Great Headway!!

We've been attending a church called Esmyrna every Sunday. Everything is in Spanish, but since they play familiar songs and project the words up on the screen, it helps us understand what we're singing. We also enjoy the pastor's message, which Steve interprets the just to Liz. Cole and Lydia like going to kids church, where they get to play with other boys and girls, make crafts and learn about Jesus. Cole chose this bear mask as his prize.
One day, after preschool, Steve helped Cole climb a tree. Now that's all he talks about doing, and loves climbing high. He're really good at pulling himself up and holding on. (Don't worry, Steve's just out of camera range for this pic .)

One thing we've enjoyed about living in Mexico is the increased family time we're experiencing. Without all the additional demands on our lives, we've been able to go on walks after Steve gets home from CUCEA. We run into some pretty neat plant life that we never see in the states. As Ohio begins to transition into fall, we've realized how neat it is that trees here in Mexico never hibernate, and just grow leaves on top of leaves. One of the "in things" to do here in Guadalajara is to keep the trees trimmed to perfect squares, spheres or any other shape.



September 16th is Mexico's Independence Day, which is a huge event. Guad has been decorating for it for the last two weeks. Today on campus, they had a short ceremony a couple hours before our third meeting. It went great, with 10 students joining Angela, Liz, Steve and Isaac (Engage student) as we looked at who Jesus is as described in Hebrews 1-2. Several returned from the previous weeks, and brought friends with them. Just before leaving today, Paola asked when we were going to have another hangout. What a great feeling for them to want to be around everyone else, and to feel comfortable and connected enough to bring their friends.