Silent Night, Steel Bands & Sunburn

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

 It's the most wonderful time of the year...

 Twins turning ten; they wanna have some friends

School festivities, will the schedule ever end?

Its the most busiest time of the year!

Ladies Bible study brunch, drinking sorral punch,

When friends come to call,

It's the happiest season of all!

With some visitor greetings and a few staff meetings

It's the most busiest time of the year!

There were  parties for hosting,

And we were all toasting

While caroling out in the sun's hot glow,

 The first Christmas story

And all of of its glory

Played out so the whole world could know,

The reason for the most wonderful time of the year!

 Flies on Christmas cookies,

Christmas lights in palm trees,

It seemed strange this time of year,

Christmas tunes I'm a humming

While the fan is a running,

But it's still the most wonderful time of the year!

Ok, I may sadly lack at poetic skills, but that kinda, sortaish sums up our December. We arrived back in Grenada on December 3rd and hit the ground running. It was a good thing though, because it took alittle to get adjusted to life here again. Being busy doesn't give me as much time to dwell on what I'm missing back home.  I will let the pictures give you a glimpse into what our December consisted of. Thankfully, we can celebrate Christ's birth no matter what country we're in!
 

                                          Ladies Bible Study Brunch....we had a brunch at our
                                           house instead of our usual Bible Study this month

                     They are ten now. Big stuff. Their stories start with, "Back when I was little..."

                        Ten years ago we were on the brink of sleepless nights, colic babies and
                         sheer exhaustion. I will take these days any day over the newborn ones!

"The Christmas of the Tissues"

I thought Kaylah was working on school work...I guess we could call it an art class...

                                       Mechanical work...one of his favorite parts of his job...

         He loves the challenge of trying to figure out where the problem lies underneath the hood...

                           LaBorie School's Christmas program...they did a wonderful job!
                                    Thank you teachers and students for all your hard work!

                                                                   "Carry your Candle"

                                                                   Fourth and fifth grade

                                LaBorie Mennonite School...the whole school, grades K-6th

 

                                                          Staff Christmas Banquet

                            Shawn Lapp is telling Austin Smoker something exciting! So cute!

           It had rained all morning and I was beginning to panic, wondering how we'll entertain             everyone indoors. Thankfully around lunch it cleared off and the children could play outside.

               December 15 brought these four young men to our little island. Three of them were
               in the youth group when we were youth leaders. We had a wonderful week catching
               up with them again! After they left, Carter said, "I wish they could have stayed
               for a year!" They loved all the attention they got!

               Chris thought it was just alright to have some Rook players living with us for a week!:)

        They moved a shed from the Laura location to our place for storage. They had to take it apart to
       move it, then rebuild it at our place. It was hot, hard work! (Or so they said, I wasn't a part of it:))

                                                             Rebuilding the shed at our house

                                                      The finished product...or almost finished.
                                   L-R Kenton Horst, Johnny Martin, Craig Martin, Chris & Justyn Nolt

                     Our boys thought having these guys help with dishes made it so much more fun!
                      I need to talk to their moms, because rumor has it they did stacks and stacks of
                      dishes when they little boys, WITHOUT complaining! Hmmm, I need some tips...

          There were quite a few visitors over this time with other staff, so one day we took the whole
         group on a little tour around the island. Above: Fish drying in the sun. They load it with salt,
          hence the finished product name, saltfish. I can't say it looked or smelled real appetizing!

                                                      Craig and Collin piloting an old airplane:)

                                     Pearls Airport, the airport that was used before the Maurice
                                   Bishop Airport was built. The old runway is used for drag racing.

                    Sugar cane mill....it is very old but they still use it to produce sugar for rum

                         Chris was glad for the boys help in setting up for the Live Nativity

                                 Covering the wooden frame with palm branches for the stable

  My biggest challenge was to get the laundry dried between rain showers. These jeans were almost     dry when it gave a quick down pour. With no dryer for back up, you have to find some different
 ways to dry them. I took them off the line and laid them in the sun in hopes of drying them faster.

                The one day the men happened to be around when these guys were dragging
               a net of fish in, so they helped pull it in. They were rewarded with a few small fish...

                                                           Filleting the fish from the net

                                                          Christmas Caroling in LaBorie

                    With some of the staff home for the holidays, it left Chris as the only driver for our
                      location. I think we almost broke a record with 20 adults and 5 children in the "bus".
                      They call it a bus but it looks more like a small van. Either way, it was packed!

