It is such a joy to do something to help our needy world.

Every month, with your help, Flutemaker Ministries supports A Heart to Love Foundation which enables them to bring food to 266 children with disabilities, run a farm, bring food to the children of 50 feeding centers and to pay the salaries of the workers.

Aside from this monthly support, here is what our donating customers and other donors have helped with:

Feeding 40 men and their families while the men dig a well in a very dry village of Uniles. The well will help 65 families. Flutemaker Ministries bought the land.

We also got to help bring water to the villages of Las Lajas and EL Cielo. For 100 years there has been no water in Las Lajas. A truck would come with 10 gallons a week per family.

In El Cielo we also put in 10 latrines and are feeding the children there. We also with the help of The Zimmerman Foundation provided many beds there and in Rancho Alegre as so many children and kids with special needs were sleeping on the dirt floors.

Martin and his family lived under a plastic dwelling and Pastor Abel, the President of A Heart to Love, grabbed 30 folks from his church to help them.

Flutemaker Ministries bought wood and nails and food to feed the workers.

The men worked for a week building them a new humble home as the ladies cooked their meals.

They also got a bed and a table and some chairs and are real happy.

 

As the pandemic hit Nicaragua we have also bought cloth and our sowers are making masks for the mercy families. We have also invested in protecting our friends down there who are still doing the work.

In El Cielo where a feeding center of 30 kids grew to 85, we learned things were so bad there, that 5 elderly had died of starvation along with 3 children of malnutrition.

Drinking the river water.

We helped this area with water too as they were drinking the water of the river. 

Little Margarita got very sick and almost died but pulled through.

Blanca lived in a plastic house with her very ill daughter Margarita who has disabilities.

Thanks to one of my customers we were able to build them a nice little home.

Linda, my wife, enjoying Margarita's company.

Sent funding for 26 beds for our Mercy Kids.

Bought 80 mosquito nets.

Put in another well at the farm to water new fields and share water with 2 new mercy homes.

Funded the planting of hundreds of guava trees.

Deybin and Pastor Carlos gathering the first guavas. Carlos is the one who rescued Deybin from the garbage dump. Both grew up in extreme poverty. Carlos is the one who inspired my wife and I to get involved. Pastor Carlos is the hero of this story. He is the Executive Director of A Heart to Love who we support.

Bought 4 sewing machines for Mercy Moms.
Put in our 6th water system in a village in the Miskito Coast.

Thanks to Ambassadors of Love, a house for Marisela of the Mercy Ministry was built. They had been evicted and Melvin, the father, had lost his job. Now they have a home and Melvin began to work for the foundation.

We are now sending Maricela to learn English.

We sent funding to help put on another room to better serve this family.

Here is the extra room.

Melvin worked at the farm caring for the cows, oxen and horses.

Here is Melvin in the back ground packing mercy boxes to help feed our 266 kids with disabilities.

Maria Esperanza and Francisco needed a home.

Bought Maria Esperanza and her disabled son a home and fixed it up.

She is real happy with her blessing.

Funded 2 more micro-businesses for Mercy Mothers with children with disabilities and expanded Sara's and Brenda's business.

Sent Keyling in our Mercy ministry to study business administration she graduated and is about to begin to work for A Heart To Love foundation that we support. One day I heard her just burst out in a song at a church. Oh my, I got goosebumps just thinking about how good it was.

Emanuel loves baseball. We got to help him live his dream by flying him to the USA to get a leg.

A year later we flew him back with his mom to be refitted in Tampa. We are grateful for another ministry that sponsored him here in the USA. He can now play ball!

Funded Deybin's roof, electricity, floor and walls. Deybin was rescued from the garbage dump and became a designer of bags, one of our sewers and main driver for the ministry. He recently got married and built his house. 

Bought lots of medicine and special milk for our Mercy Kids. But some of the milk is very expensive and we could use help with this. Helping out in the picture is Abelito, a nurse.
Sent a special offering to help victims of sex slave trade in India, Philippines, Cuba, Mexico and the USA from a gracious donation from our friends, the Heart Dwellers.

Sent $1,000 to help feed homeless victims from a Volcano eruption in Guatemala. We also sent $500 to help some volunteer firefighters in Guatemala who needed help.

Funded items for Linda's family of the Mercy Ministry whose home was swept away in a flash flood.

Then we bought Linda's family a house and fixed it up.

April 16th: We took Genesis, and her mom Keylin, into our home for 7 months while Genesis received medical treatments.

We also hired a seamstress to teach Keylin how to sew. She is now one of my flute bag makers.

When we learned Genesis and her family bathed from a bucket because they were very poor and their roof was about to fall down and walls were cracked, funding came in for a new house for them!

