October 30, 2007

Greetings from West Lafayette, OH.

I just returned from picking up the boys from their time in MI for the youth retreat, they had such a blast.

Last Wednesday, Scott and I went and transfered our driver's license to Ohio. We teased Pastor Tom and emailed him telling him so but that we still bleed "BLUE". :-)

Scott started at the hangar this week and is loving it. He said that getting use to the terminalogy is the hardest part since it has been a while since he has used it. He came home with homework again today for the second time, I guess I had better get use to that. :-)

I have the boys at the library right now, they have internet....yeah!! I am on Matthew's card so I can't be on long or he may not be too happy.

Renee Nix is bringing 8 people to our place on Thursday, Nov. 1st to spend the night. They are going to some jump rope competition and we are a 1/2 way point to stop and sleep.

Robin Sluis brought me two wonderful surprises...she brought Trisha and the boys to meet me when she picked up the boys and today she brought Amy Maiberger and the girls when she brought the boys to drop off. You absolutely rock Robin!! Thank you!!!

The homeschool group here has asked me to speak next Tuesday, I told Scott, "great, I haven't even agreed to attend yet and they have me on the schedule." :-) pray for me on that one. It has to be 15-20 minutes. They want me to talk about the business I did with Shaughn and why...all the ins and outs of it.

Matthew got his hair cut (buzzed) just before fall retreat. He donated it to a charity which was why he was growing it out anyways. Pretty cool ay? I was very proud of him.

We tried another church on Sunday, not bad. Actually my favorite so far. Keep praying that God shows us where and that it won't take 6 months. :-)

Well, that is all for now. Love you all and hope to hear from you soon.

Oh yeah, my grandma is in ICU and not doing well. Please keep her in your prayers too.

Love,
Lela

October 22, 2007 "Orientation Day No. #1"

To bring you up to date on our field experiences...

We finished day one of MMS Orientation. Scott and I spent the entire day at the hangar with Keith going through the SOP and basic training and "what to expect while serving here" books. We were given the "Official" tour of the hangar and all being shown all of the "nooks and crannys" as Keith called them. Scott has to go back tomorrow for more orientation but the couples part if officially complete.

The colors here are just radiant. We have had a few MMS families stop by for a visit while they were on the fall color tour. Our house is on the routed area so all the men who helped us unload are bringing their wives by to see the place. So far the comments from the men have been "WOW, looks different without all the boxes in the house". :-)

We also had a visitor from BCC this weekend...Elmer and Pam Franklin came for a visit and went to our local Rosco Village Apple Butter Festival with us. They came by and had dinner with us at the house and enjoyed meeting Zamu. Thank you guys for including us in your trip. :-)

Scott's eye appt. went very well. He is enjoying seeing without glasses. Healing went very well. Thank you for your prayers.

Our newsletter was approved by Keith so we will be printing them up to send out in the next week or so. Pray for us as we get those ready.

The Lord has blessed Shaughn and Matthew. They were given full scholarships by BCC to attend the Teen Fall Retreat and Robin has agreed to meet me half way to pick them up. What a HUGE blessing as they were REALLY wanting to go. Thank you all for your help in that!!!!

We have visited a couple of different churches in the area. We have a couple more that we want to visit. Nothing has jumped out screaming "HOME" yet so we are still seeking the Lord of HIS will. That is one of our prayer requests.

We have all officially received our library cards. Now we feel almost all official. We go this Wednesday to take the drivers written test to transfer our drivers license to OHIO. Please pray for this too. I picked up the books to study, they don't look to difficult but still the whole concept of testing is strange.

I was told some good news. The ladies here are placing an order from Rainbow Resources book (homeschool stuff) and missionaries get 15% off. Apparently at the homeschool convention missionaries get 15% off from many of the vendors. How cool is that?? Every little bit helps.

Well, the house is looking more and more like home. I finished most of the unpacking upstairs and now have to move to the downstairs. Scott laid the carpet in the homeschool area and has his "garage" area organized. His tools are all ready to take to the hangar and organized (and polished). He is so funny. Chase (from MMS) has a trailer for us to use to bring it into the hangar, so that is a blessing.

We are going to have our photo on the front of this next Groundcrew Newsletter from MMS. Every December they show all the families at MMS on the front cover and we are going to be included this year. Too wierd but exciting. Oh yeah, Scott was given keys to the hangar and gate...and his uniforms came in and were inside his locker today. His locker is right next to the lunch room (first one on the left as you enter the lunch room for those who were able to attend the tour). :-)

Well, dinner is about done and I must go for now. Bless you all and love hearing from you!!!!

Bless you,
Lela and boyz~

Surgery updates...

