Woodbull Family

Hello? Are you still there?

2010-06-30T18:44:00.005+02:00

It has been over a year since this blog has been updated. I would be surprised if anybody still follows it. If you are reading this now... Wow! Way to go :)

I think it is about time for a Woodbull update. But where to begin. I left off without so much as a goodbye, so why don't we start from where we left off?

Starting from where we left off would bring us to May 5th, 2009. The last time all 10 Woodbulls were together. Sad? Very! May 5th was spent at Gold Reef City (a South African amusement park). It was loads of fun and even when it began to pour down rain, it just made it all the more memorable. After a fun day together we went to a pizza place to share one last meal together. We ate, laughed, shared memories and then came the goodbyes. Oh! One thing that I personally will never get used to (even though I've had to do it so many times) is saying goodbye. It was a tearful goodbye and lots of hugs. We prayed together as Woodbulls and then waved farewell until God brought us back together again.

Let's zoom forward to March 20th, 2010. We'd been separated for almost a year. Separated in three different directions. The Woods are still in Mozambique. Dot and Hannah are in Georgia at Covenant College. And the other Bulls are in Missouri on furlough.

Ok, May 20th, 2010. Some of the Woodbulls are reunited. :) Kent and Uncle Charles came up to Covenant where Dot and I were! It was great! Kent came to check out Covenant College and see if that is where he would like to go to college. God provided and Kent will be coming to Covenant College in the fall of 2010! So, three of us Woodbulls will be together :) Anywho, it was great to spend time with one of the Woods over the three days Kent was visiting.

In other Woodbull news :) Kent, Dot and I will all be going to Covenant College in Georgia this coming year. Dot and I will be starting into our second year and we are both so excited. It was a wonderful first year! We are also excited to see Kent coming as well. Who knows, maybe all the Woodbulls will end up coming to Covenant. :)

The Woods are going to be coming back to the USA on furlough sometime in the end of this year or the beginning of next year.

And the Bulls (minus Dot and me) will be moving to Zambia by the end of this year, Lord willing.

It's crazy, it's exciting, it's what's going on in the Woodbulls lives :)

I wish I had more to share, but since we haven't been together in so long, there isn't a whole lot to update about :( Sorry. But I hope you enjoyed this mini update :)

Welcome to the Blog World!

2009-03-26T11:18:00.006+02:00

Bethy Woodbull is now an official blogger! Yippy yahoo! She's enjoying blogging and we're enjoying reading what she has to write :) Which is never dull to read.

Please welcome her to the blogging world and check out her blog at http://www.Sarah-looking-up.blogspot.com/

And, have fun blogging Bethy! :D

Has it really been TWO years?!

2009-03-16T19:16:00.002+02:00

January 18th, our Woodbull anniversary, came and went without much of a celebration due to Ian being sick and down in South Africa. But, two months later we finally got around to celebrating! Yahoo! We have been Woodbulls for over TWO years now!!! Wow! God is SO good in giving me five more amazing siblings :)

So how did we celebrate two spectacular years?

Saturday night we Woodbulls went out to eat at a restaurant in town. It was fun and tasty :)

Sarah Ellen and Gracie, my beautiful little sisters!

Lil' Andrew, Benaiah, Sarah Ellen and Gracie :) The greatest younger siblings ever!

Bethy and me... and Kent :)

Oooo look at that pizza! It was delicious! Thank you to the parents for paying :)

We got home later and had some delicious homemade icecream and brownies!! Thank you Aunt Julie, Benaiah, Lil' Andrew and Bethy!

Then we hung out and talked :)

The boys played computer games :P

The next day we went to church with them. It was nice. Kent led a bit of the service and did a great job! Way to go Kent!

After church and a fabulous lunch (Aunt Julie is an amazing cook!) we took some family pictures :) Getting ten people to smile for a picture is fun :) hehe... actually everyone did really well! :D

Getting ready for our first family picture :)

10 happy kidos! Yeppers! Thank you God for the gift of family!

Younger brothers ;)

Getting ready for another picture.

I may sound biased, but I have the best nine siblings ever!! :) Each one of them is special and makes the Woodbull family complete :)

Looking into the Wood's well... "To jump or not to jump, that is the question."

:D Awww... what good looking siblings I have :D

Then the fun began :) Haha, we decided to make a pyramid. We had the perfect amount of people... but could we do it?

Ready, set, go! Take 1: We're getting there. Dot and I were in the middle on the bottom at first...

Take 2: Then Kent and The 2nd switched places with Dot and I, so they were holding more weight :) Thank you bros!! .... And we're almost making it!

Take 3: "And the walls came a tumblin' down" or... pyramid ;)

Haha! It was a blast!

Take 4: Yes, yes, yes! We are almost there!!!

Take 5: Oh no! It's gunna collapse!

Take 6: Our final one! Everyone is up... haha... it's the dented pyramid :) But it was definitely fun! :D

Sarah Ellen our wonderful prop gofer :) hehe... she has some interesting carrying techniques. ;)

This picture got a bit whited out, but it is all the Woodbull sisters :) I'm so blessed! I have the most wonderful sisters a girl could ever dream of! They are amazing, fun, godly sisters... not to mention beautiful :)

The Woodbull brothers :) Haha... all off in their own world ;)

All serious.. except the Andrews :P

There we go! The best brothers in the whole wide world!!! I could have never asked for better brothers! They are all very sweet, gentlemanly, and godly. And handsome :)

Haha... digging the lil' bros out of the wheelbarrow :P

Family around the car :)

And, of course, a goofy picture :)

After all the pictures we went inside to do our Woodbull traditions. Read our Woodbull document. "Officially" stating that we have adopted each other and are now Woodbulls :) YAY! Pray together... and we tried to sing a Woodbull song :P

Benaiah handing Kent the Woodbull document to read.

Kent reading it to all of us :)

There it is! :D

Bethy reading it :)

Putting it away for the last time for a while. Who knows when we will all be together again to celebrate our Woodbull anniversary. I hope not to long!

Well, that is the end of our Woodbull celebrations. It was a fun time getting to hang out with each other. I can never thank God enough for how much He has blessed me by giving me nine amazing siblings!!! I love them all so much and am so thankful for each one of them!!! Happy 2nd year anniversary Woodbulls!

Back together again!

2009-03-11T12:50:00.008+02:00

Hello blog readers :)

I'm sorry if we left you hanging there! I didn't realize we hadn't updated in so long! Sorry! I hope by now everyone has heard how God healed Ian completely!! (The whole story is on my blog if you haven't heard it all.) It is definitely a miracle and only something God could have done! We are SO thankful and so in awe of what a truly amazing God we serve!

Ian is doing fabulous!! Seeing him, you wouldn't think he had almost died, he seems so healthy! God is SO good!! Here's his smiling face, and living proof of God's awesome power!

So, what's been up with the whole Woodbull family recently?

Well, the whole Woodbull family hasn't been together for a while. When we, the Bull side of the family, headed down to South Africa to be with Dad, Mom and Ian, it started the longest separation ever in the history of Woodbulls. Ah! We were separated for a little over a month. But, on March 4th, we Bulls made it safely back home and were reunited with our wonderful Wood siblings! Yeah! I think I speak for all ten of us, when I say that it is so good to be back together again!

Sorry, I don't have more pictures of all of us Woodbulls together. :)

Anyways, this is kind of a short update, sorry, hopefully we'll have more to write about soon. Thank you again for your prayers for Ian!!! God is good!!!!

Putting a Face to the Name...

2009-01-26T11:15:00.006+02:00

Ok, for those of you who have been praying for Ian and are wondering what in the world he looks like, Uncle Charles had the grand idea to post some pictures of Ian so that you guys can put a face to his name. So here's a little bit about Ian :)

Ian is our amazing 12 year old brother. He's 3rd to the youngest.

Ian adds lots to the Woodbull family...

He's a hard worker. And loves working!

He is full of smiles!!! And his smile is contagious.

He's a loving brother.

Oh he is SO talented! He can shave his own head :)

Hehe... ummm he's sometimes out of it :P hehe... and can make us laugh!

He has a great laugh :)

His sisters love him :) And he bares with us :)

He loves to sing in the shower... ok... so not really, but he's good at acting like he does :P

He loves helping out in anyway he can and is always willing to lend a hand.

He's a great brother and all of his siblings love him to death and miss him a lot.

Thank you for your prayers for Ian!!!!!!

Ian update from Gracie

2009-01-26T10:04:00.004+02:00

Good morning everybody!

This is Gracie Woodbull here updating on our brother, Ian.

Today Ian gets a blood transfusion (which is much needed). Please pray it will help!

Ian's understanding and his speech(when he does talk) seems ok but it takes so much effort for him to do small things such as move his fingers and sit up and such. Yesterday afternoon the Bull side of the Woodbull got to talk to Ian on the phone. Uncle Ken and Aunt Lisa said that Ian talked more with them then he had all week! Ian is quite emotionless at this point, and doesn't feel much. So when they found out how excited he was about hearing his siblings, they realized that that if they were with Ian right now it could be a very big help in stimulating him to get up and around quickly. Ian might need to go into Physical therapy, but, Praise the Lord almighty, Ian is already improved so much today! He has walked and the doctors are are optimistic again! God is so good! So now we're at the Turnbulls packing everything up. All the Turnbulls will be in S.A for about a month then they'll come back for the rest of the time till their furlough. Please pray for safe traveling mercies and that God would heal Ian quickly so that they may come back and say bye to everyone here. And that we would be able spend time together as ALL the TEN Woodbulls. Plus, that we Woods would get a chance to see Ian soon, and to give him a big hug! It's been a very up and down ride and a very bizarre/sad Woodbull anniversary but we're trusting that God has a beautiful plan beneath all this! We're going to miss our other half of the family SO much! Thank you for your prayers: they are so not in vain! With love to all of you, From a very grateful sis, Gracie

Updates for Ian...

2009-01-21T16:09:00.003+02:00

Thank you all for your prayers. For updates on Ian you can check my blog. Sorry I can't update this one, but it's easier to just update one at a time :) Thank you again for your prayers for our brother :D

My blog address: http://the-traveling-banana.blogspot.com

THANK YOU!

Happy SECOND YEAR Woodbull Anniversary... well...

2009-01-19T21:59:00.002+02:00

Tuesday afternoon we Woodbulls got together to brainstorm about what to do for our Woodbull anniversary. Two years of being family, we needed to do something fun to celebrate. We made up our plans and decided on dinner out and a picnic lunch the next day. Everything was set and we were all looking forward to celebrating! Until.... Ian got sick. Thursday Ian was feeling really tired and sick. Mom and Dad tested him for malaria that night. As soon as the blood hit the test it showed that he had cerebral malaria. (the brain kind) Dad and Mom started him on the malaria medicine but it didn't seem to be working. The morning of our Woodbull Anniversary dawned and Ian was getting worse. He started hallucinating so Mom and Dad brought him to the clinic down the hill from us at around 5:30am. Uncle Charles met them there and helped look over Ian and see how he was doing.

