Gimme an N…gimme an O….

Gimme a R-M-A-L

Whadda ya got? NORMAL!
Say it again? NORMAL!

How’s it make you feel? NORMAL!!!!!!!!!

The cheering that is coming out of our house in response to that is enthsiastic like you wouldn’t believe!!!

So, I’ve been getting a kick out of unloading the dishwasher.

We’ve done school three weeks straight…EVERY MORNING!!

There are laundry piles on the couch waiting to be folded….and that’s ok! (even some that still probably needs to be switched over to the drier, but that’s ok…it’s not going to get moldy, and nobody else is waiting for the machine!!)

Matt and I are joking around as we go through our days!

The boys are doing a basketball camp!

We’ve been playing outside!!

We went to the park and the library today!

NORMAL…what a sweet sweet sounding word! (normal, normal, normal..definitely has a ring!)

I realize that I have been totally distracted by the joy of putting laundry away in a dresser, and filling a bookshelf with books that had been in storage but are waiting to be read, and haven’t blogged in a long while. In putting my heart into settling our family, and settling us well, I have more or less ignored the computer. But finding a bit of normal seemed way way WAY more important!

We’re more or less done unpacking (and repacking the trailer). We’ve had three whole weeks without having to make any major moves or life-changing decisions. We’ve played some games, done some baking, gone for some walks, given little boys much needed haircuts, shopped the sales at the grocery store, shared a super fun lunch with the Pleasant Valley Get-Together Club, and have sniffled through colds.

We’ve been sleeping. I’ve read three books (seriously!! and they weren’t bedtime stories!). We’ve even found little opportunities and the energy to serve!!!

Matt actually turned to me today as we were driving into town and said “In 6 days we’ll have been in the Howard house for a month!”

This really doesn’t sound like big news, but for our travel-weary family, it is a major milestone! And we are so so so thankful to be in this house and having this rest!

We’ve turned a corner in our hearts as well…God has re-ignited the spark in our souls to figure out where He would have us serve. We are still heeding WorldVenture’s advice to not rush into anything, but until this week neither of us had the energy to even think about it!

Praising the Lord for rest and rejuvenation of spirits!

Elijah has stopped verifying each morning where we will stay and sleep that day. Suitcases and boxes are gradually finding homes out of sight. We’ve even gotten some mail!!

Now that we’ve got a rhythm, I am finding more time to catch up on emails and hopefully to blog again. We are both going to get started with our bible study courses. We are beginning to explore new ministry options for our family. It is an exciting time, but a calmer time now that our feet are more under us!

I never could have imagined how much Kristy the “keep changing it up so life never gets dull” girl could be loving or needing this time of peace, stability and rest. My Jesus sure knew, and I am eternally thankful!

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Seven nights and counting!!!! OH YEAH!

As of today ALL our boxes from Guatemala are UNPACKED!!!

Yes, you are reading right! Unpacked…and the majority of it is PUT AWAY!!

WE HAVE A HOME!!!!

7 sleeps later, I think we are finally starting to believe that we actually have a place to live and not just “stay” for a while! And, it feels so wonderful!

God has taught me some serious lessons in the past months about not trying to make things just happen myself if He’s asked me to wait.

We had been in Salida since the 19th of December staying at our friends, the Richardson’s house while they were on vacation. We had spent the week before Christmas calling places from the newspaper, looking into a couple of leads from church and beginning some pretty serious talks about how much we were going to need to increase our housing budget just so we could find something remotely suitable.

I felt uneasy though. As Matt and I were talking one day, we were discussing how we needed to be careful we weren’t taking over the process just trying to squeeze ourselves into a house, and not being patient enough to allow God to provide.

Boxing day (the day after Christmas for all my non-Canadian friends…), we were getting packed up to leave for WinterPark again. I had gone through all our boxes and bags to pull out the things we needed for school, a few different books and toys and some other clothes for everyone. We planned to stay in WinterPark until the 25th of January (in the spectacular house of another amazing family we’ve just met!). Matt had all the bags we were leaving in Salida stacked up in the room to store, and all the bags that were going with us down were by the front door ready to pack up the car. I was cleaning the kitchen and he was coming down the stairs with another load when he heard the Richardson’s answering machine going in their office.

“Hey Messicks…it’s Buss…I sure hope you haven’t left yet for WinterPark…if you are there still, can you give me a call…I think we might have found a house for you…I hope you haven’t left yet.”

