Back in Brasilia and STRAIGHT TO WORK!!

Well, after some really rough travels... We arrived back in Brasilia. We had to fly separately a week apart for several different reasons. As soon as Chris arrived back "home" he headed straight to work!! We had a work team of 19 come from Pennsylvania to help with the new school! What a Blessing they were!!! Chris worked 12 hour days, painting, cleaning, spackling, sanding, everything!!! Caleb and I arrived a week later. We took a couple of days rest because Caleb didn't need to be at the construction site... and that is definitely what it was!! Our first week of inservices, ALL THE TEACHERS AND STAFF spent painting! By the end of the week, we were all experts!! :) We even had names for each other... the "Massa Master!" (Massa = the Brazilian name for Spackle), "The SAND MAN", "Roller Girl!" and many others!! :) It's truly amazing to see the difference. Here are some pics of the Work being done. I'll post some before and after in the next post!

The New School is such a HUGE BLESSING! God is simply Amazing!! At first, Many thought that our new school was TOO BIG for us! That we didn't need that much space... APPARENTLY the Lord agreed... we found out after we signed our long term lease... that 3 of the HUGE Buildings were now illegal! They had been built under a different code... so we had to TEAR THEM DOWN!!! Our "TOO BIG" school, then became "JUST RIGHT!" Sounds like the 3 Bears, huh!??! We started school on August 14th, and thankfully they were only half days... because we didn't have RUNNING WATER! Chris had a BLAST (umm.. not really) walking all the little kids outside to the PORTA-POTTIES!! Every single child said "How do we flush!!" Priceless!!! BUT... by the 3rd day of school.. the FIRST FULL DAY, we had lots of great water!!! Well... we are now fully into our new school... and while there is still MUCH to be done... Like more painting, finishing the library, BATHROOM STALL DOORS...etc... it's still so amazing to look at see what the LORD has done!! HE TOTALLY GETS ALL THE CREDIT!!