Las Semillas: Another year!

Time to dust of this blog and get informing again! After a 7-week summer through Michigan, Tennessee, New Mexico, and Colorado, visiting supporting churches and gracious family and generous friends and clean parks and freezing beaches and relaxing cabins, all while living out of suitcases and only losing one sandal, a teddy bear, and a blanket, we are finally home! And unpacked, too. Dexter was pretty happy to see Henry again.


While last year's initial journey to Nicaragua was filled with the adventure of having NO IDEA what life would look like for our family, this year we had the bizarre feeling as if we were coming "home." (Though that particular word is very confusing, especially to Mae and Charlotte!). Last year, we were picked up from the airport by our school director and deposited into our home with only beds and a table. We knew no one. We had no car. We then spent the next few weeks gathering things,(from couches and trashcans to vegetable peelers and hangers), making acquaintances, buying a vehicle, and learning to navigate the city. And this was just figuring out life here, not to mention work and volunteering and school and church.

What a gift it was to come into a home with already-made beds, internet for which we know the password, plenty of kitchen utensils, and a box of Legos after being picked up from the airport by a friend! What a gift it is to instantly lose our children in our neighborhood for hours at a time while they play with their long lost buddies! What a gift it is to be back at church and give hugs to people with names that we know (and have some Spanish conversation, too)! What a gift to be able to drive to Pricesmart and know how to get there and what to buy to refill our empty cupboards. Things that were stressful, draining, and new are now just part of our lives. So many reasons to be thankful.

We start Year 2 with so many advantages that come with having been in a particular place for a year. Seeds (semillas) were planted and roots have grown. A lot of the groundwork--the figuring-out-life-in-a-brand-new-place stuff--is finished. We are poised to  jump right in to the work we're called to do here in Nicaragua without having to worry so much about the "newbie" stuff. And that feels good. We're not experts, and there remains adventure and unknown. Yet, it is a gift to be here for Year 2, and we thank God for that, and we look forward to another year of sharing with you what God is doing here in Nicaragua.