Back in the USA
Thanks again for all of your prayers & support!!
The Painting, Landscaping, & Steel Workers Team -
Paul, Rich, Tim, Karen, Carolyn, Jack O, Craig, Sandi, Judi, Jack VS, Kent, Nancy, & Nancy
El lunes
Monday was another day full of activity! Up at 6am & on the road by 7am. Painting window guards & steel beams, hoisting steel, moving dirt, finishing the garage, & cleaning/organizing were on the agenda.
The team was spoiled with a wonderful lunch of tortillas, vegetables, black beans, & rice cooked by Noemi in her new kitchen! It was so wonderful to have Estuardo, Manuel, & Deb join us for lunch too.
Half of the team members ventured into Antigua for the afternoon & the other half stayed at the base, along with supervision of a Forewoman. The shoppers were on a mission to buy items to sell at the Paradise Bound Thrift Stores (along with Coke, Diet Coke, & Cheetos for the non-shoppers…..thanks!!). If you haven’t been to the Thrift Store in Zeeland or Fremont, you’re missing out! Stop by sometime & support Paradise Bound (you can find maps & directions at www.paradisebound.org)
Our final devotions for the week were based on John 21. The disciples had a choice to encounter Christ - what will your choice be??
Thanks again for all of your support and please continue to pray for Paradise Bound & their mission of ”Doing whatever it takes…to bring the gospel of Jesus Christ to the lost and dying in Guatemala!”
Leaving …
Good morning everyone!
It’s 2:45am and we’re getting ready to leave. We are all on the same flight from Guate City to Houston at 6am & then we part ways – some to GR, some to Cleveland then to GR, some to Omaha, & some to Detroit. Please pray for safe travels & patience today.
Check back later today for an update on Monday and more pictures.
Muchas gracias for walking alongside us this week with your prayers, encouragement, & messages. We can’t wait to share our stories with you!
El domingo
Sorry there weren’t any updates yesterday – we lost power early in the morning & it wasn’t back on when we left for the clinic.
Yesterday morning we packed meds & toys, had a great lunch, and & left for the village around 1:30pm. Thanks to Jack VS for leading us in devotions before heading into our mission.
The name of the village we went to is Tunini and it was only about a 30 minute drive to get there. The people were very welcoming and the medical clinic helped about 75 families. Please pray for physical healing for these people, especially a 6 year old boy named Gustavo Adolfo Pirir who has serious eye issues that have caused blindness. Also a baby girl, only 1 & 1/2 years old, who is only 9 pounds.
The team took turns in the medical clinic & playing with the kids. Some of the favorite activities were coloring, soccer, playing with matchbox cars, bouncing superballs, duck duck goose (or dog dog cat), & jump rope. A few of the team members even joined in on the jump roping – hopefully there are some good pictures!!
Once it was dark, we watched the Jesus video, sang a few songs, a couple of us gave our testimonies, and then Hermano Jesus hit a homerun with his message. A crowd of people came forward during the altar call – praise the Lord that we’ll see these people again in heaven someday!
We’re off to the new base again in 15 minutes. More work on the water tower, painting window guards & steel beams, finishing the garage, etc. A few people, who will remain nameless to protect the innocent, are heading to Antigua to do some shopping this afternoon….. 
Thanks for all of your prayers – hard to believe we leave tomorrow.
Will try to post pictures quick before we leave. If not, check back again tonight.
El sábado
Two words for today – paint & steel. We spent the morning finishing up the interior painting. Rich & Judi continued into the afternoon, touching up our mistakes on the ceiling, painting closets, and organizing all the painting supplies. Paul & Carolyn spent the afternoon painting the outside window guards. Craig was organizing the chaos in the main gathering room & drilling holes in steel plates. Jack VS & Tim are in the process of building a Guatemalan style garage (lean-to) to house the vehicles and containers. Several more loads of dirt were delivered today so Dan is still moving earth around. Nancy, Sandi, and Karen were painting/rustproofing the steel beams for the water tower. Kent built a jib (boom) yesterday which was very important for today’s progress. He & Jack spent the entire day fabricating columns, beams, and welding the steel for the water tower.
The Hot Lunch Program is still a big hit. Today’s feature was grilled tuna melts – thanks Kent! Maybe on Monday, we’ll have those little ice cream cups with a tiny wooden spoon.
Judi – thanks for leading devotions tonight!
Tomorrow’s agenda is – sleeping in (YEAH!) & the medical clinic. Pray for us as we minister & show God’s love to these people!
Hope you are all having a great weekend.
