On the Road to Learning

One thing I am passionate about is helping to equip families to be as prepared as possible so that they can thrive on the mission field and not just survive.  For missionaries, eductaing their children overseas is a major issue with many choices and decisions that they will be making through the course of their children's eduactional journey.  There are factors like: What is their child's learning style?  How many children do they have?  What kind of ministry are they invovled in?  Do any of their children have learning challenges?  These factors can greatly affect what curriculum is chosen.  Sometimes a parent might be doing two or three different curriculums because of all of these factors.  As many of you know I home schooled our children in a remote area for many years.  During that time period in missions, MK schools was what most missionaries were using.  I recieved very little help and encouargement and we did not have all the help there is today on the internet.  That was just the reality of homeschooling in a remote location in the eary 90's.  I am so very thankful how much more is available now for our missionaries.  As a mission we have home school consultants on almost all of our fields.  Some fields even have a resource room with home school curriculums and other books for missionaries to borrow.  Since I know it can be challenging to live in a remote area and home school at the same time I want to do everything possible for our missionary families to help them on this journey.  For the past couple of springs I have been putting together a home school workshop for our students.  It is a tremedous amount of work to put the whole thing together.  However, it has been neat to see how God helps me each step of the way to find ladies to present on relevant topics that will be useful for our moms.  I am thankful for those of you who have prayed for me through my health challenges to be able to put this together for our students.  YEA God for a great time together as ladies encouraged each other for the road ahead.  If you know of a missionary mom with children still in their home, pray for her, pray for her kids.  Ask her how it is going.  And maybe even ask her if you can buy a book she has been wanting but doesn't have money in the budget for it. It will make her day! Be her cheerleader.

My Off Balanced Life

I want to thankyou for your prayers for me.  Yesterday was a pretty rough day.  I have gone through these balance tests once before.  It ends up leaving me dizzy, with a head ache, and like I will throw up.  I am thankful that after all the tests and seeing the doctor I was able to chill for an hour before we drove home as I knew the stop and go traffic downtown Toronto would have made me even sicker.  

I was hoping that all the tests would turn out normal but unfortunately they didn't.  You might be wondering what kinds of tests I went through.  I had another hearing and ear pressure test.  Then I went through a series of five different tests.  In several of the tests I wore different types of goggles so they could record what my eye movement was doing.  One test I would look straight ahead and focus on a red dot while the lady running the tests had her hands on my head and would jerk it back and forth and up and down.  Each time it recorded what was happening with my eye movement.  Another test I had a different type of goggles on and I would watch red dots move all over the place and my eyes were supposed to follow all the dots.  In another test they put little electrodes down my ears.  Then they hooked me up to a wood pecker noise in my ear and they monitored what the nerves in my ears were doing.  The worst test was when they had some dark goggles on and I was laying down while they poured water in my ears.

Since it was such an ordeal for me to make it there for all the testing it worked out for me to see the doctor right afterwards to go over the results.  On one test my left ear and nerves were not functioning like it should.  On anothr test my right ear and nerves were not functioning like they should.  And in another test both of my ear nerves were not functioning like they should.  I am very thankful that despite everything I have not lost my hearing yet. (This is something that they think will happen yet.). Although they don't know fully know what is happening everything is pointing back to Meniere's disease.  But no matter how knowledgable doctors are they still can not say for sure what is going on.  

So what does the path forward look like?  The doctor is going to have me see a physical therapist who specializes in balance issues.  We have no insurance for this but I am thankful that two sessions are covered since I went through all of these tests and they didn't come out normal.  I will have to go back down town Toronto for this as there are very few hospitals where there are specialists that work with patients.  I will be checking in with my specialist again in six months.  However, if I have another bad bout like I had in August they will work me in sooner so the doctor can see exactly what is going on.  Unfortunately, they do expect I will have more bouts of terribe dizziness that will wipe me out for days.  They just don't know when.  I am so thankful for everyone who has been praying for me, and have sent me notes.  It has been a HUGE encouragment to me on this journey.

A Free Date!

Growing up in Chicago our school took yearly trips to the zoo.  Although I always enjoyed it I never realized how nice it was to have a zoo so close.  You never really appreciate something until you are far away from it.

We were in the city for a couple of days and wanted to do something special with Aurora.  We also wanted to do something that was economical.  So many of the things we were looking into were too costly to afford.  Then my one of my sisters told me that the Lincoln Park Zoo was still free. We planned on having to pay at least $20 for parking but we were very fortunate to actually find a parking spot that was free.  YEAH!!! 

Since it has been quite a few years since I had gone to the zoo I felt like a kid again as we went around seeing all of the animals.  Although we only had a couple of hours between thunderstorms, it turned out to be a gorgeous day in the 60's.  It was a Win Win for a free date that was filled with making a lot of fun memories together.

All in the Family

We made a quick trip down to Lynchburg over the weekend.  It just so happened that there was a family get together in Charlotte on Saturday.  It was fun for us to pop in over there and spend the day with almost all of our children.  We were just missing Caleb & Kristina and their children.   Camille is soon having a birthday so the ladies had a little ladies event planned for the afternoon in honor of her.  God has blessed me with amazing daughters and it is always so fun to hang out with them.  Zachary and Elisha did a great job of hosting us all. 

The Bro Barn Bond

During the 18 months of training here at Emanate our students build some pretty cool lifetime friendships with each other.  We have had three single men in the training and a young man from Germany who has been an associate that is working in our main office.  When talking about these four guys they are often referred to as "The Bro Barn".  One thing they have done from day one of being together is play disc golf through rain & shine, through snow and sleet.  It has been a fun way for them to bond and make memories together.  They often invite other men to join them in their Bro Barn Bonding Time.  Today this Bro Barn starts getting split up as one man goes on a missions trip, another goes back to Germany, another goes on a vision trip to Mexico, and another one stays here.  Who knows when and if they will come together again on this side of heaven.  So in celebration of one of their last times playing disc golf together we decided to join in and make a fun lasting memory together.  There were six more men that joined in with the  "Bro Barn" to play disc golf.  Then there were several of us that stood at each disc golf basket to ring a cow bell to cheer them on.  We of course had to take a  selfies at each basket.  At the end we shared donuts in the lounge.  What made this disc golf game even more unique was the fact that it was a snow day here.  The weather was quite yucky with a nasty wind.  But it just added to the memory making experience.  May we all take every opporuntiy on our journey in life to invest in each other and cheer each other on.

Over the River and Through the Woods to Grandmother's House We Go .....

Winter is not my favorite season specially since I always have cold fingers and toes.  However, yesterday Jeremiah, Aubrey, and Gavin were coming to hang out so we planned on going sledding together.  It was not that cold but it was terribly slippery.  One of the hills we were trying to walk up we kept slipping and I ended up rolling down the hill.  It is a good thing there were plenty of sledding hills around.  After we went sledding we had hot chocolate and did some indoor camping.  Having these little ones around makes everything so much more fun.

 My kids got me this special gloves that warm up.  I am REALLY enjoying them!

First Road Trip

With living so far away from family we miss out on a lot of events.  However last weekend Camille, Layla and I were able to attend my niece Rachel's bridal.  It was a beautiful shower and so wonderful to hang outwith family.  Another higlight was    to introduce Layla to her Schroeder Great Aunts and  Uncles, and Great Grandparents.