100th blog!

For my 100th blog I will give you some highlights because I have been slacking and so busy that I have not been able to keep you updated!

First off - I am no longer sick :) Thank you for your prayers - It was just a cold.  So far I have been faithfully taking my malaria prevention drugs and have now gone 9 months without getting malaria!  I am wondering again if its a horrible thing to be taking medicine for this long though...hmmm

Last Thursday we did not have youth group because of a school event called the Celebration of the Arts - It was a pretty awesome thing to be a part of - I got to hear all the middle school and high school bands, see the art work from the art students, hear songs written by the guitar class and see some videos that were made by some other students.  Nearly every single one of my youth group kids had some part in this evening so it was fun to see them perform!  

On Friday I was asked to chaperone the prom.  So I did.  It turned out to be a ton of fun (see the facebook for photos).  I got ready with some of the girls and did their makeup.  Then I drove a bunch of the kids to the prom and then they would not let me NOT hang out with them during the actual dance.  I was so worried they would think it was weird that their youth pastor was with them but they didnt seem to mind one bit!  It was so much fun and thankfully, I did not have to tell a single one of my youth group kids that they were acting or dancing inappropriately!  Also, since the Nehlsens have been packing up and selling their stuff, the girls stayed at my house after the prom - so the night continued and I took home their dates after a movie at 3 in the morning.  The next day I was completely dead and was thinking that I am starting to get too old for this!  Haha oh well.  

Unfortunately I had no time to recover because that next day was our WIRED end of the year banquet.  So again, I had to dress all up and get things organized for another night of fun.  And it was, the banquet turned out great, we gave out awards and the food was awesome!  

Then on Sunday was another fun day with youth group kids - we had a graduation party for Kara Lyons and so we all got together again.  It was such a special time and I am so glad that I got to be a part of it.  We watched a slide show, gave words of wisdom, and then prayed for her.  

This week has been fairly busy as well.  I have been getting camp stuff ready and it is coming along nicely.  We have 32 kids who are coming so far - I think that will be about it though.  I talked to the camp speaker on Skype last week and I am very excited to meet him - from our conversation I think he is going to be perfect!  He has a thick southern accent.  Hehe...

The last youth group of this school year was last night :( I was so sad!  I talked about how life is a gift and then had everyone share what they were thankful for in the last year and then just thank God for what he has done.  We also had all the kids who are moving come to the middle and we prayed for them.  Then after that, we had the seniors who are graduation share highlights and advice for the rest of us.  It was such a great time but it was pretty emotional...I totally cried.  The night ended with all of us just sitting around and talking and lots of hugs.  One exciting thing about last night was that Susan arrived.  She used to live here a year ago and led WIRED.  She has returned to work in the CMA office for the next few years so it was an exciting time to have her back.  She will be available to help me next school year AND she is going to be my roommate!  I am so excited!  

It has been miserably hot here lately.  I have not been able to sleep without my AC on for the last month.  I am very nervous for my electricity bill because running the AC costs about $1 an hour...ugh!  But, I have to sleep with it on - I am just not hard core enough to sweat it out!  Haha.  During the day I usually go swimming at the international school - its almost necessary to survive here!  I can tell we are getting closer to rainy season though - its humid more and last night it rained quite a bit!  Its still a bit cooler today and for that I am thankful!  I am sure though that in a few hours it will be hot again.

Well on that note I think I am going to go!  I do want to say a shout out to Mandy because it is her birthday!  Happy Birthday Mandy!  

sick.

I have a sore throat!  This is no fun no matter where you are :(

But, thankfully its only 86-ish degrees and I even wore jeans today.

Prayers are appreciated!

One school year almost done...wow

I just posted the email that I sent out from earlier this week that should be informative :)

So this week I have been recovering from the 30 Hour Famine!  It was intense being in charge of all that – so I am glad to be done with it.  I do just need the rest of the money wired here from the States so that I can pay the last few people – so hopefully that will all come in this next week!

Youth group this week went great – but Thursday was VERY hot and so I think that everyone in town was using their AC’s - So around 5:30 all the electricity in town went out :( I stayed up beat but was frustrated that again, 20+ teenagers were coming to my house and I had no electricity!  Thankfully we were able to play games outside and by 7:30 the power came back on!  The rest of youth group went great! 

Things here are certainly winding down – I only have 2 youth groups left.  One will be short too because there is a school event before it.  Next weekend is the end of the year banquet – which will be the last event with all the youth because when school gets out a few weeks later a ton of the kids are leaving.  A week after school gets out is the WIRED retreat – June 15-17.  We certainly have some fun things to look forward too! 

Also, after the retreat I will be moving into a new house! 

AND AFTER THAT….I am coming home for a visit!!!! Yippy!!!! 

Also, it rained so hard last night – I couldn’t drive until it was over because the windshield wipers on my car don’t work – but it was totally worth waiting because the rain was so hard and so cold!  It was amazing!  Sadly, its hot again…

Today should be an interesting day – I have a girl in my youth group who comes from a partly Jewish family so tonight I am going over to her house to celebrate Passover.  I am so excited for this learning experience.  Also, it’s a pretty funny situation because they had to postpone Passover due to the rioting in Ouaga during the actual Passover.  

