I just LOVE this time of year! Though I don’t care for the rain – as it interferes with some of our ministry activities– it’s been nice and cool outside. We’ve actually been wearing long sleeve shirts and pants.
The kids are still in school this week but in the afternoons we’ve been making crafts together. Let me just tell you – Oriental Trading makes everything look SO easy online. Malaya and I “test” out the crafts together so we have an example for everyone else to follow. There are times that both of us just look at each other and shake our heads… some of them are quite difficult and once you have to bring the glue out – it’s a total mess.
The Elf on the Shelf made its appearance Friday night. Between the dogs, the kids, and the elf – there’s always a mess to clean up! 🙂
Sunday night we began our 10 Nights of Christmas Movies! We started with Beethoven and last night we showed Home Alone! Tonight is Home Alone 2. The verdict so far is that Home Alone 2 is the favorite of the three so far! They actually stood up and cheered tonight. (Wish I caught it on camera).
I have some clips below of everyone laughing from last night! It really floods my whole body with joy when I hear everyone having a good time. Laughter is so good for the heart…theirs and mine.
Last night there was a little boy around 3 years old who came in after the movie started with his 7 year old sister. Neither of them had shoes – and the little boy had a swollen malnourished belly with barely any meat on his arms & legs. It was easy to see that they were some of the poorest kids we’ve had attend.
Because they were running late they sat at the back table with Jose & me. I reached for a bag of popcorn to give the little boy and his eyes glistened and opened so wide. The way he ate brought joy & sorrow at the same time. It was a joy to see someone so hungry have something to eat – and yet broke my heart that this little boy was indeed famished. I snuck him an extra bag of popcorn, which also disappeared into his mouth within a few minutes. These two little kids affirmed why we do special things like this.
It has been rainy and cold the last two nights. Sunday night we had 85 people. Last night we had a little over 100 people. Tonight we ran around 100 again. It was pretty cool that we had a bunch of teenage guys show up last night. These guys are always “too cool” for the things we offer but there were about 25 of them sitting at the tables enjoying the movie.
We’ve been making radio announcements every day inviting the community to come to our movie nights. We also announced that Doumy would drive the kids to the town square when the movie was over so that the kids wouldn’t have to walk our long street in the dark. The radio station said because of the way we are doing the community a service – there was no charge for the announcements. This is the first time we haven’t had to pay anything! Pretty cool!
It’s our hope that this will open up our campus to some folks who don’t typically interact with us. This fun & laughter leads up to the Nativity Story, which is the very reason we are here! Wouldn’t it be cool if some of those same teenage boys showed up for that night!?!
If you want to know more about the first night – you can check out this blog: http://molehaiti.org/2014/12/14/10-nights-of-christmas-movies/
Here are some pictures from last night & tonight.
