Summer Travels

Strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, nutella, real milk, and real coffee creamer were our breakfast treats this morning! That must mean we aren’t in Haiti. Although we can’t seem to stop speaking Creole, forgetting to flush toilet paper and toilets in general, and are confused when the weather is referred to as “hot” we are certainly enjoying speaking English, toilets that actually flush, not being so sweaty….oh and driving in lanes and driving next to people that believe in driving in lanes!

We are in Venice, Florida, with the fam getting ready for the big wedding celebration of our niece Kaylee Saturday and the graduation of our niece Koree next Friday May 29th (which is also Eric’s birthday)! PaPa and MeMa Ream and more Illinois family are here and we are so excited to get to be with them! We are blessed to be able stay at the Stephanos Mission House provided by the First Baptist Church where Eric’s brother and family attend. We arrived yesterday after flying to Miami with Miguel and then on to Tampa where we celebrated Evan’s 9^th birthday and spent the night after picking up our super great deal rental van. It has been a very sweaty busy past few weeks in Haiti finishing up the school year, Kofael activities, renewing the rental contract and fixing several things on the house while moving in new housemates and fighting sickness the past month. We are all very ready for an air conditioned break and much needed family time. Straight from the wedding we are heading to Melbourne, Florida, a few hours away and hope to arrive by midnight so we can get some sleep before hugging our dear friends, Pastor and Brenda Branch and our Bethany Church family where Eric is scheduled to speak Sunday morning! It is a tight squeeze in the busy weekend schedule but we couldn’t be in Florida without making an effort to connect with one of our supporting churches! We had originally thought our summer travels would just be this week’s trip to Florida and then back to Haiti but God had a few other extensions planned that He is working out for us! We were able to pay our Haiti house rent through April 2016 and leave the house in care of our new ministry partners the Carroll family who will be working on learning Creole and holding down the fort in Haiti! We pray they will get some much needed rest and family time after a hard year of transitions since moving to Haiti last September. The Haitian ladies and little girl that live with us will also be there throughout the summer months so the Hospitality House will be used a plenty!

The Ream Team will be traveling from Florida to Washington D.C./Virginia on June 2^nd to visit our dear friends the Wells family and all the D.C. national sites! Page and Noah were looking for ways to get to Florida to come see us and found an unbeatable deal to fly our family to them instead! We couldn’t pass up the chance to give our kids (and us) this great educational fun (and free!) experience and to spend time with friends that encourage us so much! When Elisabeth’s parents found out that we would be near their Lynchburg, Virginia home they suggested that we might stay there even though they will be in the Middle East at that time. Eric is scheduled to fly back to Haiti to meet up with Heart of God Haiti director David Young and team mid June while Elisabeth and the kids chill out at her parents house awaiting his return so we can make the long drive to Texas together. We were not planning to make it to Texas but now have a few good reasons and excuses to get there and be with family and friends! Recently we have been somewhat forced to acquire Obamacare insurance and have discovered it is very difficult to find any doctors or dentist that will actually accept the plan. We finally found a doctor and dentist that will see our kids and this can only happen in Texas. Elisabeth needs to have the other half of her tooth implant finished sometime in the next six months and the dentist that has to finish it is in Allen, Texas. Her parents really want us to drive their vehicle to Texas where they are flying into from Israel so they can use it while they are in Texas and drive it back to Virginia. We have free places to stay, transportation provided to get there, passports and drivers licenses that need renewals in addition to the medical and dental appointments so it seems a trip to Texas is a go! We booked our tickets to Florida using our air miles and hope to return to Haiti sometime in late July or early August whenever we can find the best deals to purchase airfare.

Just wanted to let you know what we are up to and hope we get to see many of you in our summer travels!