Seems that Taylah had been playing with our phone earlier in the morning and it was disconnected. As a last ditch, my sweet friend decided to try the Richardson’s number to see if we’d pick up.

We called her back and she told us about a house that seemed way too incredible to be true…3 to 4 bedrooms, about 30 minutes from town, fully furnished….did we want to wait to try and go see it that afternoon??

Are you kidding me?????????

We went to see the house…and just stayed!

There is an incredibly gracious and kind family from Texas who are letting us live in their house while they are not using it! And, what a gift from God! It is bright, sunny, and BIG! The kids have space to play inside and outside! There is everything we could need here to have a “normal life”. I am three miles from a dear dear friend, and only a short drive in to town! And best of all, we can stay here a while!!!!!!!

Praise God for his provision!!

All Christmas week, I had been working on reminding myself to SURRENDER the housing situation to the Lord. That by SURRENDERING it, I didn’t need to worry about it, it wasn’t my issue to work out, that I could trust that He would provide a home for us and we would know when it was right.

Monday as we were packing up for what we thought was going to be a trip to WinterPark, I wasn’t feeling the normal “I never ever ever EVER want to have to do this again” grumpiness that has been part of each of the last oh 8 or 9 moves we’ve made. I felt strangely at peace, and resigned to the fact that if God has more moves for us, it is ok, I will survive. I had finally surrendered to the Lord and was just moving.

And that my friends, was the morning the Lord gave us a more incredible home than we could have possibly imagined. Was He possibly waiting for me to get my attitude in order to give us our hearts desires?

This verse keeps coming up, but wow has it impacted us this last while! I don’t know if I had quite gotten to delighting in Him over packing everything again, but I sure was trusting and finally (read finally) willing to truly surrender to His plan….

Psalm 37:4
Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart

To all of you who have been praying for a house….Thank you thank you thank you for your prayers!!!
Wooo Hoooo!!!!

The joy of timing!

I am totally smitten with my kiddos…and totally biased that I think they are all pretty great! They are all so different though too, each has his (or her) own bent. One…maybe we’ll call him ‘Micah’, is the rule guy. He is very literal and wants to make sure rules are followed.

We presented about our time in Guatemala at church today. The two younger kids were downstairs in their classes and Jonah and Micah had stayed in the church to listen. Micah had gone to find himself some water and had stayed to help his little sister who was having a hard time in the nursery.

Part way through our presentation, Micah came back into the sanctuary. I figured he had found his water and was coming back in to sit. But, he walked down the aisle, and walked right on past where we had been sitting. What was he doing?

He walked up to us standing up on the stage and I almost thought he was going to come and stand with us. Instead he held a hand up to us holding a starburst candy and said (pretty quietly at least)…”excuse me, someone gave this to me downstairs, can I eat it??”

“Yes, go ahead” we whispered back with our microphones on for all to hear.

And, satisfied that he had done what he needed to do, that rules had been followed, he turned around and walked back down the aisle, out the door and back downstairs.

Smitten with my kids!!

(And more than a little challenged by his desire to always do what is right!)

TukTuk the transportible!

As we looked through our trailer for winter clothes for the kiddos we found a little Christmas tree we had bought for Jonah as a toddler to have in his room. Because “home” is still a little fluid right now (4 moves in December), we figured we’d need a portable Christmas tree…and so, we re-welcomed newly named “TukTuk” into the family.

Tuktuk is the name of a Guatemalan rural taxi, because we figured a transportible tree was going to need a transportible name!

Friends, meet TukTuk. TukTuk, meet our friends!

But TukTuk needed some transportible and cool decorations, so while we were in WinterPark we set our little craft workshop in motion!

In the mornings we would do a little “regular” school…and then a whole lot of “making crafts” school…you can imagine which was more popular!

After we got going, I wondered whether a full-size tree would have been more appropriate for the enthusiasm the kids had!!

Each piece was a masterpiece!

We used beads, sparkle glue, pipe cleaners, pompoms and anything else we could find that sparkled or looked “Christmasy”

It was definitely a time of making up for a lack of “craft-time” while we were running around so much in Guatemala!

And…EVERYONE wanted to take part!!

We made jingle bell reindeer…

Some crazy pompom balls (these might have been the favourites!)

Of course a wreath or two…

It was a sight I have missed for a long time!!

The kids were super happy to have Mom available to “play” for a few days, and not constantly packing or unpacking!!

The snowflakes were a BIG hit! We started making some snowflake magnets for special friends too!

