Sleepover at the orphange!

Kelli doing what she does best at a church right next to the orphange. After dinner we walked to this church so the girls could practice a dance they were performing for the congregation.

Jessi reading, or better put, attempting to read Isaiah 53:5 in Portuguese to the girls in their bedroom.

Jessi with some of boys during dinner.

Kelli and all the girls she braided!!

First of all we want to thank you agian and again for all your prayers! They are much needed and much appreciated! We desire to be the hands and feet of our Lord and savior and sometimes doing that can be tricky. However, we felt that our sleepover at the orphange was exactly where God wanted us to be. I, Jessi, am excited to share about our experience there.

"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."

James 1:27

This is one of the little girls from Lily of the Valley Orphange.

We know that God has a special place in his heart for orphans, so the opportunity to love them, serve them, and just spend time with them was very exciting for us. We hopped on a bus with Marconi and Kelita to the city of Macaiba, which is only about 40min. away. Once we arrived in Macaiba we went to the local meat shop and bought a few plastic bags full of meat to take to the orphange, as providing food for 33 children continues to be a daily challenge. We got to the orphange just in time for dinner and were greeted with open arms, excited kids, and a large plate of cus cus with bread, and coffee. After dinner we took our stuff to the girls house and Mother Kika (the lady that lives with and cares for all the girls) showed us to her room which she gave up for us to stay in. The room was extremely small and filled with all different kinds of things that probably had no other place to be stored. Eventhough the room was relatively under sized, we were amazed at this womans selflessness in giving up her space to two complete strangers. We continue to marvel at the way Brazilians have mastered the art of hospitality. It's incredible and it is something I hope we both take back with us when we leave.

Later that night we watched a movie, in the girls house and giggled as we all attempted to communicate with each other. As the girls began to fall asleep Kelli and I decieded to go into Kika's room and get a good night sleep as well. Kelli took the bed and I crawled in the hammock that was hung up just for our stay. Not two minutes passed before I heard something crawling on the plastic bags in the corner next to me. I looked over and sure enough there was a insect (sized classified as a animal according to Kelli) crawling up this plastic bag toward the feet-end of my hammock. It had long tenticle-things coming out of it's forehead and wings! It started to flap those things and buzz around the room. I threw both sides of the cloth hammok over my body and demanded Kelli attack that thing. We found our selves in a predicament...we had no shoes, no weapons, no nothing except our hands. So as soon as that sucker craweled inside one of the plastic bags in the corner Kelli started to punch it. She gave it everything she had, to find out that it didn't even seem to effect that monster. She grabbed a broom, as I continued to cheer her on from under my sheet, and tried to stab it with the handle end. It escaped in the pile of stuff up against the wall and the last prayer I said before I went to bed was "God please don't let that thing get me."

Kelli attacking the unknown creature!!

The following morning we woke up, had breakfast, and went back to the girls house for devotionals. Kika told us that they do devotionals everyday after breakfast. They go around the room and take turns reading though a chapter in the bible, they sing songs, and then conclude with prayer. Kika is such a blessing to these girls, please pray that God would continue to encourage her work as she has given her life to loving these children. Later in the day we played volleyboy with some of the older boys and some dodge ball type game, that I don't think either Kelli or I fully understood. We just kept running from the ball in fear that it might hurt to get hit. We watched another movie later that day with the girls and Kelli braided their hair. We played tick tack toe, and other similiar type games with the kids until it was time for dinner. After eating, a majority of the kids asked us to write notes in their journals, eventhough they wouldn't be able to read or understand them since they don't know english. One of those boys showed me his journal with all the notes he had from various visitors and I then realized they justed wanted to have something to remember us by. So we wrote letter after letter that described Gods love for them and that he was the one who brought us there to be with them. We exchanged email addresses and before we knew it Marconi was there to pick us up. It was tuff having to leave them, but we believe that they are at a very good orphange. Everybody that works there seems to love these kids very much and all the children apprear to be really happy. However, they still need our prayers. Pray that God will provided families for them, prosperous futures, and guidance into his will for each of their lives. To find our more about them you can visit their website at: http://www.orfanatoliriodovale.com.br

We love you all very much! Please continue to pray that God will reveal himself to us while we are here and that we will be led by him in everything we do. Thank you so much for all your love and support.
-TEAM KJ

P.S. As I just read this over with Kelli she asked if you all would please pray for her cold. She is not feeling well and wants to be %100, exspecially while she is here.