Memorial season, go, go, go!

Hello everyone!

Hope you are all having a wonderful Memorial season and are enjoying following up on the interest shown.

Here all is well. It's been really hectic this month, since April 1st we haven't had a single day off to just relax, so this morning I stayed home for a bit to try and get some rest, do some studying, and get a bit of baking done. It smells really good in here right now!!

Our two biggest events this month were the Memorial, obviously, and the Central America branch (formerly called Mexico branch) had a visit from Bro. Losch of the Governing Body. The three-hour program was streamed out to all congregations who could get connected, and since we have the advantage of using the CO's internet connection at the hall, we had a trouble-free viewing of the program.

It started with a beautiful Watchtower Summary by Armando Ochoa. It was a wonderful lesson anyway, and he did such a wonderful job of summarizing it. Very nice indeed.

Then a report on the region supervised by the Central America branch which stretches from Mexico to Panama. There are 980, 897 publishers in the region, 807,000 of which are in Mexico. The rest of us are pretty little!! There are over 1,300,000 studies being conducted, 1 million of which are in Mexico alone. We had a 2.2% increase as a region, and in Bethel there are 18 nationalities represented and there is translation being done in 58 languages. A lot of those translation groups have now moved, or are in the process of moving out of Bethel and into the areas where the language is widely spoken. No other organization goes to such lengths to translate into so many indigenous languages.

Then Brother Losch gave his talk, which was the rest of the program. He made some really interesting points. He talked a lot about higher education, what dangers it exposes our young ones to. He mentioned that some parents are encouraging it so that their children can take care of them in their old age. He asked those parents "Where's your sense of urgency? Where is your trust in Jehovah?" He was very direct with some of the things he said, which I really liked! And the phrase I liked most on that subject was "Higher education is not enough for Jehovah's people. We need the HIGHEST education, the one that Jehovah provides by means of the variety of theocratic schools".

He also emphasized why we do what we do. That we preach principally, not to save lives, but because of our love for Jehovah and our desire to contribute to the sanctification of his name. And that we don't do Bible reading just to gain knowledge, but primarily to get to know Jehovah better, to increase our love for him. He said if we say we don't have time, well, we have to FIND the time. And I liked what he said - "When we do our Bible reading despite being tired, we give Jehovah even more reason to love us". What a loving God we have!

And something that I personally feel I need to work on, good works. He pointed out that preaching is not enough. We have to balance our time so that we can also do fine works, especially for our brothers and sisters. Dorcas was known for her fine works, not her zeal in the ministry, although she was no doubt a zealous evangelizer. Sometimes I get so caught up with studies and field service that I don't take out the time to just visit the sick, and do things for the friends, so that was a good reminder for me!

He also reminded us of the need to preach in small groups, small, small, small he said! Well, he said pequeno, but I'm translating! His Spanish is pretty good so it was nice to get to listen to it without the need of an interpreter. 

The three speakers, and a little shot of us singing. It was nice how they showed the auditorium in Mexico during the song so we felt like we were there with them!

Of course, the other highlight of this month was the Memorial. I had my doubts about how we were going to make our Memorial location look pretty, but I think we pulled it off! We have about 73 publishers now but we had 222 in attendance. Don Oracio came, the man in the wheelchair, and my study Ruth who also brought her two kids, teenage niece and a friend. And we had some other studies there, but mostly those who go every year anyway. I was really excited that Ruth came though, and that she brought guests! I haven't had chance to sit and talk to her yet about it, but she seemed to enjoy it. That was her first meeting, so hopefully it won't be her last! The electricity had been going out quite a bit in the week leading up to the Memorial, and as you may have seen on the news we've had quite a lot of earthquakes and aftershocks around here, although only one did much damage and it wasn't in our area. But, thankfully for the Memorial there were no rumbles, and the electricity didn't go out until we were putting the last item from the stage into the truck to take it away! Good timing I thought!

Here are some pictures which you may have already seen on Instagram!

