Boyd Bear Tracks

I thought that title might grab your attention! :-) Seeing as a lot of you are really cold right now.

I´m sitting here typing in the heat of Girardot (Not to mention being bitten by gnats! Better go grab the bug spray!). This week we´re at a conference for the ABWE missionaries from all of Spanish speaking South America. It´s been great to see a lot of people we met at candidate class and along the way in our missionary journey :-). I´ve already been refreshed and blessed and we just began this morning! I´m beginning to see the benefit of stepping back and looking at the whole picture every once in a while :-), instead of just bogging down in the "everyday". Some people are just slow learners (who might that be?). I think I´ve read about, and heard this truth several times; but it´s not until I actually do it that I remember how beneficial it is!

We´re still slogging away at school when we have the time (not a very pretty picture word, huh?). I´ve tried to keep on schedule but it´s been hard with all that´s been happening. However, I am confident that, if nothing else comes up, we will finish before July! Only to start in August with 2 students!

On that note (all that´s been happening) we have finally completed our move! We are officially Chigueños now (I think that´s what they say :-)--it sounds like we´re in Mexico instead of Colombia). We finally turned in our old house on Saturday and then left Sunday afternoon to come to the conference.

The kids are doing well. Lucas is reading very well now and can write sentences fairly clearly too (I mean that he can spell a lot of words on his own).

Ellie is my little helper and is always reminding me of things that are out of place or things I asked her to remind me of. It´s pretty cute! During our move, I threw a bunch of hangers in a garbage bag and then just threw the bag in her room to deal with later. She took the time during "rest time" to organize all the hangers by color--hers, Lucas´, and ours. It was sweet that she wanted to organize them for me! :-)

Lucas is what we call a "boyscout", --always out to put everything in it´s place. If he decides that it´s morning and the sun should come in, he opens the curtains. If he sees a spider in the house, he´s got to kill it. This quality would be nice, but sometimes when he´s supposed to be doing something else and gets focused in on what is "out of place" it´s not such a beneficial quality :-). I wonder who he takes after . . .? :-)

We don´t have internet access right now, and it may be awhile. So, I may not update my blog very frequently for a while (some of you are asking yourselves "What´s the change?"--I know, I know! Once a month is probably not enough information :-)).

Anyway, thank you for your prayers for our move and the settling in. Now, please pray that in this last year we could build relationships with our neighbors and strengthen our relationships with people in our church. This last is hard for me to ask, seeing as we´ll be leaving them in a year. My tendency is to "distance" myself as I know a "goodbye" is approaching. I don´t want to do that this time. Instead, I want to leave them with the confidence that I love them, appreciate them, and want to keep ties with them. But, it will be emotionally difficult, I know. I don´t think goodbyes ever get easier. But, I know that God will help me through this as He has with so many other things. Thank you for your part in upholding us in prayer!