Some special ladies

Some of you may not believe me when I say that I don’t easily make friends.  It is hard for me to just get out an get to know people I don’t know.

I have been blessed though with some ways that help make it easier for me.  All of these ladies work for me.  Let me introduce them to you.

This is a young girl named Micah.

Each morning this last month she spent a couple hours cleaning at Christina’s house and then came to my house for a couple of hours to look after Jenna as I began Ga’dang language study.  Jenna really enjoys spending time with her and Micah really enjoys spending time with Jenna.  The job of being Jenna’s “yaya” (nanny) was one well sought after by many ladies.  Micah gets teased about being Jenna’s yaya often but it is all in fun as those doing the teasing are jealous of her position.

In the New Year Micah will continue to watch Jenna in the mornings as I get more heavily involved in teaching our kids.  We have just been doing a light course load up till this point but we need to get more serious now that we are half way through the school year.

This is Jovilyn.

Jovilyn has been such a blessing to our family.  She comes each day to do the house work for me.  She sweeps the floors, cleans the bathrooms, washes the walls, cleans Jenna’s toys and cooks us lunch (it is our main meal of the day) along with many other tasks.  I don’t know what I would do without her.  She is 28 yrs old and she and her family live in the house behind ours.  They have 2 children and are expecting their 3rd in April.

This is Amelia.

Amelia comes 6 days a week, early in the morning to do our laundry.  With 8 of us we manage to make our fair share of dirty clothes.  We don’t have a washer or dryer like many of you have in North America.  We use a twin-tub washing machine.  Clothes are put in one side with water and washed for 15 min.  They they are put in the spinner beside the washing part of the machine.  Then they are rinsed in the basins seen here.  Then they are put back in the spinner and then hung on hangers on the clothes line.  Using the hangers makes it easy to hang the laundry under the house if it is raining or starts to rain or if it is just too cool and damp for the clothes to dry by afternoon.  Amelia then comes back in the afternoon to fold the clothes.  Amelia is just 19 yrs old and the mother of 2 boys.  She is carrying MJ in this picture.

Here is Annalyn.

Annalyn was helping Amelia do laundry this last month as we had extra people in the house, making more laundry.  Annalyn and Amelia’s husbands are brothers.  They enjoyed working together each day.  Annalyn is the mother of 2 children, a boy and a girl.  Dennis Junior in this picture, is the youngest.

This is Crynalyn.

She helps Amelia every Monday doing laundry.  She is 20 yrs old and is expecting her second child in May.  This is her son, Nardz.  He is 3 yrs old.

And here is my newest helper, Mildred.

Mildred has been so kind in helping Christina and I to learn to speak her language, Ga’dang!  She gets to laugh with us and at us many times a day as we forget words and make a mess out of words we are trying to say.  What a gracious lady she is.  She is 24 yrs old and the mother of this little girl named Queen.  She is also Crynalyn's older sister.

All of these wonderful ladies are very eager to make friends with me.  Most days when they are done with the work I have for them they stay around on the porch just to visit with me.  Now that I am learning their language they are eager to see what I know.  Often they say things with a glint in their eyes, waiting to see if I understand them.  They also like to ask me where my nose is or my eyes are!  It is rather funny when I point to the wrong one!

Please pray for all these ladies.  I pray that I can be showing the love of the Lord to them each day.  Pray that His light shines through me.