Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas and Feliz Navidad! Wow. To express thankfulness for all Christ did for me coming down as a baby is impossible. I am so incredibly thankful for the love of my Savior, that "God so loved the world that He sent His one and only Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life." I, a sinful creature, can have eternal life. Not only that, I have the presence of my God with me all the time! What greater gift is there than that! What a wonderful God I know and serve! John 3:16 was my third graders' memory verse this past week. I absolutely LOVED hearing them say those words, the words that tell us God loved us enough to send His Son down to die for us. It was amazing having them explain to me what that means and how we can get to heaven. I so often take for granted all that my Savior did for me! May this year be truly different. May I live each and every day in awed reverence of what My Savior did for me all those years ago. My students were amazed that Jesus came over 2000 years ago. Yet the offer he gave 2000 years ago still stands today. Wow.

Christmas this year has been different. My family was able to come down and visit me here in the DR. They spent last week at the beach while I taught. They came down and met my students last Thursday. To say my students enjoyed it was an understatement! Eric played some games with them, and my family also did a craft with them. I loved showing my family my life down here. I was able to go spend time with them last weekend at the beach before we all came down here. What a beautiful country I live in! I was able to go surfing--yes, surfing over Christmas. I am used to going skiing in the snow, not surfing in the ocean! It was great. My dad, brother, and I also had the experience of going to a Dominican baseball game. Boy was it different than any other game I have ever been to! Let's just say I should have worn earplugs! A group of guys were playing the drums and horns and ended up sitting right behind us for a few innings. Trying to talk to each other was impossible! Santiago's team won, and it was a great experience, despite the noise.

The night my parents came in, we had an SCS teacher and staff banquet. Amanda, my roommate, and I had dresses made for it. It was nice to get all dressed up and celebrate Christmas together. I also was invited to one of my student's houses for a Christmas party. They have one every year for all the teachers who have or have had their children. The whole extended family has children at SCS. Paul was so excited for me to come! I was a little late, and he was out pacing the balcony waiting for me. Every time the bell rang, he would run and see if it was me! I love that my students still think it's exciting to hang out with their teachers. We played a couple card games and Battleship. It's neat seeing my students outside of school.

My family left this morning, and I already miss them a lot. I am so glad they could come see my life down here in the DR. I can't wait to see them again in another 6 months. It seems so far away! My friend from Emmaus, Katie, is coming tomorrow to spend time with me. I am excited to see her and show her around this beautiful place!

Today, and every day, may you stand continually amazed at the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. He is the reason we can have hope! My prayer is that each and every one of you will know the hope of the risen Savior! Merry Christmas!

Life

Hello to my blog readers. I do not know if anyone even checks this anymore, since I struggle to update it. Hopefully I will get better at updating! As I sit here in the 70 plus degree weather it's hard to remember that Christmas is coming. The Christmas music I am listening to doesn't seem to fit. I am excited that Christmas is near. I love this time where we sing and talk about and meditate on the birth of Jesus. What a wonderful gift! God has given me several other gifts recently that have reminded me how amazing he is.

Gift 1: A voice! This is really made me realize that everything I am, everything I have, and everything I do is totally and completely His. He can take away and He can give back. I have been able to talk since Tuesday. It has been nice. I also realized that sometimes it's better not to talk because what I say is not necessary. Hopefully I will remember that.

Gift 2: Being back in the classroom. I missed my kids so much! Though they sometimes drive me up the wall, I love them. I have received about a billion hugs the last couple days, even from my little boys! They are sunshine to me. I hope each and every one of them come to know my amazing Savior. Please pray that God would open their hearts.

Gift 3: My parents and brother are coming TODAY! I can't believe it is already December 13th! That day has been in my head for months as the day my parents come. It's hard to realize that that is now.

Gift 4: My friend Katie is coming the day after my parents leave. I will only have to spend one night alone here. Wow. I am excited to show her around and relax with her.

Gift 5: Grace. I love that God shows me grace each and every day. Praise the name of Jesus! I am so grateful for the gift of His Son! I pray that you will feel His grace today.

