Kat and Tiger are coming back today with Gran, but they won’t leave until this afternoon. Bear and I ran a few errands and found ourselves only a few miles from my sister-in-law, Christy. The cousins played at a park for a little while and then we had a quick dinner with them before heading home.
Kat arriving home and running to get a hug.
I drove as quickly as (legally) possible to get home just before my mom and the other kids. The too-quiet-house problem was a distant memory now as they were talking over each other to tell me about their adventures at Gran and Gramps’ house.
I know the team in El Salvador is pretty busy, but I still didn’t hear from George today. *sigh*
I woke up early and couldn’t go back to sleep. The house was just too quiet. After breakfast Kat and Tiger called on the phone to wish me Happy Mother’s Day. Kat asked if I had opened my envelope yet. Oops, I had forgotten! Last week she wrote a letter, put “Open on Mother’s Day” on the envelope, and stuck it on our frig. I opened the envelope and read a short, sweet note saying that she loved me and missed me. The best part about it was that she did it all on her own without being prompted by anyone.
My Mother’s Day letter from Kat. (Our camera was with George. This photo was taken with my cell phone.)
I sent a text message to George today, hoping I’d hear back from him. But I never did. A quick text message on Mother’s Day would have been nice, but sometimes guys don’t think of these things, I suppose.
The alarm went off at 5:00 AM and George headed to his closet to get dressed. At 5:05 he went to put his suitcase on the porch. The driver wasn’t expected for another 20 minutes, but George wanted to be ready as soon as he pulled up. Twenty second later I hear “Uh, sweetie, he’s already here.” So, at 5:07 AM I’m outside waving bye to George for a week.
The phone rang at 8:10 AM. I knew George’s first flight had just landed in Houston. Only it wasn’t George calling. It was Kat calling from Gran’s house.
“Mom, did you know that Daddy put notes in our suitcase for us?”
Then, “I got a dollar for my tooth.â€
I commented about the tooth fairy finding her at Gran’s house.
To that she replied, “Mom, you know, I KNOW the secret!”
Sweet girl. They are having fun.
Just before 9 the phone rang again. This time it was George and he had only a few minutes to talk.
I watched the flight status online until they took off. Then Bear and I headed out to get a few things done. When we returned home, I had a phone message from George saying they had arrived safely. Later that evening I received a text message from him saying that they were now at their hotel and it was quite nice. A phone call, a message on the machine, and a text message. Three in one day. How nice!
This is the first in a multi-part series. If things go as planned, you can see a new post here everyday for a while. Check back again soon.
This morning Daddy took Kat and Tiger to the bagel shop for a breakfast date. I hear they had a good time. When they returned home we finished packing their suitcase. Gran and Gramps were headed our way and would take them for a weekend visit. The original plan was for me to meet the grandparents halfway, but those plans changed and they drove all the way here. Gosh, that was sweet! We had a relaxing morning and I even had time to mow the lawn before they got here!
Gramps took us out to eat for lunch and during lunch Kat lost a tooth. (A little trivia for you: Half of Kat’s four lost teeth have come out while eating a subway-type sandwich.)
Missing tooth on the bottom right.
After lunch it was time for the oldest 2 kiddos to leave. Goodbye’s were said and George and I then turned our attention to packing HIS suitcase. We finished early enough to go out for dinner and stop by the bookstore. Then he headed to bed. Tomorrow was going to start really early for him.
The science is simple: drinking poop kills.
Nobody wants to drink poop… but when water comes from a shallow well and the only place to do your business is a pit latrine, it happens.
— Quoted from OneDollarWater.com
1.1 Billion very important people lack access to clean water. They drink from polluted lakes and streams where animal waste, human waste, and parasites infect the water.
Women and children walk 2 hours each way to fetch water (hauling dirty water back to their families.) They have no time or energy left for education or small business, and many of them die.
Preventable water related diseases kill one child every 15 seconds. That’s 10,000 every day (and that’s just the children).
I have been given a great opportunity by my church and Living Water International to go and be a part of a well dig in El Salvador. Living Water is doing all of the heavy lifting for planning the trip, hiring a drilling crew, scouting out an ideal location, all the logistics, etc. Our team of 5 will be there to assist the drilling crew and provide education to the community with regard to sanitation and health.
I’m really excited about this opportunity. This is something that we’ve dreamed about being a part of for some time. Unfortunately, my wonderful wife will not be going with me on this trip. We felt like the Bear was a little too young to go or be left for a week away from Momma. So, we’re also viewing my trip as a fact finding mission. We hope to be able to do this as a family in the not too distant future.
Some of my friends and family have asked how they can pray for me on this trip. First of all pray that we hit water. We will be drilling for up to 5 days, and there is a possibility that we may not find water at all. We will obviously be disappointed by that, but the community who is currently drinking mud from surface puddles contaminated with poop will not be blessed. Pray that we will be able to bring the true living water of Christ to this community in addition to life sustaining water. Pray for our health of course and all the connections we have to make. And pray for Living Water to be able to reach more and more communities around the world with this most fundamental requirement for life.
If you are interested in getting involved contribute to one of the many organizations dedicated to providing clean water around the world. TheH2OProject.org has some great resources. Check our their page of water drilling organizations here.
It cost surprisingly little to dig a well for an entire community. A shallow well could be as little as $3,000 and provide clean water for hundreds. On average it only cost $1 to provide clean water for one person per year. Shocking considering that I paid $4 for a fancy espresso drink just the other day.
Bear, also known as PinkyT (short for The Pink Tornado), removed a few books from the bookshelf in the office today and left them in random places around the house. One of them was Ruth Beechick’s reading book from her Three R’s series. I found it in the living room and since it’s only 28 pages long, I read/skimmed through it while watching the Spurs game tonight. On page 4 there was this great quote I wanted to record here so I can refer back to it.
It is true that some children can learn to read remarkably early. But the fact that they can does not necessarily mean they should. Should is another question. One school district set up an experiment to help decide this question. Some kindergartners in the district received time learning science. They melted ice. They observed thermometers in hot and cold places. They played with magnets, grew plants, learned about animal life, and so on. Books and pictures were available for these children if they wanted them, but no formal lessons in reading were held.
And what did the school district learn? By third grade the “science” children were far ahead of the “reading” children in their reading scores. The reason? Their vocabularies and thinking skills were more advanced. They could read on more topics and understand higher level materials. The “reading” children, by starting earlier, used up a lot of learning time on the skills of reading, while the “science” children spent the time learning real stuff. And when they did begin reading, they were older and knew more and learned in a fraction of the time that the others took.
This research and others like it are compelling. They drive home the fact that each child has only a limited amount of time in his early years. That time can be squandered in trying to teach reading before the “optimum” time for it. Or it can be used wisely in teaching “real stuff” that the child is ready for.”
Kat has done very well with reading lately, particularly in the last week or two. But it has not been easy waiting for this “optimum” time. It’s not been easy to refrain from freaking out either. I hope the results in this study hold true for us.
You don’t realize how dependent you are on something until it’s taken from you. Something like, oh, say, electricity. A storm last night has left us without electricity since 3 AM this morning. I managed to get through today, but I hear it could be Saturday until it comes back on. Yikes.
(We’re at one of those places with free wi-fi right now. We bribed the kids into staying relatively quiet here with the promise of getting to play an online game for a bit once we were done. It appears my time is up.)
UPDATE: Our power came back on around 1:30 AM, leaving us without power for just under 24 hours. I suppose it could have been a lot worse. Thanks for all the offers of help!
