Hi from Sanibel

When I left PA to come to FL, I was hoping to leave behind the huge snow storm and come to the warm, sunny, weather. Instead, I came to freezing cold, rainy weather! I think I'd rather be back home, sledding and playing in the snow rather than here in the chilly, wet weather. However, being here does make a much better atmosphere for running than in PA with the ice and snow and so many layers of clothes..... so at the present moment that's what's keeping me happy to be here!

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What are these delicious-looking pictures of?? My new diet! Well, Mom and I are doing a two-week vegan, no sugar diet, which I am hoping to stick with pretty well once the two weeks are over! I'm not a picky eater, though, and all the good food that we have here makes it very difficult to stick with. But I am happy for several reasons to be doing this, one being that I really want to kick this cough/cold for good that I've had on and off for several months now, and I'm really thankful for this opportunity to get healthier and more fit in general!

The first picture up there is of carrot juice (and blueberries) which my mom makes almost daily, so for that I'm really grateful! And the last picture is of the fruit smoothie that I've been making every morning.... eating healthy hasn't been too bad so far!!

(I do owe a big thanks to my friend Sally, who's blog has given me very many health and fitness tips and has kept me very motivated to stay healthy! Thanks Sally! www.sallymcraeblog.blogspot.com)

More Stories from Guat.... www.fh.org

At the end of the week in Guatemala, our team leader John gave each of us a bookmark with the acronym "SERVE" on it. Each of these letters stands for a word, and every morning during devotions he talked about one of the letters and what it meant.

The first day was the letter 's' for See. We need to see everyone as God sees them: individually, created in His own image. We need to see the richness of the community that we are working in rather than it's material needs. We also need to see the poverty in our own lives, and see that we all need Christ.

Genesis 1:27

the next was 'e' for Equal. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We are all equal. Everyone has poverty in their lives, though in different areas. God's forgiveness is for everyone, and He views everyone equally.

Romans 3:23-24

'r' is for Reconcile. Christ came to reconcile all things to Himself. He is the answer to the brokenness and all the forms of poverty. Only in Him will we have the life that was intended for us.

Colossians 1:19-20

'v' is for Vine. He is the vine, we are the branches. This is God's work. This was His idea, not ours. Instead of trying to work with our own efforts and ideas, we should find where God is at work and join Him.

John 15:5

'e' is for Encourage. We need to encourage one another and build each other up. We need to look for the good in others and see them as God does. We were very blessed when John shared kind words about each of us, telling us how he saw God using us that week and how he saw God's love in us.

1 Thessalonians 5:11

At the end of devotions the last morning, John shared the well-known story of the boy who was walking down the starfish-covered beach and was trying to save as many as he could by throwing them back into the ocean when a man came up to him and asked him why he was doing that when there was no way that he could possibly make a difference with the thousands of starfish on the beach. The boy then picked up a starfish and tossed is back in, telling the man that he made a difference for that one. John then handed Amy, our translator and trip coordinator, a necklace with a starfish on it, and told her that she was one of the starfish that was thrown back in. See, Amy was a sponsored child, and because of the opportunities that the love and support of her sponsors gave her, she is now able to be on staff at FH, helping children in the same position that she was in to live their life for God and as He intended. How awesome is that?! There are really no words to describe that experience.... God's presence was very real and the work that He is doing was shown so clearly.

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On Thursday morning we left the communities that FH is working in and where we'd spent the week, and began our 5 hour drive down the curvy mountains to the beautiful city of Antigua, which is just about an hour from the capital, Guatemala City. Antigua is a small, touristy town with a lot of shops, restaurants, museums, tours, volcanos, ect.

When we arrived at the hotel at which we were to stay at, they informed us that they did not have enough rooms saved for us. Great.... they had reserved the proper amount of rooms for us weeks ago! How very Latin American to do that. If someone else comes first that needs a room, why not give it to them?