Our studies and return visits. Don Oracio, in the wheelchair, told me the other day that of all the religious organizations he's visited, this is the only one he's really liked. He's so very impressed and doesn't plan on going anywhere else!

Our congregation. Some came in taxis, others on bikes, and a few in a cart!! Haha, that was actually afterwards. I think they were coming to pick something up, and so the girls got in and let their brother push them!

Charley did a wonderful job. The chairman was our Coordinator, Wilber. We had two beautiful flower arrangements made for just $15 a piece, and I had my first french braid in over a decade!!

More of our congregation

Who needs curlers when you have plastic straws?! I love people's ingenuity here!

We also had some lovely visitors for a few days. They are friends of friends from the State of Washington, and they came to Nicaragua for a few weeks to immerse themselves in Spanish. I also think they maybe got bitten by the needgreater bug because by the end of the trip they didn't want to leave, and they said "see you soon"!! We got to take them out in service in Masaya (we almost killed them with two long, hot days!) and we took them up to El Crucero too where we spent our first month in Nicaragua way back when!

This is the BEST smoothie place in Masaya, and they had the brilliant idea of making giant tables and chairs! 

Our friend, Steven, also got a custom made, leather service bag with his name on it, made in Masaya. It only took the guy two days to make it, and I'm in love with it!! I might just have to design one myself now for the meetings!

After our morning in service up in El Crucero with Mario Robleto. Steven & Chloe are the cute couple on Charley's left.

We also spent a nice evening at TGI Friday's with Steven & Chloe, Monica, Veronica and Brenda & Caleb.

I was horrified when I realized I had eaten the ENTIRE burger. I was sure I'd have half of it left. I guess I worked up an appetite that day or something!

I also just have to share this picture and story, for those of you who haven't already seen it on Instagram! I've managed to live here 18 months without ever riding on a motorbike, but the Sunday that Charley went to pick Steven & Chloe up he left me in Masaya at a cafe with some friends. I hoped he'd be back before the cafe closed, but he wasn't. So I had to get on a motorbike and pretend not to be nervous! Since I'm a rookie they made me get in the middle. It was a bonding experience if nothing else!! Just a shame that I was wearing a really long, narrow dress that evening. Yes, that's a dress in the picture, not shorts!!!

Thankfully we didn't have very far to go. Just a few blogs on small, city streets.

And last, but absolutely not least, a shout out to our dear friends Veronica & Monica Iglesias. We had to say goodbye to Monica, and it might have been our last time with Veronica too, last week. Veronica has been here about 3 years, and she's a true missionary. Like someone once expressed it, "She makes me feel like a little grandma shuffling around in my slippers down here". I admire her immensely, as I do all single sisters serving where the need is greater. Her sister Monica came for four months and was a trooper too. So, Monica is heading back to the States, and Veronica is off to serve on the pioneer campaign for a couple of months in Guatemala - like I said, missionary through and through! And since we'll be gone July and part of August we might not see her again since she's heading back to the States in August to see what far-flung part of the earth she'll go to next!

So, we spent some time with these wonderful girls over the last week, and best wishes to you both, and thanks for the inspiration! Oh, and Monica, if you're reading this, can you send the pictures you took of us together in Granada, please? The crazy hair ones!

Caleb, Brenda, Veronica, Monica, their cousin Maddy who came to visit, and us, after enjoying fabulous pizza in Granada! Yum!!

Veronica, Brenda, Caleb, me, and Monica just before the motorbike ride! 

Same folks again, enjoying some Gelato in Granada.

Well, now you know why I had to take this morning off to recover!! Between theocratic activities and socializing with great friends, it's been a rather exhausting month so far!! 

The rest of this month looks to be equally busy, but maybe May will be calmer. That's what I say every month, MAYBE!

Just a quick one

Just a quick post to put a few pictures out there for anyone who hasn't already seen them in Instagram! Things are going well here. It's been really busy lately, and we've had a full house with our landlady, her daughter, and her brother here, so it feels like we've been even busier than ever this last couple of weeks.

