november trip picture

No shortage of smiles and silly
faces in pancho mateo!

thanksgiving

posted by sharla, austin, texas

a big thanks to all of you who have supported us over the past year and a half! we wouldn't be doing what we do if it weren't for you. it's interesting to try to explain to the kids that there are people in another country giving money and supplies, and that enables us to work with them. I know they're grateful - even though you can't hear it from them. so thank you!

Up all night

Posted by Brian

Well some of you that have lived in the Dominican Republic can sympathize with us. Last night one of our neighbors decided to have a party, but the thing is it didn't start until eleven and didn't end until 3:30. The party included very loud music that kept us up and I imagine the whole neighborhood. It is not uncommon and most who have lived here probably have had an experience like this. So we are a little tired today.

Today we took nine children from Pancho Mateo to church with us. We have been trying every week to bring children with us. Usually it is 2 or 3. We gave an open this week invitation and everyone wanted to come. We picked them up and everyone that could ran to change clothes to go with us. So we had Children in everything from dress pants and dresses to soccer shorts and flip flops. We were worried when we saw the mix we had with us. We had enough Bibles for them all to share and they behaved amazingly. I was praying the whole time that they would and God really answered that prayer. As a matter of fact they were the best behaved children in the church. Two of them did fall asleep though. We were so proud of them.

God is good

posted by sharla in austin

a big thank you to all of you who prayed for us while we were on our trip. it was a big success as far as the coffee stuff goes. we are all set up to export dominican coffee and will be sending a trial shipment in a few weeks.

we also got to introduce Rose around and give her an idea of what life will be like in the DR. we're looking forward to having her work with a few deaf children and their families. she'll also be helping Brian and Bethany in the classroom and working on her spanish. yay new staff!

we were also able to get some paintings and other artwork for the coffee shop. speaking of dominican joe, we finally have a location and hope to begin construction in the next few weeks (it's an existing building, so our construction is just on the inside)! we aim to open in march. you can read more about the shop at www.dominicanjoe.com.

does anyone else out there miss reading will's blog postings? i do. i need to write that boy.

go steelers!

trip #5 of '05

posted by a tired sharla, the night before departure. at best buy.

I'm off to the DR tomorrow morning at 6:30am. So clearly my choice to be at best buy at 10:42 the night before was a good one. Actually, I came by two hours ago to drop off my computer to have some work done while I'm gone. there's a chance that they'll actually replace my computer, so I'm buring all 1.4 gigs of my pictures to cds. that takes a while.

We have a very eventful trip coming up. I'm traveling with Christy and Mehul, who are working with me on our coffee venture. we have some business to take care of both in terms of exporting coffee and getting things we need for our austin coffee shop. we'll also be meeting with Rose, who will be visiting for the first time in preparationg for her new position that starts in January. please pray for us!

hook em.

Overflow

Posted by Brian

Our new behavior incentive program for the children has brought improvements in behavior but also an increase in student participation. We have well over 120 participating in our Pancho Mateo programs. Our classes and activities have expanded beyond our little house and into the porch outside. With our oldest class we have been doing a unit on Charlotte's Web. As I was reading one of the chapters I noticed 2 twenty something men standing at our fence listening to the book. These children have never been read to before and for sure they have never read a chapter book.
I also have become very popular because I brought a bicycle pump and needle to inflate basketballs and volleyballs. Hardly a day goes by when I am not asked to fill at least 5 balls and a few bike tires. It also has been very helpful because in the month of October we had 13 flat tires on our truck. We drive on some really bad roads. I never though to inflate a car tire with a bike pump but in a jam it works.
Please continue praying for us and the children.