Sunday, January 18, 2009

Packing AHHHHHHHHHH

After a weeks worth of running around like crazy, we are finally finished packing (hopefully)! It has been quite the experience trying to figure out how to pack for a year. The missionaries in Kenya have been extremely helpful in advising us on things to bring. Nicole, of course, has taken the brunt of the load with all the planning. I am just the work horse and just do what I am told. It works out much better that way as she has been so organized and has done a terrific job. Typically what has happened through this whole process has been that I, (the one with ADD), would start to panic as a thought came flooding into my mind among about 10 other thoughts (that is why I often will look confused or in a daze as my mind works a little differently) about something we really needed to take care of right away. I would then rush off to tell Nicole and would undoubtedly find that she had already thought and taken care of whatever we needed to do. She has been truly wonderful through this whole process of raising funds and planning. I am grateful to have her as my partner as we take this journey together. So after about 20 hours of packing over the past few days in addition to the couple of hours of weighing bags tonight and moving a few shoes and other items from one bag to another and back again, (one shoe even went into my guitar case, which turns out to stabilize the guitar quite well. who knew!) we have our bags packed full, and I mean full!!!! Nicole had to leave as I was stressing her out because our bags are probably going to literally burst somewhere over the Atlantic. We are so grateful for how supportive our families have been and have been EXTREMELY blessed by the generosity of so many friends and family, who have supported us through prayer and financial donations. God has already increased our faith as we had to trust that the money would come in when we both resigned and had less than half of the support we needed. We now have enough to go at least 9 months! We want to thank you all again for making this trip possible and for joining together with us in the ministry at the AGC baby center. We have had a mix of emotions as we are both anxious and excited that our departure date is finally here, but it has also been difficult to say goodbye to so many that we love. We are also quite nervous, but as a close friend reminded me recently, we have to first step out of the boat before we will walk on water. We continue to ask for prayer for wisdom, courage, and strength as we continue to say goodbye to the rest of our family over the next two days. ~ Jeremy

Wednesday, January 7, 2009

We finally have our leave date for Kenya!!! We are going to be leaving at 5:00PM on Tuesday, January 20th. We will be flying through London and arriving in Kenya January 21st! We are excited and also nervous about leaving. Currently we are scheduled to return to the U.S. on October 20th, but that is subject to change. We will try our best to keep this page updated while in Kenya. We are so grateful for all of the support and prayers that we have received and we are going to miss friends and family A LOT while we are away.