October 2021

October begins with rain and a lot of it. It was much needed and appreciated rain as it was so dry, hot, and dusty. Of course, I have a roof over my head so I can say that. For so many who still do not have shelter after the earthquake, rain is hard to deal with. There is no escape for some. Rain also makes it hard to travel because the roads may not be safe. Oti and I get really cold during the rainy season, some of the other missionaries laugh at me when I show up with a jacket and have a huge blanket on the bed.

We were able to receive our first team this month. LifeHouse was able to visit with their sister church. It was great to spend a little bit of time with this team and I know they were a blessing to their sister church.

If you read last month’s blog you know that I have been working on making my house more like my home. My canvases came in and this month they got hung up. Shoutout to the Nunemaker’s for helping me with that (and literally a million other things). I’m so happy with the way they turned out!

This month we began our time of traveling! In the second week of this month, we were able to visit six schools! This is such a fun time of year. We travel to each school to spend some time with them. We meet with parents, teachers, school principals, and the pastor. We also take photos of the kids and help them to write their thank you letters. When sponsors send cards or gifts we also give these out to the kiddos. It is so wonderful to see their sweet faces and be encouraged by their excitement. Some days you may see that we are in the office. On those days we are busy too! We translate the letters, edit the photos, add new kids into the system, and share info back and forth with our office in Florida. We also communicate with the schools about information and upcoming meetings.

On October 16th we had a family BBQ amongst the missionaries. The guys planned out this time and put in a lot of hard work. It was nice to spend time with everyone and have a kind of day off. On that same day, another event occurred that you may have seen on the news. I personally do not know any details and would prefer to not comment on anything that may be in the news. Please know that I am safe and continue to pray for all who are involved.

We had to put our traveling on hold for a bit which is not something that we like to do. It puts us behind schedule and also takes away our time from getting to spend time with the kids. This meant that while we were scheduled for about 8 schools a week we were only able to visit two in the third week of the month and 6 in the fourth week of the month. It did allow us to get caught up on some of the office work which was nice. I have also been able to spend more of these days at home working which Otis really enjoys.

I get many questions about how things are here, particularly during these times. Please, do not worry about me. I have seen reports of how things are and I want you to be aware that sometimes the reports use certain parts of the country and try to claim it is the entire country. Other times reports are just completely untrue. There is food to be bought, it may be more expensive than what it used to be but it is here. No, we cannot find everything that we have in the US but we never have been able to. And there are so many things I search for in the states that I can buy here but can’t there. There is gas somewhere around here it is just very difficult to get to. Again, it is very expensive and sometimes it is not being sold but it is here. Insecurity exists but RMI encourages us to be wise and vigilant. There are certain places I do not go and certain times of day that we do not travel, it is for our safety. Please do not be fooled by the media. Many people are suffering and have been for years but sometimes people embellish things. Continue to pray for everyone but know I am all good. Mama always says I am safer in the middle of God’s will than out of it. Also please remember that I cannot speak for the entire country or all of the missionaries here. I cannot even speak for all of the missionaries in the south, everyone’s experience is different. God has given me the peace to not be afraid during these difficult times.