Standing in the Gap

Good Morning everyone!

I wanted to do a quick update, asking for your specific prayers.

The House of Life and Hope Board is meeting in Magdalena, starting tomorrow afternoon. We are blessed by a group of men who have done so much for us here and all of the work in Magdalena. Please pray that each board member would be even more filled with Godly wisdom to face each decision that they must make.

Board members:

-Jon Kokanavich -Marshall Heinold -Jerry Tooley

-Wayne Banwart -Tom Hoffman

(A recent picture taken of the green mountains and stormy sky)

Also, please pray for our upcoming VBS. It starts on the 6th and is a week of non-stop activity.

A picture taken during songs at last year's VBS

-Please pray that each staffer and volunteer would have the stamina, energy and grace to embrace this wonderful week as an awesome responsibility, opportunity and privilege to teach the ones so dear to Jesus' heart.
-Pray that the children's hearts would be soft and ready to hear about the greatest story ever told.
-Pray for our time of passing out invitations to the surrounding communities on Sunday afternoon.

"And I sought for a man among them, that should make up the hedge, and stand in the gap before me for the land, that I should not destroy it: but I found none." -Ezekiel 22:30

God has heard your prayers and has been faithful in spreading His Name...Please continue to stand with us in the gap, God will continue to be faithful.

If You Teach a Woman to Fish...

"Hey, Amy, do you have any ideas for plans this afternoon or would you want to take the girls fishing?" I thought fishing sounded like a good idea. Jenean and Gloria were very excited about it and the girls were pretty pumped, so we jumped in a van in search of a lake. I was a little concerned we didn't have any fishing equipment, but Jenean and Gloria seemed okay with it. Maybe we were going to get some practice being "fisher's of men?"

We arrived at Buenaventura and asked for a good deal (translation: free) to get in and fish. We were finally granted permission and walked around the lake. It turns out that Jenean had a fly fishing rod. The girls impatiently waited for her to put a fly on and then for the fish to start jumping out of the water.

After about 15 minutes, one of the girls said, "You mean we haven't caught anything yet?!?" They started to "snail" for snails and I soon had way more snails then I have ever wanted.

Magda smiles from her seat in the tree.

Needless to say but we weren't catching much. Karla found a stick and was using it to catch big weeds. We decided it was time to move on.

As we walked around the lake, looking for the perfect fishing spot, we came across a few fishermen with nice poles. I am not sure exactly what happened next, but they offered to teach the girls how to fish and let them use their poles.

Gloria, Michelle and I watched the action and tried not to get hooked by any bad casts. When it was my turn, Jorge asked me if I knew how to cast. I told him I did, but it had been awhile. Hmm...apparently way too long. I wasn't granted the privilege to cast again.

Lupita climbed up in trees to watch the action from a perch.

Watching Paola catch her first fish was such a joy, because she was so ecstatic and not grossed out about it at all. I was excited that we didn't have to take the fish on our drive back. As we packed up the two fishermen had a juntita and came back with this to say:

Jorge: Why don't you just take the fish she caught and the ones we caught too.

Me: (Silently screaming "No!" inside) Oh no, that is fine, we would never ask you to sacrifice your supper.


José (Now said with more passion) No, you must take these fish! These girls need to know how fresh fish taste.


Me: We don't have a container and you have already done so much, we have all these wonderful memories of the day.


Jorge and José: Girls, do you want to try real, fresh fish?


10 CVE girls: YES! YES!

Somehow it turned into the fish (in the bag) and then their watermelon. I really hope they didn't have starving families at home. Jenean, Gloria and I had talked...none of us had ever cleaned fish. We hoped with everything in us that the guys would be willing.

We left the smelly fish in the van to stop and take this picture.

