Last Tuesday, we took a family day to go to Wahoo Bay. It is about an hour and a half from here and it is simply beautiful. We arrived to find we were the only ones on the resort. We had the entire place to ourselves; the beach, the service for the restaurant, the vendors (trying to make one sale for the day out of people not interested in buying, just having fun), and snorkling. A row boat picked us up from the beach and we set off for snorkling in beautiful Caribean water. The man rowing the boat was so excited to have customers for the day so he really took his time explaining different properties along the way. All of which were set in absolutely beautiful surroundings. Our translator, Schneider was very excited to come and snorkel for the first time and assured us he could "swim" or at least not drown. There were two life vests in the boat and I picture Kylie and Brooke wearing them so they could be out in the water for an extended period of time. Schneider had other plans. He began suiting up in the child-size life vest while the adult size lay under the seat. After several minutes of getting this thing on, I informed him that I needed the little one for Brooke and he might be more comfortable in the larger one. This turned into one big circus as he attempted to get strapped in. With some help and instruction from the owner of the boat, Schneider finally managed to be ready to enter the water. After 5 minutes of "snorkeling" while hanging onto the oar and peaking under the water, Schneider decided he was done and climbed back in the boat for the remainder of our time. The whole thing was too funny!


The rest of us had a great time. Kylie is a fish like Jeff, she spent a lot of time diving down and pointing stuff out. She loved it! Colton really enjoyed it too and spent a lot of time just checking things out!

Wednesday, Jeff's parents arrived for a 10 day visit. With them came Christmas! It is hard to put ourselves in the mindset of the Christmas season when the daytime highs are still in the upper 80's. They brought us a small tree and some of our ornaments, Christmas music, and books for the girls. Today, the girls made paper chains to decorate our railing. We plan to string popcorn too.

Next is to help the girls in the orphanage decorate. A new experience for them as they don't normally make a big deal out of the Christmas season other than Christmas day.

One thing that is a bit difficult for Jeff and I is trying to figure out how we do Christmas as a family here. When we visit Canaan and see so many with so little material possessions it is very hard to think about giving each other and our kids things we don't really need. How do we find a balance for our kids? How do we teach them the lessons we want to teach them about taking care of the orphans and the poor if we do Christmas as we did in the past with piles and piles of gifts? For us, I think we will understand more what it means to really celebrate Christmas for what it is. We don't have all the crazy shopping, wrapping, rushing, programs, parties, baking...distractions. It might be hard to figure out how to "do" Christmas here, but at the same time, maybe easy.

This week, we are enjoying Jeff's parents visiting and beginning to get ready for the team coming down the day after Christmas. We are very excited for this team and we are praying for God's mission (not our own) to be carried out during their stay. We are praying for God's timing with things and we trust that He has a plan for lives to be changed!

~Deb