As the day progressed Ian became worse. The Wood side of the family came by the clinic after church and went in to see Ian. Ian was out of it due to sedatives that he had been given to dull the pain. The Woods left and us Bulls stayed home. We were all praying hard and sending out updates on Ian like crazy asking everyone to pray. Uncle Charles went back to the clinic later and stayed there with Mom and Dad. Ian wasn't doing very well. He had puked blood several times. The Doctors then thought something might be wrong with his kidneys because they were pumping him full of liquids but he had never peed. They stuck a catheter in him and that helped a lot. Unfortunately, they couldn't give Ian meds for the pain (they needed to make sure his brain was still functioning) so Ian was in a lot of pain. Back at home we Bulls and the Woods too were praying hard for Ian. Around 9ish... or 10ish... Dad called again and said that Ian had taken a turn for the worse and they were going to evacuate him out of mozambique and bring him to South Africa. Dad came up to the house to pack stuff and we prayed together. Dad went back down to be with Ian and us kids prayed and cried... it was hard! The Woods (what awesome sibling we have) kept sending encouraging texts saying they were praying and sharing different verses with us. Isn't it SO great to know that we can trust in an all-powerful, all-knowing God!?! Around 10ish... we Bulls went down to the clinic just to be close to Ian, Mom and Dad. While we were there the Woods came too. Thank you Lord for family!!! It was so comforting just to be around family! :) The LePoidevins (a missionary family here working with MAF *Mission Aviation Fellowship*) live right across the street from the clinic and they generously opened up their home to us Woodbulls. They let us crash at their place so that we would be close to the clinic. The showered us in comfort. The Woods as well. :) We are so blessed. It was so nice to be with other believers and pray together for Ian. We also sang and different people shared encouraging verses. It helped all of us a lot. After a long night with no sleep for some and very little for others the med plane flew in. They came at 4:33am and went to the clinic and got Ian stabilized. It took them a long time! We went to the clinic to wait in the waiting room and while there we could hear Ian screaming in pain. It was really really hard to hear. :'( After we found out it would take them a while to stabilize Ian we left the clinic and waited outside instead.

(Dot, Lil' Andrew and Kent are missing in this pic)

Around 7ish they got Ian stabilized and the ambulance drove him to the airport. We Bulls got to go onto the tarmac and watch them unload Ian. (we also got to touch the wing of an airplane :) )

They unloaded Ian and I was not expecting him to look like that. He was covered in wires and tubes :( It was really hard for all of us to see him like that. Especially Lil' Andrew. Please pray for Lil' Andrew as it is really really hard on him to see Ian (his big strong older brother) so sick. Thank you!

They loaded him up into the airplane. (and the pilots were all saying how light he was and it was so much easier to lift that the 300lb. person last time :P)

And away they went.

Ian has been at a pediatric clinic in South Africa with Dad all today. Tonight we got word that Ian had jaundice. We thought it may be because of liver failure. We packed up our bags and got ready to fly out tomorrow. About an hour later Dad called and said the results of Ian's liver tests came back and they were good. Oh thank you God!!! So what's with the jaundice? Well, the jaundice is because... (I may get some of this wrong but I hope you get the gist) the malaria kills all your blood cells and the liver produces blood cells, but because the liver is producing so many blood cells trying to refill his body, there is a "traffic jam". Which caused the jaundice. The Dr. said that everything is looking how he expected and that there have been people with a LOT worse cases of malaria than what Ian has and they have all walked out of the clinic with no problems! Oh thank you GOD!!!!! Right now Ian is hooked up to tons of machines and whatnot. He is on a respirator, has a catheter, and loads of tubes sticking in and out of him giving him all kinds of fluids and meds. Please keep praying for him!!! Right now the plans are that Mom will fly out tomorrow to be with Dad and Ian and us Bulls will stay with our family :) The Woods. Please pray for our brother. That God would heal him and make him well again! We are trusting in the all-powerful, all-knowing God and we know that He is in control of everything!! What a wonderful thing that we can trust in Him!!! Thank you again for your prayers!!! It has definitely been a rough last couple of days and a very unusual Woodbull anniversary. :) Thank you!!!

Week Together: Saturday

2009-01-02T22:33:00.003+02:00

Saturday :D The weekend! Yahoo!

Ian and The Second fixed bikes :)

We were tired! So we laid around and played games :)

Bethy and Gracie have started this amazing ministry on Saturdays. They have girls from the bairos nearby come to their house and they do crafts with them and a bible lesson. It is a really neat mission and they are reaching out to girls their own age! They do that every Saturday afternoon, so if you remember please be praying that the Lord will use their time and effort to bring more people to Himself. Thanks!

After Bethy and Gracie were done Sarah Ellen, Gracie and I decided to lay out on a sheet on the grass. While we did that it started raining. :D nice! Gracie and I laid out on the sheet through the whole rain storm :) It was fuuun!

Double rainbow!

Sarah Ellen and Gracie rode bikes after the rain.

After dinner we decided to play rook. We split up Kent and I against Dot and Bethy. And for the other side of the table The Second and Ian against Sarah Ellen and Gracie.

Kent and I were not getting good hands! But it was still fun!!

Dot and Bethy were winning by far! They were elated.

Um, we were losing... haha.. :D

Yah, Bethy loves winning!

And Kent is trying to figure out how we can win :D hehe

Haha... the other side of the table had a loud game!!! It was hilarious to watch them play! Gracie and The Second's faces say a lot about the game! haha.

The final score of our game. Dot and Bethy wanted to frame this and give it to everyone for Christmas. *Yeah*

Lil' Andrew and Benaiah played with action figures while we were playing Rook.

The Rook table.

The winners!

Oh my goodness! We WON!

Awww brother and sister!

Qui-Gon-Jinn. The Second and Ian's "Lucky Charm" hehe... ok not really :P

All of Dot and Bethy's fans trying to get into the pic.... or mess up the pic :P

The pic of the winners. We wanted another one since this one's blurry but the winners said we would have to pay for another one of them. Haha! ... While the were SO happy about winning they went upstairs to tell Uncle Charles. When Dot and Bethy were coming back down the stairs the started to hum the wedding march. Haha, we all stopped and were like, "WHAT?!" Haha.... they meant to hum, "All Hail the Chief." Whoops, they restarted their song and came down :) hehe...

The Second's happy :D

Aww Chiquita.

Ian and Chiquita.

The winners from the other game. Good job guys!

Dot and Bethy are now being sponsored by a toothpaste company since they won Rook. Haha!

It was a WONDERFUL day to end the week together with! :D Sunday Mom and Dad Turnbull came back home and ended our week together. :) It was a fun week getting to bond more as siblings though :)

Week Together: Friday

2009-01-02T22:27:00.004+02:00

Friday! Yeah! So close to the weekend! Also the youth group Christmas party! :D

Dot and Bethy made sugar cookies to decorate once the youth arrived.

Food colouring.

The cookie cutters.

Dot and Bethy. My beautiful older sisters!

The Maddux brought over these adorable colours for the icing. Theirs are all the neonish colours! SO cute!

Annie's cookies turned out SO cute!

Esther decorating :)

Me.

Sarah Ellen.

Ian.

Everyone decorating.

Bethy's turned out SO cute!

All the cookies.

All morning Gracie planned out a scavenger hunt. It was amazing! Every clue we would get we would be like, "Wow! Gracie did an AMAZING job putting this together!" There were three teams who did different stuff, but I'll just say what the team Dot, Bethy and I were on did.

Everyone started out by the Wood's hospital where Gracie told us that we were shepherds who had just seen the angels and heard about the birth of the Messaiah, but unfortunately for us, we are slightly deaf and it's a windy night so we didn't hear everything that the angels said, like where the Messaiah was! Oh no! So we started off with our clue looking for the Messaiah. Dot, Bethy and I headed off to get our blanket, but our next clue said that, whoops, we had left it on the clothesline. We found it and the next clue, which sent us to the gates of the big house (Their house) We arrived at the gates and found our clue. We had to say, "We awaitest at thine gates." before someone would come to the gate. After a while Kent arrived at the gate, before anyone would speak to use we had to say, "How dost thou fare?" Once we asked Kent that he let us in. We asked if he knew where the Messaiah was. He didn't and gave us our next clue. We had to walk down the hallway to where the Scribe was. We knocked on the door and asked the question before Benaiah the Scribe let us in. When we came in we asked Benaiah, who was sitting at a desk studying the Bible, if he knew where the Messaiah was to be born. He held up the Bible to us and said, "You must search the Scriptures!" We took the Bible and found our next clue. It told us that Benaiah was acting a bit suspicious and we should keep an eye on him. Hehe, Benaiah was then supposed to leave and drop a clue for us, since we would be watching him. But we kinda took it to seriously, when Benaiah tried to leave I wouldn't let him leave the room. Haha, sorry buddy! Bethy finally said, "Well, maybe he's supposed to leave." Duh! She's so smart! Benaiah left and dropped our clue which said to ask the Page where the midwife was because she would know what babies have been born recently. We went to the Page which was Kent and asked him about where the Midwife was. He pointed us to the carpenter's shop where Aunt Julie was sitting there. Dot, Bethy and I walked in, said our greeting and Aunt Julie asked, "Ohhh, are you all here because you need a midwife?" Haha! We started cracking up! After asking her about any new births she told us that no one had been by for weeks asking her to be their midwife, but she said we should check with her husband the Census man. Off we went, with our next clue in hand, to find the Census man. As we were leaving the carpenter's shop we noticed a clue hanging up outside. We decided it must be for later so we would get it then. Off we went. We came to the church and inside was Uncle Charles the Census man. :P We asked him if he knew where a little baby boy was. He wouldn't answer us and mouthed the word baby. Ohh we realized, he's mute! Well we kept asking him about a baby but no reply. Then we thought that maybe he's deaf too. So we started to sign language. Haha, we all cracked up! Then we thought, "You know what? I bet something on that clue hanging outside of the carpenter's shop would help us get what we are wanting. Maybe something that we need to ask him!" So, we apologized and told him sorry but we'd be right back! Haha, we all ran out of the church only to hear Uncle Charles clapping his hands. We marched back in and Uncle Charles gave us our clue. (Whoops we realized we were supposed to be asking for a pregnant lady :P ) Our next clue was to go to the inn and see if the pregnant lady that the Census man had seen earlier was there. We went to the inn keeper, Benaiah, who told us that they had been by, but he had no room for them in the inn, so he sent them to a stable. Off we went back by the hospital site where the Smoker's containers were and in there we found the Messaiah. Well, a picture of Mary, Joseph and Jesus :) After we found the Messaiah we had to go tell everyone that we'd found the Messaiah. It was fun! :D And Gracie did an AMAZING job coming up with all of that in one morning! Way to go Gracie! It was fun to do and kept us reminded of what we are celebrating during Christmas at the same time!

While we were outside doing this, it was raining! So when we came back in Aunt Julie made us hot chocolate! Mmmm thank you!

Sarah Ellen, Esther, and Annie! Cute!

The guys.

Awww... Esther's present bag to Annie was the cutest.

Gracie passed out all the gifts. Thanks Gracie! :D

Hehe, Gracie made Ian a light saber for Christmas. Haha! What a great idea!

Riley and Kent got hats.

Annie got headbands and gum :D

Esther got a bunch of lil' stuff, like nail polish, pencils, cute bag and other stuff. :)

Sarah Ellen got a bunch of lil' stuff from the Sunday Feira that she has been wanting. It was cute! And Kent put verses on each gift that had something to do with the gift. It was a neat idea!

Dot got me this adorable stuffed animal dog!

Dot got body spray :) (it smells reallly good!)

The Second got Bethy an adorable shirt! It looks SO cute on Bethy! Great going twin!

Gracie got a devo book.

The Second got a lighter :)

Awww! Esther's hat :D

Dinner :D Mmm burritos! Yum!

Haha! Esther can make some crazy faces!

Chiquita in the hat. Awww...

Me in the hat :)

Kent and Riley in their Mozambican hats! Cool!

What a FUN day! :D

2009-01-02T22:27:00.001+02:00

Week Together: Thursday

2009-01-02T22:25:00.001+02:00

We didn't do much Thursday besides school... and Kent getting his foot broken! Ouch!

