45 Days and Counting

The Lord is providing in amazing ways for our team as funds are coming in and airline tickets are purchased! We depart in under 45 days to Santo Domingo. Hard to believe that the days are dwindling down. We are set at 17 team members who are eager and excited for this outreach. We have both returning and new members who will be setting out for this journey that will be new to all of us.
We don't have too much left for fundraisers, but are counting on support letters and donations as of now. It is always amazing how God brings it all together in the end.
We appreciate all of your prayers and support!

Day 1, Part 1

Reliving parts of our last trip...

As we descended into the rugged lands of Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, I thought my ears would explode and head fry of fever. Flying with a mucus-filled head isn't always the ideal way to arrive into the Caribbean, but I did, nonetheless. Of course the airport welcomed us with the classic corralling of human cattle and chaos. Mugginess hit our faces as we trekked through the chaotic airport to customs. I wanted to pass out, I was so fatigued and weak. Chaos was overwhelming but the culture shock was almost nonexistant in my careless attitude.
Managing to pull my passport and appropriate documents out, I somehow ended up with my bags and following the group out the door of the airport into the Dominican atmosphere, where we were surrounded by a different type of chaos.
Constant horns and vehicles and a foreign language being shouted from every which way. My head spun and I crawled into an air conditioned van past jungles of seat belts that no one ever wore anyway in this country. I curled up next to a window, wrapped up in my blue hoodie, freezing as sweat oddly enough poured from my forehead.
Passing Spanish billboards and horses in the back of pickup trucks, and people walking in the road, selling fruit and candy, I enjoyed hearing the oohs and ahhs of our first time team members. It was all such a magical experience, even for those of us who had been down this highway multiple times. There was always something new to gawk at during the 45 minutes of stopping and going and close calls and mopeds weaving in the three feet that remained between you and the vehical in the next lane over. Our supposibly 4 lanes of traffic was somehow 6, as street lines were an optional suggestion.
Turning off to a bumpy, half dirt, half paved, falling apart road, we had reached the area of Los Alcarrizos. Just as many vehicles as the city and even more people and dogs running around. The 15 passenger dipped and hopped as we drove through hardcore road damage and potholes. People weaved around us in their 80s style pickup trucks with just as many people riding in the bed. Horns would beep to let the people know not to hit us, and we wouldn't hit them. Armed guards sat in plastic beach chairs, watching our van bump by. We weren't sure whether to feel safer or more alert.
Finally reaching Unto Inc.'s gate, we pulled aside and waited for it to be opened to us to enter the camp. Eyes watched us with a glimmer or curiosity, knowing full well there were Americanos in that van, since there were always Americanos staying at that camp. The van pulled up to the side of the kitchen and halted. We had arrived at our home for the next 8 days.

A Growing Team

The team is growing with every meeting we have. Many are stepping forward to take on this calling God has set before us in completing this remarkable project for the kids. There is much support for us and the project as well, as people are stepping forward to help with fund raising and getting the news around about this project.

There are still many, many fund raisers ahead as we are still doing what we can to raise the money for our team members and the products for the building project. Here are a few opportunities for you to come and support us with!

~November 8: There will be an oatmeal bar between the 9 and 11am services, and a yummy spaghetti dinner after the 11am service at Mason County Reformed Church! Give by donation for your fill!

~ November 20 & 21: Knights of Columbus art show. We will have a table set up there, selling goodies and crafts! Friday 11- 7, Saturday 9-3.

~ Apple Pie Sale: The team will be selling delicious, homemade, freezable apple pies now, until November 14. The pies cost $10 each and will be ready by November 21. Get your Thanksgiving dessert today! It'll make the whole family happy.

~Caramel Corn Sale: Looking for a great, yummy treat for your friends and family for Christmas? How about a huge canister of various flavors of caramel corn. The team is selling Christmas-themed canisters of caramel corn for $5 each. There are flavors like cranberry almond, chocolate drizzle, and toffee almond cashew. Hurry and order yours today! The sale ends November 8!

Indoor Yard Sale!

Saturday, October 17, the DR team will be holding one of their famous indoor yard sales at MCRC from 8am to 3pm! There are tons of awesome pickings, including books, clothes, appliances, toys, games and much, much more! There will be lunch served and snacks throughout the day!

If you would like to donate items to our sale, bring them by MCRC Friday (tomorrow), or call Mason County Reformed Church to arrange for them to be picked up by our team!
Proceeds will go towards the kitchen project.
Hope to see you there!!!

