Karen's Side Street Salsa Kitchen Opens!

We weren't sure we'd even have a salsa season this year...it has taking FOREVER for our tomatoes to ripen, our garden suffered all summer from the heat, and by this time last year we'd already had 52 quarts put up!

Green tomatoes everywhere as we head into September.

But there ARE some red ones.

Karen harvesting this morning.

The peppers really LOVED the hot summer.

The heart of the salsa...

Rapid Response to Gabon, Africa

Dale, Paul J., and Andy are off to Gabon, Africa to disassemble and crate a Cessna 207 for shipment to MMS. Clipping a taxi cab and a light pole during an emergency landing on a dirt road, the airplane was damaged beyond Air Calvary's ability to repair. Air Calvary contacted us to see if we could help them and we are blessed to send this Rapid Response Team over to start the process of returning this airplane to mission service.

Dale, Andy, and Paul J.

The airplane, the taxi, and the light pole.

Damage to wing strut, leading edge of the wing, and the landing gear.

Damage to flaps and control surfaces

Damaged tail section

You can see the airplane is in need of substantial repair. Dale, Andy, and Paul J. should have the airplane disassembled and crated over the next two weeks. We expect the guys back in Coshocton the first week of September. It will take the airplane a bit longer to arrive as it will travel by boat and then truck before arriving at our hangar facility sometime in October.

We appreciate your prayers for Dale, Andy and Paul (and their families here) as they're away in Gabon, Africa.

Thanks, Special Thanks, Washer and Praise Update

Thank you to Terry, Tim and Andy (MMSer's one and all) for helping remove our old bed, pick-up and deliver a donated less-used bed, and then wrestle it upstairs and around the corner into our bedroom. The seventeen year-old bed had been a good bed but our middle-aged backs and bodies were beginning to demand something with a bit more life left in it. Special thanks to Dale & Deborah for securing the donated bed on our behalf!

Continuing in the "home front" category, Steve, the local appliance repairman, came to check-out our washer yesterday (a 1993 Hotpoint), fixed it for the price of a service call, and said "they don't make them like that anymore...hang on to this thing until you absolutely have to replace it" giving it a prognosis of up to another five years of faithful service. I like that...a washer that could last over twenty years with only one minor repair over the past eight years. They really DON'T make them like that anymore. But then if God could keep the sandals of the Israelis from wearing out over 40 years of wandering in the desert...He just might be blessing us with a washer that won't wear out for 20+ years! Now THAT'S a missionary washer!

And there's even another praise! We're having our socks rocked by blessing after blessing right now. This one is in the transportation department. More on that later...

Weather-wise, we're back into the heart of the Midwestern summer. Dale, one of our MMS staff; and Andy and Paul, MMS apprentice mechanics; are half joking that they need to go to Africa to cool off! Actually, if the weather patterns stay the same for the next two weeks, that will be true. Those three are scheduled to leave for Gabon, Africa on Sunday to disassemble and pack a damaged airplane in a container for shipment back to MMS so it can be repaired. Right now it's forecast to be in the mid-90's here and it's only in the mid-70's in Gabon. How many of you ever imagined it's hotter in Ohio than it is in Africa? I'll have more of that trip in a future blog, too.

Thank you for your prayers and gifts and donations and love and care and friendship and interest and involvement with us as we serve!

Tuesday Back In The Hangar

Hey, we made it home safe and sound yesterday evening and are now getting back into the swing of things. Karen started the day facing a mountain of laundry and then had the washing machine decide to turn into a waterfall filling, and filling until "the cup runneth over" so to speak. She has a call in to our local appliance repair shop and is finishing the laundry in our neighbor's washing machine.

I'm back at my desk trying to close-out the trip and re-integrate into the reality of MMS. While we were only gone for a week, it seems like we'd been away from home and from the mission for so much longer. It was/and is an odd feeling.

Speaking of the trip, our Sunday morning presentation at Ephrata Grace Brethren Church went well even though there was a hiccup with the embedded video in our PowerPoint presentation necessitating my acting out the video to include making airplane noises and "flying" around the sanctuary. Sorry you missed it! Or if you were there to see it, I hope you enjoyed it.

It was a blessing to meet the folks at Ephrata GBC and reconnect with Pastor Kim and his wife, Susan. They'd just returned from 3 weeks in Cambodia visiting their missionary son and daughter-in-law. Thanks for making us feel so welcome Ephrata!

Locally, our salsa garden is behind schedule with very few red tomatoes. It's kind of odd in that everything's coming in so much later after such a hot summer and last year, in the coolest summer in recent history, we already had two salsa canning sessions completed by this time.

Tucker and Tanner were glad to have us home. I need to get on them to write their article for the August issue of our Coshocton Flyer as August is almost OVER!

It's good to be home yet sometimes overwhelming at the same time. Thanks for your gifts and prayers!