He's gone

Vicente went to bed at 1:30 (we've never been much for packing ahead of time) and was out the door by 4am!
I'm sure this is him right now:

Our pastor came to pick him up, while I snuggled back under the covers with prayers swirling in my sleepy head.
Thank You, Lord, for creating such an amazing man.





Sadness will hit soon - I'm in the overwhelmed/overcaring-of-kids mode right now. :~)

The Vman is flyin' out!

We're only 3 days away from take off! I'm starting to get excited. :~D

I was able to talk to Dr W (who insists on being called by his first name - "L") for about 20 minutes today. It was very nice to get to know him a bit. I guess its a little odd that he and Vicente have never met, and yet they're planning this big ol trip...but honestly, its so hard NOT to get along with my husby, they'll do awesome!

L is *very* kind - one of those souls that you know you're safe with. He seems pretty low key, which of course makes me subconsciously vamp things up a bit...poor guy, I probably hit him like a tsunami, LOL!

Our sweet friends who connected us with L (and are Brits serving in Honduras) have apparently done quite a load of leg work for us, and I'm so grateful! There's been a problem recently with Christian evangelistic efforts to Muslims being discouraged by local authorities in England. Our friend has made phone calls to his home church, a city manager, and even lawyers, to make sure that Vicente and L have their rights understood and defended. They will be taking a printout of the current laws of England in regards to this, along with the phone #s of lawyers ready to come to their defense if needed.

Praise God!! (And thanks to the B family!)

Oh I have bunches more to say, but I gotta go grab some kiddos off the school bus!

Man, I stink at this consistency thing!

Here's the deal: our camera and our stupid, old dinosaur, dumb, and ugly computer are still not in communication with one another. And without pics, I struggle to care enough about posting to make it worth it. Plus, my back hurts too much to sit at the computer too long these days...
So much has happened lately, life is good - but without visual, who really cares! :~D

I'm workin on it. This whole blogging thing is good for me. :~)

Today...and last night...and the night before (I am *such* a digresser!)

I called my mom last night just as she was getting off work to see if she'd like to join Evy and I in our "girl time".

Vicente has been on an after-work-side-job for days, and he'd taken the boys along. (Evy was with him Thursday on the same job while me and my little men went to the county fair and rodeo! I LUV getting my hick influences in whenever possible, LOL!) Basically Vicente and I have been playing Tag Team Kid Time...its been different, but not at all a bad thing! It's kinda fun having things mixed up a bit.

Anyhoo, as mom and I were talking she tried to start her car and it said "no" - dead battery.
Evy and I cut our nail painting short and rushed to Mom/Grammy's aid. Turns out the cables connecting to her battery weren't exactly connecting, (bummer cuz I felt so capable with my cute new plastic briefcase full of important car things!) so after a phone call to Les Schwab (the tire place) we decided to bag it all and go out to eat! Yeay, eating out is the absolute best!

Evy's favorite restaurant in town is the Thai place because, "It's quiet". So Thai fooding we went! (It's my fav because our whole crew can get outta there under 30 bucks...) Mom had never been, so it was fun for her to try new stuff - turns out she'd never eaten tofu!!! Crazy. Mom drove my car home so that E Jo and I could walk, (I love living near family! ) and on the way we spent a good chunk of time at a rope swing in the park. I was once again shocked at how tough my girl is!

This morning we woke up in time to get Grammy to work, then the kids and I spent the whole morning at the neighborhood church for Children's Health Day. It was so cool! Free vision, speech, hearing, dental, and whole body health check ups. And tons of fun games and prizes and a backpack full of school supplies at the end of it all!

I'm really not sure that I'll ever get over all the benefits of living in America!

We had to miss the dental check, though, because Evy and I had to rush to my aunt and uncles for the "July-birthday's tea". Too sweet! My Aunt Jeri worked *so* hard preparing a beautiful table and amazing food. Evy got to go on a nature walk with Uncle Dick, just like the ones he used to take me on when I was little! Have I mentioned that I love living near family?

Mom, Evy, Aunt Lala and myself ran to Target after the tea to get some laundry-eh? for a bridal shower tomorrow night, and I laughed as I pulled out the Target gift card Lala gave me for *my* bday to pay for a nightie for someone else in the fam, and we all just said, "It comes around somehow, doesn't it?"

I love living near family!!!

Always something new!

I am so mad at myself for not recording this newest journey of ministry. Will I ever learn? ;~)

Where oh where to begin!?!

Okay, for years now Vicente has had an itchin' passion to reach Muslims for Jesus. He has visited England twice, and each visit found him time and time again being touched by Muslim people.

Living here in Podunk, Oregon hasn't given him much of a chance to really build relationships with those of the Islamic faith. (Shocker) But he's a persistent fellow...

About a year ago he became buddies with Ibrahim, a worker at the local quick mart. He goes and visits and asks a million questions about Pakistan (Ibrahim's homeland) and Afghanistan (where I's family moved after a dramatic national siege of some sort). Vicente has poured over library books about different regions in the Middle East, and even, amazingly! gotten on line a few times to poke around news sites.

We've prayed with our prayer group for months that God would send workers to the Muslims, and that Vicente would be one of those workers, Lord willing.

Vicente gets up early every morning and does language study of Farsi and...another language (shame on me!), trying to prepare himself for any opportunity that may come his way.
Some sweet, sweet friends in Honduras gave us the number of a missionary with a similar heart as Vicente's in regards to Muslims. The two men began communicating, and after a time Dr. W invited Vicente to go on a missions trip to, of all places, ENGLAND!
We prayed, had our church pray, and prepared as best we could for this to be a Yes from God...and yet the weeks passed with no physical proof that it was His will. (IOW - no cash flow happenin!)
Last weekend, Dr. W called to tell us that he'd be buying his tickets the following Monday, and that he'd really like for them both to travel together. Vicente said he'd have to see what the Lord does in regards to funds...I'd told him that I'd be willing to put the trip on the credit card, but it'd have to be fully his decision, because I didn't exactly love the idea. But I *want* him to go!! He said that he'll try to get extra work and see what happens, and he was able to get a side job for this weekend, but after praying about it decided that any new $ should go towards our current bills, and the England trip would have to be fully from the Lord.
At Tuesday night prayer group Vicente asked for prayer because "we'll have to buy the tickets for England this week", and then he went into a LOOOOONG ol' request that there'd be a home they could stay at once they arrived.

I sat next to him, trying not to glare... ~giggle~

I mean REALLY!!!! Here we are, more broke than we've been in years, trying to figure out how to buy milk for breakfast the next morning (we got it - no worries!), and he spends half a breath's time to talk about the tickets (not even mentioning the $1500+ needed for this trip! Not one word about the fact that finances are the *only* thing stopping us here!), and yet he goes off with all these silly, eloquent words about going to a house and staying in it, etc. It cracked me up!

Well, my God set me firmly in my place (He's so dagblum consistent!) when Vicente came in from a talk with our pastors after prayer group and told me that the church is paying for the ENtire trip, including a bit of extra spending money!!!

Itinerary set, tickets purchased, a weeks paid vacation ready and a-waitin.

Wow! I like this life He's given us. :~D

My husby

God gave me such an amazing man.
My Vicente is SO good to me. I honestly and truly don't even come *close* to deserving all the caring things he does for me.

My cowkids...

Okay, so that doesn't sound like I wanted it to... ;~p


We've had quite a bit of horse fun lately. I *so* hope that I can keep this as a passion for my little guys - maybe that way I can hang out with horses more!

This pic is a bit fuzzy, but I just love that smile!
Lovin' on Dougie the horse

And after a long day of cowgirlin'