Jeff and Limón came to our rescue and cut the heads off and then fileted the fish...I guess we had nothing to worry about. All who wanted to were able to enjoy some wonderful fresh fish for supper. :) We definitely have some work to do on our fishing abilities, especially because some of the girls want to go back to the lake every Saturday to "provide food for the whole orphanage." Kind of a high goal considering we caught one fish between the 13 of us! :)

More Creature Adventures with Jenna

This morning Jenna and I were getting ready to move her to a new room,when I heard her shriek from the laundry room where I stood. I turned the corner into her room expecting a tarantula or a scorpion...but no...it was something much uglier...a MILIPEDE!
Here the milipedes are rumored to have some of the most painful bites of any of the poisonous creatures. I lightly stepped on it, not wanting guts to spill across the floor. It wouldn't die. I squished it again, but apparently the desert milipedes are not easily extinguished. Jenna decided that if she painted it purple it would look less intimidating. I am not sure of it looking less intimidating, but it was mad! Good thing some of it's cavities and legs were squished so it was very slow in pursuing us.

I am not sure why almost every scary creature happens crawls out of dark corners when Jenna and I are together...We follow the same pattern: Shrieking, hashing out a plan of action, implementing the plan (at times that means running for a boy) and then laughing as we talk about the need to scrape it off the ground.

Maybe we need to invest in our own personal cans of Raid?

Storms in the Desert

Yesterday afternoon the rain poured down on CVE in powerful torrents that could only cause one to go and run in the rain. The kids (and some staff) enjoyed the downpour by prancing around, riding bikes and rolling around in puddles.

Uriel bikes through the rain, soaking anyone brave enough to get near him.

Michael runs through the puddles. He later laid down and did his "horse impression."

Steph had this great idea of coming out under the cover of a kiddie pool. I was a little wet but ran to join her when suddenly the kids attacked and toppled us!

The boys enjoy the rain and the rivers it left behind

Paola enjoys the fruit of Joel's labor as she stands under our new gutter.

"Then I will give you rain in due season, and the land shall yield her increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit." -Leviticus 26:4

"Amí, you are crunchy booger!"

Karla Josie giggled out this sentence in English. "What? I'm a crunchy booger?" I asked incredulously. "Yes! Crunchy booger, crunchy booger!"

After spending one day with the kids, I have noticed a lot of changes. One being that Karla Josie now has a cast because of her broken arm. Another huge change that I have noticed is the kids increased use of English. Steph has done an amazing job with her summer school English class and the kids have been quickly learning English. Although, I don't think I can credit Steph with some of the phrases I have been hearing, but rather, with a variety of workers and workteams here, the course has been supplemented with other English phrases. An example of a few of the phrases would be: "Amy, you old chicken." or an old favorite, "You smell like cow!"

According to some other coworkers, they had a great list of phrases to use with the past workteam...

"Do you want to marry with me?"
"Do you think I am handsome?"
"You are pretty."
"You run like a chicken."

Who takes care of these kids?
In other news, Yaneli looks like a different girl as her two front teeth finally started to grow in. :)

It is good to be back.

Ya regresé

A huge thanks to all the guest bloggers! You all did so well I think I might just turn the blog over to you and retire! :)

I had a great two weeks and am so thankful that I was able to spend time with different family and friends. As with most trips, I was sad to leave but ready to return. This morning I walked out into a beautiful Mexico. The rainy season has started and the mountians are starting to come alive with greenery and the grass looks vibrant. More than just the scenery has changed, the girls look so much older! Yaneli gave me her teeth that Gloria pulled as a welcome home gift.

A quick picture summary of my time in Indiana:

The Fiechter family (minus Travis) got together on Friday night.

Kristen and I stand with Janel and her daughter, Madison, who I just got to meet!

We spent time with the Kaehr family at Lake James. My equation for the week:

Twenty people+one cottage+only two bathrooms=lots of great and a few not so great memories. (Don't worry, I won't relive the not so great memories. ;))

We had the yearly "Hey, this might be the only time we are all together so we need to take a family picture" moment.

I can't say that everyone thought that was a good idea. :)

It was fun watching the boys excel in some classic water sports. Jay slaloms through the course.

But of course, as with most boys, they had to keep increasing the challenge. This may not look hard to you, but actually, the "chariot raft" proved too much for Heather, Kristen and I.

