Happy Mother's Day!

I pray that each of you Moms out there had a wonderful Mother's Day! I got a beautiful e-card from Mandie, a very sweet email from Lexi, and Ashley and Teddy brought me breakfast in bed, I got a special "homemade" card from Teddy and a nice present from them.

Last week, was very busy as I prepared for the special Reception for all the ladies at 9:30 yesterday morning. We had 42 ladies present for the reception. Everyone seemed to really enjoy themselves. It was a blessing to see their enjoyment! It made all the effort worth it! :-) I served, fresh fruit salad, mini cinamon rolls and mocha bars. We also had tea, coffee or juice to drink. Ashley helped me make the mocha bars. We did all the baking Saturday morning, so things would be fresh. Ashley was also a big help at the reception, keeping all the serving platters full and hot water and juice ready. I am so thankful for her and her hard work.

Then in the preaching service we had one of the men give a special reading in honor of Mother's day and another sang 2 specials. We also recognized all the mothers, (there were 35 present in the church service). After church we took pictures of each of the mothers with her family. Next week we will hand out the pictures.

The children also made special cards for their mothers during Sunday School. We ended up with 90 in Sunday School and 99 in church.

Pictures from our April photo album...

Teddy's Superman Birthday. April 5
Teddy and his friend Samy at his Birthday Dinner.


Terrilyn Kadle and Barb Tooley came to visit us for Easter. It was great fun to have them with us for a few days.

The table is set for Easter Dinner. We enjoyed having a houseful of company Easter Sunday.



The Ecuadorian Pastor's Wives Retreat is always a highlight of my year. Here I am teaching Friday evening.


Here is a group picture of all the ladies that participated in the retreat. April 26-28


Here (l to r) Lois Tignor, myself, Sharon Smith and Sylvia Wells are showing off our new bags that the Ladies gave us to say, "Thank you for the retreat!"


Teddy enjoyed helping gather oranges for the ladies at the retreat.


Here Teddy is sitting in front of the property we are in the process of purchasing for the church here in Manta. April 30

Prayer Please...

We woke up yesterday morning to emails, telling us that our son-in-law, Mike Lewis, had an emergency apendectomy Monday, which was Sunday night for us...(I still have a hard time keeping the days and times straight between us and Korea!) He is doing fine now, recovering in the hospital. Please pray for his continued recovery and for our daughter Mandie.

Weekly Update

How are each of you this fine week? We had a great week-end. After working a couple days to get the downstairs apartment cleaned up and set up, we were able to use it Sunday morning for the Ladies Class and our youngest children's class. This week we will be starting a new class for children, in which the youngest children, through age 3 will be separted from our 4 to 6 year olds. That should help those teachers a great deal! Please pray as this means that we are having to add 3 more workers to our children's ministry. It is exciting to see how the Lord is blessing this work though!

Sunday morning we had 69 in Sunday School and 76 in church. We had a young family visit for the first time. Please pray for Xavier and Cecila.

This week we are gearing up for a special Mother's Day reception, that we will have for all the ladies at 9:30, Sunday morning, and then of course we will be doing special things to honor all the mothers present in the church service. Then on the 20th in the afternoon, we will be having our first Wedding Shower! Melanie and Luis will be getting married on June 15th. This is the first young couple to be getting married from our church.

Thank you so much for your prayers and support of our ministry here in Manta!
Joy