Good Evening!

      How is every one doing this fine evening? Today i woke up and it was Hot For morning...and so it was a perfect day for the beach!! And then as we were busing up to LaBorie it started getting cooler and the rest of the day was rather cool in fact when we took, take out Chinese food to Quarantine point (you can see it of to the left of Grand Anna beach on the map i posted last week) i was glad to roll my shirt sleeves down because of the cool breeze...It was so pretty though there the stars,moon the lights from the towns houses ect....and the lights showed the Island outline.

yet another new thing at the beach.. sea egg....they are very poky and its kinda tricky kicking them up onto the beach..the quills or what ever they are called are almost always moving back and forth...its rather interesting to watch.. We saw some more bu we didn't get them out till later when some kids came over and made me pull out 3 or 4 more.. they tried diving for them but couldn't get down far enough. They did eventually get 1 or 2 out resulting in 6 sea eggs out on shore.

this is the gorgeous beach i swim at almost every weekend! It is always so nice to come here and distress. So i guess i'll give my annual day by day scheme of things..

Monday: school and Shavoni over for bible study

Tuesday: school and we were going to have bible club but all that day we had been having heavy rain so we didn't go even though it had stopped..we didn't want to get stuck in the rain if it happened to rain again and it prolly would been kinda geed(geed what the Grenadians say instead of gross) 

Wednesday: school, trip to town, prayer meeting

Thursday: school,supper at Sarah's, and Loris

Friday: hectic day at school, supper at Chris and then youth at Limes were we went to sing for 2 old lady's and then we played bite 'um or bump and then v-ball in the football field. 

Last Thursday i lost my keys as i may have said last week. I had a key to the inside padlock of our front door and a key that will open anything down at the school and another one that opens anything else that does not open with the other one.. anyway this week Natalie had some money stolen from her wallet that was in her classroom she mentioned it but thought maybe she may have spent it without remembering but then a few days later she had quite a lot of money stolen out of her wallet again while it was in her classroom. and then other things started missing in other classroom like a quarter here and a quarter there..and i lost a quarter dime nickle and penny US money that i had brought into class to help them with there money.... so it hasn't been to serious except the cleaning of Natalie's wallet. but now we don't feel like we can leave anything in there unattended....The teachers who have been here are really suspicious about one teen boy who lives in the neighborhood because he has been passing by the school a lot and he is acting weird around them. So anyway we would love your prayers as we deal with this...and the soul of the thief.

well i guess that is all i will write tonight have a good Sunday tomorrow! ~Crystal

   Afternoon!

 Well another weeks is gone again! This thursday was the day a month ago that I came to live on this island! Ahh it is so nice here. Although i am trying to wrap my mind around the whole thing of caroling in the heat! I mean no boots, coats, mittens, hot chocolate, and fighting off frost bite! But yes that is what is going to happen to me! It will be water bottles, sandals, and maybe an umbrella!

  Well lets see what happened this week? It is rather hard to keep track of what day you did what. And it can be kinda annoying when you try to recall where or how you lost your keys.... i think i last saw them thursday morning but when i try going through what i did that day to figure out where i may have last laid them i get everything that happened that week mixed and messed up. But lets see i did the last update on friday so lets see....Sat. we went to the beach and it was sooo nice we spent quite a while there and then we went a did some grocery shopping.. and then that evening we had a rook tournament in Limes with the anyone from the two churches that play rook and pastor Jim Weaver and his family were there they had just arrived that day or the day before i believe. They are here to help the church at Laura.

   Sunday we had a nice relaxing day or at least i did. Ryan wanted to take his sunday school class (youth boys) somewhere i forget where but then that sunday he only had 2 boys so he invited the youth girls and then Natalie, Amanda, me and i think maybe a few other...to help maintain control but i felt like i had to much to do so i stayed home and got some stuff done.... That evening Sarah and Lori had us singles over to there house and true to tradition we had punch! Every time we have been invited to their house we get punch (smoothies) they also had made a splendid pizza as well! Beside them is the court (which i have mentioned already in early blog posts...where we have our friday games class) there was a birthday party going on there for a 5 or 6 year old and the music in there was SOOOO loud like seriously its a 5 or 6 year old he is prolly rather miserable at his own b-day party! So for most of the time we were at sarah and Lori's house we had to shout or talk really loud to be heard by each other. It thankfully stopped around 8 or 9. But it was kinda sad thinking that kids have to go through that and we had peeked in and saw at least one kid that goes to our school.

   Monday started another day of school, and then that evening we had Shavoni over for supper. And then bible study with Amanda.

  Tuesday school and we have art class on tuesdays as well so we made porcupines....