While Kent was at the hospital getting an x-ray, the rest of us found a new game :) "See-how-far-you-can-go-down-the-hallway-on-the-mattress." It was fun! Especially to watch! The Second made it the farthest. He touched the door! The rest of us made it about half way :) Even Aunt Julie did it :D FUN!

During the week Aunt Julie read a book to Benaiah and Lil' Andrew. They both loved it :)

And... that's it :P Sorry... not much for Thursday...

Get Well Soon!

2009-01-02T22:21:00.003+02:00

Guess who's foot is in the cast? Any guesses? Here's a clue... he's the oldest of us all. Yep, poor Kent broke his foot on Thursday. :( Ouch! He was running around the track in the morning, like a usually morning, until he tripped on a can. The Wood's track have cans around the rim to show where you are supposed to stay, the cans are filled with cement so they are rock hard! He came inside the house with his foot swollen. About half way down his foot it looked like he was sprouting another ankle. It was gross! Throughout Thursday Kent's foot grew bigger and bigger and turned darker and darker. :P He got it x-rayed that night at the hospital and Uncle Charles noticed a fracture in his bone. Friday morning Uncle Charles and Kent went to the foot doctor and sure enough, his foot was broken. He has to keep this cast on his foot for the next three weeks. Please be praying for him that it won't be too painful! Thanks!

Also, a lil' bit of humor to go along with this story... Kent was sitting on the couch in his parents room with his foot up on a pillow. It was turning blue and he said it was painful. Aunt Julie told him he should put ice on it. Dot and I were in there and we quickly agreed! Yah! Ice would make it feel loads better. But silly Kent said, "No. Men don't use ice." Haha, okk whatever! A while later he was still saying his foot hurt. Dot told him he should put ice on it, but we got the same response. That night he went to the Dr. When he came home we asked him if the Dr. said anything about putting ice on his foot. "Ice? No, he said 'Men don't use ice.'" Haha! Yah, right. Well, Friday he came back from getting his cast and he says, "You know what the Dr. asked me when I went there?" "Umm... no what?" "He asked if I had put ice on my foot." Haha, Dot and I started laughing. Kent said, "I told him 'No. Men don't use ice." (Haha... sure :P ) And the Dr. said, "Well, next time you should use ice, it would've made it feel better. :) Hehe... it gave us all a good laugh :D

Anyways, if your thinking of Kent any time this week please remember to pray that his foot would heal up all the way. Thanks!

Week Together: Wednesday

2009-01-02T22:08:00.002+02:00

(Sorry, we skipped Tuesday... I was down with a fever and other ucky stuff all day, so I'm not really sure what happened... I'll grab Dot or Sarah Ellen later to fill us in.... until then... here's Wednesday :) )

Wednesday, I still was running fever, but Dot and I were supposed to babysit the VI kiddos for the VI team meeting, Gracie kindly stepped in and went off babysitting with Dot. Thanks Gracie!

The VI had their Christmas party. Dot and Gracie were telling us some of the funny Christmas stories people told :) Sounded like they had a nice time :D

That afternoon Dot went picture crazy! (I love it when she does that!)

Cool flower!

Beautiful siamese twin trees.

I love rain drops on flowers.

Pretty!

"Don't walk on the grass" in Portuguese.

Babysitting wore Gracie out! :P Hehe... so did the rainstorm, chilly afternoon and hot cocoa.

Bethy and Dot decided to cook again :) So they made their favourite pie... Yep, pecan pie!

Yum!

Lil' Andrew loves it! :D

That night we ended up playing Rook :) Gracie, and Sarah Ellen against Ian and The Second in one game and Dot and Uncle Charles against Kent and I. It was a fun game :D And a fun way to end the day!

Week Together: Monday

2009-01-02T21:57:00.003+02:00

Monday, Monday, Monday! Monday was a fun day (even for people, like Kent, who think good Mondays are oxymorons *which they aren't;)*). We all had fun adventures, especially Dot, Bethy and Kent.

Since it was Monday I (Hannah) wore my "Happy Monday" shirt :) Hehe, ok so that isn't really what it is. The M is for Mcel the cell phone company here, but I thought it fit :)

Dot and Bethy decided they would make dinner.... and the adventure began!

Oh wait... pause, stop, hold, Bethy dissapeared! Ah!

Oh ok! She's back! Everything's good! Moving on :)... They started to pick out a recipe.

And after about five minutes I decided to see what everyone else was up to. Kent and The 2nd were doing school. The other boys were playing with Legos! Fun!

And Sarah Ellen and Gracie were getting a beauty nap :)

When I came back Dot and Bethy were still thinking about what to make...

Time was ticking away...

And they were still thinking! But finally, after much thought (really and truly! It was lots of thought!), they found a bread recipe! :D

Oh then we had to decorate the fridge. "Bethy, Dot, and Ana (my name in Portuguese) totally rock!

Dot and Bethy then asked Kent to take them shopping so they could get food for dinner. :) Kent took them out and they had some pretty funny adventures. (Actually they told about their adventures in a movie so I'll just tell you about their adventures from their own words :) )

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D. (Dot) Ok here we are we couldn't find broccoli.

B. (Bethy) No it was too expensive. We went to Shoprite, and we went to casa do frutas, and then Ideal and then we saw some. And so we got it and it's at a hundred...

D. We were jumping up and down!

B. Yah we were like, "OH!" We were so excited. So, we got the broccoli and it was a hundred and ten so we go... do you wanna finish?

D. So we go up to the cash register and she rings it up and it comes to like four hundred fifty. We're like (drops mouth open)

B. WHAT?!

D. That's WRONG! So then we like threw a little temper tantrum.

B. Yah, and we like totally said, "We are never going to buy some from here again!"

D. Yah, so lesson learned don't go to Ideal.

B. Right.

(laughing)

B. They burst your bubble.

(Second Movie)

D. Ok so we have an exciting story to tell you!

B. Ok, when we were at Shoprite. We were just walking around and we were looking at–actually we had just got there.

D. Yah.

B. And we were going to the vegetable section.

D. Yah and so we were walking... and we thought we saw something...

D&B. And then...

D. The electricity went out!

B. Darkness!

B. Yah...

D. So we stood there and then we walked and we banged into a couple of things. And then we stopped by the meat section and...

B. Just sat there and sat there.

D. Yah, then about three minutes later?

B. Oh like ten minutes!

D. Oh yah! Maybe a half an hour!

B. Yah, yah! Probably a half an hour actually!

D. The electricity finally went on and we were like a puddle of sweat!

B. Oh it was SO hot!

D. And someone tried to rob us.

B. Yah, I know! And then cause the electricity was out everyone started stealing stuff! And they started taking it out.

D. I know! I know!

B. It was just like crazy!

D. I know!

B. We were like,"WOW!"

D. Yah!

B. But see it started cause Dot, Kent and I were talking about it. We were like, "Oh you know it would be such a good time to steal stuff and then what do you know next thing everyone is stealing stuff!

K (Kent). They all took our idea.

B. Yah!

D. So, so Bethy and I did karate. (Sorry Hannah's lil' blurb: Earlier in the day Damarise was practicing Karate moves on Bethy incase Damarise got robbed. Haha!)

B. Yah! We saved the store!!

D. YES!

B. That store should be grateful! But they didn't even say thank you!

D. I know.

B. Oh well.

D. They could've given us stuff for free.

B. I know! At least they could've done that!

D. Well we're here! BYE!

Well, it sounded like they had quite the adventure... although not all of their tale (umm like the stealing stuff) is true :P

Dot and Bethy in Shoprite (One of the nice grocery stores in town)

Kent, older brother/chauffeur/body guard :)

The two "Adult shoppers!"

Usual site in Nampula :)

The rolls they made for dinner! Mmmm they were so good!

Soo, they ended up making chicken (it was amazing!) mashed potatoes, gravy, squash (I've never really liked squash but this one was good!), green beans and a meringue peach/blueberry type dessert :) Everyone liked all the food!

Yah! Ian and The Second really liked it :) hehehe..

All in all....it was a FUN Monday!! :D

Week Together: Saturday-Sunday

2009-01-02T21:45:00.004+02:00

Saturday morning (Dec. 13th) Mom and Dad (Turnbull) headed off to Zambia. (Another long story :) If you want to read more you can go here...)

As, for the Bull kids, we stayed back in Nampula with the Woods. As Gracie put it, "We (the Woods) dull the pain for the Bull kids when their parents are away." It's true! The Woods make us feel right at home and take care of us like we were their own kids :) It's our home away from home :) Anyways, Satuday morning the Wood's picked up Sarah Ellen and Lil' Andrew (Ian was at a sleep over and Dot and I were babysitting that night so we were going to their house later) and brought them to their house. We didn't do much Saturday. I think they played some volleyball with another missionary family that is visiting, and that's about it.

Sunday morning we sisters wore our African dresses. Bethy and Gracie also had some but we didn't take a picture together :(

Later in the afternoon we took naps :P hehe, and played volleyball (no pics sorry) it was a blast! Sisters against brothers. The girls beat the guys on the first round 21-20. Then the second round the guys whooped us 21-1 and for the third :P hehe 21-2. It was a fun game though! After volleyball and dinner we watched Beethoven and went to bed :)

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow,

2008-12-03T14:39:00.004+02:00

Yes, that does say "The Woodbulls" and yes, that is written in snow :), but unfortunately, that snow is not here :( Some friends of ours who are in Norway wrote it out for us :) Awww. Thank you LePoidevins!

As most of you are enjoying the cold and hopefully the snow, we Woodbulls wanted to wish you all a happy December! We hope you all have a great month!

Thanksgiving 2008

2008-11-28T15:59:00.003+02:00

For Thanksgiving on Thursday we (the bull side of the family) got to go to the Woods to celebrate and give thanks with them. It was a wonderful time, but sadly, we forgot to take pictures. Whoopsie dasies! I guess we were having to much fun ;) Anyways, if you feel like just reading about it, here it goes. :)

We got to the Woodrows around 11:30am, and found our place to sit. :) Finding a place to sit for Thanksgiving is fun. We did the same thing at Christmas too. Uncle Charles had drawn a picture on 14 cards and each place setting had a Bible reference on it. We had to look up the verses in the Bible until we found the one that matched our picture. It's a creative way to mix things up a bit and get seated :) Anywho, after that Uncle Charles told us the Thanksgiving story. It was really neat to hear. I hadn't heard all the history before–or maybe I had, but I had forgotten it :P After the story came the food! Mmm Mmm Good! We had turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, green beans, gravy, stuffing, salad, olives, pickles, cranberry sauce, and rolls. I (Hannah) am still stuffed from all of the good food :P After we ate our fill we went around the table and read our verse that was on our place setting. Then we had 5 minutes to write out things we were thankful for. There is SO much!! Anywho, that was really fun. And funny to hear some of the things people put. Toilet paper was on a majority of the lists :P hehe. After hearing all the lists we prayed and gave thanks to God. It was really nice to have that special time just to thank God for everything He is and does. When we were done Mom and Dad went into one of the Wood's rooms to rest (they're still getting over some sickness) While they rested up the rest of us played "I've got a secret". There are three teams, one person picks something off their thankful list and that is their secret. Everyone else then tries to guess it but only with 21 questions. :P It was fun... although there were some long ones. (whoops... who knew the stamps in a passport could be so hard to guess :P Haha, but I really am thankful for them! :) ) After that game we played "Password" We stayed in three different teams. Damarise, Bethy and I were on a team together for all the games, so we made up a team name. At first it was "The 3 Einsteins" for the guessing games but when we played Pictionary we changed our name to "The 3 Einstein Da Vincis" :P Anyways, back to where I was. Oh yes, so we played "Password" A game where one person from each team gets together, decides on a word from anyone's thankful list and then can only use one word to describe it to the team. Aunt Julie, Sarah and Gracie beat us on that one. Then we played "Pictionary" Haha... that was a blast!! Aunt Julie, Sarah and Gracie won that one too! They were good! ... After all the games came dessert. Mmm, homemade ice cream, pumpkin pie and apple pie! Yum! It was delicious!!! After dessert when the parents sat around and talked we Woodbulls played around outside :) We had a fun time playing ball games, talking, singing, and we girls were trying to figure out what went on in a guy's mind. Hehe... it was fun! We made lots of great memories and I am so thankful to God for the gift of family and siblings! He blessed me with 2 amazing parents, 5 amazing blood siblings, 5 amazing adopted siblings and another amazing Aunt and Uncle!!! Thank you God!! :)

I hope you all had a wonderful day thanking God!!