The ministry is going really well. I have a lot of studies now, it's a challenge to keep up with them all, but it's a nice problem to have!

The congregation is really flourishing too. As I think I mentioned before, in the first 9 months we just had one new publisher, although we had 5 baptized. But all of a sudden we've had a bunch of new publishers. All little kids and old ladies! Another of the little girls we spend a lot of time around was approved for this past month, and her brother is about to reach that goal too. And another young teenager too. And then three older studies. Two of them are almost 80, the other is a little younger, but she's blind. One of the almost 80-year old's has back problems so she can't walk too well. So she set up a table outside her house. It's a busy street, and she knows everyone, so I think she placed over 40 pieces of literature her first day sitting there! The other almost 80-year old was at the group on Saturday for her first time out, although I haven't had chance to talk to her yet to see how it went.

I hope to have some pictures soon of all our new publishers. It's so lovely to see older ones coming along like that. We have at least 6 more studies that are over 50 too, and are at all the meetings, so maybe we'll have another growth spurt in the next 6 months or so. It's lovely to see the growth. It's like the congregation has finally settled, we're all getting used to each other, and so now the growth begins!

We also had a man from our territory come to the meeting for the first time a couple of weeks ago. He's been in the territory since always, and a lot of people have talked to him, and everyone was really pleased and surprised to see him at the Kingdom Hall for the first time. He was sick this past Sunday, so we'll see if he comes this coming weekend. Our friend Cherub met him out in service and set things up for us to take him. Here he is below, chatting with Charley outside the hall. He said afterwards that the really enjoyed it. He was impressed with how well organized we are, how well everything was explained, and how the kids all participate too.

Don Oracio at his first meeting. Charley's not asleep, just squinting from the sun!

And here are some more random pictures with brief explanations below each one.

Here we are on Sunday getting our Memorial location cleaned up. They painted over the graffiti! We'll be having it outdoors again, but this time on a piece of land owned by a study in our hall. It's nice because it's in our territory, unlike our Kingdom Hall, so hopefully we'll have a lot of people come that evening. 

We spent a lovely evening down by Lake Nicaragua in Granada with some friends who serve nearby, and some others who serve in English in La Ceiba, Honduras. If you're thinking of serving in English somewhere, they would love your help. There's only about 12 publishers and lots of territory. There you go guys - I told you I'd plug La Ceiba!

Caleb's parents were here visiting so we had them over for a nice, relaxing afternoon. I think Caleb played volleyball for 2 hours straight! Charley was testing his new goggles!

Some friends from the congregation where we served in our first three months came over. Hardly anyone here knows how to swim, or even float, so we had a good laugh trying to teach them. Not sure we got anywhere, but we had fun!

One of Charley's studies, Johnny. He doesn't read well, but he pays rapt attention!

We had the privilege of meeting this lovely family who came for three weeks, and their friend who is here for 6 months. It's so much fun to see more and more people coming down here, spying out the land!

And here are our newly adopted nieces and nephew. They call us Tio Charley and Tia Rachel now, which I love, since that's what we did growing up - everyone in the congregation was Aunt and Uncle. Isaac is well on his way to becoming a publisher, his cousin Roxana next to him is my newest Bible student, his sister Jael just became a publisher, and Roseli just was on the school for the first time a few weeks ago. They're such sweet kids.

Well, time to start getting ready for the meeting. Oh, and one other thing, we booked our flights today for our trip home - July 1st to August 11th so to those of you in Indy, see you soon! It was so fun booking tickets without giving any credit card info - we used half the credit we got last time we flew!

So proud!

We are so proud of our nephew, Noah. He's only 10 years old and he gave his first number 3 talk on the school last week to an audience of about 80 people. Click the link below to see the video on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7U9OjHW2Y7U&feature=youtube_gdata_player

It's moments like this where one gets just a tiny bit homesick!  Thank goodness for technology!

Yet Another Free Photo Book!

Click here to view this photo book larger

Shutterfly offers exclusive photobook layouts so you can make your book just the way you want.

