Sunset July 30, 2008

Here's little Leonardo again, from Villa Mendoza, the first village we visited on the Xingu mission. Last night one of the full time missionary families, the Kubackis, came to speak to our youth group. Their oldest son Luke commented that coming home to the US after being in Brazil for 2 years has allowed him to see one major difference between our culture and theirs. They are very happy with very little and we are very unhappy with very much. I thought this picture was a great illustration of that. This little guy is beaming and having a blast scooping water out of a canoe with an old can. We watched him and his little friend laugh and play all morning with that can and some fishing line, bare naked on the beach and in the water. Something to think about...

Another one from Brazil. I like the blues and the
texture in this one.

This is a stray guy who now lives at my parents' house.
He is soooo sweet. Right after I took this picture I sat
on the deck with him. He climbed into my lap, buried
his head in my arm and fell asleep. It breaks my heart
that I can't take them all in.

Have to be fair and balanced, two of Charlie, two of Lucy. Isn't she beautiful?

Playing with pictures tonight... Charlie looking soft and sweet. lol

Charlie being Charlie, sleeping, sleeping, sleeping. At least he's not growling, hissing or biting!
He loves his "Hegenberger" chair!

My Lucy watching the birds, rabbits and squirrels in the back yard, wondering why she's not allowed out to play with them... :o(
Poor baby. Pardon the nose marks on the window...

Playing with some of the photos of the missionary kids in Brazil. Hannah and Maddie.

Amanda

Hezekiah

This little girl and her mom spent some time with us on the boat in Espirit de Santo. Cassie spent some time trying to get her to draw. She was very shy but opened up a little bit after some time and after some other kids joined in.

Loading the water filters onto the rowboat is a heavy balancing act. Ben is scooping water out of the filter and boat, Zeke is steadying the boat and Eliazondo will pull the filter into the boat as Richie and others push it from inside the Maranatha III. You can see the toll it takes on the boat's paint job. They loaded 3 filters, the hand truck, enough gravel, sand and rocks for each filter and 5 people into the rowboat for this particular delivery!! To learn about eh water filters go to thirstrelief.org.

Isn't this water lily pad beautiful? I think it looks like a heart. This was taken at the Belem Zoo. We spent an afternoon there during our 3 day lay over waiting for a flight to Altamira. Our time was not wasted, we met 3 young boys who followed us around all day. We got to share with them and they got to laugh at our bad Portuguese.

We couldn't dock at Mapardacia (not sure about the spelling, sorry). So, we anchored off the shore and took the rowboat to the village. This is the first bunch on their way being led by Clyde and Kevin.

This is one of the first pictures I took from the Maranatha III just after we left from Victoria.