Day 5, Friday, March 6 - One House Finished and Sharing in the School

Hello everyone! Today was an amazing day. Like the past few days, we were split into the two teams to work on our houses.

 Eli shared his testimony before work began

 

My team finished the roof, put concrete in the posts and filled the floor with dirt.

And the race is on!

 

Mr. May then asked me to sweep the dirt floor but it did not work. It amazes me how joyful the Nicas are for little things like 16x16 foot houses the size of my bedroom with dirt floors.

 We played with the little ninos and ninas a good part of the day.

 

We gave them a soccer ball, but it had burst by lunch time because of the barbed wire that surrounds all of the houses. Edguardo, one of the Project Hope staff, played professional soccer, and it was so much fun to play soccer in the dirt with him and the kids.

 

We brought out a new ball after the first one popped,

and this is what it looked like before we left for the day. 

It is also very amazing to see our bus driver Javier take our 40 foot bus places where most people would not take a truck (although the tires now leak and the muffler is falling off).

Driving the bus is exhausting!

 

In the afternoon we went to Pastor David's church and played with the kids.

Pastor David's church

 

We made tons of animal balloons and beaded bracelets.

We passed out candy to the kids and some of them managed to get at least ten Jolly Ranchers out of us. I also found out that the Nicas love Mexican jokes. Today was so much fun. I am going to miss the people here when we leave.
Your Hermano in Christ,
Eli

(While driving back to the compound, we almost hit a kid who suddenly appeared out of the dark and ran right in front of the bus.)

 

 

Hola!
We had another fantastic day here in Nicaragua!

 When we arrived at the construction site, we finished repairing the house we have been working on. We put the roof on, finished the walls and put the door on.

 

 

 

Pastor Juan's kitchen

 

 During the time we spent fixing the house, another group went to visit the school. While they were there they shared the gospel with four classrooms.  Also Mrs. Gossack read a book called “Jesus Saved the World” to the sweet little children.

 

 

 Meanwhile back at the work zone, there was not much work left so I decided to play "duck, duck, goose" or "pato, pato, gonzo" with the kids.  The ninos are so full of energy so after a couple minutes of that game I was worn out!

 Right before we left the construction zone for the day we were able to carve all of our names into the fresh cement at the front door of the house.

 

Then we headed to “VBS” for the afternoon. The only way to get there was for all of us “gringos” to pile into the back of a tiny truck.

The only thing I will say about that ride is I couldn’t stop shaking for 30 minutes!

When we got to the church where the kids were, we started to make animal balloons and beaded bracelets. It gets very crazy when we do activities like these, but it is also so very fun! We also were able to do our Chains play for the people, and Vikki and Macy told the Nicas the Gospel story.

Then it was time to say goodbye. For me that is the hardest part! Looking back it was a very productive day. I even got this awesome sunburn! Thank you for all your prayers!

In the name of Christ,

Elisabeth