Our first market experience

We are almost settled in and have enjoyed spending some time finding our way around town.  We are eagerly waiting the arrival of Mark and Gena Killen and Russ and Emily Lambert who will be here tonight to plan the summer church trip.  For those that don't know, our church brings a group each year to Antigua to work with the Villa church so these couples come to make sure all our ducks are in a row before the big group comes (usually around 100 people).  Some of the workers will do construction (building Villa a new church building and bathroom) and the rest of the workers will run the soccer camp and VBS.  There are about 400 children that come to camp in July.  We went to the downtown market this morning and bought some fruit and a few island goodies.  Butter flap bread, banana bread, pumpkin fritters and dumplins.  None of it disappointed.  And we saw a Burger King...we're good!  The only 2 restaurants we recognize are Burger King and KFC.  Other than that, there are some restaurants and a lot of road side vendors.  We are nervously excited about trying some of those!  Here are a few pics from the last few days.

Beach time

We don't use the air conditioner during the day.  Can you tell?  And yes, it is warm but electricity is expensive.  We make do with a nice island breeze most of the day.

Some "ting" funny is going on here

Bath time for Peanut!

This is a sweet potato-soooo cool and REALLY good!!

Cooking crabs on the side of the road

Pig head for dinner anyone?!!

Fish market

Pumpkin fritters-OH MY WORD!! Sooo yummy!

Statue downtown (in the background)

A typical Antiguan house in the area where we are working

Laundry hanging on the line

Lizzie Facetiming with her class back home

I don't think I could have remembered how expensive things are.  This is what we use at home.  $132 EC (Eastern Caribbean dollars) which is the equivalent of $48 US!!

These are the hot dogs we buy at home for $4 at the most.  These are $11

The ham we eat at home that is about $3.50 at the most.  $10.50 here!!

Gluten free bread when we are home is around $5-6.  Here it is $12 a loaf.

Needless to say our tastes here have changed a bit.  We are making do with a lot of different brands and not complaining about it!!  And no we are not doing gluten free here because it would cost a fortune!  Thank goodness we don't have an allergy to it.  

3 2 1...Go!

We are here!!  We are so extremely thankful for the prayers on our behalf.  They worked!!  We had great flights and good travelers.  We felt like people didn't hate us after the flight was over (aka. Walker was pretty good).  We arrived safely and were greeted by Bernard and Denise Masson (the preacher from Villa and his wife).  We got our driver's licenses (me without even going in the building-Will took my American license and passport and they just gave me one without ever seeing me!!)  I haven't tried driving yet but I'm really good at reminding Will to stay on the left side of the road instead of the right!  After getting our licenses we went to our room and unloaded our luggage.  We got a quick tour and popped some popcorn (we were starving and hangry (hungry+angry=hangry).  Then we made a quick trip to the grocery for some essentials including beef patties and rice for dinner and then went to church.  It was so nice to be reunited with everyone and I literally think we met the whole church last night.  So fun!  We got lots of smiles and hugs and got to hear some Antiguan singing from Deon and a great lesson by Victor.  We are super exhausted but thankful to be here.  We slept like logs and are using today to get settled.  I've never seen our children sleep in so many random places.  I'm hoping this will continue throughout the summer and even back home! Here are a pics from the day.

Airport fun (up since 3am!)

Plane selfie

Reunited with Hannah (preacher's oldest daughter)

Random sleeping

Our view out back

Lizzie at Villa

3 2 1 GO!

Packing

So how does one pack for 8-10 weeks?  We're not sure but this is what we have been working with!

Have you ever gotten the feeling that God was very obviously trying to tell you something?  Yeah, me neither….Except this one time.  Back in September when Mark Killen and Will were emailing back and forth about something and out of curiosity, Will asked Mark if they had found anyone to go to Antigua. Mark said “No. Do y’all want to go”.  And that was that.  Nothing else was said about it but Will replied “Maybe”.  He was pretty much kidding but once Will told me that Mark had asked him that,  for some reason I started asking tons of questions about logistics, timing, where we might stay, etc.  All of these questions for which Will had no answers.  We talked out loud about it for a bit and discussed if it could even happen and left it at that.  

A few days later at an Upward soccer game while holding a 5 month old and fumbling my words and walking awkwardly in circles, I mentioned to Mark that we might be interested in going.  He didn’t really say a whole lot so I kind of regretted telling him but later I found out that he was excited and called Russ Lambert (who helps Mark plan our Family Mission Trip to Antigua each year) pretty soon after and said “I think they are serious.”  I’m not exactly sure why I told Mark what I did, but that’s how I knew God was speaking to me.  I knew it was my voice coming out but the words were unplanned and foreign to me.  It was definitely the Holy Spirit speaking through me.  Will, Russ and Mark met for lunch a few weeks later to discuss whether or not our family going to Antigua was even possible. We didn’t let on to Hendersons, Mark or Russ or their families for a long time that we were officially going, but I think they knew.  For some reason, saying it out loud was difficult.  I guess because then it is actually real.  Kind of like announcing a pregnancy that you’ve been hiding for weeks (Hello Walker!).  All of a sudden it’s real! 

Speaking of Walker, let me back track a little.  We went to Antigua with the CrossPoint Family Mission Trip in the summer of 2014.  I’ll be honest, we were a little skeptical of a mission trip with so many people.  Questions came up like, "What good can I do when there are so many people going?"  But we decided that we wanted missions to be something that we do as a family and this seemed like a great way to start.  Since someone else would be in charge Will could relax a little, unlike his other short term mission trips that he planned.  This wasn’t the first time for the Family Mission Trip, so we figured some of the kinks would be worked out and we would feel comfortable with so many people we knew being there.  Also, we were going to a country where the people speak English which makes things much easier.  We went on the trip and actually had some really bad experiences and random things happen (getting lost on the first day, me getting a rash that we still can't explain, Will almost losing a bag, etc.) that could have made us say, “Never again.” But through all of that we came home loving our time there, missing the relationships we had made and longing to never get over the feeling of being in a place where every day and every thought was focused on Jesus.  

We were already excited about going back in 2015 but a sweet little guest named Walker Ford Bridges made his way into our hearts and into our home in May of 2015 so that put our plans for another Antigua trip on hold.  When this opportunity came up, as crazy as it sounded to go with a one year old, we still felt like God was calling us to do it.  And trust me, I had prayed enough that if God wanted us to go somewhere he would call me and not just Will and that he would call loudly and obviously enough that I would know He was speaking to me.  So loud, in fact, that I couldn’t ignore it.  And he did. 

So how did we get to this point?  While we are excited about the opportunity to go, we are mindful of the Henderson family whose son, John Oubre, had plans to go in the fall of 2015.  He had been with our church group earlier that summer and fell in love with the children there.  He he made plans to go back to the island, to live there for several months and work with the children there.  Unfortunately, he passed away just a few weeks before his trip was to take place.  To honor John Oubre’s life and his mission, his family created the John Oubre 4 Antigua fund to send someone in his stead to continue the work of helping the children in Antigua.  We began praying back in September and that's when God starting working in our hearts.  We do not take it lightly that we are continuing to carry on the work that was so special to John Oubre.  If you would like to donate to the fund, you can go to www.johnoubre4antigua.org. 

Please keep the Henderson family in yours prayers and also our family as we head out Wednesday morning!!