Southern Dinner

2008-11-12T17:20:00.003+02:00

Saturday we Woodbulls put on a dinner for our parents. We've put on two other ones before. An Italian Valentine Dinner and a Hawaiian Parent Appreciation Dinner. This time we decided to go down to the Southern US of A and base it on the old cowboy and indian times :) We had a blast!

We slept over at the Woodrow's place Friday night. Gracie, Sarah Ellen and I decided to get up at 3am to play a prank on the guys. At 3am... or 2:30am can't remember when, our alarm went off and Gracie got up and made sure were awake. Then her and Sarah Ellen drank some frozen coffee :) Mmm... the coldness woke them up! :D Then we went and grabbed some mousse. (we've had it forever and it was starting to melt :P ) Anywho, Sarah Ellen and Gracie went in with the bottles (We only had two) and put it on the guys. They got a little on Kent, but then he woke up. He stayed quiet though! :) The Second woke up too, but didn't say anything. Sarah Ellen and Gracie got some on Ian and Lil' Andrew and Benaiah. Lil' Andrew woke up all dazed and confused. He ran into the bathroom, well, more like stumbled into the bathroom. I asked him what was wrong. He said,"Umm.. (in a nonchalant, tired voice) I got some shampoo stuff in my hair." Haha, we were cracking up! Next Ian woke up and came into the bathroom to wash up. He had a similar response only more alert. After Ian finished washing off his hair he spun around and grabbed the mousse bottle out of my hands! Woah! Fast thinking buddy! Fortunately, he's a sweet brother so he didn't spray us :) Benaiah never woke up right then. We girls headed back to bed, but around 6ish Ian and Benaiah were over our heads with the mousse bottles (we really shouldn't have left them out! haha) They only got Sarah Ellen though. Poor Sarah... Anyways, it was a long night, but definitely fun! We've been planning to do that to the guys for a while now, so we were happy it worked out... well, sorta worked out! :P

After the long night, Lil' Andrew was tired! And slept in the latest :P

Dot and Bethy answering questions that we ask the parents after the meal.

Gracie, Sarah Ellen, and I got to decapitate and skin chickens. It was... an adventure :)

Mmmm doesn't that look scrumptious!

Sarah Ellen and Gracie. Sarah Ellen named her chicken "Chicken Joe" (off of Surf's Up :P)

Kent used his muscles to smash the potatoes.

My apple pie :)

Pile O' Chicken

Ian and The Second decided to play Risk.

And Lil' Andrew and Benaiah played with Legos.

Bethy and me hanging out in the kitchen.

Sarah Ellen and Gracie were in charge of making rolls. First step, look for a recipe.

All the chicken guts. Ewww.

Sarah Ellen found Dot's cell phone and was "Oooing" with the ring tone.

The guys made some bows, arrows, and spears for the "indians"

Bucket Head Gracie :)

Making ice cream! Mmm it was good!

Haha The Second stuck ice down Lil' Andrew's shirt. I love Lil' Andrew's expression!

And where was Chiquita during all of this?

Gracie and Sarah Ellen found a recipe. Now for the baking.

The chicken waiting to be fried.

Bethy looking for a spoon.

Sarah Ellen melting ingredients for the rolls.

Awww! The wonderful cooks!

And what were they making?? Yep, Kentucky Fried Chicken.

Hehe, I'm not sure what they were talking about, but I love their expressions.

The Second turned seventeen on the 9th! Wow!!! Happy Birthday!

Gracie kneading the bread dough.

The hay that decorated the porch.

We really do love each other!!!... Really :)

Dot and Kent stringing a line to hang the sheet from.

Our lights had a short.... haha it was fun watching Dot, Sarah Ellen and Kent try to fix it though.

The place tags.

Fall leaves!

Me... trying to look like a farmer :P

Making the "Gondolamor" sign. (Gondolamor is the name of our restaurant.)

The "Restaurant"

Ian and Benaiah

The sign. Kent wrote the word. I did the fence. Sarah Ellen did the grass. Gracie the foot and horse prints. And Damarise did the hills and the sun. It was a family effort. :)

Does it look countryish? :)

Planning out our skits.

And of course we made ice coffee :) We couldn't break our tradition :)

Hay is so cool!

Aw! My handsome little cowboy brother. Isn't he cute?

His silhouette is neat too!

Mmm Sarah Ellen and Gracie's finished rolls glazed with honey! Yum!

The Woodrow's quaint looking back door.

The Woodbull sisters :)

Getting ready for a family picture :)

Awwww :)

Guys looking serious and the girls blowing kisses :)

The brothers.

Aw! Sarah Ellen and Gracie. Cute!

Dot, Bethy and me :)

Aw! Dot and Sarah! Cute cute!

Woodbulls again :) (dontcha just love Lil' Andrew's beard!)

Two wonderful waitresses.

Talkin' wit a strong southun drawl :)

Is he cute or is he cute?

Awwwww :)

Lil' Andrew and Kent acting out their skit. They did an amazing job!!!! :D

Kent: "Ye killed my dog."

Lil' Andrew: "He wuz in eye sore and he wuz on my property!"

Then the sheriff came in and stopped the fighting.

The sheriff.

Entertaining the parents with some singing. :)

Then it was game time.

The Second snappin' some pictures.

The Dads versus

The Moms. The Dads won. :)

And after all the fun, we cleaned up :)

It was a fun night with lots of laughs, good food, and many memories!

Andrew is Seventeen!

2008-11-09T19:21:00.003+02:00

Today Andrew, or the Second, is seventeen! Wow! Happy Happy Birthday to Andrew! Thanks for being a great brother to all of us. You can always make us laugh and you're fun to hang out with! We hope you have a wonderful wonderful day because you, being a wonderful brother, totally deserve it!

Happy Seventeenth Birthday Andrew!!!

Ps- Sorry if this is a little late, the electricity was off all day. And sorry that there's only one picture... Tee hee hee, the internet is running a tad bit on the slow side.

21 Months!

2008-10-18T10:23:00.004+02:00

wow! That sounds so long, and yet it seems to have flown by! We should be counting the years now, but Hannah loves numbers, so we end up counting the months :) It's fun though! I was looking through all the pictures from our time here in Mozambique as a Woodbull family, and my, my, my we have had so much fun together! And so many wonderful memories!! God has really blessed me here sending me another five siblings along.

"Surprise!!"

2008-10-12T14:46:00.019+02:00

A Birthday is fun! A Birthday party! Ooo even more fun! An 18th Birthday party! Wow! Something special!! A Surprise 18th Birthday Party! Wow! How could you celebrate an 18th Birthday without one?! Ok, ok, a lot of people have, but we weren't about to let Bethy fall into that category. We wanted to make her 18th birthday something special. Hey, why not a surprise party?? :)

About a month ago Dot and I had a brainstorm one night (A usual time for brainstorms). We wanted to do something special for Bethy, but didn't know what. The best thing we thought of was to take her out to Bamboo. (A nice hotel/restaurant/pool place a few minutes away from her house). We thought we would take out there and hang out for a while and la dee da. But then we had another brainstorm ( I love brainstorms!!!) And we thought, "Ohhh!! How about while we have Bethy out at Bamboo with us... the rest of the youth group can go to the Wood's house and set up a surprise party!" A month later our plan fell into action. Here's the proof :)

3:00pm The Bulls came to the Wood's place to get Bethy and take her out to Bamboo. We brought Sarah Ellen, Ian and Andrew along so that they could "Hang out while we're at Bamboo." Bwa ha ha! Little did she know they were really helping set up her party. At 3:30pm, while we were enjoying ourselves at Bamboo, the rest of the youth group showed up at the Wood's place to get ready for the surprise.

The three older sisters hanging out together at Bamboo. We got icecream to snack on while we were there :) Mmm... blueberry cheesecake icecream :)

Then Bethy opened up her presents and thanked us :) hehe... smile!

Aw! My two older sisses! Cute!

Mom and Dad went with us to Bamboo and hung out there until Gracie texted them to tell us that they were ready for us to come. Well, we had a little glitch in that part of the plan. :P That night was the VI get together and Mom needed to go home and make pizzas. So we left Bamboo at 4:30 and text the Woods to say that we were coming. Haha, unfortunately they never heard the cellphone. So we pulled up at the Wood's house and piled out of the car. Aunt Julie met us by the door and was talking to us outside. Haha, she was trying to block us from going inside cause they weren't ready yet. Haha, after they were done she let us inside. We walked into their living/dining room and were greeted with a chorus of "SURPRISE!" from upstairs :) Bethy was surprised. Although I think she had figured out a little bit of it :P Oh well, it was fun :)

We put together index cards with Words of "Wisdom" for Bethy. Some were serious and others were funny :) Everyone wrote out a card with some "Wisdom" on it when they first came.

Oh yes and the lil' kitty was also the center of attention. She is tooo cute!

After milling for a bit we split up into teams and started a camera scavenger hunt.

Here's the list of things each team had to do. We originally had 18 things, but that was a bit much. So we cut out a few.

1. Because Bethy loves chocolate, each team had to take a video of their team doing a commercial advertising chocolate.
2. Take a video of Uncle Charles describing Bethy in 9 words (Only 9 cause with the two teams together it would be 18 :) )
3. Play Boggle and find a word (longer than tree letters) that has to do with birthdays. The whole team could look, and we could shake it as many times as we wanted.
4. Take a group picture of our team with Bethy.
5. Spell out "Sarah Beth" with anything.
6. Take a picture of 18 things that Bethy likes with two members of the team with the object.
7. Take a video of Aunt Julie giving 9 pieces of advice for being 18.
8. Get an 18 letter word that describes Bethy. (We could make up one :) )
9. Ask Bethy what her favourite little kid game is and then act it out.
10. Make up a song, skit or poem about Bethy.
11. Since October 10th is also "National Cake Decorating Day" Each team had to decorate one of Bethy's birthday cakes.
12. Get 18 feet in one picture.
13. Get a picture of your team spelling out some birthday word.
14. Take a movie of your team acting out what we think "Hunt for Red October" would be about. (It had October and came out in 1990 *the year Bethy way born*) Only the Woods knew what it was actually about, the rest of us had no clue. :P
15. Take a video of the team singing "Happy Birthday" anyway but the real way.

Before we started each team had to come up with a team name. My team (Kent, Me, Riley, Sarah Ellen, Gracie, Esther, and Ian) was named, "The Committee voting for a chocolate statue of Bethy". Haha! The other team (Dot, Bethy, Elijah, the 2nd, Andrew I., Thomas and Annie) never came up with a name. :P

I'll show the stuff from the team I was on first.

Gracie wrote down our team name.

