Our first week in Peru...

Hello to all from Lima, Peru. Thank you so much for your prayers for us during this past week. We have been strengthened, gained wisdom and have been protected in BAD traffic through your prayers. Here's some highlights of our week...

Saturday, Dec 13...We left Costa Rica with all of our luggage and arrived in Peru with EVERYTHING. We had a big crowd at the airport to greet us including the McLamb family who were our neighbors in Costa Rica. After the airport the Holder's took us to our house here in Peru. It is incredible. We are so blessed by the home the Lord has provided for us here. We got our luggage in the house and unpacked a little and had dinner at the traditional South American restaurant...CHILI'S! Yes, it's exactly like the one in the U.S.

Sunday, Dec 14...We went to church at a great church here near our house and we could actually understand the sermon...which is good news for us because the Spanish here in Peru is different than the Spanish in Costa Rica. We ate lunch with the Holders and then came home and unpacked some and spent some time at the mall doing some shopping.

Monday, Dec 15...Meetings! We spent some of the day in meetings downtown at the mission office and then spent some time with the McLamb family. Good day!

Tuesday, Dec 16...We visited a school that the kids are probably going to attend. It's called Fetzer Academy and is a very small school not too far from our house. We spent the remainder of the day shopping for everything and got to spend some good time with the McLamb family!

Wednesday, Dec 17...More meetings. We started the process of getting our Peruvian Immigration Card by visiting the friendly folks at INTERPOL. They got all kinds of information and then looked at our teeth. I suppose if you have certain teeth then they know you are a terrorist or some international criminal. Apparently we have honest looking teeth. And, we had some more good time with the McLamb family.

Thursday, Dec 18...We had our first ReapNorth team meeting at Larry and Nancy Jackson's apartment. We enjoyed getting to meet everyone and then we had a great lunch together. We then hit the mall looking for different things and found a couch that we really like for a really good price. We then met up with some of our friends that we were in Orientation with in Virginia at a restaurant (Yep...Chili's!). It was a great time of seeing those folks again. We had to say good-bye to the McLamb family until they come down from the mountains again.

Friday, Dec 19...We had a morning meeting with our Language Coordinator here in Peru. We are required to complete some more language/cultural work before we can take any vacations to the U.S. so we are ready to get to work on that! Our boss, Boots, watched Haylee and Jackson and took care of the house while we were at our meetings. The plumber/electrician was here installing some stuff for us that needed done. Thanks to Uncle Boots for saving Haylee and Jackson another boring morning at the mission office! We spent the afternoon with Jeremy and Crystal Nelson. Jeremy helped me get some good shoes for our jungle trip that we go on next weekend...he's an expert...sort of a blend of Indiana Jones and Billy Graham. We also bought the couch that we saw on Thursday. It will be delivered soon.
We came home and had dinner and then decorated our Christmas Tree. Uncle Pete and Aunt Carrie and Mimi have sent some gifts to us so we have a lot of presents under the tree!

Prayer Requests for this week!
-- Pray for Haylee and Jackson as they adjust to a new culture. Pray specifically for new friends!
-- Pray for us as we continue to adjust to living in a new culture. Our language skills must become sharper!
-- Pray for the ReapNorth team as we adjust to working together.
-- Pray for the unreached of Northern Peru. We need churches in the US to adopt people groups so that they will hear the gospel.
-- Pray for the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering to be able to meet all of the needs of our missionaries around the world.