We made some pretty cool Christmas balls that we had to leave dry on the chandelier until they were ready to put on the tree!

Jonah really like making ‘presents’ to hang on the tree!

Taking a break from making crafts for a snack and a ‘sit still everyone!”…

The craftpersons!

Gradually, TukTuk began to look more and more like a Christmas tree!!

And, we got to doing some sledding and playing outside!

 

Just a small miracle to get all 6 of us sitting in one place at one time (and actually all looking in the same direction!).  What we’ve learned this year is that NOTHING is more important than the family God has given us, and we are so thankful for every moment He gives us as a family!

So, from our family to yours, we wish you a full understanding of the GLOOORY of Christ’s birth! As one of the boys said today…life would have been a whole lot different if Jesus hadn’t been born! Ain’t that the truth!

Merry Christmas from the Messick Crew to you and yours!!!

Handled with Care!

When we were first introduced to WorldVenture as a mission agency in 2008, it was through some of their missionaries, the Campbell family serving in Senegal. They seemed to love WorldVenture telling us how well the organization cared for it’s missionaries.

What does it mean to take care of missionaries? What is it they even need?

Unfortunately, but so thankfully these last two months, we’ve been able to find out just how wonderful an organization WorldVenture is when it comes to caring for their staff.

Cross-cultural living and ministry can be tough…that is an understatement. It IS tough!

 

There are unique challenges and stresses that are hard to even describe. There are interpersonal relationships that are further complicated by cultural barriers, language barriers, and often even value systems that are polar opposite to each other. There can be logistical nightmares with banking, taxes, immigration and health care. There are sometimes disasters, political emergencies and the need for quick interventions in time of emergency. There is culture shock, reverse culture shock and all the unique needs of kids growing up in so many different places they try to identify as “home”. There is loneliness, illness, exhaustion and discouragement. There can be marital and family problems…

Caring for and encouraging over 500 missionaries is a big job, and WorldVenture does it well!

 
There are folks on staff who work with missionary kids (Sheryl visited a couple of times with the boys our first week back as they tried to figure out finding yet a new ‘home’). There are staff working in a department called the Paraclete Centre and who were willing to sit with us just to help us process the changes and look to things to come. There are folks at WorldVenture who will help us keep connected with our supporting churches while we are here. There is our immediate supervisor who travelled from Brazil to Guatemala to support us and facilitate some meetings for us (and his wife who loves on us from afar!). There are regional admin folks who keep track of our latest addresses, whereabouts and logistical stuff when we seem to move every other day. And, there is a “Super Cheryl”, who keeps all the meetings organized, offers up encouragement, and acts as an amazing cheerleader through everything! She always makes sure there is a fun note on the door to the room we are staying or the kids are the recipients of a certificate congratulating them for some new feat!! (Not to mention there are a ton of folks who work to keep everyone’s finances in order, collect and send mail, and just plain keep WorldVenture running!!!)

 

The staff has stood behind us, encouraged us, prayed for us, loved on us and given us plenty of hugs since we’ve gotten back to head office!

 

We’ve been asked several times if we will find another organization to work with when we return to the field. Our answer has been a resounding   NO WAY!   We are so thankful for WorldVenture and it’s commitment to supporting, encouraging and preparing their overseas workers to serve effectively!

 

We look forward to working with WorldVenture these next months as we begin to look at serving in a longer term capacity and to figure out where God has us next!

 

Have you felt God’s call to overseas ministry on your life? Take a peek at WorldVenture.com (There’s a shameless plug, but if The Campbell Family hadn’t been bragging about their organzation to us, we never would have found out about them either!)

Kitchen Confusion

“Mom, can I have a glass of water?”

“Sure, just grab a glass…it’s over there”

“No, those are plates”

“Right, I am thinking of Miss Donna’s kitchen, how about over there?”

“Nope that one is just full of bowls”

“I guess that was Miss. Lara’ house…at WorldVenture they were over the sink, in Guatemala they were down where you could reach them (opening cupboards)…oh, there they are!”

“…It’s ok…I went and got a drink out of the bathroom sink”

(ok maybe I am overexaggerating a bit, but you get the point!)

I have a serious case of kitchen confusion! You know, when you go to get a plate in a kitchen that is new to you and you continually find yourself reaching for the spot you knew the plates were in the last kitchen you were in, or the most familiar kitchen to you? Since the 1st of November, we’ve been learning where to find things in 5 different kitchens (6 if you count the fact that as people were buying the furniture right out of our house, we were continually reorganizing our own kitchen in Guatemala trying to find places to put things!).