The day Genesis left Nicaragua.

Genesis Birthday dinner and ready to return to Nicaragua. Mission accomplished!

Many of our Mercy Kids are very fragile and we send funding to bury many with dignity. And I am very sad to say, like 15 year old Aleda Blandon who succumbed to Pneumonia.

Sent funding for meds for William, our dear helper who had a blood clot. Here we sit on boxes of food ready to go out to our feeding centers and the homes of our mercy kids.

Sent help to put a roof on the home of Jender Antonio one of our blind mercy kids.

Sent help to put up a retention wall where water floods the house of Milagro one of our Mercy kids.

Sent funding to buy an orthopedic leg brace for Danny. After that we deeply regretted to hear the sad news that Danny suddenly died of Pneumonia.

Funding was sent to help these kids.

Sent $100 for meds for Mario Esteban

Sent Adaelly funding for meds and a nebulizer. We also recently helped to place a micro business for this family. But this little one also succumbed to a long illness and passed.

Deybin and Rolando helping this family were rescued from the dump and now are part of the work.

Sent Byron Benavidez $159 for meds.

Sent Eyron Gomez $143 for special milk and vitamins.

Sent help for medication for Jose Gutierrez with Cerebral Palsy.

Back to Nicaragua!

We retuned to Nicaragua to take Genesis and Keylin home. Here again is the picture of when Genesis came to us and the day she left at the airport.

Here are pictures from the trip.

Ready to land in Managua

Back in the arms of Levis, her dad.

Who now works for the foundation.

We arrived about midnight and the family had gone to bed. At hearing us arrive her big family all awoke and dressed and came out of the surrounding houses to greet Genesis and many wept for joy as they thought they would never see her again.

A family gathering at midnight.

Linda, my wife gets a hug from Grandma, who raised Keylin, who was so grateful. Genesis' church came out to celebrate the new home.

Dedicating Genesis house with Genesis and my hands on the scissors cutting the ribon. How cool!

Later we delivered food to Angeline who was living very far into the mountains and it was hard to get help. When an unstable person began to attack her, the family came to Teote. In need of a home, we found this adobe house for sale.

We fixed the electric, water, cemented the adobe walls, made a new latrine, put in a floor and painted.

 

Visiting the new park at the farm called Erik Landia. Not my idea, Ha!

Enjoying the new park at the farm.

Linda my flower.

Picking coffee at the farm.

Beans ready to harvest.

Long ago, Torivio was drunk, bloodied and beaten up, when in shadows of a night meeting, he heard Pastor Carlos speak about hope and forgiveness. He opened his heart to Christ and now helps us at the farm.
He planted 6 different plants together this year on the higher farmland. Beans, Yucca, Achote, a condiment and 3 kinds of squash.

Above, is the "Farm Tractor" enjoying a field of food.

Visiting the Mercy Homes.

Ines was homeless with her daughter and grand son both with disabilities. We  built them a home and  helped her with a micro business.

Little Linda's house was swept away in a flash flood. She's happy now in a new home.

We got to say hello to Esperanza and her son and grandson in their new home.

One of our Feeding Centers:

I was asked to help this feeding center to finish their area of construction.

Mission accomplished!
Then a family in extreme poverty came up on our radar.

Araselis Hernandez is 16, has cerebral palsy, her dad got depressed and left and became an alcoholic. Her mother Maria, 45 years old, works in the market making very little.  12 year old brother Alexander cooks for Araselis and her little brother. 

These are pictures of their bathing area, latrine and bedroom.

We were able to fix a bunch of things in this house to bring some dignity and show this family they are not alone.

We bought them 2 beds, pots, plates, silverware, blankets, and clothing. And with the help of our friend Douglas, we were able to  invest in a micro business for Maria, the mother.

After this, a small structure on a property was bought and fixed it up for this family. Now they have their own place to call home.

We gave a seminar on how to run a Micro Business so these 8 families can be better prepared.
More micro businesses established:

Doña Sonya's veggie stand! She has 2 mercy kids, Mayte Luz and Jose Luis Zamora.

Cenelia is Jose's mom now selling plastic ware. Jose is one of our mercy kids.

Sent help for Lino with a big skin problem. Lindo needs a pill a day and a cream.

Lino spoke to me the other day to thank me. I was surprised he was so articulate and sweet and polite. So glad we can help him.

Thank you customers, Heart Dwellers around the world, family, and friends who help out to remind a hurting world that they are not alone.

If you would like to help Flutemaker Ministries to continue this awesome work, you can donate at www.FlutemakerMinistries.org

Thanks!!!,
Erik and Linda