Spirit Week

Doulos' Spirit Week was phenomenal. Check out the pics of Pajama day and Doulos spirit day!

A Restful Weekend

Jake and I went with some friends to a place called Villa Pajon outside of Constanza. Constanza is about a 2 hour motorcyle ride from Jarabacoa. It is a beautiful farming town nestled in the mountains of the Dominican Republic. We had an amazing time riding motorcycles, relaxing on the porch, hiking and traveling to a site called Las Piramides. One of the most refreshing things about this trip was that it felt like we were in Oregon. The air was crisp and clear. We actually had to pull out our winter clothes and were still cold! We were so thankful for the opportunity to go on a small vacation.

The School Year Has Begun!

A picturesque shot of the scene at Doulos. Kids are running around the newly finished pond looking for the turtles and new fish. The pond project was a collaberation of several classes as part of their expedition. It is pretty amazing to see what students can accomplish when they are challenged to create and plan large-scale projects.

The school year has started, teachers are back in action and students are slowly transitioning into classes, homework, and social lives. Once again the school is filled with the sound of students repeating after their teachers, laughter in the cafe and futbol games on the basketball court.

I am pretty excited to be back at work, although I didn't feel that way this Monday morning at 6 am. It has been great though being busy again, having community, and being challenged daily to become a better person and a better teacher. I feel like I have so much to learn this year, especially since this is my first official year of teaching. It is a whole new ball game when I am "in charge". So, if you think about it, please pray for me and ask God to give me wisdom. I really want the seventh graders in my devotions class to learn to love the Lord. I want us to be challenged by one another and to grow this year. I will update again with more pics and stories, hopefully there will be some good ones...

A Fantastic Summer

Jake and I have been enjoying a busy summer of workteams, summer camp and a surprise visit home. One of the workteams down here was our very own church in Eugene, Jubilee. We had such a great week with them and decided to go home for a visit shortly after they left. While we were at home we went to a family reunion and visited other family and friends. We are so thankful for so many friends in both countries.

We had a house-warming Chocolate Party!

The end of the school year...

Here at Doulos we are finishing school and the kids are so excited! Here are some pictures of my class. We just wanted to say thank you to my mom who sent us all kinds of wonderful prizes for their "Doulos Store". The students earned these "Doulos dollars" every day and we had the store every two weeks. They loved getting to make some of their own purchases with their hard earned money! Thank you mom!

Also, I wanted to include some pictures from our big project that we just finished. We were studying the Maya and the students were making some awesome art projects.

Going to club...

On our way to club in Pinar Quemado we set a record for how many people we could fit in our car...10 people and a guitar in our Rav 4!

A good move...

Getting rid of the pink!!!!!
Jake, talking to our dear friends Chris and Kristen!
Yikes, everything is pink in the bathrooms too. I guess we can't paint the toilet...

Jake and I recently moved after living in our other house for only a few months. We had been wanting to move to a house that was more accessible to our neighbors and that would allow us more opportunities to get to know people in the community. We really liked where we had been living, but the owners of the house had built a rather large wall around the house and we really felt like we weren't living very much like Dominicans.

So, this brings us to our new house. It is very close to our old house, on the Avenida, which is a nicely paved road that leads to the Confluencia, the convergence of two rivers. We live close to a Pharmacy called Farmacia Cristo Rey, which literally means, Christ is King Pharmacy. In our neighborhood there are a lot of colmados (like 7-11), beauty shops, and people walking or riding their motos (motorcycles). It is a very lively area of town with music almost always playing and of course a lot of kids too! We are excited for this change and are learning to embrace all of the loud noises and smells.

Before we moved in, we decided to paint the house, which has helped a lot! Also, we have found a lot of cucarachas, lizards, ants and mosquitoes, but we are slowly getting rid of them and showing them that they are not welcome to live in our cupboards or showers anymore. The house has a backyard that is really nice with an old rusty swingset which I wanted removed, but apparently it is still good, says the owner. Our next door neighbor's kids who climb the trees asked to come and play on it, so I guess it was good to keep it.

