Four Weddings and a Reception! Thursday June 24th, 2021

 Last day of boots on the ground.  Our team started the day with covid tests at one of the local laboratories.  It’s required to be taken within 72 hours of arrival back into the USA.  It went fairly fast and we all tested negative!!  Great news, no one needs to stay behind!  


After covid testing, we headed to the church for one last time before taking down the clinic.  Today was a half day.  Mike, myself and Milton went to the department of agriculture to meet with some people about planting trees, chicken coops and other things.  The mission has a dream of being able to help create a sustainable food source for the local people in La Ceibita and eventually in Tocoa.  Specifically the feeding center in La Ceibita and the future feeding center in Tocoa.  The one in La Ceibita feeds 150 children a day and our hope is that by the end of the year we will have one built in Tocoa to help feed the children there.  A sustainable food source is ideal for this situation.  The women we met with shared her teachings of the students in the agricultural school and helped guide us in planning and ideas for future chicken coops and plantings. It was great to talk to her and she shared that she would be willing to come to La Ceibita to help with our project ideas.  We think we will likely start with 2 chicken coops and maybe start thinking of some hydroponic systems for growing small crops at the feeding center.  Lots of ideas!  


After our meeting we headed back to the church to help with the tear down of the clinic and prepare the church for the wedding.  We had a little down time in the afternoon while waiting for the weddings to start so it was nice to spend time just chatting with each other and catching up on the week.  We got our covid test results, all negative thank goodness!  There were 4 weddings scheduled for this afternoon.  One of them being Tomas and Irma!  It was so neat to see them together like that and to witness the other 3 couples in the wedding too.  Honduran weddings are pretty unique.  There’s usually a lot going on, lots of music and children running around all over the place.  It is a blessing to be part of it.  


Everyone was pretty tired by this point and after the reception we all headed back to the hotel at around 8pm to clean up and get ready for our long travel day tomorrow. 


It is so great to be part of this mission.  Such a blessing and it has changed me in so many ways.  I was just having a conversation with someone today about how I didn’t really truly understand what it meant to become a Christian until I came on a mission trip to Honduras about 8/9 years ago. I’m reminded of that every time I am here.  I think that is one reason I love to come here - my connection to God is stronger every time.  I feel the love and the passion of the Honduras people first hand and know just how beautiful their love for God is.  


I’ll be back in November with a construction team to help with the building of the church/feeding center in Tocoa.  It’s going to be awesome to expand our mission further!  


That’s all for now, 

Blessings, Shelley B.  


Waiting our turn for covid tests



Inside the department of agriculture 




Four weddings!




Our awesome pharmacy team for the week 
So great to get to share this with Josephine. 
Our amazing team of North Americans and Honduran translators and doctors!





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