I’ve been home for about a month and a half now and have been having a great time with friends and family. Before leaving for South America in January, I was only in the states for one month, after spending a year in South Korea. I’m rarely home and therefore my relationships with family and friends have been somewhat difficult to maintain. So far God has blessed me with:
- Spending a whole week with my parents, aunt, uncle, and cousins at Maranatha Bible and Missionary Conference – a family tradition. We heard from Aaron Shust, Dave DeSelm, Bill Crowder, Leith Anderson, and StoryRunners ministry. It was a great time of being filled and resting emotionally, physically, and spiritually!
- Spending a day with my grandma and helping her out around the house, hear her stories, and catch her up with my life. My grandma is almost 90, which makes spending every minute with her that much more precious.
- Meeting my best friend Michelle‘s new and beautiful baby – Brielle Porte! It’s always such a blessing when I get to see Michelle and her family after being away for so long. She will always be my ‘longest friend’ 🙂
- Reuniting with my group of friends from working at Maranatha during the summers of 2005-2007. We hadn’t seen each other for about 7 years! I finally got to meet Meagan’s husband, Steve, and get to know Sam’s wife, Angie, as well as spend some time with his folks! We even got a private concert from Sam and a live jazz band, which was amazing! 8 out of the 11 were able to come, but it was such a fun night and I’m so thankful for those friends in my life.
- Meeting Miss Lauren Durga‘s boyfriend, Tom, and getting to spend some quality time with my dear friend!
- Seeing Adam and Chelsey Lair in Indianapolis – friends of mine from Argentina! They generously brought a suitcase home for me, which was a good excuse to see each other. It was great spending the afternoon with them and getting to see Adam ‘in context’ and meeting his parents.
- Spending the night at Laura McCray‘s apartment, one of my great friends from High School and who I only get to see every once in a while when I pass through Chicago. She always generously lets me crash at her place and, even though I only had about 2 hours to hang out, we got to have some great conversations and play with some cute cats.
- Hosting a World Race reunion for my Y Squad that I traveled the world with in 2011, during The World Race. We spent a weekend in Kansas City and got to worship together, have shabbat and communion together, pray for each other, laugh, swim, rock climb, and love each other. It was so wonderful getting to see these great friends of mine and meet some of their new families!
- Living with my sister and brother-in-law’s house in Kansas City! I rarely get to see my sister, Meghan, and spend time with her, her husband, and their three little ones. I absolutely adore Zoey, Micah, and Ethan and it has been such a huge blessing spending time with my family!
So, as you can see, I’ve been incredibly blessed since being home and I’m SO thankful for the opportunity to spend some quality time, face-to-face, with the people I love and rarely get to see.
Besides running around seeing friends and family, I’ve also been keeping busy with The Christian Backpacker, theRiver, and working on support for the World Race trip I’m going to lead in January! Today I finalized and put together the Support Packs! Each support pack includes:
- PRAYER CARD – This is a postcard-sized card that you can put on your refrigerator or office bulletin board to remind yourself to be praying for our squad!
- SUPPORT LETTER – The support letter explains the ministry we will be doing, as well as my heart behind it. It explains how you can be in support of our trip and me personally, either financially, in prayer, or with encouragement. I need to raise $6,500 for this trip and have only received about 30% so far.
- TRACT – This tract is a small booklet that shares the Gospel through pictures, verses, and easy to understand explanations. It’s a great resource to keep in your purse or back pocket and give to someone who either doesn’t know the Gospel or is having a hard time understanding it!
So far, I have 50 support packs in stamped envelopes and ready to send out! I’d love to have places to send these all by the end of this week! If you would like to receive one, message me your mailing address and I’ll put one in the mailbox for you tomorrow. I’d love to connect with you and share more about The World Race, so don’t hesitate to request a support pack and get connected! Thank you!
