Restoring The Way

a new direction

aarongross — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 19:21:35 +0000

We are so excited about the Clean Water Project, cheap water filters that last many years and are such a practical, vital need for families in Mexico and elsewhere. Our trip to El Plomo in June was amazing! After much praying and talking, we decided we would talk to churches down here who do mission work/trips and share the water filters with them. I could teach them how to make them and encourage them to incorporate them into their trips and provide clean water to villages and families. We figured, that way many more people are being reached than what our little family could do on our own! Also whenever we travel, we are by ourselves but when churches do trips, there is safety in numbers! Not to mention more people can be reached by those numbers! We thought maybe I could even accompany some of these groups on their travels, that way I’m not traveling alone.

I met with Frank Dudley the Mission Pastor at 1st Baptish Church of Harlingen yesterday and had the opportunity to share with him our BioSand Water filters. We are just starting the initial conversation with him and are hopeful for a future partnership. I will be showing them how to build them and they are very interested in implementing this into their ministry.

a good return

aarongross — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 00:42:23 +0000

it was a wet drizzly morning and very muddy dirt roads in Mexico. I brought Owen along with me to make my few stops in Revolucion and El Alto. I wanted to touch base with Marteen and ask him for his help with our “clean water project.” I also wanted to check on some water filters we had distrtibuted back in June. It was nice to visit with some of the families and see Marteen again. The water filters are working great and are a HUGE blessing to the families. They seem very grateful. We are back into our routine now that school has started so look for some regular updates on our work across the border.

video – :the Clean Water project:

aarongross — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 16:34:40 +0000

this video is from our last trip to El Plomo, MX to deliver 12 Bio-Sand Water filters. We hope to be traveling back in September or October to reach the rest of the people in the village.

a much needed time of rest.

aarongross — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 16:15:20 +0000

this past month we have been taking a breather from our work in Mexico. I picked up an extra shift at work to save a little money and we have been taking advantage of some good family time. it’s a blessing to be so close to the beach and the boys just love going. the boys got new goggles and had to try them out in the OCEAN. fun stuff check out little OE.

we celebrated the 4th this year in our backyard. I bought some fireworks and the kids really enjoyed some of the fireworks. Owen was scared from the ones that made a loud boom. but Otto loved them. I was really proud of his bravery. he’s come a long way. this time off has not only given us some time together but it has also given me some time to think and envision/dream of what’s in the future. we have a great opportunity to provide people with a tool that will supply them and their families with clean water to drink. families who suffer from illnesses due to the contaminated water they drink everyday. I have posted about this in the past and have shared stories along with pictures of our experiences giving out these bio-sand water filters that we manufacture. we have many more plans and ideas on how to get more filters to more people.

for us to travel 6 hours south of the border of Mexico into the mountains and deliver these water filters to people who desperately need clean drinking water, it takes $25 per filter per family! a filter provides clean drinking water for an entire family for 10 YEARS!! what a huge impact for pennies! check this statistic out: 1.1 billion people lack access to clean drinking water. if they do manage to get it, they can expect to pay 10 TIMES more than the wealthy, according to the World Commission on Water of the 21st Century. this is a HUGE number but very real and a very real struggle for many people. we also hope to start this project in Guatemala as well. please stay tuned for more details on the possibilites of distributing these filters in Guatemala too.

two more water filters

aarongross — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 13:18:38 +0000

this past weekend we delivered two more water filters. one in Revolucion to a family that really struggles. the father is in a wheel chair and finds it very dificult to earn enough money for the family. they have two young children in elementary school and they also ce to the after school program to learn English. the other family lives in El Alto which is maybe five minutes away from Revolucion. this family is very poor as well and this water filter will fulfill a great need for them. I especially enjoyed delivering this filter to the family in

El Alto because they are the parents of Martin. Martin is my friend and the pastor who let’s us use the church building to do our after school program. we spent some te visiting with Martin’s parents and I look forward to visiting in the future to check up on them and see how the filter is developing.
we also had our last session of our after school program for the summer and it was a good one. I really had a good time with the kids and we will miss them. I am looking forward to the fall when we start up again and to implementing some of our ideas to make some improvements.

our time in El Plomo, MX

aarongross — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 22:54:12 +0000

Well we made the trip over the weekend to El Plomo, MX to deliver 12 water filters. El Plomo is a small village of about 100 people in the Mountains near Aldama, MX. Aldama is roughly 2 hours from El Plomo which is the nearest city to this small village. As you can see from the pictures it is a beautiful place nestled up in the mountains and very primitive. No running water. Most homes have dirt floors and quite a few homes were made out of mud. Some had electricity, but many homes did not. Needless to say this area struggles for the very basic of needs. Water is always a problem and very expensive for these people to buy purified. In fact one house where we delivered a water filter to, the mother was not there (so we gave it to her son), she was in Aldama because she was ill from drinking water from their wells, that’s what we were told. It was quite the blessing for this family to receive a water filter! When we first arrived in the village I asked someone sitting on their front porch where the delegado, elected official of the village, was and they told me he was at the school. When I arrived at the school I saw that all the men of the village were there and they were having a meeting. I spoke with Antonio Flores (delegado) about the filters and asked if he and others would be interested in one. For Free. With a big grin and said “claro que si (of course)”! He had me speak to all the men in the meeting and describe to them what it was and how it worked. They were all very excited to get their hands on one of these. I had to tell them that I had only 12 and that I would like to give one to those in the most need first and that when I would return in a few months I would bring more. This was a very cool opportunity to meet all the men of the village. Instantly I had their trust and respect. We gave out all the filters, even one for the school. Jenn and the boys came with me and had a great time. I loved that they had an opportunity to be there with me. I know that these filters will be a tremendous blessing, but it was also a blessing for our family. Can’t wait to go back!

