A Merry Christmas Update

We want to officially wish you all a very Merry Christmas!! Jorge and I are blessed to spend the holidays with his family in Mexico this year. Several of Jorge`s siblings and their families will be joining us from out-of-town, we will have a full house as usual! I think there will be close to 25 of us gathered to celebrate! We have a good friend from Colombia named Silvia Rondon who is coming to spend Christmas and New Years with us as well! We have even rented the apartment upstairs for a couple of weeks so that we can all fit! That`s one of the neat things about Latinos though...there is always room in the Inn! We have a friend who, at the time, had a tiny little house in Colorado and we asked her how many people she had room for. She said, ¨well that depends...I have room for 2 Gringos or 10 Latinos!¨ We got a good laugh out of that and understood exactly what she meant!

You may remember that I mentioned before that Jorge might need sugery to repair a hiatal hernia. Well, we decided to postpone it until after Christmas so he is now scheduled for surgery on January 6th. We plan to stay about a week afterwards for him to recover and if all is well, we will then head back north of the border and start getting ready for our return to Colombia.

We still haven`t heard officially from the congressional office in regards to Jorge`s inquiery about his citizenship denial. I have this feeling that they have bigger and better things to do because it seems they have forgotten about us! But we trust that the Lord has not and that He has it all under control! It looks like we might have to start over from scratch and apply again. We pray that God will give us clear direction and help us figure out what is the best thing to do about this.

We are planning a visiting tour across the USA, starting west and working our way east, making our way south to Miami where we plan to depart for Colombia. We are thinking that we will be on the road for the months of March, April and May and then head back to Colombia in late May or in June, depending on how all the plans come together. We are even hoping to bring 2 or 3 of our staff in Bocachica to join us on our little tour. If you would like for us to pay you a visit please let us know so we can try to figure out our itinerary as soon as we can.

We hope you all have a wonderful Christmas celebration and whether it is big or small, simple or extravagant, may we all remember that we are celebrating the birth and life of our Saviour and King... HAPPY BIRTHDAY JESUS!!

Hangin´ With Mamita

One of my favorite things to do...crawl in bed and cuddle with Mamita!! She is the sweetest and in her book I can do no wrong...actually it is quite comical the way she defends me. Jorge and I get a good laugh from it. One day she was getting on to Jorge for doing something (I can`t remember what) and he told her that I had done the same thing and her quick response was, ¨well that`s different!¨ I wish you all could meet her because she is one of those people who makes everyone feel so loved and accepted, she`s awesome!!

Our Weekend Get-Away

PATZCUARO & JANITZIO

My mom gave Jorge and I an early Christmas present...a weekend get-away. We decided to go to the town of Patzcuaro, a place that Jorge has been wanting to take me to for years...since we first got married. We also visited some other small towns in the area like Santa Clara del Cobre, Zirahuen and Coroneo.

In the colonial style town of Patzcuaro all the buildings are painted red and white.

The traditional folk dance in this city is called ¨Los Viejitos¨ (the old guys).

This group performed in the main park for tips.

The boat Jorge and I took to the island of Janitzio was named ¨Perla¨
just like the boat we bought for Proyecto Libertad in Bocachica.

These boats hold from 70 to 90 passengers and are used to take tourists
and residents back and forth from the town of Patzcuaro to the island of Janitzio.
A round trip ticket costs only $3 dollars.

Janitzio is full of steep, winding streets lined with these
shops selling souveniers and family restaurants.

At the top of the island there is a huge statue of Morelos...he was a Catholic priest who helped to fight for the independance of Mexico. Jorge and I climbed inside the statue up to the very top of his fist...kind of like the Statue of Liberty.

A favorite sale item are these ¨gorditas de nata¨ which

are kind of like thick pancakes made with cream.

Another popular snack are ¨Charales¨ which are tiny fried fish.

They look like little minnows and they are crunchy and pretty tasty!

Indigenous ladies from the Purépecha tribe sell tamales. All over the island and in the surrounding towns it´s common to hear them speaking the purépecha dialect.

All the houses are packed tightly together through the island streets.

A view of the Cathlolic church overlooking the town of Janizio.

ZIRAHUEN

Jorge was eager to re-visit Lake Zirahuen...he and a group of his friends came here twenty-something years ago on a camping trip and he had fun going down memory lane.

SANTA CLARA DEL COBRE

Santa Clara Del Cobre is a small town famous for it´s beautiful copper artwork.

CORONEO

There are a lot quaint little towns along the country roads of Michoacan. Coroneo is one of them.

Meet Reinel

This is Reinel from Bocachica. He's been one of our volunteers at the mission since he was little and he was in our Child Sponsorship Program through high school graduation. Now Reinel is a recipient of our scholarship program and he is studying nursing. Even though the scholarship he has received covers the costs of his school fees, books and uniforms, he is still responsible for some of his own expenses, like transportation. Unfortunately the financial situation of Reinel's family is very critical and he has not been able to meet these expenses. We at the mission have helped make ends meet so far but in order for Reinel to continue studying we urgently need to find some additional sponsors to help cover these costs. He has to travel round trip to Cartagena by boat each day, and then once he is there he has to take two buses plus he needs to get at least a small bite to eat during the day. Ideally he needs $5 USD per day, 5 days a week...this comes to about $100 USD a month. I know a lot of you who have come to Bocachica know Reinel and we wanted to let you know of this need...if any of you would like to sponsor Reinel so he can further his education, please contact us so we can give you the details! THANK YOU!!

An Unexpected Side Trip

A little over a week ago I was invited on an unexpected side trip. My mom had to go to North Carolina to pick-up my grandma and bring her and her car back west to Arizona for the winter...so, since my mom didn't want to do the driving all alone, she bought me a ticket to join her. On Nov. 20th I flew to Burlington, North Carolina, which is where I grew up, and it was great to be able to go back, even if it was only a few days. I hadn't been to NC in about 5 years so it was good to be back. I was there with my mom and grandma over Thanksgiving and then on the 24th we set out on our road trip. We stopped for a couple of nights in Mobile, Alabama to visit my Uncle Bill and Aunt Betty and we left my grandma there for Christmas and New Years and mom and I continued on the journey. It took us three more days of driving once we left Mobile but we finally made it to Yuma, Arizona! In a few days I will be flying back to Mexico to join up again with Jorge and get ready for Christmas in Mexico.

With my grandma (left) and my Uncle Bill and Aunt Betty in Mobile, Alabama.