Visitors!

March was a busy month preparing for and hosting sets of visitors! We love this part of living here, but it IS work, believe it or not!

We had the privilege of hosting Jim and Josh from World Missions for one week. They were primarily here to create a few short videos for Tesoros de Dios, but they also spent time interviewing, photographing, and learning about NCA and our anticipated SOAAR program, the cohort program in Leon, and the Nehemiah Center. We're looking forward to seeing the fruit of their labor through videos and photographs featuring God at work through these organizations.

Andrew and Josh at the Masaya Volcano

Josh was a Calvin College friend (see above), and Jim was Andrew's small group leader when he did a service project in the Yucatan peninsula for 3 weeks in 1999 with START (see below)!

My group with our "host parents." Jim is on the right. Can you find me?

 It was fun to catch up with both gentlemen, and see how God allowed our lives to intersect again here in Nicaragua.

The day before Josh and Jim left, Ruth was at the airport greeting 14 folks from Rehoboth High School (NM)--2 leaders and 12 students. The group served at NCA Matagalpa, an orphanage, our church, and the dump where Ruth is beginning her childbirth classes.
                             
    

Their primary mission, however, was to serve as the childcare workers for our annual Central American CRWM retreat for four days this past week!

Dinner at our house before the retreat

Henry with his awesome group leaders, Glen and Amber

Sharing meals at Vista Mar

As the leader of "Fun Night," I got to pick on a few Rehoboth kids

We ended our time together with a dinner at Papa Johns!

Henry likes high school humor:)

What a blessing it was to have Charlotte, Mae, and Henry in the care of this group of students. The group came down with tons of ideas and materials to make this event special for the 30-some kids in their care (while the adults had our own sessions to attend). Our kids made painting with squirt guns, baked cookies in homemade pizza box ovens, created bouncy balls, ate homemade ice cream, and MORE! You have know idea how much our kids looked forward to this week at the beach again this year, and it again exceeded our expectations. It might seem like a "cushy" service project (babysitting on the beach!), but honestly, this was a HUGE service of love to the 60+ adults in attendance at this retreat and it would not have been possible without this group.

The Rehoboth group left early this morning (after a "fun day" of ziplining, volcano climbing, shopping, and exploring the town of Granada), though Ruth couldn't quite relax until they pulled into Rehoboth's parking lot last night (or early this morning, depending on how you look at it!)