Sunday, August 14, 2011

School is here

Our 3rd year of dorm parenting started Wednesday with the arrival of our 12 girls. They arrived with lots of luggage and hugs and giggles. Faith has loved being with the girls - she definitely feels a part of the dorm. We have some younger girls, so that has been nice for Faith. The boys are down stairs and are loving being in the dorm. They have come upstairs often - so that has been nice for us! We definitely miss them being in our apartment though. But the fact that they have amazing dorm parents with 23 years of experience, I think is going to be such an great time of growth.

School started Thursday - so we only had 2 days of school and then the weekend. That was nice to be able to get started, but then have a break to get settled. We are finding the differences between boys and girls pretty great - not that we didn't know that with our own children, but when you have large groups of boys and then have large groups of girls, the differences are vast. The biggest difference of course is food - they barely eat compared to the boys. However, I did discover they can chow down on some brownies!! I have heard that the first week is a little bit weird with nervousness, etc. So hopefully it will increase a little bit once they get settled. Another big difference is communication - in these 4 days the girls have talked with me about missing their parents, periods, nervousness, etc. Boys tend to keep it tucked inside. But so far it is great - we love the girls and think it is going to be a great year!

PRAYER
Here are our girls names if you ever want to pray for them: Erin, Susanna, Akinyi (pronounced like bikini with an a), Yea Lim, Hannah, Rebecca, Heather, Gloria, Ha Young, Grace, Allison, Yea Rang.

Pray that they would transition quickly - especially the new girls. Pray that the home sickness won't last long.

We continue to make plans for our stateside time - pray that the detail will come together.

Thanks again for your support and prayers for our family!

Saturday, August 6, 2011


Zach took this and edited it - the roman aquaduct in Segovia.


Royal church by the palace

Royal palace

In Mallorca

Statue in the park

Went to the bull fighting arena - there are bull fights every Sunday



Streets of Madrid - 11 o'clock at night

In Segovia



Mallorca


Met this priest and his brother who is a baker and baked this bread for communion - they loved Faith!

5 days left

Well, summer here is officially winding down - we have 5 days until the girls start showing up. We have had a great summer, full of fun and lots of memory making things. Kids had a great summer, but are ready for their friends to come back. Faith is excited

We have 12 girls in the Fall and then 2 more come in January so it is not too big. We have 2 seniors, 3 juniors, 1 sophomore, 4 freshman, 4 middle schoolers. So it is a pretty young dorm. We are very excited to start this new transition and look forward to experiencing the differences between parenting a group of girls versus guys.

The electricity has been a constant source of aggravation for us - it is a little bit better now, going off for 2-4 hours a day. Unfortunately alot of those times are at 10 pm - ugh. It hasn't rained that much for rainy season, so I suspect that there will be a lot more rain coming soon - hopefully it will help the heat - we start sweating the minute we wake up, gross!

We have only minor things to do for the dorm to be ready thanks to our predecessors! We will try to be better about blogging - our internet is a little slow, but will try to post pictures soon.

Our plans for furlough are starting. We will be leaving here around June 10th and flying into Washington DC - we will be in Maryland and also go to North Carolina to visit our friends there!
I know it is a while until that happens, but want to get things lined up - does anyone have a vehicle that they would be willing to let us use/rent for the 7 months we are in the States? We are trying to reserve a vehicle with some of the companies that rent out to missionaries, but they are all booked right now, but will keep looking. We are also looking at some options for housing - anyone have a guest house, missionary apartment or in-law suite (preferably with separate entrance or kitchen)? Please email us if you have any information - we are just starting our planning, but wanted to throw it out here first.

We are starting our planning for visiting and speaking at churches as well, if you would like us to visit your church and speak, please email us!