As I sat down to write this blog I planned to share that figuring out the kitchen-of-the-week is just a funny funny part of our days…and most of the time it is pretty amusing trying to put dishes away, but I’d not be me if I didn’t admit that there have been a few tears shed as well…

Does it really bother me that much that it takes a few tries to find a mug to put hot chocolate in? No.

Am I exceedingly thankful for the warm, cozy and inviting kitchens we’ve been blessed to prepare or share meals in these last weeks? Oh yes!!

Are you tired of reading news that we are still homeless? I sure am!

But, that’s where we are still! Can you believe there aren’t bazillions of houses empty and waiting lining the streets of Salida where we can pay $500 in rent and all be able to actually move around in without crashing into each other?

So the tears aren’t so much that the spoons just aren’t where I thought they were, but rather, we are still in temporary-land. And, as incredible as temporary-land is here in ‘the boys can spend hours a day sledding outside’ Winterpark…our time is coming to an end next week, and we aren’t sure what comes next.

But there is that hopeful trust. God has provided everything we’ve needed up to this point, and I can trust Him to continue to provide!

Is it frustrating not to know where our next “home” is? you bet!

Can I be sure there is a lesson in this time of waiting, uncertainty and transient-ness? Yes…and I am guessing it isn’t a lesson in “things come easily to those who eat their vegetables”.

Is it humbling to look past my own selfish desire as a mama for a nest for my family, to the lives of dear friends who are struggling through far more challenging things right now? ummmm….ashamedly yes.

So tonight, I am enjoying a fabulously stocked kitchen, loading up a DISHWASHER after homemade pizza while the kids munch on fresh chocolate chip cookies.

Warm fresh cookies and milk...but where to find a glass??

And as I share this with you, I thank the Lord for a warm house, for lots of space to run around, for games, for a kitchen full of forks and knives, and I resolve myself yet again to say, “Father, we’ll go where you send us, we’ll wait while you ask us, we’ll live where you plant us, and we trust your plans”

And maybe, just maybe one of these days, I won’t have to keep reminding myself that I resolved to feel this way! (Doesn’t take much to see how the Isrealites kept getting themselves into such trouble does it?)

Thanks for listening and lifting us up in prayer!

Packed up tight

wanted: shelves and drawers to settle down in!

Here is our life as we brought it back from Guatemala. It has just moved yesterday from the VW van of one sweet friend in Salida to the upstairs guest room of another in town.

We’re living out of one suitcase and one duffle bag right now. The boxes are all still taped up tight. We haven’t dared begin unpacking the rest because there still isn’t anywhere to put it.

We’re still ‘homeless’.

House…home…shelter…They’re all represent a similar thing, but are still pretty different.

True, we have no house we can call ours, where we can unpack, where we can leave our toys out on the floor, where we can put up Christmas decorations, where we can turn the music up loud and jump around as a family.

But, we’ve been blessed to be in the homes of a few dear dear friends these past couple of weeks. They aren’t our homes, but we’ve been made to feel we are completely and totally welcome. And, we’ve been blessed by some incredibly kind offers of places to stay!

Elijah is having a hard time with the moves. He gets tired, upset and begins to cry “I want to go home”. Twice now, it has broken my heart to have to tell him we don’t have a home, that home is where we are staying at the moment. (Seems that 3 nights in one place and we’ve begun to set down roots!) Our prayer is that will change soon and he will have a home to go to when he is tired!!

No, this isn’t ideal. But this is our reality right now.

I got an email the other week with this picture that about brought me to tears…true, we don’t have our own “home”, true we are carting around a mess of boxes waiting until we can finally unpack, true this gypsy life is tough on little ones. But, we are sheltered. Truly sheltered, loved, provided for and cared about.

We've got nothing to worry about!

Psalm 91:4,

He will cover you with his feathers. He will shelter you with his wings. His faithful promises are your armor and protection.

I also got another email this week reminding me that nothing about our being here is a mistake. That for this season we are here, and that if we cling to Jeremiah 29:11,then we can let go of the frustration and discouragement of not having a place to call home yet, and rest in the shelter He has provided!

“For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope”” (Jeremiah 29:11)

Shelter is pretty sweet.

You are my mighty rock, my fortress, my protector, the rock where I am safe, my shield, my powerful weapon, and my place of shelter. (Psalm 18:2)

Your love is a treasure, and everyone finds shelter in the shadow of your wings. (Psalm 36:7)

Homeless is ok for now, as long as we continue to rest rest under God’s amazing shelter!