    Headed to our next location to sing. This is the first time I got sunburned while Christmas caroling!

           We got invited to one of our church member's aunt's funeral. It was a Catholic funeral.

                              The grave yard. We couldn't stay for the burial because we had to go back
                              to LaBorie and bring down people for the Live Nativity that evening.

Live Nativity...we did two plays for two nights in a row at the Spice Island Shopping Mall. It was fun, but the children were ready to be done. Above: The donkey was so scarred from his traumatic ride to Bethlehem, he refused to carry pregnant Mary to the stable. He showed some donkey traits by biting, kicking and refusing to walk. In the end, we decided poor Mary will just have to walk to Bethlehem.

                                                                            My shepherd boys

                                     My angelic girls...at least they had to act like ones for a few hours!

  The Live Nativity included a mixture of narrative, youth singing and acting out the Christmas story

                                                           A quickly snapped family pic

Now the donkey decides it's ok to have someone ride him...after the play is over!

We took the youth Christmas caroling to the mall Christmas eve. I am thankful

 we have managed to teach our children to be attentive and sing out......or not:(

 

 

             We spend Christmas Day at Thaddeus and Rose. The food was delicious! While we did
              miss our families it was nice to have "family" in Grenada to celebrate Christmas with.

We spend the afternoon playing games. 

 While the gesture was appreciated, my world didn't feel very joyful when my silent night was interrupted by bells on Christmas Day....actually this steel band came later than the ones

 that came by EVERY morning the week of Christmas...BEFORE 5:00am...sigh...

just let me sleep, I don't feel like being merry and bright that early in the morning!

Needless to say, there was no sleeping in for the children that week!

                           The day after Christmas we had a picnic at church for church attenders

    They are teaching us some new games and we had fun playing them after lunch

 

                  This clubhouse in the bush continues to be a source of entertainment for the
                  children. They spend many hours back there, scheming up new booby traps,
                   ways to better their clubhouse and new membership rules....

Not only was I hearing drums out my front door, but now I'm also hearing them out the back door?!
                                  Practicing for the upcoming tour...the High Band (its).
                                 We are now accepting reservations for our 2015 tour.
                                 We will perform at your school, church or social event.
                                   Please call to make your reservation...314-jus-kidn
  Or you can visit them live, in studio.We will be happy to accommodate you!:) (We love visitors:))

             And that concludes the month of December...at least the events I took pictures at.:)

Prayer requests:

Bible Conference-Dec. 28-30

Crusades- Jan. 1-6

Speaker, Merle Burkholder and his wife Edith

Scott & Yvonne Martin-they plan to move here as pastor in March

 We are so thankful they have answered God's call to serve in Grenada!

The need for pastors in Grenada

From Sand Shovels to Snow Shovels

We would stare at their backs as they disappeared behind the sliding glass doors of the Maurice Bishop International Airport. Silently wondering what sort of adventures awaited our departing guests in the wild blue yonder. And what for adventures would await us when it was our turn to walk through those doors....
 "Only a few more months," we would say, our minds already attempting to form a mental picture of how it would be to see friends and family after being separated for almost a year.
 Then it was a few weeks. And finally, only a few days. For so long we had anticipated our trip home, that it seemed unreal that it would actually ever happen. But, finally it was our turn to walk through those glass doors and be transported to another world, so different than what we had become accustomed to. It reminded me of entering the Imagination Station in Odyssey and being transported to a different time and place in the blink of an eye....except it wasn't quite that fast.
   Did we have culture shock? I'd like to think we didn't, but there were some things that took me off  guard. Although it felt very much like we had come home as I walked down the corridor of JFK airport, everything seemed so big. And so modern. And so clean.
 For my husband, he experienced a taste of it soon after we stepped off the plane....
"Highway robbery!" he declared on the price of the sandwiches. "$10.00 American!!" He didn't find humor in the fact that I found humor in the fact that he emphasized the type of currency we were talking about. I just had to remind him we are in the US, therefore I do believe it's American money we're talking about, not Eastern Caribbean currency...
 I did not find humor in the fact that Carter laid his sandwich on the airport floor in order to receive the hand sanitizer I had whipped out in an effort to ward off Ebola, tuberculosis, AIDS, hepatitis and other foreign diseases floating around in an International airport. (Ok, maybe that's stretching it, but airports do gross me out.) I can't believe we didn't get sick the whole time we were home, other than colds. A miracle, I'm sure!
 Driving back from the airport everything looked so strange, yet so familiar! It was such a weird feeling! And the sun! It just set and set and set... We are used to the ocean swallowing up the flaming ball of sunshine in one big gulp and darkness falling in a matter of minutes. I forgot how long it took the sun to set back home. Another thing that I thought of was how flat everything seemed and how far you could see. I guess living in hilly Grenada will do that to you. And the place we stopped for gas....as I eyed the rows and rows of candy and snacks, I thought, "Wow! This is one well-equipped convenience store!"....then I realized it's really just a typical store, unlike the little tiny shops in Grenada.

