Benjamin's birthday

on tuesday 22nd september Benjamin celebrated his first birthday! We were in Quito for office meetings so the family organised a party in La Tola for Benjamin. The theme was 'Liga Campion' (Alfredo's football team) and we had pinatas and cake and icecream and ham and cheese on sticks!
Tia Loida in Puyo has planned another party for today (saturday) as she couldn't be in Quito, so I have been baking cakes all morning as it is also tio Josue's birthday today.
here are some photos from the first party.

September prayer and praise

Dear friends,
Sorry for not writing earlier, we were travelling at the beginning of the month.

Benjamin took his first steps on Aunty Loida's birthday (2nd sept) and my new job is to hold his hand as he leads me around the garden in search of puddles and mud. Benjamin?s birthday is coming up (22nd), he's a year old already!

Praise:
We have received the money for the latest contracts and have bought the pipes, pumps and solar panels.

Stephanie Smithers arrived last night, Stephanie Bliss arrives tonight and Lizzie White at the end of the month. They are all engineers coming to work with us in the Shell office for 6 months.

Miriam Gebb has returned to Shell, so we have company in the office!

Alfredo?s Aunt Loida has got a contract to run the 'bar' (cafeteria) in a Puyo high school this year. She has been without work for over a year.

Alfredo's brother Rodrigo is engaged and will marry Miraya in November.

Prayers:
The pump we installed in Cusuimi last year has got damaged with sand. We have had the motor replaced but now need to find a solution so this pump won't also get damaged. The pump technician says it very unusual for a pump to get damaged and at nearly $2000 a pump we don't want it to happen to any of our other installations! Pray for the trip back to Cusuimi to reinstall and for wisdom on how to protect it.

Alfredo's brother Josue's girlfriend's dad died suddenly of a heart attack last Thursday. We see the family almost every weekend and Marco treated Benjamin like a grandson so it was sad for everyone. Please pray for Fernanda's family at this difficult time.

With three more engineers coming to work in the shell office we need to be organized! Pray for the work the girls will do, for quick adjustment to the cultures in and out of the jungle and for strong stomachs so they don't get sick.

Pray for the projects in Cangaime and Santa Rosa that we are just starting.

Thank you for keeping us protected in prayer.
Blessings,
Alex, Alfredo and Benjamin

praise and prayers august

Dear friends,

July was both a productive and relaxing month!

Alfredo was able to get two project contracts signed from Taisha Municipio and then we had to rush to get all the other requirements in Quito and return the documents before the mayors and counselors all changed at the end of July. God was obviously helping us as we were able to get the mission’s lawyer to sign the contracts, get all the notarized paperwork and 2 insurance policies in just over a week… something that could normally take months.

Adeline finished up on the project in Mutints and left Ecuador at the end of July. We have enjoyed having her help us in the Shell office and we’ll miss her!

Alex and Benjamin presented our work to the HCJB Global Vision tour that came through Shell. (Alfredo was in Taisha).

We enjoyed catching up with the Hardin family, ex-Shell missionaries who returned for a few weeks to help out in the hospital.

We did some mountain climbing! We went with some friends from Shell to climb Chimborazo Mountain… from the car-park/first refuge to the second refuge and then Alfredo and his brother climbed up a little further to touch snow. I (Alex) struggled with the altitude so went up on horseback (I know, what a cheat!)
A week later we went with Alfredo’s brother Eduardo, sister Gaby and cousin Daniella, (Benjamin stayed with Granny Julia) to climb Cotopaxi… from the car-park to the refuge and then across to play in the ice/snow. It was a perfect day with clear views of the top.
(See photos on our blog)

While in Quito we were able to spend time with Alfredo’s nephew Alejandro (who normally lives in Guayaquil), taking him to the zoo and buying him new glasses.

We celebrated our 3-year wedding anniversary in a nice Quito restaurant.

This email is late getting sent out because we went with the Covenant Church to visit a possible project in the north of Ecuador with the Cofan Tribe. We joined a Korean-American Team who was going to help the community build a church. Our job was to evaluate the possibilities of a water project/other community development projects that the national Covenant Church and team from Canada can help with. It was an interesting trip and chance to visit another Ecuadorian tribe and another part of the jungle. The access to the community was via canoe in very rough water… I had Benjamin strapped to me and prayed hard that we didn’t capsize! While there wasn’t an opportunity to build a water project, we were able to apply our community development principles and help the community develop plans for future projects.
Prayers for August:

We are without a camera… one got lost up Cotopaxi and the other has succumbed to the humidity in Shell. Pray we can get a replacement and the other repaired quickly.

