The business and Beto´s bday...33!

I am so happy that Beto has more time now to work at home! He has bought tons of wood and cement and has started building the little galera to put tables and chairs, make a menu, and make the business a little more formal. In the future we are thinking of putting smoothies and other snack foods, like Baleadas, a sort of quesadilla with refried beans, white cheese and sour cream. Anywho,

we also celebrated his birthday the 7th! It was a lot of fun and we put him on the ¨Hot Seat¨and all his friends told him what they appreciated about him. It was really special. He only put 7 candles on his cake becuase it represents perfection. It was symbolic.
oh and the last picture, there are the boys anxiously awaiting to see what present he will open next!

our onions

Thanks mom for the seeds! These are what Beto planted and we enjoyed inour omelet this morning! the best.

Thanksgiving, Honduran style

We invited all our gringo friends, and some latinos becuase we like them too, for Thanksgiving at our house Sat. the 29th. We had chicken instead of turkey, but we all closed our eyes and pretended and it tasted just the same. Besides, you know what they say about other meats...."tastes like chicken". The same is true for turkey! Everyone pitched in and we even had stuffing and apple pie! There's Brian doing the honors and then there's me,cutting the pie. Doesn't look like I need to be eating any more pie!
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Graduations

The picture of Beto with the boy in the red shirt is at the first graduation. The school year here is from February to November. We were asked to attend this graduation by Bob and Kathy who left for the states at the last minute to visit their brand new first grandbaby! They left their gifts for us to take and represent them. The other pictures are for a second graduation where we were asked to be "Padrinos", kind of like sponsors, for a girl at our church, Fernanda, who graduated from Sixth Grade. (Amy, this is Freddy's family). Unfortunately Laura came down with a bad case of conjunctivitis the night before and couldn't go. I had been looking forward to it for so long, but there was no way I could attend. Beto did a great job of representing.

The doggies, again

Fabio loves watching movies with daddy. the boys, chillin...

5 mo.

well, there i am in all my 5 months of pregnant glory. we still don´t know the sex of the baby. it is moving a lot and that feels so cool, well, like gas, but better!

the business

I don´t remember if I´ve written much about this but our business is going well. we started it out of pure necesity to pay the rent and God really blessed us with many clients. we decided to keep it going becuase we have alot of requests. I sell different muffins and cookies which can not be found in any other bakery, more or less so that is an advantage for us, like chocolate muffins, carrot muffins and chocolate chip cookies, although the way people like them here i would never make that way for me, but i gotta give the people what they want!

One sister Raquel from church loaned us her canopy for the two weeks it was sunny and then last sunday when we got home from church we found it broken on the ground from the wind. Beto is has hired some young boys from church that pass our house on the way home from school. they work occasionally. beto is making a little kiosk like structure to put the business more inside the yard, it´ll be more formal. we are hoping to expand to sell more snack foods, Honduran style, and hopefully hire another helper to be there to sell when i cannot.

Notice our puppy, the poor spoiled thing hardly has any hair so there he is inside next to the space heater and his food dish. What a life!

Fabio y su cafe

Just so you know, we do say it ¨Faaaaabio¨like the old famous model. That´s the Romance´-Language way!

He loves his coffee (my coffee) with milk and a tad of sugar. I was sitting on the couch and got up to check on dinner when Beto heard the ¨slurp slurp slurp¨ and went to see what it was. We actually refilled the cup so we could take the picture! We are teaching him such bad habits.

Bob and Kathy

I´ve known I´ve mentioned them but they have blessed us so much and I was going to write so much about them, I will dedicate this to them. They have been here in HOnduras for about 18 years and are really amazing people. To help us in our new pizza-baked goods business, Kathy took me shopping and told me to load up the cart with whatever we needed! It has really helped a lot! We have sugar for the next two months, I´m sure!
Last WEdnesday they invited about 10 couples over to their house with their kids for a social night of fun and eating. We played the ice breaker where everybody has the name of someone famous, real, fiction, dead or alive, ontheir back and they have to ask ÿes¨or ¨no¨questions to figure out who ¨they are¨.
After wards we took äll men¨and äll women¨pictures. We even compared bellies, even though I was the only pregnant woman there!
Please be in prayer for Bob and Kathy if you will. I know they will greatly appreciate it!

Women´s Ministry

Every Wednesday we have prayer and last Wed. was my turn! It was a great turnout and just right. One more person and they would have had to sit on the floor. It was a great time of sharing and praying and afterward of fellowshiping together. I thank God for these great women of faith and please pray with us that the ministry continues to grow and mature.

GOD IS GOOD!

First of all, Mateo and Fabio are Spanish names too. Italian is a close cousin.

