La Cruz and more

Wow, where to begin? We spent the entire day in La Cruz on Saturday and managed to get the truck unloaded into the house at long last. Three weeks of packing everything we own with us was getting old! And Ralph can see out the back window of the truck again!! He’s a happy camper now.

After unloading we started shopping for the things we needed: A fridge, stove, boiler, living room furniture, kitchen table and chairs, cupboards and a bed. What an adventure. We shopped first at the two largest stores: Coppel and Valdez. They had the stove I wanted at Coppel, but they didn’t have it in stock and wanted to order it from Culiacan, but couldn’t say when it would get here, so no stove! Ralph and I had some confusion over the fridge as it turned out we were talking about two different models and were comparing apples to oranges! But we finally got on the same page and ended up saving about $1100 pesos on the fridge by comparison shopping and buying at Valdez. They delivered it to the house at 3 that day! Talk about service!

Darwin and Ralph were off to get the gas tank and boiler we need for hot water, and were successful on that venture, again saving about $200 or more pesos by shopping a bit. They also checked out cell phones and satellite TV, but we are still considering those things. We shopped at several furniture places, large and small and were having trouble finding a queen size bed. One shop keeper actually told us that they only have “matrimonial” and king in Mexico, no queen. We knew that wasn’t right as we’d seen them here in Mazatlan. So we continued to shop.

We took a break to have lunch at the Chinese restaurant, and it was very good, lots of fresh veggies and no breading on the meat, plus really good sweet tea to drink. It was great! Then we were back to the house.

While Mary Ann, Gracie and I were home waiting for the fridge delivery Darwin and Ralph discovered another furniture store, and low and behold, they had a queen bed and frame at a very reasonable price. Also had a good set for the living room and a kitchen table and chairs all at great prices. So they came back to the house and gathered us up and we went back to the store. Ended up buying them all after a few trips to the cash machine!!

It still blows me away that you pay for most things in cash here, even big purchases like these! But the store owners are all mostly small business owners, so they do what works best for them. I sometimes feel like the Bank of Mexico with my wallet stuffed full of pesos for these big purchases.

One of the things I’ve not mentioned before is that Genaro cooks! Every weekend Carmen turns the kitchen over to him, and he goes to town! He makes a mean omelet, and he cooked a great shrimp dinner for us a couple weekends back, shrimp ceviche plus big shrimp in a spicy tomato broth that was wonderful…we were stuffed. Yesterday he made a great fish stew, loads of big chunks of fish and a ton of veggies!

And we’ve discovered a new use for those old scratched CDs…bike reflectors! They are everywhere on bikes here and it really does make it easier to see them coming and going.

Another interesting thing is that we’ve discovered that the neighbors have an in-ground pool! Pretty amazing! There is a lot of variety in this neighborhood, that’s for sure.

We also had our first rain since we’ve been here, it rained a little on Friday, a lot overnight and into early Saturday, then cleared up and was beautiful again. And I’ve been getting teased a bit because we’ve just been marveling at how warm it’s been, and the other night when the wind kicked up I went in the house to get my jacket. I was chilly with a windy 68 degrees! Who would have thought it a few weeks ago.

Thanks so much for you prayers for Jorge! This is a man who hasn’t seen the inside of a church in decades, and yet he is so drawn to the other Christians here. He came to the cell meeting on Friday night and stayed for it all, and then showed up at church on Sunday! We were all so thankful. Please keep praying, there is a long way to go!

Thanks also for your prayers for our continued language learning. Carmen wasn’t up yet when we left the house this morning and so I left her a note telling her where we were going and when we’d be back and she was so impressed she kept the note! We still have a long way to go, and we are learning so much that we are virtually exhausted each night, it’s all so overwhelming at times!

We appreciate your prayers and your support! Thanks so much.

More answered prayer!!

Well, it’s been an exhausting week, but we have so much to be thankful for!!

The Lord has answered our prayers with a house in La Cruz!! Two bedrooms, bath, large living room and a large eat-in kitchen. Covered parking for the truck and a small patio with a coconut palm! What a blessing! We will move in slowly over the next couple of weeks, buying the furniture and appliances we’ll need.

We also had a great team meeting with Darwin and Mary Ann and then spent the afternoon and evening exploring La Cruz, Ceuta and Tayoltita. We also met Pastor Jose and brother Ismael, from the churches in La Cruz and Ceuta. We also spent a quick minute at the beach at Ceuta. Then we went to church in Ceuta, and then visited with a family in the camp there. They are farm laborers from the southern part of Mexico who come here for the farm work. They live in huge camps, with tiny little houses. They prepared a lovely meal for us and we had a wonderful visit. We are looking forward to getting back there on Sunday with Darwin.