Dominican Meet & Eat

The team is gearing up for a Saturday of presenting Dominican culture and projects to the people of our church an community. There will be displays, photos, fellowship, food and a guest speaker, Cristian Santiago! He'll be sharing with us about projects and culture. Come on down and get to know our team, join the team, support the team, or just come down for some fun and learning about the missions that God has placed before us. There are some really great stories behind many of these projects and the people involved.
Saturday, October 3, 1-4pm @MCRC.
Cristian will be sharing around 3.
Hope to see you there!

Dominican Trip May 2009 Video

Here is a video I made from our most recent trip last May. Enjoy!
Song: Give Me Your Eyes by Brandon Heath

Building Up for Another Adventure

As some of you may know, another trip to the Dominican Republic is being planned. We already have a solid number of individuals ready to pursue this next trip, but are still looking for more to join us in this awesome journey. We will be working more with the kitchen project and working towards getting that kitchen up and running for the next school year.
Fund raising is also a given for this trip. We have already held many events to raise money for this cause, but will be holding many more, and encourage everyone to come on out and see what we have to offer. Bring friends too!

• Harvest Festival Weekend- The DR team will be working out of the Hungry Howies booth at the Scottville Harvest Festival (September 24-26). There will be many yummy snacks and goodies offered, including pizza, chili, and our delicous grilled cheese sandwiches! Stop by for lunch and dinner!

• Indoor Yard Sale- October 17 at MCRC from 8am to 3pm. We will be seeking donations, so be setting aside things you don't want anymore to give to this cause. Bring them by church starting the Thursday (Oct 15) before the sale. Come on out to the sale to get some good stuff for sale by donation!
  

• Dominican Republic Meet & Eat: We will be holding a special event October 3 at MCRC from 1pm-4pm, for anyone interested in what we are about, and for those who have been on previous DR trips to come and see what our current project is about. There will be food, and Cristian Santiago will be speaking at 3! Come and have some fun with fellowship and food!

That's all we have coming up so far! Please keep checking back here for more updates on our progress and our team! We are cooking up more events every time we meet, so come back!

Fundraising updates!

We have decided to return to the Dominican in January of 2010, or at least try to. In order to keep supporting the project we are working at completing, we would like to extend invites to the summer fundraisers we are having:

~July 4th we will be in downtown Ludington, selling food from a booth at the art show. You should all come out and get a bite to eat while supporting a good cause. Spend your day at the art show and then head on down the street to the beach for some fireworks!

~July 11th: We will once again be having our annual church parking lot sale. We are currently taking registration forms from anyone (personal or business vendors) who would like to rend a 18 x 27' space to sell your stuff! To rent a space, the cost is $25. Or if you would like to come out on July 11th to see what kind of stuff is being sold, feel free! This is always a great summer event. There will also be lunch at this event! Pick up your registration forms and information at the missions station of Mason County Reformed Church today!

Home and Well

We're home! We're alive! We're well! We actually rolled into Ludington around 4am on Saturday morning. The end of our trip was great! We moved Pedro's bed in and we got to pass out goodies to the kids on our last day. We finished the wall around where the kitchen will be and the gate is looking good.
There will be sharing of our experiences at MCRC this Sunday at the 9 and 11am services! Come hear a great sermon from Pastor Rick and check out our trip. There will be slide shows, videos and team members sharing their experiences.
We would like to thank you all so much for keeping updated of our journey! We hope to return to the Dominican Republic very soon to keep working on that kitchen. You can stay in touch with this site to hear about more updates of our upcoming trips and fundraisers! We will be having some activities going on during the summer for you to come out and support the Dominican and our community! Please pay attention to the site to catch those dates! Also keep praying for future teams, the kitchen project and the people of the Dominican. We want to keep this God's work!

Muy Bueno

So we are still here and doing well, although it has been awhile since I have updated. Yesterday was the hardest day of work yet with the hot weather and tough manual labor. We mixed cement, which isn’t done the way we do it in America, painted a huge, metal gate, and hauled cement and cement blocks around in the humid air. Luckily, it was my 23rd birthday yesterday, so the hard work kept my mind off of the fact that I am almost to my quarter life.
Today we got to have the day off and go into the mountains of Dominican and see the nature and hike to a waterfall. It was gorgeous and we could truly see God’s amazing work in every rock and flower. It’s amazing to see the contrast of the lifestyles in the mountains as opposed to the ones in Los Alcarrizos. There is still some poverty, but there are many more huge homes and vacation homes. It was a new perspective for all of us, since our group had the special treat of seeing this new area of the Dominican Republic. The hike itself was intense and one that no one has really experienced before. I stayed back at the first fall, but many others in our group shared their photos and experiences with us.
It’s so hard to believe that we have only a couple of days left here in this truly amazing place. We are all finding it to be a very bitter-sweet feeling as we begin to prepare to return back to our everyday lives. We miss home and our families, but at the same time this experience has done some amazing work in our lives and the last days have flown by. We ask for your prayers as we begin that transition and prepare our hearts to part from this place physically. However, it will always hold a special part of our hearts.

