Cool and Not Cool

Harbor House staff and residents in ambulance

• We took the ambulance for her maiden voyage late Monday afternoon. Old timers at this here blog will recall that a bunch of us ran a marathon together just two days before the earthquake. If you rally all your faculties you might also recall that you and others gave of your resources generously to sponsor us in order to raise funds for this much needed vehicle. We ordered it after the earthquake. It took a year to get it but finally we have the ability to help our ladies. So cool! Now we can pick them up in the middle of the night and deal with emergency situations in a vehicle big enough to deliver if necessary. We pray it will serve the women and pre-born babies of our area well. Thank you again for caring for Haitian women!

• Please pray for Enisse.  She is the newest young lady to move into Harbor House.  Today she came with her one tiny bag of possessions.  Understandably, she is pretty scared. She has always seemed a bit withdrawn and quite shy. We're a little worried about her. The other young women have been living together for some time and she has some breaking in and relationship-building to do.  She is fifteen years old, was recently kicked out of her house by her mom and is due to deliver in about four weeks.  We fear her baby may be pretty small. Please pray for Enisse and the Midwives and Dr. Jen as they prepare to welcome this new little one into the world soon. 

• We learned last week that a mom in our prenatal class is suffering from pre-eclampsia. Guerda is about 33 weeks into her pregnancy and needs prayers.  We hope to help her and improve her situation with medication, nutrition, prayers, and careful monitoring. It is possible she could improve enough to deliver with us, but she may require a c-section if things remains as they are today.  We're hoping she can hold on another four weeks until her baby is big enough to do well.

• The little guy born last Friday just after midnight is hospitalized.  Jen and Jonna did a home visit on Saturday (a tent visit as it were) and found him running a fever.  Please pray for him and his momma, Roselore.

the new property

• Until Sunday I had not had a chance to see the Heartline land.  We visited after church. We will eventually move the Women's Maternity Center onto that property and (si Bondye vle) build the hospital and housing there.  It is a lovely piece of land.  I am less of a visionary and more of a doer. Therefore I experience dangerous spiking heartrates thinking about all that needs to happen before we can work on that land.  I am told others don't necessarily respond that way.  This is reassuring.  We think God is moving. 

• One way God is moving is through three guys that are visiting this week.  They are currently downstairs pontificating with pipes in hand. They are with SafeWorldNexus and the Dave Ramsey Show and are here with us specifically because they want to raise money to help Heartline develop the property sooner rather than later. Cool! Not only did they bring an obnoxious bounty of crackers and granola bars, but they brought their cameras and their notebooks and their skills and will tell the Heartline story soon in hopes of raising beaucoup bucks for building on the new property. 

• The commute to school has its ups and downs. (Literally and figuratively.) We were amused to find this note in Hope's schoolbag the other day. It is good to know that we toil not in vain! The training and instruction in the fine art of sarcasm has begun to pay off. Below you'll see she goes with a much more advanced technique wherein you begin totally sarcastic, but then - BAM - just like that without warning - you switch to truth.  It is sort of along the same lines as, "I really love what you've done with your (fill in the blank).       NOT!"