Family

6 July 2012

Congratulations, Hannah!

Today was the closing program for Hannah’s school. She and her classmates officially graduated from Grade 4 this year!

Hannah was honoured with the spelling award this year (if any of my elementary school teachers are reading this, they are no doubt wondering if she’s really my daughter!). She was also frequently on the Cuadro de Honor (honour roll), as a bulletin board in the now-empty halls of learning will attest.

However, she told me just now that she hasn’t yet learned everything there is to know… so I guess she’ll need s’more eddy-ca-shun.

Of course we’re most proud of the love that she showed for her teachers and classmates over the past few years. Way to go, Hannah! Congratulations!

5 July 2012

The Adults at the VBS!

Jim Family, Ministry glimpses, Prayer and Praise 0

I mentioned on Facebook and Twitter that there had been more adults coming every day to our club this week – which I originally called a "kids’ club". The reality is that there have been activities for kids, youth, and adults.

We have had new adults every day. We’ve been learning the same verses as the kids – and actually, we’ve been doing the same crafts as the kids! Except that we fight over the colours more. 😉

Tomorrow is the last day of the club – the grand finale!

By the way, it’s also the last day of school! Well, actually, there is no school – just a closing program at Hannah’s school. So we’re all going to go in the morning to cheer her on – then on to the Vacation Bible School at night. 🙂

Here are the adults, gathered around for the study. Tonight we learned a great Gospel verse from James – God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. (Jam 4:6^b)

4 July 2012

Just what is this Convocation thing?!

Jim Family, Ministry glimpses, Missions, Prayer and Praise 0

Some of you may be wondering – what is this Convocation you’ve been talking about?

Well, our mission organization has tried to have an all-mission-international get-together every few years. Lately it’s ended up being about once-a-decade (I believe the last one waqs 2003).

So that’s basically what Convocation is. Missionaries and other connected people from CAM International of Canada and Camino Global will be getting together, this time in Estes Park, Colorado.

Now, we wouldn’t have chosen to leave home again at this time, but these meetings is compulsory. The good news is, we’ll only be gone for about 10 days. And there are some other great things about the trip…

So here are the details in a nutshell:

Name: Convocation
Attending: Those with Camino Global and CAM International of Canada
Dates: 15-21 July 2012
Other dates: 22-24 July, we’ll be staying a few days for a mini-holiday
Purpose: This year’s Convocation will serve a variety of purposes. For one thing, Camino Global has a new president, so we’ll be welcoming him. Of course it’s a chance to worship and celebrate with and connect with missionaries from around the world. We’ll also be attempting to set up international groups to share resources and strategies on certain themes, such as church planting and leadership training. There will be various other meetings going on for various purposes.
Where: In Estes Park, Colorado, there’s a YMCA outfit that we’ll be making use of. Don’t know much about it, but I think we’ll have a place to sleep and some food. 🙂
Kids? Hannah and Nathanael will actually be enrolled in a YMCA kids’ camp. It’s a Christian based children’s day camp that runs until mid-afternoon each day.
Other stuff? The YMCA and park have lots of great facilities and activities that we may be able to make use of in the afternoons.
How? How are we getting there? We decided to fly, since we don’t want to be away for long and driving would have added several days to the trip.
Weather: Lately the weather has been about 5-10Â°C hotter in Estes Park than it has been in Ixtapaluca. Hence all the wildfires, I guess! The good news is, the wildfires near where we’ll be have been mostly contained.

So – there are things to look forward to and not look forward to! There’s the challenges – like I’ll probably have health issues to deal with with all the changes of food and environment. There’s the onslaught of US culture (we love our friends from the US – but don’t always understand them! (or – do we ever really understand them?)), there’s sitting in meetings (AAAAAHHHHH!), and travel times with two (hopefully angelic) kids….

