Monthly Archives: December 2008

I’ll Be Home For Christmas

1 Comment

Kudos to you bloggers out there that are able to consistently post during the holidays. I’ve been swamped with projects and family stuff. My mom was in the hospital for four days and that was a bummer. Thankfully she’s home but since my last blog, I’ve been sewing and creating, cleaning, cooking, working, complaining, planning and everything in between.

We also went to the Army/Navy game. Thanks to nine layers of clothing and two blankets, I was able to enjoy the event despite our big loss to Navy. 


Hopefully by this evening, my oldest OS will be home. I was watching Good Morning America yesterday morning and they were discussing the weather. “A winter storm is blanketing the Midwest and the Northeast today with snow up to 10 inches in some areas…” It’s interesting how weather events become personal. I looked at the map and knew someone I loved was trapped. My heart sunk. 

Our OS was leaving West Point, catching a flight from Stewart Airport to Detroit and despite the cheery voices on GMA, I knew my boy wasn’t coming home on Friday night. He was going from a place of snow (West Point) to another place of even more snow (Detroit). How ironic because at the same time in our neck of the woods, we had the windows open and our other OS were in shorts! While driving, I even had to put on the AC! How crazy is that?!

I had warned Nate that he would soon experience snow in proportions the likes of which he had never known. I was hoping it would have waited until January but that was not to be. After four years at West Point, I’m sure Nate will have wracked up many winter stories which he can embellish for his own kids one day beginning with his travels back home for the holidays as a lowly plebe. As soon as the bus arrived at Stewart Airport and learned flights had been cancelled, our plebe was back on the bus returning to West Point for the night. 

I told him to make sure he wore his uniform and to be nice and polite. He says that uniform is the most uncomfortable thing he’s ever worn in his life but I chided him to remember manners on a handsome young man in a uniform can go a long way.

This morning he texted me and said it was so freezing at West Point that there was ice on his jacket! I think he’s going to appreciate the warmth of our home more than ever. 

Although I am disappointed that my OS is not home yet, I am looking forward to seeing him tonight. He might be tired and grouchy but he’ll be here and our five piece puzzle will be together again. 

Bracelets of hope in an El Salvadoran prison

1 Comment

The plans had been for us to speak at a university while in San Salvador. We had made a nice slide presentation about purity and were looking forward to the opportunity to share our message with college students.

But as I should have learned by now, things don’t always go according to plans and we learned Thursday night that we wouldn’t be speaking there after all. I was a little disappointed but assumed that God had other plans for us. We were given the choice between staying at home while the rest of the team did the medical clinic at the girls’ prison or joining them and finding something to do. That was an easy choice.  We decided to go back to prison.

I can honestly say I was looking forward to going back to prison. Wow, that is a strange sentence I never expected to write!

Beth Anne and I scrambled Thursday night brainstorming about what we could do with the girls in prison. We had enjoyed such a precious time with them the day before, what else we do with these girls given the restrictions and the limited time and resources we had available? The Lord, always faithful, gave me an idea, something I had seen American girls do and with a quick google search, our plans were underway.

At the prison, while everyone else on our team organized the medical aspect of our visit, BA and I got permission to meet with another group of girls, those serving much longer sentences than the ones we had seen the day before.

As we gathered around a table, with prison guards patrolling the grounds right outside the gated windows and a steady breeze wafting through the open air walls, we were blessed to share our message with them.

I even saw a few guards peeking in to hear our presentation. These girls were a little tougher and wilder than the last batch but seemed genuinely interested in hearing about “pureza” (purity) and having a fresh start through Christ.

After we were finished we asked the girls, “Do you want to do a little project?” “Si!” they all shouted.

At first I was going to just tell the girls that we were going to make some little bracelets but then I got an inspiration and with a quick nudge to BA, I said, “Would you like to make bracelets of esperanza?”

Esperanza means hope and I think it’s such a beautiful word, in Spanish. Even more excitedly the girls said, “Si!” I was encouraged already!

So this is what we did.

First we dipped little strips of cotton material in water. Once wet, we placed the strips on the table and began rolling the strips diagonally.

It was great how the Lord supplied all our needs because in addition to having plenty of fabric around the house the night before, we also found a bunch of beads and brought them along with us to the prison.

