The kids in Haiti, their stories and how you can help…..
Here’s what Dixie wrote about the need for hearing screening equipment:
“I received an email today from Susan Westwood, the RN in charge of the nursery. For years, our babies have had repeated ear infections from a variety of causes, but we know that it has affected their hearing. We have no way of checking hearing on children under the age of 4. Most pediatricians in Haiti send children to the Dominican Republic for hearing testing when they think there is a problem.
Susan told me about a baby we have in the NICU who is 4 months old and doesn’t respond to noise at all. There are others that only respond to loud noises. We would like to be able to test their hearing.
Susan found a portable machine that is able to test hearing on infant. This machine is called a Welch Allyn OAE Hearing Screener. This machine is easy to operate and do not require a lot of training. The results are fast and accurate and take only about 10 seconds per ear. We can get accurate results without any response from the baby, and the machine gives us either a pass or fail result.
This would help us test the children’s hearing, and identify children that might benefit from hearing aids. It would also be good to be able to monitor our children who have chronic ear infections.
We need $4500 to buy the machine, printer, and supplies needed to make it run. I think it would be really great if we are able to use this machine to do screening of all of the school children that are sponsored through GLA and children living around the orphanage. But to reach out and be able to do this, we need help to raise the funds needed to buy the hearing screener. Can you help?”
Dixie Bickel, RN
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Thursday, June 24, 2010
More news on conditions in Haiti
Check this out from today's New York Times.
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — The 22-year-old woman, wearing a gauzy blue dress that she had changed into after her release, spoke in a whispery voice. Perhaps the worst part of the whole ordeal, she said, was the place where her kidnappers had chosen to imprison her. That they abducted her was terrifying. That they raped her, repeatedly, was too horrendous to absorb just yet. But stashing her in the ruins of a home? Making her crawl on her stomach beneath a collapsed slab into a destroyed house where they hid her in a pocket of rubble? That was torture, she said.
“Since I had not slept under any roof since the earthquake, I was so scared I could not breathe,” said the woman, Rose, who requested that her full name be withheld.
Rose’s kidnappers told her brother-in-law, who delivered the ransom of about $2,000, that they would kill her if she talked. She had no intention of doing so. But police investigators showed up at the family house in the Delmas 33 neighborhood shortly after her release, and a reporter from The New York Times happened upon the scene, later accompanying Rose to a women’s health clinic at the family’s request.
Being present when Rose and her family were grappling with the horror of her ordeal offered a firsthand glimpse inside the vulnerability that many Haitians, and particularly women, feel right now. Sleeping in camps, on the street and in yards, many feel themselves at the mercy not only of the elements but of those who prey on others’ misery.
So many cases of rape go unrecorded here that statistics tell only a piece of the story. But existing numbers, from the police or women’s groups, indicate that violence against women has escalated in the months after the Jan. 12 earthquake. Kidnappings are rare, but they, too, have increased, and “the threat is constant,” said Antoine Lerbours, a spokesman for the Haitian National Police.
Malya Villard, director of Kofaviv, a grass-roots organization that supports rape victims, said that the presence of thousands of prisoners who escaped during the earthquake aggravated an environment where insecurity and despair feed on each other.
“It’s an ideal climate for rape,” she said.
Ms. Villard said that Kofaviv’s two dozen case workers, in Port-au-Prince, had counseled 264 victims since the earthquake, triple the number in an equivalent period last year. Arrests for rape are fewer — 169 countrywide through May, but more arrests have been made in the last few months than during the same period last year.
Since the earthquake, international relief groups have expressed concerns about violence against women, especially in the camps under their watch. Poor or nonexistent lighting, unlockable latrines, adjacent men’s and women’s showers and inadequate police protection have all been problems.
Recently, security in eight big camps has improved, with joint Haitian police posts or patrols; about 100 Bangladeshi policewomen arrived late last month to deal with gender-based violence at three of them. But there are about 1,200 encampments throughout Haiti, and this city’s battered neighborhoods are largely left to their own defenses, too.
Rose and her relatives recently moved back to their properties when the owner of the property where they were squatting threatened the tent city residents with eviction. Their homes have been marked with a yellow stamp by surveyors, meaning they are damaged but fixable. Rose and her relatives sleep outside them, fitfully. They were scared of the “young thugs in Mafia sunglasses,” Rose’s cousin said, even before Rose’s abduction.
