The Lakota Indian Tribe - South Dakota

The Duke family spent last week on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota - home to the Lakota Indian Tribe. The week was spent on service projects throughout the area from construction, to clothes closets, to soup kitchens to nursing homes. It was a great week for all of us and Jamey and I have said several times that we both feel called to participate in mission trips together and with the kids. Actually, by Thursday, I was a little worried that Jamey felt called to move to South Dakota and teach there! :-) Of course, I would follow him gladly wherever he went. I was so in love with him last week - he worked so hard and spent much of the time working on scaffolding 2 or 3 stories up. And heights make him extremely nervous!!
I learned so much about the hardships of Native Americans. Until the late 1970s, it was still illegal for Native Americans to practive their own religion/spirituality. The people there was so kind though. It was great to meet them and learn about them. Many of the people in their 50s and 60s endured horrible abuse and forced religion at mandatory boarding schools set up by the church. It has taken years for the people there to accept kindness from white people (understandably).
I am going to post a few pictures below. Of course, I took over 200 so this is just a small amount.
Here is a little prairie god popping up! They were cute, but made this weird chirping noise. They also kiss each other!

This was a town we visited one day that was set up as a town from the 1880s. Many movies have used this town as a set.
This is a Catholic church on the reservation near the house where Jamey worked on the siding. It is purple! And the reason it is purple? When it was time to paint the church the last time, the adults argued fiercely over the color choice. Finally, the committee decided that bc the adults were arguing so much, the children would get to decide the color. And the kids voted for purple!
Here we are watching the sunset on the Missouri River.
Here we are entering the Badlands National Park. It is hard to describe, but so very beautiful. There was an ocean and underwater volcanos many years ago that casued this rock layer formations. They are still finding fish fossils today. The Duke family at a waterfall

We went to a Buffalo and Elk preserve. The buffalo would walk right up next to us! There were signs everywhere warning that the buffalo will kill or seriously injure you if you got out of the car. So we stayed IN the car!
Here is Ansley and Jen (a friend from church) working on one of the service projects making pillows for the children on the reservation. After Ansley finished her pillow, she brought it to the mission to put behind the counter. A child from the reservation will come in and pick out the pillow that Ansley made and take it home! She was very proud.

My two cuties - At a random dinasuar park in Rapid City, South Dakota. Apparently after the war (in the 1930s)the WPA was all about creating jobs, and one of those jobs was to make these giant dinasaurs. Very strange, but the kids loved it and the view was pretty.

And here we are at Mt. Rushmore - it was beautiful and really impressive. It was cold, raining, and very overcast, but we all enjoyed it. The kids even seemed to be impressed with Ms. Rushmore.
We are glad to be home! Thanks to everyone for the well wishes and prayers for safety.