The Lord is GOOD! We saw so clearly Him working in our lives yesterday. We were both exhausted. We got back from our trip Friday and all day Saturday were working at home doing chores and grocery shopping. So Sunday we were very tired but had invited Lilian, Miguel{s older sister, over for lunch. She had wanted to talk to us and we had not seen her in so long. She is 20 and has two girls, 5 and 3. She took them along with her sister Milagros, 10, to live with her in another house, because she has a job! Praise God. Miguel went to live with his younger sister Rosario at their aunts house. The mother is still drinking a lot and is mentally ill, being very violent and threatening her childrens lives at times. Only her boyfriend and two sons live with her. One son is also drinking a lot at only 14 years old, and the other Jorge works on a delivery truck, which teaches him many inappropriate adult things at such a young age of 11. The mother did not want to lose her children but she did not want to give up drinking either.

Lilian works in the mornings while Milagros, 10, takes care of the two youngest toddlers.

This is getting longer than expected but all important info. We are now working with others in the church on getting all of the kids into school when the year starts in February. Please pray with us about that.

After they left and we gave them a lot of our food, we took a nap. I got up to bake about 80 baked goods to sell the next day and was doing that when two friends from church came over unexpectedly. Our [sound man[ and his girlfriend. He had jsut taken care of our house and dogs for one week while we were traveling. I was not too excited at the surprise becuase I was so busy, but then Kayla offered to help me and I took her up on her offer! She saved me about 2 hours of time by peeling and cutting about 20 carrots and helping with the bread. They invited us for Chinese food too which was good becuase I do not know when I would have cooked, or what!

So we saw how after blessing others, God really blessed us. Our friends surely came as angels, I am convinced. It is so encouraging how God always takes care of us.

Today the baked good sales went really well. That is a good source of income and ministry and we would appreciate your prayers for that as well.

our doggies

Mateo is a good big brother. They like to play and he keeps little Fabio warm at night.

Meet The Guatemalan Family

Beto´s family...

Sonia, his little sister, in the chair by herself.

Beto´s dad, me, and his other little sister, Elida, on the couch.

His older brother, Jairo (hi-row), his wife Sandra, and their youngest, Rodrigo, on the other couch.

His oldest sister, Blanki, his mother, and neice Cristal talking at kitchen table.

His neice, Jaira(hi-raw) knocking on the door

His nephews (who are cousins), Kenneth and Jairo Jr.

and finally Cristal with her cousin Jazmin.
Not pictured are his older brother Elias and his wife, his other brothers Mardo and Nelson(Sonia´s twin) and another nephew.

¨Vacation¨

First we took a boat like this from Guate. to Belize

Then we took the Hokey Pokey during the beatiful sunset.

We enjoyed the beach all to ourselves, took a long walk in which Beto found Goliath´s walking stick, and just relaxed in the beauty of it all.


Well, ok. Where do I begin? Beto and I just got back from a one week trip to Guatemala and Belize, but it wasn´t really a vacation. Now that I´m not working in the school where they took care of my passport for me, I have to leave the country every 3 months to a country that doesn´t border Honduras. Beto and I were going to go to the closest place, Belize, but Beto´s passport had expired, so last Thursday we left first for Guatemala and stayed with his family for 6 days. He ended up getting his driver´s license also for that future car we´re praying to God for. We took first the 4am bus 3 hours north and from there took a nicer bus, with a BATHROOM!, the 10 hour trip to Guatemala.

We had a good time in Guate and I ws happy that we got to eat at Taco Bell once! And they even had the USC football game on the TV!

I was supposed to technically leave the country Saturday but we had to wait for Beto´s license to get published Tuesday, and Tusday was the last possible day for me to leavet the country but we left WEdnesday at 4am and left the country without getting penalized. We took a 5 hour bus trip to the coast to Puerto Barrios. Luckily that bus stopped half way to go to the bathroom too!

The boat from Puerto Barrios to Punta Gorda, Belize was just a little 12 passenger one with a canopy and was really really jumpy and scary, and after one hour we made it. Then we took a school bus converted to passenger bus about 3 hours north to Independence , Belize. We waited 45 min. for the ¨water taxi¨, the Hokey Pokey, and took that on much smoother waters only 10 min. to Placentia, Belize where we stayed two nights.

This town was pretty dead as it isn´t tourist season right now. I think we were one of three people in the whole hotel and most of the restaurants were closed. We were getting low on cash but had budgeted just enough to be able to return directly to Honduras on a nicer bigger boat.

When we went to buy the tickets for this boat that only leaves on Friday´s at 9am, we were told that because of bad weather it wouldn´t be going. Great! We couldn´t return the way we came because of time and because the boat ride was so awful. And we couldn´t stay and wait another week for next Friday´s boat because of work and lack of money. So the only thing we could do was fly out, and we had to do it Friday even though I was supposed to stay in Belize three days and we only stayed about 1.5.

We went outside to talk about what we were going to do and were feeling prettty stressed when a local man came by and cut down some coconuts from the palm tree in front of us and gave one to Beto(I don´t like). That was a gift from God. And of course Beto was able to talk with him about God.