After the girls had rolled their fabric all up, they began adding beads to their bracelets of hope. I told these El Salvadorian girls that I saw a lot of American girls wearing these in the States.

They intently worked on their bracelets and even Font sizecame up with a few cool variations. I loved seeing their individuality expressed in their bracelets and they even made bracelets of hope for their friends and some family. They worked nicely together and were very kind and respectful to us. Even the toughest and hardest of people still deserve a fresh start.

When we finished, we asked if we could take their pictures. We were forbidden to take pictures of the girls’ faces but this was not a problem, we simply took pictures of their hands.

If you look at this picture below, you will see an old, white hand with a thin, silver wedding band on one finger.

It’s the hand without a watch and um, that hand belongs to me ;).

The reason I placed my hands there is one of the girls was embarrassed about her hands. I’m not sure what had happened to them but she had dark blue markings or burnings on her knuckles. It would have scared me in the real world!

I didn’t want her excluded from the picture and so desperately wanted a picture with her, I offered her a solution. I put my hands over hers so no one would see them. All of our hands are over a piece of paper where I wrote:

Esperanza = Hope

It was one of many bittersweet moments I experienced in the prison. Check out the lemon in the picture. Apparently the girls like to eat lemons!

One by one, the girls placed the bracelets of esperanza on each other.

They made them for all the members of our team.

I have many new pieces of jewelry at home that I rarely wear but since returning home from El Salvador, with a few minor exceptions, I haven’t taken my bracelet of esperanza off my wrist.

A meager bracelet made only of a small swatch of fabric and a few cheap plastic beads is among my most treasured possessions.

Mementos from Prison

2 Comments

I’m a very sentimental person. Look around my house and there’s probably a story related to just about anything you find there. The picture of daisies in the dining room? My husband took when we were in Neurenburg, Germany about 15 years ago. The photo of a man with tomatoes? That was my dad. The lithographs of two horses in the family room? They were purchased in Japan and given to us by Mark’s parents. I like to be surrounded by memories. It feels cozy, like a home should be. 

Last Sunday I returned to the States and I find myself missing El Salvador. I miss the strong breezes, the sweet people and the adventure of it all. A country I couldn’t have identified on a globe, has now found a place in my heart. I was only there for eight days but I want to remember the time and all that the Lord allowed me to experience. Being a sentimental person, I came back with very special souvenirs. 

Which is why before Thanksgiving I had Mark do some “husband training” which is my affectionate term for what my boys will one day refer to as a “Honey Do” list. Husband training is a way he can teach our OS a few ways to help around the house and become great husbands. They see it as a pain in the butt but one day, their wives will thank me (I hope!).  I thought I’d show you a few of the new treasures that are now in my home. 

This picture is of Garfield. The picture says, “I miss you.” 


This drawing says, “Thinking of you. I love you. I love you.”


Yeah, these pictures aren’t exactly going to be hanging in the Louvre anytime soon but I couldn’t stuff them in a drawer knowing who made them and gave them to me. 

Two girls at the El Salvadorian prison gave me these drawings. They even wrote something on the back of each of these pictures! We were not permitted to take pictures of the girls’ faces so we got creative. 

Each time I look at these drawings, I will remember to pray for these girls facing long sentences and difficult choices. I wept as each of these girls lovingly presented their humble gifts to me. 
Now I have remembrances of them in my home. 

My friend and fellow traveler, Beth Anne, was given a little washrag from one of the prisoners. It had a little cartoon on the cloth and might have been one of the girl’s favorite washrags, maybe even her only one, but this girl wanted to give BA something. BA has already threatened her husband saying, “I don’t care how cheesy this might look, we are going to hang this washrag up in our apartment!” I think she’s going to shadow box it which would be pretty cool. Until then, she will have a washrag hanging on her wall and that’s that. 

I also have a favorite wrist and that’s because since my return I’ve been wearing three bracelets I received from Salvador (as I often heard the natives say) which is probably like us saying “the States” as opposed to the United States of America. Our sweet, sweet translator Lulu gave me the red bracelet, a lady from a women’s conference gave me the leather bracelet which she took off her wrist and put on mine and the third, well that’s a bracelet of hope. I can’t wait to tell you about the bracelets of hope. It’s on my list of things to share but if I make this post too long, I’ll lose your attention. 

If you see my left wrist, ask me! If you see anything in my house, get ready for a story! Tell me yours too!