A Full Day

Here are a lot of pictures from today. We had an eventful day. Mostly good but a little bad. Let's at least start with some good. This morning, Kerwin enjoyed playing after breakfast with his little buddy. We have posted a picture of the two of them together. He is usually good for an hour or so of free babysitting a day. Then I went to music class with Erin and we passed out the instruments to the kids. It was really neat. Erin got tons of donated instruments to give to the kids in the class. They are fifth and sixth-year students. She has flutes, clarinets, saxophones, trumpets, trombones, and drums. The kids learned how to put them together and take them apart. Wednesday and Thursday she will be seeing the kids in smaller groups to start playing the instruments.

After lunch, we went out visiting with one of the Haitian pastors, Pastor Fadino. Mike and I both really like him and enjoy going out to visit the people so we both went and took Kerwin with us on piggy back. This was a bit of a challenge because it was a bit more of a hike than the food run. We were going up the mountain and across some narrow little paths and over a stream. We visited two houses. The first was the home of a young woman who had been sick. She had a large tumor on her neck which was malignant. When we got to her house, we were told that she had died. Her mother and her son were both there and we prayed with them. The mother was very stoic at first when talking about her daughter; but after the prayer she began to cry.

Part way up to the first house, we stopped to rest for a minute. The house we stopped at was right next to a home with lots of people sitting outside. One of the little girls looked familiar and I realized that it was one of Kerwin's classmates, Kata. She is so sweet and so shy. She did talk with me a little and we got to take a picture of the two of them together. Kerwin seemed not to know what to think about the whole thing. He is usually very quiet and doesn't communicate much with us when we leave the campus. Every now and then he will point to something and name it like a goat or a kite.

The next person we visited was a lady whose house had burned down a week ago. She was living with family right next door to where all the rubble lay. Her mother had been burned in the fire and she was there in a brand new wheelchair that she had just received from the mission today. We were also able to pray for this woman and her family. Then, after we returned to the mission, the pastors were going to go back to her and give her some things to help her get back on her feet. The ladies in my Bible study had written me notes to open while I was down here. One of the notes included some money and had a note on it saying that she will be praying that God will show me a place where the money could be put to use. I was able to give that money to the pastor to take with him to the woman to help here start rebuilding her home. It was an exhausting trip physically and emotionally.

When we got back my hands were hurting so much and I was so frustrated with them being out of commission that I just sat and cried and then slept for a little while. (That was the bad part). Kerwin had fun though. When we got back we were all hot and nasty so we just threw him in the shower with Mike and he got to take his first shower. He thought it was a blast. Then this evening, the pharmacist found me a steroid cream that I am sure will help my hands heal. I had used the same one in the past and it had worked well but I was out of that medicine.

This evening it rained like it hasn't rained since we've been here. It felt wonderful to be cool for a little while. We actually put Kerwin's sweatshirt on him for the first time. Even though the wind feels great, the Haitian really suffer when it rains like this. Many of them live in houses that are not waterproof with dirt or cement floors. Many people will not sleep tonight because they cannot lie down. Please keep the Haitian people in your prayers as well. Some of the incline we went up today were nearly impossible to climb when it was dry. I can't even imagine trying to get somewhere with a muddy torrent to contend with.

We hope you enjoy the pictures. We enjoyed our day today.