trying times of preparation.

aarongross — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 02:10:55 +0000

We are leaving Saturday morning to deliver some water filters! Jenn and the boys are coming with me! This wasn’t the original plan but it’s the plan now and I’m very excited! We’re heading toward Aldama, MX and staying at the camp owned by Way of the Cross Ministries. We have supplies for 12 filters so we’ll build all 12 of them once we get down there and then head into the mountains to a village or two. We are very excited and hope that these filters will be a huge blessing for many families! Even though we won’t be able to give everyone a filter, the families that do receive one can always share it with a neighbor or family member. Please be thinking of us as it is a 5 hour drive to the camp where we will be staying and are hoping for no car troubles with a safe drive. In the picture above you can see our van full of water filter supplies. We have sand, river rocks, small pebbles, buckets, pvc and all our fittings. Thank you to all of you who have been praying for us and have sent funds to make this trip happen. Please know that you will be there with us and that you are playing an important role in this work.

a little setback…

aarongross — Wed, 27 May 2009 23:40:01 +0000

Last Thursday while on my way back from Revolucion, MX, I was driving through a little city called Lucio Blanco and I got in a wreck with my Jeep. Before this, I had been working on the Jeep for weeks getting it ready for the big trip to Aldama, MX (a 6 hr drive south in Mexico) to distribute water filters in a little mountain village called El Plomo. So needless to say this was really upsetting. I had to give the guy that I hit $300 for the damages I had done to his vehicle and I wanted to take care of it all without the police getting involved. I was a little scarred and nervous but I was able to calm the guy down and get out of the situation on some friendly terms. In fact he and his friends run a ministry near Rio Bravo, MX for alcoholics and drug addicts. They invited me to come and help some time and bring some of our water filters. A friend and supporter sent us some money to fix up the Jeep and everything should be back on track. Praise God!

water filters in Revolucion!

aarongross — Fri, 22 May 2009 02:10:35 +0000

We gave the first three water filters away this week and they were joyfully received!! We had two filters already made because they were the ones we were testing to see not only if they worked but also if the water that came out tested “safe to drink.” And they did! How awesome! Thank you, God! Because this is a very cheap thing that can really impact a family’s life and save them money (if they’re buying bottled water), in some cases protect their health (if they’re drinking from the land).

We gave the first filter to Martin and his family. He is the pastor who allows us to use their church building for the after-school program. He, or his wife, or his daughter, go pick up the kids every week and bring them!

The second one we gave to Francisco and his family. Aaron tutors his 2 teenage kids in English. Leslie wants to be a kindergarten teacher and Paco wants to be an artist. Their 3rd child, Esmeralda comes to the after-school program. This is the family we brought chickens to in order to provide eggs, more babies, and meat! The money they save on buying water can help pay for the kids’ education because in Mexico, parents have to pay for their children to go to school. Francisco makes about $60/week and it costs $50 per child to go to school for the year. Francisco said they were going to give his mother the filter because she’s even worse off than they are. So Aaron asked Francisco if he would like another one for their family and he said YES! So we made a 3rd one and brought it to them!

the filters are ready!

aarongross — Fri, 15 May 2009 19:17:16 +0000

about a month ago I posted about the Bio Sand Water Filters that we will be destributing all throughout Mexico and about our trip to El Plomo, Mexico, which is a small mountain village. I took a picture of two glasses of water, one being prefiltered and the other being filtered. I wanted to show you what these filters were capable of as far as getting crystal clear water. well the process didn’t end there. the next task was to check the bacteria levels in the water to see if it was safe to drink. the first test I took was with prefiltered water and it came back almost deadly. the water was just nasty, it even smelled up an entire room. now each filter needs roughly 3 weeks to build up a biological layer that rests on top of the fine sand layer

within the filter. the biological layer is one of the most important layers in the filter. without it you will not remove the bacteria from the water. one week into the process I took a sample of filtered water and put it into our bacteria test. 48 hours later it came back positive. there was still bacteria in the water but it was definately better than the prefiltered. there was no smell and the color change wasn’t as dramatic. so I needed to wait the full three weeks to allow the bio layer to build more. I took a sample

two days ago and tested it and today the results came back…….NEGATIVE! there is no bacteria in the water and it is safe to drink. this is huge news. we were able to take water that is very dangerous to drink and naturally filter it through a process that has made the water drinkable and safe. each filter will cost roughly $12 to make. the first weekend in June we are scheduled to take our trip to El Plomo and distribute about 12 filters. this is going to be a great trip and I look forward to pursuing this part of our work more and more over the next months and years to come. check out these photos of the bacteria tests (yellow is bad water, purple is good safe water) and the bio layer in the filter.