Fun at CVE

We went to Jenna and Steph's house for dinner a few weeks ago... We had a fun time and the kids had a blast together!!!

Please keep praying that God will work in mighty ways here at CVE for His glory!!!

Dia de la Independencia

Here are some pictures from our Mexican Independence Day Celebration on Sept. 16th!!!

School at CVE

This school year has been the start of something new here at CVE. We now have all of our Secundaria (Middle School) kids and 5 of our Primaria (Grade School) kids attending clases here on campus. Classes are held in the church Sunday School rooms. Here Tania is ready for class. Primaria attends from 1:30pm-6:30pm. She is our only girl who is in primaria here on campus. Alexia, Jose, Michel and Ezequiel are the other 4.

The 5 Secundaria girls. Lili, Michelle, Lupita, Jaqui, Karla. These little girls are growing into beautiful women very quickly! Though they had reservations about staying on campus for school, they all admitted that it would be much better in the long run, and they are really enjoying how much they are learning. As they say, "The teachers actually explain things well, so I can know what I have to do."

Here is one of our secundaria teachers, who came to us from the Gateway Woods school, Todd Stoller. The girls have all expressed that they appreciate Todd, both because of his teaching skills and his ability to share a laugh.

Rhode, Michelle and Lili. Last year Rhode helped us out by teaching Michel, Jose and Blanca. This year she has changes to teaching secundaria. She and Elizabeth Martinez (one of the sisters from church) spent the summer in Hermosillo attending classes so that we would be able to have a school here at CVE. WE are thankful for their dedication! Eli and Carissa Schlipf teach the primaria kids.

Paulina is our third Secundaria teacher. She just arrived a week before school started. The teachers have done an amazing job of getting things organized and getting the school off the ground.

Fede and Jaqui share their morning chat before school begins. Secundaria classes go from 7am-2pm.

Kali helps the girls with homework in the kitchen. The girls are doing a LOT more HW than they ever did last year when they went to public school. They don't seem to mind it. English is a favorite, and that is the homework I can easily help out with!

Yaneli still attends the primaria in San Ignacio. Until we have the proper staff, the younger kids are going to the same school as before. Here she is all ready for the first day of class.

Thanks for you prayers and support! Keep lifting these kids and this work up to our Father.

Magda and Blanca

Here are some old CVE picutures from 2005... Can you find Magda and Blanca?

Since last summer, Magda and Blanca's aunt and uncle from Tucson have been going through the process of adopting them... The day finally came a little over a week ago for their aunt to take them for good, and they are no longer with us. Magda and Blanca were two of the first seven kids here at CVE, and they got here in Feb. '05. Kaleigh LOVED playing with Magda. Kaleigh even learned how to say "ma-da" (she still doesn't say any of the other girls names very clearly), and always went running to Magda when she was around... Magda has such a gift with children- she always knew how to cheer Kaleigh up, how to make her laugh, and she was just so good with her.

Here's Blanca with her new little brother.

The girls have changed a lot in the last 4 years here at CVE. Magda came a VERY angry girl- there were battles fought almost daily with her; she had so much bitterness and hurt inside of her. God really worked in her heart, and she has become a different girl. She now has a very fun personality, always ready to play jokes on someone. Living with us for the past year, she was always very willing to help out with anything, always ready to watch Kaleigh for us, and it was always great to see her smile.

Blanca- who doesn't know Blanca? One thing I love about her is her friendly personality- almost everyone who steps foot into CVE knows Blanca. She is also very thoughtful- she gave Kaleigh her doll when she left because she knew Kaleigh loved it. Blanca is very sensitive- a week or so before she left she was telling us how she kept asking her aunt if she had read the Bible she gave her. She made many comments about how she hoped her new family would become Christians.

Here are some more pictures of the girls form the past year...

Blanca and Rhode- Blanca's teacher last year who is now teaching at the new school here on campus.

Please keep Magda and Blanca in your prayers. Eventually, they will be moving up to Tucson with their aunt and uncle. They will be going to school up there and it will obviously be a huge challenge for them. When you pray for all the kids here at CVE, please remember them as well.

The Ranch

Last Thursday-Friday we took our annual summer trip to Rancho Betania. The highlight of the one night trip is the pool, but we had lots of fun in the free time as well. We even enjoyed the company of our newest mascots of CVE...Lucy and Mac. Lucy lives with the little kids and Mac makes his home with Limon and Kristi. Here Jose, Ezequiel and Kaleigh enjoy the "dog days" off summer. (insert corny laugh...haha) Kaleigh and Gloria continue to grow up each day, doing new things and always making us laugh and smile. Here Kaleigh shows her affection for her friend.

Thursday night we enjoyed singing around a bonfire (with S'mores of course). After the bonfire the little kids were sent to bed and the older ones played games for a while. This year's hits were the bag toss game, Blokus, Settlers and Euchre. Below Joel, Keith, Fede, Seth and Michelle are playing Euchre...Seth is teaching Michelle, she wasn't brave enough to try and play.

The highlight for the kids...THE POOL....Tania gives Julissa a horse ride.

Jazzany, Tania, Yaneli, Alexia, Blanca and Lupita. Wet and happy after an hour in the pool.

We thank God for His faithfulness as we have passed our 1 year anniversary of being here at CVE. It has been a challenging blessing and we ask they you keep praying for God's work here. He is an awesome God.

-Pray for the upcoming school year and all the changes it will bring, as the middle school kids will be attending classes here on campus.

-Pray for the new teachers and staff

-Pray for wisdom in decision making

-Praise God! He is good.

VBS

Jesus is ALL-POWERFUL... We talked about Jesus' power over nature, demons, sickness, and other things last week during VBS. Over 300 kids (and adults) heard about Jesus' power. We just pray that everything they heard will take root in their hearts, and that many will someday understand the power of Jesus' blood in their own lives.

Trying to keep hundreds of kids occupied before we started singing every morning was a challenge... Here some of them are playing tug-of-war.

Keith taught the 12 and up class, and a few days had OVER 80 kids! That's a ton of teenagers to keep track of... Lots of the girls in our house were in his class, and were a great help with registering the kids.

One day we were talking about how our classes went, and I (Emily) was saying how I love teaching the 3 and 4 year olds, and how fun they were, and how we played games, etc. Keith told me about how he had to drag a kid out of class... Well, let's just say I was very glad to teach the younger kids.

We had a fun class... The kids just make me laugh. Since they won't pay attention to the story for over 10-15 minutes, we played some games as well as doing the Bible story, craft, etc. The day we talked about the blind man being healed by Jesus, our ALL-POWERFUL God, we blind-folded the kids and led them over to a bucket of water to "wash" their eyes and be healed of their "blindness..." They thought it was great!!!

How exciting for some of the kids to hear about Jesus' power- maybe for the first time!

Please join us in praying for the many hearts that heard the word last week during VBS... Many may return, but some we will probably never see again. Pray for God to do abundantly above all we could as or think, according to HIS POWER that is at work within us.

Ephesians 3:19-21

Luau!!!

ALOHA!!!We had a very fun luau at our house this weekend- planned by the summer staff girls! We all had a great time, but most importantly, the girls had a BLAST!
The girls worked really hard and made grass skirts and tops for Kaleigh and Gloria... (It was great... It kept them busy for hours trying to tape the skirts together!)

This picture would be so cute... if Gloria was happy (she HATED the grass skirt!) and if Kaleigh was looking...
Thanks to the summer staff girls for a great evening!