I got another irresistible offer from Shutterfly. I didn't think I had anything to make a book of, but once I started to look at the pictures from the last few months I realized they would turn in to a rather attractive album! 

Two days in a row!

I should just keep a little list of things I want to blog about, because when it comes to sitting down and writing I always forget the little stories I was planning on telling!

The first one that comes to mind though is about the pool! I've finally been making myself take advantage of the available exercise and for the week that our friend Cherub was here I swam every night. I took a week off, but started again this last two days. I'm not a strong swimmer, probably never will be. I have a bit of a fear of water, which is why I haven't managed to make myself jump in the pool yet! Anyway, I'm quite proud of the progress I've made. I started out only being able to swim about 10 lengths, which is only about 70 meters since the pool is small. But as of today I'm up to 32 lengths - that's about 220 meters, or just over 4 lengths of a standard olympic pool.  I'm hoping I'll have really buff, muscular arms soon!

We had our CO visit at the end of Feb/beginning of March. It was a lovely month of activity with 11 auxiliary pioneers for February, and I think we have about the same for March. Our three young sisters who were baptized in November & December pioneered for the first time and made a success of it, despite the fact that two of them were back in school most of February.

The visit was really encouraging. We have 68 publishers, 37 of whom are conducting 131 Bible studies. We had one new publisher and 5 baptized and have an average Sunday attendance of 88. The support for the ministry was really good every day, morning and afternoon. We had at least 30 out for every arrangement, and Sunday pretty much the entire congregation was out. We worked all of our territory by Friday and had to start it over again!

His final talk was really nice. Talking about how Jehovah is greater than our hearts. How he sees more than just what we are, he sees what our potential is, and takes into account our DNA, external factors that affect us like upbringing and current circumstances. He knows us better than we know ourselves. It was just a very encouraging talk, knowing what a struggle it is for so many families in our congregation just to provide for their families and still find time and energy for spiritual activities. We had 132 at the meeting Sunday so there's lots of potential for growth.

My study Carolina, who I mentioned in a previous post, is doing really well. We started the Bible Teach book this past Friday and I just come out floating from her study. She's SOOOO excited to finally be learning more about the Bible. She'd read over the chapter which I could tell right away because she kept referring to things that we hadn't got to yet!! I think once we finish the first chapter I'm going to teach her how to prepare since she's already half-way there anyway! She's a joy to study with.

Rut is also doing well. She's one of the calls I worked on for months, and now we're in chapter 2 of the Bible Teach book. I'm teaching her to how to study her book, highlighting the answers, and she's really getting the hang of it quickly. I really appreciate her because she's really setting the time aside for her study now. This week when I arrived I could tell that she was still a bit busy, and tired from a busy day, and they had people at the house, but despite all that she set everything aside for her study even though I offered to just go over the last page of the Watchtower together. She is developing a real appreciation for what she's learning it seems. Hopefully she will come to the Memorial next month.

We put the public witnessing table out on Friday this past week at the same place where we've putting it on Tuesdays. We now have an official sign to hang up next to it, and thanks to a sister's brother who is a welder we have a lovely sturdy stand to hang it on. I'll have to get a picture of it this week since I forgot to on Saturday. The sign drew a lot of attention.

Plans are coming together for the Memorial. We were going to do it all together with the other two congregations that meet in our hall, on the same big piece of land out the back of the hall where we did it last year. But then the CO encouraged us to do it separately and somewhere in our territory since the hall is a 15 minute walk for some in our territory and that can prevent people from coming. So, it looks like we're doing it at a house that belongs to a bible student in our congregation. It's a great big place, loads of room to do it outdoors, so it'll be fun to see how many our congregation has for it's first Memorial together. Charley has the privilege of giving the talk and when we took a trip to Pricesmart (Nicaragua's Costco) on Monday we went ahead and got the wine too. And an extra bottle to make sure it tastes good!

