Feliz Natal!

Ah, Christmastime. A time to reflect on God's love for humankind and his faithfulness through the ages. A time to spread joy and cheer in the form of cookies. A time to clean out the various drainage trenches in our yard, since the rains have arrived on schedule.

The past couple months have been mind-bogglingly busy and intensely rewarding. Let's rewind to November 12-15: The annual Spiritual Emphasis Retreat. After school on Thursday, we packed the whole junior high and high school into vehicles and paraded out to camp El Shalom, a beautiful, bucolic setting surrounded by rainforest. Nate Johnson, director of a NICS school in Caracas, Venezuela, was our guest speaker. He did an excellent job. It was great to have some extended time outside the classroom with the students. We had a memorable weekend of social and spiritual refreshment.

November 20: Fun Night. A time-honored tradition at AVA. The gym is transformed into a Chuck E. Cheese-style funhouse, complete with games, cakewalks, and a jail. The theme was The Future; therefore, many things were wrapped in tinf0il. Jill aided the high schoolers in organizing and preparing for the event, which was well-attended and, "Fun," said George.

November 25: Thanksgiving Chapel. Jill organized the high school into an elite army of pastry chefs. Each unit produced potent pans of cinnamon-enhanced heaven, and sold them to the unsuspecting public at the Thanksgiving chapel. Everyone is looking forward to the next chapel. I, Timothy, delivered a devotional; in short, it dealt with the 10 lepers, Sour Patch Kids, and the need for gratefulness.

Our already short staff became shorter. Dennis, our beloved Bible teacher, chaplain, lead HS teacher, etc., suffered a serious back injury in November. This lead to a month and a half of pain and necessitated a trip back to Seattle for surgery. He is now recovering and pain-free, thank the Lord!

Megan, after a convoluted trip fraught with missed and cancelled flights, made it home after 60+ hours of travel. We miss her already.

December 24. Finals are graded, and Christmas break is here. We are relishing the recovery time, catching our breath, and enjoying our holiday traditions. Our hearts go out to all you cold folks in the North, as we amply apply our SPF 45 and head outside to clean up mangoes. 'Course, it doesn't seem right to sweat profusely while rolling out gingerbread. "The cookies seem saltier this year..."

Have an excellent Christmas season.

"And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God Bless Us, Everyone."

Super Hot and Supernova!

"For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in."

Matthew 25:35

It's been so hot lately, we've had the boys take some extra measures to keep hydrated.

This is our first pet with fur! Supernova Snowflake Stewart, born 09-09-09. She is a genuine, purebred Brazilian vira-lata (trashcan tipper) a.k.a. fura-saco (trashbag ripper). She's pretty cute and likes to chew on flip flops.




We had an opportuinty to go see another ministry here in Brazil. We drove out to settlement built around a dump. These people live off of items that other people throw away. Three missionary ladies run a ministry there, reaching out to the impoverished families in the area.
We decided to help out at their kids camp one Saturday. So, a few days ealier, Megan made 303 shaped sugar cookies for them! Over 100 kids showed up that morning! We taught them a new action song, "Get On Board with the Lord", by Jana Alayra.


For our craft and snack, we had them decorate the sugar cookies. We brought vats of frosting, billions of sprinkles, and everyone had fun!

The cookies were so pretty, some couldn't believe they could eat them! Decorating cookies isn't something they have done before. Being able to share sugar and Jesus was a real treat for us. Theses kids live tough lives, full of filth; it was great to help the missionary ladies bring them fun and spread the joy of Jesus.

This little guy in the striped shirt stole our hearts. He was wearing one of Finn's shirts that we donated last spring to the ministry. After showing Finn the picture of him, he said, "Hey, that little boy has my little shirt!!!"
The next weekend brought around the 2nd annual Fire-Eatin Welcome Back party! Even though a quarter had already past, we still hosted the party for the entire staff of AVA. It was a great time full of tacos, hot sauce, and decorations from the States. One of our friends mailed them down, and, boy, was it a breeze setting them up!!!

Peppers from our little fire garden. A few teenagers had the guts to try them, then regret it.

And finally, this chap flew out of the bathroom drain early one morning. Not our favorite way to wake up, but more effective than coffee.

A Month of Fridays

Various events have been taking place on Fridays. The biggest event being Field Day. An entire day in the tropical sun, full of friendly competition, running, sweating, jumping, sweating, throwing, sweating, eating, sweating, cheering, and sweating. George and Megan participated, Tim orchestrated the discus throw and Finn and Jill cheered, took pictures and stayed as sweaty as the participants.

Usually on Friday, Finn's friend Thiago (Chee-Ah-Go) comes over to play. His mom and Finn's mom work on various Brazilian crafts together.

Jill is the administrator for the student council this year. She and 15 high schoolers are planning many of the activites and fund raisiers for the year. "Western Day" was part of the Spirit Week. Always interesting to create costumes out of what we have here. There are no costume stores, huge departments at Wal Mart or used clothing shops. Jill was also the resident french-braider of the day.

Finn had some health issues this month, culminating in many hours in the ER room on a Friday afternoon. He had bronchitis and pneumonia. We thank God we caught it early enough. This climate is rough on the lungs. After various medications and treatments, his breathing was clean and healthy. Just in time to help Tim harvest the red bananas from our tree!

We hunted for the perfect rocks one Friday after school. We scrubbed them down, dried them in the sun, and had fun painting them. They are now used for various door stops around the house.

"HEY...do you want some bread?" As soon as he gets within earshot of our house, Antonio wants to sell us his bread--from his bike! He delivers fresh bread to our door each Friday afternoon.

Stew taught the elementary chapel one Friday morning. All about ants! Jill leads the worship for the K-6th graders two Fridays a month. The kids are learning new songs and new actions, and I think all the them would highly recommend Jana Alayra's music!

So, our eventful Fridays come to a close, but not without try a new food item? Here we have: monster Brazilian green beans!

Cousin Megan & 15 Banana Splits

My (Jill's) cousin, Megan Anderson, has come down to live with us for the next five months! She is a senior in high school and is attending AVA this fall. She has adjusted super well considering all she has experienced in her first three weeks:

Intense Amazon heat, a cockroach in her Q-tip bag, intermittent internet, two rambunctious little boys around, no power and water for hours, walking to and from school many times a day, experiencing traffic, riding the bus (no wimpy task), getting caught in a Amazon downpour, playing soccer with Brazilians, and rooming with a huge spider and ant invasion in her backpack
on the first day of classes.

She stays super busy with classes, teaching English to Brazilians, basket ball, soccer, golf, learning Portuguese, doing all my chores...er...uhm...............

We all have to learn how to hang laundry. Not too long ago I was hanging it all wrong:

Now, it's my turn to teach!Okay...she passed!



We'll get the ice cream and bananas; you bring the toppings!!!! Thirteen 9/10th graders showed up last Friday night for banana splits at our house. It was the first time we ever heard, "Can you give me less ice cream, so I have more room for toppings?" HA! Great round of Pictionary, and getting to know the students.
George came in before school looking all over for his sunglasses, yes, the 80s Ray Ban style that WE wore as kids! He rode to school looking like: Mr. Too-Cool-For-1st-Grade!