SO. They organized a reservation for us at at a hotel about ten minutes away. Fine with me... I can sleep anywhere. Well, one of the reasons that I was very excited to go on this trip is because there are two schools in Antigua that I am looking into attending for a semester to study Spanish, and I was planning on visiting them while there. Well, that afternoon we were taking a walk into town, and as soon as we left our hotel, John said to Dad that he thinks that one of my schools was right there across the street. Dad didn't believe it so he called up to me and asked the name of the schools. I told him, then turned and looked, and there right across the street was the school! So THAT'S why we went to this hotel!! I was so thankful how God totally worked that out. The other school, which is the one I'm planning on going to, was just several blocks away... our hotel ended up to be in the perfect location!

I very much enjoyed walking around the city with our team, shopping, sightseeing, touring a coffee plantation (very cool!) and visiting the Spanish schools. I am SO VERY excited to return and have Antigua be my home for a few months!

The morning before we left the country, we met with a couple for breakfast who are from the States and who have been working for FH and living in Guatemala for nine months now with their six kids. Well, it turns that they attended CSA (Christian Spanish Academy) which is the school that I want to attend! They were so kind in telling me that I could come down a week early and stay with them and they would show me around the city and help me get accustomed to being there.... you can imagine how relived and thankful I am to have a someone there that I know and who can help me with any questions I have... I am so thankful that God has had our paths cross! With each step I take in my plans to go there, God has never failed to show me that He is going before me and working everything out. I am so looking forward to my time there!!

Reflections on Guatemala

Before our trip to Guat, our team leader, John, asked us to read the first two chapters of a book called "When Helping Hurts" (and I realized after I started reading it that it's written by two professors from my sister's college in GA!). after reading the first chapter, I knew that I would want to finish the whole book. I am learning SO much, and I highly recommend it for everyone. It is very helpful for me in understanding poverty and how to make effective changes, and I think that you will find the same. I think it may be one of the best books ever written! I'd love to hear your thoughts on it if you've read it.

While I'm on the topic of books, my dad finished a little book that was given to him by his friend in Nicaragua, and on our flight down he gave it to me to read. It is called "How Good is Good Enough?" by Andy Stanley, and I also recommend this one. It's very short and to the point, but this is a perfect example of "big things come in little packages." It really helped me understand important things that I never really got or thought about.

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So, the rest of our week in Guatemala was amazing! I really enjoyed the first two days doing the VBS with the kids in the community of Santa Cecilia, and also visiting them at school and giving them valentine cards made by kids at a school in Colorado, which is where most of our team was from. We also got to give the three oldest classes letters written by some of these kids in Colorado, and the students in Guat responded to them with their own letters. This was a very special event for me to witness, seeing these kids writing beautiful letters to their brothers and sisters in Christ.

The third day we went way up into the very remote mountains to the community called Satacia to visit the sponsor children of some of the people from our group. This was definitely a highlight day! We split up into small groups and each went to different homes. Well, the home that our little group went to was quite a treck away! Being the rainy season, all the paths were very muddy, and being in mountainous Guatemala, it was very hilly and slippery! By the time our 20-30 minute muddy hike to this family's house was done, our shoes and the bottom of our pants were completely covered in mud! I didn't care though; I was just marveling the whole time that this is the treck that this family has to make ever time they go to church, the store, even to their neighbors! I was trying to imagine what it would be like to live there...it's amazing to me how small yet how huge and diverse the world we live in really is.

this is when we finally came to the clearing by the sponsor children's house that we were visiting; you can see the house way up on the hill! This is Amy's sister, Aura, who works for FH and has to make many, many house visits each month! She was a life saver in leading us and helping us not fall every other second!

This family has four children, and during our visit their eldest son, who was about 9 or 10, played us songs on the guitar while the family sang. Then the asked us to sing some of our church songs for them, and he still played his guitar right along with us! One of us asked who was teaching him to play so well, and he said that he just takes it to church every sunday and learns by watching the musicians!