Our commercial for chocolate. We had Riley stand there and Ian would put the bubble up behind his head. Sarah would stick different things in the bubble like peanut butter and a cucumber until the chocolate showed up. Gracie was the commercial commentator. "Don't you hate it when your stomach rumbles (rumble sign pops out) and you don't feel like that cucumber (cucumber appears in bubble) and peanut butter's just to dry. (peanut butter shows up in bubble and Riley shakes his head.) (Chocolate pops up in bubble) Ah! Now there's something you like!" *everyone says "Chocolate Yay!"* Riley then pulls the chocolate out of the bubble and does a victory dance while Kent's voice is heard saying all the warnings for chocoalte and where to buy it :) It was fun to watch :)

Our 18 things in nature. We had 18 different rocks that we took individual pictures of.

Our Boggle part word was "Games". We also found "Spit". Like what happens when you blow out the candles ;)

Team picture with Bethy! Aw!

18 of Bethy's favourite things. Sorry only put in some of the pics, cause some of the turned up blurry.

Chiquita.

Her stereo.

Showers :P

Her journal. Oooo

The piano. Haha I love Esther's and Ian's expressions.

Her Dad.

Her Mom.

Make-up. Haha! Great faces Sarah Ellen and Riley!

Her chocolate sign.

18 feet! :) One of the Woods had the novel idea to use a ruler :)

Team 2:

The word. Can you guess what it is?? B'day... with an upside down "A" :)

Getting ready to decorate their cake.

The team with their cake. Their cake was adorable!

18 things from nature.

Team picture with Bethy. Cute!

"Sarah Beth" spelled out of Legos.

The team with the 18 things that Bethy likes.

The rest of the stuff were movies. Sorry, I can't post them... but they were really good :) For the poem, skit or song about Bethy, our team did a song about Bethy to the tune of the Alleluia Chorus. Haha! The other team did a poem about Bethy. Here's their poem :)

"Bethy is now eighteen.
She is no longer seventeen.
Although she will miss it,
she won't throw a fit.
Watch out here she comes!
Let's go bang the drums.
Woo! Let's go have a party!"

We finally finished all of the stuff around 7ish and were ready for dinner!

For dinner we had tacos! Mmmm!

The girl's table.

The guy's table. Tsk tsk, segregation...

Bethy opening up her presents. Dontchya just love the crown! Gracie made it :) Too cute!

Reading cards. Sarah Ellen's was funny :)

Aw! Look at the birthday girl :)

The crowd watching her. :) hehe... The guys didn't really know what to say. All of us girls would say, "Awwwww" to all the jewelry and candles, but when the chocolate came out... there was a loud applause to that gift from everyone :)

The cakes. Bethy's and Dot's team did the CUTE smilie face. Our team did the hour glass.. :)

Bethy with her cakes :)

And everyone enjoying the cakes! Mmmm chocolate cake with rum and raisin icecream (hehe, it was the only icecream in the store... but it was good!)

Elijah and Andrew I eating.

Aw! Sisters!!! :D

Kent telling everyone to be quiet cause the Stolks were sleeping :P

The three older sisters :D

Annie! hehe...

And last but definitely not least. Bethy and Chiquita :)

Later that night we watched "National Treasure 2" and then went to bed. Welll.... some of us went to bed. Sarah Ellen, Gracie, Esther, Annie, the 2nd, Elijah, Riley and Ian stayed up and played Camps until 3am! Then Sarah Ellen, Gracie, Esther and Annie were trying to stay up 'til 3:30am to play a trick on the guys, but... they were too tired :( Oh well, next time :) We woke up the next morning, ate breakfast, and the headed on home :)

All in all...we had a wonderful time getting to celebrate Bethy's big day! :D :D And, once again, HAPPY BIRTHDAY BETHY!!!!

Happy 18th Birthday Bethy!

2008-10-10T00:01:00.000+02:00

Amazing! Simply amazing! Today marks Bethy's 18th birthday. Eighteen! Can you believe that? Where has time flown to? It seems like yesterday that we first met her and she was only 15 then. Unbelievable! Happy Birthday Bethy! I wanna say, from all of us, thanks to Bethy for being a wonderful sister! You are so special and our family just would not be the same without you! We love you Bethy!

While going through some pictures of Bethy.... well, I came across all of these... So I'll just list some of the many attributes about Bethy that we all love and appreciate!

She is good... no... she is great with kids! She listens to them and helps them and always has a smile on her face while doing it.

She is a good cook... haha... well... wait a minute... this picture is from the first parent appreciation dinner... when Dot and Bethy got the lasagna noodles stuck together :P Hehe... okk, even with that little incident she is still a wonderful cook... her food is always delicious!

She loves sugar! :) I don't think I have ever met some one with such a sweet tooth. He motto, "Just add sugar!" Haha, she adds it to anything if it doesn't have enough flavour, hence why she's so sweet :)

She can play the piano extremely well! Like WOW, Woah amazing well! It is always lovely to hear her play.

She's goofy :) Hehe

She tackles any challenge! (She did a great job sewing that by the way!)

She is adventurous! Ready try out anything new! Haha... yah... even BIG sunglasses!

Hehe... she's silly. She can make anyone laugh! :)

She is a spectacular sister and friend! :)

She is a servant. Always ready to serve others in any way she can. I guess that could also be classified as humble. She always puts others above herself!

Like I said before, she is a GREAT older sister!! showing love to all of her younger siblings

I remember meeting Bethy in Massachusetts in May 2006, and thinking what a spectacular friend she was and how I couldn't wait to get to Mozambique to hang out with her! I was thanking God for having her and her family in Mozambique. And now... I'm still thanking God for having placed her in my life. She is a wonderful sister and friend! Very caring, kind, loving... etc! Thank you God for Bethy!!!!

Our family just would not be the same without Bethy! Thank you for all you've blessed us with Bethy! I hope that this year of being 18 will be a terrific one for you! We love you Bethy!

meow

2008-10-08T15:40:00.005+02:00

*Meow* is the new sound around the Wood's house. And why would that be? Is it some new cat toy? No way. It is a tiny lil' fuzz ball of a kitten named, Chiquita.

The Woods picked her up from the LePoidevins on October 4th. They say she is still getting used to them and is kinda scared, but they all love her.

Oh yah, she loves taking naps too :) Aww! Cute!

So, Chiquita, welcome to the Woodrows!

A New Fridge!

2008-10-08T14:20:00.003+02:00

Yes! A new fridge it is! The Woodrows have been waiting for... I'm not sure how long, but it was before we met them, they've been waiting for their container to come. Especially Aunt Julie. And why? Because her new fridge was on it! Well, their container arrived a couple Fridays ago and their fridge arrived! Aunt Julie was thrilled... naw.. that's not a good enough word... she was more like ecstatic, elated, delighted, Super Duper happy! (hehe, I love thesauruses). So, yes, she is one happy Aunt now! This new fridge keeps everything a lot colder than the last one and everyone is thankful it has arrived! Yeah!!!

5 Days Together

2008-10-08T13:30:00.005+02:00

Ok! Time for another update. :) This time though, it'll be a bit different. Here's the most recent couple of days together as Woodbulls. Everyone except Dot and myself. We were in Malawi taking the SAT again, while everyone else was having fun together :) Soo, since I wasn't there and don't know what went on, I've dragged Sarah Ellen in to give me the run down.

--------------

Hannah: And here she is! Hi Sarah!

Sarah: Hi!

Hannah: So, how were the five days together as Woodbulls?

Sarah: They were super fun!

Hannah: Yah! I bet! Anyways, can you please tell me all the stories behind these pics? Here's the first one...

Sarah: The bros playing Battle Front. They played it every day.

Hannah: Awww!!! Beautiful Bethy!

Sarah: Oh yah, Gracie and I came in while she was taking that picture and we were pretending we were camera people and we were gunna take lots of pictures of her for her profile pic.... but... she wouldn't cooperate.

Hannah: Ohhh hehe... Anddd by the way, for all those who read this blog, Bethy is going to be 18 this Friday! Wow! Can we hear a happy TWO days 'til her birthday!!

Sarah: Gracie was studying her verses and I'm doing school.

Hannah: Ohh so it was early morning. Were you feeling tired?

Sarah: No. I was feeling wide awake cause I had just taken a cold shower.

Hannah: Woah! Really a cold shower?!

Sarah: Well, it started off cold but then it got hot ;)

Hannah: Ohhh okk :) Well, at least you were awake! :)

Hannah: And what are Ian and Andrew doing??

Sarah: Haha, I don't know. I wasn't in there.

Hannah:... hmmm... yah... not sure...

Hannah: Wow! What is the story behind Sparkle being dressed up??

Sarah: Lil' Andrew, Benaiah and Bethy were telling us about how they had dressed up Sparkle while we were in Beira. So we decided we would dress her up. hehe.

Hannah: Aw, haha, poor Sparkle!

Sarah: Oh yah. That's Aunt Julie trying to keep a straight face so that her face mask wouldn't crack. Everyone kept coming in and laughing at her, so it was hard to keep a straight face.

Hannah: And then I guess you guys put on masks too?

Sarah: Yep!

Sarah: Gracie and I were really giddy so we were trying to act like Chinese people. We put on bright red lipstick and yah.

Hannah: Haha! Wow! You guys look like mimes.... great facial expressions! :P

Sarah: Oh and there was this lady on the back of the face mask package. She looked really goofy! She had huge lips and was trying to look like she was relaxing. So Gracie and I tried to look like her.

Hannah: haha! Wow! Good job!

Hannah: You look relaxed ;)

Sarah: I'm not sure what he's doing....

Hannah: Did he play with legos a lot while you guys were over there?

Sarah: Naw, only once.

Hannah: fun fun!

Hannah: Awww! What great lil' bros!

Sarah: Bethy was the only one being normal when we all put on the mask.

Hannah: Haha. Way to go Bethy! :D

Hannah: Um... wow...

Sarah:I don't have anything to say about it... I wasn't there.

Sarah: No clue.

Hannah: AH! The 2nd is armless!

Sarah: Oh! We played Camps everyday except for Sunday. It got really boring after the first day.

Hannah: Yah, I bet! So what was your's and Graice's sign?

Sarah: I can't tell.

Hannah: Wow! Really!

Sarah: Yah, it's really good!

Hannah: Ok well, there are all the pictures we have. Do you have any fun stories to tell us Sarah?

Sarah: Gracie and I were extremely bored cause we finished our school early. So, we decided to make soup for lunch. We got a.. umm... cream of chicken soup and a cream of mushroom soup.

Hannah: Canned soup?

Sarah: No, they were in packets.

Hannah: Okk... back to your story.. thanks :)

Sarah: So we cut open the packets and poured them into the pot. It looked like there were more spices than usual. So we looked closer and we noticed that all the spices were moving. haha. Then we realized that they were bugs! But we just decided we would cook it anyways, cause our oats always have bugs in them and no one has died. We just wouldn't tell anybody. So we got the water and poured it into the pot, and all the bugs floated to the top. And we realized just how many there were. The whole top of the pot was covered! And right after that happened Bethy walked through the door.

Hannah: Uh oh! haha

Sarah: So we started stirring it so that it would mix up the bugs that way they weren't as obvious. Then we decided to sift it. We got out the sifter and started sifting all the soup. Meanwhile, Bethy was in the kitchen cutting up and apples and didn't even notice. Finally, after a long time she asked us why we were sifting the soup. Haha. We told her, "Just to be safe." Then she said, "Safe from what?!" So we said, "Oh just safe. Just in case." After a while though, she figured it out. So we told her not to say anything to anyone else. After all the soup was gone, we told everyone except for Uncle Charles. We told him the next day :)

Hannah: Haha, sounds like fun! I guess you and Gracie didn't try cooking again?