Danno shows us how it's done

Tadd and Chad's wakeboarding show

The boys decided that everything that is fun by yourself is better with another person.

Troy, Jeff and Ben ski. I think that Jeffy and Benny are high-fivin'

Thanks everyone for your continued love and support! It can't begin to express how much it means.

God bless,

amy

¡¡Ya Viene Amy!!

The Final Guest Bloggers:

The excitement here at CVE is mounting. In just a matter of hours, Amy will return!! We all will be thankful to hand back the blogging to her. (We are sure all of the blog readers will be happy too.)

Thanks for keeping the blog up, Amy, we are thankful that you do it!

The work of many hands but most importantly the work of many prayers

Guest Blogger #7 (what happened to #6)
Bill

As the last official work team of the summer left Friday I had to realize how much has been accomplished. Not so much in the buildings that have progressed but more importantly in the lives of both those that live here at CVE and those that have passed through only for a time. It is the work of the Lords hands and we continue to stand amazed as we have the privilege to see His hand at work. Friday after the group left I was out leveling out some gravel on the road that leads to the side entrance and had the 4 girls that were not able to go to swimming lessons in the tractor with me. As I went back and forth leveling the rock they were singing "Cristo me ama" (Jesus loves me) to there hearts content. It made me reflect back on the purpose of what we do here and on what is important. The Lord is building lives that desire to serve Him and we see his work progressing daily despite the distractions that the enemy throws our way. That is why it is so vital to us that you continue to lift up this work to the Father so that His name may be glorified, not the work of mans hands. Pray not only for the work here at CVE but also for your Church and for yourselves that we may have a unified body of believers that supports one another. Thanks to all that have shared a prayer, a talent, a week, a gift, or in a hundred other ways with us in the past. May the Lord draw you closer to Himself each day.



As an update to our current projects I am including the pictures of the church and group home. Many hands have made light work.


Assembly Room


Dining Room and Sunday School Rooms


Joan and Poncho with the church in the background


New Group Home


Sunset over the new Church. If you look closely you can see the sunset through the window at the top of the gable.

Life in the Comedor

Guest Blogger #5

Pepe

Welcome to the CVE Comedor, summer home of Maestro Limón y Maestro Pepe's classes.

The Rules are simple:

· Bring your stuff.

· Have a good attitude.

· Do everything as well as you can without staying in the Comedor.

· Be respectful.

Confused by rule #3? Don’t be. It’s just one of our ways getting the kids to leave so that we have more time to sneak back into the bodega for snacks.

We also accomplish this by sending the kids to sew or to work on their own in the corner.

Of course, this is an equal opportunity Comedor. Even the boys and the girl with a broken wrist are sent to sew.

Can you really blame us when we’re forced to teach while people bake wonderfully smelling pumpkin pies? I’m sure you’d send the kids off so you could sneak some food too!

What do the kids think of all this? Well, of course they’re not very pleased…

…but it’s ok. As we all know, it’s things like this that build character.

But of course, I’m kidding.

The third rule of the Comedor is not that the kids do their best work without sticking around; it’s that they do their best work without complaining. If you look closely at the “Reglas” picture you will notice that the incorrectly written quedarse has been changed to quejarse. Do your best without complaining! Much better.

And, though the Maestros do often make excursions to the bodega for snacks, all of the kids immensely enjoy their sewing classes with Marie (even the boys), and have finished some very impressive projects! As for the last two pictures of Magda and Fede with their unhappy faces, well, Magda was unhappy that I wasn’t giving her more math to practice (really!) and Fede was upset that he couldn’t remember where a certain country was.

In fact, the Comedor is a place of games…

…happiness…

…friendship…

…and even some actual teaching!

Still don’t believe me? Well, just ask Uriel. Look how excited he is to see that his schedule is filled with the blue that signifies a class with Pepe y Limón!

So my friends, have no fear. The CVE Comedor is a lovely place where children can come on hot summer mornings knowing that they will leave after a class or two with their minds (and their teachers’ stomachs) well-fed.