Mazatlan

I am finally caught up on 2007 so here starts our new year, just 21 days late in posting.

In early Jan we took another trip to Mexico. This was our 7th trip down to Mazatlan running mobile medical clinics with our church. We always take a big trip in January when the kids are out of school. Overall our trip was great. A couple in our church had a baby sick in the NICU who died while we were gone. That was hard. We are 1000 miles away from our grieving friends with the pastors with us on our trip. We wept and prayed as a group on the beach when we heard the news. It made us incredibly homesick and if we could, we would have just gone home. But God had called us to the work in Mazatlan and to be present. So we stayed and worked and prayed and laughed when we were happy and cried when we were sad and together as a group, we got it done. It was amazing to have God so close and present in our grief, the same God who was so close and present to our grieving community in Iowa City.

Here is a group shot.
Bill seeing a patient with Leslie helping him translate.
Me and our friend, Tiana.
My mom wanted to make sure Bill and I got some pictures together. But after 7 trips to Mazatlan, the pictures are all the same. Me in braids and a bandana with Bill still bald but we did as we were told and Mom here you are...
The night before Gabe died when our trip changed, we got a call after Bill and I turned in for the night. It was Tiana, "You've gotta come down quick, Adey stepped on a jelly fish and her foot is swollen." Bill reluctanly got up and went downstairs. There is nothing to do for a jellyfish sting except the old wives tale to pee on it. Adey, however, had a puncture wound in her toe, big and bleeding. No jelly fish sting, she stepped on something. Her leg felt like it was burning, her foot was grossly swollen and she stated that the pain was worse than labor. Bill told her to soak it in hot water, remembering that hot water denatures proteins, gave her a benadryl and ibuprofen. The team prayed for her. We gave it about 2 hours and if it was worse, I was going to try to call the ER at home to get some advice. Turns out everything resolved thanks to hot water, prayer and probably some luck. The next day in the daylight they returned to the scene of the crime and found this on the beach- Adey stepped on a puffer fish -- ouch!