Birthday Pics

I've had 4 birthday celebrations this year (plus an unexpected cake), each with a different group of people.  That is definitely the bummer of growing up in one place, putting down roots in another, then being abruptly relocated for a year.  However, with FOUR PARTIES (!!!!) it's also the bonus.


I'm missing the picture taken at one of my parties, but I'll explain each of them in chronological sequence.


October 10th: Brunch. WI.  My mom made the delightful salad that I mentioned earlier, and I enjoyed being with family and family friends.

October 10th: Evening. MN.  My friends (who I like to call my TC fam) in the Twin Cities took me out to Gandhi Mahal's, this amazing Indian restaurant.  The food was spectacular, and it was wonderful to just be with them.  Afterwards, we took some "family" pictures and celebrated with apple crisp and Dr. Quinn episodes.  

Enjoying the delicious food

This one accurately capures us

Oct. 11th: Airport.  FL. I bought myself Chinese food and Dr. Pepper to celebrate.  

Oct. 12th.  Classroom.  Bolivia.  My students surprised me with wonderful cupcakes and cards.  I was so grateful, and I love them a lot!  (Picture coming)


Oct. 13th.  Goodbye party for missionaries.  Bolivia.  The cake that I thought was the despedida cake was actually for me, and my church family sang Feliz Cumpleanos to me.  

Oct. 17th.  My house.  Bolivia.  We had a little "party," meaning that four people came over, and we watched Horton Hears a Who!  My roommate Adreana baked a delicious coconut cake for the occasion, and it was a great time!

So, have I enjoyed my birthday?  Yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes.  Thanks to everyone who helped make it a cross-continentally special!

The LORD will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.

-Psalm 121:8

FULL Day

Today was so full I just need to write what I did so that I don't forget.


1.  My kids earned a party, so I took popcorn and refresco to school and we watched The Borrowers.  This one was so much more chill than our last party.
2. Parent Teacher Conferences!  I was so nervous; sweating a lot, but they went really well.
3.  Lunch with one of my student's families.  They were so great!  I had lots of fun and ate a typical Bolivian dish with chicken, rice, and tomato/onion salad.
4. Played Wii with my student.
5. Went to the violin concert of another student.  Great Bolivian/Korean/Dutch/United States experience.
6.  American pizza with Korean and Bolivian stories.
7. Waiting for sleep.


So tired.  So glad to be living in another culture for a year.  


P.S.  I actually love being with people.  

Lessons Learning

They aren't lessons learned yet.  I'm still in process.  I know, I know, I know with my head that "God will provide for my needs according to His glorious riches in Jesus Christ."  I know in my head that "His grace is sufficient for me, for His power is made perfect in my weakness."  Speaking truth to myself helps, but it seems that sometimes I learn best through experience.  


For example, at the beginning of the school year, I kind of had this idea in my head that God's power being made perfect in my weakness meant that when I let God use my weaknesses, suddenly I would be awesome at everything I had struggled with before.   Never taught an entire classroom?  No problem, God's strength will make your weakness go away.


Well, that is not what Scripture says.  It says that God's power is made perfect is my weakness, not my skills.  Uh, this means that I am so imperfect as a teacher.  I think I'm feeling the first-year-teaching blues.  My lessons aren't head-turning enough.  My homework is not mind-penetrating enough.  My discipline isn't life-changing enough.  


Also, my students are SINFUL!  But that's another post.


Anyway, I've been feeling this inadequacy lately.  It's heavy.  But as I mourn the fact that I don't know how to best teach the steps of long multiplication and division, I also remember the encouraging words a friend left with me when I stayed, "The LORD protects the simpleminded, when I was in great need, He saved me."


He is the one who saves.  It's His power that is made perfect when my weaknesses become evident.  And best of all, He receives the glory, honor, and praise due His name.

But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all those things will be given to you as well.

- Matthew 6:33

Opportunities

My dream and, I hope, my calling, are to one day work with an unreached people group in the middle of nowhere and raise a family in the wilderness with the tribe as our closest friends and supports.  Maybe God has that for me someday.


But this year, He has called me to be in support ministry for people who do things like that.  I actually am enjoying this support work more than I thought.  One of the amazing things I'm getting to do this year is invest in MK's.  I'm so excited that last night a high school girl who I've known for a few years asked me to begin being her accountability partner!  God is good to me.  I'm also discipling/mentoring another high school girl.  Both of these ladies are wonderful, and I'm so grateful to get to learn from them and with them this year.  


Praising God that even when things are hard He brings me opportunities to praise Him.


I feel the need, after reading what I wrote, to qualify my words by saying that sometimes I'm grumpy about being in a support role, some days I wake up and don't want to teach (gasp), and every day I sin.  More than once.  In case I made myself sound like I always love life and am never discouraged or sinful.  I am the greatest of sinners, but God uses me anyway.

A Taste of Home

Sometimes, I just wish that I could be home wrapped up in my Mom's quilts against the cold air of Minnesota or Wisconsin.  Some things make me feel especially like I'm at home.  Like this:

Straight from the bogs of  Marshfield, WI

Thank you soooooooooooooo much Rachel, Cacey, Nicola, and Lacy for this WONDERFUL birthday gift!  It was the perfect way to make me feel at home here.

Reality

I'm not sure exactly what stage of cultural adaptation I'm in.  Ha, of course that's the first way I evaluate myself.


Life since coming back from the States has been so strange.  Sure, I'm sleep-deprived and about as emotionally exhausted as is possible for me, but I feel like this is something more.


It used to be (from when school started Aug. 10 until maybe a month ago) that I would wake up in the morning, and it was an adventure to be in a whole different world.  It was exciting that I had no idea how I was going to make it through the day doing something I had never done before.  When I was lost in my classroom, I would just stand in front of my kids, pray, and make something up.


I guess I still do that.  I did it today with devotions.  "Quick, what did I read this morning?  How can I make my students excited about what I got excited about?"  It still worked pretty well.  Philippians 1:6- God doing a good work in my students and bringing it to completion- how could you not get excited about that?


But I digress.  I just felt weary today.  I even felt like the way I view my students has changed.  At the beginning of the year, I was ready for whatever cultural MK/Bolivian stuff they could throw at me.  I remember counting my Sharpies after the first time my students used them to make sure they weren't stolen.  Now I know that I really need to watch them after I tell them to put their comic book away because they'll be reading it under their desks, but I'm realizing all the ways that I don't know them.  


I don't know where their attitudes come from. What goes on in my Bolivian kids very blended families?  What about the boy who spends one night at his mom's house and the next at his dad's?  Why is one girl refusing to do homework to the extent that two F's will now be on her report card?  How clearly were the lines drawn this week when the most popular Bolivian boy gave a back eye to the loudest MK?  How do I teach a class like this?


Maybe it's just the weight of this week's events, or maybe it's just me adapting, or maybe I'm just plain tired, but something is different, and it makes my stomach knot up.  It makes my head hang, and sometimes it brings tears to my eyes.  Pray for me, friends, as I trust God's plan in bringing me to Santa Cruz and to this school.

Being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion in Christ Jesus.

-Philippians 1:6

My Beautiful Family

The children that are nearest and dearest to my heart and their parents, grandparents, aunts, and friends.

Words can't really help these pictures.