Blessed be the Name of the Lord

Wow. It's been a long time since I've posted. Sorry about that. I am afraid this is going to be a rather long post to get you caught up on all the happenings around here. I know some of you are dying to see pictures, so I will try to post a lot.

Let's see, where to even start? Well, the last time I posted I said I had my voice back. What a blessing to get it back! I was able to go back into the classroom, which was a huge blessing. I couldn't talk very loud, so my kids had to learn how to listen. They did a great job! They learned to listen as soon as I said something and not to talk when I was talking. I should have thought of training them that way at the beginning of the year! Lessons for next year I guess. I did try, but since they had to listen, I think that really helped. About two weeks ago, I got a cold. My voice started to get scratchy and I was a little nervous. By a week ago Saturday, my cold was gone but my voice was still scratchy. I started to get a little more nervous, and so on Monday I talked to the nurse at the school, Linda, and she said she would take me to the doctor. So she called the doctor and we headed out, only to get there and find out he had already left for the day. He asked us to come back the next day, Tuesday. My rommate Amanda and I were hoping I would go there and he would laugh at me for coming back and say it was just a cold. Unfortunately, there was no laughing at the doctor on Tuesday. He looked down my throat and saw another nodule. Last time there were two, but this time there's only one, but it is way bigger than last time. He said it was not the same ones but was really fast for another one to come, since it had not even been 4 weeks since the last ones disappeared. He said there might be an infection in my throat, but he doesn't know. So I am on vocal rest again for two weeks, which means once again I can't teach. I am a little frustrated at this point, but i am hoping it will go away quickly and i will get to go back to my kids in a week and a half. Thankfully part of my silent time has been over Thanksgiving break, so I don't have to miss that time with my kids.

I've been thinking a lot lately about the song, "Blessed be the Name of the Lord." My kids sing it and do motions for it too. That song has a special place in my heart, as it was very dear to a friend who died of cancer last year. I've been thinking of the line, "You give and take away." The Lord sure does give and take away, and I am thankful that what He has taken from me is not as big as it could be. I am glad He has given me a voice for the past 21 years. I can only imagine what it would be like to never be able to talk. This has made me all the more thankful for the voice I have had. I can still say, "Blessed be the name of the Lord!"

I haven't posted much about life around here lately. It's exciting, crazy, interesting, funny, hard, good, busy, and so much more all rolled into one. I sure have some funny stories! I am enjoying getting to know my 21 busy third graders more. We have had a lot of fun in class. They love to laugh, move, dance, and draw! That class could draw all day long, and if you know me, you know I'm horrible at drawing! Some, or probably most, are better than me. Here's a class picture we took on "Jean Day" when they are allowed to be out of uniform.
And here is my class being their true selves!
In the last few weeks, we have been studying about Native Americans. They had a ton of fun making Southwest pueblo houses out of cardboard that came from between the dishes I bought. It was so good for me to see them get excited about such a simple craft! Some of my friends also sent me pictures of what the SW looks like, which they loved. Thanks guys! My kids' favorite part was that the pueblos didn't have doors and you often had to go in through a hatch in the roof. They had fun making that, as you can see!


Because we were studying about Native Americans, we just HAD to have a feast for Thanksgiving, even though the third graders didn't last year. I was supposed to be on vocal rest for it, but I asked my doctor if I could at least talk through the party, since I went to him the night before, and he said yes! It was bittersweet--I was glad I could talk but sad that it would be my last time with my kids for a while. Here is my class writing down three things they are thankful for:
And of course, you have to have one Native American trying to stab another one!
And the Indian chief with his princess!
I had quite a few moms come in and help. Here is one, who is Dutch, helping my girls with the art project. Yay for moms who are good at that kind of thing!
And the finished project--a turkey puppet! Lesson learned--paper bags are impossible to find here, so bring them down with you!


