My friend is expecting a baby in a couple of weeks.  It's their fifth child.  They have three girls and a little boy.  And now the new baby is coming soon.  Problem is that she normally delivers at Mbingo Baptist Hospital.  But Mbingo is right in the middle of the war zone.  They asked us to pray with them that the baby will come at a peaceful moment.  Otherwise they don't know where they will go.  They have had to evacuate their house a number of times in theses last two or three months.  Now they are just staying put and trusting God to protect them.  Evacuating is hard on pregnant ladies.  They don't want to run the risk of the baby coming  early.  So we wait and watch and pray.  God is still in control.  Of all things.

We are busy, busy, busy.  Our numbers keep creeping up and up.  But we are managing.  We  ran out of water today so I rushed off to the store to buy more bottled water.  We can't run it through the water filter fast enough.  And I picked up more butter.  They eat an awful lot of butter on their morning bread.  And they are plowing through the jelly, but fortunately I have quite a supply of jelly.  It's sure a good thing we are  flexible and have tons of experience.  We take it all in stride.  

Someone is coming tomorrow to see Shiloh and book a group for a future event.  Can't show them much as the house is crawling with this group.  But they can see what they can see and that will have to suffice. 

For more than a year now I've been looking for a good used sewing machine to buy for Pastor Eugene's wife Maribel. She teaches widowed ladies in villages how to sew so they can support themselves and orphaned grand-kids they are raising.  Just found one.  It's practically brand new.  Been used a time or two.  It's a Singer but is 220V which is perfect.  And the sale price is incredible.  It comes with all sorts of sewing notions plus a supply of material.  I'm picking it up tomorrow.  And I can hardly wait to phone and tell the good news to Maribel.  She will be delighted.

We have friends who are Methodist missionaries.  They are both Africans from two different countries.  They've been here in Cameroon for a handful of years and are now being sent to another country on the continent.  They're selling a lot of their things.  One item is a older stove that still works.  The price is real good. We are buying that for Doris.  Then there is a sewing machine with lots of notions and material.  We are buying that for Eugene's wife.  She has been teaching widows how to sew in village areas for some time.  She has one old sewing machine but could use at last one more.  The team brought sewing scissors out to her from America.  They have been greatly used by the Lord.  In fact some ladies have come to know the Lord as a result of those scissors.  We use everything, absolutely everything, for His honor and glory.

We are off and running.  Started with breakfast for one this morning.  Moving right along to dinner for four this evening.  Then we jump up to 10 for breakfast in the morning.  Seven o'clock.  We will top out at 14 by Sunday.  And then we are cooking in earnest.  It's a good group.  We see some of these guys twice a year.  They are all serious Christians.  They come from Germany, America, Chad, Central African Republic, and Cameroon.  They keep us busy, busy, busy.  But we enjoy serving them.

And we continue to pray for Dorothy that she will get a job real soon.  We have hired her for this month.  But if nothing works out after this, she will go back to Bamenda and not have any work there either.  God is still in control so we lean on Him.

Today was a cooking day.  Homemade chicken noodle soup.  Spaghetti sauce.  Lasagna.  Enough chicken pot pie for fifteen.  Chocolate cake.  And re-fried beans.

Tonight their director arrives from Germany.  Six months ago he came but his luggage did not.  Not until the very end of their conference.  It was terrible.  He ended up buying new cloths to get by.

Tomorrow the rest of the people arrive and then the work starts in earnest.  Three meals a day.  Morning coffee break.  Afternoon coffee break.  Dishes, dishes, dishes.  We swept and mopped the floors today.  We're all set.

She came bursting into Shiloh, rushed up to each one, threw her arms around our knees, and hugged us for all she was worth.  Then she announced that they were on vacation.  "Vacation is when you don't come to work.  We're still on vacation.  We're going back home and not coming back to work."  Wow!  What an education she gave us.

Doris told us that each day she is asking about Shiloh.  I mean, vacation's fun.  You get to sleep in and do other things.  But Shiloh is considerably funner!  And Shiloh has Papa Jim.  So she hugged us some more, gave me a bunch of butterfly kisses, told me she loved me, and skipped off upstairs with Papa Jim to have some alone time.  Several hours later when it was time to go home she was so dejected I thought she was going to cry.  Forget vacation.  Let's go back to work!