Christmas Morning 2012

My gift to myself!  A beautiful new quilt made by "Charles the Tailor"....I swear I think that's his real name! haha!

Tink and J

Reading the Christmas story and "The Night Before Christmas"

1st Christmas!

Family shot with a timer....I think we took about 12 to get one where we were all looking.  Lots of laughing!

AJ reading more Christmas books

Cookies for Santa and Mrs. Claus!  They know it's Mom and Dad but we love to pretend and have fun with it!

Dad what's this?

Merry Christmas from the Kyser Family!

Christmas Service at Rainbow CC

Today our family had the privilege of attending the Christmas worship service at our church, Rainbow Community Church.  Three other churches joined ours for one big and blessed Christmas service.  At least 4 village chiefs were also in attendance.  How amazing to see hundreds of Malawians praising our Savior and celebrating HIS birth!  (We were the only nono-Malawians in the service)

Five pastors shared brief messages with the congregation followed by singing, praying, and worship.  Here are two of our Rainbow pastors.  Pastor Nasson and Assoc. Pastor Martin.

One of my favorite pastors!  Jeremy was blessed to share a message.

Pastor Nasson and Jeremy getting the drinks ready to serve the congregation lunch.

One of the senior village chiefs and his wife.  This is Chief Nkhangamila.

Another village chief's wife.  

Chief Nkhangamila and his wife both wanted their picture taken with J.  

He was the little star of the service!

Lots of Coke, Sobo, and Fanta!

Everyone helping get the lunch prepared.

Our lunch consisted of rice, nsima (think extra fine grits without salt or butter), chicken, and biscuits (cookies to the Americans).  

There was a TON of nsima!  It's the staple food in Malawi.  No meal is complete without it.

Glory getting ready to serve!

Chicken!

Ida and SM

J decided to join the Rainbow Praise Team

AJ playing with Mamma's camera

A blessing over the meal.

The chiefs and their wives and special guests are served first.

Patiently waiting for food.

The children were served from a separate line outside.

Hey, there are some really pale kids in that pic!  Wonder who they are?

The kids serving line...

Jeremy and J

The Kyser family in front of our church.

After the chiefs and special guests are served the men are served next.  After the men are served the women are served.  

After the service AJ and Justina (her bestie at Rainbow) goofed around.

CJ and the boys!

Jumping rope.

SM and Ida sharing a book.  

What a blessed Christmas service that we will always remember.  Thank you Lord for your presence today!  It was truly felt!  To God be the Glory!  

Merry Christmas from the Kyser family and Rainbow!!!!

Gusu/Jidi December 2012

Our family took a quick trip to Gusu today to check on the progress of the multi-purpose building, the water tower rebuild, and the mobile medical clinic.  Now granted, it takes nearly 2 hours to get to Gusu so no trip out there is ever "quick".  But we had a great time and were able to take in some of the beauty of this blessed country that we live in.  

It is planting time and all over Malawi there are scenes such as these.  Men and women working with every ray of sunshine to get their crops in the ground.  Rain is essential to life here.  The crops are dependent upon it.  The people are dependent upon the crops.  We are all dependent upon our God!

Above you can see some of the work with the new water tower.  The tanks will be hoisted up as soon as the tower is complete.  We are praying that this one doesn't fall!

More planting and working the soil.

Those village kids need a tan! haha!  J is quite comfy on his Sissy's back!

Here are some of the E3 volunteers working the mobile medical clinic.  Above is nurse Carson and her mom gathering meds.  Below Nell is pricking a finger for a malaria test.  

Just a few of the reasons why we are here.

Above...two brothers brought together by Christ alone!  Chisomo and Ryan

Here is a snail pic (above and below) that CJ wanted me to add to our blog post.  

The cattle on a hillside!

Cute boys!

Road block....Malawi style!  

And that's all she wrote!  Praise God for a safe and wonderful trip!