Sad Goodbyes

It's always hard to say goodbye. The word goodbye is often met with sadness in our English language. Goodbye, the word is derived by the phrase "God be with you" and means an act of parting or leave-taking. In the English language a goodbye could mean a short departure or a long one. Our family is having to come to terms with the long version of this word this week and the tears that are falling show that they would gladly erase this word from our English language. This week if you will remember to pray for our parents: Kenneth, Melynda, Clelleen, Joe, Mike, Pam, Brenda, Richard, Jeri, and Bobby. If the multitude of names confuses you, don't worry there isn't a mistake! =) We are not from a divided family, we are from a well loved one and our kids thoroughly enjoy Christmas time!

Cameron and I are handling the transition from Corpus okay for now. There is a knot in the bottom of our stomachs that business is currently pushing aside, but we know our emotions will come to the surface soon and we too will shed our share of tears. The neat thing about God is that He never puts a call on one's heart without preparing them for the destiny He's calling you to. I surrendered to this call on my life at the age of 15 and Cameron knew God was calling him to foreign missions when he was 19. When we married in 2000 we quickly applied to go overseas to Japan and because of my young age of 18 we were denied. Cameron felt God continuing to push him towards service in the Air Force and though we didn't understand why, we followed. I can give you 1,000 testimonies of what God did for us during our seven years of service to prepare us for this moment, but for this post I am focusing on one. When we joined, we first served for three months in San Antonio and drove two hours to Corpus to see our families every weekend. Our second duty station was Wichita Falls, Texas and we drove one to two times a month to see family. Our third station was in Shreveport, Louisiana and further distance only allowed us to make every holiday and special occasion. When we moved to New Orleans it was the furthest distance we had lived from home and with two children in the back seat, we only came home two times a year. God has given us and our parents baby steps the last ten years to say goodbye and get used to distance. These ten years he has gradually moved us further and further away from home. He has been so sweet in giving us all time to prepare for this journey He is calling us to. We praise His sweet nature and kindness for the last ten years...our ten year goodbye to our families. Our second prayer request is that you allow our parents to see the sweet goodbye God allow them to have with us and us with them. He called their children to this journey, yet allowed them abundant time to say a sweet ten year goodbye.

This week will include packing our belongings again. This time we will organize what we want to take with us to Bulgaria and pack it in our luggage cases. In addition we will need to pack for our time in Virginia. During our last packing process we lost three very special things and have yet to find them. One of these items was a brand new I-Pod. This may seem trivial to some but it had Bible study stuff on it that I planned to use during my time overseas and music that I loved to listen to during any season of life. Ah, if we could somehow come across the special things that seem to have been lost during this transition I would love it! As we pack our things for Bulgaria we are hoping to avoid repeating the same mistakes that lead us to arrive in Corpus short handed. Please pray for us during our time of packing.
We are leaving Corpus on June 29Th or 30Th depending on my step-dad's schedule. From there we will have destination stops in Shreveport, Monroe, & Kentwood, LA; Tennessee, Connecticut, Cape Cod, Massachusetts and arriving in Richmond, Virginia by July 26Th. Please pray for travel mercies! The boys should be a bundle of energy at each stop and when we arrive in Richmond for our 8 weeks of training they may send us back home and skip the whole process because the kids are so wired and FUN! Just kidding. I am hoping for alot of car naps and giggles as we drive in peace and quiet with low gas prices at each stop. Look! It's a prayer request I can ask whatever I want here~! =)

On a side note our adventure walks have included a LARGE walking stick, two snakes and some locusts. Micah was thrilled that daddy killed a scorpion that in his words "Was coming straight for our car! It didn't know that Daddy and me were standing outside the car and daddy surprised him when he squished!" South Texas critters will be the only ones celebrating our departure!

