preparing...

After we finished our time in Oklahoma, we returned to the MTC in Missouri, for just 2.5 short weeks.  During that time in Missouri, we wrote a MASSIVE paper on Cherokee phonemics and grammar.  Whew.  We are glad we got through that!

Not only did we finish up our linguistics program, we also spent time preparing for Papua New Guinea (can't believe we will be heading there in two and a half months!!)  We have a lot to do before then!

We spent time in New Tribes' Tech Center (located on the MTC campus).  The guys in the tech center are geniuses at anything to do with missionary tech issues.  They invent things, test things, and ship things all over the world to missionaries.  We went over there to look at lights, tools and fans, to make some decisions for our (future) tribal house!  We won't buy anything quite yet, but just figuring out what we will want to order when the time comes.

(a tech guy, Randy--showing us all the different lights we could run on our solar power)

We also went to Menards to check out some other things for our tribal house..I'm pretty sure this is not the way these carts are intended to be used :)

Waiting in the health department waiting room... to get yet some more immunizations (just a few more to go!)

I bought a good missionary cookbook :)

We sorted through our stuff, and got some stuff ready to ship to PNG (for our tribal house)--this was not an easy job!  It was hard to know what we will need over there, but yet we didn't just want to throw away perfectly good stuff that we might need in the tribe...sigh.  My brain was fried after we moved this time!

While Nathan and I were busy doing all of that, our kids were enjoying being outside in the gorgeous Missouri fall weather!  They spent lots of time with friends outside, but we also discovered a really great website that teaches kids to draw!  A friend showed it to me, and we LOVE it!  See the next picture…

Here, Layla and Daisy drew Anna (from Frozen).  Isn't Layla's sooo good???  I think she did such a great job!  And Daisy's is just so cute :)

We said "good-bye" to many of our favorite places to go.  The creek is one of them...

And said good-bye to friends.  Never a fun thing to do :(

And now, our chapter of life in Missouri is done.  Hard to believe!  We are back in our hometown, in Indiana--and we will be preparing some more. What a fun, exciting, overwhelming, busy and really amazing phase of life we are in!

celebrating the best guy EVER.

Last week was Nathan's birthday!  The kids and I had SUCH a fun day celebrating him!  We all love him so much :)

He turned 33 (now he is caught up with me again!) ...Funny side story:  As he was coming up to our house (from a loooong day of working on the Cherokee write-up paper), our kids started yelling to him, "Happy Birthday, daddy!"  And our neighbor, Olivia heard our kids telling him this (she and her husband are a married couple who are new this semester--so we don't know them super well yet)--and as he came up the hill to our house, she told him happy birthday, too.  Nathan says, "Yep!  It feels good to be 53!"  Haha!  What a dork.  Poor Olivia!  She wasn't sure if he was serious, but inside, she was thinking, could he really be 53?  Haha!  We all got a good laugh out of that one :)

So the kids and I baked him some lemon cupcakes (his favorite)...

And we had the idea of doing a scavenger hunt around campus!  So we hid some clues and small presents, and then we found the perfect spot to hide the last gift.  It was really fun to set it up :)

Then, later that afternoon, we all went on the scavenger hunt.  It was a hit, that's for sure!

He had to row across the lake to get one of his clues...

We love this man so much.  He is such a blessing to us!

allergic to missouri...but still loving it here :)

I mean that very literally!  Every time we move back here to the missionary training center in MO, I almost instantly begin sneezing, my nose gets all stuffy, and my eyes start itching.  Fun stuff :)  

However.  Despite my allergies, I LOVE being here in Missouri!  Our family will always cherish the time in our lives that we lived here.  It is coming to an end very soon...

We finished up our Cherokee practicum in Oklahoma about two weeks ago.  We returned here to the MTC and we have been finishing up a huge write-up for the Cherokee language.  And I mean huge.  But...praise the Lord, the paper is DONE!!  What a relief!  I am so proud of Nathan and all of his hard work on it--he has definitely done the majority of the paper.  

