Ready or Not, Here We Come!

We're off to Santiago, Chile!  We have 6 suitcases (most of them carry-on size), 6 backpacks, 1 Pack n Play and one jar of peanut butter.  The kids are so excited that they're kind of driving us crazy.  We're trying to focus on packing and making sure we have everything we need, while the the kids are so excited they're bouncing off the wall.  It's cute though, and we're thrilled they're excited.

It's hard to tell what the kids are most excited about:  going to Chile, or getting their birthday present on the plane.  Noah, Griff and Wil have their birthdays in the summer (6/26/, 7/7 and 8/3) and decided they wanted to use Grandma and Grandpa's birthday money to get a Nintendo DS.  We told them they could have this awesome gift a little early - on the flight to Chile.  Yesterday one of the boys said, "Tomorrow we get our Nintendo DS when we fly to Chile!  I can't wait!"

Today we fly from Denver to Toronto (3 1/2 hours) and then Toronto to Santiago (12 hours).  Santiago is in the same time zone as Eastern Time, so we'll be two hours ahead of Mountain Time.  We arrive in Santiago at about 9:30 a.m. tomorrow.  Some airlines have been cancelling flights today due to the Puyehue-Cordon Caulle volcano (see pictures here) that has been erupting since early June.  Our flight is so far not affected and we don't expect it to be.

Many of you have asked what we'll be doing while in Chile.  The short answer is, we don't really know for sure yet!  We have two main things we'll be focusing on.  One is a girls home in Santiago.  We hope to just spend time with the girls (ages 3-18) and make them feel loved and accepted.  We'd like to do some "kids' church" type time, where we play games, worship and do a hands on activity together.  We'd also like to do some cleaning and maybe even light construction type work (as you know Greg is so handy!).  We meet with the head of the girls' home on Friday of this week to figure out the details (what, how, when, etc.).

The other main thing we'll be doing has to do with Kristin's job.  She'll be meeting with clients in Chile, Argentina, Uruguay and Peru to speak at a few events and discuss things like how to use technology to get banking services to the poor.

Thanks for reading and going on this journey with us!  Let us know what questions and comments you have, and thanks again for your support.

Helloooo Santiago, ready or not - here we come!
Greg and Kristin