Sarah: Actuallllyyyy, we cooked pudding next.

Hannah: Oh?

Sarah: Haha. Now that started out working fine, but after we were stirring it on the stove top for about an hour, we decided to put in corn starch to thicken it. Then we put in more. And more. And more.

Hannah: Oh no!

Sarah: Then we finally decided to take it off the stove. As soon as we took it off it started to solidify really fast! And then we divided it up into cups. Then we put them in the freezer but they spilled over all the candy bars. So we had to wash off the candy bars. Well, actually we just scraped the pudding back into the cups and then washed the candy bars. And yah, in the end, I don't think anyone really liked it. It tasted... interesting.

Hannah: Haha! You guys are to funny!

Sarah: Yah, we decided not to cook anything else.

Hannah: Sounds like a good idea ;). So any other fun things you would like to tell us about?

Sarah: Ummm... nope that's just about it.

Hannah: Cool! Well, thank you so...

Sarah: Ohh yah! Gracie and I had a sensible conversation finally!

Hannah: Haha! Wow! Way to go lil' sisters! :D... While Damarise and I were in Malawi Bethy text us and told us she was praying for us and that Sarah and Gracie would have a sensible conversation. Haha.

Sarah: Yah, we were really giddy and just talked about nonsense and goofy stuff. So we told them that we were going to have a sensible talk.

Hannah: Well, I'm glad you did! :) Okk.. Well, thank you Sarah Ellen for filling us in on the week! It was nice to hear your voice... or... typed voice... on this blog :) Anything you wanna say to the readers?

Sarah: Umm... Always have a sifter at hand if you're going to make soup in Mozambique, cause you never know what might pop out of the package.

Hannah: Haha! Thank you Sarah!

Okk, until next time...

Sarah: That's all for now folks...

Growin' like a weed!

2008-09-29T08:35:00.005+02:00

Recently, Sarah Ellen has been shooting up like a beanstalk! When we first got here to Mozambique, lil' Sarah was shorter than Bethy! Now she is even with Gracie! Woah! Sunday, Kent had Sarah Ellen and Gracie stand back to back, he put a level on their heads and sure enough, they were the exact same height! Unbelievable! She's just gunna keep sprouting up!

Family Time!

2008-09-29T07:08:00.009+02:00

Sunday afternoon all the Woodbulls got together for some family time! It's been over 2 months since we last did something fun together as a family.

We (the Bull side of the family) got to the Wood's place around 12:30. Bethy made a scrumptious lunch of potato salad (with pickles! Yum!), pickles, and sloppy joes! Speaking of Sloppy Joes, I have a question. When eating Sloppy Joes, is the meat called the Sloppy and the bread the Joe? Some people say yes and others say no, so thought I'd ask our readers and see what you guys think :)

Okk, back to what we did :) After that delicious lunch, we played Murderer in the Light. At first we could guess the murdered in the first round (what can I say, we all know each other to well :) ) ... But after the first couple of rounds it took us a while to figure out who it was.

Here's some pictures of us playing :)

Ah! Kent's winking! Benaiah's scared... runnn...

Time for "Who do you think did it?". Sarah Ellen has her accusation ready... The 2nd looks a lil' lost and as for Gracie... haha.. who knows :)

Bethy and I :) Aw! I love my older sis! (Anddd for those of you who didn't know... Bethy will be turning 18 in 11 days! Wow!)

Haha.. not sure what was happening here. Kent making sure Gracie wasn't the murderer and lil' Andrew hopping on for the ride :P

Woah! Close up of lil' Andrew =oO

And Benaiah... he looks a lil' lost :P

The Sarah's petting Sparkle. Aww what a cute dog!

Bethy was on a delicious cooking spree :) She made these...umm... I'm not sure what they were. They were like a donut type texture covered in chocolate and coconut :) Mmmm... She is one amazing cook!

Just hanging out as a family :D

After playing Murderer in the Light, we played Charades! Kent, Gracie, Sarah Ellen, Benaiah and I were on a team and Dot, Bethy, Ian, Lil' Andrew and the 2nd were on another one. It was fun!! Our team did open heart/bypass surgery extremely exaggerated :) And flying on an airplane... with a fat guy, annoying kid and that person who always leans their seat way back in your lap :) Haha! ... The other team did a scene from Pride and Prejudice and Pirates of the Caribbean. It was fun!

When we were done with Charades we went outside, sat in a circle and threw the volleyball back and forth. Every time you had the volleyball though you had to say one memory about being Woodbulls or even before. :D It was really neat to hear all the different memories that we all have :) We have had some good times together!!! I love my family! :D

After finishing that game we started to plan another Parent Appreciation Night! Yeah! Those are always loads of fun! Can't wait to have another one :) We're planning on having a winter theme... haha... but it'll be the middle of our summer... which means HOT! :P Oh well, it'll be fun!

Unfortunately, time always flies by way to fast when we're all together as Woodbulls, and pretty soon it was time to head home :(... But we had one awesome afternoon together getting to laugh, play games, hang out, and just enjoy each other's company! :D

Beira Missions Trip: The Drive

2008-08-31T20:04:00.002+02:00

This past week and a half was an amazing week. What happened this past week? Oh wow! So much! Hopefully I, Hannah, can tell it all and give you a glimpse into an amazing week.

Before I begin here's a quote from Andrew. I asked him to share some memory from the trip. His answer:

"Well, all I know is that it was an awesome experience and I'm so thankful to God that He gave me that opportunity to be involved in it! I also really miss it, strangely. Even the cold showers and the bathrooms. Weird."

Now where to start from... the beginning is always good. This all started at our pastor's graduation party. Mrs. Preston, who had come to the pastor's graduation, was sitting next to Damarise and I telling us about what her summer plans looked like so far. Her and Mr. Preston were going down to Beira to help build a church. They would be there for six weeks and teams from the US would be coming down to help them, but in the last week they wouldn't have any teens there only seven other adults. She asked Damarise and I if we would want to come down and help out since they would be driving back to Nampula after they were done with the church, traveling back wouldn't be a problem. That night we talked about it and decided that it would be a really neat experience and it would be so wonderful to help the Mozambicans out. We asked the Prestons if they minded if we invited the youth group. The answer, you guessed it, no. The plans for going to Beira were coming together. And finally, after a few months of waiting the day was there! We were packed, tired, and ready to go!

The Maddux kids came to our house Friday night to spend the night that way we could leave bright and early. We woke up at 5:30am got ready to go, and drove to the Woodrows.

The LePoidevin kids had gone to the Woodrows house Friday night and they too were up and packing at 5:30ish. When we got to there house we dropped off Andrew who was going to spend the week with Benaiah while Mom and Dad were gone. Then Aunt Julie treated us to some amazing cinnamon rolls, we prayed for safety and we were off, after many of hugs.

About an hour into the trip our (sorry I have no idea what it is called) thing above the tire started peeling off. So Dad and Uncle Mike pulled it off and we hit the road again.

Oh wait, while we were stopped, Damarise couldn't resist taking another road picture.

Traveling was kind of boring cause everyone was so tired, so Sarah and Esther watched a movie on Sarah's iPod.

Ah yes! A glimpse at a road trip in Africa.

This is the second bathroom stop. The first one is at a town about 3 hours out of Nampula. This one is about 6 hours. The first one is a squat pot (ew!). This one is a normal (but nasty) toilet! Ah, sigh of relief!

After that stop, we headed out a lil' ways to a bible school (I think that's what it was) and had lunch.

The younger boys enjoying their lunch.

And everyone from the Stolks car enjoying their lunch.

Back on the road. What our car looked like. It was comfy cozy!

The Stolks car behind ours. They were saying it was getting really boring just seeing the back of our car the whole drive down. Whoops!

Around 3pm we arrived at the Haugs house. They made us feel right at home! Esther Haug took us girls up to her room and we watched Ice Age 2. After that was done some of us went down stairs and watched a Lord of the Rings marathon with some other people who were there.

And some of us played Blokus. A very brainy game! Way to go Jesse on winning!

Dinner time! Mmm spaghetti! We had two tables for the kids. Which was loads of fun (Damarise was at this table too)

And this table. Haha, in the middle of the meal Jonathan Haug was telling a joke, "How to you sell a deaf man a duck?" Answer: "DO YOU WANNA BUY A DUCK?!" He screamed so loud! We were cracking up at our table.

Andrew's plate got piled sky high with spaghetti but he finished it off! Yeah Andrew!

They also have a bush baby there! Aw it was so cute!

Karina got to hold it too.

That night Sarah started throwing up. She went to bed early. Damarise and I went to bed a little after her cause we were so tired!

Everyone else stayed up and played pulsey pulse and mafia.

Here's the guys waiting for the game to start.

And a cute one of Esther and Sylvia.

Let the games begin!

After a loud and fun game, they headed off to bed. Ah, the lovely place of la la land!

The next morning we took off at around 7am. Poor Sarah had thrown up 4 times in the night and wasn't feeling to good.

We got to the ferry after 2 hours. And waited... and waited... and waited.

Finally we got to go!

Oh yes! Esther face says it all! We were thrilled!

After we crossed the river we came to a very nice gas station. We filled up with gas and went to the bathroom (it was a nice bathroom!) While there, Sarah still wasn't feeling very well and Dad and Mom said that if she wasn't well by the time they were going to leave Beira she would have to go with them, so the youth group made a circle and prayed that she would feel better. We stayed at the gas station for a while after that though cause Sarah started to run a fever so Dad tested her for malaria. Praise the Lord she didn't have it!

A few minutes after the gas station we stopped at the place where we spend the night when we are traveling down south. It's a beautiful forest area!

With flower that shout out God's majesty!

Quaint lil' lanterns.

And nifty signs.

Sarah still wasn't feeling good while we were there though:( Aw, it was not a fun drive for her.

A few hours after that we stopped again at a place (translated into English) named Rainbow. Sarah wasn't feeling good so she needed out to stretch etc. The rest of us decided to get out and explore.

Ooo they had a merry go round! Fun fun!

And see saws!

And swings that were just a lil' small.

It was so sad! They had an alligator in there! That lil' bitty cage! Poor alligator!

We got back on the road and headed for Beira. Where we youth would spend the next week.

Here's a pic of the Stolks car. Elijah traded cars the second day so that he could have more leg room. Thomas joined us.

We got there! Yeah! We stayed on the Australian Bible School's campus, which, by the way, was right next to the city prison! Scary! The first second night we heard gun shots and us girls screamed. Haha. But when they started doing it every night we got used to it ;)

We started the unpacking.

So did the Stolks.

The place before we set up our tents.

The guys put up there tent pretty fast! Wow! Way to go guys!

And we girls stretched after the drive! Aw!

A bunch of the guys put our tent up for us! Thank you guys!

While they were putting up the tents we were still unloading the cars.

Oh and we were helping Gracie shake out her blanket. Haha, that was fun!

The boys in their 5 man tent.

Us girls with our 10 man tent! Yay! Thank you to everyone who helped put it up for us :)

After the tents were set up Mrs. Preston came back with all the adults. (They had gone to the beach) We all ate a lovely dinner of pancakes! Yum!

The girls. (Minus Sarah who was feeling pretty bad.)

After dinner we went around introducing ourselves and saying what we've built or made. We also got to meet all the adults who would be with us for the week. Mr. and Mrs. Preston (we already knew), Mr. Greg and Ms. Karen, Mr. Dana and Ms. Emily, Mr. Jim, Mr. Ed (Mrs. Preston's brother) and Ms. Penny (Mrs. Preston's sister). A wonderful group of wonderful adults ready to begin a wonderful week.

