So many stars in the sky

...and like them so many things to do.

Among the plethora of things going on this month, I gave blogging a back seat.  I had many an idea, many a rant (including a still unfinished blog about emotionally and spiritually wrestling with visiting Hospital Escuela for myself and those that get to go with groups) but other things were more important.  Some of those being my family (although not as often as I would like), I am ok with that trade off.

We had two more groups through July, and another intern as well, making our sixth for the year.  You can see Beca (aka Ceiba...aka Calabaza Blanca...we have tended to get creative with nicknames this year) in this picture working with one of the groups to finish the columns for the future corn container and its upstairs neighbor.  It looks like she is holding up the column...at least that is what we are going to tell everyone.

We do not actively recruit interns, but wow are we so glad to have them. God blessed us abundantly this year.








We got the new Ford this year...and among routine maintenance on the other ones...seen here is a minor fix needed on the white Ford I drive.

No big deal, just the entire cab broken in different places, falling apart.  Routine right?  At least it is here.  You can see if you carefully look...that on the wall there is a crack that runs the full length as well.

Teto the welder is almost full time with us right now...we have been paying him to weld things all over the property for over a month now...things that have needed done for quite some time.  When we discovered this problem...we were especially grateful we had him already there.

A few hours later...good as new, or better.  And no more squeaky seats.  Now the next time I have a squeaky seat I will be paranoid the entire vehicle is falling apart.

The groups are helping us a ton on the milk project building foundations and retaining walls.  As we engineer the building/walls as we move along, we think that getting one floor at street level will also give us two "basements" along the way.  One of them will have a very high ceiling in fact.  How those will eventually be used/divided will be interesting to see.  Bathrooms?  Play room?  Bat cave?  All in God time.

We needed the blue Ford for the big group of 30 in July, but a few days before Oscar used it for a trip to inspect/help with the ongoing Hill Climber coffee work in Las Botijas.  Along the way was a truck dumping some manure on the side of the road.  Oscar being a good steward, and having a shovel...could not resist free good fertilizer for the coffee plants.

We did wash it out thoroughly before the group needed it.










Here is Jose Luis and Oscar talking in Talanga...we need Sunday School room (or rooms) there for the Church, as right now they have no where to meet, and it is getting to be a problem just trying to meet outside (noise from either bothers the other, not to mention the sun, rain, etc. outside.)

Finding another $10,000 or so for another lot to build rooms on is probably not in the cards right now (unless you know something I don't?  Hey...it could happen) so we are looking at this narrow section of the Church property to build something for the interim until God provides another route.  Cost for something like this lean to where the pastor's truck is parked, with some walls...maybe $400.

I would love to buy the next door lot and get started on something bigger and longer term stable...again, all in God time.


An anonymous donor provided supplies and some meals for some very talented young people from the Church to do some murals.  Here is one of the finished products (four or five total)...

....and the inspiration













Speaking of painting...another coat of Hawaiian Waters went up on most of the Mission House and man cave with the last group.  It looks so much better...and one color, than prior.  To paraphrase Frank Burns "It is always nice to see things look nice."

Thankfully we had our new 30' ladder from the US to reach the tough parts.










Not to be outdone...that same group came with some very talented painters in their own way.  They did not know they were going to do murals, but ended up completing two!

The first one (referencing Isaiah 55:12) went so well and so fast...that seemingly out of nowhere I had an idea to see if they could do a version of Vincent Van Gogh's "The Starry Night."  I printed them out a picture for reference...

...and they nailed it!  I could not be happier...especially with the two nods to the buildings on our campus included.

It will be hard to walk by there every day without stopping to appreciate it, along with all the other murals of course, but I have to admit this is my favorite to date.

I forgot to grab a picture of the other mural work being done on the outside of the wall...using some of the paint we had leftover from other projects or donated, I will try to get that one next time.

I could not forget the SFC!  The groups have also continued with the dry wall efforts there as well.  Without them, we would be stopped, so it has been great to see them make such progress.  Realistically with two groups left this year...we will not get the clinic portion opened by the time the clinic opens from vacation in January 2015...but again...all in God time.