Monthly Archives: March 2012

It’s another beautiful day in Ganthier, Haiti. The breeze is blowing, and the sun is burning off the clouds from the mountain. God has blessed us with fabulous weather for working. Today I am having to take a break from building the house. My fingers have blisters all over them from lifting concrete blocks without gloves on. Our gloves were stolen from our bags at some point during our flight here. Jonathan still has his and someone had extras for Tony and Jacob, so they are still able to work. Stan and I are going into town today, however, to set up our bank account here. That will be cool. We started a compost box today for all of the vegetable peels and such that Esther has left over when she cooks. We will start composting to prepare for our garden. We plan to grow peppers, herbs, tomatoes, onions, and melons right next to our house. A group from Florida is coming in next week to plant some banana trees, pineapples, and coconut palms. They said the palms will make good hammock spots too! Yay! More bedding areas! ha! We thank you all so much for your prayers. It has been a productive trip. This group from Petal is so much fun. I must go now. We love you all!!

Today we have not worked in the sun like we did yesterday, but we did unload a huge container truck that came for the clinic and a local orphanage. A group in Florida had donated 300 five gallon buckets of rice and beans as well as cooking oil and sugar to be taken to a local orphanage. We unloaded it all from the container truck, loaded it onto a flatbed, unloaded it from the flatbed to the clinic, then back onto the flatbed and then we took it to an orphanage and unloaded it again and stacked it in a little hut. Yes, it was a little crazy, and tiring, but it was great once we arrived at the orphanage and we got to see all of the children. They sang for us from their classrooms, then we got to meet and talk with many of them. There seemed to be hundreds! I will load some pictures once we return to the states. They love to show you how they can speak a little English, and of course, I try to speak what little Creole I have learned. They laugh at me. I imagine Southern Creole sounds a little funny. We met Esther’s parents who run the orphanage. These beans and rice will feed the children there for about six months. They were so excited. 

Now the men are back there trying to unload the rest of the container. It has hospital beds, mattresses, wood to make bunkbeds for the orphanage, and two HUGE generators. We have had to order a crane to come lift the generators to put them in place. Once they are up and running, we will have enough power to run a small city! Wow. And these generators were donated! God is providing for this clinic in so many amazing ways!!! 

Yesterday afternoon there were some children who were curious and hanging around the main door to the clinic compound. A few of us went out to meet them. They wanted to play soccer with us, but we were expecting the container to arrive any minute so we couldn’t. While we waited, I got out some water color paints I brought and some paper. They had a blast painting pictures for us. 

Oh, I almost forgot to mention the soap, germex, toothbrushes, and toothpaste we brought. We have given out some, but they have told us that we need to wait and give out the majority of it once the clinic opens. Those who have received soap here this week, however, have been very excited. You should see the look on these children’s faces when we hand them a bar of soap. They go running off to show everyone what we gave then. It’s very humbling. 

I can’t wait to load pictures so you can see what I am looking at right now. If you look at the mountain on my Facebook profile, that is what I see as I sit here and type. (The service is better out here) The sun is beaming down very hot, but the breeze is constant. I hear birds chirping, goats bahhh-ing (however you spell that), and children laughing at the well as they pump water for their families for the evening. It is so peaceful and beautiful. There is no way to adequately describe it. 

I better go now. We are about to go visit the village church where we went to church last Sunday. I will post again when I have a break and when the internet is clear. 

Thank you all so very much for your prayers. God is answering them daily!!

_Mickie

Thank you Lord for your protection and provision. I am overwhelmed and humbled by your love! We already share a beautiful friendship with Esther and the ladies she has brought to help her. I feel like Esther and I already have a special relationship. She adores Jacob and I can tell he loves her too. He calls her his Haitian Mama . She loves that. Yesterday was a day of hard work as we worked along side many Haitian workers building a house. Jonathan and Tony mixed mortar and concrete while Jacob and I laid block to build the walls. The team from Petal is fantastic! We have so much fun working together. A couple of the men are building cabinets for Esther’s kitchen too! God has provided the perfect group for the needs of this particular mission. Thank you Jesus!! I wish I had time and data to be able to share all of my thoughts with you all, but I will have to wait. I am keeping a journal and I will pour it all out in my blog when we get to Miami on Saturday. Just know that God is doing AMAZING things here! Thank you all for your prayers!!!

This is our house!! Praise the Lord!!

As I begin this post, it is 6:30 and we are planning to leave for New Orleans at 7:30, so in an hour we are going to be on the road to beginning another adventure to Haiti. We are staying in New Orleans tonight because we have to be at the N.O. airport at 4:30 a.m. We will be meeting up with Pastor Mark Farris of Vineyard Baptist Church in Petal and his team at the airport. We are very excited about meeting this group of people who will become our family for a week. We will fly out of New Orleans at 6 and arrive in Haiti around noon.

On this trip we will be getting to see our house in Ganthier for the first time in person. Since we were there last, teams have finished building the two clinic buildings, a mission team dorm with two bedrooms, the mission team kitchen and bath, a storage building to house the generators and other equipment, I think 7 Haitian houses, the wall surrounding the clinic grounds, and our house! All of this has been built since May of 2011! Wow. Amazing how much work has been accomplished already! I have no doubt that our arrival at the Village of Hope is going to be a very emotional one. We are excited that Vladimir is going to take us to church at Estimi’s church. Estimi is the village elder that is a leader in the community.

Well, we are out of time. It is time for our family to pray together before heading out. Please join us in prayer that God will give us protection, safety, wisdom, and use us in a mighty way for His kingdom. Pray that we will learn all we need to learn to prepare for our move. Pray that our group will get many things accomplished. Pray that no one gets sick or injured on the trip. And pray that we reflect the love of Jesus to everyone we come in contact with.

Thank you!! Mickie