Haiti

Well, please forgive us the the lack of posting! Being in Haiti last week, I can tell why Luke did not have two seconds to himself never mind sitting down, praying for a strong Internet connection, and posting!

Like I said last week I was able to fly to Haiti (after lots of plane and ticket issues going and coming from Haiti) and see Luke after almost 2 months!! It was amazing to hug him, but the initial embrace was quick and off we were to the chapel. John Edwinson (a man from our home church in NH, he is like our second dad) came with me to build a " lean two" that was needed to keep dirt and stuff out of the water purification system. I have posted recently about this, and John's amazing work.

The week FLEW by and before I knew it Luke was dropping me off at the airport. He will be flying tomorrow from Port-au-Prince to Miami, spending the night, and then Friday returning to Dallas :) I am beyond excited to have him home! Haiti has stolen our hearts, we will return there again, and someday (Lord willing) we will live there. I am so looking forward to having my husband home with me!!

Below are some pictures that I took while in Haiti..I took almost 500 pictures and will try to post as many as I can the next few days. Thank you all for your prayers, and please continue as Luke makes his journey home!

This is JJ...he stole my heart this summer! He was rescued along with several other orphans from a village that was flooded by the hurricanes last year.

Just one of the many "tent cities" that consume Port-au-Prince right now

Everyone is in need of clean water!

disaster everywhere!

I really hope no one was in this car!

To the right of the picture is a small building which was at one point a great friend of ours store (Maxime)...he was in it when the earthquake hit, and only by inches made it out of his store!

I like others have many memories of this building called "one stop"! Everyone in the store made it our alive!

Life goes on in the streets, with ladies selling their daily goods.

This is a pole on the ground and connected to the pole is our transformer for the electricity. Those wires are also used to bring the electricity to the houses....it is not working. The "electric company" came to cut the live wires and just left everything there for a couple days. We did eventually get electricity again :)

John and his crew after completing the "lean two"

Luke....trying to fix everything :)

Almost there...John had this much done in one afternoon!

Karl and Joseph unloading the truck full of food.

Luke and Karl explaining to Maxime how to cook the food.

The packages of food upclose...I believe this is beans.

Unloading the truck of food

This little guy was hanging out...I have never seen a snake in Haiti before, so I thought I would capture the moment :)

Still unloading food...Praise the Lord from whom all Blessings flow!

So far.....

So here we are..... John and I have been here for 24 hours so far and LOTS of things have been done. Yesterday shortly after we arrived John went over to the chapel to see what his project looked like and develop a game plan for the next morning. While Luke, Karl, and John were discussing the "lean two" a truck load of food showed up. It took quite a few Haitians and Karl to unload the food and water, but it go done!

Unloading the 2,000 pounds of beans, huge bags of corn, and lots of bottled water (that came out of their packaging and were rolling all over the floor of the truck) :)

Karl, John, and Luke looking at the supplies and taking about what else they need

The big black container in the back here is the water tank and the thing wrapped in a tarp is the filters. This needs a roof over it to keep out dirt, junk in the air, and leaves.

Here are a couple of pictures of the destruction from the earthquake...

A Church

Apartment building

As you can see there is still TONS of stuff around to remind everyone of the earthquake. Luke and I just returned from driving around and gathering more supplies. While we were driving you cannot miss the tents that are up everywhere. Some are in parks, some are in fields, but these "tent cities" stretch so far in some places. Other tents you see in people's yards. They are still afraid to sleep in their homes so they are sleeping in their driveways.

Here

No wonder it is so hard for Luke to update this thing! I haven't been here that long and Luke has been running around doing tons of stuff, and every minute it seems the guard is pulling him away because someone is at the gate for him. Wow, poor Luke!

John and I are here, and praise the Lord we had no problems getting into Haiti (John had a hard night flying from Boston to Florida last night, but he is here) and we got our bags! It was awesome to see Luke, "awesome" actually doesn't describe it! We got to our "Haiti home" and had lunch then John, Luke, and Karl got right to work with the "lean two" thing for the water system. They have plans and already started the project. I do have pictures, but not sure if I will be able to post them on here. Those of you who have a facebook I did post some pictures on there.

While at the chapel a truck came to deliver food. There was 2,000 pounds of beans, tons of water, and even corn. There was a lot to unload, but what a blessing to have food to unload! We have a wonderful breeze blowing in through the windows and some clouds, not sure if it will rain, but I am going to post this before the Internet goes out, and then try to post pictures. Thank you all for your prayers, and hopefully I can update tomorrow! God Bless!

4:45

Good morning!!! It is currently 6:00 here in Ft. Lauderdale,FL where I stayed the night last night and continue my adventure today to Haiti. I woke up at 4:45am very excited to see my husband and actually hug him for the first time in almost two months. I am VERY excited! There are military and other relief help that have been in Haiti since the earthquake and have not had the opportunity to talk to their family never mind being able to see their loved ones; for this opportunity I am thankful!

Luke and I were talking last night and he was reminding me again that Haiti is not the Haiti that I remember. I have spent the last couple weeks thinking about this and trying to prepare my heart. Luke has been nonstop since he touched ground there, and I can just imagine the weight of being on the go, and seeing all the sad sights around you. We have close friends in Haiti, that have been greatly affected (like all the Haitians) and I am sure that will be hard to see them in their current situation.

I am hoping to post more when I am in Haiti, and post pictures as well. I do not think I will be as busy as Luke is and that should allow me to post more, but I also need to Internet to cooperate. So keep checking and hopefully I can update soon! Thank you for your prayers and support! I am feeling so much better and ready for this trip!

4 MORE HOURS :)

Brief update:

Continued with building inspections and food distributions since the last update. Funding a couple reconstruction/repair projects for a couple of homes that are close to being able to be reoccupied. Tomorrow morning a team of 3 counselors from Dallas will arrive and I'll be coordinating their counseling times for most of this coming week. I'll take them around a bit tomorrow afternoon so they can get a sense of what has happened here and then Monday morning they'll dive in and begin counseling. I have several people scheduled for counseling sessions over the week and I'm hoping it is a benefit to them. I think it will be. We're so thankful to these counselors who are volunteering their time and paying their own way to get here.

Karl, Ann and Bobby are back now and it is VERY good to have them back. Now that they're all back I don't have to be the go-to guy on everything that happens on the campus and I can more effectively do the other things I'm doing. They had a good time of rest in the States and I'm glad for that. The schedule here has been crazy. I've not had a day off since Feb 3 and I'm beginning to feel it. The other missionaries here have been pulling this schedule since Jan 12! Many of the full-time missionaries have taken some time off and gone to the States for a brief rest, those who haven't look completely worn out. I'm worried about them. I know it's tough to get away but in this environment if you don't create some kind of rest you'll not last. So - pray for those who live here all the time.

John Edwinson comes in for a couple of days in a week or so to build a lean-to for us and Becca comes the same day because she's smokin' hot and I miss her. It will be awesome to see both of them.

Looks like I'll be heading back to the Big D on the 26th. Hope it's warm by then.