Happy Feet Wrap Up

I've decided to do one more Happy Feet post and wrap up the week.  As I mentioned in the last post, the road to our scheduled location on Wednesday was blocked by a half mile landslide which made it impossible for us to get there.  Pastor Francisco called his sister who teaches at a school in another neighborhood and she opened her classroom to us.  I don't know how he did it, but by the time we arrived at the school around 9:30 in the morning, there were more than 150 kids waiting in line.

One of the difficult things for the Happy Feet team is trying to decide how many of each size shoes to bring.  They hate running out of a size because sometimes it means that a child won't get a new pair.  By Wednesday we were out of the smallest size, but had a good supply of most of the rest of the sizes.  For some reason, there were more older kids than usual and we almost emptied the size 4 bag before the day was out.  On Thursday, it was just the opposite, we didn't run out of size 4 shoes, instead the oldest kids needed size 3.  It was amazing to see how God worked out all of the details.

On Monday I had the privilege to translate for Emily; on Tuesday, instead of translating I was able to work by myself, washing feet, giving new shoes and sharing the gospel in Spanish.  It is so much easier to share in Spanish than it is to translate English to Spanish!  On Wednesday morning Emily and I worked together again and then on Thursday, Stephen and I were able to work together.  

Thursday was our final day and it was our smallest group of the week.  We finished with the 115 kids just after lunch.  We left all of the remaining shoes with Pastor Francisco who said he would try to get them to the children of the town we were scheduled to visit on Wednesday.  

We headed back to Chimaltenango and had an opportunity to tour the Don José León coffee roastery.  The owner, Gustavo Perez, is a member of Vida Nueva Guatemala, and he kindly demonstrated the whole process for the team and served up freshly roasted coffee. 

Each night after dinner, we had a testimony time which helped the team to get to know one another better.  Our final evening at the hotel was very special as we heard from each of the translators.  It was special to listen to several of the younger girls sharing how great it was for them to share the gospel with kids their age.  

Friday morning after breakfast and clean up we checked out of the hotel and drove to Antigua.  While everyone shopped, Stephen and I visited with our teacher, Corina, and her family.  We always make it a priority to spend time with them.  Stephen played cards with the four girls while I visited with Corina and her mother-in-law.