Women's Ministry Outing

Yesterday about 90 women from our four campus sites spent the day together to celebrate Mother's Day.  We met at the Miralvalle campus and loaded the bus to drive to our campus in Lourdes.  

After a delicious catered typical breakfast (eggs, fried plantains, rice and beans) we met in the sanctuary for a time of praise and worship.  Isabel Paloma shared a powerful testimony about how we have many rolls to fill- as daughters, sisters, wives and mothers.  

Next we boarded the buses and journeyed to Ataco, a small pueblo in the northern part of El Salvador.  Once we arrived, everyone was free to shop at the artisan markets and then eat lunch on their own.  Ena, Erlen and I walked up to the top of one of the hills and had coffee at Mission of the Angles, a small boutique hotel and restaurant.  The views were spectacular.

We visited a few shops and then went to eat at Vitto's Pizza.  We were about finished when it started raining, in fact, raining cats and dogs or like they say in El Salvador, raining snakes and frogs.  It rained really hard for about 20 minutes and since there is little or no drainage in the town, the street looked like this.

We thought it best to wait for the water to recede before heading back to the bus.  It took about 20 minutes, but we were finally able to cross the street.  

Low-Key 4th of July

The worship ministry held its first retreat this past Friday and Saturday.  It took a little bit of convincing, but Stephen finally decided to go.  Thirty-one team members (from all of our campuses) boarded the trusty, yellow church bus on Friday evening about 5:30 p.m.  They spent the night in a small hotel in Ataco called, Jardine de Celeste.  Pastor Julio provided the teaching and lead the discussions.   

I had a very low-key 4th of July at home by myself.  My biggest accomplishment was rearranging the furniture in our living/dining room.  I also had time to work on the plans for the next sewing ministry project.

Stephen returned about 7:00 p.m. and said, in spite of the fact that it's still difficult for him to understand Spanish, he had a great time with the team.  

Day Trip

Our small group decided that the best way to celebrate the 2nd anniversary of IDEM was to "get-away" together for a couple of days.  Unfortunately, since Stephen had to play the piano at the hotel this morning, we could only make it a day trip.

The day started early as we met for breakfast at Pollo Campero before caravaning to Apaneca.

The little town of Apaneca and the hotel, Villa Bonita, were both very cute.  Like most small towns here in El Salvador, there was a very large Catholic church.  

We traveled a bit farther north to Ataco to have lunch.  We found a charming little pizza place--table for 20.  After lunch we walked through the park and market.

It was a great day and we were sorry we had to leave early.  It was a great day with good friends.  We made it safely back using Waze--a great GPS map program that's remarkably accurate here!