On May 10, Rose, a statuesque woman who is learning to be a beautician, went out to buy some cookies. A police officer whom she knew beckoned her to sit in his unmarked car, she said. She did. Then two men ordered the officer out of the car, taking his gun and driving off with Rose.
The men shoved her into the back, and made her lie face down. She does not know what neighborhood they took her to; it was empty and rubble-filled, and had many destroyed houses. When she protested entering one, they slapped her, she said, and forced her to squeeze through the collapsed entrance. They pushed her into a crawl space beneath a fallen ceiling.
“I was scared mute,” she said. “Only when they raped me did I scream. It hurt.”
Clutching her pelvis as she talked, Rose said that the men had taken turns, raping her seven times. “Or maybe eight,” she said, shutting her eyes.
The police officer showed up at Rose’s house the morning after she was kidnapped to tell the family what had happened. “He waited all night while we lay awake terrified,” her brother-in-law said. “He was looking for his car. We said, ‘What about Rose?’ He said, ‘We’ll look for her, but, you know, you will hear from them first.’ ”
The kidnappers used Rose’s cellphone to call. They put it on speaker phone and hit her repeatedly so her family could listen to her cry out in pain.
“They demanded $50,000 American,” her uncle, a vendor, said. “That’s crazy. I don’t have 10 gourdes to my name. But they said, ‘Don’t bother going to a voodoo priest. He can’t help you. Don’t bother calling Obama. He can’t help you, either. Just give us money, or we will kill the girl.’ ”
Over the next few days, the family managed to raise $2,000 in gourdes, the Haitian currency, from neighbors. The money was left at a drop site on Sunday evening. At 3 a.m. Monday, Rose was blindfolded and put on the back of a mototaxi. When she arrived home, she collapsed into a fetal position at the door to her house and knocked weakly.
Several hours later, the police investigators arrived. Family members encircled Rose as she answered questions in a monotone. Occasionally they peered out at the street through the cracks in their home, fearful that the kidnappers were watching.
Rose had already changed her clothes and bathed, which she did not know would frustrate the collection of evidence. But the police did not raise the issue, anyway, her family said.
When the police left, Rose rode in the back of a car to a Doctors Without Bordersclinic, wincing in pain as it bumped over rutted roads. At the tented clinic, she was instructed to take a seat on a bench. Another woman, slim and poised, entered the open-air waiting room and told a nurse she needed to see a gynecologist.
“Infection?” the nurse asked. “A case of rape,” the young woman answered, in clipped French. She had been invited to a “literary circle” in a tent city the previous evening, she said. “No books were discussed,” she said. The two victims sat side by side and stared straight ahead. The nurse said that the clinic had treated about 60 victims in May.
When Rose was called into an examining tent, she stumbled, woozy from hunger. The nurse gave her a couple of packages of crackers. Rose said, “I don’t have any money for those.” The nurse told her they were free. Rose offered one of the packages to a Times reporter, who declined and left her to be examined privately.
Rose was discharged with an armful of condoms and pill boxes: antibiotics for sexually transmitted diseases, anti-H.I.V. treatment, pills for vaginitis and over-the-counter painkillers.
As she emerged, her uncle — whom Rose calls Papa — watched her from a distance, tears streaming down his face.
“Beautiful child, oh beautiful child,” he said. “Look into my eyes and you will know how I feel. When is this all going to end? Haven’t we suffered enough?”
A version of this article appeared in print on June 24, 2010, on page A1 of the New York edition.
Jim Dykhuis
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — The 22-year-old woman, wearing a gauzy blue dress that she had changed into after her release, spoke in a whispery voice. Perhaps the worst part of the whole ordeal, she said, was the place where her kidnappers had chosen to imprison her. That they abducted her was terrifying. That they raped her, repeatedly, was too horrendous to absorb just yet. But stashing her in the ruins of a home? Making her crawl on her stomach beneath a collapsed slab into a destroyed house where they hid her in a pocket of rubble? That was torture, she said.
“Since I had not slept under any roof since the earthquake, I was so scared I could not breathe,” said the woman, Rose, who requested that her full name be withheld.
Rose’s kidnappers told her brother-in-law, who delivered the ransom of about $2,000, that they would kill her if she talked. She had no intention of doing so. But police investigators showed up at the family house in the Delmas 33 neighborhood shortly after her release, and a reporter from The New York Times happened upon the scene, later accompanying Rose to a women’s health clinic at the family’s request.
