Christmas Angels Needed

We have our Christmas list started. We have 36 kids consisting of 28 boys and 8 girls.  I am going to assign each child to a Christmas Angel.  You can pick up an APO box at the post office, fill it with Christmas goodies and mail it to our address. We will wrap the box, carry it to Ebeye and give it to the children for our Angels on Christmas day. Our goal is to have at least one box of Christmas goodies for each child.  For most of these kids, it will be the only Christmas gifts they receive. Tell your friends, family, and classes more details are coming.

 The atmosphere in the Marshall Islands is one of the harshest in the world.  Nothing lasts as long here.  Cars, bicycles, anything made of metal rust out very quickly.  Our post office boxes are metal.  Our box is on the “ocean side”, which means it gets more ocean breeze.  That has caused our box to rust beyond repair.  They have brand new boxes in the works but everything government moves slowly and twice as slowly on an island.  We will be getting another box that should transfer to the installation of the new boxes, (trying to avoid a second number change).

If you have any of these song books, we could use 12 to 24 more.  Everything seems to grow feet and walk away here.  Contact me at, nothertz@gmail.com, if you can send us some and I will give you our address and tell you the least expensive way to mail them.

Pre-Christmas Preparations

We had trouble getting one of our rooms open this morning, but it all worked out in the end.  We were blessed while worshiping our Lord and the kids learned about the first people on this earth.

I know it seems too early to think about Christmas, but we are going to try to do something different this year.  In the past we have had people send boxes of goodies and passed stuff out to the kids. We enjoy sharing with everyone, but somehow one or more of our regular people gets left out and someone who only comes on Christmas day walks out with as much as they can carry.  We have decided this year that I am going to match up a kid (or as many kids as you want) with our Christmas Santa’s.  I will email the information to each person who responds and hopefully a pic of the child (if our dial up slow poke system will allow).  I am hoping for one box of goodies specifically for each child. 

Last year Kwajalein had a whole load of Christmas goodies go to Wake Island.  This year I plan on everyone mailing your Christmas blessings no later than Thanksgiving week.  That will allow us to make sure we get everything in plenty of time and allow Lee and I to carry it over to Ebeye. In the past, Lee and I used a cart we loaded up every week between Thanksgiving and Christmas.  This year, we have a new ferry with more narrow doors to pass through.  That will make it harder to carry large loads of boxes to Ebeye.

We are taking attendance through Sept. and Oct.  No attendance, no Christmas.  I saw a few kids today I had not seen for a while. :)  Meanwhile, they are learning more of God’s word every week.

Stay tuned while we work on gathering information on the kids.  Remember it is always 86 degrees here.  It is a good time to get summer clothes on clearance in the states. Tell your class, church, or friends to keep watching for the week when we will start.

God's Word is the Same

This is a part of the Ebeye public school kindergarten court yard. 

 We feel blessed to be able to borrow two of their rooms every week for our church services.

The air conditioning was broke in the kids class room.  It was cooler to move outside under the eave.  The kids did not care, they are used to it. The message of God's word was the same.

Sweet!

We got all our ducks in a row today .and were able to use plan A. Sweet!  God has blessed us with several visitors at church lately. 

Thank you to Dean and Becky Lightfoot for some school supplies and to Gina Blankinship for some little girls cloths.  The kids were blessed to start the school year with new cloths and school supplies.

FLEXIBLE

The internet to the houses was down all week end.  I had to go to the food court to get my blog to come up.  We got into another class room for our kids class at church. The taxi’s were not running to Gugeegue again because most of them do not a spare tire.  There were two garages in Ebeye and both have closed down.  That gives anyone with a flat tire or repair no way to get it changed or fixed.  We did not get to use our usual room.

You have to be flexible out here.