In November, we had been collecting food for a food drive. On Monday, the third and fourth grade classes had the chance to take their food to the people who would receive it. It is a great thing for my very rich kids to see poverty, which they do not see almost at all, though they are surrounded by it. My kids will pray for the poor people, and we are trying to help them see that they can do something about it too. I told them that some people don't have enough food to eat 3 meals a day and they may only get one every other day or less, and they were shocked. Please pray that these kids who have a ton of material possessions would be willing to help! Here are some of the kids waiting to hand out their food bags.
After our party on Wednesday, Amanda, the nurse Linda, and I set out for the Caribbean side of the island, about five hours away, to spend our Thanksgiving break. No snow for us! Be prepared to be jealous! On Thursday, we took a catamaran out to this island called Isla Saona. I didn't think places like that existed--clear greenish bluish water, white sand beaches, palm trees...the works! It was gorgeous! What a way to spend thanksgiving! Though I couldn't talk, I was reminded of all the things I do have to be thankful for. Not having a voice is nothing compared to all my blessings. Here is where we spent Thanksgiving:
My mom likes to send me crazy things in the mail, as you all probably know. This time, I received a little stuffed turkey that makes noise! Of course, he had to come to the island with us on Thanksgiving. Here he is, in the sun with me!
We had pizza for Thanksgiving dinner at a little Italian place. I had a pie left over from our feast that we wanted to eat for dessert. Unfortunately, we didn't have any utensils to cut or eat it with. But when it's Thanksgiving, and you really want apple pie, you think of a solution!
I've never had pie circles cut with a glass before! It was great though.

Here is a picture of Amanda, me, and Linda at this beautiful art school we stopped at on Friday. This country is gorgeous!
Most of you probably remember that my mom sent me a rubber chicken in the mail that was bound and gagged. She seems to think it was prophetic, since he couldn't talk, and shortly after receiving him, I lost my voice. I finally ungagged him, so hopefully that will be prophetic too! Here we are, both not able to talk!
There has been some funny stories that have resulted from not being able to talk. On the boat on Thursday, one of the Dominican guys who was working for a resort and taking pictures for the tourists kept asking if we spoke English. I was carrying a notebook to write down what I had to say, and he saw it and was like, "That's English. Let me see!" So he starts looking at it. I was sitting in the aisle with Amanda on one side and a lady across the aisle on the other side of me. Linda was next to the lady. As he was looking at my notebook, Linda said, "She can't talk." Then the random lady said, "She's deaf!" Amanda and I got a huge laugh out of that as Linda proceeded to explain to her that I am in fact NOT deaf!

Another funny thing happened today. Amanda can't speak Spanish, and I can't speak at all, so it's interesting going places together. We needed to go to the store today, so we walked over to it. All went well until we tried to check out. I checked out no problem, and then it was Amanda's turn. Things were going okay until something funny happened to the computer and the checker didn't notice, so she thought she was ringing things in and wasn't. Here we are, I can't speak and Amanda doesn't know the language, trying to explain to the lady that some of her things didn't ring in! The lady behind us thought she understood, but totally didn't, so then they were trying to take other items off her bill! The item she tried to take off we finally convinced her that we wanted it, and I tried writing down that some of our other things didn't ring up, but they never figured it out! So we ended up leaving the store, being forced to steal things! We tried to tell them, but it didn't work!. We left and busted up laughing in the middle of the parking lot. I have now seen someone be forced to steal something!

I will try to also post a movie on here for the first time. This is at our Thanksgiving meal. Both third grades were in my room, and while they were working on their puppets, I turned on a cd with songs they sing in chapel. They started to sing along, especially to, "Our God is an Awesome God." It almost made me cry seeing these third graders worshipping God while working. Most of them don't hear anything about Him at home. I love that they are learning about Him at school, and that I get to share in that!
Okay, I tried posting the video, and it didn't work. It was "uploading" all night, but never came through. Do any of you bloggers have any advice on how to do that?

Our God truly is awesome! I am so glad that I know Him and can share Him with others! I love being here, and I am so glad that my parents and my brother are coming on the 13th. It will be good to see them and have them get a taste of my life here. My friend Katie is coming on the 26th, and I am so excited for her to come too! I am hoping to go explore some orphanages with her. I haven't been able to do that yet, and it's killing me.