Being present when Rose and her family were grappling with the horror of her ordeal offered a firsthand glimpse inside the vulnerability that many Haitians, and particularly women, feel right now. Sleeping in camps, on the street and in yards, many feel themselves at the mercy not only of the elements but of those who prey on others’ misery.
So many cases of rape go unrecorded here that statistics tell only a piece of the story. But existing numbers, from the police or women’s groups, indicate that violence against women has escalated in the months after the Jan. 12 earthquake. Kidnappings are rare, but they, too, have increased, and “the threat is constant,” said Antoine Lerbours, a spokesman for the Haitian National Police.
Malya Villard, director of Kofaviv, a grass-roots organization that supports rape victims, said that the presence of thousands of prisoners who escaped during the earthquake aggravated an environment where insecurity and despair feed on each other.
“It’s an ideal climate for rape,” she said.
Ms. Villard said that Kofaviv’s two dozen case workers, in Port-au-Prince, had counseled 264 victims since the earthquake, triple the number in an equivalent period last year. Arrests for rape are fewer — 169 countrywide through May, but more arrests have been made in the last few months than during the same period last year.
Since the earthquake, international relief groups have expressed concerns about violence against women, especially in the camps under their watch. Poor or nonexistent lighting, unlockable latrines, adjacent men’s and women’s showers and inadequate police protection have all been problems.
Recently, security in eight big camps has improved, with joint Haitian police posts or patrols; about 100 Bangladeshi policewomen arrived late last month to deal with gender-based violence at three of them. But there are about 1,200 encampments throughout Haiti, and this city’s battered neighborhoods are largely left to their own defenses, too.
Rose and her relatives recently moved back to their properties when the owner of the property where they were squatting threatened the tent city residents with eviction. Their homes have been marked with a yellow stamp by surveyors, meaning they are damaged but fixable. Rose and her relatives sleep outside them, fitfully. They were scared of the “young thugs in Mafia sunglasses,” Rose’s cousin said, even before Rose’s abduction.
On May 10, Rose, a statuesque woman who is learning to be a beautician, went out to buy some cookies. A police officer whom she knew beckoned her to sit in his unmarked car, she said. She did. Then two men ordered the officer out of the car, taking his gun and driving off with Rose.
The men shoved her into the back, and made her lie face down. She does not know what neighborhood they took her to; it was empty and rubble-filled, and had many destroyed houses. When she protested entering one, they slapped her, she said, and forced her to squeeze through the collapsed entrance. They pushed her into a crawl space beneath a fallen ceiling.
“I was scared mute,” she said. “Only when they raped me did I scream. It hurt.”
Clutching her pelvis as she talked, Rose said that the men had taken turns, raping her seven times. “Or maybe eight,” she said, shutting her eyes.
The police officer showed up at Rose’s house the morning after she was kidnapped to tell the family what had happened. “He waited all night while we lay awake terrified,” her brother-in-law said. “He was looking for his car. We said, ‘What about Rose?’ He said, ‘We’ll look for her, but, you know, you will hear from them first.’ ”
The kidnappers used Rose’s cellphone to call. They put it on speaker phone and hit her repeatedly so her family could listen to her cry out in pain.
“They demanded $50,000 American,” her uncle, a vendor, said. “That’s crazy. I don’t have 10 gourdes to my name. But they said, ‘Don’t bother going to a voodoo priest. He can’t help you. Don’t bother calling Obama. He can’t help you, either. Just give us money, or we will kill the girl.’ ”
Over the next few days, the family managed to raise $2,000 in gourdes, the Haitian currency, from neighbors. The money was left at a drop site on Sunday evening. At 3 a.m. Monday, Rose was blindfolded and put on the back of a mototaxi. When she arrived home, she collapsed into a fetal position at the door to her house and knocked weakly.
Several hours later, the police investigators arrived. Family members encircled Rose as she answered questions in a monotone. Occasionally they peered out at the street through the cracks in their home, fearful that the kidnappers were watching.
Rose had already changed her clothes and bathed, which she did not know would frustrate the collection of evidence. But the police did not raise the issue, anyway, her family said.
When the police left, Rose rode in the back of a car to a Doctors Without Bordersclinic, wincing in pain as it bumped over rutted roads. At the tented clinic, she was instructed to take a seat on a bench. Another woman, slim and poised, entered the open-air waiting room and told a nurse she needed to see a gynecologist.
