A little project.

We took some pictures of Reese last Sunday, and then yesterday David put it to music. This song can calm a crying baby down very quickly, we thought it would be fun to be able to show this to him some day too.
Enjoy!

Mark jinxed me.

In my last post I mentioned how Mark had noted the lack of bugs in my recent posts. Not long after that comment this “little” guy was spotted in our house. He has been spotted in each room now.

 

Thanks Mark!

Doors.

On Tuesday night we attended the YWAM family evening. A family meeting is when all the people from the different YWAM ministries get together to sing, pray, and listen to a message by the speaker for the DTS school that week. This week’s speaker was Stefan Hugo, he is the head of YWAM Southern Africa. He shared a basic but significant, and importnat, message about judgement and grace.
I want to focus on something that he said before the message though.
When we walked in, we were 5 minutes late, Stefan was sitting in the back taking notes. I noticed him looking at us several times. When the singing portion on the evening was done Stefan said that he had some “words” he wanted to share with some people in the room. He felt that God had a specific thing to say. He came over to us and shared a short a simple word with two people in the room and then he came over to us. What he had to say was spot on. Keep in mind that this is the first night that we met him, and he knows nothing about us.
He said that he felt God was saying that He is closing some doors to us, but opening others. That there are some doors we thought would be open, and they were open, but now they were closing and God was opening a new door for us. He is closing the wrong doors and opening the right ones. He said that He felt God lay Revelation 3:8 on his heart for us. It says:

Still here!

We are still here! Just busy with the new year at school and our new baby 😉 Things are going really well. I will write a proper update later this week…

Happy new year!

Something amazing happened last week.

Last week two students in David’s discipleship class decided that they wanted to become Christians. Actually seven of the students decided this, but only two of them were able to get permission from their parents to be baptized, and others were told that that they are not mature enough to make such a big decision. It is a huge victory for us, and for the kids! It was surreal to stand next to the swimming pool and see them be buried in Christ, and then raised up again to live new lives. God is great! Please pray for these kids as we are now going into the Christmas break period where they will be out of school and away from the influence there. AND praise Jesus for their decisions! Their names are Steven and Angelika!

Week 32/33

I figured I should get on this and get this post done, seeing that I don’t know if I have hours, days or weeks left! Things sure are getting interesting around these parts. This post is probably going to be ridiculously long. A lot has happened in the last few weeks.


How far along? : Right now 33 weeks and 4 days. 

Total weight gain:  Let’s say 35 pounds for fun. There is no scale here in the hospital so I am guestimating. 

How big is baby?: Yesterday the specialist guessed that he is about 2.7 kg, which is about 6 pounds.

Sleep?: I was sleeping really well at home. I was getting a kind of dead sleep, with no dreaming, just sweet oblivion. Now in the hospital I realize that the people who work here have sleep sensors. Whenever you fall asleep they come ask you weird questions. This morning at 5 am someone came in to ask me if I wanted coffee. They woke me up to ask me that. After letting me go to sleep at 4am. Then when I said in a disgusted voice that I did not want coffee at five in the morning I was asked if I wanted juice. Yes lady, that is the issue, it is in fact a cold beverage that I require at the crack of dawn….

Movement?: He has been moving a whole lot. I have been getting non-stress tests around the clock, and sometimes they just don’t work because he moves way too much. He is a busy little buddy.
 
Food cravings?: Not that I can think of. 

What I’m looking forward to: Right now, I cannot even say.

