It has been too long since my last post and I apologize. Five days after I last wrote, on the first day of school, while we were all in Chapel worshipping, the vacant house next door to our caught fire. My downstairs neighbor, another missionary, whispered the news to me as we sang. Less than five minutes later she whispered to me again, this time that our roof had caught fire---did I want to go home with her. Yes I did! We got outside only to realize that our husband's had each taken off with the family car so we were stranded: only until we asked our city director for a lift. We were only able to get about 3 blocks away and hoofed it the rest of the distance. There were seven firetrucks on our street and at least one more on the block behind our house. the firefighters did a wonderful job and we were left only with water and smoke damage, plus 3 very traumatized cats...2 of ours and 1 downstairs from us. One single missionary teacher had to move out, fortunately there was a house for him to move to.

Now we deal with the demolition and renovation work, which my husband will oversee. At first we were discouraged, thinking that it would take even longer for us to get in to our house. Instead, the opposite is happening. So that they can renovate properly here in the apartment, there is a push on to get us moved out of here and into the house. This week Steve and I went to Home Depot to choose colors and buy paint. Keep praying!

School is going well and I enjoy my students: all 70 of them. I see all of the classes twice a week. Last Thursday was the anniversary of the Star Spangled Banner so we had a good time learning the story, listening to the song as sung at the Super Bowl by Whitney Houston, and then singing the song for ourselves. This coming Tuesday is Johnny Appleseed's birthday so we will learn a song, hear the story of his life, and I will give an apple to each of the kids. Doesn't that sound like fun?

Thanks for reading, and for continuing to check my blog even when NOTHING changes for so long.