Beira Missions Trip

2008-08-31T20:03:00.000+02:00

Sunday night, after the introductions, we all headed off to bed. Around 3am it started pouring! It was pretty hard to sleep with so we girls were up and dressed by 4:30am. At 4:45ish Mr. Ed came by our tent and told us it was time to wake up. We headed out into the drizzle up to the dining hall for breakfast. Cereal! Yum!

After devotions at 6 everyone went to the work site except for the kitchen crew for the day. Gracie, Esther, Sylvia, Karina and me. We stayed behind to help do the left over dishes and to pack everything up for lunch.

It was still a cold and rainy day, but it was perfect for working in. Nice and cool!

Mr. Preston and a mozambican made the frames for the windows upstairs.

And Mr. Jim and some of the boys helped lay the floor.

Gracie filled in holes.

A few of us helped weave the mats for the floors. The cement goes on top of it.

Kent helped lay brick with Mr. Greg.

And some of the other helped prepare for the upstairs floor to be poured.

Around 10 in the morning, Mom, Dad, Sarah and the Stolks stopped by. They said that Sarah was too sick to stay in Beira and that they were bringing her home with them. They had stopped by to say goodbye and then they were off to a pharmacy to get some heart medicine for Aunt Hilda that she had left behind. While at the work site though, Aunt Hilda started having attacks of some sort. Mr. Preston drove her to the hospital with Mr. Jim who was an EMT. The hospital wouldn't let them in, or something like that, so they drove around and found a clinic. After a while, and once she got the medicine, she was alright. Were we ever praising the Lord! Once she got out of the clinic they and Mom, Dad and Sarah headed up to some town where the Stolks had some friends. They spent a few nights there and then headed up to Nampula.

Anyways, around 11:30am the kitchen crew left to go prepare lunch. We used the house that the missionary community uses for their Sunday night fellowship. It was a nice and big house! It didn't take that long to set up for lunch so when we were done we sang. Singing in that room sounded so amazing! It was loads of fun!

After lunch we were back to work.

Laying the mat for the upstairs floor.

The first (And most fun) cement bucket line! We had a wonderful time passing buckets. We saying, laughed, and passed buckets. :)

The Mozambicans were usually on the scaffolds because they are so strong they can lift them up, but while they weren't there Ian gave a shot at it.

We also got to mix some of the cement.

Once back home and showered we were pooped and ready for a good night's sleep!

Day 2:

We woke up bright (correction: dark) and early ready for another day of work!

Getting to scrape off the dried cement off the floor.

Some of the guys laying another floor.

Ms. Emily cutting a brick.

YAY! Way to go Ms. Emily!

Kent laid brick again. That was his job for the whole week. He did an amazing job!

How the church looked the second day.

We made and mixed cement again. Three wheelbarrows of sand, five wheelbarrows of rock, and two bags of cement.

People on the roof still building walls.

A beautiful sunset to end the day with.

And tacos for dinner! That was a nice ending!

Mmm everyone loves tacos!

Some of the girls after dinner... and Andrew in the background. Even with all the work we could still goof off. ;)

And our favourite: Nutella! Yum! Chocolate spread! We were trying to figure out how to say it. Everyone but the Woodrow's say Nutella all together. The Woodrow's say Nut Ella. Because it was getting to... different... we decided to call it Nutshe. She in Portuguese is Ela. So we dropped the "ella" in Nutella and put "she" instead. :)

The dish line Tuesday night.

That night after dishes all the youth went outside and sang. It was a beautiful starry night. The heavens did for sure declare the glory of God! And it was wonderful getting to sing praises to Him!

Wednesday! or Beira Day. Because of it being the city's holiday lots of Mozambicans from the church came to see how they could help out. And entertained us with some singing.

Kent, once again, was up on the roof ready to lay brick! Doesn't he look chipper :)

Mr. Dana and Ms. Emily working on a pillar. Good work guys!

How the church looked on the 3rd day.

Look at all they've done!

This is one of the Massa guys. The would make the mortar and then bring it upstairs. All the while, shouting, "Massa, Massa, Massa!"

I have a story about a massa guy, so I'll go ahead and share it :)

We were standing in line one day, in fact it may have been that day, passing buckets or bricks upstairs. I was in the staircase when along came the massa guy. He was carrying the massa on top of his head in a long rectangle bucket. I was close to the top of the staircase so I figured that I'd be fine standing there cause he could get pass me. Let's just say I was wrong. He came up, the bucket caught under my chin, he kept walking, I stood on my tiptoes, he went up, I started gagging, I kinda shoved him a lil' and jumped out of the way. He cracked up and I couldn't help but laugh myself. Who would of thought I could be almost choked by a massa bucket? He walked down the stairs still chuckling and we went back to our assembly line. A few minutes later he came up again and immediately I was up and out of the way. He laughed. I laughed. He set the massa up stairs and I went back to work. Let me tell you though, after that experience, whenever I heard the guy crying, "Massa!" I was up and out of the way!

The upstairs floor we had laid the day before.

Some Mozambican ladies practicing their singing for church! A-Mazing!

Laying, fixing, dumping and organizing rubble for the inside of the stage.

Wow! Look at all the progress they've made!

Kent and Thomas ended up being a brick laying team for the rest of the week! You both did a swell job!

The youth practicing their singing. They sounded really, really good!!

Speaking of singing, Gracie taught us the "Peanut Song" If you haven't heard it... well... it's a fun song!

"Peanut sat on a railroad track
it's heart was all a flutter.
Along came a choo choo train
'Choo Choo'
Peanut Butter!"

Godfree (The one in the middle) was helping out with all the carpentry work. He was from Zimbabwe and happened to pass by the church. He volunteered to help work and did a wonderful job. It was also nice having another English speaker around!

Here's a picture of the outside of the house where we ate lunch every day.

The walls around the building. Mcel is the main cell phone company here in Mozambique and they advertise on anything and everything. A lot of Mozambique is coloured yellow and blue green.

They were really making good progress with the back wall!

The bathrooms. Squat pots. Or a hole in the ground. (short one was for the guys. the tall stick one was for the girls). Ew! I'm so glad I only had to use it once!

That night we had youth group. It was nice getting to sing and fellowship after a long day!

Thursday: (i.e.- lets-bring-our-camera-to-the-site-today day)

The girl's tent after we were all up. Slightly messy...

Damarise and I up way to early.

This is the house where Mr. Dana & Ms. Emily and Mr. Greg & Ms. Karen stayed. Us girls used their bathroom at night and in the morning. It was right behind our tent.

Damarise and Karina off to work.

The kitchen crew (minus Sylvia who was taking the picture) sleeping.

Until we came up with a novel idea! Why not sing the peanut song to the tune of "Blind Man". We were loud and we made up a long song! And then Mrs. Preston came in and reminded us that people do sleep past 6am! Whoops! We were way to loud!

Part of the kitchen crew leaving for work.

All the kitchen crew ready for a day of work!

The kitchen coming to work.

The church at the beginning of day four.

From the back.

And the front. The wooden slats were our stairs for the week.

No. The people on the roof cannot see in the bathrooms when you squat! *Phew!*

The floor... waiting to be... a floor!

Karina was a very hard worker during the week! She would clean the upstairs every morning before the guys started their work. Wether it was picking up rubble, half bricks, or sweeping she was willing and ready to do it! She was very diligent!

Look at those muscles Thomas has!

Damarise and Esther waiting for a job.

Helping pass a board downstairs.

Some of the tools that we used during the week.

Oh yes and the infamous piles of rock, sand, and more rock.

Our arms from passing up bricks! Ouch!

A mini brick line.

Here's a few shots of some of Damarise's neat photographic eye working.

Grass of all colours.

Wood blocks.

Lettuce.

The cement floor.

Leveling out a floor for the cement to be poured.

And smashing the rubble in the stage to make it level.

The staircase.

Mr. Ed contemplating how to build the next flight of stairs...

A fun job was pulling out nails!

Oh yah, and taking a break to goof off... or hurt Andrew.

Esther taking out a nail! Go Esther.

Karina standing by watching.

And about 20 minutes later. Pop came the nail! YAY for Esther!!!

The nail pulling gang.

Everybody up on the roof again. It's really starting to look like a room!

Kent and Thomas one amazing brick laying team! Great team work guys!

Gracie and Sylvia waiting for a job.

All the girls watching people work on the roof.

Ms. Emily filling in holes.

Aw a heart in the dust.

And a heart in the sawdust.

It's 9:26am! Three hours till lunch!

Gracie was tired so we were giving her a hug.

Elijah and Andrew waiting around for a job.

"Say Cheese!" Ian, me and Sylvia .

Showing off our Mozambican hats.

Shoveling rubble!!

The hard workers!

And them working.

work gloves.

Aw. I like this one of Karina! She was taking a break from the shoveling.

We were inside still leveling the floor... and while we were at it taking a feet picture!

Our electric guitars! Fun!

Or maybe they're just shovels... :(

Elijah picking up Andrew! Woah! Be careful guys!

Haha! I just had to post this. This bag floated around every day and every day someone said something about it! Haha.

Andrew and Gracie! Such happy siblings!

Esther doesn't know if she likes varnishing... I'm guessing she doesn't.

The trowels. Such handy tools!

Playing hand games! Very entertaining and loads of fun!

Damarise, Esther and I. Friends forever!

And Gracie and Esther are sad that it's almost time to go. :(

Ice cream! A special treat! Thank you Ms. Penny!

Mr. Jim doing the floor.

Gracie's shoe.

The faces of some of the youth who were working.

Andrew

Ian

Karina

Damarise

Gracie

Elijah

And last but not least:

Esther

Mr. Preston counting out money.

I like this picture. :)

Gracie and Ian hanging out on the sand pile.

Andrew and Ian's tunnel that they had dug. Can you see them at the end?

Digging, wheelbarrowing, and watching.

Varnishing. They were amazing varnishers!

The varnish.

Way to go Karina getting in every nook and cranny!

Andrew helped for a wee bit.

Good job Damarise!

Karina's feet almost on tip toes in order to reach the top.

The cement in a wheelbarrow waiting to be poured for the floor.

Sylvia and Esther with some very goofy faces!

Esther told us to do a monkey face. A what?!

And back to normal. A cute one of Sylvia and Esther!

Sylvia, Esther and me.

Cute face Esther!

Esther's purity ring. So pretty!

Sylvia and Gracie giving varnishing a try.

Oh yes, then we found some broken glasses in the grass and just had to try them on.

Ian helping varnish.

Kent and Thomas hard at work. They were a very diligent and persevering team!

Gracie and Esther playing the hand game.

Aw Gracie, Esther and Sylvia. What great friends!

"It's your fault!" "Naw aw! It's yours!"

Feet picture!

Let's do the hand game again!

The staircase girls! Karina, Gracie, Sylvia and Esther.

Cute!!! Andrew, Gracie, Sylvia, Esther and Elijah.

Doing dishes is fun!

Reading the Australian's Readers Digest. Haha! We found an article in there about Mac users being arrogant snobs?! Say what? hmmm... I think I might have to disagree. (Hehe)

Friday!

Everyday Damarise's cellphone alarm would go off at 4:45am. It was so quiet though that no one could hear it so Damarise would say, "It's 4:45!" Everyone would groan, lay in bed, and wait until Mr. Ed came by to say good morning. Once he came by we would get up, get dressed and get ready for the day.

Friday morning was different. Damarise's voice rang through the tent, "It's 4:45!" Everyone groaned and then Esther's voice was heard, "I'm sick." Oh no! Not Esther! Not now! She was running a fever and felt achey and sick! Poor girl! At breakfast we found out Elijah too was sick with the stomach ache. Damarise decided she would stay behind to take care of them while the rest of us went to work.

