The newest member of the family...

As some of you have already heard, we have married off our son during our time in Orlando. Yes, arranged marriages are not common in this country, but this seems to be a special case....and he seems to have chosen her first. :) We'd like to introduce you to Miss Sage. She is the beautiful daughter of Chad & Leah, who are part of our Wycliffe Training Camp group. She is 7 months younger than Patrick. They have a great time together--at school and out of school when "the parents" want to spend time together. They are looking to become youth leaders at the center in Papua New Guinea, which means there's a good chance we'll either be at the same center or, at least, on the same island as them when we all go to help Bible translation in our various ways.

Sage is a "rough and tumble" kind of gal--I think she liked going in the mud more than Patrick!

"Run, Patrick, Run!"

Patrick at "School"

While Momma and Daddy are learning, Patrick is busy learning about Creation and playing with his new friends. Here are a few pictures that have been taken by the instructors who walk the halls/classrooms taking pictures of us all day.

BUBBLES!! Playing with Anna and Daniel...

Nice hair!

As some of you know, Patrick has found himself a lady-friend named Sage while we've been here. They are quite inseparable and give each other a reason to get out of bed each day. Here they are playing dress-up during class. More pictures of the two of them together will be coming in another post. It has been great fun getting to know Sage and her parents.

Wycliffe Center in Orlando, FL

Last night, after 9 hours of driving, we arrived at the Wycliffe Bible Translators campus in Orlando. We enjoyed our time coming down here. Here are some pictures of our apartment here--our "home" for the next two weeks. We have internet access in our apartment, so now is a great time for you to email us! *hint hint* :) We're not sure what the next two weeks have in store for us down here--it sounds like long days of class for us and "school" for Patrick. Please be in prayer for all three of us as we completed this portion of our training.

We had dinner at Subway on our way here. We ordered Patrick a pizza since he never likes the goodies we get on our subs. Here he is "trying" to use a knife to cut his pizza into pieces.

This was actually just outside the Subway, but we were excited that this was Patrick's first time on Florida soil. He has now been in 12 states in the last 10 months!

This is the view walking into our apartment. There is a tiled entryway and a large, walk-in entry closet. You can see our living room, kitchen and dining area.

Here's another picture of our kitchen and dining area. We won't use them much, though, because our "tuition" for training camp includes three meals a day.

This is Patrick's room--he has two twin beds and a pack 'n' play, dresser, nightstand, chair....very roomy and nice.

This is Patrick's bathroom and walk-in closet!! What a lucky li'l man.

This is our bedroom, complete with a desk, dresser, walk-out patio, adjoining bathroom with a walk-in closet.

Here's Jason enjoying a nice tall glass of fresh squeezed orange juice---look closely. Haha. But we do hope to find an orange grove nearby to visit and get some real Florida oranges!! Yum!

BEBO DADDY!

This past summer we borrowed the movie Finding Nemo from a friend in our small group. Since then, Patrick has been nearly "obsessed" with Nemo, or as he calls it, "Bebo Daddy" (Since most of the movie is about Nemo's dad trying to find him). For Christmas--and in preparation for our long carride to North Carolina again--we bought him the movie. Here is his reaction, and his sweet excited voice.

Back to JAARS

We left on Sunday, Dec. 30 and got as far as Wisconsin Dells before snow, ice and seeing several cars in the ditch and in accidents made us stop for the night. The next day we got as far as Louisville, KY and celebrated New Years Eve there. On the 1st we got to North/South Carolina. God has greatly blessed us with a house to live in while we’re here this time around. The owners are friends of ours (Keri worked with her in the kitchen during Jason’s internship), and they are traveling the United States and abroad until the end of summer. The house is far more space than we can fill, so if you’re in the area, please let us know…we have room for you! The yard is wonderful—a thinned out forest in the back and a fire pit, along with a long driveway at the end of a dead end.

Jason started training on the 3rd, and we will be in Orlando, FL at the Wycliffe Center for two weeks at the end of this month. Then we’ll be back up to N.C. for orientation. Keri is going to start volunteering in the kitchen again for one morning a week, and Patrick will go to his “School” again during that time.

We are really enjoying ourselves, and feel so much better here this second time around. It was nice to run a few errands and not have to Mapquest the whole route like we used to! It was great to be in Minnesota and see so many people this fall, it’s great to be here in the Carolinas (we live in South and JAARS is in North) and see so many people we’ve gotten to know, and we’re looking forward to going back home in June! Thank you to the many individuals and families that are holding us up in prayer and helping meet our needs financially while Jason trains.

Bringing our “luggage” in to the hotel in Wisconsin Dells—we had to haul in everything that couldn’t get frozen.

Thank goodness for laptop computers and the movie “Bebo Daddy” (translation: Finding Nemo). We typically wouldn’t think to put on a movie in the car (we never had that growing up!), but then again, this is the 4th time in less than a year that we’ve put poor Patrick in the car to go half way across the country! It was a nice diversion from the long ride.

We were “here” for New Years Eve, where were you?

Home Sweet Home

The yard/woods—and the weather is beautiful right now so we are out there a lot

Living room and beyond it is the more casual family room area

The kitchen

Jason & Keri’s bedroom

The master bedroom includes the bedroom space (our “guest room”), walk-in closet (which is Patrick’s room), and to the right out of the picture is a bathroom area with a shower, deep tub and vanity/sinks.

Christmas

Patrick right where he likes to be—in the center of people’s attention! He’s hanging out with his cousins Melissa, Olivia and Tyler (with Cosmo on his lap). Ironically, this is the same get-together that we had to leave early because Patrick threw a fit out of complete exhaustion from the Christmas chaos.

Opening gifts with Olivia—what a team!

Patrick was trying to take a picture, and each time we took a picture of him holding it up he’d think he made the flash go off!

Patrick and his cousin Sam enjoyed playing with Thomas together. Little did Patrick know that later that day he would get his own Thomas the Train set as a Christmas gift!

Patrick, Olivia and Jason playing with Patrick's new Thomas set.

What a beautiful snow there was on Christmas day (and two very handsome guys!)