Marriage is an adventure.  Everyday meets new challenges and new blessings.  I love my husband and I love my life with him.  I wish I had a scribe to write down all the thoughts and feelings of the last month.  Can you believe that we have been married almost a whole month????  On Monday it will be one month.  One of my friends just said to me...there is a saying, being single is easier, but being married is wonderful.  I totally agree with that.  Marriage is a lot of work in every area.  Spiritually, mentally, physically...everything.  I did finally hire a young girl.  She comes to help me three times a week.  She washes clothes and the bathroom and does some extra stuff to help me out.  Its been great and I've been able to develop a good relationship with her too. 

We have a little frying pan thing that is electric that we can use at 2AM when we have electricity but we have been unable to get all the parts to our stove so we have a pretty staple diet of sandwhiches and salad and other such thing, but if  the electricity does come on we do get up and iron and cook even if it is the middle of the night.  That was an adjustment for sure, but my wonderful husband helped me through it.  Below is the first Sunday meal I was able to put together in our new home.

 We have a HUGE mosquito problem where we live.  We have dealt with it in many ways, but the most life-saving is our mosquito net.  We also had a water problem. When it would rain the water would enter our house, but our gracious landlord Monsier Delva, has graciously fixed it and thank the Lord we do not have that problem any more.

As you know, I know how to wash clothes by hand, but washing for two is an entirely different matter.  :)  I am getting used to it though and we now wash twice a week.  Last night we washed and then my clothes got a second wash by rainwater.  Oh well, that's life :)

Some of you have still not seen wedding pictures so I will try to get some on here now. Thank you all so much for your patience!  The wedding was beautiful and having my parents and some of my friends there was so wonderful.  We had a great time and I felt like a princess.  Everyone is right though that the moment you see your groom all the stress and everything from preparing for that day all slips aside.  Its amazing.

I promise to give more later, but I have not received my pictures back yet.  Thank you for your prayers and your support.  We love you all and remember that every day is a gift from God.

Maggie

Sooo here I am, the Bride to Be...on Valentine's Day! It is truly a wonderful place to be.  When I think of the years behind me and the years ahead, I stand in awe of the grace of God.  He's healed hurts, he's grown me, he's changed me, he helped me to survive nursing school, he brought me here to Haiti and matched me with exactly the right man.  Now I am getting married and here we arrive on the day to celebrate love.  Wow I have a lot to celebrate and I praise God for it.

So I mentioned on facebook that I am trying to figure out if I want to get a maid or not.  In America we women do the work by ourselves, but its not quite so much work as here.  For instance, I can't get away with just cleaning once a week. I have to clean EVERY day because of the dust and stuff.  I also have to handwash my clothes on Saturday mornings and who knows when else.  The problem is that I don't want an older lady coming in and pushing her way to the "head of the home."  So I'm thinking of finding a young girl that can just help me out.  See its very cultural here to have maids and if I just say no way, I probably will offend a considerable amount of people.  Needless to say, I am thinking of taking in a 15 or 16 year old girl and have her come 2 or 3 times a week and just give me a hand so I'm not totally exhausted after work every day.  Its complicated culturally, but it works.  :) Just keep that in prayer and that God would provide the right person.  It would also present a ministry opportunity.

So I'm getting married in 9 days.  Please keep us in your prayers.  Things are going well and I'm not even too stressed at the moment. However, I AM going to bed now.
I'm so tired

Goodnight and God bless

Maggie