el retiro

so last weekend our church had a retreat which when we first heard about it seemed like forever away.  now, it's been and gone.  we had a wonderful time.  a speaker came from argentina and spoke on the church as a refuge, family, and army.  it was fun to go somewhere and spend time with our church here who have really been like family to us.  we are so thankful!  

we spent time playing soccer on the beach, throwing the frisbee, and just hanging out.  

we have four more weeks of school!!  we will be heading to uruguay to help the stallings with their project, "fields of the fatherless," an orphanage they are starting.  

incendio

We woke up last night at 12:30ish to the sound of crashing glass in an apartment nearby.  We laid there for a few seconds and after the crashing continued I decided to see what was up.  I went out on our patio and saw things (glass) falling around me and a couple people on the street looking up at our building and pointing.  I thought someone was on the roof throwing things.  I looked up and fire was pouring out of an apartment four floors above us.  We grabbed clothes and a few things and headed down the stairs.  Glass was falling around us as we left the building as more windows were blown out.  We sat in the median of our street and watched flames go up the side of the building as the apartment burned.  Thankfully the building is constructed of all cement and the fire didn't spread.  Chile's volunteer firemen used the fire hoses in the building to put out the fire which we've heard was started by a candle.  We still can't understand why there are no smoke detectors or alarms in our building.