We also took our first bus ride! We went downtown to Pastor Guadalupe and Emelia’s for lunch on Thursday! Much less stressful than trying to drive and park down there! We had a fine meal and wonderful visit, even with our little bit of Spanish. Carmen was so sweet too, she had the pastor meet us at the bus stop and she also called the house to make sure we made it there and then asked the pastor to walk us back to the bus to make sure we got the right one! There are dozens, so she wanted to be sure we made it home!

Please pray for Jorge and Emiliano, they are both resisting getting to know the Lord, even though their wives have both come to Christ. When we told the wives that we’d ask you all to pray they were so touched!

Please also continue to pray for our language and culture learning. It’s coming along, but we have such a long way to go.

We’ll be taking our day off on Saturday to go to La Cruz and thoroughly explore our new town!! Darwin, Mary Ann and Grace will come with us and we are so looking forward to it! Lunch at the Chinese restaurant! God is good and we are thankful to all of you for your prayers and support!

Answered prayer

Thanks so much for your prayers, the Jimmy has been repaired, it was just a leaky brake line to the caliper and it was a quick and economical fix and they are back on the road again!!

The cell meeting had three women from the neighborhood join us, Karla, Patricia and Marta, plus four children. Please pray that they would come back this Friday and that others would join them.

And the celebration of Carmen and Genaro’s marriage on Sunday was huge…loads of family and friends helping them celebrate. We helped prepare the food, including a spicy dish made with smoked marlin and tons of veggies.

Sadly, we missed the service because I got an infection and fever that knocked me off my feet overnight on Saturday. Sunday morning I tried to get penicillin, which I know I’m not allergic to, however, they didn’t have any at the farmacia we went to and the substitute they had required a prescription. So off downtown to a doctor who is in the church and after much discussion of what was ailing me and what I’m allergic to a decision was made on a medicine and then we were off to the farmacia again…so now I’m taking these huge pills that I have no idea what exactly they are, but after a couple of days I’m much better. I even walked to the supermarket with Carmen and Ralph this morning. I was pooped when we got back, but I was glad I was able to go. Wouldn’t have been possible on Sunday afternoon or evening!! I’m thankful that whatever it was is going away.

In addition to our team meeting this week with Darwin and Mary Ann we’ve also will be having lunch with Pastor Lupe and his wife Amelia on Thursday…hectic social schedule!

And we had been told that the Seahawks had lost their playoff game a week ago and we found out today they are going to the Superbowl! We are going to try to find a place to watch the game in English if possible, but we had a lot of fun watching the Indy-Pittsburgh game with our host family’s son, so we may just end up doing that!! Can’t believe they made it all the way to this game!!

One little funny note…the Coke delivery to the little store across the street. Truck pulls up with two guys in the cab, and a pair of legs sticking out the slide up door on the side with the soda. They come to a halt and the door slides open, the truck doors open and all three of them get out and start hauling cases into the store…no hand truck, just manpower. Then guy number three gets back in with the soda and off they go.

Thanks so much for your prayers and support. We really appreciate it!

Lots to pray for

Please pray for:

Jose Manuel, a 9 year old who is at the house a lot, he’s neglected and sometimes abused. Carmen feeds him when she can and helps him with his school work as much as she can without getting in trouble for it from his mom.

Our fellow workers the Lumppios, left Minneapolis this morning and will take about three days to get to Laredo TX where they will cross, then on to Aguascalientes to see Lidia’s parents and then back up to us in Mazatlan by February 1. And praise the Lord, Lidia got the trailer she was praying for! Now she can bring the extra things she’d hoped for!

Carmen and Genaro’s Jimmy, it has some sort of undetermined problem with the brakes, so they aren’t driving it right now. Please pray that it gets figured out soon and that the cost will be small. Thankfully Genaro has a scooter to get to work!

Pray also for the celebration this Sunday as Carmen and Genaro renew their vows. They were married in a civil ceremony more than 20 years ago, and they are now marrying in the church and are very happy. We were with them the other night when they picked up their wedding rings, they were very excited.

Carmen and Genaro are trying to start a cell meeting in their home, so last night we went around the neighborhood and invited everyone to a Bible study tonight. Please pray that many will accept the invitations.

And thanks be to God, after a 36 hour respite from driving, Ralph tackled it again and did much better last night. We took Pastor Lupe and his wife back home and they live downtown, about 20 minutes away in the land of the tiny, narrow streets…with our big truck it can be challenging but it was successful. We are going back out today!

Besides learning a new language and culture, we are also learning new money and new weights a measures! So when I talked of the liter coke the other day I should have actually said medio litro, half liter! Sooner or later we’ll get all this straight and appreciate your prayers until we do.

Next Wednesday we begin our first team meetings with Darwin and also make our first trip to La Cruz to get familiar with the town and to house hunt. Keep that in prayer as well please.

And praise! Our hot water at home has been fixed so our showers are warm now no matter what time of day!