Thank you!

We are so blessed to have people send us some much needed and missed items! It is amazing what a difference it makes to have some treats from home! Some of our favorites are natural peanut butter, almonds, and movies. Thank you especially to both of our wonderful parents as well as our church in Eugene for sending us these items (especially Pastor Scott and his men's group)!

You are all so wonderful and we really appreciate the thought, time and money that went into these packages!

Love,

Jake and Kyla

Master del Desierto

Jake and I participated in the Master del Desierto race/competition with my boss, Krista, from Doulos last Saturday. The race consisted of biking, padaling, running and swimming as well as nine team challenges. We had so much fun and really enjoyed ourselves, despite Jake being sick and me not feeling prepared. It was an experience that we will not forget and one we are glad we had the opportunity to participate in.

One of my favorite challenges was the soapy wall. We had to get all three of us up a 12-15 foot wall that was covered in a soapy mixture. Luckily, by the time we got there, a lot of it had dried and we got up the wall pretty easily by climbing up one another. It was a little painful to have the weight of someone on my head and shoulders. It put a whole new meaning to bearing one another's burdens.

Another of my favorite parts was actually wandering through the desert. I couldn't help but imagine what Jesus and Abraham must have felt like. We even stumbled upon some olive trees and I really felt like I was traveling around Israel. Of course, I had plenty of Gatorade and Powerbars to eat, but I felt like I understood how hard that would have been to wander for forty days without food or water.

Hopefully, we will have more pictures later and possibly even a video, they are going to make a mini-series out of the race, kind of like The Amazing Race or Survivor. There wasn't as much drama though I can guarantee.

We'll keep you posted!

Jumprope Fun!

A work team from Texas came and brought some awesome equipment for the students to use. Their favorite was the double-dutch jumpropes. It was such a blessing to have this group. They did an amazing job and taught the kids how to jumprope, juggle with scarves and many more activities!

Some pictures of Jarabacoa

Here is the sunset from our kitchen window...

Jake...

I will add more later...

Sixth Grade Girls Party!

Jake and I have been doing great. Thank you all for your prayers and support. We have really felt them especially as people have commented that we are adjusting remarkably well. Thanks to the Lord, he has helped us so much in this transition.

One of the things I love about the place I work, Doulos Discovery School, is being able to hang out with students. I had wanted to have the sixth grade girls over to our house and finally it happened! It was so much fun to connect more with the girls and the other teachers. I had eight sixth grade girls over after school until about ten o'clock. They wanted a pajama party, but I thought this would be enough time together for now. We had a water fight in the yard, played tag, painted nails and toenails, ate junk food and pizza, danced a lot, and watched a movie. I had so much fun and can't wait to plan our next party.

I am really excited about the way that the Lord is opening doors to be involved with kids' lives. I love getting to know the students here and in doing this I hope that I can be an example to them in word and in deed. They are so awesome and I just wanted to share some pictures from our party so you can see how much fun we had!

Please continue to pray for me as I am asking the Lord what he would have me continue doing here. I would love to be involved more in discipling and leading Bible studies. For right now, teaching has been an amazing way to connect with students and to pour into their lives.

Some fun sights we've seen

Here we are in the capital, in front of the oldest still functioning church in the new world

A moonlight stroll on the beach

The Cristopher Columbus statue in the Colonial Zone of Santo Domingo

Cabarete beach, one of the biggest kite surfing meccas in the world

Presidential elections are in May, so the streets are always full of honking cars with flags waving for their preferred candidate.

Sixth Grade Field trip!!

These are some pics from the field trip that I just took with my sixth grade class. We had so much fun. The kids liked the waterfall, but not really the hike back up. One of the highlights of my trip was seeing one of the kids' mothers take off her sandals and hike barefoot. She was even carrying some of the girls' backpacks and encouraging them along the way. Wow, these people are amazing.

Thank you all so much for your prayers, we are doing really well. Next week is Semana Santa, or Spring Break. I am looking forward to a break and Jake will be hosting a work team. Until next time...

