Madie Ruth

I have a new little niece!!  Madie Ruth was born on Monday, May 10th.  Exactly one week after my birthday (so hopefully I'll not forget it).  She is the cutest little girl in the whole world!  I have three nephews, so I am excited about my first niece.  I was sad that I was not able to make it to Georgia to be there when Madie was born, but thanks to Skype, I was able to sneak out of class and watch as they brought her into the nursery for the first time for the family to see and also was able to watch her first bath and all the crazy measurements and foot impressions.  It was a sad time since I couldn't be there, but it was so joyful to see a new life that God has blessed us all with.

I am so thankful that God has blessed me with such a wonderful family.  I could not have asked for a more amazing sister in Carrie.  We have an amazing brother-in-law, Jeremy, that has become an important part of our family.  Carrie is the kindest person that I know, and she is the most patient and loving mother that I have ever seen.

The New Face of Wheat Harvests

Andrew and I have had a long day in ESL training again today, and this is what I have to show for myself :)  I really liked our old blog background, but I wanted to try to be just a little more high-tech.  This might actually be a little too high-tech for me, as I am struggling through some technical difficulties.  Hopefully ya'll will enjoy the new look though, and be patient with me as I try to get all of the technicalities worked out.  Give me some feedback.  What do you think?  Do you like the new look of the blog?

ESL and Skype

This past Saturday, Andrew and I were involved in an all day course to become ESL/EFL certified.  This course consists of two Saturdays, going to class from 9:00 am to 5:00 pm.  A very long Saturday!  After we finish these two days of classes, we will officially be certified to teach English as a second language or english as a foreign language.  We learned all about the differences between these two things yesterday which I will not bore you with today.

I went into these classes thinking that it was going to be one long very boring Saturday, but the teacher was actually really good.  She has been teaching since before I was even born, so she has a lot of really great knowledge and was quite interesting.  But...as can only be expected when you have internet access, I was online during her class.  I just did a quick email check and then right back to taking notes. :)  Did I mention I kept my Skype on?  Thinking I might be able to chat with someone, I had the forethought to go ahead and mute my computer.  It was a good thing too because not long into the class my sister, Carrie, called me.  I quickly denied the call and sent her a message over chat saying that I was in class.  We chatted for a bit and then she told me to answer her video call but just keep my computer on mute so she couldn't be heard....

Five perfectly placed hair rollers and the most adorable face of my nephew, Zeke, were the first things I saw on my computer screen when I answered the call.  It was all I could do to not burst out laughing and waving right in the middle of class.  Thankfully the hair rollers were not in Zeke's hair, but in Carrie's who was sitting right behind him in the screen.  I could see Zeke pointing emphatically and laughing with excitement at seeing me.  Jeremy, my brother-in-law even made an appearance.  It was such a joy to see them, especially while I had to sit through a long day of classes.  It was so hard to not give away to the teacher that I was video skyping with my sister during class, but the rest of the day I had a huge smile because I got to see them!

Thank you ESL class and Skype.

"Busy"

I know it has been a little while since my last post, so I wanted to write just a quick blog to let you know what all has been going on around here.  One word could describe it all, "busy."  We are pretty much in meetings from 8:00 am to 4:00 or 5:00 pm.  Breakfast is at 7:00 and supper is at 5:00.  Sometimes we even have meetings after supper!  We stay pretty busy in meetings all day and then we come home to the quad that we share with eleven other people.  Needless to say Andrew and I don't get a lot of "us" time.  We are going to have to be intentional about getting away from everyone and just having some down time together.  Well, that's the scoop on things.  Not a whole lot interesting, just crazy :)

Home...for now

I finally got around to taking some pictures of our Quad.  They are not that great, but they will give you an idea of what it's like here.

Our small dining area...not that clean at the moment

This is the view coming in the door.  Part of our kitchenette, the dining area is on the right.  We have a little washer dryer area.  The bathroom is to the left right behind the kitchenette, and that is the door to our bedroom.

Part of our room.  We tried to make it a bit homey.

Well, that was the grand tour, I hope you enjoyed it!  Things are still pretty busy here, but I think Andrew and I along with another couple with no children are going to sneak out tonight and go see a movie :)  I'll try to keep up with my blogging while we're here even though things get hectic.  

We Made It!

Andrew and I made it safely all the way to Virginia.  We have unpacked our stuff, are now safely situated in our quad and ready for training!  We arrived yesterday around 1:00 after a beautiful scenic drive through Virginia.  There is so much history in this state.  We are a young country, and compared to other countries around the world, we do not have very many historical markers.  Just think of Rome with the Coliseum in the middle of the city for those who live there to be reminded of their history every day on the way to work.  We were able to drive past and through several civil war historical sites on our way here yesterday.

There are still people arriving today, so we have not had any meetings yet, but we look forward to plunging in bright and early Wednesday morning.  In our down time we have been able to reconnect with friends and meet some new ones.  We stayed up late last night playing Settler's of Catan, Andrew's favorite board game, with another couple with the same love of board games.  Our quad is quite simple. There are four other units in our building, but our unit consists of a kitchenette, bathroom, washer & dryer and our room with two twin beds that we push together to make a king size bed.  I will take pictures to post on here, but the internet connection in our unit is too weak to be able to post pictures from here.  Thanks to Dad's AT&T internet thingy or we would not even have this weak connection.

Well, I'd better run.  I just wanted to update quickly so everyone would know that we made it here safely and that we are excited about all the things to come!

Things I will Miss

So, I've just been going through a few pictures on my computer and I thought I would share just a few things/people I am definitely going to miss, not limited to but including...

My Sister Carrie

Our Small Group

Watching little Zeke grow up

Adorable moments

My mom and our matching outfits

This really does not even begin to touch on all the things and people that I am going to miss while we are out traveling the world, but it is a good start...more to come :)