After church, we walked through downtown West Liberty to see how they have been rebuilding after the devastating tornado in March of 2012. It was my first time to West Liberty, but Bruce had been there many times on clean up teams and rebuilding teams. It was really a blessing for him to be a part of it, and he met so many neat people during that time.
Here is a short video of the history of West Liberty Christian Church:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5qJX3m4d9k
After walking around and talking about the rebuilding, we went with Matt and Amy Daniel and their kids (our gracious hosts) to the infamous Sorghum Festival in West Liberty. We ate lunch, then walked around the shops and finally saw how Sorghum is made. It tasted a lot like Agua Dulce here in Costa Rica. The process was pretty neat!
After the Festival, we headed back to Matt and Amy's house and hung out, watched TV, napped a little, and waiting for the evening festivities to begin. They invited the youth group over for a cookout and bonfire. They kids had a NERF gun war and the adults talked about everything under the sun. They kids really had a great time, it was such a blessing to just let them loose, and the youth kids were so good with the little ones. I think Leyton gave the older boys a run for their money with those NERF guns.
At the bonfire, the youth prayed for us, our trip, and our ministry here in Costa Rica, it was such a blessing.
We were completely blessed by the words of encouragement, the donations, the prayers, THE FOOD (thanks AMY and MATT), and just our time with the Daniel family and West Liberty Christian Church.
Before church that morning, we visited with Henrietta and Ova May who live next to the church and their house was damaged by the tornado. Our home church, Southside Christian Church took up the task of rebuilding their house for them. Henrietta and Ova absolutely fell in love with Bruce and Emme the time she was there. She remember replanting a bush in their yard. We were able to spend a little time with them before church and just to get to talk with them. While we were there, Ova, was having a pretty good day (he had been battling cancer and dementia for a couple of years). That day, he remembered Bruce and interacted well with me and the kids. It was an absolute blessing to have been able to spend that time with them. After we returned to Costa Rica, we learned that Ova passed away on October 25. It was sad to learn of his passing, but so blessed to have spent time with him. We know he is in Heaven now with Jesus free of sickness--what a blessing!
Here is his obituary:
http://potterfuneralhomeinc.com/fh/obituaries/obituary.cfm?o_id=2298195&fh_id=10723
All in all, the trip to West Liberty was a huge blessing for us and our time in the States. We wish we had more time to spend with the Daniel Family and WLCC, but know that we will be back hopefully sooner than later.
Thank you to everyone in West Liberty who were such amazing hosts for our family!
Here are a few pictures of our time there:
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| Leyton in the MONSTER TRUCK (rock crawler) with Mr. Matt. He was in heaven!! |
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| And Leyton got to ride on a TRACTOR (lawn mower)!! |
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| Deep fried OREO....can you say yum!!?? |
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| Leyton taking on all the big kids in a NERF gun war |
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| All smiles from those boys!! |
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| And from the "grown up" boys |
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| Of course to keep with tradition, we stopped at Doughdaddy's before heading to W. Liberty |
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| First time seeing and sitting in the MONSTER TRUCK |
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| getting ready to take it for a spin! THUMBS UP!! |
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| The bon-fire at night..... |
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| The fire still going the next morning! |
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| Emme in Mr. Matt's hat....cowgirl in thought! |
