Ingram Family News

Wow, another year has begun. 2009 was so full I can’t imagine what this year will bring. Trying to go back and remember what we were doing a year ago, let’s see. We had a furlough trip in the fall of 2008 and we celebrated the Holidays (’08-’09) with family and then returned back to Puerto Rico shortly after the New Year. We then started preparing for our trip to Kenya. This time the whole family went to Africa. It was a 30 hour plane trip with layovers sprinkled here and there. Our flight over Somalia was canceled by the Homeland Security because of a missile threat against our plane! That was interesting. Hannah loved Kenya and all the little friends she made along the way. In Kenya everyone drinks tea all the time and Hannah got so accustomed to it that she now likes to have tea in her sippy cup. After spending about a month in Kenya we took a pit stop in Ohio and spent 2 months with family & friends, unwinding and relaxing. It was nice being home and not having to travel all the time; we were able to just hang with family and friends. We did, however, travel to Tennessee to speak at a VBS in one of our supporting churches, Pleasant Grove Baptist Church. We spent Fourth of July weekend with them and traveled back to Ohio mid-week. When we got back to Puerto Rico in September we had to get back in the swing of things and get reorganized. We started back up with our Deaf/English/Spanish Bible studies on Sunday nights and just recently had a Christmas party. We had many visitors that have now been coming on a regular basis, Praise the Lord! The Deaf have been bringing their families to the studies and before we begin the Deaf spend around 30 minutes teaching their family members Sign Language with our Power Point Class material we use for our free Sign Language classes. The Deaf enjoy teaching their family to better communicate with them.

This past October Hannah turned 2. A month before her birthday we bought a pool for our wedding anniversary and were assembling it when she fell. We thought she had just sprained her ankle but a day later she still couldn’t walk on it. So we took her to the emergency room and they did some X-rays. Turned out she had a small fracture. They temporarily bandaged it with instructions to keep her off it until we could get her a more permanent cast. Well, keeping a 2 year old from walking for a week is a laughable task! Now normally you would call your doctor schedule an appointment and get your cast set. Not so here in the land of “Jumping through Hoops”. We had to go to Hannah’s Pediatrician, get a referral for the Orthopedic Surgeon. Then we have to wake up early, arrive at the office and put our name on a list. We wait for several hours as there are around 30 people crammed into a small 20 x 20 office and are spilling out into the hallway. It is finally our turn and Hannah is prepared for the cast setting. The assistant asks us what kind of cast we want and we ask what kinds are there? He tells us of about 3 different types of cast and how much extra they cost. We pick one out only to discover the only type of cast they have are plaster ones! So we get the cheap cast and the Doctor says to keep her off of it, not because it would hinder her recovery but because the plaster cast is too fragile and will inevitably break. Not to mention we couldn’t get it wet. One might ask how do you keep a 2 year old from walking for a month??? You might be able to make other children not walk but not our child. You can’t keep her from moving unless she’s asleep! Therefore the cast started disintegrating and we had to dismantle about 2 or 3 shoes to make a sort of “boot” like padding for the bottom of the cast so when she walks she won’t tear it apart. Before we can get the cast off we, again, must get a referral from the Pediatrician to get new X-rays then a referral to go back to the Orthopedic Surgeon to get the cast removed. We must get up early, put our names on a list and proceed to wait several hours. While we wait we watch Hannah sprint up and down the hallway with anticipation. When she gets it taken off she kisses her leg and foot repeatedly and attempts to sprint down the same hallway again but this time she finds it more difficult and trips a few times. About a week later we celebrated her birthday and had a party with several friends. Now every time Hannah see’s clear wrap (which is what we used to wrap her cast in when we gave her a shower) she points to her leg and says, “Ouch, cast, ouch”. It was definitely an experience I NEVER want to go through again and I am sure Hannah agrees!

We do have a few tentative plans for 2010 but we always like to remain flexible in case God would open or close doors. We are for sure planning on another trip to Kenya where we will have 2 leaders’ conferences; one will be in Kayole (the same place we had it last year) and then this time in the “up country” where several of our churches reside. We will be having another VBS for the children and hope to have a True Love Waits seminar for the young teenagers and single adults. We will probably do what we did last year and come to Ohio after our trip, though this time it will be a furlough trip with Holidays to celebrate with the family. It is David’s desire to plan a trip to our churches in Pakistan and India however; we still aren’t for sure when these trips will occur because David has temporarily lost his traveling buddy Josh Ducworth. Josh just got married on the 1st and won’t be available for traveling for awhile. It is our prayer and hope that David will be making these much needed trips sometime in 2011 or sooner if the Lord wills. And of course while we wait for time to come for these trips we are going to continue our Sunday services and it is also another goal of ours to reopen the Sign Language classes closer to our home in a nearby church or school.

We ask that each one of you reading this will approach the Lord in prayer with us for this New Year He has gifted us with. We covet your prayers ever so much. We want to say a hear t felt thank you for all the emails, letters, encouragement, love, and financial donations that we have received from so many of you not only in 2009 but ever since we moved on to the mission field here in Puerto Rico. Some of you have been with us since the very beginning and we can’t express enough how thankful we are for your love and support. Our 2 main prayer requests for 2010 are for our mission trip to Kenya to be God led and God timed and also for financial support. We are full time faith based missionaries and God always provides in miraculous ways and we ask that you will continue to pray that God will bless us and make us a blessing. You can visit the other parts of our web page and see how you can become more involved with the Lords work He has us doing whether it be financial or maybe you feel the Lord leading you to go on one of our mission trips.

Again, thank you for your prayers and love!
God bless,
Heather Ingram