"Catch up" time.......starting where I left off!

Seriously, look at the date of my last posting......seriously this is killing me. I have procrastinated in such a way that the task of "catching up" is daunting. Daily I think I should do it, but do I?.....NO! I don't know where to start or what I should skip or if I should just start over. But so much has happened in the last month with so many pictures that I can't just start over. So this is the start of my attempt to "catch up". All two of our vacations happened in July, so the fun of our summer can't be left out. So feel free to begin this journey with me....hoping that I stay on task to actually complete it.
I will begin where I left off.....Honduras. After giving this much thought and letting so much time escape, I decided I would not give a detailed blog entry on my trip. If you are interested in more details I have a couple of links on the side in which my fellow team mates have done an incredible job of giving an account of our trip. I will however show some pictures with captions that will capture some of my trip. Still the most amazing experience I have ever had, I will never forget this trip. It's interesting how the impact is heightened even more after my return home and still a month later. I am so blessed to have had this opportunity.


The men on the team....

Chad,Verly,Matt,John,Jim

The "sisters" on the team

Angie,Trina,Tanya(me)

The bunk house where we slept. Girls on right, boys on left.

Inside of our sleeping quarters....

The director of the mission our host and guide; not to mention the most amazing, Christ like man I have ever spent time with in my entire life. This man had such an impact on my life and my time in Honduras.

The one in blue is Nellie, Alvin's wife, and an amazing woman herself, she had such a God given spirit about her. The girl at her feet is one of their two daughters, and the gentleman behind is Bent, he works for the mission and was our guide on a few occasions.


Typical surrounding scenery....words or pictures do not describe what our eyes saw day after day.

Massive amounts of garbage consume the land everywhere.


Typical house for a Honduran family.

Street vendor.


The kids would do anything to be embraced. Literally, these kids at a place called Tiny Houses which was a government run facility, would mob you, jump into your arms with smiles that melted your soul and just hold your neck and squeeze as much love out of you as they could in the short amount of time they had with us.

This little boy in particular for me tugged my heart like none other. He ran up to me and grabbed my hand and started running with me through the grounds. I had no idea where he was taking me, nor could I understand him, but it didn't matter. We ran to a swing set where I pushed him on a swing and we just smiled back and forth at one another. He rarely left my side. I would hold him, he would hug me, hold my hand and just absorb every ounce of love I could give him. After a few short hours of being at Tiny Houses this little boy referred to me as mama on a couple different occasions. I wanted to take him home with me, I couldn't obviously, but I hope he feels Jesus' arms around him at all times.

Here I am trying to free my hand from his grip :)

This boy is 5 years old, he was taken off the streets. He has been addicted to sniffing glue(which is the drug of choice) for most of his life.

This breathtaking statue of Jesus was amazing....the view was incredible too.

I'm Home!!

O.K.....well I have been home since Sunday afternoon. But I have needed the days following to re-adjust and get back into my roll as a wife and a mother. I had an amazing time...AMAZING! Words will not come close to describing my trip to Honduras. The emotions, the things we saw and witnessed, our ever powerful Lord's mighty work seen in all we did, our travels, the poverty, poorness, and despair of the Honduran people, the smiles and hugs, the relationships built with our team....it is all a story. A story that I have yet to figure out how to put into words. I will most likely do some random postings as the spirit leads me to. Changed? Forever changed. I was told about this factor, would never had imagined the reality of it. Thank you to all of you that have kept me and our team in your prayers....God covered us and gave us His gift of grace. A special thank you to my amazing husband who continues to awe me in every season of our life together. His love for me and our family is such a blessing. I know it wasn't easy for me to be gone and leave him with the restaurant and full time daddy duties. But he rocked and I am so grateful for his support in allowing me this opportunity to be God's hands in Honduras! Blessings to you all and check back as things are getting back to normal and I will find some time to post.

Well this is different!

This is a special "guest" post from Tanya's #1 guy, Brian. As many of you know, she is in Hondurus on a mission trip. I have hijacked this blog spot to let you know that as of Saturday, She was at the airport in Hondurus awaiting a ride to where they were going. I can tell you that she is surely missed. I sure am proud of her for going on this trip. This was a huge step for her and she embraced it. Though it was very hard for her to leave her family, she was following what God was asking her to do. I think that she has set a great example for our kids and for me. I love you Tanya and can't wait to see you!

BP

A little of this...a little of that

Just a sorta random posting of our weekend. We celebrated Father's Day on Sunday, yes a week early, but I am leaving on Friday for my trip to Honduras and will be gone, and our family was together this past weekend. So we loved on Brian with gifts and a yummy brunch( that he of course helped cook..hehehe). I so appreciate what this man does for me and the kids....I love how much he loves us!! We also celebrated my awesome sis in laws birthday along with her twin sister, Treva. Trina is such a blessing to our family, my bro did good! I love ya Trina! So with some craziness we are getting ready go to Honduras. For those that don't know the airport we were supposed to fly in to in Tegucigalpa was shut down a couple of weeks ago after a plane crashed on the run way. We didn't find out until last Thursday and it wasn't until yesterday that we had our flights finalized. We are now flying into an airport that is about 150 miles from where we will be staying and we gained a 12 hour layover in Miami on the way back home. We are excited to see what God has in store for us and are even looking forward to the traveling that will take to get us to where we need to be! All prayers are appreciated.....
So just some random pix of the family before I head out!

innocent....umm, no

what a camera? oh let me pose with my ice cream!

ummmm..... messy!

and goofy....

Our AMAZING kiddos....and dog :)

Celebrating a dad....


My incredible mom and dad! I get to be with my dad on our trip, so I will celebrate Father's Day with him in Honduras....

Trina and Treva celebrate their 26th birthday!

I had to get the annual "crazy" picture of Chad and Trina posted!


Rex has grown just a bit...ya think?!!

Madi and "coach" Brian's last soccer game!

Wrapping up May....can you believe it?!

Getting some good sugar from my girls on Mother's Day....

After 7 months of voice lessons, Kelsey had a recital in which the students performed the song they learned in costume. Kelsey sang "Rubber Ducky". She did a great job! She had performed the song before and she just had a small rubber ducky. I thought it would be fun for her to have a BIG one, so I saw one at a local store and gifted it to her before her performance....


Dolled up and ready to hit the stage!

We spent our Memorial Day weekend at the ball park cheering Jake and his team, Lynden Storm, on in a tournament. The weather was perfect. The kids had fun and it was super relaxing!
This picture cracks me up because of the tongue sticking out a smiggen....after I saw this, I really started noticing that he sticks his tongue out a lot when he's playing, even out in the yard. Brian said he was the same way when he played sports...Go figure!




My favoritest part of watching Jake's games, is watching him catch....it's this look right here that I think is the best!

Madi and her friend were able to cool down between games on Saturday...they had so much fun running through the sprinkler and going down the wet slide!





What's this you ask?....

Well after the fun is all said and done, Daisy is still Daisy...naughty...this time in the middle of being naughty she fell asleep....nothing better than a peacefully sleeping naughty girl!

Playing outside