Six months in Uruguay

Today was our sixth month anniversary on the field. It's been a time packed with learning, adjustments, trials, joys and a different persepective on life. I'm ever so thankful to the Lord for giving us this opportunity! Brandon and Kaitlin have found areas to minister in the church. Brandon will begin this week with the children in Kings Kids and he also ushers. And Kaitlin has been teaching the children during the S.I.L.O. (Bible Studies) at the Perez' home on Thursdays.

Scott and I have been given the go ahead to preach and teach (respectively, of course) once a month. So now we get to start translating and begin public speaking in Spanish. It's frightening and exciting at the same time. Our language teacher believes this will be very helpful for us and will work towards solidifying the language in our minds. She is even willing to proof our work for us. This is a wonderful opportunity.

Kaitlin and Brandon are nearly 100% comprehensive in Spanish. Brandon has an all Spanish speaking friend and so he's been the testing ground, poor guy! Kaitlin still hasn't been daring enough to speak much. Nehemiah talks a lot in his Sunday school class, not necessarily a good thing, but he does speak in Spanish. Bethany and Adeline are learning Spanish in school now. And I'm sure we don't need to worry about Simeon and Isabel.

I find myself singing songs now in Spanish. Usually it ends up being more Spanglish than anything; as I start to sing in either language I forget the words in one and remember the words of another and so I go back and forth - Spanglish singing. That's a huge step for me as I never thought I'd get the rhyme and meter of singing in Spanish.

It's possible that we could have our legal residency in it's final submission this month. A miracle to be sure! It usually takes this long just to get the papers back from the FBI. All we need now is a statement from the Uruguayan police verifying we have not been in trouble while here in the country. If that comes in the next couple weeks we should be good to go. If not we'll have to re-submit a couple papers.

The honeymoon is definitely over, but with it the time of major homesickness has passed. We're starting to settle in and adjust. I'm sure it will be a lifetime of learning, thankfully, we have God at our side to guide us along. Proverbs 3:5,6 continues to give us hope and strength.