“Infection?” the nurse asked. “A case of rape,” the young woman answered, in clipped French. She had been invited to a “literary circle” in a tent city the previous evening, she said. “No books were discussed,” she said. The two victims sat side by side and stared straight ahead. The nurse said that the clinic had treated about 60 victims in May.
When Rose was called into an examining tent, she stumbled, woozy from hunger. The nurse gave her a couple of packages of crackers. Rose said, “I don’t have any money for those.” The nurse told her they were free. Rose offered one of the packages to a Times reporter, who declined and left her to be examined privately.
Rose was discharged with an armful of condoms and pill boxes: antibiotics for sexually transmitted diseases, anti-H.I.V. treatment, pills for vaginitis and over-the-counter painkillers.
As she emerged, her uncle — whom Rose calls Papa — watched her from a distance, tears streaming down his face.
“Beautiful child, oh beautiful child,” he said. “Look into my eyes and you will know how I feel. When is this all going to end? Haven’t we suffered enough?”
A version of this article appeared in print on June 24, 2010, on page A1 of the New York edition.
Jim Dykhuis
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
More pics from conference..
OOOOOOOOOOOOps, that' my new dooooo!!!!
More conference pics..anyone have anymore? I wanna see them..
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Conference with Dr. Morquette in Naperville
Had a really nice time catching up with everyone last night at dinner and Morquettes conference.. He did a great job!! Great story teller:) Anyone else have more pictures?
Friday, June 11, 2010
More World Relief News from Haiti
From the Ashes
Pastor Gerald Bataille looks weary. His voice cracks with the hoarse edge of someone who has not slept well for some time.
In the weeks following the January earthquake, the leader of the Tabernacle of Glory Pentecostal Church in Port-au-Prince has been working around the clock every day. But Pastor Bataille is not in the frame of mind to give up. His name means “fighter.” And that, say those who know him the best, is exactly what Pastor Bataille has shown himself to be. In the face of massive – even overwhelming – odds, Pastor Bataille has rallied his people to respond with energy, with compassion, with grace.
Less than three weeks after the quake, Pastor Bataille led a funeral service for 30 of his church members killed in the disaster. Some of their bodies had not even been recovered from the rubble. There were moments, he admits, that he felt like dissolving into tears. But he kept it together – not just for himself, but for all those looking to him for strength and leadership.
With such a heavy weight on his shoulders, it is remarkable, perhaps, that Pastor Bataille can stay buoyant. Yet he exudes genuine optimism, genuine hope.“People are seeing the love of Christ in us,” he says, barely pausing to talk as he helps to unload rice and beans at his church. “With World Relief’s help, we’re showing people the love of Jesus, not just telling them… and their hearts are touched.
The love of Christ is something that everybody needs and I believe this love can draw people to find hope and peace.“I pray: ‘Lord, this is the time… it is the time for change for Haiti.’ If we will turn to God, He will hear us. We have known so much pain, so much sorrow, but I really believe this is the time for a big change.”
Within hours of the most cataclysmic earthquake in Haiti’s history, the Tabernacle of Glory Pentecostal Church in Port-au-Prince became a place of refuge for thousands. The church – an impressive half-completed mini-amphitheater – became a central food distribution point for World Relief. Inside, thousands of bags of rice and beans – enough to feed more than 100,000 people – were readied for distribution to the neediest families.
World Relief set up a system with the church to distribute the food in bulk, primarily to trusted local pastors. Word soon got out. Hundreds of pastors and others lined up in the sun in the hope of receiving some rice to take back to their families and their churches. Meanwhile, children were served hot meals of rice and beans at the church’s feeding station – a lifeline for many families struggling to find any food.
Pastor Louis Ricot came to the church every day after the quake, looking for food. “My people have nothing,” he said with a slight shrug. “We have no help from anywhere else…”Pastor Ricot was just one of thousands of pastors desperate to help his people who were living in tents made out of sticks and torn sheets. “It’s very difficult because there are many people in Port-au-Prince who are hungry right now,” said Michael Jean Baptiste, a church mobilization officer with World Relief, working alongside the church. “I thank God that we’re able to serve Christian and non-Christian alike, because everybody needs help.”
Like many quake survivors at the Tabernacle of Glory, Baptiste questioned God: ‘Lord, thousands have died… why am I not one of them?’God gave him the answer: ‘I have given you the opportunity to live to help your brothers and sisters in this hour.’ “Pastors come to us and say: ‘I have to feed 500 people… can you help me?’” explained Baptiste. “These people love Jesus… Jesus taught us to give to those who are hungry and it is a grace for me to serve them.”
