Worship Breaks Down The Walls Of Hostility

I was eating breakfast with my 2 & 4 year old this morning and as I flipped through the English channels I came upon "hillsongtv" and a pastor was giving a message that caught my attention. A few minutes later the worship team started some slow worship songs.

I noticed my girls weren't making any of their usual noise, i.e. stop touching my poha, she's drinking my chai, ayiiiiiii, Mummeeeeeeeee!

So I glanced over and there were both girls, eyes glued to the TV, hands raised in the air and gently swaying to the music.

Well, I burst right in to tears.

How P. Puts Herself To Sleep

These are heavy days I am living in so it's always nice to have a little levity.

P. puts herself to sleep like this every time. She just picks her nose til she conks out. I am not kidding.

Ignore The Adults

My beloved son in the faith, Joshi, is leaving our ministry and going to a new life ministering among orphans and lepers in Delhi. I was putting together some pictures for him today and came across these two from last month. I had forgotten how we laughed when they were taken. Ignore the three adults in the picture and focus on E. and P.

In the first picture P. just jumped in at the last second. What a ham! I guess she learned it from older sis E.

Nothing Is Sacred

Hmmm. Favorite pastime: Taking the books out of mommy's bookshelves and making roads.

Obviously, these children should be taking a bath...

Girls On Tour

We didn't take our three older girls with us for the first half of the Gospel Tour, but they were there for the second - in full force. They had a great time. Still has not grown into the ears...

E. & C. even performed two dances. Everybody works!

*More pictures of the gospel tours on my facebook page.

The Littlest Member Of The Team

Little P. recovering from her recent illness ate her way through most of the first half of the "Gospel Tour." She did love banging on those drums tho.
She would wait til the drummer in the back would start playing and then she would play along.

This pose she must have learned from her father...

P. Plays The Congos

Cold Turkey

I have no idea where the expression "cold turkey" came from, but that's what we say when you stop something without any prior weaning off. Right? Well, P. is being weaned. I've been on O. for a month to go away for a few days or something. He can't bear the crying. He finally decided today was the day we would wean so he's working all night in the office.


I haven't seen P. since this morning and she is apparently happy as a clam without me around. It's the seeing the mommy that starts off the awful "Mamaaa, mamaaa, mamaaa!" wining til she gets what she wants.


Great day.

P. No more dude (milk) for you.

Faces From P.'s Party

Thanks to Joyce for taking these beautiful pictures...

Random Pix From P.'s 1st

New friend Deena who was visiting with us from Guam for a few days.

P. showing off her new payals. (ankle bracelets)

Ahhh, the testimony of P.s birth.

Choir and G. playing with balloons.

Old friend, Joyce, who took all these pictures (except this one, obviously). She was also visiting us from Guam for a few days. Loads of fun.

O. with P. in a big hat.

That's all I can get loaded for now.

P.'s First

P.'s first birthday is Monday but we arranged the party tonight since we'll be away on Monday.

We're expected 350 people. Arg. I left most of the arrangements to O.

SO Tired

I'm just tired out. I think it's the children. I'm too old to have children this small.

P.

Mosquitoes, Pastors And Village Ministry

Last Monday O. and I flew into the beautiful Hyderbad airport in South India. We were met by one of our Pastors working in that state and his brother. As we were driving to the hotel Madhu pulls out surgical masks and gives them to both Onkar and myself. "Swine Flu" he said. He was totally serious.

Thus began a highly amusing week in my life. O. stayed in Hyderbad for a conference and I traveled 6 hours south to Vijaywada to visit the places were two of our pastors are working. I stayed at Pastor Madhu's house the first night and was pleased to meet his new wife. They fed me shrimp and P. ad I went to bed since we were very tired. In the evening the electricity went out twice but came back on. At 11:30 at night it went out again and didn't come back.