One school year almost done...wow

I just posted the email that I sent out from earlier this week that should be informative :)

So this week I have been recovering from the 30 Hour Famine!  It was intense being in charge of all that – so I am glad to be done with it.  I do just need the rest of the money wired here from the States so that I can pay the last few people – so hopefully that will all come in this next week!

Youth group this week went great – but Thursday was VERY hot and so I think that everyone in town was using their AC’s - So around 5:30 all the electricity in town went out :( I stayed up beat but was frustrated that again, 20+ teenagers were coming to my house and I had no electricity!  Thankfully we were able to play games outside and by 7:30 the power came back on!  The rest of youth group went great! 

Things here are certainly winding down – I only have 2 youth groups left.  One will be short too because there is a school event before it.  Next weekend is the end of the year banquet – which will be the last event with all the youth because when school gets out a few weeks later a ton of the kids are leaving.  A week after school gets out is the WIRED retreat – June 15-17.  We certainly have some fun things to look forward too! 

Also, after the retreat I will be moving into a new house! 

AND AFTER THAT….I am coming home for a visit!!!! Yippy!!!! 

Also, it rained so hard last night – I couldn’t drive until it was over because the windshield wipers on my car don’t work – but it was totally worth waiting because the rain was so hard and so cold!  It was amazing!  Sadly, its hot again…

Today should be an interesting day – I have a girl in my youth group who comes from a partly Jewish family so tonight I am going over to her house to celebrate Passover.  I am so excited for this learning experience.  Also, it’s a pretty funny situation because they had to postpone Passover due to the rioting in Ouaga during the actual Passover.  

Here is the update I sent out this week

Hey Everyone!

Most days I feel like my life is totally random here in Burkina.  Things that would be completely abnormal in Washington State are seemingly normal here.  For example: I was driving my friend Kari home last week and while we were driving we both looked over and saw two women driving on a moto – not too weird.  The crazy part was that the woman on the back was nursing her newborn baby!  Oh multi-tasking at its finest!  I laughed so hard and Kari who has lived her nearly her whole life said that she had never seen that before – so maybe that’s not too normal. 

Life here has been heating up – just when I thought it couldn’t get hotter, it did.  I can be thankful that the power cuts have been few and far between though!  Now they seem to only come right before a rain storm.  We are slowly getting closer to rainy season so the humidity is fairly high but I am looking forward to the coolness that rain brings. 

This last week was very exciting for WIRED youth group.  We were able to spend all the money we raised with the 30 Hour Famine!  For an entire week we had a medical team seeing over 800 children in the village of Yagma.  On Friday I drove a van full of boys there and they began drilling a well.  On Saturday the whole youth group went to Yagma – the boys continued to drill the well and everyone else continued the medical clinic.  After lunch at the Dorcus house (which is also in Yagma) we did a grain distribution to about 400 people and rejoiced because the boys found water!  Then in the evening we helped put on a worship service right there in the bush and a church that is being planted there did some evangelism.  As I drove home at 9:00 p.m. in a van full of wiped out teenagers I thanked God because we were able to participate in something so beautiful. 

I also thanked God because it was over with – on Friday night we had no internet and I was completely unsure how the day was going to go.  I looked at the schedule for the entire day and I slowly, one thing at a time, gave it to God because I just didn’t know if anything was going to work.  Would we have enough drivers to get there?  Did the sick kids know where the clinic was?  Would we find water?  Was the grain going to be there to distribute?  Did I have enough food to feed these hungry teenagers?  No one seemed to have the answers to these questions.  But, man God just answered every prayer!  The day turned out great and I was so glad that I stopped worrying about it and trusted him. 

Thank you also for all your prayers for this awesome event!  Some of you even gave money to support this – so thank you for being able to help this village that is so needy right now. 

In other news things have seemingly quieted down with the protests and riots – since I last emailed you we had some more scary situations and for an entire weekend I was on lockdown at the Nehlsen’s but for the last 3 weeks all has been fairly quiet.  There is still a curfew in effect and nothing has been completely resolved but I think everyone is getting tired of drama – African’s included.  Please continue to pray for peace here in Burkina. 

I took a spring break in April and went to the Lyon’s family’s house for a week.  Their kids are in the youth group.  It was nice to get out of the city and away from the protests.  It was a vacation but I did spend it with about 8 youth group kids in a village – so I'm not sure how much of a vacation it can be called.  I did enjoy hanging out, listening to music, and laughing really hard with these crazy missionary kids! 

In one month I will be on day two of the WIRED end of the year retreat!  Please continue to pray for all the details that go into that.  Before that though we have three more youth groups and an end of the year banquet.  Pray that this year we can end well.  Its going to be hard to end because so many people are leaving – not just seniors.  Families come and go here so quickly and many of our youth group families are leaving at the end of this school year – youth group will look drastically different next year.  Pray that those kids that have been coming leave with hearts changed. 

