Coming Home

Day 8:

11:00 pm March 23 - 9:00 pm March 24

We left the Hostal around 11:30, went to the airport and waited until six in the morning to get on the plane. You can imagine how tired we were but it was a pretty fun night! I played Spades with the guys, we slept for a while, I was crabby for a couple hours, Randy was taken for a background check. The usual. We got on our plane and left around 6 am to Miami, then our next plane left from Miami around 11. We got in Chicago around 1 and by this time I had gotten maybe four hours of sleep in over 24 hours. I was a hot mess. The trip on the bus was my favorite. We slept for a little while but I got to sit by Kari which was so great being able to catch up with her. Then Laura Moklestad and Emily Olson dared me to eat the sugar in the bottom of the Sour Patch Kids bag. This was the beginning of a very funny couple hours of us joking around. We got home at 9 and I have never been so excited to see corn fields! I love Des Moines and as wonderful as the Dominican is I am so thankful for our country and our city.

Matt taking a snooze. He snored pretty loud.

Playing presidents vs. aliens I believe.

Sleepy bear.

Erin sleeping.

Haha

All of us camped out.

The sunrise was so beautiful! And the clouds looked amazing

Our traveling group

You can't even tell this is Kari sleeping on my shoulder

We were all draggin...aka we all turned into dragons. Wiggy knows what I'm talking about.

Kari getting ready for her beauty rest

Our friends!

Sunset

The Liz and Kari of Drake University. Oh man, what a fun trip. Notice how attractive Kari and I look compared to Laura and Emily. 

Republica Dominicana: Day 7, 2012

Day 7:

Friday March 23. 2012

The last day in the Dominican was very bitter sweet. I was so excited to see everyone that we had met, but I never knew it would be so hard to say good-bye to people I had only known for a week. Paula and Joana were so sweet and they got each of us going away gifts. The actual gift didn't really matter to me, I was so touched that they want to love us in that way. Erin was stung by a bee on the foot the night before so we were one lion short most of the day so that was pretty sad. We started out the day by going to the Conde Street and shopping. It had a lot of tourist shops and everyone there was very eager to have you buy from them. I am sooooo bad at bargaining but I was glad that Ben helped me talk a guy into letting us buy two bags of coffee for three dollars each. After we went shopping we got some food. Ben had this fried mongu thing with cheese in and it was heavenly. Then we went and bought A LOT of candy just for the heck of it. We ended up giving it out to the people in our English group. We had our last English group and we played a game that everyone got into. After Bible Study we had a huge party outside. God answered a huge prayer in that it looked like it was going to rain all day but it never did! It was so difficult to say good-bye to everyone but what a great thought that I will see them in heaven someday even if I never see them on this earth. It was pretty overwhelming to think about especially with people who had just come to know Christ that week. What a joy!

The picture aren't in the right order but you get the idea!

 Last day of worship at the Hostal.

Dominican Candy Bars

Crachi...hahaha I can't say it without laughing

 The apartment people didn't know the password.

  Playing the guard the treasure game.

 The Elizabeths!

 Walking to the huge indoor market

 On the yellow brick steps

 Our friend that we met in the store.

 Caleb trying to calculate the price from pesos to dollars.

 Tropical trees!

 Conde Street

 The Building of Languages

 Elizabeth demonstrating the efficiency of our bathroom. Wash your feet go to the bathroom and wash your hands all at once!

 Ben helping Paola

 Paola is so beautiful!

 Handing out her gifts.

 The girls

 Joana's gift to me!

 Bible Study

 Allie and I

 Kassie and Elizabeth

 In the van on the way to the shops

 The Dominican way...driving with the door open!

 No hands!

 More Conde Street

A Vendor

Teaching everyone how to make the Jesus bead bracelets

Kaden and Barack

Elizabeth and Rocio!

Some of the guys

Shaly, Onelys and Kari

Erin, Joana and I

Erin learning the hand clapping game...it is so fun!

They were really really fast

Schreiner's English Class

Awkward class portrait

Playing another game

And another game

Notice her necklace, these are to remind us of what Jesus has done!

I was horrible at this game

Playing handkerchief

Josh playing some more guitar

A huge group playing handkerchief

Team 1: The Winners

Team 2: The Not Winners

Smiles beat Isaac three times...it was insane

So many people came!

Praise the Lord

The wall that people would spray paint on

Team 2 celebrating losing

Joana is so cute!

Jeff and his Barbie cup

Getting some helado

Leslie helping to serve

The group!!

Los Liones Valientes!

Haha I love my group.