are "really getting away". All of the food items were donated for the tamale-making by various families of the Youth and church members.

Short-Term Team Preparations beginning in Costa Rica

Just to give you an idea, this is "some" of the food that Ken & I bought for a "small" team over the summer. Missing from the picture is a huge box of fresh vegetables and fruits and other miscellaneous items like toilet paper which has already been stored away in a cabinet, and fresh bread and meat which we buy just the day before the team arrives. We need you to be in prayer beginning NOW for the teams that will be coming from the beginning of December through the middle of February; that's four teams in eights weeks and we will also have various rental groups at the camp during this time as well. Right now, there is not a free-day during the month of January on the camp schedule! The teams will be doing children's ministry, construction at the camp and medical missions. The preparations for us here have already begun on all of these teams. Soon, we will be bringing bigger shopping loads than this back to the camp kitchen!

Extreme Make-Over: POOL edition!

What Ken honestly thought was going to be a two-day "breeze" job beginning on Monday, has turned into a week-long struggle against the rains. I have spared you all the gorey pictures of the molds, slim and started with the ending of the cleaning of the pool for your viewing pleasure!

This is the other end of the pool, clean, dry and ready to begin painting!

This was this morning as Ken was painstakingly painting the stairs by hand before the sudden rains came and washed his paint away. Tomorrow's rental group had to be called and informed that the pool would not be functioning this weekend. Thankfully, they were more than gracious about our dilemma. And so tomorrow, the painting begins again!

The "bail out"!!!

The bail out of water down here in Costa Rica, that is! This month, October, is supposed to be the rainest month of the rainy season; that's what we've been told anyways. Things got a little scary around here this afternoon when Kyle and I stepped out our front door and realized that the good-sized ditch across the road from our driveway was up over the embankment and flooding our neighbor's house. We quickly began moving things to higher ground off our front porch (our shoes) and in our front room, the livingroom. I ran down the road and got Ken at the camp and we started helping our neighbor, Norberto. It was pretty messy, but we had fun working away with the family to clean the home. His sister, Isa, is our camp cook and Isa's husband, Koki, is the camp groundskeeper, who came with Ken when I found him at the camp. We also got an urgent phone call from Marjorie, our Spanish teacher, asking us to drive to town, Orosi, and help her remove water from her home as well. This week the team is working around the rains trying to paint the camp swimming pool that we drained over the weekend. We've got a rental group coming in this weekend and we hope to have it back up and running by then. Yikes! I've got cabins to clean tomorrow!

There's no place like HOME!

After a long day of traveling due to bus and roadway delays, we sat at the bus station for 5-1/2 hours before our bus came, we finally arrived home. We enjoyed ourselves in San Juan Del Sur, but it sure is different than what we are used too. We got through the border on Saturday, only to find out from another couple on Monday who were staying in our same hotel, that someone had been murdered there at the border crossing on Sunday. When asked what to do with the body they were told to put it in the trash and it would be burned later. Thank you to anyone who prayed for us as we traveled. As you can see, your prayers are very important to our family and God allowed us more importantly than "delays" to travel with safety!

6th months...

This weekend we have to leave Costa Rica, crossing the border into Nicaragua to get our passports stamped. We do this every 90 days. This weekend also marks a ministry milestone, in that we have now been here for six months. One thing hasn't changed in the time that I have been here. That is, the understanding that we ALL have natural and spiritual gifts that God has equipped each of us with. God won't use those who are unwilling and fight against Him. He cannot and He will not force us to serve Him. But, He did promise that He would empower us to do His work and He would prepare us for it. I think there is a misconception that missionaries are spiritual Super Hero's. I can promise you that we have been tested over the past six months in our faith. I can promise you that there have been days when we have really struggled with wanting to come home. There have been frustrating days because of language barriers. But, I can also tell you that on those particular days God was present with us! He has used many different ways to meet our spiritual needs and to encourage us in our ministry; emails, an opportunity to have some free time and check our mail and not ironically find that we had received something from home, specifically a letter from our parents, or from our church, phone calls that we "out of the blue" received from friends at home and the list can go on. I guess, what I am trying to say, is that we are ALL "called"! Faithfulness and availability is all that HE needs because He can, and is able, to fill in the gaps. And while I wish I was "Mrs. Incredible", I realize that these times of hardship and frustration are intended to continue to mold me; my attitude, my actions and my heart so that I might be more like Him.

