Don't eat the goat meat!

We had a great visit from some of our fellow missionaries here in Zambia, the Kimbroughs, last week. Their family includes Blake and Dawnya and their four children Isabelle, Abigail, Isaac, and Amos. Part of their visit included a survey trip of the north-east corner of Zambia where Blake and I met up with three other men from Lusaka. One of these men was our Strategy Leader for Zambia in our mission, the other was the Executive Secretary for the Baptist Fellowship of Zambia and the third was the pilot who works with the Flying Mission of Zambia. We had a great survey trip up and down the beautiful Lake Mweru. We stopped in a small down called Munuga for lunch and had some goat meat that was room temperature. One of the first things you learn as a missionary is to only eat hot food, but we all "rolled the dice" on this one. We lost the bet the following morning, but where able to get back on the road again after it was out of our system. We ask for your prayer as we consider whether or not to put a missionary in this area of Zambia.

Our kids had a great time with the Kimbrough children. Their are four red-heads in the group!

Amos(3) and Hutch(4) got a little tired after Bible study in the village and took a little nap on the way home.

Grocery Shopping

Sometimes your wife may ask you to run to the grocery store and pick up a few items. It may seem like a hassle, but you know that it is worth it to show a little love and to keep the peace. One of the hardest things about where we live is supply trips. I have to drive 400kms on horrible dirt roads to get to the small town where supplies can be found. I load up my 4x4 with empty barrels to buy diesel and empty ice boxes for groceries. The road looks similar to this for the most part:

But along the way you may come across places like this:

...and sometimes your vehicle can even get stuck in those places. 

All around it was a 21hour round trip drive to the grocery store and fuel station. It may seem kind of crazy, but I get to check off grocery store run from my "honey do list" for at least 2 more months. I guess maybe when you total up your time spent driving to the fuel station and grocery store for two months you might reach around 21hours too. Then again, maybe not. 

Hutch's Farm

Hutch got his first egg this morning!  He went in to look and there it was! I am soooooo happy to  have fresh eggs! Let's hope there are many more to come!

Perhaps even more exciting than that is the two-headed snake we killed in our yard! Well to be honest it is not a true "snake" but in the snake family. It has a fake head as a tail as part of a defense mechanism. Just another day on Hutch's farm.

Another Year!

The rainy season here is so beautiful.  We don't realize it until the end of the dry season when everything is dead.  Since it's always around the same temp, it doesn't feel like the seasons are changing, but we realize it when the heavy rains have transformed the world around us. Our yard has changed a lot too, when we first came there were no trees, no grass, hardly any bushes and we've waited and planted things all around our yard to make it green and shaded!  Most of the things we've planted came from the villages in Kaputa.  We pray that the Lord's words would be soaked up by the hearts of the people like the ground soaks up the rain!

Christmas in Kaputa

Well, Christmas in Kaputa went very well this year. We had lots of toys for the kids because of our recent trip to South Africa and because of family and friends. We even had some of our Mission Family come and be with us. Dwayne and Betty Mitchell drove up to help repair my leaking porch and spend Christmas with us. Betty brought lots of good food, including a turkey! We opened presents on Christmas morning and then went to church for a Christmas service.

Lulie got a tea set and Hutch got some Transformers (which I am still trying to figure out how to transform properly). 

Lulie loves to give the offering at church.

This is our hand shaking line which we do after every service.

Hutch and the boys.

Look at this grin. It says "I am well fed and happy" or maybe "I am in complete control of these people"

Chansa Baptist Church

We were so very excited when  we went to teach Bible study at Chansa Baptist Church. They had taken their own initiative and put up a small structure for us to meet under during this rainy season. We have bee meeting under a mango tree for the past year and a half. Now we have a place to call our own. It is so great to see nationals taking charge of their church and getting things done. (Can you spot Hutch and Lulie in this picture?)

Farmer Hutch

He loves these chickens.  I would not ever be brave enough to grab them like he does.  It helps that James keeps working on the boxes and spends a lot of time with Hutch inside with the chickens.  They haven't gotten used to the boxes yet so Hutch is helping the chickens get inside to acclimate them so they'll start laying eggs.