Meanwhile, in the church grounds, hundreds received medical care at a clinic set up under a shelter. Moms with their babies in their arms waited patiently, while a doctor and nurses from Colorado treated and bandaged wounds, checked eye infections and gave out vitamins.
“I feel that God is at work here,” one mother said. “Who else would do this for us?”
Jim Dykhuis
Pastor Gerald Bataille looks weary. His voice cracks with the hoarse edge of someone who has not slept well for some time.
In the weeks following the January earthquake, the leader of the Tabernacle of Glory Pentecostal Church in Port-au-Prince has been working around the clock every day. But Pastor Bataille is not in the frame of mind to give up. His name means “fighter.” And that, say those who know him the best, is exactly what Pastor Bataille has shown himself to be. In the face of massive – even overwhelming – odds, Pastor Bataille has rallied his people to respond with energy, with compassion, with grace.
Less than three weeks after the quake, Pastor Bataille led a funeral service for 30 of his church members killed in the disaster. Some of their bodies had not even been recovered from the rubble. There were moments, he admits, that he felt like dissolving into tears. But he kept it together – not just for himself, but for all those looking to him for strength and leadership.
With such a heavy weight on his shoulders, it is remarkable, perhaps, that Pastor Bataille can stay buoyant. Yet he exudes genuine optimism, genuine hope.“People are seeing the love of Christ in us,” he says, barely pausing to talk as he helps to unload rice and beans at his church. “With World Relief’s help, we’re showing people the love of Jesus, not just telling them… and their hearts are touched.
The love of Christ is something that everybody needs and I believe this love can draw people to find hope and peace.“I pray: ‘Lord, this is the time… it is the time for change for Haiti.’ If we will turn to God, He will hear us. We have known so much pain, so much sorrow, but I really believe this is the time for a big change.”
Within hours of the most cataclysmic earthquake in Haiti’s history, the Tabernacle of Glory Pentecostal Church in Port-au-Prince became a place of refuge for thousands. The church – an impressive half-completed mini-amphitheater – became a central food distribution point for World Relief. Inside, thousands of bags of rice and beans – enough to feed more than 100,000 people – were readied for distribution to the neediest families.
World Relief set up a system with the church to distribute the food in bulk, primarily to trusted local pastors. Word soon got out. Hundreds of pastors and others lined up in the sun in the hope of receiving some rice to take back to their families and their churches. Meanwhile, children were served hot meals of rice and beans at the church’s feeding station – a lifeline for many families struggling to find any food.
Pastor Louis Ricot came to the church every day after the quake, looking for food. “My people have nothing,” he said with a slight shrug. “We have no help from anywhere else…”Pastor Ricot was just one of thousands of pastors desperate to help his people who were living in tents made out of sticks and torn sheets. “It’s very difficult because there are many people in Port-au-Prince who are hungry right now,” said Michael Jean Baptiste, a church mobilization officer with World Relief, working alongside the church. “I thank God that we’re able to serve Christian and non-Christian alike, because everybody needs help.”
Like many quake survivors at the Tabernacle of Glory, Baptiste questioned God: ‘Lord, thousands have died… why am I not one of them?’God gave him the answer: ‘I have given you the opportunity to live to help your brothers and sisters in this hour.’ “Pastors come to us and say: ‘I have to feed 500 people… can you help me?’” explained Baptiste. “These people love Jesus… Jesus taught us to give to those who are hungry and it is a grace for me to serve them.”
Meanwhile, in the church grounds, hundreds received medical care at a clinic set up under a shelter. Moms with their babies in their arms waited patiently, while a doctor and nurses from Colorado treated and bandaged wounds, checked eye infections and gave out vitamins.
“I feel that God is at work here,” one mother said. “Who else would do this for us?”
Jim Dykhuis
Sunday, May 30, 2010
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Morquettes Home
This is Lincolnson, our household helper.. Very nice kid!!! I gave him my clock and he was ecstatic and very grateful, for just a little ol clock..
This is Eda our other household helper... She cooked and cleaned up after us, helped us whenever we needed anything.. A very sweet young lady.. I gave her my watch and she was very grateful...
This was from the dining room looking into the kitchen..
