Celebrating 25 Years in Turlock

La Familia De Dios, the Spanish speaking congregation of Turlock Covenant Church, celebrated it's 25th anniversary on Sunday, March 5.  We made the one hour, 40 minute trip to arrive in time for the 11:00 a.m. service.  William, Gilma and Amy Flores were there for the celebration, as well.  Her brother, Samuel, is the pastor.  

The service had everything--contemporary worship songs, at least one hymn (How Great Thou Art with William on the guitar and Stephen on the piano), singing and dancing children, recognizing one of the "founders" of the church, video memories and a guest pastor.  If that sounds like a lot, it was--the service was nearly three hours long!  

After the service we had lunch with William, Gilma and Amy and then returned to the church to help with the celebration dinner.  Former staff members and others were recognized at the dinner.  It was a great way to end the celebration.  We left about 9:30 p.m. and made it back to Sunnyvale before midnight.   

IDEM Dinner

Friday night we had a "farewell" dinner for our IDEM group leaders, Ryan and Keeley Blackstock.  While they're not leaving the country, they are changing churches.  Ryan accepted an assistant pastor position with Iglesia Bautista Nueva Esperanza (New Hope Baptist Church.)  

Stephen's had a really bad cold so he didn't go.  Of course, I went so I could take the dessert!  It was at Salvador and Roxana's house in Santa Techla, not far from where we used to live, so I knew the way.  Dinner was great--grilled steak, rice, beans, salad, fruit and cheesecake for dessert.  

We all agreed that we will work hard to maintain our friendship with the Blackstock family so I expect we'll be having more dinners together in the future.  To end the evening each of us shared how we felt about them and then had a group prayer.  We know that they are following God's will for their lives, but will miss seeing them on a weekly basis.

Dinner with Friends

I totally forgot to take pictures on Tuesday evening, but we had a great dinner with friends here at the apartment.  My two co-leaders from Hilo, Aguja y Biblia, Maria Elena and Isabel, and their husbands, Mauricio and Luis, joined us for dinner.  

The menu was Italian all the way, including Artichoke Salsa (recipe) as the appetizer, Baked Chicken Kiev, whole wheat pasta and spaghetti sauce, green salad with poppy seed dressing (recipe) and garlic bread.  Dessert was a peach pie cookie (recipe) with vanilla ice cream and salted caramel sauce (recipe.)  The dinner was as healthy as I could make it.  As far as the loaf of garlic bread and vanilla ice cream, they are part of the "all things in moderation" category, right?.  Thankfully, everything turned out delicious.

However, the company was even better than the food.  Besides being good friends, Maria Elena and Isabel are sisters-in-law.  Isabel is married to Maria Elena's brother.  It was nice to spend time with their husbands.  Mauricio is an artist--one of the well-known painters in El Salvador.  Some of his paintings hang in the national art museum.  Here are some examples of his beautiful work.

Isabel's husband, Luis, graduated from Texas A&M, is an engineer who works with installations of water wells and facilities to bring clean water to the people of El Salvador.  

It's wonderful to see how God brings people together . . . we were honored to have these wonderful men/women of God in our home.  I've loved getting to know Maria Elena and Isabel and we are looking forward to spending more time with both of these great couples.  

California Time

We arrived on Wednesday evening and have enjoyed every minute we've spent with the grandkids.  It's great to hang out with them on a daily basis and be part of their routine.  Thursday afternoon we watched gymnastics and Friday morning we went to swimming lessons.

Friday afternoon we went to Cinemark to see Cinderella (a first for us.)  Both of them loved the movie (and the popcorn.) 

Saturday we spent the afternoon at Shannon's parent's condo.  The swimming pool was too cold, but the hot tub was just right.  

On Sunday afternoon, Jon and his friend, Kate, drove up from Santa Cruz.  We had dinner and made homemade ice cream.  Fun times!

Catch-up Post (1)

I didn't have much time to update the blog while we were in Guatemala--just too busy, so this is the first of a couple of "catch-up" blogs.

We stayed with the Rivas family while in Guatemala City.  When we arrived on Wednesday only Rosemarie and the kids were there because Nelson was in Kansas City for the mission's conference of Blue Springs Bible Baptist Church.  We went to the airport to pick him up on Friday night.  Stephen had a little sign so he would know we were there to get him.  The name on the sign is Chabelito (a nickname that Nelson uses for people whose names he can't remember.)  

On Saturday, after a long day of working on VBS things, the four of us had a night out at Cayalá, a very upscale retail shopping, living area on the other side of the city.  You can see the Spanish architecture in the pictures--it was an amazing place to walk around.  The pictures "almost" do it justice!

 We had a great dinner at Saul's and enjoyed sharing the night with our friends.  Priceless!