David and Patty (who sponsor the eldest son) with three of the four siblings (their mother was holding the baby brother)

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That afternoon we went to the church of this community and had another fun time doing a VBS- playing games, sining songs, and doing our Noah skit again! What a blessing it was to be in such fun fellowship with these children and to bless them as they blessed us.

One last thing for now... at the church that day I found the baby that I wanted to bring home with me (don't mind my huge poncho; it was very cold and rainy that day!)

More about the lessons I've learned and experiences I had to come...

We left earth and are in in sky

Well, friends, we left Guatemala early this morning and flew to Dallas, and once again we are makig our way through te sky back to PA. I just wanted to give a quick update because it's so cool to be able to have internet in the sky!

We really had an awesome time in Guat and met some amazing people. We had a full week and are of course very tired now! God is doing great things there and I will definitely share more soon. I was so blessed to be a part of the Food for the Hungry team and to have John Frick as our fearless leader!

More to come!

l-r: Dad, me, Liz, Amy (our amazing translator who knows FOUR languages!) Abby, and John

This is our team on the last night, minus three- David and Patty, who left that morning, and Jeanene, Liz's aunt, who was back at the hotel. I was so blessed to be a part of such a wonderful team and spend the week with these godly, adventurous, like-minded (and very, very, funny!) people.

Mas en Guatemala

So, it´s a beautiful rainy night here in Guat. This lovely hotel even has free internet service! Just as a side note, I don´t know if I´m just really hungry here or if the food here is seriously some of the best I´ve ever had! As some people know, I´m very particular when it comes to iced tea, so I have no clue why I ordered it tonight... but it ended up to be the best iced tea I´ve EVER had! All the food so far (including American Airlines´ which shocked me), has been awesome. The moral of the story- come to Guat for good food!

Ok, on a more interesting note, we joined our team at the church today for games and activities with about 250 kids! We played bean sack toss, jump rope, duck duck goose, games with the giant colorful parachute... it was so well organized for having so many kids! They were so well behaved and attentive to what was going on, I was seriously amazed at how smooth the afternoon went with that many kids! We then had a time of sining songs, and I really enjoyed learning them in Spanish! After that we proceeded to put on a skit, re-enacting the story of Noah´s Ark. The kids loved it (and got to be a part of it by making hammering noises for the building of the ark, rain noises for the flood, ect.) Liz, who was in charge of the activities today, came well prepared with props, even with a big gray wig and beard for Noah. The best part, though, was when they had the littlest kids walk down the aisle, two by two, wearing little animal hats and walk up onto the stage into the árk´. One of the cutest things I´ve ever seen! Can´t wait to share pictures.

Well, I´m past the thirty minute limit that they ask people to stick by when using the computer. So, buenas noches, y hasta mañana.

PS- the time of all my posts are never correct, and I don´t know why! Just thought I´d make that clear.

Bienvenida a Guatemala!

We arrived safely in Guatemala City last night, only to find our hotel ride nowhere to be found! Dad was texting Mr. Frick who arrived a few days before with the rest of the group,asking him what we should do. I guess the guy from the hotel thought we were arriving an hour later... that was fun. So finally a guy came over to us with a hand-written 'Colonial Hotel' sign. Praise the Lord. Yes! we said. That´s us. Well, when we went over to the vehicle,we realized that it was just an ordinary taxi. No, no, I told him, and I tried explaining that we had a vehicle from the hotel coming. Silly us! Like the little hole-in-the-wall hotel had it´s own van service! I realized that he was the right guy when he got Amy on the phone, the lady who set the whole thing up for us. Lo siento, I told him- I felt so bad that we didn´t think he was the right person. When we were finally on our way, he told that my Spanish was beautiful. Ha. I wish! But being here is a good place to start.

