Great News

Greg and I had very exciting news today as we are attending our last course here in Nampa, Idaho. Our passports are now back in our hands and they carry our visa for Indonesia.  To emphasis the incredibleness of this and how the Lord's hand was in no doubt the reason for this.  Last Thursday we reported that we had received our visas which really only meant that Indonesia had granted them but we didn't have them in our possession.  To get the visas we had to send our passports to the Indonesia consulate in LA which is where they were sent on Thursday from Nampa.  And low and below Monday morning this morning they arrived back in Nampa with the visas installed, meaning they had them less than a full business day, Praise the Lord!!!  And now that we have them in hand Greg will be able to return with me back to Canada Thursday morning and it also means that MAFC will go ahead with ticket purchase for departure which means unless something totally unforeseen happens we will be departing to Indonesia on August 3rd to begin our language study on the 14th.  Thank you for all your prayers and encouragement as we have been planning for this day for three years now.

Techie Courses Complete Yee Haa

Just completed my final technical course in Wichita for the Cessna Caravan.  Which leaves us with one final training course to navigate back at headquarters.  And this course is a non tech one that will help Julie and I in preparing us for the possibility of difficult situations while living in a foreign country.  This is also just a 3 day course held at MAF US's headquarters which will also allow us to visit our friends that we made while living there last year.

And praise the Lord our visas have arrived this week!!!  We are now looking at the 4th of August as a strong possibility and the next option is for around the 27th of August if we are unable to get all the needed paperwork back in time for the 4th.  The next and last thing that we are needing to do is have our passports shipped to the consulate in LA where they will insert the visas to our passports.  Once we have our passports back in hand which we are hoping for next week we can book tickets and finalize our departure time.  One concern regarding the passports is that Julie and I are currently both in the US and we are suppose to travel back to Calgary next Thursday.  This however may present an issue for me as I am passport less at the moment.  Thankfully Julie being a dual citizen has her US passport along so she is able to return regardless of our Canadian Passport location. By sending off our passports the departure on the 4th is a close reality had we waited until we were back in Canada the 4th would likely have come to soon as well.  So the possibility of me being stranded in Nampa a couple extra days seemed like a good risk to take in order to help the process along.

Thank you for all your prayers and your faithful support.  Please remember to keep our children in your prayers as have been staying with their grandparents while Julie and I travel.  They are having a blast and doing really well however it is still hard for them to be away from parents. And remember my (Greg's) parents as they are doing a great job taking care of three very active children.

Time to Say Goodbye

Our family has been blessed to have spent the month of June in Manitoba visiting, speaking, and even getting in a small vacation. We arrived on the 6th of June in the Steinbach area and dived right into meeting as many of our friends for we knew that this would be our last chance before heading overseas. The children had a blast  driving around town and noticing all the changes that had taken place through the city and visiting some of their favorite stores. One of just many different highlights was being able to take a five day vacation at one of our friends cabins on the lake.  Greg was able to get his boating licence so we could take the children for rides and discover all the great fishing spots.  Besides doing a lot of fishing we found a great hiking trail that reminded us of what life is like for the people of Papua. As we found ourselves climbing over rocks, pushing tree branches out of our faces, and swatting bugs off of us all at the same time.  It was a blast!

Greg was able to share a report with our home church in Steinbach and do a little preaching on our first Sunday back. And I (Julie) got to do a ladies teaching time with the ladies of our church.  It was a great time of being able to show them what missionaries can go through before they even leave for the field.  I will be honest though and say I was very nervous for this was my first time speaking without Greg standing next to me. Along with allowing both Greg and I to speak our church family blessed us with items that were still need for life in Indonesia.  I think that the children really love there new backpacks the most especiailly when they discovered that each came with their very own whistles built into the bag.

Along with seeing our dear friends and supporters, came the task of having to say good bye to everyone as well.  They are such a great bunch of people that have so greatly blessed our lives and we will be taking a part of each one of you with us as we head oversea's.  Say good bye is never easy especially for the children  but it is also a very important step that needs to be done before they can head forward.

So please remember our family and lift us up as we go through this process of the finally good byes, last minute packing, checking all of our different list, and any other last minute details. And please pray for all our visas as they are switching them to a different kind of visas that may allow us to leave actually a little earlier then planned if they come through. Which if the paperwork comes through they would like us now to leave on July 28th. However, our prayer is that we arrive when God wants us to and we are trying not stress ourselves out to much about the constant changes of the dates to depart.  Which is some times easier said then done as we just want to get their and get settled into our new roles.

Just dreaming of the day when they will turn me loss on this thing!!

Enjoying time at Grandpa and Grandma's

Isaac and Jaclynn enjoying time on the lake for the first time.

Look what we are having for supper tonight!!!

Greg heading off to teach the boys how to clean supper.

Hiking along the lake and just a little rock climbing along the way.

This is the half way point of our hike that we took.

Our dear friend Mary from our home church in Steinbach on our last Sunday.  Going to miss this dear lady and her great hugs.

Jaclynn and her friend Ezra.

Saying good bye to their friend Caleb on our last Sunday in Steinbach.

Isaac trying to tame the wild life at the zoo in Winnipeg.

Julie saying good bye with a couple of amazing ladies.

Our dear friend Billy worked with all three children and helped create some great memories for our children to take with them.