Today was a great day! Our teammate, Rachel came and taught our kids today.  She was a 4th grade teacher before becoming a missionary.  This morning we did a prayer walk through Pamba and afterward she asked if I wanted her to substitute teach today!! It was a huge blessing to me and the kids. I had so much fun watching her 2 1/2  year old and 8 month old baby and I think she loved teaching for the day. Tonight Ashley had so much to tell me and she was so excited. They assured me they still love me teaching them, but Aunt Rachel gave them so many good ideas of what to do in class.

After our strategy retreat in January. Team Beyond has formed to smaller teams within the whole team. Each team is focus on a certain area of Teso area.  Our team consists of Bobby and Rachel Kolb, Karen(Aunt Karebear) Lubbers and Becky Carlson.  Steve is our Community Development Leader (CDC) or in other words our team leader. Our area of focus is Soroti Town and Pamba area.  Every month we are doing a prayer walk through each area to open our eyes to the assets of the community and keep our eyes open to some who seem invisible. In Soroti town, Bobby is involved in the street kids ministry.  It is amazing what these kids live like. As we were doing our walk through Soroti town, we greeted some of the kids that Bobby ministers to.  They are so young and just living on the streets. I pray that God will become real to them even in there uncertain circumstances. God is a God of All!
Karen is new to the team and is still trying to discern her main ministry focus.  She is involved in evangelism explosion trainings, children's ministries, and sidewalk relational ministry.  We were at training with her at IT and she is very loved by my kids.
Becky mainly works with the former child soldiers out in a village. She will be living out in the village two weeks out of the month.  When she is in Soroti, she is involved in relating to the Muslim women.
We call ourselves the SoPaTea team.  We meet with this smaller team for meetings and worship times. It has kept Steve very busy with structuring the meetings, checking in with everyone and keeping up with his own ministry focus. He loves it!


Another excited event in our household is our new kitten!! ( our Tabby cat went outside our gate and is no more) Our watchman, Moses called us one morning and said that he had kitty's by his place. I ran over there to check them out. The mom was still with them, but I told him that we would love one. He watched all day until the mom finally moved and Steve and him caught the baby.They took it to our house and it is so cute. The bad thing was that it had about  100 fleas on it and about 20 ticks.  My friend Hellen was over and she helped me give it a bath and pick the fleas off with a teezers. Some fell off just from the hot water. It was so gross, but so worth it!  He is so cute and sweet. Drew has been carrying it around non stop. He even takes it out with him wherever he goes. He puts it in his pocket and the cat just sleeps. It has kept me awake at night and Drew wanted to wake up with it in the night so he could give me a break.  He tried and then he took him to me at midnight and said "I just can't do it mom"  He was so tired, but so cute for trying.

For homeschooling, we are studying Aquatic Ecosystems and the other day our focus was on Coral Reefs.  The kids made their own coral reef out of clay.  Here are some pictures of their projects.  I have such talented kids or I am just a really good teacher! LOL!

This week I had a new experience. Many Ugandan women get their hair braided and I decided that I needed to at least experience it.  On Wednesday, I sat for 8 hours and got my hair braided.  It is so crazy, I have never had so much hair in my life! Every time I see myself in a mirror, I wonder who I am looking at.  I feel like I have a wig on my head, but after sitting for 8 hours, it is staying in whether I like it or not. By the way, it only cost about $10 to have it done. I don't think I would work that hard if I knew I was only making that much money. I even paid her more than a normal Ugandan would pay her.  It was a great experience and a way to get to know more people. So many people came up and talked to me, since we were in the middle of the Pamba market.  I will try to take pictures of my new Ugandan do, but please don't be shocked!

Many of you have asked about Ashley, and I want to report that things are going good!  We have really hard days, but God is faithful! He is stretching her, molding and shaping her.  She is still not loving it here, but she does love some things about here. I also am reassured that God is in control of all things and Ashley is here for a special purpose for her life. Even though it is hard on us as parents and it is hard on her as a young lady, we know that God had this time of suffering planned for her before she was even a thought in our minds. We have had great conversations and she has been seeking God's word.  Please pray that she continues to talk to me and tell me how she is feeling and pray that she continues to seek God's plan for her life! 

Sending LOVE to you all from Uganda!!!