Mexico Day Four

God is good! We got completely caught up yesterday thanks to the help of a beloved former student of Dale's named Loren Spencer. He is in his mid 20's and has been coming to Mexico since high school, even though he lives in Wisconsin and has to fly out each year to make it. He is an amazing handyman and is a fan favorite around here - everyone affectionately refers to him as "Sexy Loren" which, of course, is embarrassing in his eyes but he knows it's all in good fun. So, we did all of the shingling on the roof and finished little details around the outside of the house, as well as doing all of the drywall and texturing the walls. The texturing part was a real blessing to our group because if we didn't have that machine (and only 3 houses out of 15 this week being built get it) we would have added a couple hours of sanding the mud down flat so the paint job looked nice.

Everyone was in better spirits yesterday as well, as we could really feel the house coming together. Rick and his son Jake came down yesterday as well, which was a real treat. I think Rick put somewhere between 1 and 3 nails into the house... so he can say he had a significant part in building the house of course! But it was great being encouraged by them, and Rick spoke last night during our chapel time.

Last night is one of the greatest parts of our whole trip each year. Every team comes up with a skit and it's a competition to see who has the best skit - judged by Rick, David (pastor at Valley Springs), and two local staff people at EOC. There were several hilarious skits and competition was fierce. PBC's skit had a "LOST" theme, and we really did great! We just barely got edged out by the Food Distribution crew who had a Food Network theme. They had all the most famous cooks of the past few decades on the "show" and it was quite funny. Rick said he had us in 1st place but, alas, that didn't hold up and we took 2nd out of the 8 crews. You'll have to ask the students more about the skit when they get home.

Last night and this morning it rained for several hours on us, so please be praying for today. It is extremely muddy which makes it much more difficult to finish the house today, which is the goal. The house we are on is on a hilly slope, so the van with all the materials needed for bunk bed as well as the tools we need to use will not be able to make it up the hill. So we'll be walking up and down in order to prepare, which will slow things down a great day. The rain has subsided for now so we're praying it stays just wet on the ground without adding anything else. It is a blessing that it rained during the night and not on us as we were working. Pray for our attitudes to be patient, helpful, and encouraging. And pray that we really take to heart the fact that this is the sort of thing people deal with every time it rains down here. They walk everywhere with heavy, muddy feet, and I'm sure there are many more struggles that we don't even know about when it rains. Pray that we make it through this conflict and grow stronger from it. Thank you for your encouraging comments and prayers. We love you all and I'm excited to report the good news of finished house later today!