This was only 1/2 of the dining room and the table we all gather at for breakfast and dinner time.. We all knew when to come for meals as Dr. Morquette would sing this song and we all would come running.. 1/2 the time if you weren't in the room you would hear everyone sing very loudly at the end, AMEN~AMEN~~
Dining room again...
This was the Family room where we gathered every night for our team meetings..
This is the 2nd 1/2 of the dining room where myself and JR spent a lot of time on our computers:) AND SEE THE DOOR BEHIND JR?? THAT WAS KEPT SHUT ALL THE TIME SO JR WOULD HAVE A NICE COLD ROOM TO SLEEP IN EVERY NIGHT!!! hahahaha!! :)
Family gathering room..
Amanda took my braids out for me after having them in for 4-5 days, THANK YOU AMANDA & this was the final result..
Here is a few picture of the Morquettes home that we stayed at.. The food was good and plentiful, beds were clean, (except for Teri's one night, hehehe) and well better than sleeping on the floor hehehe... Some had air conditioning (JR-JR-JR-JR!!! hahahaha BUSTED!!!) others had fans and we all had ice packs.. We had showers daily, some of us had bucket showers and some had water coming out of a make shift shower head BUT we all got clean daily:)Our last night we all discussed how well we ALL got along great.. There were NO disagreements nor personality conflicts, and we all truly enjoyed being around each other:)
OUR HAPPIEST time during the trip
This was by far the funniest day we had.. Our last full day we were able to spend the majority of the day with the children of the Garden (Orphanage).. They laughed, played, sang, danced took our cameras to take pictures of each other and us..
After that we went to the Church site and had fun with the kids there... It was just a HAPPY HAPPY day, not only for the kids, but us too..
I figured how to post more than 1 picture at a time JR!!!! YEAH "ME"!!!
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Patient of the week..
This was by far my favorite patient and touched me the most and I don't even know his name..How sad is that...
You can't even see the stitches in his forehead from the gash that was all the way down to where you could actually see his skull...That wound will heal, the others probably never will.....
Hi everyone! It was great to get home and see my dear faithful blogger friend Michelle and my beautiful wife RC. RC had pizza for me when I got home and I had flowers from the Nelson family. It was truly an inspirational and spiritual expereince and our team leaders Amy and Mike Adams were the best. The entire team said they would not hesitate to make another trip to Haiti in the future. We ALL felt so blessed by God to experience everything he allowed us to go through in Haiti, from tears, to fears and everything in-between, especially laughter. We could not have had 12 better people from 12 different backgrounds, all at different paths in their walk with God. Thank you to all my team members for making this an unforgettable experience for me as a person and Christ follower! I love you all dearly and look forward to our team celebration. JR
Safe & sound & back in town!
JR & RC see each other for the first time! So sweet!
Welcome home CCC Go Team! It was so nice to see all of you at the airport last night and welcome you in person! What a privilege to hear the stories from JR and Vince on the way home and I look forward to hearing many more! Well done! You are all inspirations to me! Thank you for all of your hard work!
In Christ,
Michelle
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
I miss my wife and daughters cannot wait to see them! My phone is finally toast! It's been great all week, I drop one call after another with AT&T sitting at my desk upstairs in South Elgin, but I can call from Haiti and have a great wi-fi connection, what's wrong with this picture? We are checked in through customs and immigration with very little problem, a lot easier to get out of the country than it is to get in! We are relaxing upstairs at our gate, most are playing Uno, I'm blogging, Debby and Justine are still trying to figure out how to get on th "free" wi-fi here at the airport...lol! Teri is not feeling well, she thinks she may have picked up a cold from one of the kids, but of course she is still smiling and says everything is fine. Amanda and I are craving Pizza, Sarah wants Subway, Tom wants an ice cold Pepsi, Vince wants to help the world, Amy was showing off her puppeteering skills with her passport, Jim is itching to find a wall to tear down and Mike is looking for a pile of rocks to move, and poor Dr. Steve is home and we hope he fills better. We saw the capital building today and the devastation of Port au Prince, it was UNBELIEVABLE! There was a demonstration starting and we had to high tell it out of town and to the Visa Lodge for lunch and then to the airport. We are getting ready to board I will call my wonderful wife who I cannot wait to hug in Miami. I love you honey XXOO, I have some pretty cool news, I will tell you when I see you! Mee-Shell-Lee i knew you would never abandon the blog, I just wanted to make sure the owls wer not crowding us out.
Nubby (JR) is facebookin and bloggin with one hand
"Look honey one hand", says JR to RC! LOL!