P.S. Thanks to all who have sent ideas for housing! We are really hoping to stay close to our home church and will try to exhaust all options here before we start to look further away! Thanks for your thoughtfulness!! We have several options we are looking into, and we pray God makes it clear where we are to set down roots for a bit! There are so many things to consider when “settling” six of us!! Thanks to all who are praying and offering suggestions!

Seven Cents!!

One of the highlights for the kids are the WorldVenture bicycles!

It was COLD yesterday and we realized that the boys just didn’t have the clothes they needed for the hours and hours they want to spend riding the bicycles here at WorldVenture. If we were going to be playing outside, we were going to have to find a few warmer clothes for each of the boys, and Taylah needed some winter clothes period (she’s never seen winter before!).

Shark-man Elijah!

After a little 'practice' Micah remembered how to ride!

The spidey rider

I’ve always loved reading stories of God’s incredible provision. He gives lovingly and abundantly to His children. He provides what is needed, not excessive, but what is needed. Always.

Hearing those stories always gives me chills.

Last night someone had pressed some money into my hand and said “I am sure you’ll be needing to get some things for your family”.

This morning, all the kids had a “date” at the park with Sheryl, one of the WorldVenture staff who works with missionary kids. When we had to send Taylah out dressed as a perfect candidate for some sort of a TV reality show “my parents dress me funny!” (onesie under a dress, leggings with pyjama bottoms overtop, two pairs of socks, a light hoodie, and wrapped in a blanket), we realized we should probably get some clothes sooner than later!

We took advantage of all the kids being gone to run out to one of the local thrift stores and started to pick out some warmer things for them. We found just what we needed to get thru the next few weeks, knowing that we’ve got some things tucked away in storage in Salida, and headed to the cash.

Should I have been at all surprised when she rang all the clothes thru and the final total was 7 cents less than we had been given last night??

God's love and provision is everywhere we look!

God’s hand is on every bit of our lives. Every bit.

Praising Him for everything!!

Jesus said to his disciples:
I tell you not to worry about your life! Don’t worry about having something to eat or wear. Life is more than food or clothing. 24Look at the crows! They don’t plant or harvest, and they don’t have storehouses or barns. But God takes care of them. You are much more important than any birds. Can worry make you live longer? If you don’t have power over small things, why worry about everything else? Look how the wild flowers grow! They don’t work hard to make their clothes. But I tell you that Solomon with all his wealth wasn’t as well clothed as one of these flowers. God gives such beauty to everything that grows in the fields, even though it is here today and thrown into a fire tomorrow. Won’t he do even more for you? You have such little faith! Don’t keep worrying about having something to eat or drink. Only people who don’t know God are always worrying about such things. Your Father knows what you need. But put God’s work first, and these things will be yours as well. ~Luke 12:22-31

Our flight is tomorrow!

Here we are, our last day in Guatemala. Never thought it would be so soon, and we certainly never thought it would be this way. But, we also realize now that we would never ask for the ‘easy street’ version of life and miss out on all the richness of growth and blessings that seem to sprout best in the dirty muck of real life.

People have been asking how we are doing with the transition. Matt and I were talking about that this morning. The honest answer isn’t really the polished or completely spiritually mature answer. We are tired, we are discouraged, we are battling feelings of failure no matter how unfounded they are, at times we feel resentful, and can’t see much farther than the next step ahead of us. Not that we’ve experienced the sort of tragedy that totally de-rails you, but rather that our emotional, mental, spiritual and physical reserves seem to have bottomed out after fighting a battle that never should have had to be fought.

We aren’t sure what to expect or have a sense of what comes next. We figure we’ll get back to Colorado and spend some time visiting with folks we love and, as our tanks start to re-fill, we’ll begin to get a better sense of what is next.

We all hurt in different ways over different things. That is how we were created, to feel. Sometimes though, we might feel like we don’t deserve to hurt. I was uncovering emails this morning that I needed to answer and found one from a woman who lost a child less than a month ago. What do I know of discouragement and grief over an incompatible field placement , compared to someone who has released a child into the arms of Jesus. It feels a little ridiculous that we are experiencing the feelings we are, but also encouraging to know that God made us to feel, and that part of growing closer to Him is through living, experiencing, processing and understanding the path He’s laid out for each of us to walk.