Here's how the second story looked on Friday.

Mr. Jim laying the last square of floor.

He also made a cross. It reminds me of "At the Old Rugged Cross."

Ms. Emily cleaning out some tool in the wash buckets. The buckets had about 6 inches of sand, dust, cement, and mud down at the bottom. Ew!

The front view of the church on Friday.

Ah, the notorious see saw. This see saw is at the place where we eat lunch. One day after lunch Mr. Dana laid down on the see saw to rest. Well, I guess he wasn't resting on it evenly and next thing we knew he had done a back flip off the see saw. But not without a scrape all the way down his back the size of this handle! Ouch! It looked so painful!

The lil' mozambican boys outside the place where we eat lunch.

Andrew was helping Mr. Ed with the stairs.

A cute girl that was outside the church for a while. She was so sweet!

Some of us girls watching the building.

Saturday morning. Almost everyone had diarrhea! Mrs. Preston was prepared though. She gave them all something to stop it and it did just that. At 3:30am most the adults and Kent and Andrew went to get the top floor ready for a roof.

The rest of us joined them at the normal time. 6:15am.

The building permit. It looks so quaint.

Aw! Cute!

Ms. Emily asked this lady how to wear a capulana. The lady whipped hers off and showed Ms. Emily.

Ta da!

The bags of cement.

The back entry.

The second flight of stairs.

The walls of the second story are finished! Yeah!

Getting ready to pray.

The view from upstairs.

A cool picture of charcoal.

The boys minus Kent. Cute picture!

The pliers.

Karina filling in holes.

Thomas getting water from the well.

The rest of us getting carrying buckets of water.

Getting ready for a cement line.

Oh wait, pause for a picture...

The Mamas getting ready to cook.

Wow! Looks at Damarise's muscles!

The ice cream men!

Yum! We love ice cream!

Andrew carrying boards for the rafters.

cute cute!

Damarise and I were keeping Esther company in the car. She still wasn't feeling 100%

Karina and Sylvia stopped by to say hi to us in the car and while they were there they decided to snap a pic. :)

Ms. Karen and Mrs. Preston resting.

Esther reading comics.

Helping get wood out of the shed.

Kent after a long morning's work.

And Karina ready to sleep.

We were hanging out on the pews outside chit chatting.

This is so cool! All the boys have different colour hair.

Some of us were just too tired!

Ok! Most of us were to tired! So we all took a nap.

Lunch time! Mmm. Nutella and egg salad.

They look ready to eat.

I love this picture! They look deep in thought! *Thanks Gracie for taking it!*

We love lunch time!

Nutella.

Taking a break from the work to... smile! :)

Aw! Cute! What beautiful girls!

Ms. Karen and Karina screwing holes in a block of wood.

The people from the church making stairs.

Sylvia hammering. She hammered so hard she created sparks! Woah!

I love this comic!

Gracie reading comics.

Damarise and Gracie making funny faces.

And some of the many faces of Andrew:

Huh?

Hmmm... is there a name for this face?

Uh. Haha. Napoleon Dynamite.

Andrew and Damarise ... Andrew has a better face on ;)

Mr. Jim helping get ready for the roof to go on.

Sergio washing the cars. He always wanted to do something and when there was nothing for him to do he would wash the cars.

There was absolutely nothing to do. So we sat around talking, playing card games and reading comics.

I like this picture too! The three youngest ones there reading comics together.

Yeah! We got a job! Sweeping! a.k.a Dust galore!

A picture of the mamas making food. Yumm!

Putting up the rafters! Yeah!

The youth! What an awesome group we have!

Oh and our muscle pic! We all gained a lot of muscle during the week. In fact, Mr. Jim, Sylvia and Andrew counted it all up and they figured out that each one of us lifted over three tons during the week! Woah!

We got another job. Putting silver skirts on screws.

Fun fun!

Still putting on the rafters!

The sun went down and they were still putting them up.

All of us youth minus Kent jammed into the Pajero and played the Village of the Green Glass Doors. Fun!

Night time! And the rafters were almost done going up.

Back home we enjoyed another tasty meal! It was always so cool how we would all squish together at one table. I love our group!

We had cake and ice cream for Elijah and Mr. Dana's birthday. Mr. Dana's face says it all. It was good!

The Preston's house. Also the place where we girls took our showers every night. Hot water! Yes! The poor boys took their showers in the guy's shower house. They only had cold water! And cold water on a cold night! Wow! Cold!

Mrs. Preston started packing up the kitchen Saturday night. She went fast! She had everything organized and ready to go in no time!

Sunday:

We went to church. This is what the finished church building looked like. They couldn't put on the roof, but Lord willing, the people in the church can put it up.

The inside of the church! Beautiful! Some of the ladies in the church decorated it the night before.

The front entrance.

They had a march from their old church to the new one.

Some of the food cooking for lunch after church.

The goat! eww...

We were practicing our songs before church.

Here's the side entrance into the church. We had to wait for the Governor to come cut the ribbon.

I love this picture of this lil' girl waiting for the ribbon to be cut.

Here's some more kids waiting.

And all of us youth waiting...

And more people waiting.. ;)

The albino kid was adorable! And sung amazingly!

Finally the ribbon is cut! We can go in!

They sat all of us volunteers in the front.

Godfree's daughter, Michelle! How cute!

The service was long (9am-2:45pm... and for the people who had went with the march from one church to the next they started at 7:30am and went till 2:45pm! Talk about a long morning!)

They had asked us youth to sing for the church while we were there. We sang "I Will Call Upon the Lord" for our walk up song and "You are Holy (Prince of Peace)" and "Amazing Grace" (A different way). It was fun, although we were so spread out that we couldn't really hear each other singing. Haha, oh well.

Towards the end of the service they called up the Prestons to thank them for all they have done. (They had been working on the church for five weeks!) They gave Mrs. Preston a capulana, spoon, and bandana and Mr. Preston a cane. Then they lifted them up on a chair and did a lil' dance. Haha, it was so much fun to watch!

All the Mamas had their capulanas wrapped around them and then when they got to the front they would take them off and put them on the Prestons. ... Then they called us up. They put bandanas and capulanas around us and danced. It was so much fun!

After the dance and most everyone (including a few guys) got capulanas we stood in a line and they told us all thank you again.

Finally the service was over! We got in line for the food, but never got to eat most of it. We did get some of the bread and fries, but we weren't sure about the salad and meat.

Us girls (minus Damarise) waiting in line.

Haha! Oh yes, Mr. Jim also got a capulana. One lady had wrapped it around him and then he took it off again (cause really what guy would want to walk around in a capulana!) Well, when the service was over and we were waiting in line for the food another lady came up to Mr. Jim, took his capulana off his shoulders and wrapped it around him again! Haha, poor guy!

The finished 2nd flight of stairs! Yeah!

All of us girls after church drinking sodas.

Then Damarise and Esther were starving and decided they would go find some food to eat. They came back bearing bread, cake, and lil' donut type things.

They were happy with their find!

Gracie's happy with the food too :D

Aw! It was so sweet to watch Kent with the lil' kids! The kids were adorable! They kept trying play the guitar.

Then Kent played some music with some of the other guys in the church.

The albino kid borrowed Kent's guitar and played a song and sang! He did both really well... ok.. wait I never heard him play the guitar but he sang amazingly!

We decided to get pictures with everyone...

Us girls with Ms. Karen. She was a blast to hang out with!

Mr. Dana and Ms. Emily.

Mr. Jim. He was always making us laugh!

Ms. Penny (Mrs. Preston's sister) she was fun! (We drove back home to Nampula with her)

Leaving the church for the last time.

Mr. Dana and Ms. Emily with Godfree and his wife.

And Michelle! Aw! She was too cute!

Damarise, Esther and I on the way back to the camp.

Silly faces!

This is the old church. They were renting a room out of this building to hold their church services in.

Once home we packed everything up and got ready to take the tents down.

Wow! We had all that in our tent?

Haha! Mr. Jim was trying to deflate his air mattress, but all it had was an eensy weeny hole. He sat on it for a while until finally most of the air was out. Then he sat up looked down the air mattress and found a hole... a big hole with a cap on it. The one to let all the air out! Haha, poor guy! Oh well, at least he got a few minute of relaxation.

Karina swept out the tent, and did a great job of it!

The boys took down their tent. They did a good job of cleaning their tent too.

The youth group! Aw cute!

Goofy faces!

All the girls :)

Oh yes a glimpse of the bathroom we girls used every morning and night. The toilet seat kept falling off and there was only a curtain for the door!

Mr. Dana and Ms. Emily! Aw! What a cute couple!

Us girls (minus Karina) with Ms. Emily.

After we packed up our tents and all we headed out to a nice restaurant by the beach. (Thank you Ms. Penny and Mr. Ed for paying for it.)

When we got there Mr. Dana found this car in the parking lot. The license plate had Ms. Emily's name written all over it!

Then came the deciding... what to order... what to order..

It was cold! Freezing cold! Esther (the smart one!) brought a capulana with her! She was our hero! We wrapped it around all four of us! Aw! Toasty warm!

Aw! Some people walking along the beach had these adorable dogs. Gracie just had to pet them! Aw!

I like this one of Esther out on the beach... the wind was.... windy ;)

This is cool! Some of the guys jumping up up and away!

Aw! The LePoidevin siblings! What a great family!

Sister picture! Sylvia and Karina are so cute!

Haha, and then there's Gracie and I... haha... we were just too happy.

Haha we tried to do a pyramid type thing but then it fell...

Take two we nailed it!

Gracie and Esther swinging in circles on the beach.

We got called back in to wait for our food that would be coming any minute...

Mr. Dana and someone else ordered this seafood platter. It had so much seafood on it! A huge variety! And the amazing thing... it cost $4.00! Four American Dollars!!! Woah!

All of us kids except Kent, Karina and Gracie ordered pizza. Most everyone ordered meat pizza. Elijah and Thomas ordered 0live pizza and Sylvia ordered chili pizza. She likes spice but I don't think she liked that much spice.

Alright, here's the story of the chili pizza.

Everyone sat around the table waiting for their food to come. Thomas' and Elijah's pizza came first, then everyone else's food trickled in, but not Sylvia's. She sat there waiting patiently and finally her patience paid off. In came her pizza covered in chili peppers. She was hungry so she took a bite fast. "Woah!" she said! The pizza was spicy. Esther and I decided to try it! Oh my! I have never in my whole life had something so spicy and all I took of it was a bite one lil' measly bite! My mouth was burning. My lips were singed. My throat felt like it was laying on top of coals. Esther was turning red and crying. I was too. "Water!" we called. We needed water. But to our dismay there was no water on the table. What?! No water! The waiter had just come by and was on his way to bring us more water. Esther grabbed Damarise's coke and drank. No relief. Our mouths were burning. Ms. Emily and Mr. Dana also tried the pizza. Too hot for Mr. Dana, but Ms. Emily finished off the piece, with a burning mouth and tearful eyes! Elijah stuffed his mouth with the chilis and burned up too. And then he came. The waiter bearing great gifts of water. Two 1 liter bottles. Those bottles of water were gone in no time. Everyone filled their glasses to the brim and drank them down so fast you would never have guessed we had poured water in the glasses. And finally after 10 minutes full relief came. Our mouths were back to normal. We laughed and laughed. No more spicy things for me please!

That night was our last night together as a group, so we snapped a picture.

The week was amazing. It was wonderful getting to work along side all these wonderful people and to help the Mozambicans build something that, Lord willing, will help spread God's Word to many other Mozambicans. It was a week I will never forget and I am so thankful to God that I got to go be a part of it!