The Previous Two Days

Yesterday we got to spend time in relaxing and fellowship. We went to church a few blocks down and worshiped in the native language. It was really awesome, especially because there were many worship songs we sing in our own church back home, but obviously in English. The pastor talked about the Lord’s Prayer and asking for God’s Will. We all truly enjoyed the service.

Today, we returned to work at Pedro’s house and finished it up. Many of us are covered in multiple colors of bright paint. We put up walls, painted, cemented a front walk, put in smoother, cement floors and made the place look much better than it did before. Pedro is so very grateful for our accomplishments and can’t wait to move back in the neighborhood. It was truly a blessing to fix his house and create a better living situation for someone so humble as he. The before picture of his house is on the previous blog posting; above is the finished product.

We also returned to the kitchen work for awhile, putting together more rebar and working more on the wall. We will continue working there for much of the rest of the week.

Thanks to all of you out there who are reading this and praying for our safety, health and growth on this journey of ours. We also ask that you pray for this country (Dominican Republic) as it is a country in much need. It has truly become a very special passion in my heart as well as many others on the team!

Renovations

Today we headed into the streets of Los Alcarrizos to begin work on a house for a man named Pedro. It’s falling apart and he was unable to live in it anymore and was forced to live about 3 hours away from his house. We worked on floors, painting inside walls and making cement. It was fun to walk back to camp for lunch, as we were handing out candy to the kids and watching them get such great joy from something so small.
Apparently we have brought Michigan’s rain with us here, because the Dominicans have told us that it has been very dry here and we have brought them rain from up north.
We spent last night doing devotions and talking about our individual experiences. Everyone is really getting a lot out of the experiences here. It’s really cool to see everyday from so many points of view. The “newbies”, Chris, Sherry and Kendra are doing amazing and are absolutely loving it here.
We are having an amazing time. Many of us are praying that we don’t see any spiders…
(To the right is a picture of the house we began renovating today before we started. Hopefully we can get an after picture up here soon!)

Arrived and bueno

Our team arrived into Los Alcarrizos yesterday around 3:30 or so. We caught the plane from Miami to Santo Domingo around noon and got in around 2.
Everyone is doing great and is out working on the kitchen as I write. I however, am sick, so I stayed back to refresh and get ready to work the rest of the week.
We had an opportunity to look around the community last night after we got in. It really gave us a new look at how things are here:

3 Days!!!

Yep, that's right. 3 days until we start making our way to the Dominican Republic. It's hard to believe that the year, months, weeks and days have gone by so quickly. God has truly done some amazing work in our team and in providing for us all along the way. We have made our team's total funds and so much more in order for us to send more funds down for donations and building products for the kitchen.
We simply ask for your prayers as we are heading there, while there, and as we return home in the end as we work to adjust back to life. Pray for safety, traveling mercies and team growth, not only as a team, but as individuals too.
Keep updated with this site! We'll do our best to keep you updated with stories and pictures daily as we're down there.

19 Days!

Our team leaves to Santo Domingo in 19 days! Hard to believe that April is already here and the trip is looming around the corner!
We ask you all for prayers on our trip and in preparation of it. Pray for health of our team members before and during. Prayer for direction is always great too. We appreciate all the financial and spiritual support!

Let me know if you're interested in:
~July 4th art show concession stand. We'd be raising money for the Dominican kitchen and other ministries around the area (HELPS, West Shore Pregnancy Center, etc...). We're looking for at least 6 people who would like to help out with this!

~June 20-21ish. Gus Macker concession stand. Do we want to pursue this fund raising opportunity? It's a lot of work, but fun if everyone works together well, and there are enough people to work it. If you are interested in this, please let me know! Funds would be raised for area ministries!

30 Days

For anyone following this blog yet, I am happy to inform you that our team funds are raised! Donations for purchasing donations for the school and kitchen, however are still happily welcome. We depart now in about 30 days! How exciting it will be to see the work God will be doing down there!

All About This

The purpose of this blog is for you to keep updated with the happenings of the Dominican Republic outreach team! As many of you may know, about nine of us from Mason County Reformed Church are leaving April 23-May 1 to help build a kitchen for a school in Los Alcarrizos, Dominican Republic. It is sure to be a very beneficial project for the hundreds of kids who attend school daily without breakfast, causing their grades to suffer.
Please keep returning to this blog for the next couple months to see how our project is coming along! I will do my best to keep it updated as the trip carries on with words and pictures from our daily progress of the construction and team outreach! We appreciate your support and prayers!