We love you and appreciate you taking the time to check on us, pray for us and love us!

misconceptions

Week 1: This journey to Texas to visit family and friends before reporting for training in July has been much different than what we imagined it to be. When we lived in New Orleans Cameron had three jobs: Hiller, full time school, & serving our church as the music minister. I was a full time mommy to my little guys and worked at Kenneth's part time. When we packed what little bit we had left and departed from New Orleans we had an idea that life would be very relaxing and welcomed being "bored" for the first time in our married life. This was our misconception!
Texas welcomed us with a virus and a scramble to get Benjamin into a doctor and since our insurance didn't cross state lines with us we had a challenge on our hands. God is good and provided a doctor free of charge! In an attempt to keep things interesting, Micah followed with a virus all his own =)
Week 2: We headed to Austin, Tx to visit my sister and her family. It was a great visit and the boys were fasinated with picking all of their dinner vegtables straight from her impressive garden. They picked quite a few things they didn't plan on eating for dinner too; beets, bell peppers, ect A dinner at ChuckECheese resulted in Jennifer and her sister acting like children and hitting every ticket jackpot they could, ending the night with 1,600+ tickets and leaving the facility with three very impressive dollar store level toys for the kids.
On our way back to Corpus we stopped and made a visit to the Snake Farm. Cameron and I had been there before but felt obligated to share our reptile passion with our boys. We are proud to say they have inherited this wonderful genetic gift! Micah and Ben were fascinated with the petting zoo but did require being reminded to stay out of "green" mud (yes disgusting). Our next stop was to the Natural Bridge Wildlife Ranch. It amazes me what I think my children will be excited about and then they end up could care less about. We drove through the safari and the boys would hop into our laps and feed some African Deer and then jump into the backseat and play with a toy. We would exclaim "Look! A buffalo is coming to the car to eat!" And the boys would not be phased by the exclamation as if buffalo have visited our car on a regular basis!?
Week 3: We are now in June and I can't believe how fast our time is flying. There are still so many people to see and spend time with! This week has been really fun. The weekend was spent seeing my grandparents. They have a huge place in my heart and have invested so much into me spiritually being the woman I am today. I don't think they will ever understand HOW much they impacted my life! In addition to sweet visits with family, I caught some cool wildlife. Cameron and I have started running together every morning with the boys. In part this is exercise that we both desire and enjoy but the real reason for this passion is Cameron doesn't trust me going alone! Cameron knows the real reason I'm out running is to see how much wildlife I can encounter and catch! Part of the "for better or for worse" part of our marriage is that he is obligated to run 3 miles with me inorder to keep me safe! So we've caught and brought home two turtles. The first one Micah named "Micah'Angelo" in honor of Ninja Turtles. I 'thought' I had found a shady spot to put his box but the sun has a tendancy of moving through out the day and killed our "Micah'Angelo." To redeem myself I found a tiny baby turtle and set it up inside in a box. It wasn't eating and the same fate was closing in quickly so we let him "play" in the garden and make his great escape! The highlight of the week was the huge Tarantula!!! Now I am scared out of my wits of spiders and this was huge for me to catch it! The boys have a book about spiders and tarantulas and have been wanting to see one badly. I was driving home the other day and saw a big furry circle in the road and as I came on it I realized it was a huge tarantula. I jumped out of the car with a zip lock bad and a flip flop and got it to run into the bag. It wasn't easy and there was alot of jumping and screaming on my part but I got it! The kids loved it and I did actually pet his booty and was surprised at how soft he was. We ended up giving him to my little brother's friend as a pet.
Unfortunately Ben has managed to encounter another virus and has been running a fever of 103 today. Fortunately not as high as the last virus but 103 is yucky still. So a few prayer requests from us would be:

• Healing for Ben and protection for Micah from getting sick
• Spiritual growth as Cam and I feel days flying by without a moment to sit and study God's word. Discipline to MAKE time!
• Busy days of repacking and reorganizing what we will take with us, what needs to stay and who will keep it for us.
• Travel mercy on our family as everyday we are driving to see somebody or making appoitments somewhere to speak with churches.