So, this morning we had a three and half hour ride to Coban where we met up with the rest of our team and joined them in our first day of Vacation Bible School with the community kids. We had a blast, and I wish I had time to tell about it, but we have to go meet for dinner now, so Abby and I will hopefully be back soon to share about our fun time! Hasta luego!

PS- Sarah, Dad is not getting any service in this town of Coban, so that´s why he´s not in contact with anyone right now. H´´ll let you know when he gets service again.

In the Dallas airport

Headed to Guatemala City!

It's a day of firsts!

Dad, Abby, and I are in Queens, NY at the La Guardia airport waiting to board our flight to Dallas to then catch our flight to Guatemala City and meet up with the team from Food for the Hungry (www.fh.org). Today is definitely a day of a lot of firsts.

Number one, it's my first time going to Guatemala. Number two, it's my first time taking a trip with Food for the Hungry. Number three, it's my first time in the La Guardia airport! (and Dad and I agreed that it should be the last! It was not very easy to get to being in the middle of the huge city. And Dad just told me that his brother, my Uncle Tom who is a pilot, calls this airport La Garbage). (These three are also firsts for Abby too, so we're excited about our new adventures!) Number four, during the drive here was the fist time I had to use my iPhone GPS. Number five, it was the first time something of mine ended up in someone else's bin going through security. My sweatshirt came out in a bin on top of a guy's pair of shoes.

There will most likely be more to come if I have service!

Ski Day

Sarah, Abby and I took Will and Nathan skiing today for their second time, and they did great! (you just might see them in the Winter Olympics someday! ;)

During their ski lesson Sarah snow boarded and I skied, then when their lesson was done Sarah and I switched skis and board, so we both got to ski and board! Sarah totally rocked the board, and I... well, I'm getting there :)

Will and Nate skiing!

Teaching Nathan to jump rope

He has his fine-motor skills down pretty well; we're just working on
the large-motor skills :)

Snowy Days

The girls are building giant igloos with the big snow storm that we've
been waiting for all winter! (and that everyone else seemed to be
getting but us!)

(Sorry it's dark; Abby on the right and Mariah and Katie on the left)

Watching my little buddies today

I love Hal and Tristo's forced smiles :)

Acey and I went for a run in the snow!

Joy is a Choice

***NOTE***

Writing is not my favorite thing to do, nor is it my forte, but I hope this blog helps me become a better communicator through writing as I share my stories with you.

...I have learned how to be content with whatever I have. I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little. -Philippians 4:11-12

Always be joyful. Keep on praying. No matter what happens, always be thankful, for this is God's will for those who belong to Christ Jesus. - 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

In recent times God has been changing my heart to be more like Him, revealing to me and helping me grasp certain Truths that I've had a hard time understanding and accepting in the past. I was so blessed to go to the Passion Conference (268generation.com) in Atlanta at the beginning of this year with my sister Emily and some of our good friends. Much healing took place for me at the conference, and it began a journey of healing in my heart that is freeing me from burdens that I've been struggling with for a long time.

In past times I have found myself deeply discontent if I was not exactly where I wanted to be and doing what I thought I needed to be doing, assuming that only at those times was I where God wanted me. I knew in my head that God wanted me to have joy wherever I was but when I wasn't where I assumed He wanted me (wherever I thought I should be), I would get stressed out and have a bad attitude about it. What I have recently been coming to realize and accept is that God has me where He does for a reason, and He has called me to have joy in it whether it's where I want to be or not. It has been a beautiful journey of learning to make the choice to be joyful wherever I am, and it has been so healing to know that each moment, no matter where I am, God wants me to live it to the fullest and not worry about being anywhere else. He is truly changing me into a child that can be used by Him.

