Sarah Burrows, Doing Ministry in the Philippines...This week was another great week in the Manila!  Danny and Kyle are continuing to work away at the sewage project up the street.  They are learning what it's like to work around lots of unnecessary red tape set up by the land owners and using some creative loopholes to get the job done.  Kyle is building a great relationship with Sherwin's family and is involvedin an on going Chess competition with Sherwin's younger brother, Robert.

 Teacher Jackie and teacher Colleen had another great working at the school.  Preparations have begun for the Christmas program!  Lindsey started teaching art this week in the second grade classroom.   We are sad to report that Sarah and Danny were laid off from their music teaching positions.   They are grieving but are prayerfully considering other ways to use those talents. 

There were a few big events at the Children's home this week.  Thursday night we had a sleepover party in the big room because there was no school on Friday.   We watched a movie, ate kettle corn, and slept in forts built from sheets.   A bunch of the older boys were circumcised this week (bet you didn't expect to read that in a team blog!) so there was more watching movies, coloring, and reading books than usual this week!  Saturday was a very exciting day.  A group from Manila came to play, eat lunch, and deliver new tennis shoes to all the kids for Christmas.   The children were very excited to open their new shoes and the shoes have made them very hard to catch in our daily games of "ice ice water" (freeze tag).

Sports are very popular here the Philippines.  Danny and Kyle participated in the Old Men's Basketball league and games at the Community Center.   Sarah is still coaching touch rugby a few afternoons a week up at faith academy.   This week there were also a group of professional baseball players in town doing baseball clinics at local schools.  Danny was drafted for the week and spent several days helping run the clinics.   We are thankful that he turned down the pros to continue on the World Race. J

We had a surprise group of middle schoolers stay here with us this week.  Their mission trip was rerouted due to the typhoon activity on other islands.  They certainly livened up the place and provided some great manpower for the sewage project and playing with the kids at the Children's Home.

One of the long term volunteers flew back to the states so there are extra opportunities for Lindsey, Sarah and Colleen to spend time with twin babies, Jacob and Daniel.   They are a lot of work but cute enough to get away with just about anything.

The social scene is hopping around here.  People got to watch Anteneo (The university Jeff's son attends) win an offseason tournament.   The stadiums are energized and very loud!   Also, we were invited to a cocktail party and white elephant gift exchange at one of the volunteer's apartments.  Danny was the big winner with his Winnie the Pooh toothbrush with Jackie came in a close second with her beloved new pen.

Kids International continues to be an amazing to work with…  we will be sad to see this month come to a close in a few short weeks!

Coming  Up -DG

This last week, during our scheduled spiritual discussion, Lindsey introduced us to Lectio Divina which is Latin for spiritual reading. It is a combination of reading the bible, praying, and listening to God. So we read the beginning of Luke Chapter 3, reflected on what God was telling us, and then discussed that with each other. It was awesome.