Please be praying that my voice would heal completely and quickly and that this is the last time I ever hear the word "nodules" again. that would make me unbelievably happy! Pray for my kids too. The sub is going to be the same one they had before, so that's good. Pray that God would open their eyes and show them their incredible need for him. You can join me in praising Him for all His blessings. He truly is awesome, and I can say, "Blessed be the name of the Lord!"

A Voice!

I just wanted to let everyone know that I can talk now! I went to the doctor on Thursday and he said my vocal chords are 98% better. There is still some irritation on them, but he said as long as I am careful they will be fine. I am going to be able to teach tomorrow. Please pray that my kids would learn to listen, as I won't be able to talk very loud. Hopefully I will be able to use a headset mike that is portable as well. It has been strange talking again. I enjoy silence a lot more now. Sometime soon I will post some of the things God taught me during this time. Please pray that I would continue to remember all the lessons I learned. Thanks for the prayers!

Things You Can Do Without a Voice

I am finding out there is a lot you can do without talking! I have now not talked for almost two weeks. It's crazy to think that it has been that long. I am hoping that my vocal cords will be great in a week so that I can talk!I am finding out that there is a lot you can do without a voice though. Just to give you a little idea of the things you can do...I have found that you can...
-Communicate with your roommates and others. One day I need to video record it. It often involves lots of crazy motions on my part and guessing on the other's part, or a pad of paper and a pen. I am getting fast at writing things down, and my roommate Amanda is going to be the best charade player on the continent!
-Go to the beach! A group of nine of us took the bus to Sosua, a beach on the Atlantic Coast, for the day on Saturday. It was a very good and restful time. The beach is so beautiful! The water is warm and I probably shouldn't tell you that we were hot! It was in the 80s at least. Amanda and I didn't appreciate the ride back as much--two guys from across the aisle stared at us the whole time!
-Barter with a store owner! Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I can barter and get the owner to agree to my price without talking! You're probably not too surprised :). Amanda and I found a painting we really liked while we were at the beach. We decided we only wanted to pay 500 pesos for it, which is like 15 dollars. Paintings are cheap here! She doesn't speak Spanish, so we grabbed another teacher, Christine, to help us. The first price he said was 1,500 pesos, which is like 45 dollars. Christine bargained for a while while I was just shaking my head. The lowest he would go was 1,200. I eventually took out the 500, which is the only money we had on us, and showed him that was all we had. By that point, Christine stopped talking and let me take it. He kept telling other prices but I just shook my head and showed him the money. We started to walk out, which usually does the trick. He still didn't want to give it to us, but I wouldn't back down. And in the end, I was victorious! It was great! Now I can say I bought my first painting without saying a word!
-Take a taxi by yourself. Now, before you get all worried about me, let me tell you that my roommate Robin had already called the taxi and told him where I wanted to go, I know him, and he had taken me there before. So no worries!
-Go to church by yourself, where you are already the only white person. Once again, no worries. Robin had called my friend I met there and told her I wanted to come and to please meet me. She was also going to call the taxi to pick me up. I started to get a little worried when she didn't show. I probably looked funny just sitting there, not even trying to sing. Thankfully, she got there about an hour and a half late. She translated for me and called the taxi.
-Do the teacher stare. I went to school today for the first time in over a week. Obviously, I can't teach, so I spent most of my time helping in the library. When kids in there were not being quiet and obeying, I gave them my best teacher stare, and it worked! I even did it on my own kids when they were in the library and it worked on them too! So you don't need a voice to remind students to obey!
-Talk on the phone. This one is a little more challenging, and I only did it once with our neighbor who can see me from her window. She wanted to know if I needed a ride to Bible Study. I motioned to her and she confirmed what my motions meant. It must have been quite a site, especially since it is still across the block. The buildings between us are low, but I am sure others could see us motioning to each other with the phones in our hands!
-Pray, read, and rest. Hmm, those things are pretty self-explanatory. My body has definitely needed this time to slow down. I guess God needed to get my attention to remind me to rest, and He sure did!

