On April 12, we broke ground for the missionary house on the JBI campus. This was a very exciting event as we are building a house which we will actually live in. Living in community on campus has always been our desire.
As soon as I had the building permit in hand, the guys started to clear the site. We are building at the top of the hill on a site which was excavated years ago for a mission house but never built. A big thank you to Graeme, an engineer, who answered my SOS over his lunch hour and gave me some expert advice and reassurance on the site elevations. Due to the varying elevations the site needed further excavation work. Then the guys spent 2 weeks with a jackhammer breaking through the solid coral stone to make foundation trenches. That was not a pleasant job and everyone was glad to get it done!
Finally, on Friday, May 30, the ready mix cement trucks started coming up the hill and dumping cement into the trenches. The first cement truck got up the hill without a hitch but then it started to pour rain and we spent most of the next 7 hours trying to get the next four cement trucks up and down the hill! The last cement truck had to be unloaded by the wheelbarrow full, with the guys racing up the hill with wheelbarrows and dumping the wet cement into the trenches. It was a grueling day and there are still scars on the school flower beds and lawns as a reminder as to how dangerous a sliding cement truck, with bald tires on wet grass can be!
We are now building the foundation walls and getting ready to pour the floor. Hoping for a week of sunshine so we can get a lot done!
We are not fundraising for the house as we currently have funding from AGWM and ActioNow for the main construction. We may need help with finances for the utility hookups and some inside finishing work. We are very thankful to be moving ahead with this project and look forward to moving into the house around the end of the year.
Vision for Vanuatu 
Very exciting to see the progress after so many years.