see you soon!

we're done here. hmmm... not sure how i feel about that. i may not know for several months. we played hard today. i'm not going to show pictures because you may get jealous. (really, i am too tired to wait for them to load.) we are all looking forward to seeing some of you at the airport. pray that these tired, weary women can keep our emotions in check and love on each other for one more day. thanks for all the prayers this week- they have been felt!

dios bendiga.

laughter, gossip and nicaraguan history

today started with american church at international church fellowship. there was a visiting pastor from.... greenville, sc! i have loved hearing the praise in spainsh, but it was nice to be able to sing along. it was a nice time.

then... girl day began. we went to the market and shopped-for two hours! i have NEVER shopped that long and enjoyed it. we had pupusas for lunch: these delightful, pancake looking things, filled with pork or beans or chicken or cheese or veggies or all of that. delish! then off to an overlook to learn more about this country than i ever thought possible. amazing how the ordinary, off the street nicaraguan can give you the countries history-including dates. how many off the street americans even know the vice president? (it's joe biden, by the way.) we had a man that stopped amber and told her that "he had something to tell us." 30 minutes later, we had to kindly stop him. he wants you all to know that all the people of nicaragua want is peace. we told him that we would bring his message back. a message of peace. isn't that what we all want? i wonder, now, did we miss an opportunity? we did not leave him with the words of true peace. the type that transcends all understanding and guards our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. man, i missed that today. forgive me Jesus. i was too focused on my agenda and did not see yours... the story of my life.

next: the grocery store. what?! my one week to not think about that and there i was, with my girlfriends, at the grocery store. (don't worry everyone, we cleaned the shelves of ALL the good coffee!) AND it's owned my wal-mart. beautiful. air conditioned. still a grocery store. you can buy anything from milk to underwear.

the evening ended with dinner and a time of fellowship with all the missionaries with Christ for the City and a birthday cake and ice cream for amber. what a sweet time with these wonderful people.

so you may be thinking: what did they do today? i gave how much, so they could do what? let me tell you how emotionally drained we have been. physically, this trip has been pretty easy, but emotionally... whew! story after story about hurt... we needed to rest our minds and our hearts. more importantly, i think this time was necessary for amber. she needed american girl time. what a blessing to have the honor of encouraging missionaries. i love that a day in town can do that for someone. in other words, your money has been well used- as have we!

tomorrow is debriefing day and a day to prepare to come back to you all. this can be very bittersweet. pray for us as we begin to reconcile all that we have seen and heard. we want to come home beginning to find all that Jesus has to teach us.