Medical Teams, Birth Families, Organization, and Furniture

A great big Thank You to the Oregon medical team. What a wonderful group to work with! It was an amazing week with multiple services offered including medical care, nutrition, and mental health services. It was a busy week and we look forward to working with the group again next year! 

We had some great help working on organization of the clinic. I will try to take some pictures of the lab area because that is looking really good as well.

Ron now has some wood/material for building more shelving upstairs. The ministry transported it up to the clinic area. Yeah!! He is in the process of building a physical therapy section. We'll also have more room to put overstock above. This way we will be able to more effectively rotate our stock and eliminate the issues of expired medications.
                                                                     

Steevenson was able to meet his birthmother for the first time! We are so happy to connect with her. I have met her on previous occasions, but we lost contact this past year. He is actually her only child which is somewhat rare in Haiti. Most of our children's birth parents have multiple children (at least 8 or more).

Steevenson with his birth mother

Billy and I were able to take a trip to Les Cayes to meet with Billy's birth family and also visit with some good friends (Daryl and Stephanie Fast). They have been involved in orphan care ministry for years. It was nice to meet with them and see the services they are able to offer with the ministry they are involved with in Haiti. 

It took us over 5 hours to travel there, but we were then able to stay at the guest house with an incredible team from Austin, Texas (Victory Christian Center). What a blessing to meet fellow believers in Christ that are dedicated to serving and promoting the kingdom of God!  Billy's family was able to travel about an hour and a half into the "city" that we had traveled to. 

Billy with his birth father and birth mother

It's good to be able to fill in some of the details of his adoption story. Our children from Haiti were originally adopted by other families into the USA. They were all at the same orphanage and I knew all of them since I had worked with that orphanage for adoptions, but I didn't know about their particular cases or situations. 

Apparently Billy's father had not seen him since he was a baby. The father had been injured with a farming accident and was not around during that time due to the struggles of trying to feed the family.

Billy with three brothers and his cousin

If I understand the information correctly, it had been a dry year and the crops did not get the water they needed to grow, so there was no food by the time Billy was born. He is the youngest child. We have met his sisters that live in Port au Prince and previously met his birthmother as well. She was in Port au Prince, but has since moved back to the countryside with Billy's father.

Billy with Godparents (family that brought him to the orphange)

The family above are neighbors and Billy and his siblings. They were also struggling due to no crops over a few years time span. They brought their daughter to an orphanage in Port au Prince because they could not feed her. She was eventually adopted into France. When Billy's family was struggling to survive, they brought him to the orphanage on behalf of his family. Everyone was very happy to see Billy and see that he is doing well. You can tell that his family loves him very much!

The kids with Joan sitting on new couch (still in process)

Ron continues to build things for the ministry and for our family. We now have another couch and most of the kids have somewhere to sit (besides the floor). Some of them still like to sit on the the little rugs on the floor, but at least now we have some options. We'll work on getting some cushions made for the couch. Right now it's just a wood bench. We are feeling more and more at home in Haiti. Just simple things like hanging up pictures that were on our walls from in the states helps make us feel more "at home". 

As a heads up, our family will be in the states this summer. Twelve of us will be on the road throughout the US and partially into Canada in the months of June, July, and August. We are visiting friends and family, but are also raising support to continue to serve on the mission field. We would appreciate your prayers! Please let us know if you would like us to visit your church or home group.