 Ok, without further ado, here is a whole slew of pictures, which will give you a little glimpse into our visit home....

Waiting for our plane. Our excitement knew no bounds! John & Rachel Brubaker dropped us off at the airport. We hugged them goodbye, knowing till we come back, they will have completed their term in Grenada and returned home. We will miss them alot! Even though they were the oldest missionaries, they added so much spice and spunk to Grenada! The island won't be the same without them.

Virgil & Dolores Nolt and Jason & Coleen Brubaker picked us up at the airport. (Thanks again!!) Neither of our parents have a vehicle big enough to fit us and all of our luggage in, so I wasn't expecting to see my family till we got dropped off there. What a wonderful surprise to see mom and Elsa get off the bus at the airport! It never had even crossed my mind that they might come along! I can't even begin to describe how good it was to see friends and family again! Oh happy day!:)

 After not driving for almost a year, I was as giddy as a 16 year old to be able to get behind the wheel again! I was worried I would forget how to drive but it came right back....and was as much fun as it was when I was sixteen years old!!:)....Now my husband was another matter....he drove in Grenada, so he didn't forget how to drive, BUT, he occasionally forgot how to drive in America. Let's just say he had to remind himself the turn signal lever will not change gears for you and it's not a real good idea to drive on the left side of the road in America....the children were more than happy to tell him he's doing it all wrong.

Ah, home sweet home! Or is it? Seems sorta strange to see someone else's stuff in our house. 

We are so thankful for good renters though! And an extra bonus, it's family. The children went flying right in the front door. I had to remind them that, technically, this is not our home anymore and they should be knocking before entering.

One of the first things we did was take Collin to Lancaster Orthopedics to get his arm evaluated. He had broken it in February and it had healed wrong, giving him limited mobility in his wrist. After an x-ray and seeing where the break was, the doctor decided at this point it would be best to hold off on surgery, as he is afraid it would do more harm than good. The break was close to his growth plate and doing something as invasive as surgery could mess with the growth of his arm. We will watch it to see if it straightens out on it's own as he grows, and hopefully he will regain full movement of his wrist. The doctor said the body has an amazing ability to heal itself, so we are hoping that's what happens. I was so thankful we didn't have to try to fit surgery into our busy weeks at home.

Carter and some of his buddies! For the past few years, some of our friends have been going to the cabin over hunting season. We had resigned ourselves to missing out on it this year, but when we realized our visit home happens to be over the same time we couldn't resist going for at least part of the week end. Chris thought it was just pretty much fun to hunt deer by day and fox by night!

Chris's family had planned to go the cabin the next week end, so we joined them for part of the week-end. Was nice to have more time than just evenings to spend together. As usual though, it went way too fast!
 We spend the first week and a half with Chris's mom. Since his dad passed away from brain cancer 2 years ago, she was glad to have some noise in her house again and have someone to cook for. She was a wonderful hostess!

The cousins playing Pit...a game that is fun for the players, but hard on the ears for everyone else!:)

The last week and a half we spend at my parents. They have a 

litter of puppies right now that the children had so much fun with!

                                And it even snowed! I didn't expect this, but it was fun to
                                drive in, play in and whatever else you like to do in snow!:)

The children had fun playing with their cousins in the snow at my parents.

And Carter was thrilled that Grandpa let him drive this all by himself!

This picture has a funny story behind it...the children were overjoyed to drink "real" milk again. After my mom realized her milk is going down really fast, we had an idea. To see if Grandma's "real" milk really tastes better than powdered milk, we mixed up some powdered milk and put it in the jug the "real" milk came in. It didn't take long till they were once again filling their cups to the brim with milk. We just watched and waited (and snapped a few pictures:)) to see what would happen. They gulped it right down. I asked them if Grandma's milk tastes better than powdered milk....they said "Yes!!! Much better!!" You should have seen how big their eyeballs got when I told them they just gulped down powdered milk! It was so hilarious! (Disclaimer: Chris claims powdered milk in the States tastes much better than powdered milk in Grenada)

               My brother Ray works for Farmer Boy and had to wear this costume for a parade
               they were in. He couldn't resist giving the children a scare...or at least trying to!:)

We had my family's Christmas on Thanksgiving Day. We were shocked, grateful & humbled when we were presented with a monetary gift from a sub sale on our behalf. It was a huge blessing to be able to put that toward our plane tickets for our visit home. Thank you all soo very much that were a part of that! A special thanks to mom, Elsa, Lynette & Jess for all their stress, hard work and time they put into it!