But there’s good things too – visiting a foreign country and seeing new things, Lord willing visiting a friend in Denver (you know who you are), spending time with family, reconnecting with old friends, making new ones, and sharing together about making disciples of all nations!

We’re also going to be picking up some school supplies – more on that later!

So – ok, I admit it, mixed feelings. But it’s only a few days. I’ll let you know how it goes!

Meanwhile, lot’s to work on before we go… kids’ club, Sunday music, Bible studies, getting together with people…. and lots to think about when we get back! 🙂

10 May 2012

A Brief Visit to Canada

Jim Family, Mexico, Practical matters, Prayer and Praise 0

Believe it or not, we are on our way to Canada! But we’ll only be there a few days.

Since returning to Mexico in November, we’ve been working on issues related to our visas. A number of things have changed, and so we’ve basically been starting from scratch with a number of documents.

Our work on this has been in some ways a comedy of errors. Emails didn’t arrive, information was lost, there were meetings about things that don’t concern us and yet impacted some document somewhere, changes in Mexican law…

The work goes on, as we try to get documents from Canada and documents from Mexico and figure out legal issues.

To make a long story short, our visas are expiring and we are required to leave the country – and then come back.

It’s not what we would have chosen. However, we can see some good things in all this.

First of all, we will be able to briefly visit Shari’s parents and my parents. Obviously this is not something we are able to do very often!

Secondly, we do have some business to do in Canada, and this may actually save us a trip down the road. So we’ll try to make the most of our time and deal with some things while we’re there.

Some of the things we’re planning to do should actually save us some money, so thankfully it’s not a 100% drain on the wallet!

As an added bonus, we get to see our Mothers right around Mother’s Day, and the Grandparents get to see the Grandkids right around their birthdays!

So we’re off for a few days. If you think of it, do pray for us as this will be a challenging trip in many ways. Also, pray for our visa situation. We had an encouraging meeting on Monday, and hope that we’ll be able to get the final documents in order very soon.

All right, gotta run. We have a plane to catch.

1 May 2012

El Nido (The Nest)

Jim Family, Mexico, Video Blogs 3

A little over a week ago, we went to a local aviary known as "El Nido" (The Nest). We drive by it all the time, but only recently found out that it’s the third largest aviary in the world!

And I have to admit, it was pretty cool.

So here is some video from El Nido – mostly birds, birds, birds. But what an amazing variety!

4 April 2012

A very full day!

Jim Family, Ministry glimpses, Prayer and Praise 1

Wow – I just don’t really know what to say about that day – today! So much happened, it was kind of like a week all packed into a day!

Well, maybe it’s not worth it to go into too much detail. The kids’ club went well today, as usual. The children are learning a lot about the Gospel, about Jesus, about the Bible.

Trying bannock at the English Class

I was looking forward to hanging out at the club today, but we discovered that we were out of gas at home and Shari had baking to do in preparation for the big baking class tomorrow. Our second tank was defective, so I went out to find somewhere to fill the gas – and that led to a stop by the police and other adventures I won’t get into (don’t worry, the police let me go… apparently I hadn’t done anything wrong. I guess they just wanted to chat…)

In the afternoon the team did a lot of cleaning and construction-related stuff. (Our word "construction" loosely means anything related to screws, wood, paint and metal – we’re doing a lot of small projects).

The English class this afternoon was a smash-hit – packed out with people from the church and the community. The team played some games, taught some geography and even made bannock.

After the class we went out for tacos (YUM), and then they team went to do some more socializing (which, without doubt, is a very important reason why they’re here!).

Shari, Hannah and Nathanael were on their way to join us for tacos when Nathanael fell splat onto the pavement. He had quite a goose egg, and we went to the doctor as a precaution. But the doctor felt he was fine, and he’s doing well now. Although I admit he looks a little worse for wear.

So that’s a quick summary of our day – here are a few pictures. By the way, eventually I’ll upload some high definition pictures into our photo gallery. Time being limited, I’m just throwing up a few previews here.