Well, I'm sure there are other stories to tell, but I can't bring anymore to mind at the moment. Oh, but I am going to add a few links to blog posts lately that I've really enjoyed. I follow blogs of a lot of other needgreaters and even a missionary (she is an AMAZING writer who will make you laugh and cry!). Here are a few experiences that I really enjoyed lately. Enjoy!

Matthew serves on the Atlantic coast of Nicaragua and posted this fascinating post this week about a tiny island I'd never heard of before. Read about it at http://pioneerabroad.blogspot.com/2014/03/the-secret-island.html

Linka and Peter are missionaries in Guinea (Yes, a country featured in this year's yearbook) and she posted this lovely experience about making sacrifices to further Kingdom interests - http://ilynca.blogspot.com/2014/03/are-you-sleeping-brother-john.html

And this experience from Kat who is serving with her family in DR - http://thedrsurvivalguide.blogspot.com/2014/02/new-missionaries-needgreater.html

Picture overload!

This post will mostly be pictures. Maybe tomorrow I'll get chance to post some of our recent service experiences and talk more about CO visit. If you follow poet879 on Instagram then you've already seen a lot of these pictures!

First, we went to the beach a couple of weeks ago, and on the way we stopped in at Casares to see how the finished Kingdom Hall looked.  A couple of pioneers live next door so they let us see inside it too. We had the privilege of working a couple of times on this construction project so it was nice to see it all finished.

Then we spent a lovely afternoon at the beach in La Boquita. We went with our friend Caleb, his parents and our fried Cherub who had just arrived from Indianapolis the day before.

Our lovely lunch at the beach - fish complete with eyes!

It was a really relaxing, lazy day!

My friend Cherub, one day in to her Nicaragua adventure.

The gang. We missed Brenda - she wasn't feeling well that day

We stayed until the sun set.

We had CO visit and Cherub stayed with us for the week. The visit was really encouraging, maybe I'll write more about it later. It was fun introducing Cherub to Nicaragua. She has a blog too if you want to check it out - http://www.querubina.org/my-blog.html 

She took some cool pictures out in service that I have been posting on Instagram. Here are some of the shots she took of our territory.

Amongst these pictures are a couple of me with my bible studies. And the big group shot is the pioneer meeting with the CO. We have 8 regular pioneers and a big crowd of auxiliary pioneers, quite a few of whom were at their first ever pioneer meeting. It was very encouraging indeed.

Pancasan is the name of a neighborhood in our territory, and also the name of our congregation. And there is a picture of me crossing my favorite bridge in our territory!

In the middle we are with the CO and a family whose house we were invited to lunch at.

I love this shot!! I was showing Isaac the story of Abraham going to sacrifice Isaac. He didn't know the story of his namesake. He seemed to be pretty interested in it!

Saturday afternoon we had the privilege of having the CO and his wife over for lunch, along with a few others, and at their request we made pizzas! We also discovered that our CO plays guitar and sings pretty well!

CO chillin' in the recliner!

Pizzas galore!

This Saturday that just passed, which is usually our short day in service, we ended up being in Masaya for over 12 hours. Charley went to help on a project at the Kingdom Hall trying to get the water sorted out because the CO's water tank keeps emptying out and he has no water. He was going to help for a couple of hours, but it turned into an all day affair. But the CO has water now, so all is good!

About 4 brothers throughout the day dug that whole tunnel by hand! And the further they went, the deeper the water pipes got! Charley has blisters all over his hands.

We also went to Esteli, about 2 1/2 hours north of here, to drop Cherub off. She's going to be there, enjoying the cooler climate, for about a month. I didn't take a lot of pictures, and those I did take were out of the car window, but here's an idea of how hilly, and pretty it is north of where we live.

We decided these were rice fields, because in dry season everything else is brown as you can see in the other pictures!

And to finish off, some more random pictures from field service that I've taken over the last week.

My youngest bible student, Anai, on her wheel swing!

Public witnessing table on Friday. That lady in the blue skirt is reading the Good News brochure.

Nicole was rather engrossed in the brochure!

Walter Jr couldn't figure out how to get that shirt off his head!

Well, there's your picture overload. Hasta luego friends!