Best moment of the week: Ok there were so many best moments this week. Let me begin with last Sunday. David was acting really weird like he just had to get out of the house or he would lose his mind. So he said we needed to go out and see a movie, even though there was nothing to see. So out we went to go and see Johnny English. It was an awful  movie, but I thought that David must really need it so I sat through it… Afterwards I had a coupon to spend and we needed some groceries. As soon as we walked into the shop he started acting like his stomach was killing him and that he needed to get home ASAP. Very weird indeed. So I grabbed some pacifiers with the coupon and enough groceries for one meal. When we were almost to our house I noticed someone parked in our driveway, and I got really annoyed, then David mentioned that someone must be having a party as so many cars were in the street. I looked over and noticed familiar cars. Then it hit me, A SURPRISE BABY SHOWER! So I did what was natural and turned to David and started yelling “NO!!!!” I walked up to the house and an invitation was stuck to the door, when I opened the door I was surprised by a group of wonderful women. Marye had engineered the whole thing behind my back! And of course David was in on it. I thought it was weird when he was cleaning the house obsessively. Marye had balloons up all over the house, and a cake covered in jelly beans. My secret pregnancy craving! We played a game where people had to take a piece of string and guess how big the baby belly is. I think everyone, including myself guessed way bigger. Only Meke was close, she measured her own baby belly, and there was only about an inch difference. The funny thing is that she was 39 weeks and I was 31. Marye also had the ladies pray for me. And the mothers in the room give me encouragement. It was a great night! Sara made me a diaper cake, I hope we have enough diapers now! Meke made a t-shirt that says “under this shirt is the best kid.” I don’t have it with me here now, so I may be off on what it says. Will post a picture when I have a chance! And some of the other ladies went in together and got me a Modi wrap. Here it is called a UbbaBubba wrap. I love love love it. It is going to be great to carry him so close to my heart. It was a great day to celebrate his life. I was so touched and blessed by Marye going to all the trouble, I know she has been very very busy at school.
During the week after that we watched one of the birthing videos that we have. They are about how the husband can coach the wife through labor pains. This specific episode was about breathing techniques. So the exercise was that the wife had to go Hie Hie Hie while the husband clamps down on my leg with his hand. Then he is supposed to squeeze as hard as he can, and try to hurt the wife. This would show how effective the breathing is. This is filmed in a class setting so we can watch the other students doing it while we go along with it. David was horrified but agreed to be a good husband and squeeze the snap out of my leg. So I started breathing going Hie Hie Hie and David started squeezing. And then it happened I went HiehiehiehieheiheheeheheheeeeehahahahhahhaHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH! David started laughing too, so we failed that. By the end we were both in tears and holding our sides. Hilarious.



Dr’s Appointment?: Yeah well, I fell on Sunday skinned my knee and started having contractions. Then some more signs the next morning, I will spare you the gory details. We went to the dr, and he sent us to the hospital for a 24 hour monitoring. That has turned into a three night stay, and now there is no sign as to when I will be allowed to go home. So here I am coming to you straight from Rhino Park Private Hospital. The dr. is concerned as he cannot seem to find a reason for the symptoms. Reese is at almost 6 pounds though so he should be ok if he comes now. This means we either have hours, days or weeks. Will just have to wait and see. They also found an infection and tried to treat it but the second round of IV antibiotics gave me a horrible reaction. I was  in tears as the drug was burning as it traveled through my veins. I had a red rash appear and move up my vein, and it burned. It just really really burned. They decided to pull the IV completely as they think it is either an allergic reaction to the meds, or an irritation caused by the needle that had been in for over 17 hours. So now the meds that were suppressing the contractions have been stopped too. So now we wait. Pray they stop tonight. Please take a moment right now and pray that these contractions top right now. I am scared to tell the truth. He is still really young. I have been given the steroid shots. The pastor also showed up today to pray and spend some time with us. It was really nice. That is all I can think of right now. But please keep us in your prayers as we go though this time right now.

Thankful for: The people in our life who are praying for us, and pulling together right now to help with scrambling to get things together for the baby, or driving David around while our car is in the shop, washing our laundry, bringing David meals in here, and just all the love and comments we have gotten on faebook. I will add pictures to this post tomorrow!

CCCB

We have classmates scattered throughout the world. People we spent years with preparing and training. We have memories of eating Rita’s bread rolls and rice crispy treats while brainstorming in Mike’s office about how to make the missions program more effective. We spent nights preparing for missions emphasis week, hours together on buses traveling to the National Missionary Convention, and many days raising support together for our different fields. Most people we went to school with spent at least one early fall morning in an apple orchard learning about the principles of “harvesting.” More than anything we learned at school we built relationships with people who have a passion for people around the world. We may not always have agreed on where to go, or where the greatest need was, but we were there for each other. Today we have class mates all over the world. All in different stages of ministry. Some are still raising support, some are new to their chosen field, and some are veterans. It has been amazing to be part of the steps that these people have taken in getting to the mission field. With joy we read about the victories, and when bad things happen we know we have a network of people around the world praying for us.
Today I am thankful for the friendship and brotherhood I found in the students and instructors at Central Christian College of the Bible. Take some time today to pray for the alumni of our school as they are spread out all over the world bringing hope to lost peoples.

Always.

Prayer for a friend.

When dealing with something as heart wrenching as infertility one finds a lot of comfort from other families who are dealing with the same thing. Throughout our journey I “:met” some ladies on an on line support group type place. One of those ladies tried to conceive since 2008, she finally succeeded (with twins!) and we are, or were, both due in January. She went in to labor today and gave birth to two beautiful boys. They were too young and did not survive. This is absolutely heart breaking. I cannot even phantom the pain her and her family are in tonight. Please take a moment and pray for her tonight.