Tuesday evening we had kids club. It was rather hard for me to keep my attention and maintain control of the kids for Amanda because i was so wore out i don't know what i will do when it is my month to be in charge of it.... hopefully i can keep it lively and interesting...

chicken salad that Natalie made for us sometime this week it was SOO good!

     Wednesday school trip to town and then we had prayer meeting in the evening...

Thursday .. school and then i went to football (soccer) in the field the guys get a game together with the neighbor kids..and anyone else who wants to..it was a lot of fun to play again. And too sweet so hard felt good to.. we had a meal with Sarah and Lori like we always do on Thursdays it was our turn so the came here and we also had the guys over that evening as well. 

   Friday school to 1 and then games class for an hour. That evening we were invited to Pastors Johns for a meal and they cookes a mix of a pot (oil down) and chicken soup. it was really good! that evening was junior youth so our household had to make snack for that....i decide i like junior youth better then senior youth because the kids are more fun! :)

Saturday (today) we as a church went to town and passed out tracks and then we as a household went shopping before we took a buss up to Shivani's house where she cooked us a pot of oil down and took us on a walk and showed us different trees and stuff that bare this and that....man everything that grows around here it seems like is eaten in some way and most everything is totally amazing. like coco i didn't know that you can eat/suck of the meat around the seeds and it is nice and sweet.

 the yellow thing is coco

 Shavoni's brother Sammy

 picking the coco

 a big tree..ummm i cant remember if she told us what it was...

 a congerie they are harmless but many children are scared of them because adults tell them that while they are sleeping they crawl through your ear and eat your brain!

the picked coco

 Shavoni showing us something

 opening the coco

 what the inside looks like...

 some of the kids that went on a walk with us

 K.K. or Kaydon was not in the picture above so we got him here on this pic.

after are walk we were not at her place long untill the pot was done. I though the dumplings were really good! i have had dumplings that are really dry in the middle and they are not quite as good but these were just right!

 Shavoni's mother

 above what with the dumplings on top but Shavoni's mom scooped them out and but them i the bowl beside in the picture below..

 my plate full!!!! yes and mine wasn't piled as full as Natalies was either! No i couldn't finish it and i got teased that i haven't gotten use to eating like a Grenadian which i guess is true they put if on a plate for me and i happen to be eating some of it while i type this up! :)

Well that pretty much sums up our day! Shavoni and her family were so nice and generous! her little brother or cousin cant remember came in at one point and shyly gave us some fruit he picked for us then her older cousin picked us a breadfruit and she gave us some mint starters. So we left there house bearing may gifts! Being out all day today was rather tiring so the guys picked us up on there way back from whatever they were doing and took us most of the way home which was really nice since Natalie and Amanda were rather sore as well with side affects from Chikungunya. 

Sunday we had church and during Sunday school the rain started getting really load so we had to talk loudly to be heard then that afternoon we were going to go to a children's home and we went around and picked people up and then we decided to cansaled it because it was raining really hard. So we drop of everyone and at the last stop which was Thaddeus and Rose the road right ahead of us had a mud slide so we had to go a scenic route which was nice we got to see more of the country and what the rain was doing to everything as well....

And here is the crazy part about this day!When we got back which was in all about an hour and a half we find Amanda's room almost ankle deep in water!!! So we had a nice huge mess to clean up and I felt sorry for her lot of her kids books and school books got wet as well as other things.. we got 10 bucket fulls out of the upstairs! it was crazy!  Well i am sure i have rambled long enough...there is more i could write but i'm sure you are all board. So later!

~Crystal

dear family and friends i know i am sounding like a broken record but really time FLIES down here!!! it seams like only a day or two ago that i wrote here about last week and now i am suppose to have a whole nother week that i can right abut....well i don't know what day did i write my other post??.... well ok sat. we went on the beach oh it was so amazing!!! it was sooo nice just to relax! and i could just feel all those bad toxins leave my body as i soaked in the ocean....the water is so warm and relaxing and ya.... just amazing... you will have to come experience it for your self to know what i mean.. anyway enough of that. it was kinda crazy i was grumbling to myself about  not knowing what was my responsibility to buy and what comes out of our 'community' fund.so we come home from town and i finally got ahold of this piece of informationt that you should get your own snacks for school lunches. well so for some dumb reason i was rather distraught! (what a silly thing to be fussing to myself about i know)Well lo and behold sunday morning a lady who comes to church here and likes when i sit with her in church said she had something to give me and guess what it was!!! yes, you got it... snacks!!!!! i felt rather embarrassed, and felt like i should share this because it was so cool (and humbling) but anyway God def. got my attention there! ok so i talked about sunday some now. that afternoon the whole church clambered into 3 busses and took off for two old folks home one in Gouyave which had a amazing view of the ocean and all the sail boat out and about..and then we went to  Victoria we did singing and a lil devotional it was a lot of fun..singing down here is a lot of fun cuz you can sing as loud and of key and crackly voice as you want!! And then on to Couture falls which was really nice. we walked around in the water and everyone was saying how cold it was but i thought it felt good it def. isn't like fresh ID mountain water...ok so down here is a map that i found online and i circled some point of interest

yellow: Laura, Limes, & LaBoire

purple: were we went sunday

green: the point i went to the second evening i was here

blue: the beach we go on saturdays

ok so lets see 

monday: schol and then kids club down the road aways were we had crusades a while ago it is me and Amanda's spot to have it so we will be doing that frequently. it was a nice time although i was rather worn out from the day. 

