Tha calm before the madness!

Hello and Happy Easter!!

This whole week has been really busy in DR life! Which makes it feel quite strange that today is quiet! Today is good friday and its a public holiday here so everything is closed. The weather has changed and turned cold and wet, and its very quiet outside!!

In contrast to a week that has been really humid and hot, with so many jobs to get done and manic rushing around to do...! I think Ive spent at least 7 hours on the back of motorbike taxis this week, going from village to village, travelling through the sugar cane fields and up mountain paths! I truely do appreciate the beauty of the DR countryside! I just dont appreciate the rough dirt roads!!

Yesterday I had a meeting to obtain the next batch of birth certificates - 53 more for Esperanza, which is amazing! It is such an encouragement to me to see people in the UK getting a hold of this vision and really supporting it! My church did a fund raiser last week and raised enough for another bunch too! Thanks to all of you who have helped in any way with this - through prayer, or through donating. Its amazing, last year when I was collecting peoples information in the village they were all asking me what it was for. I explained that I had a dream and that it was a BIG dream. I said I didnt know if it would happen but that I believed it was right to try and get them all legal papers. I said that we all needed to join together and ask God to help us as I didnt have any money to do this project. The people all looked at me a little sceptically and agreed to ask God to help us. So every time that I get to hand over a birth certificate or a visa or a passport we all get to be reminded that God has heard our prayers and that God loves them and has put it on the hearts of the people in other countries to help us here! Pretty cool hey ;)

SO today is a bit of a quiet day, although Im off to a friends house later on.
Sunday is the first Mission Direct team of the year to the DR. There will be 10 of them coming to help serve the people here and to serve God. We hope to make a difference in the lives of lots of people over the next two weeks - we will be building a home for a family, taking them out of a shack and into a brick home! We will be visiting schools, a drug rehab center, childrens programs, feeding programs and all kinds of other things too! Please keep us in your prayers over the next two weeks - Im the only leader for this team, so good health for me and plenty of energy would be fantastic too!

Have a great Easter, remember what this weekend is really all about (no, not chocolate, bunnies and hot cross buns.....)

Claire x