JR your wife has been making me cry with her sweet post too. You should see the text she sends me. I'm pretty sure I'm her fave! LOL! I was at your house last night around 10:30 and RC was working her tushie off preparing the house for your homecoming! I think you are gonna like Coco's new pink pillow that goes right above yours in your bed. She has missed you too! She (Coco) gave up drinking bottled water while you were gone just as an act of appreciation.
Alexis said she may even wash her smelly volleyball gear too before you get home tonight. Just between us, well and all the other bloggers, I hope she does. It smells like the inside of my kickboxing gloves!
Did you sweet talk any government officials so they will consider opening the borders for international adoption again?
I'm praying for y'all today and the people on the airplane who have to sit next to you...lol...seriously safe travels all the way into the arms of your families! Well done!
Love,
Michelle, Meshelle, Shellyboo, Shelly just don't call me RJ
JR your wife has been making me cry with her sweet post too. You should see the text she sends me. I'm pretty sure I'm her fave! LOL! I was at your house last night around 10:30 and RC was working her tushie off preparing the house for your homecoming! I think you are gonna like Coco's new pink pillow that goes right above yours in your bed. She has missed you too! She (Coco) gave up drinking bottled water while you were gone just as an act of appreciation.
Alexis said she may even wash her smelly volleyball gear too before you get home tonight. Just between us, well and all the other bloggers, I hope she does. It smells like the inside of my kickboxing gloves!
Did you sweet talk any government officials so they will consider opening the borders for international adoption again?
I'm praying for y'all today and the people on the airplane who have to sit next to you...lol...seriously safe travels all the way into the arms of your families! Well done!
Love,
Michelle, Meshelle, Shellyboo, Shelly just don't call me RJ
Meshellee is here Capin' Ron
Hey JR I've never left the blog for a minute, well maybe a minute to check in on the owls!
I've been gettin' my funny on in the comment section of the blog! Have you been checking the comment section? We sure have enjoyed ourselves there! LOL!
I can't wait to get the news that you are back on American soil, so text me from Miami K?!
Psalm 118:24 This is the day the Lord has made rejoice and be glad in it!!!
I love the pictures!
I've been gettin' my funny on in the comment section of the blog! Have you been checking the comment section? We sure have enjoyed ourselves there! LOL!
I can't wait to get the news that you are back on American soil, so text me from Miami K?!
Psalm 118:24 This is the day the Lord has made rejoice and be glad in it!!!
I love the pictures!
church
Hello all. this is a picture taken at church after service. some of the kids from church. this is the church that the team has been working on. even though they increased the space in church to double it's capacity, it was packed! about 500 people at service. it was powerful and amazing! justine see you all at home soon. 
Hi Honey! My phone has been down since yesterday. It says "No Sim Card" I have popped it out and cleaned it, but it still is not reading, so I cannot use my phone. You brought tears to my eyes after reading your past couple blogs. I love you so much and cannot wait to see you. Your info is correct, we have very little time in Miami, I will have to borrow someones phone to call you. So, plan on that time. I cannot wait to give you a big wet dirty hug and kiss! Yesterday was tough to get through. Jim and I were not feeling well, he was an animal the harder he worked the better he felt. So, I tried that too...and it worked for me as well, the harder I watched Jim work the better it made me feel! LOL! I couldn't eat lunch and for dinner I just had rice, bread, split pea soup and a piece of cake. I left with 5 bags and I am coming home with two! We gave everything away yesterday to our Haitian friends, even our shoes...Mike had to piggy back me to the van so I wouldn't have to walk through the sewer water we picked up rocks out of all week. Now I think he needs to see a back doctor when he gets home. Everyone is so excited about getting home to see their loved ones. Thank you so much for taking care of everything which allowed me to go on this trip. The next one we are doing together! I asked Mike when the next Hawaii mission trip was and to let me know and to count us in! I wish! Okay, I gotta go help Mike find his ipod. Love you and talk to you soon! JR
Flight info
Please correct me if I am wrong, but I think I found the flight info for the Go Team. I was going through some paper work and happen to come across it. The GoTeam will be leaving Haiti @ 4:55 pm. arrive in Miami @ 8:15 pm. Depart Miami @ 9:50 pm. arrive into Chicago Ohare @ 11:55 pm. Wow long day of travel for you guys. I will keep you all in my prayers. Please call from Miami so I know where to pick you up from.
Love,
RC
Love,
RC
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