SEWING ROOM WORK PROGRESSES

The girls are busy working away on the sewing machines and crocheting. They are now finally getting it down to a science and are completing projects to sell. We have sold some items to the visiting mission groups and the ladies were thrilled to receive the money. Every Monday and Wednesday morning the sewing shop is filled with laughter, chatting and singing along with the worship songs played on the CD player. It’s a wonderful atmosphere to fellowship and work together.
I’m trying to incorporate my love of quilting into the bags and patchwork baby quilts. Next week we hope to put the 3 layers together and finish their first quilts off. I don’t have any pictures yet of them but soon will. When my friend Cheryl came to visit she was able to work with a few girls making the baby quilts. As you can see the machines we use are all donated and not new by any stretch....but at least they work! The challenging part is trying to figure out when things go wrong how to fix all these different machines.
God has been good and faithful enabling me to communicate with these ladies in my limited Spanish....but as we say here “cada dia poco a poco” each day little by little, I learn more. My second level of language training is finished and the fear of reaching out and talking to locals has diminished greatly. Know a little, use it a lot is the best way to learn...even at age 47!
On Friday five of us ladies are planning a girl’s day out to Santiago to look for more supplies. It’s about 1 ½ hours away and over a mountain range so it’s not something we do often. The road is very twisted and winding with the occasional washed out section so it is only good for daytime travel. We hope to leave early in the morning to allow plenty of shopping time and return by suppertime if we don’t get distracted along the way. You know..5 women....shopping....lot’s of fun... a welcome break for us all from our daily routines.

Just a tad chilly are ya.

As hard as it may be to understand, it does get cold here. I know you’re going to say, “Have you been to Canada lately? We just had 5 months of winter and your gunna tell me about chilly!” Well I have to admit, it’s not quite a cold here as it gets back home but to the Dominicans and Haitians it feels very cold when it dips to about 12 Celsius or 55 on the Fahrenheit scales. For this reason many of them are very thankful to group of people back home in Sarnia, Wyoming and some of the other surrounding areas. My sister Pat Mensinga and some of the ladies from her church, Peoples Church, in Wyoming, Ontario have been busy sewing and making blankets and quilts to the poor here. My other sister Betty Wildschut and sister in law Patty Huizinga have been busy collecting children medicines, diapers and other baby needs for good friends of ours here. Jim and Sue Coates from England operate Dominican Ministry, http://www.dominicanministry.com/ , which is a food, medicine and clothing ministry for poor families with its main focus on children. They are amazing people and their work never ends. The following are some pictures of their ministry and also huge THANK YOU to everyone who sends the blankets and medicines for to distribute among the poor. Your hard work, generosity, unseen labor and kindness are so much appreciated by all here. Your love will never be forgotten by us or our heavenly Father.

Do you believe in miracles?

There was a song years ago, “I believe in Miracles”. I don’t remember who it was sung by but it had a sentence and question that included “do you believe in miracles?”. Well I have been around for a few years and have seen a few odd occurrences but since living here in the Dominican Republic, I have had the privilege of seeing more. Let me take some of your time and share with you the latest. Grab a java because I’m not sure there is a Readers Digest version.

We have been nearing the completion of our 7th village, Nazareth, for a little while now and since we are expecting many more groups over the next couple of months we have been in the hunt for more land. Since we still have not recieved permission yet to build homes in Los Algodonas, the need for additional land is becoming more urgent.

Elio Madonia, the founder of The Samaritan Foundation, myself and others have been praying with earnest for the Lord to provide us some land but also someone to donate the money to purchase it. The Samaritan Foundation does not believe in working with borrowed money. One of our principles is that if it is the Lords will for us to have it, he will provide. Finally we were able to find some land and at a price we felt was stewartly and started negotiating to find a settled price. The price a settled and now we had to find a donor.

One of the people who works closely with us, Rev Ony Miccolis, recieved a phone call from another pastor friend, inviting Rev. Miccolis meet him for coffee and see what was going on in each other’s life’s and do what people like to do sometimes, reminisce. The next day as they were discussing things, the topic moved to what he was doing in India with Christian Life Television International and what he was doing here in the Dominican Republic. From there the conversation went to the Samaritan Foundation, what we do and our need for additional land. Mentioning to him that land was found, not the best piece but as they say, beggars can’t be choosy, but a buyer was still needed. It was at this point that Pastor A (I have not used his name or the organization he works with because I have not asked for his permission to reveal him) said that he represents an investment organization, which was here for an investment consulting retreat, and would be willing to consider donating some money towards buying the land. When asked how much was needed, Rev. Miccolis mentioned $150,000 (US) was the needed amount. With this, Pastor A asked if they could see the proposed land and then the group could pray about it and trust God’s will. So the next morning about 30 of us mounted the bus for a ride to the proposed land. Reaching the property, we all disembarked, surveyed the land and prayed for the Lords will for the group. Shortly after they felt that donating towards this was likely God’s will but they would meet and pray about it some more and give us a definite answer in the morning.

Later the same day in the afternoon, we recieved a phone call from a family member who owned the sought after land and said that the deal was temporarily off because unknown to us, the father suffered from a form of dementia. If we still wanted the land after their father passed away, we could renegotiate the land and price. We never knew. The land deal was now dead. We now had a different problem, possible donator but now no land.