Our lives in the DR

I am just finally having a moment to write and update y'all on our lives so far. Since we have been here, we have been busy with figuring out where we will live, buying a car, figuring out our new jobs and meeting a lot of new people. Jake has been doing great in his new job. Last week was the first work team at camp and it was very busy but also a great week for him and everyone else. Also, two new interns arrived to work at camp and Jake has been busy hanging out with them and leading them.

I have also been busy. When we arrived, I wondered what God had for me here in this country. There was not enough work for both Jake and I at camp, so I started looking for oppotunities to be involved in this community. I wound up at Doulos Discovery School (http://www.ddsdr.org/), a place I had been considering working at before. Last year, when we visited, we came to this school and I was excited about the possibility of working here. I am working as an assistant in the sixth grade classroom and I also teach English/Language Arts as well as Art with the sixth graders. It has been a wonderful community to be involved in and the students are amazing. I love getting to share the Lord with them and seeing their smiling faces everyday. For now, this is where I am called to serve. I am learning more Spanish and getting to know the kids that I came to work with.

Also, I stay busy with Spanish tutoring five days a week. This has been busy, but it has been really good. Everyone says that the first two months are difficult, and that is definitely true. I have not found it easy to live here, but I have found that God is faithful through all of my struggles and frustrations.

I am excited to share more pictures once we have the internet at our house or when I am able to upload some pictures. For now, here is a picture of the sixth grade class that I work with and their teacher, Patrick. Thank you all for wanting to hear about our lives and for keeping us in your thoughts and prayers!

Love,

Kyla

Jake and I arrived in Santiago, Dominican Republic just a few days ago. We were pleasantly surprised that our boss picked us up at the airport and we had a ride to camp. We were not sure if anyone would be there, but everyone has been very helpful. We are staying with a family that we met last time we were here. They are so gracious to open up their home to us and to let us use their car! Jake has felt very victorious to be able to navigate his way through town and avoid hitting anyone, or be hit himself! It is quite dangerous driving around here and people are very unpredictable drivers.
So far we have been able to do a lot of things in this first week. We went to our first national staff meetting in the capital, Santo Domingo, it was an adventure in and of itself. Our friend's car was having issues on the way there and it ended up taking twice as long. As Jake and I are shopping for cars we are being very careful not to end up with a car that needs a lot of repairs. Anyways, it was a fun time to meet the other staff, they are so amazing; it was quite an honor!
Here is a picture of Dioni and I. She is an amazing person, she was one of the first student staff members in the Dominican Republic to work with Young Life, or Vida Joven. I am looking forward to getting to know her more, as well as other Dominicans here in Jarabacoa.

Thank you all for your prayers, emails and encouragement on this adventure.

Kyla

Happy Birthday Jake!

Here we are in Crystal River, Florida on our day off! It was Jake's birthday so we went snorkeling and swam with the manatees! It was soooo much fun, and unbelievably beautiful. Thank you Lord for such a great day.

Jake and I have one more week of New Staff Training and then we are off to the Dominican Republic!

(We are learning lots of great stuff and working hard during the week :)

Christmas times a comin'... and now it's gone!

Wow! The holidays really fly by when you are having fun. Jake and I enjoyed a wonderful Christmas this year filled with beautiful white snow and the reminder of the true meaning of Christmas-our Savior's birth. We tried to focus more on Christ-mas this year rather than consumerism. It is always a challenge not to get wrapped up in it, no pun intended.

We spent Christmas Eve with Jake's family celebrating Joel's birthday and going to a Christmas Eve service. Christmas day was spent trying to figure out how to give our anonymous gifts to each other without revealing who they were from. It was quite comical how long it took us to figure this out. Also, as pictured, Jake and I went snowshoeing with my parents. What fun enjoying a winter wonderland and spreading Christmas cheer with fellow snowshoers/skiiers. It was a blast and a fun memory.

May your new year be blessed, as it is already January, I can't believe how much the year is already flying by!

Speaking of flying, we are leaving in less than two weeks! Wa-who!!!