Day 3 in Nicaragua

This was the first day for us to wake up in the village. This is the corner of the unexperienced.

And here is the experienced mission trippers.  

Yes, next time I will bring one of these. It would have been good for privacy and keeping out little critters. It was hard to sleep with the roosters crowing all night and snoring roommates. Earplugs took care of that the rest of the trip. 

We start off every morning around the flagpole at 6am for worship and devotional. 

Kurt, one of the pastors on our team, led our devotional the first morning. He read from John 13. "Love one another as I love you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know you are my disciples, if you love one another." Jesus commands us to love one another. It is not a choice. Kurt's point was that we are unified today with this village and we are to love these people as God loves us. 

You all have heard me talk about my Monday morning Bible study at home with my Starbuck's Sisters. Well guess what....... We are studying the book of John and when I looked at my watch I realized my girls at home were reading this at the exact same time. This was one more confirmation that Brooke and I were right where we were suppose to be.......in Nicaragua! Still gives me goosebumps!

After morning worship we headed to the kitchen where this awesome crew fixed our meals.  Remember, this is a school room not an actual kitchen.  All the food, pots, pans, ovens, and utensils were brought in by our team. This was how they ministered the whole time. They worked so hard!

This team consists of 13 different ways to minister.

Here is our dental team.

This is our Medical team.

This is our optical team. 

You can see how many boxes of eyeglasses were brought in. 

These two ladies were our pharmacists. 

Veterinarian team 

But BMDMI (Baptist Medical and Dental Missions International) is more than medicine.

It is a store for food and clothing.

It is a place you can be pampered.

It is a place you can have a family photo made and printed to take with you. 

There are families who have never had a photo of themselves.

BMDMI is also a team that witnesses door to door. 

It is teaching children about Jesus in children's church.

It is about a youth group for the week. 

And it is about worshiping our Savior!

Each family had to sign up and attend a worship service before they could receive and entrance card for medical care. 

Here is our first day in Dental!

This was my main job..... LOCAL ANESTHESIA!

We pulled a lot of teeth! I was able to pull my first adult tooth on a patient! 

The children are beautiful, thankful, and loving.

There were three dentists including a dentist from Nicaragua. 

These people wait in long lines and walk hours to seek medical care. 

There was one boy Nathaniel's age that left his house at 3am all by himself and walked hours to get here.

We prayed that he got home safely. 

We finally left the dental clinic at 7:45pm and made it to worship. I took two eight year old girls with me.  They were so sweet and hugged and thanked me afterwards. 

Brooke and I got brave enough to wash our hair in the freezing cold water. It felt good to have clean hair but we still were not brave enough to get in the shower.