It's been a while...

Sorry all! It's been a while since my last update! Last week, I got sick with a nasty cold, had a crazy last few days of work as we saw off our first group, and am now recovering. We have strange week right now, because our groups for this second week cancelled due to fundraising trouble, so we have an off week. Monday, we drove to the mountains at Jarabacoa and hiked to waterfall, ate lunch, and swam around all day. It was a great day to bond as a staff, and we had several of our Dominican staffers with us for the day, which made for a really fun day. There were a lot of silly games and laughs as we drove, and a lot of sunburn once we returned to Santo Domingo. 

That was only yesterday, but a lot has happened since. We had a girls night last night, complete with an episode of The Bachelorette, popcorn, and nail polish.  I spent this morning in meetings, and then rushed out to Cielo to meet the staff and paint a house, which is now mostly completed and dedicated last week. The family will be moving in over the next few days, which is a huge celebration and blessing for them! Then I came back to the hotel after the lunch to meet with the Manager and get all of our room assignments set up for our group arriving on Saturday. I finished that meeting, went for a quick run, and returned to bad news that our director, my boss, will need to fly back to the US tomorrow. His daughter was in a bad car accident in March, and has been dealing with a lot of recovery since then. We got a call yesterday that she was taken to the hospital because she had lost feeling in her legs and feet. After tests and not a lot of change, she stayed last night in hopes that they would find out more information today. After an MRI, they are still unsure, but a lot of the options they are giving are really scary, one of which is MS. So Jack is flying out tomorrow to be with his daughter, returning Saturday to lead our next several weeks of work teams. Please pray for his daughter, the doctors, and safe travels for Jack.

So now, I am here, planning out all of the details to cover our team while Jack is gone. And, to make it all more complicated, I am leaving on Thursday to return to the US for the weekend for 2 weddings. I am so excited to see friends, have a phone conversation with my family that is longer than 5 minutes, and celebrate 2 great relationships. But, the timing could not be more awful for the way things are working here. Jack's right hand man Ron left earlier this week, so I inherited his responsibility and have been helping run things while he is gone. Now, Jack, Ron, and I are all gone when a complicated group arrives. Pray that everything, all of our advance planning and preparation, holds until Jack returns on Saturday and I return on Sunday. I know God will do great things, but as I look at my to-do list that is several pages long, I wonder how it will all come together before I leave Thursday. God is definitely going to prove that it is not Jack, not Ron, and certainly not me that gets things done around here. I am excited to come back and be amazed by all God has done in our absence.