Well, there is a little update on my life as a mute person. I would love to hear from you readers out there, as my only real communication right now is written. I am sure I will have more stories soon enough. I am going back to the doctor sometime this week, so we will see what he says. Thanks for being interested!

ONE WEEK!

I have officially gone one week without talking at all! I did not know that was possible for me :). It has been a challenge but also a good reminder. It has taught me to sit still and listen. I am learning more about words. Words have such power. There are so many words that come out of my mouth that don't need to. Not being able to have any words come out of my mouth has been a good wakeup call. I have been reminded that I don't need to say a lot of what I do. Hopefully I will remember that lesson when I can speak again!

It has been weird to not be around my students all week. I got the cutest email from one of my little boys today, saying, "I want that you get well soon because I love you with all my heart." It almost made me cry. I miss them so much! I have been able to rest though, and that has been good for me. I am not very good at slowing down, so this has forced me to do so!

I am getting really good at writing quickly, and my roommates are getting better at reading my motions. I don't know if I am necessarily better at charades, or if they are just getting better at knowing what I am trying to say! I spend a lot of time during the day by myself, enjoying the presence of my Creator. It has been really good for me. I also have had time to read and work on other projects.

Thank you to all who have been praying for me. Please continue to pray that my vocal cords would heal quickly and that I would be able to talk again soon. I miss teaching! I go back to the doctor next week. I have felt your prayers--thank you!

No talking, day 3

Well, I guess I should give you an update on this whole "no talking" thing. It has been almost 48 hours since I was told I can't talk anymore. I found out on Thursday night. Last time I wrote, there were a lot of unknowns. There still are, but not as many. The school found a sub who will take my class for the next three weeks. She used to work at the school as a sixth grade teacher, so she will be great. I met with her and the other third grade teacher to get her up to speed, as much as I could without a voice :). My kids did well with her yesterday, so that's really good. The school wants me to take an entire week where I don't come to school at all. Part of this is stress induced, so they want me to lower my stress levels as much as possible. After that, I may be there doing other things at the school that don't involve talking, we will see. Katie, the lady who is subbing for me, will be handling my parent/teacher conferences on Thursday. Pray for her as she just met the kids yesterday! I will be writing stuff out for her. I have no idea what I will be doing next week, but i do know I will be trying to rest! It is definitely strange not being able to talk! My roommate Amanda and I will challenge you to charades in about three weeks. We will win! She is already getting good at figuring out what I am trying to say. I try to keep paper with me or my computer. Thanks for your prayers. Please keep praying for patience in this and also that my throat would heal. Thanks so much!

Challenges and Blessings

Well, first of all, sorry for not posting in a long time. Life has been crazy, and it just got crazier. I have mentioned before that my students talk all the time, and I think I said that my voice was not very strong because of it. It has been bad for almost seven weeks now. I can't really talk loud or change pitch or sing. The last few days, my chest started to hurt too. The nurse at the school started getting concerned so we went to the doctor today. Before going, someone told me I may have to go on complete vocal rest for one week, so I was trying to mentally prepare for that. At the doctor, he stuck a camera in my mouth and looked down my throat at my vocal chords. I didn't want to look, but the nurse who was with me, Linda, was able to see my vocal chords on a TV screen. Technology amazes me! Well, from the camera, he saw two nodules on my vocal chords, one on each side. For those of you like me that have no idea what that means, basically, there are two bumps on my vocal chords that are very bad. If they don't go away, it could require surgery. So, the doctor has ordered complete vocal rest for THREE WEEKS! I cannot talk for at least three weeks, which means no teaching. At this point, that all hasn't sunk in. I still can't believe I can't say anything for that long. Please pray that my vocal chords would heal so that I don't have to get surgery. They should go away with rest. For those of you who know me, you will know that it will be very hard for me not to talk for that long! Please pray for my kids as well as they will have a sub for quite a while. I found all this out today after school, so they don't even know yet.

