Various Pictures

Yesterday we hosted Thomas's end of the year school party. His teacher asked us to do so weeks ago and we agreed thinking it would be a great time to minister/love on the parents, teachers and kids who attended. It was great! The kids had a blast and the Lord really opened some doors for us to build more relationships with these families. Each child had at least one parent in attendance and so we had a great time as adults as well. We look forward to more opportunities to love on these families with the love of Christ. Here are a few pictures from the party.

Below are a few pictures of the boys decorating our Christmas tree. We found a mini tree here and the boys were so excited we were buying a Christmas tree this year versus a Palm Tree.

Here is Micah in an outfit that both Thomas and Jacob wore--brings back so many memories!!

Thanksgiving

What a wonderful treat to have my mom and stepdad, sisters, brother-in-law and niece all come visit for 4 days over Thanksgiving!!! We had so much fun just being together!!! And my boys just ADORE their cousin, Anna. We so appreciate them sacrificing to come and bless us!! Here are a few pictures of our time together...

The Daniel Family

Many of you read a blog post from February where our friends David and Eva Daniel from our home church visited us for about 2 weeks to "scout out the land" here in Jaco. They have been praying and feeling led to this area to start a U-Turn for Christ ministry here. U-Turn is a ministry to men and women with addictions and they have been involved in this ministry at our home church, Calvary Chapel Lexington for a few years now. Many of you are fully aware of the way Satan has taken so many captive to addictions here in Jaco and the devastation it has caused. Anyway, it is OFFICIAL!! They (with their 4 children and twins on the way) are moving December 9th. God has confirmed in so many ways His plans for them to be here and be a part of what God is doing here in Jaco. We are just so excited for them and for us!!! We look forward to seeing all that God wants to do through them. We have been house hunting for them this last week and just found a house for them around the corner from us. We aregetting the house ready for them so it will feel like a "home" when they get here. Please be praying for Eva and David--for their last minute packing and organizing; for their travels here; for their transition to a foreign country...that God would be glorified through all and that they would feel His peace through it all as well!!!

On another note, here are a few pictures of the boys with their friends at their soccer game last week...

EcoRun 2011

Saturday I ran a 10K with a few friends to raise money for the turtle refuge in Hermosa (about 10 minutes from us.) We had so much fun!! Daniel and the boys borrowed a golf cart and drove around cheering us on by banging pots and pans--it was great! My favorite part of the race was when Thomas and Jacob met me close to the end and ran across the finish line with me...it was such a sweet moment for me!! Here are a few pictures of the event...

George's Baptism

Daniel got a call from his friend, Shawn, at the beginning of the week with good news. George wanted to be baptized!! George is a guy who was homeless on the streets of Jaco for many years and was a drug addict during his time on the streets. Daniel and Shawn got to know him through the homeless feedings Daniel has been a part of on Friday nights. Seven weeks ago George decided he had had enough and was finally ready for help. Shawn took him to Casa de Amor, a Christian rehab center in Quepos, and he has been there ever since. He came back to Jaco this week, 7 weeks later, to get his tooth fixed and told the guys he wanted to be baptized here as a symbol of the change the Lord has done on the inside of him. So, Daniel had the privilege of baptizing him at our house on Wednesday surrounded by all the guys that have been pouring into George and praying for his salvation. It was truly amazing and just more evidence that the Lord is doing something here in the streets of Jaco. The Lord desires lives surrendered to Him--praise the Lord George has finally surrendered! Please continue to pray for him as he has returned to Casa de Amor to finish his time there .

My sweet boys

Meeting Needs

Today we had the privilege of going down to Quepos (a city about 1 hr from Jaco) to take food that our church has collected for Casa de Amor. Casa de Amor is a drug and alcohol rehab center for men that is run by some wonderful missionary friends of ours, Kim and Laura Stilwell. They emailed us last week saying that they had great needs at the center for food and toiletry items. We presented the need to our church last week and what a blessing it was this week to see our church members wanting to help!! They provided tons of groceries for us to take and bless the ministry today. So, because Thomas was out of school today we made it a family day and went down with all of the goods and visited with Kim for a while. It ministered to us to be there with these men and they were so excited to receive all that we had, knowing the Lord had provided!! We then took the boys to a fun little restaurant for lunch called"El Avion" (the airplane). It is an actual a C-123 that was abandoned here after the Iran-Contra affair was exposed in the 80's. Later it was moved to Quepos and turned into a restaurant. They had a blast playing in the airplane and we enjoyed a delicious lunch there! Enjoy pictures of our day below...

Daniel with Kim (green shirt) and our friend Alejandro, who is an overseer at Casa de Amor

Here are the guys eating lunch

Here is some of the food we brought from the church donations

Daniel and George, a guy from Jaco who has been at the center for 6 weeks...Daniel knows him from the streets of Jaco--today was his birthday

The boys had so much fun!!!!