The Sisterhood of the One-Size-Does-Not-Fit-All Wedding Dress

There once was a one-size-does-not-fit-all wedding dress that was made in Ohio. It had the supposed ability to morph into any size or shape, to fit any woman regardless of height or weight. Everything was adjustable, from top to bottom. The woman from Ohio who made the dress decided to send it with a team to Costa Rica in case any of the women in the community decided to get married but it sat in a closet for months. Until one day it was called upon....

(This is how the dress came...adjust the shoulders, adjust under the arms, adjust the waist.

Voila!! Insta-dress)

Meet Will and Jessi....

Will and Jess live up in the Mangoes. For those of you who have been here before, they live in the yellow house right infront of David and Terri's house. They are the last set of houses in the Mangoes.

They have been together for a while and are expecting a baby in April.

Enter New Life (Columbus, Ohio)

Will and Jess started pre-marital counseling with Rodney and Cindy and the New Life team heard of the wedding plans.

Cindy happened to mention that we had this one-size-fits-all-wedding dress in the closet and:

The Lord happens to have a phenomenal sense of humor...and timing. One month before the set wedding date, a wedding dress seamstress just "happened" to be part of the team.

Coincidence?!? I think not.

Meet Tatyana:

She works at a wedding dress shop in Columbus, Ohio.

She looked at the dress and measured the bride and literally completely redesigned the dress in four days!!

 

Tatyana took apart the beloved one-size-fits-all wedding dress and tailored it for our bride, Jessica.

The day of the wedding dawned clear and bright.

We had our fill of blowing up balloons....

And the bride and groom's family decorated the backyard of the Casa Nueva.

We went to the farmer's market and bought $32 of flowers.

(That was about 15 bouquets of daisies, Gerbera daisies, violets, ferns, and filler flowers as well as 4 large bouquest of Birds-of-Paradise, ferns, and other tropical flowers)

Getting ready at the bride's house...making food and getting dressed,

Rodney officiated the wedding and Federico translated.

Everyone came out in their finest.

The bride tossed the bouquet...Anna caught it.

They danced.

They did the "dollar" dance.

David threw cake in the bride and groom's faces...

And they drove off into the sunset.

All in all, the one-size-fits-all wedding dress saw a wonderful day with lots of friends and family.

The Last Laugh

So I was cleaning my room this afternoon and ran across some quotes I had written down from the New Life team from a few weeks ago...Enjoy!!!

"Things are a but more like they used to be than they are now. I wrote a country song once, but I'm sure you won't want it on your blog." ~Craig

"It's my turn to wash the dished, but I'll pay you $15 to do them for me." ~Craig to me after dinner one night.

 "You scare me so much with your talk of caca in the streets I wear my boots." Tatyana

"I don't want to get spidered. Wait, you're going to throw a spider on me?!?" ~Lisa

"They left to get a coke and came back with 2 tacos and a Sprite." ~Brett about some of the guys leaving randomly around 9 at night.

"Would you manipulate my face?" ~Brett after he found out what I do for a job.

"I've learned to ask, "Where's Rosa's? In the Mangoes? Not going there. Where's Rosa's? Next door? Going there. Do I have to climb three flights of stairs with no handles up a wall? Not going there. If the person is sick needs to be visited, I'll send Diego." ~Cindy Schmidt

Changes come....

Wow! So many changes in Los Anonos, where to begin? Each team has a flavor, and this teams flavor is change. We now have a thrift store in Anonos. It seems like it happened over night. One day we had the Casita, the next day we had a store. The Casita has definitely gone for a face lift. It is no longer a cement tomb with a toilet. It is now a shelf-lined, hanger-filled, new-to-me store.

When the flood happened, we were also flooded with donations of clothes. Literally so many clothes we didn't have enough people in need to give them to. So the logical idea was to create a store where people from the community could earn money by running the store and other people in the community could benefit by buying clothes, shoes, and home goods.

Ginger shows off our collection of ladies' shoes.

Yeron checks his pockets for spare change.

Ginger and Maria model the latest of fashion trends in Costa Rica.

Now with the new store opening, teams also have a new opportunity to keep the store stocked with items to sell. When coming on a team, consider bringing gently used clothing and shoes (especially for children) and small home appliances that are in good working condition. Prices are set by people who live here and know the fair cost of things. The prices are kept reasonable so anyone here could afford them. This not only provides jobs for the community, but also helps give money and support back into the community of Los Anonos. Thank you for all your support and prayers for the people of this community!!

The Casita got a nice face-lift on the outside

The Grand Opening happened on February 12, 2011. Adriana got to cut the ribbon :)

The line was out the door for the first day of shopping.

The new thrift shop in Los Anonos was a success!!

Almost $280 was sold in the first day!!