Author: To Haiti We Go

Hey everyone! Here is a fun brief update on language studies & the boys schooling!

LANGUAGE STUDIES: Once we move down to Haiti at the end of August, we will start our language studies. Jim has already learned quite a bit so he will definitely be ahead of April who is more of a beginner. We will both be hiring a local Haitian tutor to come daily to our house Monday through Friday for about an hour each day. Then we ourselves will probably do another hour on top of that going over what we just learned. As you can imagine, this will be a time of excitement but also intense learning where there will be moments where our brains will feel fried haha 😉

BOYS SCHOOL: Isaac & Micaiah will be going to Cite Lumiere school in our little village. It is a school made up of mostly missionary kids. There are such a few numbers of kids and teachers this year that Isaac & Micaiah will most likely be in the same classroom. We have heard only amazing things about their teacher and they are excited, as are we. So group lessons like history, science, bible etc they can all do together and then subjects like math, reading etc will be broken up more individually since there will be several grades in the classroom. It kind of reminds me of a big homeschool co-op! They will go Monday through Friday 8am-1pm. We will take our ATV each morning to drop them off and then pick them back up at 1pm each day. The boys start school September 1st!

HERE IS WHERE YOU COME IN!!!! We are looking for people who would like to specifically sponsor/donate towards these two things that are very important to our ministry down in Haiti. Below you will see the breakdown that it costs for each of these things. Whether you would like to pick one and donate to cover the whole costs or just partial, we would be so grateful.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO COVER THE EXPENSES FOR OUR LANGUAGE TRAINING? 

The total cost for 6 months of daily language tutoring for both of us will be around $2,400. We are looking for people to cover that cost completely or even a month or two of it, which breaks down to $400 per month. Please let us know if you would like to be a part of helping us learn the Haitian language to help us further our reach and be able to build relationships more. This could be given as a lump sum or broken down into monthly donations you can give specifically towards it. You just let us know! 🙂

WOULD YOU LIKE TO HELP SEND THE BOYS TO SCHOOL? The cost to send both boys to school, which includes tuition, curriculum, computer, new student & testing fees is $2,100 for both total or $175 per month. If you would like to help cover all or a partial amount of the boys schooling, please contact us and we will help you get that set up. This could be given as a lump sum or broken down into monthly donations you can give specifically towards it. You just let us know! 🙂

THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH! We have loved seeing God work through each of you and we can never thank you enough.

Love,

The Starkeys 

We want to keep this short & sweet. We wanted to share some great news quickly with you all…we have hit 88% in our monthly support. HOW AWESOME IS THAT! We praise God for how He has used the body of Christ to support us and encourage us on this journey.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record…

We still need 12% more in monthly support, which is around another $900 we need in MONTHLY support. Can you help us get there? 

What does that look like? It’s simply families like you who decide to join our team and pledge to donate a certain amount each month to our family to do ministry in Haiti. You can send it in via the mail (contact us for info) or set up safe automatic monthly occurring payments online through our organizations website by going HERE!

If you don’t like to give monthly and would rather do it annually or quarterly, we can set that up for you as well through the link above! Here is a quick 3 min video walking you through how to set up support online! VIDEO TO START SUPPORT!

With 56 days left, we can’t stress enough how crucial it is for anyone who has shared they are going to join our team or have been thinking about it, to start support now.

Over 3/4 of our support are from families just like you and we can’t thank you all enough. We have heard of some of the sacrifices you all have given to help our family serve in Haiti.

Love,

The Starkeys

Awhile back we did a post on the things that we were struggling with, people & things we would miss. It felt good to share them, to think about them and not act like they are not going to happen. It is part of the preparation! HOWEVER…we wanted to do another list. We thought it was time to now do a list about all we were looking forward to, with moving our family to Haiti.

Here we go, in NO PARTICULAR ORDER:

• Experiencing new things together as a family.
• Getting to know new people & hopefully make new life-long friendships.
• Trying new foods we would have never tried before.
• Learning to do things differently than in America, figuring out how to adapt. Part of this yes will be hard but part of it will be exciting too.
• JESUS! Of course Jesus is everywhere, but we are very excited to see what Jesus is doing in Haiti and get to be a little part of it.
• As we take teams to different places or go to the different schools, we will be excited to see all the new places and God’s creation wherever we go.
• Learning another language.
• Having a banana tree in our background and getting fresh produce, some of which we can’t get in America or as fresh as we will get it there.
• The boys are excited to be able to go to the beach a bit more often than we do here in Ohio 😉
• Micaiah is excited to have his birthday in warm weather. (He is a March baby)
• Isaac is excited to meet Nathan Nunemaker’s bunnies.
• Looking forward to the boys living a life there that is more simple and just plain fun for them to play outside with friends and be boys.
• Excited for the boys to have new teachers (that are not me however April will miss homeschooling them) and friends at their new school.
• Excited to meet all the people that come down to serve & love. We look forward to growing relationships with them as well.
• Making our new home there HOME! Making new memories in it and starting new traditions together there.
• Riding an ATV around the village to the places we need to go to.
• Not having to shovel snow or wear a winter coat!!!!
• Video chatting with friends & family and sharing our adventures online with them. Thankful for technology.
• Visits from friends & family when they come to visit. That will be so wonderful to show them our new home and share the beauty of Haiti with them.
• We are just so excited because we know God doesn’t need us, but He wants to use us and we are grateful. We look forward to seeing what all He will have us do in Haiti for His kingdom. We look forward to serving & loving wherever He leads.

Love,

The Starkeys