Dec/Jan Birthdays...oh and one November birthday!

Derson turned 9 December 31! He was quite tickled by the contageous excitement and had a lot of smiles to share with us.

Also celebrating were Vens-1, Eddy-6, Joseph-2 and Gerald-3

Please pray for Alyssa

Alyssa arrived in July 2007. Severely malnourished and literally wasting away.
God worked and healed Alyssa. Here she is 6 months later!

Alyssa went home today. Her parents have been very uncooperative as far as providing us with the papers we need to keep her here at HCH, so after weeks of waiting for them to cooperate, we had no choice but to send her home. From what we know of her parents, they are not together and Alyssa's father refuses to take any responsiblity, even to get Alyssa a birth certificate so she can stay here. It is so frusterating because we did not by any means want to send her home, but legally she can no longer be at HCH without paperwork. It is even more difficult when we think back to the state she was in when she came!

Alyssa went home with her mom, and we sent food and milk for her, and told her what she needed to do if indeed she did want to give Alyssa up for adoption.

Now we wait.

It's hard, knowing and loving this precious little girl.

But, God is in control.

He knows the plans He has for Alyssa.

Though we sure wish we knew them in advance!

Please keep Alyssa and her parents in your prayers, as well as all of us as we wait to see what will happen with this precious little girl who has a place in all of our hearts!

Frogs, sand and a pump.

So, a few weeks ago we had a nice little frog do a very not nice thing: he/she crawled up into the pump and got stuck in there and died! The stench was incredible. Apparently this has happened before, and so the guys knew how to take the pump cover off and take out Dead Mr. Toad. We also found a bunch of sand in there, and a little spoon....sand+spoon+42 kids=suspicion.
Once things were back together, the pump was not putting out much water for the amount of work it was taking. So, we got a hold of Blue Ridge(a Mennonite mission here in Haiti who do a lot of wonderful work with wells) and asked them to come. They managed to squeeze us into their schedule and in a few days arrived to see what the problem was.

Zach and Charles, the guys from Blue Ridge, soon discovered that a piece of what reminded me of rebar had broken off inside the pipes, just below where they could reach it with some hand tools. So, in order to be able to get their big rig in there by the pump, the guys had to do some incredible work with a machete to cut off a bunch of branches hanging over the pump. I have NEVER seen the power of a machete like that before....gave me some respect for them!

Pulling the first piece of pipe up...I have no idea if it's even called pipe...or for that matter any of the other names for any parts/tools/machinery related to fixing a well!! So, for those of you who actually do know, please be kind and just smile and nod!!

These trucks are just amazing! Can't think of another time when I've been more thankful for hydraulics! It's kind of a funny feeling when you are personally so impacted by the same thing that you think about affecting others less fortunate than yourself! I am SO incredibly thankful for our well, in a way I really appreciate having a new outlook!

The first piece of pipe came out looking great. The next two had a lot of eyebrows going up! Some parts were almost rusted right through!

And then they found a sandbox in the cylinder. The child with the sand and the spoon really pulled a good one. The guys were fairly confident that the sand was what had broken the piece of rebar that had initially stopped the pump from working. So we had some little conversations with the kids and with the nannies responsible for them....never a dull moment!!

But, it all worked out. There was gonna be some significant issues with those rusty pipes in the near future, so perhaps Dead Mr.Toad and the sand child did us a favour after all!

Zach and Charles:Thanks so much for being such a blessing to so many in Haiti!!

New Years in Haiti

Just wanted to make sure you all clicked over to Pat's blog where we posted some pics of the Haitain New Years Pumpkin Soup Celebration.
There are a few other pics there to see to. Should be some pics of Christmas soon too! We just finally got to celebrate yesterday as the rest of the stuff arrived just this past Thursday!

Some more faces

Chrisla

Samuel

Deanna(our super volunteer who is coming back soon!) and Roselisa

Roselisa is having clubbed foot surgery in February. It is going to be a bit of an adventure heading up to Cap Haitien and meeting all the great folks from CURE International.

Lineda

Carlos

Kendy

Chris and James

Alyssa

December Faces

Jenny

Chris


James
Moise

Moise and Michael

Golson

We took the kids on a walk and when we were almost back home I noticed these little puff ball weeds that reminded me of dandilions when they get all puffy. The kids thought it was so fun to run and find as many as they could! I was worried some of them were going to pass out from all the blowing!!

Joseph..............Daniel..........Golson