I laid in bed with P. for a long while, she, at least, was asleep. I was hot and the mosquitoes had started their attack. I fanned P. and eventually, Madhu's mother came in and fanned me. Still, the mosquitoes bit. As I scratched I prayed. I said, "Lord, why did the electricity have to go out. You know how uncomfortable I am. Can't you turn it back on?"

I guess the Lord had lessons to teach me. I have been praying for a year about starting to travel around and visit and encourage our village pastors, and here at last, the door which had previously been shut to me, was now open. And what happens, I get eaten alive by mosquitoes - and not just me - my 7 month old too.

By 2:30AM the electricity came back on and we slept. P. was sick with a bad cough and runny nose and now she was covered from head to heel (literally) in red swollen bites.* Lord, afflict me, but not my baby please. The bites never seemed to bother p. And Madhu's mother did fan us for two straight hours, God bless her.

By Wednesday I was tired but it was the big day. In the morning I was teaching Madhu's small congregation about Baptism and then one sister with an amazing testimony** was baptized. We also held the groundbreaking for a church hall for that congregation.

In the evening I visited our other pastor, Stephen, in another village. At present he has a small house church and works with his father who is also a pastor. The electricity went out - again - that night and I shared from the work of God by the light of my cellphone. The meeting later that night got cancelled when there was still No Electricity and P. was really unwell. She proved this by vomiting all over me in front of everyone.

P. recovered and on Thursday we visited and prayed and ate. Man was I fed. I had three breakfasts in one day, two lunches and one dinner - not to mentioned the drinks. I was blessed.

By Friday we were heading back to Hyderbad. We missed our train. For the first it in my life I missed a train -BUT - we caught a bus. It had a bed and it was air conditioned and it was cheap, so it actually was waaay better than the train would have been, except that it took forever to reach our destination. Oh well, I slept and read and prayed.

*see photo I will eventually post

**I'll post this testimony separately

P. On A Rainy Day At The Beach

P.'s Passport Photo

She's just too much. WHERE did she get those funny ears?

We have an appointment with the US consulate in Bombay on Wednesday, June 3rd for P.'s "report of Birth" and Passport and SS#. A lot of paperwork and documentation. I can't complain about it too much because O. initially insisted that P. be born in the US to avoid all this. I won out on her birthplace but I hear the "I told you sos" if I mention the headache all this paperwork is.

Let's pray it all goes smoothly next week!

Beautiful Baby

Do they get any more beautiful than this?
Oh, maybe they do!

Questions And Answers

First I will attempt to answer the most asked question during the whole Typhoid ordeal.

Did I/How did I feed baby P.?

Yes, I nursed P. the entire time. The Dr. actually told me to keep her with me. I struggled more while in the hospital because I had a horrible IV needle in my wrist and my right hand was out of commission. THANKFULLY, I have a wonderful niece, Sumitra, who stayed with me the entire time in the hospital and did everything for P. All I had to to was lay down and nurse. P. was a trooper.

Apparently, Typhoid is not contagious or transmittable through breast milk.

I continue to suffer from symptoms of my illness, namely headaches when I wake up from sleeping and dizziness, not to mention the tiredness. I really am attempting to rest. Unfortunately, my work is backing up.

On the restful side, E. & C. went to Bombay on Monday and will come home tomorrow. So, it's been somewhat quieter around the house the last few days. I'm glad they're coming home soon, I miss them.

Like Me

My brother Dan saw the picture of P. in the next post and commented to my mom:

"It looks like Bec."

Thanks, D., It does look like me.

Sweet P.

I love this picture because P. looks exactly like what she looks like.

I've Obviously Lost it

Once, long ago, I took E. & C. (the older 2 daughters) to a simultaneous doctors appt. where they both got vaccinated. I thought to myself afterwards, Never Again.

Yesterday I took P. & G. (the younger 2 daughters) to the doctor for vaccinations - together. This apparently always seems like a good idea to me.

Two very unhappy, feverish and in pain children under the age of 2 later, I'm recalling my earlier self-advice; one day too late. One day too late. Arg.