Welcome, Brianna!

Since we found out that Jessi, the school nurse, was going to return to the US mid-September, I have been asking the Kids Alive directors to try to find a new missionary to come work at the Care Center. And they found someone! This is Brianna:

She has jumped right in and worked hard this week! We have been prepping our Christmas sponsorship project (that's what she's doing here - shaving crayons), and she weighed, measured, and de-wormed all the kids this week! She is wonderful. So much fun to be around, sweet, and a great coworker - I have really enjoyed showing her around and talking with her and watching her love the kids. She will be here until just before Christmas. Please pray that God will bless her time here. Pray that our friendship will continue to be encouraging and a blessing. Praise him for providing perfectly, as he always does, a new friend and coworker for me. God is good!

America

I went to America. Shocking, I know... it was hard to explain to my coworkers that I was going to America but not to my house! I managed to get lost 3 times in the Miami airport, stare at skyscrapers like I had never seen anything that tall, sleep on 5 different couches, FREEZE on a Chicago architecture boat tour, step on lots of crunchy fall leaves, go to Concert Choir rehearsals, and spend wonderful time with my family, Aubrey & Jeff, Erica, summer interns, and Wheaton friends and professors. It was definitely refreshing and relaxing, and it was also confirming that I am where I am supposed to be. As I walked around campus, I didn't wish I were still a student, and I didn't feel nearly as nostalgic as I anticipated. Yes, I have wonderful memories from my time at Wheaton, but I don't belong there anymore. The thing that struck me most about America is how easy it seems to live there. I can't describe it, and I know that some Americans live incredibly hard lives, but my life in America seems really easy and comfortable compared to my life in the DR. I am still sorting through that observation and praying that God would reveal ways for me to live in America with the consciousness and faith that I live with here. Another incredible part of my trip was being blessed with teaching manuals/idea books/resources and lots of games, supplies, etc for my new first grade class! See the next blog for more on that... I came back to the DR feeling equipped and excited about teaching and using all my fun new things. I geeked out in the teacher store - it was pretty hilarious - and Molly said it was like I had been shopping for new clothes, showing her everything I got! It was so good to see my family and spend time relaxing together. I also got to spend four days in Milwaukee with Erica, going to school with her and seeing what her city life is like.

America is nice, but I was ready to come home. Maybe not ready to return to the heat, but ready to return to Lauren, my apartment, my students, and this culture that in so many ways feels more normal to me than American culture. What a blessing it is to have "home" in two places! My next trip to the States will be for Christmas, and I will be in Quakertown on that trip.