When I was in Nashville this past time, two of my friends were chatting about how it's a choice we have to make to be thankful and totally content with where God has us, because really no matter where we are we will always be wanting something more or something else. We need to fully embrace the stage of life we are in, and in that God can fully use us to do His will. Hearing their conversation encouraged me so much really confirmed in my heart the things that God is teaching me, and also I saw that I'm not alone in my trials and learning experiences! These past days have been so freeing and healing as I choose to rejoice and enjoy each moment of life, not because it's necessarily exactly where I want to be, but because God has called me to rejoice wherever He has me, whether I have everything or nothing.

My first devotion when I got home was this:

Dear Jesus,

I know I'm supposed to give thanks in all circumstances. But sometimes my words ring hollow: I can say them without feeling the least bit thankful. It's especially hard for me to be thankful in the midst of a bad day, when everything seems to be going wrong.

Beloved, I know what goes on in your heart far better than you do... When you struggle to be thankful, stop and remember who I AM: the Author of your life and your faith. You are utterly dependent on me for everything, including your next breath... When you thank me during a difficult day, you are assuming the proper stance for a child of God. If you persevere in this thankfulness, resisting the temptation to grumble, you can find Joy and Peace in the midst of your struggles.

(Excerpt from Sarah Young's book Dear Jesus)

While organizing my bookshelf the next day, I came across a devotion book by Charles Swindoll called Wisdom for the Way (which contains excerpts from all of his books), and I remembered my sister had been reading it. I opened it to the page in which the bookmark was, and I was shocked at what it read:

I have discovered that a joyful countenance has nothing to do with one's age or one's occupation (or lack of it) or one's geography or education or marital status or good looks or circumstances... Joy is a choice. It is a matter of attitude that stems from one's confidence in God- that He is at work, that He is in full control, that He is in the midst of whatever has happened, is happening, and will happen. Either we fix our minds on that and determine to laugh again, or we wail and whine our way through life, complaining that we never got a fair shake. We are the ones who consciously determine which way we shall go...

Regardless how severely the winds of adversity may blow, we set our sails toward joy.

(Excerpt from his book Laugh Again)

That excerpt pretty much sums up what I have been learning and what has been healing me and some of my relationships. How freeing it is to know that we can rejoice in every moment of life because our life is not our own; we are His.

And let the peace that comes from Christ rule in your hearts. For as members of one body you are called to live in peace. And always be thankful. - Colossians 3:15

Welcome!

I am so happy that you've found my new blog! I'm so excited to share with you stories and pictures from my exciting life with my great family of Mom and Dad, Dan and Sarah (and their kids Will, Hallie, Tristan, and one on the way!) Andrew and Jen, Jon, Emily, Abby, Mariah, Katie, Nathan, and all of my amazing friends (you!) that God has so graciously blessed me with.

You can see my old blog at xanga.com/annagrace16, and I hope you continue with my new one now that I plan to keep up with it more than just when I travel (and even then I didn't always keep up because I rarely have internet access when abroad).

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The latest exciting news is that Mom is in the Dominican Republic and Haiti with sis-in-law Jen and her friend Katie who lived in Haiti for some years and speaks Creole! (Both are nurses and mom is a midwife). They went with a medical team from CURE International (cureinternational.org). It is an amazing organization- my family has been blessed with the great friendship of the Executive Vice President of CURE and his wife. They are changing forever the lives of children and families around the world.

I was so blessed to go to Nashville this past weekend for my friend Nick's wedding with my amazing friend Kerry (her blog is rockin' awesome- I highly recommend reading it! kerryhasenbalg.typepad.com). Nick and Natalie's wedding was beautiful-they have such hearts for God and that clearly came through in their God-glorifying ceremony. It was one of the best weddings I've attended, one that I hope mine will resemble someday if I have one. Congrats Nick and Natalie- you guys are such a blessing!

While in Nashville, I got to see some of my best friends in the whole world who work at Show Hope (showhope.org), one of the best and my favorite organizations in the world! I am so blessed to be a part of it and to have these amazing people be a part of my life. It was refreshing to spend time with these friends that I rarely get to see and be so encouraged by them.

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