Happy 2nd Birthday Mason - in Jamaica

We enjoyed a great week working on our school computer projects and then on Thursday, we were able to travel to MoBay and meet Marc, Brittney, Mason, Carl, Cindy, and Brett as they left the airplane and entered Jamaica.  We then traveled to Ochie and stayed at the Sunset Jamaica Grand Resort.  In flight, Mason turned 2 years old!!  What a 2 year old -  We had a great time watching him play Grandpa Carl's Ipad and everything else with a button.  He is quite talkative and is soooo cute.  You don't know how much you miss family until they arrive.  I became quite emotional just seeing them come out of the airport.

We had a fun, relaxing time at the resort.  Carl and Brett took a beginning scuba course and Marc and Theron did a two tank dive.  The Pond and Schaefermeyer gang did the Dunns River Falls and grandma and grandpa Schaefermeyer got to stay at the hotel and watch Mason sleep - well for an hour or so.



Grandpa and Mason playing in the sand





A great time in the water and eating cookies - lots of sugar this week.

 Sunday we all went to the branch in Ochie.  The meeting started with a member of the branch presidency, one branch member two elders, one senior couple and the 8 of us. By the time meeting was over there was14 members.  Ponds got to see what a "branch" is like and the branch got to see what a 2 yr old is like.  A very different experience for all.

Ponds in Fern Gully

We then drove to Kingston and showed the family the sites -- everything from the towel racks at Fern Gully to flat bridge in Bog Walk Gulch to changing the mission president's tire on his car.  Yep, it's all a story for another day and time.

Shanna showing Gerda and her secretary and one teacher how to use the system.

Marjorie Bailey, the principal at Ewarton playing TuxMath - it's free, try it out.

After we left the family, we spent the rest of the week installing computer labs.  The first one was Achievers Multi Resource Center in MayPen and Ewarton Primary School in Ewarton.  Both of these schools were ecstatic about these new labs.   When we completed the install, we had the principals and some staff come in and we put them through the paces.  Gerda, at Achievers, is not as computer savvy as Marjorie is at Ewarton.  She got so excited thinking about the potential for the students.  We are not finished yet, but close now.

Yep, it's a mopping job.

In all the busyness of traveling and recreating, we haven't had time to wash the truck, so today, at Portmore, we found a mop and an outside faucet.  The truck is loaded with hygiene kits and newborn kits.  Oh, our containers came in!!  We now have 1008 boxes of hygiene and 768 boxes of newborn kits to deliver along with bundles and bundles of clothes and shoes.  Food for the Poor is distributing the medical and orphanage modules.  The only things we are still waiting for is school kits -- we will deliver 6 pallets of these when they arrive next week.  Life is never dull.  We are taking the truck load to Sav-la-Mar this weekend and then on Monday install the Godfrey Stewart High School Reading Lab computers.  Thanks to all for your donations, it's a rush to see the joy and appreciation.

How can I be this old and still have so many "firsts"?

"Firsts" are those experiences that you've never done before, you know, things that happen for the first time in your life.  I guess if you're not having "firsts" in life you're just not doing anything.  I suppose that we are always having "firsts" but many times our firsts are not very remarkable.  Well, if that's what your life feels like, I would suggest putting in your papers for a mission.  Here it's pretty hard to say that you've "done that" or "seen that" before.  Well, this blog will tell you of the some of the normal happenings and then a little about the other stuff.

Saturday we got together with the Cheesmans and the Flakes for a "P" day activity of setting up two raised bed, square foot gardens as demonstration sites for the branch members.  As we have given presentations to our members about the Food Production Program, they tend to give us a blank stare when we talk about gardens in the city and especially when we use the terms raised bed or square foot gardens.  So, we got permission to install a small 6'X4' garden at each of the three chapels located in the city as a visual example of the concept.  Our gardens contain tomatoes, carrots, corn, calaloo (kind of like spinach) green peppers, scotch peppers, cucumber, beans, scallions, and marigolds.  Since we cannot tend to them daily we installed drip irrigation systems to help insure they survive.  We had a very long but enjoyable day and the sunburns and sore leg muscles will heal with time.  We had several members that happened-by and they were soaking it all in like a wool blanket in a rain storm.  We visited one garden today and found that the corn was about an inch out of the ground after just 4 days!

On Sunday I had one of those "firsts" I was talking about.  I and my two piano students each played one of the hymns in Sacrament meeting!  The two students each played special arrangements using all ten fingers but only one note at a time.  I played from the simplified hymns so I had spurts up to four notes at a time!  The two sisters were very nervous but made it through just fine and the branch president couldn't have been more proud if he'd just given birth to twins! 

We had a lizard running around on the row of chairs in front of us during church that was quite entertaining - not too remarkable but a "first" just the same.

Monday we stopped in the Mission Office for a minute and while there the Assistants to the President were involved in an auto accident just a block away on Red Hills Road.  In spite of the fact that it was raining heavily and thundering loudly, Elder Cheesman and I each grabbed umbrellas and walked down to see if we could help.  The car that hit the elders truck was traveling very fast (not unusual), was only carrying three passengers (somewhat unusual) one of which was a little girl who's abdomen was pierced with a piece of re-bar when she fell off her roof (quite unusual!).  There was a policeman nearby that drove the little girl and the woman in the front seat with the concussion to the hospital.  The two elders weren't hurt at all but the other driver had a fat lip (bigger than usual) so I walked back through the parking lot to get him a piece of ice for it.  Okay, here comes another one of those firsts we were talking about.  As I was walking in the rain carrying my umbrella, there was a lightening flash and thunder clap that was pretty much instantaneous and at the same time I had a visible spark jump from the steel umbrella shaft down to my hand on the plastic handle and a second spark jump to my cheek!  Now I'm sure that you've been around someone who swore and you moved away just in case he got struck with lightening?    Well, I've figured out that you probably had the sequence of events backward,  infact, I'm sure of it!  If you ever come that close to lightening you will understand what I mean.

Speaking of storms, as part of the disaster preparedness plan that Shanna is writing we found that we have a Satellite Phone at the mission home that needs to be tested monthly.  Now maybe this first doesn't compare with the lightening strike but none the less, I've never used a satellite phone before.  If any of you have ever considered owning a satellite phone let me state that they will work in a disaster situation but I wouldn't want to call home and discuss recent family activities.  It's not a convienent, easy, or fast way to communicate - but using one is another "first" for me.

Sometimes "first" are just things (people) that you see on a normal day.  Here are two pictures of interesting individuals we have seen here in Kingston.

Beard Beads

You should see him before he gets ready for work.

Dog Tired or Junk Yard Dog - Either way I'm staying on this side of the fence!

Tonight we got to celebrate a "first" for us.  We just completed our first six months in Jamaica.  Three more months and we're half way finished, which is a rather worrysome thought, but we're doing well, and are quite comfortable in what we are doing.  We think of home and know that we'll be back soon, but "first" we've got to get a lot of things done, along with a few more "firsts".