Home for Christmas

The end of another year is almost here. Although the seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, and years are still the same length, it seems that time is moving faster and faster.

Our week has been overshadowed with the loss of Floyd Yoder. He was one of the founders of JRM, and his vision has touched many lives here in Jamaica. He had a huge heart, especially for children. We had the privilege of living here at JRM with Floyd & Ellen during the first year that we were here. He will be greatly missed, but we are happy that he is no longer in pain. He was looking forward to being with Jesus. We will be traveling to South Carolina to attend the memorial service.

Lots of things have happened since we last updated you, so this will be a summary of our lives over the past several months.

Last weekend, Carrie and I had the privilege of attending a marriage retreat put on by His Glory Ministries (Daniel & June Pollard). It was a wonderful time, and we enjoyed being able to relax at a resort for several days.

We enjoyed having family visit over Thanksgiving. Some of Carrie's family came to visit us here in Jamaica. It was special to spend the holiday with them.

We invited some friends from church to join us for Thanksgiving dinner.

Jasmine, Chloe, and Sierra were able to travel back to Ohio with Eric & Monica and spend a couple of extra weeks with cousins. The rest of our family will then be traveling from Jamaica and spending a month in the States over Christmas and New Years. We are very excited about that! The girls have been dreaming about seeing snow again. We have had 3 Christmases in Jamaica, so it is time for us to experience the cold of winter again.

The weekend before Thanksgiving, we had a "staff retreat." Some former staff came, along with some cooks, and we had a guest speaker for the weekend. The theme was "Caring From the Heart." Sam & Cathie Gingerich from Life Ministries in Pennsylvania were our guest speakers. We had a wonderful weekend with a good combination of thought provoking sessions, connecting with good friends, and fun. One day we took a boat ride into Montego Bay and did some snorkeling.

We are enjoying some extra living space. The front porch has been screened in, and we use it as a dining room and living room.

Sharon Troyer has returned to JRM and is helping out short term as a cook. She had served at JRM for over 9 years previously. She has been a great blessing to us!

We recently had a local farmer start some gardening on the property here. If everything produces, in a few months we will have more vegetables than we will know what to do with. For example, he started over 200 tomato plants.

The girls are still participating in ballet classes. They had a performance at our summer church picnic, then participated in a competition recently. One of their routines got them first place. They have really enjoyed being part of it.

We also enjoyed going to a local high school football (soccer) match. It was an exciting game, and the crowd showed their enthusiasm by blowing horns and stomping their feet on the metal bleachers.

Here are some other highlights of the last few months:
VBS for the community around JRM

Beach outing before the start of school

A relaxing weekend in the Blue Mountains

Carrie spent a weekend in Virginia visiting her niece in the hospital.

Thunderstorm rolling in

A new roof was installed

And new tile flooring...

Start of a new school year

Loaded for church

Please keep praying for us. We appreciate you support and interest in our work here at Jamaica Relief Ministries. Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Kevin for the Stutzman family

This store will have everything you need to finish your Christmas shopping...

Summertime

So many things have happened since I last wrote that it is hard to know where to begin.

In early May, Carrie & I made a trip to Kingston. One of the children needed a hearing test that is only administered in Kingston. We enjoyed a treat of eating some "Jamexican" food, but the best news of the day was that the baby passed the hearing test.

We had lots of staff changes with two more aunties leaving, and two new aunties arriving. Mandy Sauder returned to Ontario, and Erin Miller moved to Ohio. Arriving to replace them were Emma Yoder of Pennsylvania, and Leann Kuhns of Indiana.

Another big event was our family's trip to Ohio for 3 weeks in May and June. A big thanks to Joe & Ellen Shetler, and Wesley & Sandra Hershberger for taking care of things in Jamaica and making it possible for us to go.

We left a few days earlier that we originally planned to since Carrie's grandmother passed away. We were glad to be able to attend the funeral. During our time in Ohio we also attended 2 weddings and 2 graduation parties, so we were able to see lots of family and friends.

A new family member was born before we left, so the girls got to see their new cousin.

We also attended a celebration party for Carrie's brother Marcus. He had his last chemo treatment, and that was an event worth celebrating!

We returned to Jamaica on June 6, and it was good to see everyone again, and to be "home."

The Logos Hope book ship was docked in Montego Bay for 3 weeks. This is a ship that travels all over the world, selling discounted books and doing outreach in the countries that they visit. We visited the ship several times, both as a family, and then with the aunties and children.

We also had 4 more children come to JRM, to give us a total of 12 children in our care.

The "farm" has some new faces as well, with 2 rabbits, and 50 laying hens.

The girls enjoyed "cupcake wars" with their friends recently. They spent the day creating unique cupcakes, then the parents got to be the judges.

We have had several groups at JRM recently. We had a group from Ohio, and a group from Michigan here at the same time. They worked together well, and we enjoyed getting to know them.

Currently, we have a youth group here from Christian Life in Beach City, Ohio.

Two of the children graduated from kindergarten this year.

It was good to see many of you when we were in Ohio! We are hoping to come back for Christmas this year. We have spent the past 3 Christmases in Jamaica, so we are hoping that it will work for us to be in Ohio this Christmas. Keep praying for us!

JRM staff and children July 2017:

I recently needed to bring a bed home, so I transported it Jamaican style.

I tried to order the "Cash Air", but they were out of stock...

Thank you again for your support!
Kevin for the Stutzmans