Important: Prayer Request

This picture was taken in January when our house was placed on the market in N.C. (thus, no green grass, blooming trees, etc.) A couple of weeks ago we lowered the price of our home...again. I am still working my full-time N.C. job to pay for the mortgage on the home. It means that I have to cut back on my ministry plate (which is full) down here in order to do the work or sometimes "burn the candle at both ends" to help get what needs to be done here. At this time, we just want to bring this situation before you and ask you to join us in prayer over this matter. It is impacting our ability to minister in Costa Rica physically and financially.

Typical Costa Rican dress

With permission, this is a picture of Siday (the Youth Pastor's wife) holding Alianna (David & Katherine's daughter) after church yesterday. This is the typical dress that you would see children and women wear for celebrations such as Independence Day and at Christmas. Yesterday, Siday (who heads up Children's Ministry) at our church dedicated the entire service to the children. Last week, we celebrated "Children's Day" and this week was of course their national holiday, Independence Day. She did a small sermon on Samuel, but also incorporated children's day dancing and the typical dance that is done in celebration of Independence Day with the help of the Youth from the church. Of course, no children's celebration in Costa Rica is complete without a cake or a pinata! Jordan was chosen to whack at the pinata a few times which was special for him since he has never had a pinata at a party before. We had a lot of fun attending the parade today and together with David & Katherine we had a family picnic!

Happy Independence Day Costa Rica!

Today, is Independence Day in Costa Rica. Right now, there is a truck just a few feet from our house blocking our small road and blaring pre-recorded Marachi band music (it's good stuff). There are two ponies outside our gate chewing on grass and the neighbors are beginning to line the street on this Sunday morning. I expect that in a few minutes the neighborhood school will be having their parade and that is what everyone is waiting for. Tomorrow is the "BIG" festivities, parades all over the country. We hope to be able to attend one with David & Katherine for the cultural experience. Today in church most people will wear traditional clothing in the colors of red, white and blue. Not sure that my red "Carolina Hurricanes" pajama pants meets the standard. Well, I guess it's time to step outside and enjoy the celebration!

Extreme Make-Over in Costa Rica!

The Celebration Center got an upgrade to its roof...insulation! Back in July we had ordered all the supplies for insulating the roof due to changes in Costa Rican building codes, and this week a Costa Rican company arrived to do the installation. This picture is the men removing the sheeting. You wouldn't get away with this in the States! No harnesses, no safety lines, no OSHA!

Taken from inside of the building, you can see the layer of insulation.

Again, from inside the building, this picture is the roof now completely insulated.

Here's also a picture from the inside, the old, uninsulated roof. Just for kicks, Katherine and I went into the building last night and had a little shouting session, (not at each other, of course) to test it out! It is amazing; the improvement in sound in the building! And it looks really, really nice too!

What you don't know, won't kill you...

That's Ken. This was the white water rafting excursion. It was all just explained to me today that there are different levels of difficulty in white water rafting, the highest level being a 5. This river had 4's and 4+'s, and the 5's were just up river a little bit further! It was explained in the "oh, so familiar" Man-jibberish with grunts and groans of satifaction and delight, similar to when he sees new Craftsman tools with that infamous "glazed over look". This is crazy!

White Water Rafting and Packing Up

Well, today was the Threshold team's free-day. Ken accompanied them to Turrialba to do some white water rafting...um, better him than me! Tonight they will begin packing up since they need to leave the camp at around 11 a.m. so that we can get them to the airport on time! To their families I'd like to say thank you for the sacrifice that you have made this past week without them at home. We have truly enjoyed getting to know each of your loved ones while they were here. They are a GREAT bunch of guys! Thanks for loaning them to Costa Rica if only for one week. Our prayer is that in some way they were blessed as they served, and as we served them! Our prayers go with you as you travel..