Wishing I was there...

Posted by Christine

Today, a week ago, I was down in a wonderful place called the Dominican Republic. Every day since I have gotten back to the states, I have missed being there. God truly transformed my heart while I was there. I told Will this several times throughout the trip, but I am still so jealous that he can be homeschooled and be down there for 3 months.
I want to say thank you to Sharla and Senora Majcher for planning the trip and to Brian and Bethany who were such amazing hosts to all of us. I admire y'all so much, Brian and Bethany. For a long time now, God has been telling me that he wants me to go into some kind of missions when I get older, but I have come up with all kinds of excuses to ignore Him. Y'all showed me that being a missionary is definitely something I want to do now, whether long term or short term. Thank you for your encouragement throughout the trip. Thanks for helping me realize how God has gifted me with children. Also, Senora Majcher, thanks for being an encouragement back here at home this past week.
God really broke my heart while I was there. He showed me how he has gifted me and he showed me a lot of things I had never seen before. Living in such a materialistic world, which seems to only be made worse by the private school I attend (my classmates), it is hard to not let that effect you. Since I have returned, I see everything differently and I am so thankful for how God has blessed me. Not a day goes by when I don't think of those kids and their houses, the water situation, Mares and his ministry, and Reuben and his farm. They had such an impact on me. I miss Bernito and Pajon (spelling?) the most. I wish I could be back there this instant holding them and laughing with them.
I have told many people about this trip, coming to tears as I tell them about Bernito and Pajon and the amazing work being done down there. I am excited about returning next spring break and hopefully more in the future to work with Makarios.
Here is a link where I placed all of the pictures from the trip. You may want to check back in a few weeks, because I will be placing many of the pictures I steal from other people there also.
http://community.webshots.com/album/303474740IUYZQm
Brian and Bethany, I am praying for you everyday. May God truly bless your lives and your ministry.

Oh the fun times!

Posted by Lola

Well the D.R. was incredible! It was all that Sra. Laurie Beth Majcher said that it was plus more. I cannot believe how hard it has been for me and some of the other girls being back here in the states. I keep thinking about all the kids and waking up in the middle of the night expecting to see Jen and Jessica and Mandy across the room from me. So yeah its just been hard being back here.
Ok well i would like to give a HUGE thanks to Brian and Bethany for hosting us the brand new and beautiful Makarios house. Y'all are such a blessing and i hope and pray everyday that God continues to bless your ministry down there. And to Sharla thanks you for all the green taggy stuff for our luggage because we would have been helpless without it and also thank you for the time and effort you and Sra. and everyone put into planning and putting together this trip! This trip was amazing and definiately changed my life. I cant wait until i get to come back!

well then

posted by Will

So, another success I would say. I am getting some of the pictures up right now from the last group. I think one of you guys might have generously given me the stomach bug though. It just keeps getting hotter down here. Right now I am sitting here at the computer typing with shorts on, the windows open and my shirt off, and I am still sweating. Pray for the Whites, the missionary family that I am staying with. On sunday, Kerry, their daughter, was banged up pretty bad in a car accident back in the states. Teresa flew back for 3 weeks. She messed up her back and face so she is going to have to be in some big back cast for 3-6 months. My email is willhaizlett@yahoo.com Well, I guess my chocolate plea went out a little bit to late, but the stoners came up big anyway. They loaded me up. Unfortunately I ate it all before the week was over. My family sent some good stuff down too. If you were down here last week and want to comment on the week, you can. Time for this sick little boy to go to bed. The pictures are at www.msnusers.com/willspictures I got the one of the cow head in Pancho Mateo up. It's worth checking out. Click on pictures when the page comes up.

Will

quick trip update

posted by Sharla

I'm busy getting ready for our board meeting, which starts tomorrow, so I won't be able to post news and pictures from our trip until next week. Suffice it to say the trip went amazingly well, the groups were awesome, and our kids and our ministry were blessed as a result. Hopefully the team members will start posting their stories soon. And a big thanks to Will, who despite getting voted off the island, built some great bunkbeds, benches, and kitchen table!