We continue to be amazed at things here, milk superpasturized and on the shelf at the store. You only chill it when you want to drink it. Jicama from a pickup vendor that came to the house, huge, only 5 pesos and a big enough snack for the four of us during Bible study in the garden yesterday afternoon after Genaro got home from work. And in season, Carmen and Genaro have mangos, lemons and guavas in the yard!!!

This is also a cash society, and for a debit card girl like me that has been a big adjustment. I’m just not used to carrying cash. But here, its cash on the barrel head as my grandmother used to say. And they carefully inspect each bill too. The insurance guy in Nogales gave us a heads up about this and it was because of his information that we were able to get enough cash before we crossed to pay cash for fuel and tolls and food on our way down. We would have run out of cash the first day without him!

There’s also a big police and military presence here…and all fully armed with automatic weapons slung across their bodies. Yesterday a truck full of army guys came through the neighborhood, followed closely by two carload of cops. Never did figure out what they were doing.

Gotta get home, nearly time to finish preparing lunch, the main meal, for Carmen, Genaro (son), Fanny, Ralph and me!

Blessings, and thanks for your prayers.

Impressions

So much has happened this week, so much to praise God about! Here are a few impressions of life here:

Our host family is loving and gracious, they have a lovely home and garden and are patient teachers…we are not only learning Spanish, but are also getting a crash course in cooking Mexican cuisine! Carmen is a great cook and I’m helping with each meal, most made completely from scratch. They did buy BBQ chicken on Sunday afternoon, but otherwise, we cook. All Ralph can say is YUM, YUM, YUM.

One morning this week I was helping Carmen clean the patio and she got busy talking with a neighbor so I finished spraying it down and turned off the hose. From the house I can hear Ralph yelling, I had turned off the water to the house, not just the hose, and he was all soaped up in the shower when the water quit…oooops! Lesson learned… Also, the water is whatever temperature God makes it, so it makes showering later in the day preferable, but with six of us showering you take what you get!

Laundry for six is interesting too, seems there’s always a load going in the washer, which is on a tiny side patio, and the wet clothes also hang there to dry, but again, with six of us we run out of line so are using the fence today!

Carmen sent Ralph down the block and over a block to fetch hot fresh tortillas from the neighborhood tortillaria, a huge stack, plenty for all of us for just 6 pesos! Still, I made gorditas from scratch today with Carmen’s help, and she still likes to cook and use fresh homemade things rather than store bought.

Ralph has been thrilled to find Coke in 1 liter glass bottles, a thing of the past in Washington, but common here, and only three pesos!! About 30 cents. He has one each evening from the little store across the street. We also are surprised by the number of American brand names that are here, Coke, Pepsi, Mr. Clean, Kraft to name a few. Each visit to the store reveals more.

We are thankful we don’t have to drive much, traffic is very heavy and very crazy. Hard to put into words…cars, trucks, motorcycles, taxis, buses, bicycles, pedestrians and vendors all in the street all at once, all vying for space to travel, all at crazy speed! It’s just flat scary. So we stick pretty close to home so far.

There’s an amazing array of butterflies and hummingbirds that visit the garden and a big contingent of cats that belong to the neighbors, and one little neighbor dog named Willie that has adopted Ralph! There’s a little two year old boy who is at the little store across the street and he’s cute as can be, but a pill too, he really keeps his family hopping. There people visiting all the time, lots of opportunities to practice our Spanish. The kids all adore Ralph of course, and while Carmen and Genaro and most of their family call us Ralph and Chris, we have become Raphael and Cristina to the rest of the neighborhood. Genaro Jr. is taking an English course, and we have become his live in lab! He’s 14, 15 next month.

We visited all day yesterday with our friends Pat and Arlie who are vacationing here. Shopping in the Golden Zone (all dollars, too spendy) and lunch in their beach front palapa!! Enjoying the beach and the breeze in the lovely shade! It was wonderful. I took my camera along to take pictures of them and the beach, but sadly, I left the camera in the cab!!! It didn’t get turned into the lost and found or to the hotel either, so it was lost.

On the way home we were talking with another taxi driver about it and he said he’d take us to the HQ of the taxi that we’d use and see what could be done. Pretty much nothing, it was not reported, but the guy gave Ralph his card and said to call today. Since all that communication is still pretty hard for us, we asked Darwin to call. He tried to let me down easy saying that there was no chance to get it back, it just doesn’t happen, and he didn’t want to get my hopes up too much by making the call. I told him I understood, but still wanted him to call…he called back shortly and said it was a miracle…my camera was at the cab office, I just needed to come by and pick it up! Praise the Lord…all the pictures we’ve taken in the last week are safe and sound!!!

WE SERVE AN AWESOME GOD!!!

Mazatlan, Sinaloa, Mexico!

