Half back!

We are "half back" in Itu now.

I (Mark) am home and Ali is finishing her last week state side. Ali is doing an online masters program with Rochester Christian College, and she has one intensive week of classes to kick off her semester of online studies.

I had a great day here in Itu. It started early with work on the halfway house. Eric and I were taking off more mortar to apply water proofing. My plumbing is done!!! What a huge gift and great donation of service!

Next I was doing some organizing of paperwork and seeing where my fundraising process was. I was down from what I needed for my payment this week... so I was prepping to deal with the lack when I got news of two amazing acts of kindness and generosity that puts us over our goal for this weeks payment!!! I am so humbled, and thankful! It still amazes me. As faithful as God has been, and as consistently supportive as the community around us has been, it still floors me to live it. Thank you.

And the day was brought to an end with work on our Chance Bags project. Look up "chance bags" on Facebook. We unpacked our new jersey donations from ACU and Centennial high school (my old jerseys!) and our 3 new donated sewing machines (thank you Granbury) and Susanie was very impressed and excited that we had a "Project Runway" edition machine! :) We got the Chance work space from cluttered and full of leaves to open, clean, and ready for action.

At the end, I'm just thankful that God has given us this chance to use our passions and skills for His glory and for the betterment of those around us, humbled by the amazing support we get in carrying this on, and, glad to be back! Half back. Ali, we're ready for you now!

the strange "land" in between

we spent wonderful time with mark's extended family in Canada for the past couple of days. We had 4 generations present for the weekend! This was a great event to close our time in the States.

Now that we are back in Ohio, we are living in the strange "land" in between the US and BRAZIL. Last minute shopping (brownie mix!), gifts for friends, calls back home, travel arrangements, good-byes... these activities have a way of throwing us into a stage of being both places and neither at the same time. Honestly, it's the most uncomfortable place to be. It's like temporarily trying to have a foot on both continents and painfully realizing there are 9 thousand miles in between.

my prayer is that none of us try to live this way for very long, that we all learn to practice full presence wherever we find ourselves today.

can we still be blog friends?

You know those friends with whom the connection seems so entirely natural that even when you have been separated for weeks or months or years, it only feels like a few hours have gone by? … well, welcome back! It’s been a while, but my hope is that this will be a natural continuation of good conversations.

i will attempt a rough catch up in this post, and then we will move on from here knowing that there are PLENTY of adventures for us to live out together in the future!

Our summer was incredible and chaotic and beautiful! Camp Roots joined 127 ppl from Itu & San Angelo and we celebrated our week with the theme “My Story Belongs to You,” which culminated with an hour-long CIRCUS production offered to our community!

The CURA medical campaign continues to grow and impact our city! This last summer we assisted over 900 people in 5 days. We now are brainstorming what it would look like for our church to have a year-round presence at the local schools where we usually set up CURA.

Several of you have seen us closer to your home lately… or IN your home! =) we’ve enjoyed the several weeks spent between Texas and Ohio visiting old friends, making new ones, and spending qt with family!

Exciting things loom on the horizon – we will share more about them on this page.
ali