tuesday: school and then a PTA or rather meet all the parents night

wednesday: school and and then went to town and then there was cottage meeting in the eve.

thursday: school and then us staff girls go together for our weekly meal it was at the other girls house this time.

friday (today): school and games class with the students at a guy just up the road me and miss Eberly had to get the games together for that we played doug the ball, and then we split up into two groups the older one on one side of the court and the younger ones on the other side... i organized the game for the older group. we played donkey base or as you all would know it, tree or dare base. this evening us single staff went over to the Foxes for supper and then us girls had to come back for girl club at our house we had 11 girl which i understand was an amazing turn out... it was fun but man am i ready for the weekend and just relaxing. you are busy busy busy here but so far i have been ok and enjoying it. i never was one to always be packing my days but i have not regretted all the things we are doing so that is good....

well i guess that is all i can think of to write right now i have some more pic. here.....

our lovely basket of amazing food... although i'm not sure about the soursop..(the prickly looking thing) me and Natalie wanted to try some but Amanda who had tried it already was kinda hesitant that we by it because she didn't like it but we wanted to try it so we got one. me and Natalie opened it this morning and the smell!!! it smells like body wash which is a nice thing when it is body wash but not when it is food. it rather made us almost gage...we decided we would quietly put it away in the fridge  and see if it would appeal to us later i don't know that it will though...rather skeptic. although when it is in smoothies it is good thursday night sarah or lori made soursop & banana smoothies and they were really good. well enough about the soursop. lets see there is pears (avocados) and lots of mangos the yellow red and i think one of the green are mangos.

 well here is my class we were waiting to go up to the court for game class. i tried to get them to take a nice pic. but they were all excited about game class and the whole building was noise with cleaning going on so i didn't really succeed.... one of my kids Cyle was sick today so sadly i don't have a pic. of him... but in the back on the right is Renel,(a spunky little girl who also loves hugs and talking) Rebekah, (she and her mother would go to church here she is a very sweet girl) David, ( one of the little 'foxes' (his last name is Fox) very sweet my smart kid, sensitive and has the cutest smile) Darrell, ( is normally a nice boy and loves to please. and loves when i let him do a puzzle.) Shane, (  he is really sweet can be one notice i said one of my clowns and is always wanting to tell me something...miss!..miss!!! he says trying to get my attention over the hub-bub of every one else telling me something) Nella, ( my other talkative girl she is a very funny bubbly girl who takes her little stuffed i dont know what it is a lemurs....the monkey things on madagascar you can actually she her holding it on the pic.) Leadon, ( a boy from Laria he loves to play although i think fitting in with everyone here has been a lil hard for him. it seems some of the boys pick on him but i dont know that he is completely innocent. right now his dad is in the hospital and from what he said his dad broke his back. i would also love if you prayed for me to on knowing how to approach and handle him he is having a hard time with his work sometimes. he can do amazing one day and not so good the next and he seems a lil bitter. he wrote in his math book today instead of working something to the effect of miss you will be sorry someday that you are making me do this work and the other day he wanted to poke someones eyes out and he told me in a very defiant voice that he was stronger then me like he was going to try to prove it right there and then. obviously he is small enough for me to handle and it is what his mind is obviously dwelling on that makes me scared! but all in all he is a nice boy most of the time and loves to have fun! i think lot of it is the stress with his day and changing schools and 2 of his cousins didnt make it into our school so ya im hoping all this will go away....

 Nella she wanted me to take passport pics. of everyone...she is taking hers to go to Hawaii

 i got here to smile here

 leadon

 shane i could not for the longest time get him to smile nicely :) but wait did i ever get a nice one of his adorable smile dosnt look like it he is still cute though with out his signature smile....

 leadon and shane

 almost...

 darrell

 david

 renel the lower one shows more of her normal smile :)

rebekah

a little frog we found in our house tonight the smallest frog i have ever seen!! i dont know he was prolly only twice the size of my thumb nail.

 our craft for girls club this evening it was on making choices. Amanda did a really good job at teaching!!