The Latest

It seems a lot of little things have been happening here in the past while. People have been asking us when we're leaving for the Philippines and what's been going on with us. So here's a snapshot ...
*We're hoping to leave for the Philippines in Feb.of '07 (the absolute latest)
*We're trying to work on our newsletter right now so we can get it out before the Christmas card rush. We want to share how things are progressing with our preparations and our needs at this point.
*We recently became members at the Vancouver Japanese Gospel Church
*John's taking a Photographic Essay class at Emily Carr college (night class once a week)
*John's been asked by one of SEND Philippiness ministries to start working on a brochure for them now
*I (Edith) have been trying to learn Adobe InDesign CS2 (a very slow process)
*Kayla is a Salamander in Swimming and a Chimp in gymnastics and she may start preschool in January (but we'll see)
*I have been having fun getting to know different Moms from different places (it's been good for me to find friends outside of the church/Christian environment)
*A couple of ladies from the church asked me whether I would teach them English so I'll be having an English lesson with her once a week (it's also good to be around people who are of different age than me)

Some challenges we're facing
*Our financial needs: we still need quite a bit of $$ in our one-time fund as well as for our monthly living. We're really praying that people will consider giving regularly (monthly perhaps) for the next two years because the bottom line is, we just can't go if there aren't people to help us out in this area.
*Learning to just leave everything in God's Hands and feeling at peace about it all
*Learning to balance ministry and work. Right now, because we're in somewhat of a transition state, it all becomes one big mishmash which sort of leaves us feeling like we haven't accomplished anything at the end of the day.
*Knowing when to do something and when to sit and wait