We met our friends while attending Rio Grande Bible Institute. They are from one of the churches started by our mission board in Chile and are studying in order to work in a church or bible institute in South America. Last Christmas they were able to visit us in New Jersey and this Christmas they went home for a family wedding. On their way they stopped in Uruguay for a visit. It was great to see friends again and a good opportunity for them to see Uruguay since we are secretly praying God gives them a church here! They are seeking the Lord if Uruguay is where they will be ministering after they graduate next December.

    Since we still have not gotten Bruno’s birth certificate from South Africa, we had to take a trip over the bridge to Argentina to renew our visitors visa for another 3 months. Instead of turning the car around as soon as we got through customs, we went to the closest little town and got a few groceries (the tax is MUCH less there) therefore somethings are a lot cheaper. So, it was pretty much uneventful except that Callie got sick at the border on the way back. 

    A group of 17 people camp from a few churches in Pennsylvania for 2 weeks. They worked on quite a few projects to improve the camp, like…

1. The maintenance building has doors!!! This was a major blessing since we were unable to store anything inside.
2. A cement floor was laid in a storage room and a double wall was built. It used to be used to store tools and some supplies, but now it can be used to store the belongings of missionaries while they are on furlough.
3. Screens were redone for all the windows in the lodge.
4. Painting of the main hall, cabins, doors.
5. Lots of cleaning and organizing.

And lets not forget some piranha fishing!

    Last year the women’s retreat had almost 50 attendees so this year the prayer was for 65. We were almost overwhelmed with 90 women! The speaker was one of the missionaries here, Andrea Duarte, and she taught a wonderful series on what our spiritual fragrance is before the Lord. The whole retreat was a wonderful time of fellowship and it was a great opportunity for us to get to know many of the people that attend the GMSA churches in Uruguay and Argentina as well as several non GMSA churches!

For the first time ever we did a singles young adult retreat. The retreat began on Friday afternoon and ended on Sunday right after lunch. We had 48 attendees that came out for a time of biblical teaching, fellowship and lots of fun… Colby Homes, pastor in Argentina, brought some great biblical challenges to the young adults. Having great weather allowed us a lot of time outside even got to try out the canoe and kayaks. We are looking forward to doing it again next year!

In our container we had the opportunity to bring down a wheel chair for this lady Ofelia. Last week we were finally able to deliver it to her after a lot of running around. The chair arrived here with a charger problem which was easily fixed but then because it had sat for a while the battery went bad and we had to order new ones. We ran around Uruguay looking for a place that would either fix them or have new ones for sale. With no luck in Uruguay, we ordered them in Argentina… She was super happy when we brought it over. She had one but she was on the street one day and a truck hit her and totaled the chair. Thus she was somewhat house bound but with this new one she is now able to go out again…

Before we left the States, since I’ve cut my hair for years, I bought a new buzzer. I was so excited, my friend has had that same one for like 10 years and has to cut 6 haircuts quite often with no problems or maintenance. That’s what I needed, something I wouldn’t have to worry about for the long haul. Well, a couple nights ago I went to use it for the first time and when I turned it on it was so loud it hurt to put near your head. I spent an hour taking it apart to then realize there seemed to be nothing wrong with it, except, that it was in a million pieces. I put it all back together and had a crazy thought… Could it be related to the 50/60hz? How could I try it? I pulled the car close to the house started the engine and connected a cable to the battery to plug in a converter to get a 110v 60hz outlet to an extension cord which ran power into the house in order for the buzzer to work smoothly… What a process!

I thought school would be great because we would have sometime with one less kid. Ummm I mean, she would be learning the language and making friends, but I didn’t think about the fact that I would have to be doing homework too… Callie did great! We were coloring the matching vegetables and learning their Spanish names. Fun times. On Monday’s her class goes to a farm where they learn about, well farm stuff. (ie. planting, watering, caring for animals) She is very excited about that. Up until now Audrey has stayed with her in the class the whole time. Tomorrow we will be trying her alone, she has been adjusting well, so we’ll see how she does. The teachers are super friendly and seem to have a great curriculum. One day they focus on mathematics, another on spelling, they have a linguistics teacher come in one day, a music teacher another. In October their class is actually coming and renting our camp for a sleepover. Yes, the school does sleepover retreats with 3 year olds…

    Uruguayans have a drink called Mate that they drink aaaaaalllllll day long. They walk around with their mate cup and thermos and it’s a social thing too. In a group of people just talking the mate cup is being passed around to everyone. Mate is a very strong tea drank with no sugar or milk.

I’m going to blame my parents for my struggle to adapt to a big part of the culture. Every time I got sick, they would stuff me full with tea therefore now there is that negative association. Just the smell of tea makes me start to feel sick. Thus I have Miguel, my Uruguayan representative. He loves the stuff. No sugar, nothing. He will sit there calmly and quietly, yes I’m talking about Miguel, waiting his turn and enjoys every last sip of it.