While I Was Away

A lot has actually happened in the 3 months I stopped keeping up with my blog!!!

The biggest news is that baby Mondlane #2 is on the way!!!  He/She is due around Christmas!!  We'll be heading to the States in early November and I'll deliver the baby there as well as have the surgery i wrote about back in January to remove a tumor that was found on one of my ovaries.  We will be in the Atlanta-area for about 3 months.

Melina is doing great!  She is 11 months old already.  Back in May she was hospitalized because of a severe ear infection.  The infection started to spread to the area between her cranium and scalp.  The doctor had to make an incision behind her ear and drain all of the infection.  She has recovered beautifully from the whole ordeal....except for the scar on her forehead from where the bandage was put on too tight after her surgery.  I'm using coco butter on the scar.  Any other tips?

We've had visitors from both Athens Link and the UGA Wesley Foundation.  Both teams were a blessing to Roberto and I as well as the Masana family.  It's always so nice to have friends from my other "home" visit!

Masana is going great!  We celebrated Children's Day on June 1 by taking about 40 boys to the local water park.  We've taken 3 boys back to their families, continued visiting the families of about 12 street boys that have returned home in the past year and a half on a monthly basis, and helped a few of those families work through issues they were encountering with their sons.  Our day center is still going Monday-Friday though the numbers are a bit lower these days because of the cold temperatures (low 60's).  All the boys will be back soon though...just got to get out from under there blankets a little earlier :-)

We've had to deal with sickness in our Masana family as one of the boys who lives at Masana was hospitalized on and off for a good 6 weeks due to some digestive problems.  He was unable to keep any food down and lost around 30 lbs.  He finally had the surgery that he needed and is now on the road to recovery!  During all of this, we were so blessed by the kindness of family, friends, and strangers who gave towards medical bills.  

So there you have the highlights of the last few months.  Will try not to be away for so long again!

Routine

I've been very absent lately from the blog world....perhaps because life is feeling very routine these days.  Wake up, get Melina ready, go to Masana, spend the day with the street boys, go home, clean some while Melina naps, bathe her, cook, put Melina to bed, enjoy a couple of hours relaxing and catching up with Roberto, sleep.  Then do it all again.

The life of a missionary is suppose to be exciting and full of adventure.  Living in another country.  Speaking a foreign language.  Interacting with the locals.  Learning a new culture.  And usually it is....but right now, I find myself tired of thinking in Portuguese all the time.  Tired of getting ripped off on produce because I'm white.  Tired of not being able to communicate all that I want to communicate because I just don't know the vocabulary.

Life is feeling routine.  And I want more than just routine.

I recently read an article on Relevant Magazine's website that challenged me :

"When we wake up daily with a full awareness of how powerful God is and how deeply He loves us, the ordinary becomes saturated with life. And it is wild.

It’s wild because not only do we breathe in and out under this perspective of God’s sovereignty, but we also remember that this incredible God invites us into the enormous story He is writing."

I want to wake up daily fully aware of the powerful God I serve and how deeply He loves me!!!  I want to see His love in the eyes of Roberto and Melina and my Masana family.  I know it's there.  I just need eyes to see.  God has invited me into an enormous story He is writing here in my little corner of Maputo, Mozambique.  It's a story of serving alongside my husband and raising my daughter in an environment surrounded by the poorest of the poor.  Its a story of sitting in the dirt with dirty kids.  Its a story of restoring prodigal sons to their families.

This is no ordinary life I live.
I just have to remember that when it gets to feeling a little too routine.