Atuntaqui

We got up early this morning to travel outside the city to preach in a little town named Atuntaqui.  The people were so friendly, as usual.   We really enjoy going to the small churches outside the city and seeing what God is doing in these churches.  This church started with 10 people and now has about 70.  I guess I need to start taking a picture of the pastor and his family so you can see them.

The views from this church were amazing.  There was a volcano in front of the church and one behind.  It was beautiful.  I believe that Russellville First Assembly and West Memphis First helped in building this church.  It's a beautiful building.

Shannon praying for a cute little baby.

Check out this cool slide.

Happy Wednesday!

Street Life

We had to get out and do a few errands so I decided to take my camera with me.  I don't do that very much because of the "getting robbed"  thing.  Most of the pictures that I take are taken from the car and therefore aren't the best quality.  But you do what you gotta do, right?  Here are some pictures that I took today.

If you ever need a stuffed animal, you can get one from a street vender.

An old man begging on the streets.  Sad I know.  This always makes me sad and most of the time I'm a sucker and give them money.  Especially to the old people and the kids.  I just can't help it.

Notice the clouds covering the mountains.  It's a very cool sight to see the clouds come in.  

And I must add this funny story.  (Just to have when I go back and read my blog book)  Shannon preached Sunday morning at La Presencia in Lleno Grande.   He did really good too, I might add.  Well, while he was preaching a car alarm started going off. Wait, let me fill you in on the full picture.  The church is set up outside under a "carport" type thing and there are cars setting next to the carport.  (I must take a picture so you can see what I'm talking about)  Needless to say the car alarm was loud. Back to the sermon.  This car alarm is going off and Shannon doesn't know if it's ours or someone else's.  He stops preaching and says, "that's not mine is it?"  And proceeds to take his keys out of his pocket and hits our alarm and then says, "no it's not mine." Then goes right back to preaching.  Everyone laughs.  I must say that that was a first.

New Blog Design

Welcome to the new blog.  I have been trying to get this done since September.  I was actually on a waiting list for four months and finally decided that I needed to try someone else.  And I am really glad that I did.  I came upon this site looking for photo tips.  Then I got to looking around her site and noticed that she did blog designs and to top it off her work was exactly what I was looking for.  She is really great to work with and if you need a professional blog design, I highly recommend Rita.  I also added her button at the bottom of the blog.

Why did I want a new blog?  Because I wanted something more professional looking that would be more help to our supporters. Especially since I use this blog for work purposes too.  I now have a menu bar that will help you with any questions that you might have.  You can also find us on facebook and twitter.  Shannon does the twitter, not me.  I also have a prayer request button that I will be updating every month or so, or whenever we have a new prayer request.

I am loving the new design!

And one of my favorite parts about the blog is that I will be able to post bigger pictures.  For example:

This is Shannon and Pastor Luis.

This is one of my favorite pictures.  

Wow! This is great news.

Remember this little guy, Gray? 

Check out their latest news here, Pray for Gray.  Pretty great testimony. They are the DYD's in Oklahoma.  (DYD stands for district youth directors.) Continue to pray for Gray for a complete healing and this family that has been through so much.

Placas

(Placas = license plates)  We have waited for over four months for our license plates here in Ecuador.  Apparently they had a shortage of placas here and had to make them.

Notice the plate.  Isn't she a beauty?

Now let's check this out a little closer.  Do you notice anything missing?  

How about the holes?  That's right, we have to take these to someone somewhere to get the holes drilled in the plates before we can put them on our awesome STL vehicle.

Isn't that funny?  It seems like everything here takes so much longer to do or to get done.  For a gringa, that is a hard adjustment, but I'm getting use to it.  Speaking of license plates and cars, we need to go take our drivers test here so we can be legal drivers.  Not that we are not legal now because we have our DL's from the states and our AAA international drivers license, which is good for a year.  What's the big deal you say?  The test is in Spanish!  Well, duh, it's Ecuador!  There are almost 300 questions to study and then there are only 20 questions on the test.  Should be interesting to say the least.  I'll let you know how it goes.  Well, maybe, because if I don't pass the first time I won't be sharing that bit of news.

Gringa = white girl
Placa = plate
Carro = car
Toyota = Toyota

Valentines Day in Ecuador

We went to our first valentines banquet here in Ecuador.  Of course that is not what they call it here, but that's what I call it.  This was the churches first time to ever have a dinner for Valentines Day and it was a huge success.  There were about 60 people there in all.  Shannon and I played the newlywed game with them, which they had never played.  They really liked the game and can't wait to play it again.  We had a great time and are so glad that we went.

Shannon got me these for Valentines Day.  (Not to degrade the gift, but a dozen roses here cost $6.00)  Roses are a big expert here and over the last week they were exporting 25,000 roses per cargo plane.  I don't know how many planes left the country each day with these roses but I'm sure it was a lot.

And as I promised, pictures of Megan.  

Who's Jimmy Dean?

Tonight we made our first homemade sausage and it was unbelievably delicious.  Oh. My. Goodness. We haven't had sausage in six months and we were craving it some kinda bad.  Some other missionary friends in Romania sent us the recipe.  Thank you God and thank you Robertsons and Liebes!

If you want to try it, here's the recipe:  (prepare yourself for pure deliciousness)

1 pound of ground pork
2 tsp. of sage
1/4 tsp. of marjoram (we used 1/8 tsp. of oregano)
2 tsp. of salt
1 tsp. of pepper
1 TBS of sugar (we used brown sugar)


Mix well and set in fridge overnight.  Shape and fry.

Looks like sausage to me!

The end results.  Tears were almost shed.  (please notice the fine china)

Find of the week: Aunt Jemima syrup for $1.96.  That's two bucks off, so I bought four.  Hey, when you find a deal you have to stock up.

Turkey Bowl

Seems like I have been talking about Ethan a lot here lately.  Well, the last post and this post.  I must do a post about Megan soon.  (she never lets me take her picture)

Ethan played in the turkey bowl today at school.  The turkey bowl = flag football tournament.  Guess what time he had to be there?  7:30!  Who does that to a family on a Saturday?  Kidding!  We took E down to the school and then we didn't go until 10:00.  It all worked out.

What a match up!

Ethan is in between the guys in the grey shirts, running with the ball.

Nest post, Megan.  Well, we will see how that goes.