Pray for safety and good time as we take the youth group from our church in Mera on their summer trip next week.

Pray for Stephanie Smithers, Stephanie Bliss and Lizzie White as they prepare to come to work with us for 6 months. Praise God that they will be able to continue our work while we are in the UK.

Pray for our preparations for our visit to England next January.

Pray for the two new projects in Santa Rosa and Cangaime. Both communities are few evangelical believers so pray for opportunities to testify to God’s goodness while we work with the people.

Pray as Sara Hossman (a nurse who worked with us in April) will return to visit for a week in Mutints and teach hygiene and hold holiday bible club with her friend from Switzerland.

Thank you for making it to the end of this message… turned out I had lots of news!
Thanks for all your prayers and support for our work here in Ecuador.


May you be richly blessed this month.

Alex, Alfredo and Benjamin Leon

June

hi there,
sorry I've not been very good at keeping this updated! The beginning of the month we finally handed over the Amazonas project (with big tank in place) and then went on a little holiday to Quito and Papallacta. plan was to relax but Benjamin doesn't really let us relax much! we had fun in the hot springs and got nicely sunburnt (luckily Benjo didn't).

We have just got back from a second trip to Quito this month, this time for Jorge and Laura's wedding. Was beautiful, in an old hacienda in Quito and it only rained when we were all eating under the marquee, perfect.

Yesterday we presented in the 4 children's services at Inaquito church (I had to be at church at 7.15!) lovely knowing that even the Children know and support the churches missionaries.

Now back in Shell with Adeline and the three summer missionaries working on topography for the new hospital sewage treatment system.

here are a photo of the big tank in Amazonas.

Benjamin!

The Tank Flew!

hi all,
just to let you know prayer works... the big tank that we have been praying about since last May was flown into its new community on Tuesday! God's timing is perfect, but not what we'd plan as the deadline for the project is this Sunday (final final deadline as we've already had three extensions!)and we'd already renegotiated the contract to put in some smaller tanks to make up for the lack of big tank! Alfredo is in the jungle now taking down the little tanks and installing the big tank. I'll post pictures when he returns... till then you can enjoy the video of the tank being lifted.

Thanks for praying with us!

may prayer and praise

Dear friends,

Here are some prayers and praises for this month?

There was hope that the tank would be flown in by the military because
our colleague in the office has contacts? but when I phoned the
officer in charge I got the run-around again!
We now how a final deadline of the end of may? so we have agreed a
temporary solution of 4 little tanks to replace the big tank. Alfredo
is in the jungle this week installing the tanks and finishing the
construction of the pump house.

Ecuador had major elections a week ago? Correa is still president and
won on the first round. Pray for wise governance. A mayor Alfredo?s
Dad worked for 4 years ago got reelected so it is looking likely that
Fernando will have a job again. The Mayor in Taisha changed, so we
have to start negotiations again to see if they want us to work with
them this term. The Mayor in Palora was reelected and is offering
Alfredo projects, so we might have opportunity to expand into an area
with road access!

Our next year plans now look like we?ll be in the UK to study bible
for a while and we hope to return to Shell for a second term with HCJB
Global. We are looking in to studying at Redcliffe in Gloucestershire
and plan to arrive in the UK in January. The idea of studying the
Masters course in the USA won?t work this time because Alfredo doesn?t
have the necessary English qualifications to apply and the application
deadline was this month to start studying in January!

Benjamin has two teeth, is sitting up well and is now rolling over and
trying to crawl (he can push himself backwards but he doesn?t realize
this is useful yet as he is trying to go forwards).

Adeline has been working with us since March and it is great having
someone else down here! She is in charge of the Mutints project and
has spent most of April in the jungle with Nurse Sarah.

Next week the Fogg family is coming to shell for a visit to see if
they want to come to work with us more long term. They will be
training us in water filter construction next week and then taking a
trip into the jungle to see our projects. Pray that they like it here
and want to come back!

Thanks for your prayers; we are only able to be here because of the
faithful support of you guys.

Hugs, Alex, Alfredo and Benjamin