We crossed the border with no problems at all, were waived through all the inspection points, never had to unpack the truck once! We managed to buy fuel, food and hotel with our limited Spanish and arrived in Mazatlan Saturday evening. We moved right in with our host family and began our learning experience!

My junior high Spanish is coming back to me more quickly than even I imagined! We are both learning a lot about this amazing place. We’ve shopped at the supermarket, met the neighbors and many of the neighborhood children, learned about the schools, the bus routes, etc. Ralph has even driven in the wild traffic here twice and survived both times. There are no street signs, so it makes navigating a bit tough! You just have to learn your way around!

It’s been sunny and beautiful and our host home has a lovely shaded garden that’s cool and nice. We have a nice room in their home, they moved their 14 year old son into their daughter’s room and moved their 8 year old daughter in with them temporarily. Genaro works for the government here, Carmen is a stay at home mom and a great cook!! They stuff us with wonderful food all the time. They are very loving and patient with us and are picking up English from us too.

We went to church last night and enjoyed it, there were more than 50 in attendance. Our friends Pat and Arlie were there and we had a brief visit with them. We’ll spend more time with them Tuesday. They return to Washington on Friday.

We’ll start house hunting in La Cruz with our fellow worker Mary Ann some time next week, and we’ll also begin the process for our more permanent visa with immigration this week. We’d certainly appreciate prayers on those issues and on our continuing education on language and culture!

Thank you all for your prayers and support. We love you guys and appreciate all you do to support us while we are here!! We can feel your prayers.

Nogales, AZ

So many praises! We have a host family! We got the news just as we were shutting down the ISP on Friday! What a blessing that is to have someone to stay with to immerse ourselves in language and culture!

We had a great send-off from church with WMPL folks Pat and Arlie and Richard and Leslie down from Bellevue and Sammamish, plus our family and friends from the Thurston County area, and friends from our old church in Graham as well. Lots of prayers and hugs and pictures, even the WMPL song to send us off.





And we’ve had a great trip so far because we’ve been so covered in prayer! We’ve been through areas where there had been heavy rain, flooding, mudslides and snow, and we found none of it! Smooth travel, dry pavement from Grant’s Pass Oregon to here. We just had rain up to that point. Thanks be to God!

We did have a tail/brake light go out on the truck, and you know how unmechanical we are!! Plus we had visions of having to at least partially unpack the truck to reach the light assembly, expense and delay too. Could we be more negative? We pulled into Yreka, stopped at the first repair place that we came to. The clerk was busy telling us that the couldn’t fix it for us and naming off several places in town who could, when one of their customers offered to fix it for us. He got his tools out of his truck and had it fixed in about 10 minutes, no unpacking or repacking necessary! We just had to buy a bulb! His name is Troy and he was definitely heaven sent! What a blessing and a reminder to us as well of God’s faithfulness.

And the house closed on Tuesday without any further hitches! Praise the Lord! We were able to do all of the banking related things we needed to by phone from the hotel yesterday morning, so that is all taken care of! Another praise!

We also got a little lost in San Bernadino, CA, got forced off the freeway when we didn’t want to go due to rush hour traffic, and spent a bit of time trying to get back to where we needed to be in an unfamiliar town in the dark, but with lots of prayer and a good map we got back on track within an hour.

Tonight we are having potluck with the Kennedys of Triumph Church in Nogales, and are staying in one of their houses here. It’s giving us an opportunity to catch up on our laundry and e-mail and to get things in order to cross the border. We hope to do that tomorrow or Saturday. We’d like to be in Mazatlan for church on Sunday…

Thank you, thank you, thank you for all of your support and prayers…we really appreciate it. More later from Mazatlan!

Hitting the road at last

Oh my goodness...we hit the road right after church on Sunday. We are done with work, done with packing (well, almost!), time has gone by so quickly!

We hit a tiny snag in that our house didn't close on schedule yesterday, however it was a legal technicality for the buyers and an error on the part of their lender. We signed everything we need to sign and they will wire the money into our account rather than giving us a check. It is now expected to close on Wednesday January 11. Please keep that transaction in prayer.

Tomorrow is a big day around here, loads of people coming to pick up our furniture items that they "dibsed" (is that a word?) months back, helping us load the pickup and helping us do a final cleaning of the house. We are serving pizza lunch.

Then we are off to dinner with my cousin, and then hope to get a good nights sleep, have church with friends and family seeing us off with prayer coverage and then drift south!

Our prayer requests for the next few weeks are travel mercies, smooth border crossing, a host family, relationships with our fellow workers (the Jacksons and the Lumppios) and language and culture acquisition. It's a big list and we appreciate your prayers.

We'll only be blogging and checking our e-mail sporadically for the next few weeks, so bear with us as we begin settling in our new home.

Blessings to you all, thanks so much for your prayers.