So, even with that massive paper looming over us, we have really been enjoying being here.  Preparing to say some more goodbyes and move away, but we had a good two weeks of just living life at MTC.

Our kids were very thrilled to be reunited with friends on campus--they can be found almost daily on these railings, doing gymnastics for hours!

Reunited with our house, and all of their forgotten-since-springtime toys...

Back to our favorite state park (HaHa Tonka)...and look at these two cuties.  Don't they kind of look like twins?  I think they do :)

We had a visit from Uncle Kyle!  (who was working in Jefferson City)  He's so great!  He explored some caves with Kaine and Halle, and he even bought us Sonic.  What a great guy :)

The weather here has. been. gorgeous.  SO beautiful!  We have been soaking it up--swimming at the lake one last time (in October!  I never would have guessed we could swim in October, but in MO we can!)

Thanking the Lord for His grace in giving us this family time!  Such a beautiful campus.  We will really miss it!

the many ways Oklahoma is preparing us...

This training in Oklahoma is helpful in too many ways to count!  But here are just a few...

#1:  Linguistics.  "Figuring out" a language.  Haha, this is the main purpose of our time in Oklahoma!  So, it does seem obvious, but I wanted to highlight it.  I can see so many ways that this Ling training will help us with our tribal language that we go to in Papua New Guinea.  I am so thankful that New Tribes does such a great job of training their missionaries!  

Nathan and Craig (fellow classmate)--looking at Cherokee data many nights...

who knew Lego guys and Little People could be helpful in learning language?  :)

At a language session with my Daisy girl :)

Cherokee verbs...what a headache!!

#2: Culture.  Nathan and I grew up in small town Indiana.  So we haven't had many other cultural experiences.  But being here in the Cherokee capital of the US, on our "campus" out in the middle of nowhere--it has been so good for us!  Great practice as we are moving to a completely different culture in just 3.5 months!!

A multi-tribal pow-wow.  Amazing.

Learning (or observing) how to weave baskets!  Our language helper is an amazing basket weaver!

Encountering all kinds of interesting things!  

p.s. our girls are crazy :)

#3: Many new ways of living life.  I am not kidding when I say--this way of living (here in OK) has been very different for our family!  Which is SUCH a good thing!  Again, we are moving across the world in a few short months, so this is such a great experience for us and our kids!

No dryer.  Now, this is definitely a first world problem!  But I have never had to hang laundry before!  I know, I know--I've been very spoiled.  And at first, I thought it was kind of incovenient, but after the first week, I really came to like it!  And value it as a good experience!

Daisy enjoys it too :)

Homeschooling in not-ideal quarters :)  We live in a dorm room!  Which makes it interesting.  But it has really been going well.  I know when we are overseas I won't have my "dream homeschooling room".  And that is okay!

(speaking of homeschooling...Halle wrote me this letter the other day.  She melts my heart--what a sweetie!)

Getting educated about essential oils!  We haven't bought any oils yet, but we have considered it for the tribe and many have recommended it to us.  Steph (a classmate of ours here in OK) has helped to educate us!  Kaine has been extra interested in them--so funny!

Learning to fix vehicle problems on our own!  We won't always be able to take our van into Family Ford (love that place!)--so Nathan has been practicing.  Here in OK, our van wouldn't start one day, and Nathan checked into it and figured out our starter needed replaced.  I was so proud of him--he did it all on his own!  Great job, babe!  A complete success :)

Learning to cook a whole chicken.  Lol.  I am almost embarrassed to admit it, but I have never done this!  It's a cheaper way to use chicken, so we have done it multiple times here in Oklahoma.  Thanks to Anna for teaching me! (she also taught me to cook dry beans--another good thing to learn!)

So much good sibling time.  This will be their future in a remote tribe in the jungle!  Less peer interaction, more sibling interaction.  It has been so good! (not perfect, but good!)

We have one more week here in Oklahoma!  Then, it's back to the missionary training center in MO.  We will finish up our Linguistics paper, and clean our apartment and move out.  Then, our stateside training is OFFICIALLY OVER!