The next morning Elio and Rev. Miccolis went land hunting again and discovered available property that was not known to us before as for sale. When the inquires were made as to how much land was available and the costs involved and amazing thing occurred. Though the land was slightly smaller than the previous piece, it was in a much, much better property location and available for, you guessed it, $150,000 (US). Later that afternoon, back to Pastor A to find out what their decision would be regarding donating towards the property but also with the news that the original land was now suddenly unavailable but another one has be found and if they would be willing to consider donating to that instead.

Pastor A met with us and said that yes they would be willing to donate towards the purchase of the land and the fact that the land was not the original was fine also. Now came the awaited result of the money they would be willing to donate and as you guessed by now, it was One Hundred and Fifty Thousand dollars. Within approximately 48 hours, God provided the land and financial providers we needed. Our God is AWESOME!

Do you believe in miracles, we do!

They come from everywhere to see ....

What a wonderful surprise when we got an email from good friends of ours that live in Sarnia that they were going to be in the area. You probably think all we do is entertain visitors, well that’s not quite true but we have been blessed with an amazing assortment of family and friends coming. Jack and Marie Van Marum stayed at a resort here in Puerto Plata and spent a few days with us. (They must have heard the snoring rumour). Actually we do love having visitors because this gives us an opportunity to renew acquaintances and continue existing ones. This also provides ways of showing what the Lord has led us to do and give them a “hands on” look at the other side of the Dominican Republic, its beauty and its hidden people. When are you in the area?

The Hamilton Connection

Well the island got just a wee bit cheerier (is that a word?) when Gord and Sylvia Veldstra should up. It was great having them here for a few days; they stayed at a resort because they heard that I snore. I tried to convince them that it’s the dogs but I don’t think they bought it. While they were here they participated in a milk ministry and a visit to the local hospital combined with a trip to the local flea market style venders. We love having the visitors because it brings home just a wee bit closer. Besides, absence makes the heart grow fonder! Notice the good looking people, stealth and specimens of health and beauty, at least 2 of them.

Our additional family

Some of you may know but I am sure most don’t, Jane and I have sponsored a family in one of the villages we have built. This is a family of six children and even though the Dad (Confesor)isn’t in the photo he does his best in supporting the family. Over the past couple of months we have been working with the local authorities in getting birth certificates for the six children (after trip #5 to Puerto Plata we still haven’t got them). Since they are a Dominican family this is in one sense much easier than trying to get birth certificates for Haitians. (Getting Haitian birth certificates is almost impossible) With birth certificates the children will be able to go to high school and college/university. They are Juana Polanco Rodriguez (mom), Adan 14, Beyarleny 10, Jeremy 9, Neroliza 7, Yendri 3 and Leidy 6 months. All the children are bright, intelligent, well behaved and just sweethearts (sounds like our own children) and so for us, though it’s a pile of work and unbelievably political, it is well worth it. We love them!!

Eric Wildschut and John Harman

Had a nice visit from my nephew, Eric, and his friend. They were here for about a week and chump change and it was good to have them around. While they were here John Harnum (that’s his first name) solved all the Haitian social, political and issues with just a single conversation of his deep philosophical mind. When we had to leave a village, all I had to do was look for the gathering Aristotle’s, Plato’s and all those other wise men and there was John deep in conversation. His French language skills certainly came in handy because the Haitians love to discuss just about anything. Unfortunately when he got too deep I bailed out before I needed additional help and counselling. Eric on the other hand solved much of our civil engineering dilemmas. He helped us on some of the road, septic and river crossing issues. He is a pretty smart guy but that only goes to figure, look who he’s related toJ. It was nice to see them come and hard to see them go. Those guys can come anytime!!!

Neighbourhood Participation

If you get our newsletter you would have heard about the feeding of an entire village. When Jane and I came back at Christmas, we got together with our neighbours, there were 5 or 6 families , and put together a food hamper for 215 families in Los Algodonas. This village is literally dirt poor and the hamper we all put together would feed a family of 4 for about 2-3 days. It took us a day and a half to put together and about 2 hours to distribute. It was awesome!

Work teams from ...................

Sometimes people wonder where our teams come from. Well pretty much everywhere. From Jan. 29 until March the 8th, we had 11 groups come and help us serve among the poor. They came from Alberta (1), Ontario (7), USA (2) and our first and certainly not last group from Belgium (1). Not bad for relying solely on the Lord to provide the workers.
Spruceland Millworks from Alberta was our first team of 2008. They came and did the roof for our school in Los Algodonas and showed some of our Dominican builders the new roof plans for our houses. This small group of 5 (our smallest this year) worked like dynamite, not only working everyday but some afternoons they participated in a hospital ministry and also in a feeding ministry for a village.

First visitors for 2008

Well we had our first visitors for the New Year arriving Jan. 29 and they were Dad and Mom (Jane’s) parents. They came for 2 weeks and the time really went quickly. While they were here, we had two mission groups working here also, so it worked well for Dad to work with the groups while Mom worked in the sewing center. They also did a good amount of socializing with the neighbours, most days it was like a regular “hen house” around here with all the women neighbours cackling. When it was time for them to leave, I think the neighbours were as sorry to see them leave as Jane and I were but they promised everyone they would return and start where they left off. Birds of a feather do flock together, regardless of where they start from.