My adorable nephew, Austin Banks. Another surprise for the day, we learned he's gonna have to
 give up his title as the one and only child till summer...Congratulations Cliff & Lynette!!

                 Oh, how we laughed...my brother Cliff made a DVD of old home movies...such craziness!

     My sister and her family came down from New York on Wednesday before Thanksgiving. Church got canceled that night because of the snow, so we had extra time together. Was so wonderful to hang out and catch up again! The men played many games of Rook.

                                                 Our Thanksgiving/Christmas meal.

I am blessed to have my both sets of grandparents yet! (Well, not quite. My grandpa Earl Martin died in his 40s, but my grandma remarried Amos Hurst so he's the only grandpa I remember and seems like my "real" grandpa:)  We got to visit both sets of grandparents, an opportunity I don't want to take for granted.

                      The children love Uncle Jay...especially when he has a candy scramble
                           for them and they have bags full and overflowing with candy!:)

I believe it's safe to say she's double jointed

Chris and "his" boys...was so good to catch up again with the youth that were part of the youth group when we were youth leaders. Chris even got a birthday cake out of the deal!:)

Me and "my" girls...thank you Leonard & Leanne for getting 

this  together. Was so very good to see everyone again!

                                          Collin & Carter always like to pick on the guys....

Maybe next time they'll pick on someone their own size!

Chris & Tom Martin share birthdays, so when we happened to be invited 

to Virgil & Dolores Nolt that night, she made sure they had a cake to celebrate!:)

Gingerbread man pancakes are extra special when Grandma makes them!

The church had a farewell party for us the Sunday evening before we left to fly back to Grenada. We are so blessed to be part of a caring congregation! They stood behind us in prayer many times this past year and we are so thankful for that!

                                                                   Girls-a-skipping....

                                                          Collin and some of his friends

                                                                   Some cute girls

                                                                      Some silly girls:)

                           Some of my friends...I often thought, serving on the mission field
                     would be much easier if I could just bring my friends and family along!:)

                                                   Chris and some of the youth guys

Playing games at the school the evening of our farewell party

                                      Saying goodbye to family...we went to Chris's mom for
                                        supper, then to my parents for the rest of the evening

  My adorable twin nephews...it's hard to believe they will probably be walking till I see them again!

                                                       Last evening with my family

This little girl was heartbroken and sobbed and sobbed when they had to leave. We will miss you too, Hailey! I found this note on my pillow from her....tears falling from the "I"....

The dreaded final goodbyes...I hate them. They don't get any easier. In fact, they were even harder this time. Maybe because I'm not naive to the fact of how long it really is till I will get to see everyone again. I guess I should be thankful I have friends and family to miss...

                          Dwight & Heidi Fox drove us to the airport...more goodbyes:(

Waiting for our plane to whisk us back to where we came from...our adventure in the Imagination Station is over. The weather was dreary. It matched my mood. It was so good to reconnect with everyone again, but it was hard to leave everyone again. We made many good memories though that will last a lifetime!

Home from home. Yes, that is exactly how it felt. There is an article floating around on social media right now about how a missionary feels like they have no home. They don't totally fit in in the culture and country they are serving in, but when they go back to their home country, they feel like they don't fit in there either. People have moved on in their lives, made other close friends and basically learned how to live their lives without them around. I am sure there is truth to that article, especially for those who have served a longer amount of time, or maybe singles, whose friends got married and moved on to a different phase of life. I must say though, that I was surprised how much it felt like home yet. I'm sure it made a difference that we weren't gone quite a year yet. It still felt "normal" to walk into our church Sunday morning. "Normal" to sit and chat with friends I hadn't seen in almost a year. So fun to sit around the table with families, eating and catching up on all that happened this past year.
 On the other hand, while I still feel like I'm adjusting to life in Grenada again, (the heat! Is it always this hot & humid?:) it was good to see my friends around here! So, instead of feeling like I have no home, I'd like to think I'm one of the lucky ones that has two homes and blessed to have friends on both ends of the globe!