Triplets--Update long overdue

Back in December 2010, I wrote a post about triplets born in the village and the dilemma we were in when the parents asks us to take them into GSF.  Read the post, tough decisions, now for background information.  

We ended up giving the father a job on the farm and moving the family closer to GSF.  All three girls were put on the feeding program, and we have been able to monitor the girls' health and growth.  There have been a few challenges when one of the girls would have to be put in the hospital because of being sick.  But overall, this family has been able to stay together and all three girls have grown to beautiful, cute little 2 year olds.  The mom is getting instructions and help on caring for these little girls at the feeding program, and their dad goes to Bible Study every week at work where he is learning to be a Godly leader in his home.  What a blessing from God!  Caralina captured these two pictures of them.   

Thank you for praying for them.  We're sorry for such a late update.  We would appreciate your continued prayers for them and their mom and dad.

Women's Day Celebrations

March 8th is Women's Day in Uganda.  Because it is a public holiday and all the staff are off today, we gave gifts to all the women staff on Wednesday during our weekly Bible Study.

We have 49 women staff; here's shot of a group of them.

It is customary to kneel out of respect and gratefulness.  The women  always think it is funny when I kneel to them.

Fellow missionary, Shelia helped give out the gifts as well.

My legs always hurt after I kneel especially when I do it as long as I did this time.  I started shaking my legs and told the ladies I don't know how they kneel for so long.  Notice the laughter.

Opening gifts

What a fun day it was!  The women of Uganda are incredible and I am so grateful to be able to work with so many of them.

A note: The missionary women were also honored as Mark made breakfast for all of us this morning.

Record Time-Charles and Inno update

I wrote last Thursday in this blog regarding two new little boys, Charles and Inno.

"Our hope and aim for these two boys are to nurse them back to health, help the family and return the boys to those in the village who love them."

Little did I know that the boys' mother would show up the very next day! She had left the family for a couple of months for personal reasons. We were skeptical at first but began counseling with her and her husband, invited her to come and spend time with the boys and invited the family to come to the local church. By Tuesday, it was obvious to all of us that it was better for all involved that the boys return home. The whole family came to church on Sunday, the mother spent a lot of time with the boys at GSF most days, and the boys and mom were distraught every time they had to leave one another.

So today, after the parents signed several agreements regarding the care of their boys, the family left GSF together. We believe this may be a record of the shortest time a child has been at GSF before returning to their home. We are helping with the education of the 5 older children, helping their father restart his garden (as he had lost much during a recent hospital stay), putting the two boys on our feeding program and facilitating counseling.

Please pray with us for this family that they will grow in their understanding of God, and that their lives will bring glory to Him.

Ivan, Inno, and Charlie

We've said it before and it always seems so true: bringing in a new child to GSF is bitter sweet.  It is never an easy decision, but knowing a child is physically not well often urges us bring them in.  

Inno and Charles are part of a large family where the 70 year old grandmother  is the main caretaker.  Inno and Charles, both so young, are malnourished.  Our hope and aim for these two boys are to nurse them back to health, help the family and return the boys to those in the village who love them.  

Ivan'smother brought him to us because of a growth on his back.  She had never taken him to a medical doctor as she lacked the funds.  Now 2 years and 4 months old, Ivan is pulling himself up to a standing position but not yet walking.  Since being brought into the orphanage, Ivan has begun treatment for spinal tuberculosis.  His future is unclear but there is hope for a surgery to correct the growth on his back.  

Faithful God

This afternoon, as I began teaching the women’s Bible Study about a faithful God, my social worker walked up and said they needed a nurse at the school immediately.  Fortunately, Nurse Dayna was there and went quickly down to the school.  Towards the end of the Bible Study, she came to tell me that she was pretty sure that the kid had an appendicitis.   After they sent him to the hospital, we began to second guess if we should have had Nurse Dayna go to really stress that it was an emergency.  But we did not.  I told Dayna that whether we messed up or not, we serve a faithful God.  We cry out to Him for wisdom every day.

We made several phone calls to nurses at the hospital, then waited to see what would happen.  As I was writing this, Nurse Dayna came down to tell me that the hospital nurse called her back.  I wish I could say that they are doing an ultrasound and taking care of the situation.  Alas, it just doesn’t happen that way.  The doctor has put the boy on “pain management” and will do an ultrasound tomorrow.   Nurse Dayna tried to stress that the appendix may have burst and they needed to act quickly.  The nurse laughed and said the doctor didn’t think so and they only do ultrasounds on Monday and Thursday anyway!  Grateful it is now Wednesday evening, but still.  Since he is a school kid, we can’t really do much.  Even if we could, all ultrasound technicians go home at 5 pm.  We realized it is in this moment that we have to trust in our faithful God.  We can only do so much.   He calls us to be faithful.   But when we can’t do anymore,  we look to Him who is always Faithful to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep His commands (Deut. 7:9).  

Surprise--7 Boys!

 When we returned to GSF 2 weeks ago, we got to meet some special kids. . . the 7 who arrived at GSF while we were gone.  And yep, they are all 7 boys!  We have a "boy boom" at GSF.  In the toddler houses we have 18 kids and only 4 are girls!  We praise God for each of these boys and look forward to getting to know them more!  We pray that God will use GSF in small or great ways to raise these boys into Godly young men!

Well Be Back

We had a great time in the States being refreshed and renewed and ready for the work to which God has called us. We enjoyed seeing so many friends and family.  We even got to to be a part of celebrating both of our parents' 50th anniversary-what a blessing!  If you would like to see more pictures of our time in the States check out Caralina's blog.  So many loved on us in ways we do not deserve.  We were able to go back refreshed and we are grateful!

Mark's family

Amy's family

We arrived home last Tuesday, January 15th.   We have been welcomed in a such a sweet and incredible fashion.  Welcome back or Well Be Back is the way we are greeted each time we see someone we have not seen yet.  Here are just a few pictures of the first few days back.

This was our greeting at the gate!

Caralina was gone for 5 1/2 months so was really glad to be back with those toddlers she loves!

Megan with Joan

Mark with Betty

It is so good to be able to love on the special needs kids again!  

Andrew and Titus are good buddies--this was taken on the bus on the  way to GSF

I was so glad to see these ladies, the housemoms.