Monday, July 25- Normal morning routine. Up around 8:00am, breakfast, quiet time, small group time and then off to Douglas for the second time. Today I got to help make the kids happy meals when we first got there. We made ham and cheese sandwiches and then put them and a bag of chips, bottle of juice, cookies and some toys in bags for the kids. The kids at Douglas today were at VBS all morning and most of the afternoon so we put the bags in the frig and the kids were able to enjoy them for dinner. After setting up for our lunch and then cleaning things up from lunch I headed outside to do some manual labor. I helped backfill dirt along a wall where the sports court will someday be. To some of you this may sound like a piece of cake, but this was not just dirt. It was muddy and clay like with a bunch of rocks and pieces of cement in it. There were about 5-6 girls working on this one section. Some of us were using picks to chip away at the rocks and cement, some of us were picking up rocks and throwing them into the area we were backfilling and others were actually using shovels to backfill. We worked in this one area for quite a while but it was tons of fun. One of my favorite parts was when we found this huge cement piece that needed to be moved and it took almost all of us to move it, but we did it.
After we finished up our work for the day we got about 45 minutes or so to play with the kids. They had just gotten back from VBS so we face painted, blew bubbles, did crafts and just hung out with them. We then left and headed back to where we stayed for normal evening routine of dinner, showers, worship, debrief and then bed.Tuesday, July 26- Same morning routine and then I was off to Douglas again. This was probably the hardest work day for me the whole week. In the morning I was put on a crew that was responsible for back filling along a cement wall again, but this wall was much bigger and there was a lot more to do.
At moments it felt like we were getting no where, but we continued to plug along with the help and encouragement from others. After lunch I got to help fill buckets full of cement to go along the sports court. This was a lot of fun and again I was able to work with some great friends. After finishing this task it was then time to play with the kids. I had a great time and had found myself looking forward to spending time with these kids. The kids at this home are the ones who never see family. There are normally about 100 kids there during the school year. Most of the kids go home for either the whole summer or parts of it. The 25 kids that were there this week are the ones who don't see family and never get the chance to go home. I really grew to love the kids at this home. My heart just broke for them and I wanted to do all I could to just show them as much love as I could in a week.
So at this point I am half way through the week. I was going to bed every night praying for Daryl, the kids, and those watching the kids. I was surprised at how well I was doing with being away from them all but I knew God was calling me to be in the moment as much as possible and I knew that He was taking care of my family. It also helped to have some good friends on the trip with me. It felt like being at GCC even though we were a few thousand miles away!
