~ Rachel Baker ~

What a week! I missed a couple days of school this week due to being sick, but a day’s rest leads to quite the recovery! Thankfully, Emily summoned me to my bed and took over school on her own. It was great to finally be back with the boys, though and I love being well again!

Each week, the boys have been coming up with new sports to play at recess and this week was baseball. I have to say this has been my favorite yet! It was hard for me to sit back while they played… often I found myself giving hints on throwing and catching, since softball took all of my free time while growing up. There is a huge mango tree in our back yard and often they ended up throwing through the mango tree. When the ball hit a branch, you never knew what they’d end up with in their gloves – could be a mango or baseball! Often, they’d even drop the ball and just start throwing mangos. The trick is stopping the “mango throwing” soon because before you know it “mango war” can get started.

The boys are diving into their Botany lessons more than ever. We’re currently waiting on some flowers to grow. We found some seed packages from the States in the back of a closet that are expired, so who knows if they’ll even work! But, needless to say, we water the dirt spot every day and we’re counting down the days. This week they learned about how plants pollinate so they tried to pollinate our lilies outside our house. Using Q-Tips as their “pollinator” they tried so hard to be a part of nature’s course. Since they are all boys, getting them interested in “flowers” is tricky. After a long discussion at the beginning of the week, they’re all convinced that if there were no flowers, we’d all be eating fish all the time, there’d be no paper, and we wouldn’t have any clothes to wear. Thankfully, they’re now fans of flowers!

~ Murphy and Christine Crowson ~ Crowson's Blog

From Murphy - Thank you praying for the village of Agbeku. Mawuko (Ma-wu-co) met with several people last Saturday (this, after his wife had their third child that morning!) and they were all interested in meeting again. By this point, Mawuko has already met with them twice, sharing and resharing the Good News of Jesus. Pray that the Lord would bless these "seekers" with deep faith and a love for the Lord Jesus.

Happy Easter! We worshipped with the Tsadome church (pictured left) and enjoyed a great time of worship and praise. Pray for the leader there, Toglo (Tow-glow) and his wife Alice as they faithfully serve Jesus. Pray that God would bless them with power and strength to usher in His Kingdom in their area.

Sunday afternoon we had a great treat! Pop-corn, A&W Root Beer, Air Conditioning and the Super Bowl! Some good friends burned the game onto a DVD and mailed it over. Great game! Thank you!

Now that the rains have begun, the Woodland Kingfisher (beautiful) family has returned to live in our backyard. Last year we rescued one of the babies that fell out of it's nest. Two fell out, but we were only able to save one. He's grown up now and has his own family. Their morning song is a welcome delight in our home.

Please continue to pray that the Lord would mold and shape us into more fruitful servants in His Kingdom. Pray that God would give us undivided hearts, hearts that do not compromise!

From Christine - Happy Easter to everyone. We had a good week. The boys are doing great, enjoying school as usual.

Wednesday I went to Sedome and walked around the village greeting the Christian women in their homes (Marta is pictured right). While walking around this very large village, my heart felt heavy for the harshness of life for those who are living outside of Jesus. Pray for the Christians in Sedome to have a powerful influence for Christ among their pagan neighbors.

~ Emily Dunnagan ~

We had a lovely Easter Week. On last Wednesday (art day) we made paper hand print lilies to go with our science unit and our memory verse from Matthew 6:28-29. We also happen to have bunches of beautiful lilies blooming in our front yard! Since Rachel was sick, I actually taught school by myself all day. I am now even more thankful to have Rachel as a fellow teacher!!

On Friday we celebrated our friend Lauren's 25th birthday with a great dinner and ice cream cake at the Crowsons. At school on Saturday the moms helped put on an Easter egg hunt. We had actual American Easter candy - thanks to everyone who sent some! It was really fun to watch the boys get excited.

On Sunday we worshiped with the Koonces and the church in Ahepe. This was my first time to worship there on a Sunday, even though we drive past their building every time we visit Lome. Despite the heat, I enjoyed getting to meet the Christians. I was actually able to introduce myself in Eve for the first time. Louise made a great Sunday lunch, then came my big event of the day. For those of you who don't know me very well you may not realize how significant this event is, but I actually had Louise cut my hair shorter than shoulder length! I have short hair for the first time in fifteen years!

This Wednesday we finished up out history unit on Ancient Rome with a game of Jeopardy. I have enjoyed sharing the books I brought back from the states, and I think the boys have learned a lot. I wanted the boys to have a better understanding of the world Jesus was born into and hopefully they will each carry away something new that they learned.

~ Marty and Louise Koonce ~ Blogs: Marty, Louise, 4T's

From Marty - Marty and Tucker are away at this writing. They have gone to the mountain for a father-son camping trip to commemorate Tucker’s turning a teenager.

From Louise - Happy Easter to you all. Another fairly routine week has flown by, filled with schoolwork, tests, language class and of course cooking and cleaning. Our water has been mostly reliable, thanks to all of you that have prayed for that. Sunday, we enjoyed worshiping with the Ahepe church. They are amazing us with their growth, both in numbers and maturity.

~ Agricultural Ministry ~

The first rains have come and everyone is in farming mode. During the dry season, Denni (pictured left) rented some land with a watering hole and has been trying to get a tomato crop going. One thing we are trying to do is help people find crops to grow during the dry season so that they have better cash flow all year long and not just during the rainy season. Pray that God will bless his tomato harvest so that he can provide for his family's needs.

2008 Watchi Team

Nledzi's wife and new son. Nledzi is one of the Sedome leaders.

Emily and Rachel after church in Ahepe.

Teachers and boys after the Easter egg hunt.

Silly Stephen with his Easter basket!

Marta, a Christian woman from Sedome

Taylor playing baseball at recess

Denni's tomato farm in Sedome.

What is "Tabligbo" in Tabligbo Times? Tabligbo is the town that we live in:) Thus, the title:)