I am still going to the Dorcus house once a week and it has been one of the highlights of my week!  As soon as I drive up all those girls just run at me – I cannot speak French but we share deep connections and the hugs from them mean everything to me!  I know that some of you support Dorcus house and I just want to say thank you because your support is changing the lives of these young women in amazing ways. 

Again, thank you so much for your continued support and encouragement!  A special shot out to Mercer Creek for your encouragement cards that I got last week – that was really special and great timing! 

Also, feel free to email me any time – and pray that the Internet doesn’t get cut off like the last few days so that I can reply!  (Can you imagine all Internet and landlines being cut off in your whole country for even one day?  Its crazy.)

Thank you all for everything you do for me – you are amazing.

Love,

Hannah

Thanks for your prayers last week!  Most of the 30 hour famine money was able to be wired here, we actually had youth group, and things are coming along with the camp planning!  God is so good!  If you would like to continue to pray for the exciting ways we are using the famine money that would be great!  Since Monday we have been putting on a medical clinic to see over 800 kids by the end of this week.  Tomorrow we head up to that area (Yagma) and begin work on drilling a well and on Saturday we will continue to do the well and the medical clinic and also a huge food distribution, a worship service, and a time of evangelism!  Prayers for God to move would be appreciated!!!

Also, last Friday ISO had a talent show and the band that I mentioned played in it.  They did a really awesome job and I thought that maybe you guys would like to see the video of it.  All 5 of these kids are in youth group and I love them all dearly!  Click here to see: E.R.O.C.'s epic performance at the talent show!

Pray for this week!

I am really needing the famine money to be wired here ASAP and we have a hold up for some reason – pray that it all gets here so we can feed people next week!

I had to cancel youth group last week because of the “issues” so pray that they are all gone so we can meet together on Thursday.

I am planning the end of the year retreat and a ton of details go into something like this – pray that it all works out, falls together well, and we have tons of kids that want to come!

rain!

The dust in Ouaga was rinsed off last night with some intense rain.  It was a nice and welcomed change to this high stress country.  The rain just seemed to lighten everything up a bit, in fact this morning my house is even a bit cooler! :)

A different kind of Easter

Easter in Leo was a new experience all together.  The Lyon’s have started a church in their neighborhood – and by neighborhood I mean village.  Easter morning we drove about a mile through mud huts and bunny trails and parked under a tree.  Around the other side of the tree we sat on benches and had a church service.  The church consisted of about 10 adults and 40 kids.  We sang and danced and listened to a sermon (it was in French but I caught some of it).  I had ants crawl up my skirt but overall it was a good service.  Then afterwards we had a church potluck!  But this potluck was sardine sandwiches.

Easter in the village is certainly a different experience and honestly for me I couldn’t even tell it was Easter.  All the things that make that day Easter in the past were gone – except for the whole reason for the event (thank you Jesus.)  It was strange without family, a big special church service, eggs, salads and pastel colors.  I did have a great day and a great experience though. 

We came home from church and had leftovers (the sardine sandwiches just didn’t cut it).  Then we played Risk (well I actually fell asleep during that game – so long), rode bikes down the road and hung out and talked.  It was a great day and certainly unforgettable!  

Highlights (not the magazine)

So highlights of my time in Leo – which is still not over.  I am going to ride the bus back with everyone here on Sunday. 

So here we go:

It rained!  SO MUCH.  Like poured, so naturally at 1:00 in the morning, we went outside and danced in it.  I got goose bumps for the first time in 8 months J  Now its hot again.

Listening to these hilarious boys!  Oh my lands if you wanna laugh come here.  We have 5 teenage boys here that quote every movie, sing silly songs, tell the most ridiculous stories, and just laugh.  I love it. 

Sleeping on a waterbed.  I have never done that before – so every time I get on it I say “Whoa, WHOOOA, Whoa” I also think I may be swimming in my sleep!  It is nice though because its cooler – I have had no trouble falling asleep in a house that’s 90 degrees at night.  Apparently though most nights are hotter…haha oh boy. 

Pranks.  Hanging out in a house full of teenagers naturally evolves into toilets covered with clear wrap, alarms hidden and set for the middle of the night, glue on the bar of soap in the shower, water being thrown at you in the morning and who knows what else.  Thankfully I have claimed to be Switzerland – hopefully that will last the rest of the week BUT I have certainly been effected by the above pranks J

Listening to music – eROC24/7.  Robbie, Nathan, Jonathan, Farris, and Liesbeth make up this totally awesome band.  They have been practicing all week and although its so loud we have to wear ear plugs they are very good and I enjoy taking pictures and listening to them all day. 

Brianna.  Oh my lands the Lyon’s have an 8 year old sister that is hilarious.  A few times a day she bounces through the room wearing a cowboy hat and a scarf around her neck on a big bouncy ball rabbit thing.  Every time it happens I feel like my life is completely random. 

Well that’s enough for now and about all I can think of right now.  BUT fyi – I am currently sitting on the floor listening to all these boys sing songs from every Disney movie known.  Ridiculously awesome.