Doesn't anybody love me?

posted by will

Thankyou all for your support of my blogs. I'm really feeling the love. Wow, I just got back from Puerto Plata on the bus. I slept the whole way. I finally realized that I can get a better price if I ask them what it costs before I get in the taxi. We took the wood and some of Brian and Bethany's stuff from here in Santiago up to the villa last Friday. I rode in the rental truck. When it's dark, Dominicans flash their lights constantly, and when it's light they just beep their horns all the time. The driver was trying to learn english so we listened to some station that plays american music. As we were coming into Puerto Plata and the ocean came into view, YMCA came on. Yeah, this is the life. So they finally filled up the pool at the old place the day before we moved. When we came back from church on Sun. morning, it was raining and the next renters were already moving in even though there was still a bunch of stuff left that we wern't able to get out the night before. We finally got the water and fridge working. I primed the pump like you said Dad, and it started right up. The hot tub should be full by the time the next group gets here, but I don't know because it's pretty big. If you want the real view from the new place, you can find it on my picture page, www.msnusers.com/willspictures it should be the last picture.
So at six on wed. morning, Brian took me to the surfing beach to go surfing for the first time. There were no waves most of the time and then all of the sudden there would be a set of like five of them. It basically consisted of me floundering out into the ocean for about ten minutes, seeing a big wave headed towards me, trying to turn around and then falling off the surfboard, trying to get back on the surfboard and then another wave would hit me, repeating step three a few more times, realizing I had been washed way in and had to go back out, and then starting the process over again. Maybe I better just stick to digging holes in the sand. I was starting to get really tired out and thinking that this was really tough until I realized, wait, it's about 7:00 back home. Right now everyone else my age is getting ready to go to school and I am playing in the waves on some tropical island. Ok, so maybe I can endure this. My knees hurt. I just spent all this past week assembling stuff on the floor. Ouch. So the group is going to Shelly and Guille's church. That's going to be a lot of people in a small church. The phone that Sharla left me while she is gone is possessed by a deamon. First, it took a couple weeks too get it from the missionaries house where she left it. Then I had it for about half a minute and I put it in Guille's truck and forgot it. Then about a week later he got his truck back from his brother and left the phone in the church for me. But before I could get it, it was stolen by some kid from down the street that just got out of the insane assylum. About a week later Guille got it back and I finally got it again. After about two weeks it stopped working completely and Brian got it fixed but now it only works every now and then. What does it all mean? Brian and Bethany are teaching me hard-core fasting methods. I don't know what keeps them alive. When the fridge was out they barely ate anything the whole time. I hope the next group doesn't eat much either so that I can have all the leftovers. I hear a maid is going to cook for us, so I'm starting to get pretty excited. It will be interesting to see how Mr. Wilson is going to fit into the passing game. I am sitting here sweating with the windows open. The weather is deffinitely taking a turn for the worse down here. I'm tired. I finally finished Ivanhoe. I have been working on it the whole time I have been here. For some reason, I kept thinking the whole time that I had read the abbridged version once and Rebecca dies towards the end. So for the whole last couple hundred pages I was just waiting for her to die. All of the sudden the book was over though and she still hadn't died. What a rip-off. All week I have somehow been a day behind. I finally realized that today is friday just a few hours ago. It's kind of a wierd feeling. If anyone reads this blog before they come down tommorow, can you please bring me some chocolate. A bag of almond joys would be great. I will pay you for them. The chocolate here is really dry and light. Wow, did I just write all that?

Buenos Nachos, Surfer Will

Why take one group when you can take three?

A group of 13 of us leave tomorrow morning for the DR and then on Saturday a group leaves from Philadelphia. And then later that day another group leaves from Austin. We just like to keep things interesting, which is why we are particularly excited about the fact that our "new" refrigerator in the DR has decided it's not quite ready to work yet. The last group didn't have water, perhaps we will not have cold food! We've been advised that it needs a day or so to get the freon circulating, so it should be ready...but who knows. In the DR each day brings new adventures and challenges. It builds character and puts hair on your toes! Hopefully not the later. My dad used to say that as motivation to eat strange things. He said it as though we wanted hair on our toes. I for one, do not.

There will be a total of 27 of us down there. Why three groups at once? The easy answer is, spring break. This is when people could come. It works out great, as far as I'm concerned. The group of 13 is a work team, a group of 4 will be joining them and planning their June missions trip, and a group of 7 will be helping us get our coffee business going. All groups will be together for certain activities, so it won't be as crazy as it sounds. But I'm sure it'll still be crazy. Good thing I learned the word for logistics in Spanish: logisticas. (pronounced low-his-tee-cahs)

We would appreciate your prayers through this trip, which goes from March 11-20. I will post pictures when I get back.

Moving Day

Makarios has a new home! Brian and Bethany are moving in today and the first group will arrive next Saturday. We are so thrilled with God's amazing provision for us!

Here's a picture of the view from our roof:

Let's take a vote

I've heard from a few of you about Will's blogs. You like them. They're entertaining, sassy, and somewhat informative. But does he go too far? Does youth know no bounds? Tell us what you think! I personally vote NO on proposition "reprimand Will for his sarcastic blogs." Some of that stuff is laugh-out-loud funny! Will, your vote doesn't count.