Other than that whole mess, life here is crazy but good. I have been able to do a few fun things, like jump off and slide down waterfalls. That was quite the experience! It was absolutely beautiful. My students are chatty (obviously!) but so cute. I have seen an intense interest in Spiritual things. Please pray that God would open their hearts and that they would all enter a real relationship with Him that will last. I was able to try out a church I really liked the last two weeks. Last week I went by myself! I probably won't be able to go for a while since I can't talk, but we will see.

On the funny side of things, my mom sent me a rubber chicken in the mail! Those who know my mom won't be shocked. It was so funny to get a bound and gagged rubber chicken in the mail! Maybe it can talk for me :) Life has truly been good, though it is tough at times, and will now get tougher. Please pray that everything would work out for my students. I also don't have enough sick days at work, so we are not sure what will happen there. I know the Lord will work everything out, it will just be finding out what that will look like. Thanks for the prayers and I will try to post an update with pictures soon!

The Craziness of Life

Well, I'm sitting here in my room getting nothing done, so I thought I would update my blog. Always a good thing to do when you're distracted, right? :) I am leaving to go to a student's house for dinner in about an hour, so I have some time to kill.

Where to even start? We are in our sixth week of school here at Santiago Christian School. My kids are starting to get a little more used to the way I do things. The problem is, sometimes I don't know how I do things! It's coming together though. We play a lot of games in my classroom (learning ones of course), and they love that! One of my boys always asks if we can play "Math around the World," as he says. My answer to him is "Maybe, we'll see," in which he responds, "You ALWAYS say that!" My answer definitely reminds me of something my parents used to say to me, and I'm sure I sounded a lot like my little boy too :). They make me laugh every day. One of the little boys split his pants open today. He tried to staple them shut himself. 3rd grade boy+stapler=not good. It definitely did not hold his pants together, so I went to the nurse to see if she had safety pins. She did, but the rip in his pants was too big. She ended up sewing his pants together! Our nurse not only helps sick kids, she sews split pants up too! When one boy hear that, he said, "She sewed your pants?!?! She's a doctor, not a sewer!" Another girl wrote in her journal that she goes to the beach to get a "tang." So next time you are in the sun, enjoy your "tang." :) They say the cutest things! I am definitely starting to speak like a Dominican though. Instead of "Mindy's pants," I have caught myself saying, "The pants of Mindy!" AAAHHH! Oh well.

One thing most of you probably don't know is that Dominicans hate the rain. My kids will get out their umbrellas to walk 100 feet in the rain from one building to the other. You rarely see people out in it unless they have to be. On Sunday, it was raining off and on. My roommate Amanda and I really wanted to walk and get empanadas (a meat-filled pastry) and frozen yogurt. It wasn't raining when we left, and of course we didn't bring umbrellas. We bought our empanadas and started to walk to get frozen yogurt. I bet you can guess what happened. Yep, it started raining. It wasn't pouring, but it was raining pretty good. So here we are, two white girls walking down the street IN THE RAIN eating empanadas! I'm sure the people who walked by us thought we were ridiculous! It was exciting though and makes for a good memory now.

The Lord has given me many more moments in which I have seen how great He is and been reminded of His faithfulness. My kids' favorite song right now is "Our God is an Awesome God." It is so cool t hear 21 third graders, many of whom do not live in Christian homes, shouting out that our God is awesome. I will have to videotape it sometime. What a great reminder it is to me that our God indeed is awesome! He has given me more beautiful sunrises and sunsets. The day we found out the staff member died, the sky that night was gorgeous. It reminds me of the Twila Paris song that says "God is in Control." He sure is, even when it doesn't seem like it. I am so glad He cares about us. I'm sorry if you are getting sick of sunset pictures, but some of these are too amazing to pass up!
Sunday night. Isn't our God creative?
One morning last week. This is from my bedroom window.

We finally have furniture! We still need a few more pieces, but we are getting closer. Amanda and I bought desks on Saturday. We opened mine on Sunday to try to put it together. Let's just say it's still sitting in pieces on the floor :). Hopefully we will figure it out soon! Here is a few pictures of our couches and our dining room table. They double as clothes dryers!
I will try to take more normal pictures again soon. If you look closely, you will notice bright yellow plastic bags on the furniture too. In this country, they use so many bags when you buy groceries! We have a TON of them and we've only been here a month and a half. If you buy three bags worth of groceries, you will probably end up with twelve bags, and that's not an exaggeration! It makes me laugh, that's for sure.