Through God´s provision we were able to fly out in a little 12 passenger propeller plane 1 hour into San Pedro Sula, only 3 hours from our house. Of course there were even more unexpected expenses like having to pay an Ënvironmental Conservation Fee¨, mandatory only for non-Belizan residents.

It had been a really stressful trip, one we don´t ever want to do again, and when we reached Honduran soil I really wanted to kiss the ground! But instead we had lunch and madeit home yesterday, so happy to see our doggies!

Thank you so much for your prayers because we were able to travel safely and I was able to cross back into Honduras without being fined for not staying 3full days in Belize. Beto and I now have 90 day VISA´s. In this time we are both going to try to begin the process of getting our Honduran residencies so we don´t have to leave the country again. Please keep us in your prayers about that.

If you haven´t received one of our update letters through snail mail or email and would like to sponsor us in our ministry here in Honduras, please leave me a comment o email me at

laura.speaks@yahoo.com

and we would be glad to send you the information. We are still in need of about $18,000 for our first year of ministry and cannot ¨officially¨ begin until all our funds are in, although we are already working here as missionaries, but right now as ¨tent maker missionaries¨. That is fine, we enjoy it, but we would like to be able to be full time for a least one year with World Gospel Mission.
Thanks!
Many blessins to you all.

more details

just to say...
When we crossed the border from honduras to guatemala i got called in to the migration office..oooooooo...never happend before. the customs agent said that i was late in crossing the border becuse i only have 90 days to be in honduras and i went over. i said, but it´s three months from july 21 till oct.21. that´s how every other customs agent ever counts it that i´ve ever met. but this guy was a stinker. he gets out his calendar and starts to count and add up every day on his calculator. when he gets to october he counts till the 21st, and i said,´But today is the 16th¨. And he looked at me and said, öh yea, i´m sorry.well you only have two more days. you really should get your residency. how long have you lived in hondruas?¨ like i don´t already know all this. we think he was just hoping to get some cold hard cash in his hand.
please pray for us though as we attempt to get into Belize on Tuesday or WEdnesday. Beto needs to stay till tuesday to pick up his license which is the day I should leave, but sometimes (usually)the agents are merciful and will waive the fee if i´m only a few days overdue. Then we will return to honduras from belize but there has been tons of rain everywhere in Central America and flooding in Belize so we are going to try it but it may not be fun to be at the beach this time of year.
Thanks for your prayers.

Teguc. and Women´s Retreat

As I mentioned in another blog I made a trip to Teguc last week. Some people don´t like the big city but I love it! I got to see old (young) friends that I came to know and love by visiting where Amber worked a lot when we lived together. I got to stay with Steve and Jeanne at Baxter. They are my Honduran white Kentucky parents. So multi-cultural! They really spoiled me and I am so grateful to them. I was in Teguc. for the World Gospel Mission Women´s retreat which was a lot of fun. We made scultptures out of bubble gum ! So creative, and went out to eat, shopped, but had great devo times using the book by Stormie Omartian, ¨The prayer That Changes Everything...The Hidden Power of Praising God¨. I highly recommend it. The furry little creature was stuffed and put on display in the hotel where we stayed. It just cracked me up.
I also stayed in Teguc. after the retreat to work on my residency, which was a little successful, but the best was spending time with friends like the Whites and Amber!
I went home for one night and Beto and I left the next morning at 4 for Guatemala. I have to leave the country every three mo. to a country that doesn´t border Honduras until my residency starts to process, so we decided to go to Belize, but first we had to come to Guatemala becuase Beto´s passport had expired. Praise God he got that renewd quickly and even applied for his car license which we hadn´t talked about but while he was out and about I thought it would be a good idea for him to get it once and for all while we´re here instead of having to come back again when we do get a car, which we don´t know when taht will be but we are believing in faith it will be very soon! We are having a great time with the fam and will leave for Belize on Teusday hopefully and stay three days before heading back to Honduras! I havn´t been home in so long!

Dump Ministry

Last Thursday I got to go visit a ministry of our mission in Tegucigalpa. I got a ride from La Esperanza with a group that was working there from Missouri, and went to Teguc. their last 2 days before flying back to the States. The name of this ministry is ÄFE¨....Amor, Fe, Esperanza, or Love,Faith, HOpe. It is an amazing ministry that has been in operation for about 6 years. One missionary would go to the dump around 6 years ago to dump medical waste that he couldn´t put in his trash when medical brigades would come to work. He took his young 6 year old daughter with him at the time and she asked her daddy why there were people working and even living in the dump and why no one would help them. She said that if no one was helping them, that HE should start to help them. After much persistance, he finally started taking food three days a week and now they have a school for children who have lived and worked in the dump. It is across the street from the city dump and has preschool through 9th grade. The fist picture is of the beautiful surroundings but if you look closely you can see 100´s of vulchers hovering overhead. The surrounding neighborhood is called the dump neighborhood but this ministry is beginning to revitalize it. They´ve started a church there and have a lot of great plans and vision for the future. It was really encouraging and gave us a lot of ideas of what we can do in the future in La Esperanza.