Summer is on it’s way!

As the temperatures rise, we realize the summer is on it’s way. We have begun to use the air conditioner at night and are contantly out of cold water and ice cubes.
Our sons, Joey and Danny are here visiting and have the pleasure of sleeping upstairs in the palapa.
Both are covered with bug bites! They have stopped counting. The only one not affected by the temperatures
is Annie, who seems to have no temperature guage. She can wear jeans and sweatshirts when it’s 90 degrees out, go figure!
The good part is the evenings and the mornings are a mild 80-85. I know you wish you were here. We haven’t seen rain here since last fall. It is a challenge to keep the plants watered. The other good thing is the clothes dry quickly on the line.
We have enjoyed have part of out family together for the past couple weeks and will miss the boys when they leave.
There is no holiday here so it is business as usual today.
Hope all of you are having a wonderful Memorial Day weekend!

Kathy

NO FIELDS FOR KIDS!!!!

We are faced with many obstacles as we move forward with our work. With a population approaching ¼ million people in Los Cabos, there are no baseball fields for kids . We are looking for land to purchase or lease that is privately held and close into the city where most of the kids live. Currently, we play at the local adult baseball stadium that has many events that conflict with our schedule. Often times we are spending time cleaning up someone else’s mess and waiting for the field to clear so we can play. Long-term, we see the potential for 8-10 fields in the Cabo/San Jose area to meet the needs of this growing community.

We also are in need of more volunteers to coach the kids and help run the league. Through all of the struggles, we sense that our vision of Giving hope, Reaching families, Inspiring kids and Praying and playing together is being fulfilled.

Thank you for supporting our work and encouraging us with your prayers and resources.

Mike and Kathy

grip update

GRIP International UPDATE May 07

Last Saturday was a very fulfilling day as we completed our first 8 week season of CaboYouth Baseball League. It was thrilling to see most of the kids that signed up completed the season and were able to improve on their baseball skills.

Several “life lessons” were taught each week through the game of baseball. For example, one of our younger players had a serious problem with not being able to hold onto the bat after making contact with the ball. Our rule is… if you throw your bat …you are out and you have to run a lap around the field. On one occasion, the bat landed on two little girls that were participating with us. One of the girls was injured, and after a trip to the hospital and a lot of tears we were able to get the two players together to reconcile what had happened. It was a perfect opportunity to talk about forgiveness when someone hurts you and what the correct response is. Thankfully, the injured girl was doing fine by the end of our session. Each week we are able to teach “little life lessons” that will be useful as they face a life of challenges.

As you can see from the smiling faces in our pictures, these kids are having fun! We were able to give each one of them a gold medal for participating in the first season of baseball in Cabo San Lucas. As we awarded them the colorful medals, tears of joy came to me seeing the huge grin on their face from their accomplishment. Many Moms and Dads came to watch their children participate. We will start our next 8 week session this week and will hopefully have more teams participate as we continue to add new boys and girls.

Mike and Kathy