Its been a year!

A year ago I was finishing my second day at the Castillo.

I remember laying in bed asking myself if I was really in Tijuana.

And now in Ohio, I lay in bed asking myself if a year has already gone by!

wow.


Okay, story time.

I have a busy summer ahead of me:

working for the Salvation Army, volunteering at the Domestic Violence Shelter, college bible study, 6 weddings, preparing for the Sojourn and Turbo Kick!

All of these things will be awesome! Especially the Salvation Army! What an awesome organization and church! Anyway, yesterday I went in to the SA's Dewald Community Center for a job test run. Basically I hung out with the k-6 graders during the after school program so the director could get a feel for how I would do this summer.

I'm convinced the learning activity I led sealed the deal. What did I do? I taught the kids Spanish words related to Cinco de Mayo.

God is funny.

Welp, another late recap

Holy! I'm only in TJ for 9 more days! That is so wild.

I'm planning on doing a whole summer recap post soon, so this is just going to be a short update...(sorry Mom & Grandma ;) You'll hear all about it soon enough.)



Lindsay and Breann prepping for our appreciation dinner/dance party that we host for Caravan Ministries. Dinner was great, but the dance party was the highlight of the night! Earlier this summer, I was accidentally told by a Caravan staffer that they were planning on 'showing us up' at our own dance party with a choreographed dance routine to Michael Jackson's Thriller. So, we secretly started practicing the routine from Slumdog Millionaire's closing credits. After two months of preparation, Caravan showed up without a routine and we totally blew them away! It was one of the highlights from the summer for sure!



Kelly and Addie at one of our favorite Chinese restaurants, The Chinese Dragon Bazaar! The three of us attempted to demolish enough food for 10 people...it didn't work out. I love these girls so much! I never expected to become such good friends with the staff here! Its going to be so hard to leave them!




Today's project - regrouting the Castillo shower. Work has been going really well the past few weeks. The dorms are almost done and we're doing some of the finishing touch jobs on the Castillo itself. Today I regrouted our huge shower and it took forever! This weekend were pouring concrete and stamping the main floor and that'll complete the Castillo as far as construction projects go!

Other than that! Life here keeps chugging along...Next Friday will be here in a heartbeat and the summer will be over...weird!

To Grandma [Because I'm convinced you're the only one that reads this.]

So the countdown begins - 19 days until I head home.

Its a very bittersweet reality. Mexico has been an unbelievable learning experience and it is the only place I would've wanted to spend this summer. I have made a few really good friends and gained new insights into missions life that I would not want to travel without. To me, Mexico is a place of comfort, security, and growth - and the thought of leaving is a little scary. But this experience has given me a renewed sense of motivation and strength for college and I am so excited to go back! Part of my heart is here, but I know that school is preparation for greater things. I leave here on the 28th, go home for two days, and then straight to Indiana on the 31st, so the transition is extremely short and right now, all of my thoughts are on getting back to school!

Until then, a lot is going on here! We have less than six weeks until students arrive and we can almost see the light at the end of the tunnel when it comes to finishing the dorm rooms. (I'll have to take more pictures of the work we've been doing sometime this week.) To be honest, I've been kind of tired of working on dorms lately, but after this weekend, my attitude has changed and I'm excited for the finish.

Okay, so the past few weeks...well they've been pretty normal here. But the most exciting event was that a group from Mansfield came here last week! My old youth pastor, who brought me to Mexico for the first time 5 years ago, brought down a small group from his church to work at Caravan. It was so good to see familiar faces - I cannot even begin to explain how happy I was. Tony, Sarah, Denette, Alyssa, Nate, Diana, and Gary are some of the people that I've known in the past and getting to spend time with them this week was absolutely fantastic. And we had so much fun! I don't think I've laughed and talked so much all summer! Their team had such an awesome week with Caravan - I had the privilege of sitting in on their debrief, which they did here at the Castillo this past Friday night, and I am amazed by what one group of people can learn in one week. God continues to amaze me in the ways He works in the hearts of His children when they desire Him. Having them here goes down as one of my favorite summer memories - hanging out with Sarah, Denette, and Alyssa - I will never forget this week.

On a side note, part of this week was funny because Nate was here with the group - and we used to do worship together for Crossroads' Senior High. So reminiscing about the old days was hilarious! Anyway, I swear by Nate's talent. And at one point we were sitting in the lounge area at Caravan and he was singing one of my favorite songs, so I recorded it just to remember the moment. Its actually a pretty crappy recording and I think me and a girl talk about cereal or something for a minute. Anyway, I don't have many pictures from this week (I'm waiting for people to put them up on Facebook) so this little bit will have to do until then...

One month left...

Welp, we just got back from our staff camping trip and that's crazy!

I remember when I got here in May, everyone was telling me about the summer highlights and the trip at the end of July. I remember thinking, "Wow, July is so far away. I just need to get through May first." But here I am - July's almost gone and the camping trip is done. I have exactly one month left until I go back to life in the States...I just can't believe it.

The camping trip was pretty cool. I probably didn't appreciate it as much as our outdoorsy people, but it was nice and the area of Mexico we were in was beautiful! It was the kind of place where the only sound you heard was the wind blowing and birds flying...and the occasional flying beetle attacking in the dark. Ha! The stars were unbelievable! Dustin killed a rattlesnake. There were horses and cows wandering around...etc etc

I'm still phased that I only have a month left. There's so much going on this last month, every weekend is busy and we have a lot of projects to finish.

I'll write again soon!

Frustrations...

Is it okay to write about a few frustrations? I guess if I'm being real about what life is like here, there are definitely bumps along the way. I'll keep it short and just share one that's been plaguing my work here lately.

SO,
my job here on campus as a summer staffer is to help with construction. Funny, right? I'm definitely not one to bust out my tools and construct something on a regular basis, so 6+ hours a day doing construction type work is new to me. For the most part, its been fun and really rewarding to learn how to do new things like paint the right way, stucco, texture, install flooring, build ladders, ect., especially when the results help further the progress of Baja Bible.

BUT,
obviously, as our team does construction together, there are miscommunications, careless mistakes, and just straight up accidents all the time. And I feel like I get the butt end of the deal, because I've assumed the position of detail finisher and now, fixer. While the boys work on big tasks like plumbing, electric, and hanging doors, I (Kim too) do the painting, the tiling, the cleaning and re-cleaning, and all of the little details that finish the big tasks. But, sometimes, paths cross in the most horrifying way or tasks are assigned and completed way below my own standards - and I'm stuck spending more time fixing mistakes than it should've ever taken to originally complete the job. At the end of the day, I can say I've spent many hours, painting, re-painting, re-re-painting, and touch-up painting - and that's just in one room!

This curse has hovered over a majority of our work projects the past few weeks. Most recently, my newest tiling project has been massacred while a plumbing job was being completed, and my frustrations are beginning to boil over.

It is true that for us here at Baja Bible, that one of the major things we are learning is how to live and work together in community. I 100% believe that living in unity and tight-knit community is the way God intended life to be, but sometimes, it is just really really difficult. Really, really, difficult.