I love birthdays. I just can’t help it. Growing up it was always made into a big deal, and it was so fun. We were woke up early in the morning by everyone crowding around your bed singing happy birthday to you. You got to decide what you wanted for breakfast, lunch and you even got to choose where you wanted to out to dinner. It was great. Something never change, and I still love birthdays. I try to keep my expectations low, since it seems not too many people share this great enthusiasm for them. But, my husband knows me well, and worked at having to make this one special. He was creative though, and the day began with him making me french toast. It was amazing. It was with that home made bread, and Brandon makes the best french toast already. It was delightful. We even busted out the frozen sausage we packed in.

Then, I got to open some presents!! Because Jae and Jesse were here just before my birthday, our sweet family dropped off goodies and even presents for my birthday!! I am so spoiled! I loved opening presents, what a pleasant surprise they had sent them-and wrapped them up all nicely too!!

Thanks everyone for sending fun presents, writing sweet emails, and wishing me Happy Birthday. I had such a fun and special day!

It was so fun to take Jae and Jesse out to see who is receiving the food, where they live, and so they could meet some of the kids too. Jesse took some amazing photos, so I wanted to share some of them with you.

This first photo is from Open Arms, the first organization we began a nutrition program with. I have photos of the little girl holding the pink basket from a while back, and she looks much better now. Her hair used to be pretty red and hardly is anymore, and she doesn’t look as thin. We love that we are actually starting to see a difference in some of the children. It seems we have been noticing it for the last month or so.

Another stop was at Rose and Edriss’. I know you remember them, I blog about them all the time. They have become our Haitian family, and we love them dearly. They are the couple that were already helping out children in the community. They have taken in many children who have no homes, and turned old storage rooms and any empty spaces they can find to house them. They feed children, young and older, who don’t always get a consistent meal. And they know who needs it most, cause they have lived here their whole lives, and know the community well.  They are an amazing couple that shows the love of God in a most astonishing way. Just recently too, they took in a family of five. Their picture is below the large group shot (the fifth child was still in school) The mother was sick with aids, and asked “mama Rose” if she would take in her children when she died. As Rose told me this, her eyes filled with tears, and she said, “how could I not? If I don’t help these children, who will? The oldest daughter will get caught in prostitution trying to take care of her siblings. I cannot allow that to happen”  Tears rolled down my cheeks too, as I squeezed Rose. God has given her such a heart for her neighbors and those in need, and I feel so blessed to know her, and call them family.

We love visitors. We love when people come and visit. We love it. It is so wonderful to have family, friends, people that we know and love back home come and see life here in Haiti. Jae and Jesse work for OTB stateside. Jae and Debra are the couple that started the whole thing back in South Africa. They had already been here, but since it was almost a year ago, things looked very different this time around. Last time they were here, there was nothing here, nothing had been started, it was all just dreams and ideas. Now, the OTB kitchen here is feeding about 850 kids, serving over 2,000 hot servings, six days a week. Jae and Jesse loved  meeting the Haitian staff, seeing and meeting the organizations and children we are feeding, and participating in what is going on here. Our Haitian staff just loved that we are all employees of OTB, and it was so fun when we took a huge team photo with everyone. They just loved it. Now, you can’t really tell that they loved it, since Haitians love to stop smiling when you pull out a camera, but we had so much fun.