Thank you to all who have been praying for the family of the man who died on Sunday, Rane. He was the sole income provider for not only his immediate family but also his extended family. Please pray that their needs would be met. Continue to pray with me that I would be able to reach my students and that they would have open hearts. I really appreciate your prayers!

Please Pray with us

Hello on this Sunday morning. I just wanted to ask you all to join all the families and staff at SCS in prayer this morning. Renee, the driver at the school, was in a car accident last night and died. He is married and has at least one child. They are holding a visitation today and a funeral this afternoon. Please be in prayer for the family and friends during this very tough time.

God is Faithful!

Hello all. My brain is full, so I won't be writing too much or too intelligently this post, but I wanted to let you know a little bit about life here lately. The one thing I have been most overwhelmed by is God's faithfulness. He is continually with me and providing for me and showing me that He cares. He will never leave me. I am learning to let go. I am learning to trust. I am learning that I can't be such a people pleaser. I am learning that He gives me good days in the midst of the hard ones to remind me that He is there and that He cares. I have both good days and bad days with my students. The last two days have been amazing, and it totally has made me realize that God is in control and He knows what I need. He has blessed me with two great days with my students. They are really chatty, so that's always a problem, but the last two days have been better. I started to lose my voice two and a half weeks ago and it is still bad. I can talk, but I can't really sing and by the end of the day it's pretty scratchy sounding. I think it's partly from having to talk above 21 super chatty third graders. Hopefully we will continue to have more good days with less chatter so my voice can come back!

I definitely feel like I am learning more than my students. I love being able to tell them in the morning, "Miss Seeman is having a great day today. Who can tell me why?" I love their answer back to me. They now tell me "Because you spent time talking with God this morning!" I love it! It brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it. It is so true. I can be having a lousy day but have a good attitude because the Lord has helped me to get my heart right. I have been learning a lot about surrender and giving Him all of me. I have been learning a lot about trusting Him that when I surrender, He will honor that. It has been so good.

One day I will try to post some of the funny adventures of living here in the DR, like trying to cross the street without being killed when you walk for forever to pay your electricity bill only to find out you could have paid it at a location much closer. Or when I asked my students what a synonym is and one little boy raised his hand and said, "It's the stuff you put in your coffee that makes it taste really good!" I do have to say that cinnamon sounds a lot like synonym. I love being able to work with students with a different language as their first language even though it brings challenges. It is cute to see "tree hundred" on their math sheets and "a baby sheep is called a land." I love them a lot! Here are some pictures from math centers on Monday. They love to work together in groups, though it gets a little crazy at times!
Thinking hard about place value. They love whiteboards!
Let's see, did we get it right? :)

God has given me many moments where all I can say is "Wow!" Here are some pictures I took from my apartment recently of both the sunset and the sunrise. He gives us beautiful pictures everyday to remind us of His faithfulness and that He cares for us. My prayer is that you would see Him in these incredible reminders of the great God we serve!
The view of the sunrise on Monday out my bedroom window. I love the views God gives me in the morning!
Sunset from our roof. These colors just blow my mind! I would have never thought to put pink in the sky!
A broader view of the same sunset.

Thank you to all who are praying for me. Please pray that I would be a light to my students. Pray too that I would learn to balance school and having a life outside of school. Those who know me know I'm a bit of an overachiever :), but I don't want to burn myself out. I am excited to see how God will use me here in the next few days and weeks. Thanks for being interested in what is happening here!

Switching Websites

I now have a new blog because people were typing the other one wrong and getting sites they shouldn't. Sorry if it caused any confusion. I will try to figure out how to post the information from the other one over here, if I can figure that out. Thank you for all who are following my blog. It means a lot to know people are praying for me and thinking about me. Things here are going well, though they are sometimes tough and difficult. I will try to write more this weekend about life here.