Greetings all,

I am sitting here at the Coffee Beanery in Brighton MI with high speed internet and it is all good!! :-)

Scott is doing great with his eyes and had a great report with his 1 day check up. We went to see Stephanie and she is doing wonderful!! She is at St. Joes in Ann Arbor in room 5125, floor 5 until Sunday. They are moving the whole wing on Sunday to the NEW section which will be in the new tower on floor 8. I am not sure of the new room number, she will find that out today. She was sitting up and they were going to have her walking by noon. They put 2 4" rods and 8 screws in her back along with many artificial cusions between her discs. They also removed a huge cyst which was located in her lower back twined with her nerves. The doctor said she should see huge differences. She is not allowed to lift, bend or twist for 4-6 weeks so pray for ED! :-)

We are heading back tomorrow and wishing we had more time to see everyone. Did I mention that high speed is wonderful?? Well, it is!! :-)

Well, that is about it for the updates. Bless you all and hope to hear from you soon.

Love,
Lela and boyz~

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Good morning,

Scott is at the hangar having devotions with the guys. They do a little longer devotion on Wednesdays and also include their weekly team meetings. I went, last night, to the MMS Ladies Prayer Meeting at the hangar and it was a great time of prayer. They had asked me to give my testimony so I did. It was great to see all of the women and to see how much they love the Lord. I really enjoyed that. It also gave us a small chance to get to know each other more. I had received a phone call just prior to the meeting asking me if I would like to car pool with a couple of them, I thought that was great. I drove to Cindy's and on to Donna's. The 3 of us decided to go out for ice cream after the meeting since we all had some "free" time from home. That was also a great time of getting to know them more.

My parents were in this weekend and that was great to see them. They came to help us unpack some more but we were all just too tired and took the time to rest and show them the area. We went to Rosco Village and checked that out for the first time, very cute! It was like a miniature Greenfield Village. Lots of history! My dad loves history. Mom decided that this county loves triangles...most places have "T's" when the road comes to an end and you need to turn onto another road, not here...it comes to a "Y" and 3 of those make a triangle. Not many "T's" here...lots of "Y's". She wasn't sure she liked that part. ha ha

We see many deer while driving at night. Since we are so far out and our road seems like a one-laner, it makes it kind of scary driving in the evening. Most MMS'rs have all hit a deer at some point, pray for us on that one, I don't want to be in the "MOST" catagory. :-)

We are leaving today for Scott's eye surgery tomorrow morning. Stephanie is having her back surgery tomorrow a.m. too.

Having dial-up is very time consuming. It took me over 2 hours to download my emails the other night. I find that I am not attempting it very often as I don't have the patients yet for this. It has taken me over an hour to get this site up so I can post for you. With dial-up, you never know what speed you are going to get. There is only 3...slow, slower and not moving! Crazy!! I know...be thankful I even have it....but do I really??

Yesterday after my parents left, I was pretty sad and within 20 minutes of them leaving, there was a knock on the door...the Fed Ex guy was here with a box for Lela...I signed and opened it up to find 6 yellow long stem roses and 6 yellow lillies in a beautiful glass vase. Yellow Roses are my absolute favorite!! Someone had sent us a "MISS YOU" bouquet and had totally came at the perfect moment! THANK YOU FRIEND!!!!!!!!!! You know who you are!! :-) There was a rose for each of us. They are sitting on our kitchen table and are absolutely gorgeous!!

We miss you all and really appreciate you prayers so much. As things are getting more and more settled each day, we are looking forward to finding a "routine" to our life, starting school, work and finding a church to connect with. Last Sunday we went to a dear friends church in Akron with my parents. The pastor there is really sick and a long time friend of the family. This Sunday we hope to start visiting locally again and checking it out.

God bless you all and hope to hear from you soon.

Lela and boyz!

Greetings from West Lafayette, OHIO

Yes, I am blogging this sitting at our kitchen table in our new home in West Lafayette. All is quiet except for the crickets and bugs. It is very dark here. You can see stars...wow!

We are settling in a little bit by little bit, box by box. This is a very long process but it is going well. Everyone has had good spirits (attitudes) about it and this helps. It must be all of your prayers!!! :-)

We were "Officially" welcomed into Coshocton County by attending their county fair last night with most of the MMS'rs. It was the fairs last night and the special feature was the "ROUGH TRUCKS". Oh yeah!! 137 entries and we stayed for ALL of them. It was quite entertaining and educational!! The only requirements to enter are: license, helmet and seat belt. People entered all kinds of vehicles and not just trucks either. What a hoot!!

Tonight we went to a staffer of MMS who held an Open House for another staffer who has been with MMS for 20 years. So, we were able to see many of the MMS'rs who we had not seen at the fair. This was very cool.

I received a call today from Lisa Swartz (staffer) and she asked me to share at the MMS Ladies Prayer Meeting time this coming Tuesday at 7p.m. my testimony for about 10-15 minutes. I said sure. Please pray for me that God will fill my mouth with his words and I will not babble on.

MMS is in the midst of planning their Christmas dinner (already) and their ladies retreat for next Feb. Seems strange to be here and a part of it. We all still feel we are going through the motions and that this is our "vacation" home for the week or two. The reality hasn't hit yet.

Scott went in to the hangar this week a couple of times and was able to share their devotional time with them before they began their work day. He also signed the "CONTRACT" with MMS and received our first official paycheck. Very strange.

Zamu is settling into the family nicely. She is getting very spoiled and has gained a little bit more weight.

Everyone sends their love and we hope to hear from you soon!!
God bless,
Lela and boyz~