El viernes
Hola everyone -
You guessed it – another day of painting! Our colors of the day were jalapeno, castano, and dover blanco. Tomorrow we will finish the final coats of the interior painting and then begin painting the steel for the water tower. Maybe even a little landscaping on the “to do” list.
Several of us hiked to the spring after lunch – it was another beautiful day here so we decided to wander off the base for awhile. The Guatemalan workers were one-by-one carrying 60 bags of cement, 97 lbs each, down an incredibly steep hill. From top to bottom, the hill is 105 feet. Most of them were even running….amazing! Today they also finished a 2 week project – a trench, 1,500 feet long, from the spring to the water tower.
We’ve implemented a new Hot Lunch Program at the base. Today’s grilled sandwiches were courtesy of Kent & Judi.
Some of us didn’t realize there was an additional member on our team this week. Jack VS was kind enough to introduce the furry (dead) critter to Carolyn, Nancy, and Karen. Screams were heard throughout neighboring villages….
Miles between old base & new base: 6
Travel time tonight from new base to old base: 1 hour
Throwing “dulce” out the van window to children in the villages: priceless
Our word for the day was encouragement. Nancy – thanks for the personal notes to everyone, what a great surprise. We hope that your travels were uneventful & you had a good night’s sleep at home. We miss you!
Powerful devotions again tonight from John 21:15-17. Do you love HIM? Are you feeding HIS sheep?
Have a great weekend!
Painting & Landscaping – El jueves
Today’s task – painting bright colors! We finished Haven’s room with the rosa color, moved on to azul & verde in Ben & Malachi’s room, & then azafran in mucho rooms – Estuardo & Noemi’s bedroom, Manuel & Deb’s bedroom, the girls & guys bunk rooms, & the medical offices. We started with jalapeno red in Dan & Heidi’s room and will paint several more rooms tomorrow.
Great progress was made on the water tower – check out the pictures!
Agua is being delivered tomorrow to reduce the amount of dust and moisten the dirt before the grass seed is planted.
Thanks to everyone for your messages & prayers! Keep ‘em coming
Great devotions tonight – thanks Nancy. Have a safe trip home tomorrow – we’ll miss you!!
Painting & Landscaping – El miércoles
Our task today – priming 11,000 square feet of drywall!! We used 30 gallons of primer (actually, it’s inexpensive light tan paint….primer is real expensive in Guate). Since the primer was drying so fast & we’re such incredibly fast workers, we were told we could also start applying the color. Our color palette started with a lovely shade of pink in Ben & Malachi’s room. Kidding…..it’s a beautiful pink room for a beautiful little girl – check out the pictures Haven!
Now picture Petticoat Junction – several guys were working on fabricating the water tower today. Lots of welding, lots of rebar, and a Hope College Senior who is quickly becoming fluent in Guatemalan construction lingo.
We think we left Tim in the bathrooms at the new base……he spent quite a bit of time in there today, stomping the ceilings, mudding, sanding, etc.
Dan had “therapy” today by driving the Catepillar trac skid loader most of the afternoon, getting ready for grama (grass).
Noemi is making sure we are very well fed – tonight’s dinner was watermelon & awesome lasagna.
PLEASE pray for release of the containers – both are in Guatemala but due to issues with the import broker, they have not yet been released. Many of the items in these containers are needed to finish the base.
Pictures will be posted next…..enjoy!
p.s. Jack VS is apprenticing with me (Karen) as Vice IT Director – he’s very proud that he helped Tim retrieve e-mail tonight.
Painting & Landscaping Team – March 24-31, 2009
The painting and landscaping team will consist of Rich & Sandi Joslyn, Judi Kruis, Carolyn Courtade, Jack Overweg, Tim Peters, Jack VanSlooten, Paul Muller, Karen Lepine and from the JQ99 team Nancy Dyke, Nancy Mouw, Kent Mouw and Craig Lorinser.
Please check back here for updates and pictures and please check the team members’ pages for their posts and to send them messages.
Thank you!
Pictures, Videos & Team Member Pages
- Pictures - Monday
- Video – Men of Steel!
- Pictures - Sunday
- Pictures - Saturday
- Video – Dan’s time-out
- Video – Guatemalan OSHA approved
- Pictures - Friday
- Pictures - Thursday
- Video – Grande Dump Truck
- Pictures - Wednesday
- Carolyn Courtade
- Craig Lorinser
- Jack Overweg
- Jack VanSlooten
- Judi Kruis
- Karen Lepine
- Kent Mouw
- Nancy Dyke
- Nancy Mouw
- Paul Muller
- Rich Joslyn
- Sandi Joslyn
- Tim Peters