Please pray as we fly home tomorrow that we figure out ways to rest and process, that we share wonderful times of connecting with friends, and that we begin to sense clearly God’s path for us.

There is a volcano hiding behind us...just too many of us!!

One more big prayer request : We had planned to stay in the home of a family from Salida who were going to be travelling. Their plans have just changed, and they will be staying in their home. Please pray for housing for our family while we are in the States. We have had several offers of homes where we could stay with friends, but we would ideally like to find our own space for us to try and figure out normal again! Please pray with us as we thank God in advance for His provision of housing for us! We are both totally at peace about this new ‘hiccup’ and praise Him that He has provided everything we’ve needed to this point, and we can definitely count on His provision for this!!

Next time we write, it will be from Littleton, Colorado!

Hey! All signs point home!

Messick Paca

Our conversation in the car yesterday:

“Ok, that was craziness!”

“Did we really just do that??”

“Boys, that is going to be a fun story one day”

“You don’t think other people do this?”

“Are you kidding me?”

Yesterday we tried something different. And, it was a little nuts, a little overwhelming and mostly great fun.

When missionaries leave here, they have to sell all their things. There is a great resource called Intermissions here which is an email network of all the missionaries in-country. You send out an email with what you are selling and within minutes you start getting emails from people interested in buying your stuff.

We live pretty far away from the two cities where most missionaries live, so it isn’t really practical for folks to come by to pick up a frying pan or a blender. So, we had to get a little more creative.

God’s provision last week was amazing as we were able to sell a lot of our big furniture to a missionary family who is just moving into their house. But there were still lots of things to sell!

We tried a garage sale in our community. Not really what people are used to, but we left a flyer with the guard and we had bunches of people come by. In fact, that was a crazy even. At one point, the house was full of people and everyone was bartering at the same time…yikes. The crazy part of the ‘local garage sale’ route is that we still have people coming to the door at all hours wanting to see things, and nobody seems to believe us when we say everything is sold. “And that?” pointing at something “Si”, “and that?”, si. “That is sold too?” “SI!”. But at the end of our garage sale, we still had a huge pile of random things that we weren’t sure what to do with.

So, we had a Paca. Our very first (and probably last) Gringo Paca.

This is what a real Paca looks like...calm, orderly...

What is a Paca? Still trying to figure it out completely, but it started to make more sense the other week when we were driving thru a town and I saw a shopfront open with bales and bales of clothing. People buy these bales, take them to the market, open them up and sell things piece by piece. It is all stuff imported from the States and Canada, I think generally from thrift stores. The clothing is all laid out in piles, and people stand on the side of the street and pick through the piles to find what they want.

We had mostly smaller things but a few larger things to sell. So….we packed the car up to overflowing (yes, I had a hand out the sunroof steadying a shelf that we just perched up there…), and drove into town. We left the house at 10am.

We drove to the centre of town to the central square. Two sides of the park are taken up by mini-van taxis. One side has food venders, and the fourth side of the park has Pacas. So we parked the car, set out a big tarp and started putting our things out.

Everyone wanted to see what was going on!

It was CRAZY!! We never even got to take a picture of our “set up” because there were so many people so fast!! And if we thought the inside garage sale was busy, this was something else all together. There are lots of things I’ve found you don’t really barter for here…but apparently Paca bargaining is huge!

People were disappointed we hadn't brought more!

Somewhere in the process a woman who had come by to take a look appointed herself our sales associate, and she was GREAT! She was loving it, and was SUCH an amazing help! We needed a third person! She took some crazy fun initiative and was just such a gift!!

The big things sold immediately. By 11:30 mostly everything was gone, but there were still lots of people coming to take a look. And, tons of people asked when we were going to bring more stuff and do it again?!?

PHEW!!!

The most requested item? “How much for the canchitos? (the light haired kids). Each time I told them there wasn’t enough money in all of Guatemala for me to sell my kids. We’d all laugh, joke and wait for someone to ask again!

The kids thought it was GREAT!

It was hot, it was sunny but it was lots of fun…there was lots of laughter, lots of teasing and lots of visiting with people. Not time to actually talk to anyone, but for a quick hello, a smile or a hug.

Just after 12 we called it a day. There was not much left at all. Matt had wondered as we drove in whether anyone would come and if we could even do it…..

Finally calm enough to visit!

I am guessing driving into town with all your stuff and setting up on a street corner to sell it is a little out of the ordinary. But, apparently out of the ordinary is just what we are!