Happy Easter & Great news...

Friday the Agape kids visited the house..looked at a different view. 

What a few days.....

Saturday we planned to work at the house but a heavy fog all day with some sprinkles kept us inside....time for school work, office work, reading, watching videos. Overall a good day.

Palm Sunday we rested, read, and shared worship time with the Agape house children.

Monday through Wednesday we basically did the same thing daily.

Listening to school work, The Grapes of Wrath, while painting

Headed to the house early...painted the interior walls [Kris and Anna] or worked on putting a thin layer of cement over the rough, bumpy, and dust producing floor.

Anna continues to work hard on finishing her senior year well. Her goal is be be finished before area retreat in early May.

On Wednesday morning we woke up to discover that somehow the internet bandwidth had been used up overnight.

Tongue and groove for a storage room.

This means that for 24 hours the internet will slow to almost nothing.

During our lunch break I was able to get a few emails in and to our great delight one informed us that Fritzlin's I600 visa application had been approved.

And thankfully by the afternoon the internet was back.

A second email included the next steps...how to fill out needed forms; set up the medical appointment; and what is needed for the Embassy interview.

Grey blue for 2 bedrooms, living room and kitchen. 

With great rejoicing we returned to finish painting the house walls.

So next week staff members, Fritzlin and we will travel early Monday for the medical appointment in Port-au-Prince; go to the Embassy for the final interview on Tuesday morning; and Wed. will return to the medical clinic to have his TB skin test read.

Someday a rock wall and mantel will be here. 

After the interview...there may be additional information needed to be researched or resolved before the visa can be issued or they may only need the final medical report.

Once all information is in place there will be a short 2-5 business day wait while the final paperwork is prepared.

'Pumpkin seed' color for Anna's room, hall, and small bathroom

Then Fritzlin would be able to travel with our family to the USA and he will become an American citizen when he enters the USA.

We plan to travel in early May to join other Global Partner missionaries in Florida for our area retreat.

This morning we awoke to no internet.

During the night a horse must of hit or rubbed agaist the sattelite dish, knocking the receiver down.

So Cory and I spent a couple of hours getting it back aligned.

Very thankful that we were able to get it working again so that we could work on the needed forms and paperwork for Fritz's visa.

Thank you for the prayers.

Photo's from biology lab and house...

Flat Stacy visit

Plastering of walls

The pig.. for Anna's advanced biology dissection

Cory's yacon...a path was made over it but it survived. Now rescued.

Clean up started.

Crew leaving after we prayed with them. 

Walls continue...

Electrical and Plumbing in the walls.

I've not done much this week on the house, mostly because when trying to move a big stone that I wanted for a small interior wall I smashed the end of my left ring-finger between two rocks.

Now sporting a purple finger in a metal split I'm focused on school, correspondence [but spelling isn't helped with missing one finger to type with] and mental work.

I'm thankful that the Embassy visit for visa fingerprints occurred before squashing my finger...but in the next couple of weeks we may need to go to a Haitian office for prints so we can pick up our Haitian residential visas. Praying for fast healing.

I'm starting to try to plan for trips but they all hinge on getting Fritzlin's visa so that we can travel as a family.

We pray to soon hear about the US visa, and then getting his medical exam done.


So even traveling to northern Haiti to get our household items can not be totally planned at this point because we don't know when the medical exam will need to be done.

Meanwhile this week there are 5 Haitian men working on the walls, along with Cory.

 Thankful that our water cistern still has water for the plastering.

Special cement "Base coat" powder mixed with water is applied to the foam in a thin layer.

Next the orange fiberglass mesh is cut and pushed into the first layer...and a second thin layer added on top.

By the next morning this has harden into a strong layer.

The next step is to apply a thin coat of Haitian mix of mortar

Cory is nicely working to remove small splatters from the rock walls that occurred the first day.

Now taped up pieces of plastic help to protect my rock walls.

In addition to this work the inner door frames were put in this week.  

Praying that my nice wooden doors will fit as it appears it will be a very tight fit. 

Off the Veerhouse Voda web site, the company who sold some of the supplies and gave Cory and Eli a tour of how the wall system works.....the advantages of this system include:

• while comparable to traditional systems it is faster and cheaper

• hurricane resistant to category 4.

• earthquake resistant

• fire tested to 1,500 degrees centigrade

• flood resistant-no mold

• non caloric-no insects or rodents

• no wood needed

• housing lifespans 70+ years

• and no heavy machinery needed to put it up. 

Interior walls...first steps

During the busy medical clinics a small crew of three men continued with our interior walls.

Very exciting to see something you worked out on paper be transformed into 3-dementional, full size rooms.

• Step One: measure, dream and plan.

• Step Two: Rethink, remeasure, plan again....

• Step Three: Measure in the house, putting down tape or boards to help you visualize the walls.

• Step Four: Crew cut and put 1"x2" hollow metal support bars in place with screws.

• Step Five: Cut, measure, put styrofoam in place.

Foam cut with a tool that has a heated blade but it is slow so most is done with handsaws. 

• Step Six: Screws with plastic disk tops screw into the iron frame to hold the foam in place. 

• Step Seven: spray expanding "glue" foam along the joints. Cutting smaller pieces to completely cover the support bars. 

• Step Eight: Peel off or trim off excess glue once dry. 

• Step Nine: Draw on foam where electrical plugs, light switches and water lines will be placed. 

This next week...putting the electrical and plumbing in the walls.

Cover the joints with with plaster and fiberglass mesh, then the whole wall gets a layer of plaster, mesh and another coat of plaster. 

Busy, busy, busy

Teaching the patients waiting in line

We finished up last week with only a couple days between teams.

I continued to clean the rock walls...and finished Anna's room yesterday afternoon following clinic.

On Saturday, late afternoon the big medical team arrived.

The last three days we've seen over 800 people.

I start the day talking to those waiting in line about the various health topics that I always focus on with a waiting crowd.

Things like: cataract prevention, not putting small objects in ears, how to prevent and treat colds, vagainal dischage, high blood pressure, heart burn, breastfeeding, knowing your medication, skin care, massage, aloe plants....and a new one is anti-tabacco due to many smoking and sniffing tabacoo up here on this cold mountain (lows in the low 50's this week).

After I answer any questions folks may have I've been helping with pharmacy.

There are 3 practitioners seeing children, one seeing aduts and one seeing women.

Today we saw the woman who I delivered her second twin while my folks were here. Following the deaths of her children at day 5 and 10 after delivery, she became very sick.

She continues to do poorly and appears to have suffered from a mental issue. She received prayer and some IV fluids before being sent down the mountain for additional medical care.

Please continue to pray.

We will continue to have full clinics for the next two days and a 1/2 day on Friday before the team heads down the mountain.

On the house...they started putting the foam on the interior walls today.