Christmas is coming!

Filming a big tarantula in the road.

This has been a fun week.  If you're a friend on Facebook you've seen a few of the pictures.  For the rest of you, I've been helping a friend from Canada while she films a documentary for a TV channel in Calgary.  I'm what's called a chauffeur/creative consultant.  For the past week or so I've been driving her and her cameraman around and helping translate and set things up with people/sights here she wants to film.  It's been a lot of fun and I've actually seen and done a few things I've never had the chance to do before.  I was joking with my mom that like a lot of dads I took on a second job to help buy the kids Christmas presents.  =)

So while there have been lots of upsides to this job, the downside has been that I haven't really gotten started on preparing for Christmas yet.  Well...that and the fact that it's 33 C out and it feels like Christmas is six months away still instead of Tuesday.  But tomorrow Andres and Yimy and I will start our Christmas shopping for the house and then Saturday I'll grocery shop for everything we need for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.  I only have to buy for 15 guys and cook for 35 so it shouldn't take that long.   

The other thing I didn't quite have time to do was write this post.  =)  I wanted to let you know about a special project we're doing.  If you've been following the blog for very long, you'll remember we did this last year.

For those of you who are new or don't remember (it's okay...it happens to the best of us) last year we helped a children's home we work with celebrate Christmas.  First we found out they didn't have any Christmas decorations and that they had nothing special planned for Christmas Eve (when Bolivians celebrate Christmas).  So we went out and bought some decorations.  Then we put on Christmas supper for them.  It was a ton of fun and made for some pretty happy faces.  Of course we'd like to make this all happen again this year.

As well, like I said, I'm starting my Christmas shopping tomorrow.  Once again we have a new face in the house and this will be his first opportunity to celebrate Christmas with us.  For a lot of the guys, Christmas with us was the first time in their lives that they'd received a personal gift or shared in all the joy that go along with Christmas.  Since those early days, we've established some great family traditions.  We invite any of the guys we know who maybe don't have anyone to celebrate with to come join us.  So there's always a full house.

Of course all of these things take time (which I mostly have) and money (well....).  So if you're interested in helping us financially to see these things happen, it would be a huge blessing to us.  As many of you know, some of our guys are approaching the end of their schooling or have graduated.  Here in Bolivia, those final classes are very expensive and as a result our coffers are pretty low.  We would hugely appreciate any help you might be able to give.

One of my favourite traditions my family has in Canada is reading the Christmas story together before we open gifts.  It helps us remember and focus on what it is we're celebrating.  It's a tradition we've carried on down here.  Christmas morning we read God's Word together, take time to pray and then open gifts.  We all know there's a lot of joy in that moment.

Thank you all for considering this request.  If you'd like, you can e-mail me at ken.switzer@iteams.org for any additional information you need or you can click on the link on the right hand side of this page "To Donate".  As well, you can call my mission at 1-800-465-7601 and they'd be happy to help you.

I'll post some pictures of our Christmas decorations soon.  Just as soon as we finish them.  =)  Tonight in about an hour I'm off to help my friend film the all-night butchering of 250 chickens for El Jordan's "Christmas on the Streets".

My life is never boring.

Feliz Navidad!