February & March recap

Hello! This post will be photos of the last month here in Ecuador. A lot has happened in a short amount of time. We welcomed and said goodbye to our first short term missions team of the year. We have a few short weeks before our next team arrives, which happens to be our home church, & some of our family is on that trip. We are so looking forward to squeezing them & showing them where we have called home.   The picture above is directly outside our front door, this was taken after a heavy rainstorm, when the sun came out. 

The pictures above are a fruit called rambutan. You peel them back & eat the white flesh, there’s a seed inside you spit out. Josie and her friend Hadasha love these. 

Josie and Winnie keep me busy. Josie asks to do school pages occasionally. Above she was practicing her numbers, she’s doing a great job & loves the one on one time. Winnie is crawling & pulling up onto anything she can. She also is trying to walk while holding onto items, like the couch. She’s determined to keep up with big sister! 

Josie lives for an opportunity to use her rain gear, luckily for her, it rains a lot. Also, take note at the flooding under the bridge. This is the same bridge as the first photo. It floods quickly after a hard rainfall but about 30 minutes of the sun being out, everything goes back to normal. 

Winnie was so happy with herself being in here (Gideon helped her out), she b-lines to stand at this when she hears the door open. I have a picture of Josie our first summer in there also. 

Josie and Gideon planted six pineapple heads, she was very proud. The trees in the picture above are cacao trees. The small bright green leaves in the picture below are banana trees coming up. Did you know that one banana tree produces a bunch of bananas & then dies. The tree won’t produce anymore, but after it dies, ten new trees grow up in its place. I think that’s a beautiful representation of how God works & multiplies for his Kingdom. 

Speaking of cacao trees, here’s a close up. This is what a cacao pod looks like when almost ready to harvest. It should get a bit more bright red & some yellow stripes. You can see below what they look like inside. You can suck on the white part, it’s sweet and sour. You save the seed, it needs to ferment & dry before selling, to be made into chocolate products. Cacao is being sold for $5/lb currently. 

A friend of ours, Wilmer, reading to the girls. He was trying to teach Josie Spanish, but she was determined to teach him English. 

This lizard was found on campus. The locals said they eat chickens and eggs, so they kill them. I was also told the students were going to eat the lizard later that day, I did not stick around to see if that was true. 

We celebrated international women’s day with the women who live at Ninawachi. We went to the local coffee shop, Witoca. We laughed about how we ended up with all the kids. It was a good day out, I’ll never turn down coffee out! Pictured is Magaly and her son, Kalel, her and her husband are expecting their second son in July. And in the red is Marilú, she is a student at ninawachi. This is her second year, it’s been cool to see how God has worked and is transforming her life in the last year. She came to ninawachi as an unbeliever & now she has given her life to him, been baptized, and is allowing Him to make her new. You can feel His love and gentleness through her. 

Here is an “updated” picture of the current students and staff, I say updates because by the end of the summer, two new babies will have joined the group. Currently there are 8 students, though that’s also changing. 

We were planning to come to Quito to pick up the team, but Josie got sick, so it forced us to go earlier than we had planned. She was diagnosed with bronchitis & given treatment. She still has a cough but it’s much better than it was. Winnie stared with the same symptoms, she seems to be on the mend. Because of Winnie’s age, she can’t have the same treatment as Josie. I am always thankful I can nurse, that’s her medicine for the time being, and lots of cuddles! Fun fact for here: you can go to a pharmacy & buy pretty much any medication without a script or doctors note. Need a tetanus shot? Got it. Antibiotics? Yep. Steroid shot injection? You got it! These are all items I have witness being purchased “over the counter” and used. Ninawachi has two trained nurses on staff, they administer all shots necessary. The tetanus shot was given to a student last year who stepped on a nail barefoot during the roofing project which involved bat poop everywhere. 

While in the city, we celebrated my birthday a week late. We found sushi & Josie impressed us all by using chopsticks. This girl loves sushi, she ate a whole roll herself. 

Winnie is taking full advantage of the relaxed car seat rules here. Don’t worry, this was while we were at a red light. Most of the time she’s on my lap. Driving here is much different than in America. In America we have highways & go up to 80/mph, here, you probably max go 45/mph (that’s my girl guess, I’m sure Gideon would have a different answer). Driving here, in some ways, is safer because of that. 

Ending this post asking for prayer, we have been reminded that we do not flight flesh & blood, the spiritual battle is real and we are given authority over it because of Jesus. Thank you for praying over my family and being in our community.