Top 5 Things I miss about Brazil

It's been nearly a month since I left for Brazil. I'm still getting my photos organized and thinking through everything. I still have a ton to process through..but in the meantime, I thought I would write about the top 5 things I miss from Brazil.

5. Siesta- We had one every day after lunch for at least an hour. And I always took advantage of that time. :-) There's something about being in that heat that makes you really tired and sleepy.

4. Simplicity of life - Believe me, when I got back, I was excited to take a hot shower, head out to the gym, and wear my high heels, but there was something very refreshing about just being out in the Amazon without a worry in the world and completely remote

3. The beautiful Amazon Jungle- It's hard not love God's creation when you see these things..

Along the Solimoes river

Cuinha

Cuinha at Sunset

2. My new family- When you're in the Amazon with 16 other people on a boat, you become pretty close with everyone. It's like having a new family. And they're the only other 16 people who know exactly what you've been through.

The only picture I have of everyone. Well except for me, since I took the photo

1. Total Dependence on God - There several times on the trip where I would be frustrated or I felt like things weren't going well. But God always shined through. Whether it was feeding the 5000 or me sharing my testimony and encouraging other women who were struggling. It was pretty awesome!

Me gearing up to share my testimony

Feeding the 5000

One awesome story from Brazil...

I was on the women's team and we got the opportunity to give talks to the women about hygiene and parlay that into how God created women as his most perfect creation..and encourage these women in telling them that they were beautiful.

The typical run down would be:
Hygiene
Testimony
Gospel presentation
Prayer and Gifts

Our gifts were goodie bags full of travel sized shampoos, toothbrushes, nail polish, lotion, etc..

At our 2nd to last village, we had run out of goodie bags and we still had one last session to go to. So just before we entered the last village, my leader, Holly, encouraged us to take our ministry kits (armed with a handful of items should we happen to run into someone on our own) and break them down. We made 21 additional bags. Holly said that we were feeding the 5000. We just prayed that the 21 bags would be enough.

So we had our last session in which ended with a woman weeping on the floor. After we prayed for her it was time to give away the gifts. I counted and told Holly we had 23 women, not enough.. And then she said, "No we have 23! That's a God thing!" It turns out she had found an extra 2 bags at the last minute. God had it all worked out!

It was a great reminder for me to see how God always provides!

The Trip of a Lifetime

Thanks for all your prayers. I got back a few days ago and I have to say that the Amazon might just be the most beautiful place on earth!

It was an honor and privilege to serve and minister to the "Forgotten people" on the Amazon River. It was the biggest blessing to me.

Keep checking my blog. I took about 350 photos so I need to filter through some of those before posting them. In addition, I'm still processing through a lot of what I learned.. So keep checking back.

Thanks!

The Amazon

It's been 7 months since I first applied to go on short term missions in Brazil with my church, and now it's finally here! I leave today! I'll be returning on Saturday, May 23rd. I'll be serving on the women's ministry team educating women on healthy living and more importantly, sharing the message of God's grace and healing.

I've said it time and time again. I've received such blessings (including receiving full financial support, healing from past relationships, and beginning new ones) prior to even embarking on this journey . I can't wait to see what will happen when I'm actually in the Amazon with my team!

We still need your continued prayers. Please continue to pray for:
- People of the Amazon; that they will be open to hearing the Gospel
- Our team to have unity, boldness, and desire to share the Word; and open hearts to hear God's direction
- The Church in Brazil that we're partnering with and our translators.

Lastly, attached is a blog that is updated daily summarzing our adventures. (Our trip leader calls the States every day from a satellite phone to send updates back in Dallas). http://www.watermarkinbrazil.blogspot.com/ Note, the first Watermark team is already out there. They return to Dallas the same day we leave. You can start reading about their journey. Our trip will be very similar.

Scatterbrained

I don’t know if it’s the schizophrenic weather or my memory fading at the ripe age of 32, but I have been very scatterbrained lately.

Here is the evidence
-In the past month, I have misplaced my phone at least three or four times
-Last Friday, I left my wallet at work and had to drive up on Saturday to get it
- I can’t find the special toothpaste floss my dentist gave me
- I can’t find my camera, part of the reason why my blogging is so sparse..
- I keep forgetting where I parked my car
- This morning I forgot I had a morning meeting and then ended up walking late into the WRONG meeting
- And as I type this blog, I realized I just sent off an email to the wrong person

However, I think the biggest evidence of my scatterbrainedness (if that’s a word)/ klutziness is a few weeks ago, I was late to a meeting that I was running. My black patent leather heel got caught in my cuffed pants. I took a spill on the Frito-Lay 2A stairs.


I’m not sure what’s happening. The only thing I can think is that I just finished riding a pretty intense wave at work.. Or another part of it is that I’ve been very focused on working out, so a lot of my energies are being thrown that way. So in the mornings, it’s extra hectic as I pack my gym bag or head out to the gym in morning..

Whatever it is, I hope I get out of it soon. I really don’t like being so nutty..

I'm a REAL homeowner..

So many of you know how hard and scary it was for me to purchase my townhouse. Under the very wise advice of my parents they told me to purchase a house that was new enough that it wouldn't need a lot of repairs, but not brand new so that someone else has broken it in. And, even now, I'm still not done furnishing my house.

Anyways, about 8 months ago, I had my first repair..dunh, dunh, dunh (loud trepidation music). The lights and my alarm clock in my bedroom weren't working. At first I had assumed it was a power outage but when I realized that the bedroom TV and the bathroom lights still worked, I realized something else was up. It was late at night..like midnight or so.. and I finally deduced that something must be wrong with the circuit breakers. (Note I only remember this from living on Camino Lindo when two hairdryers were going at the same time and would suddenly die)..So I ran out to my garage and checked..sure enough I was right..Crisis averted! I was Miss Fix-It! :-)

Well, tonight the same thing happened. I was doing the dishes and my garbage disposal didn't work. It definitely seemed clogged. So, of couse, I did the thing you're not supposed to and started cleaning out the remnants of the clogging with my newly manicured nails, which was disgusting... Suffice it to say it didn't work; and my hands now smelled like curry. Yuck! It was like 11:30, and I don't have a handyman because well, I haven't needed it yet..I'm Miss Fix-It after all..

So I reset the garbage disposal, plugged and unplugged, and unclogged as best as I could.

Finally, out of desperation, I googled "garbage disposal problems" and came upon this website

http://homerepair.about.com/od/plumbingrepair/ss/fix_disposal.htm

It turns out I had a stuck flywheel, which I have never heard of, but I was able to find the wrench that came with the garbage disposal (the wrench was taped under the sink).. And it's working now.. Look out Tim "the Toolman" Taylor!

I think the bigger lesson is to buy semi-new if you can.. for crying out loud, the wrench was still there, talk about making it easy for the homeowner

Cartoon..

I always wondered what I'd look like as a cartoon and now I know...Cheetos wasn't an option or I would've chosen those!