When God Unites

My hubby and I had an incredible conversation with our finance manager two days ago. He was so thrilled to share how much God touched him on a routine drive for materials.

We love to celebrate family because Papa God loves family. This is a wonderful story about a reunion with extended family written by Pine Pienaar, and shared with permission.   

Pine Pienaar

July 26 at 9:30pm · Chimoio, Mozambique ·

Today was a phenomenal day, and I just have to share my experience with you. A lot of you know that I grew up in colonial Mozambique, in the years 1966 through 1975, but you may also know that I've been back here since 1992. Today I was driving to pick up some firewood for a Chimoio based orphanage that I'm helping out by handling their financial management. Augusto, a Mozambican who works at the orphanage, accompanied me to the place where we normally buy firewood. Along the way, we got talking about the situation in Mozambique. Somehow the conversation got around to me describing my early days in Mozambique, including the fact that I spent the happiest days of my childhood on a farm well known in this area, as "Chitundo." Augusto looked at me in astonishment and said: "I was born there!" Well, one thing lead to another and I told him about some of my friends I grew up with on Chitundo. Eventually I mentioned to him the name of one of our tractor drivers, Companhia Razao, who mentored me in many ways, not the least of which was in Mozambican bush craft and hunting. Augusto looked at me incredulously and said: "Companhia Razao? He was my uncle!" At that point I nearly overturned the Ford Ranger in which we were traveling!

Upon our return to the Chimoio area in 1996, I managed to track down Companhia Razao in his old age, and what a reunion it was! There is much more to the story, but suffice it to say that Companhia was one of my boyhood heroes. He sadly passed away in 2005, but meeting up with his nephew today, under such unexpected circumstances, brought back the precious memories of an old African who had an indelible impression on an "umzungu" boy growing up in the wild African bush at the tail end of its romantic era.

In the photo, Companhia is second from the right. His son, Araujo on the right.

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We are so grateful to Papa God for how he is loving us so well. He is blessing the children at ROG and the team of staff and volunteers. Truly whom God brings together is blessed. We are very very thankful to God for each and every person who he draws into the Iris Chimoio ROG family.
God loves to show how he is delighted in our love for Jesus! These special moments are treasures and gifts from a Papa God who loves each one of us soooo much!

lots of love,
Missionary Momma Mia

The Perfect Twirl

There was a day that we found this long sleeve t-shirt on sale in a big department store. My hubby and I then found other winter clothes that were also on sale. We started to load up our shopping buggy with sweaters, jackets, and long sleeve shirts for our boys and workers. Then we headed over to the girl’s department where we found all kinds of pretty, shiny, sparkly, lacy, and fluffy girl clothes.

It was the first time I bought a ballerina style dress for two of my girls, and fancy shiny dresses for three of my girls with lace crochet cardigans to match. We even bought them gloves. My hubby and I actually bought two dresses with multiple layers of tulle skirts. We all loved it so much! The moment our two youngest girls twirled in their brand new dresses was perfect. 

I had shopped many times for t-shirts and girl clothes in Pep or at the outside market, but never for fancy dresses. The minute I saw a fluffy skirted dress, I knew I could buy that dress for one of my girls. It was a moment I had been waiting for all my life.  I had always dreamed of the moment that I would buy a fancy dress for my little girl, and I  would see her twirl in her first ballerina skirt. I had imagined a tinier tulle skirt – maybe for a baby girl. For some reason, probably the sparse shopping available in Chimoio, I had never seen these type of fluffy dresses our girls size until that day in the department store in Colorado. There are more shops in Colorado, and that was the first day I had noticed a pretty, fluffy dress just Julieta’s size, and Margarida’s size.  There were three more fancy, shiny dresses that matched perfectly with these sweet little cardigans.

All five of our beautiful girls sparkled and shined in their fancy dresses. They curtsied, and danced. They sat so politely at our friend’s restaurant. It was such a beautiful day. We loved spending special time with the girls. There was something magical about being dressed up in fancy clothes and going on an unforgettable lunch date. We spent the afternoon with the girls. They used our phone to take a bunch of pictures and videos dancing, singing, and twirling in their dresses.  

It was the perfect lunch date with our daughters, and the perfect dresses, and the perfect twirls.

Lots of love,

Missionary Momma Mia

Bright colors and happy faces

I love the kids happy faces as they show their fantastic bright art for the camera! It's beautiful art for my refrigerator door….

Awe, but there isn’t a refrigerator door big enough to display all of our Kids’ Art. So this little blurg will have to do.

This kids have had a great time with some model clay. They spent their afternoon arts and crafts time making colorful little figurines of animals, people, flowers and shapes.

Like any proud parents our kiddos’ art needs to be proudly displayed.

We love how the kids are so happy with their colorful creations! 

Brand Spankin' New

I think that tonight's blog should expound on the blurb that I posted on Facebook with the receipt and the mountain of brand spanking new clothes from Kohl’s today.

It was truly epic. I didn’t really want to go shopping today, but our other plans had to be postponed. That’s ok. We were also heading to Kohl’s to spend our 10 Kohl’s bucks from the last time we went shopping there to get some things for our trip to Cali. That was before we purchased our tickets for our trip to Moz. So I convinced my hubby that we couldn’t take a trip half way around the world, It is literally half a world away if you just run your finger from the somewhere near the center of Colorado to the middle of Mozambique you will find that it is half over and on the opposite hemisphere. That makes it pretty perfect for shopping for winter clothes for low low prices. Great! I want to write that like Tony the Tiger on a box of Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes. But that would be just a little too cheesy.

Well, if you don’t know what Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes are, I’m sorry for the impossible image reference. He was my favorite box to read during breakfast as a kid. Tony the Tiger is so cool.

Oh my goodness. What does that have to do with getting new clothes for kids? Well everything makes sense. I will tell you why this makes sense.

I was remembering some of the things that just made me happy as a kid. One of them was getting brand new clothes from a department store, shoe shopping with my mom, making cookies, and eating the brand name cereal because their boxes were awesome to look at. I don’t think that it tasted much different from the store brand cereal, but I loved to read all the words on the boxes. Seriously, that’s where the correlation comes from.

Not too much of a story there. But then again there isn’t always something grand to write about.

We are just so thrilled to go shopping for our boys and girls, young men, and even mama’s and papa’s who care for the children. Once we get started we don’t stop though! We think that the suitcases will be determining the limit! It’s so great to get brand new, high quality clothes as presents. It’s  great for frugal parents to purchase brand new, high quality clothes for 90 percent off on clearance because they are out of season in America, but perfect for Southern African Winter.

So that’s way G-R-E-A-T.

Sorry I did it. It’s even cheesier on the box. So fun!!!

Maybe this is why I love kids. They don’t judge me too harshly for my sillies.

Ok that’s enough for tonight, because if I keep writing like this I’m gonna sound way to giddy.

It happens sometimes. Maybe it’s because my hubby and I feel like we hit the jackpot with a savings of nearly 2200 bucks! Thank you Jesus!

 

Oh my goodness, if that doesn't sound like a goofy commercial!

But it’s absolutely real, and our kids are going to be super happy. The girls’ dresses and sweaters are so sweet, the boys will look handsome in their new sweaters, and long sleeve T’s. Most of all, they will be reminded of just how special they are. We want them to know that they are GREAT Kids, and we love them.

Thank you to everyone who cheers us on as missionaries. Your love and support is so important. Each thought, prayer, dime and nickel, present and visit helps us know when to be lavishly loving by spending four hours picking out clothes for our big international family!

You Rock! (as my lovely missionary friend Andrea says)

Lots of love,

Missionary Momma Mia