Life in Germany... the first 4 weeks. (Minus my trip to England)

I can't believe I've already been here four weeks! I arrived in Germany on October 12th. And as you can imagine things have been quite crazy since then.

 I spent most of the first week jet lagging. I was basically just tired all the time.
Though I did make it to my German class once that week. The class I am in has about 20 international students of all ages. I am pretty sure I am the youngest with the oldest being my parents age. The class runs from 8:30am-11:50am. With a 20 minute break at 10:00. I have about a 25 minute walk to and from school. Most of the days so far haven't been too cold, though it is overcast most of the time here. I have learned quite a lot in class, and can already tell that I will be able to read/write and understand German much better than I will be able to speak it. The dynamic in the class is a little weird because it seems like everyone has 4-5 people who speak their native language to talk to before/after class and on breaks. There is just one Russian girl in the class that speaks English well enough to carry on a conversation. I guess this is just more motivation for me to improve upon my German skills.

That first Monday in town I went to an OM Womens bible study that meets once every two months and I met some lovely ladies who are all working in Mosbach with OM. I then learned of a single womens bible study that meets every week on Mondays and plan on attending that more regularly once it gets up and going. I went the next week to the study and it was one of the girls' birthday's so we just hung out and ate yummy desserts. (Including Nutella Brownies which are my favorite dessert here).

Tuesday was Carmen's birthday. She turned 7! We had all the girls from her class over on Wednesday for her party! There was tea and cake and the girls puffy painted/bedazzled t-shirts. It was a fun time! We also painted the girls' toenails! 

I am usually over at the Witherall's from 1pm-7pm each day. This time is flexible if I make plans with someone or if I want to get lunch with a friend after school. I will usually stay at home with Elsie while Helena goes to pick up Carmen from school at 1 and then the middle two kids get out of Kindergarten at 2pm. Kindergarten is very different here in that it starts at age 2 and goes until 6 (school age). All the kids are mixed ages in the same class, though they try to keep siblings in different classes. The day is mostly just play and fun activities with the older kids helping the younger kids. There is a circle time, but really no formal instruction. The kindergarten is all in German.

When the kids get home I help with lunch and clean up, then we usually try to go out either to the park or do some kind of activity with the kids, we are hoping to start some home schooling for the middle kids, so they can develop their English language reading skills before being taught solely in German at school. Dinner is usually around 5:30pm and bedtime is started around 6:30pm, with the goal of everyone being in their rooms by 7pm.

Most of my nights here I come back to my "house" (which is really just a decently sized bedroom with a bathroom on the third floor of a house/restaurant in town) and watch movies or lately I have been working on Grad school stuff.  I have a great view of the pedestrian zone though. Which on any given night can be quiet or filled with people who have had a few too many to drink. Luckily I am a heavy sleeper and have yet to be woken up by any drunken escapades down the Pedestrian zone.

My second Sunday in town, we hosted the international students for dessert and a movie. We had delicious Nutella Brownies and watched Anchorman. Believe it or not it was my first time seeing it. I thought the movie was pretty good but really the highlight of the night were those brownies. And getting to meet some of the students. Six of the 30 or so students came to hang out. I am excited for the next time we have them over and to start building relationships with them on a more individual basis.

The week before vacation, a pastor and his wife from Texas were visiting. They came over for dinner a few nights. It was fun to have other American's (more so people who speak English) around for a few days. We went up to see a castle in a nearby town one night and it was beautiful!  I'll see them again in Rome in July as they are bringing a team to Transform to do VBS for the kids of the staff.

Carmen and Juliette

My first two weeks in Mosbach were a lot of adjusting to the culture, family, kids and living a foreign country. But after almost 4 weeks living in Europe, Mosbach is starting to feel like home. I started to decorate my walls with pictures that I had printed in the US, and I am looking forward to coloring pages from friends and kiddies for my birthday to add to my decorations. I've even gotten used to the church bells that go off on the quarter hour and then at other random times throughout the day.

We left on 10/25 for Fall break vacation in England, the 18 hours spent in the car in the first 24 hours of the trip was an adventure in itself, but I will cover that in another blog. We returned on November 2nd, and I have had quite the busy week since then.

Sunday the 3rd, there was a festival in town. So the streets were filled with a bunch of different vendors and cool stuff for the kids to do. Sunday is my day off, so I spent most of the day sleeping/reading/watching Duck Dynasty (I just started watching it on vacation, Gary has the first three seasons on DVD). I ventured out into town for meals though, I had a pizza thing for lunch and then a nutella and banana crepe for dinner and a chocolate chip bagel/pretzel thing for dinner/breakfast the next morning.

On Monday I skipped German class so I could run some errands. I needed to pick up a few things at the charity shop and do some grocery shopping. Monday night, bible study was canceled because It was just going to be 3 of us, so I invited one of the girls over the Witherall's house and we made Scones with clotted cream and had tea. It was nice, and the scones were delicious I can't wait to make them again!

Tuesday and Wednesday were pretty typical days. I went to class both days and then over the Witherall's afterwards. We had a party in my German class on Wednesday, everyone brought in Yummy food and we even had some leftovers for Thursday. After class on Thursday I picked up Carmen from school because she gets out early (12:15) on Thursdays and its on the walk home for me. I hung out with the kids for a few hours and then at 5pm I went to Zumba at the OM office with one of the girls I met from bible study and afterwards we went home (we live across the pedestrian zone from each other), showered and went out to dinner at a pizza place just up the street. It was really good! I ate an entire thin crust 32cm pizza! She told me that people often hang out there to watch soccer games, so I am looking forward to heading up there next time there is a game on.

German class party!

Sunset on my walk to Zumba

I am going to a church down in Heidelberg on Sunday with Rachelle. Its about an hour train ride away, and this will be my first time on the trains and adventuring into different parts of Germany. I am pretty excited. Hopefully I will have time to work on two more blogs tomorrow after church and maybe just maybe my internet will work and I'll be able to post them! God has been teaching me a lot in my time here so far. I have been Journaling quite a bit, but it is always hard to put my thoughts into something other people might make sense out of. I am going to try my best though.

For those that are curious, I decided that I am applying to the Clinical Audiology programs at UMD, Towson and Gallaudet for grad school, with UMD being my obvious first choice. FOREVER A TERP. <3 I am finishing up the applications and essays and I hope to have everything officially submitted by the 1st of the year.

Photos of a sunset one night

Some things I have noticed/learned in Germany...so far

- Mosbach has a lot of Graffiti everywhere, pretty much every graffitiable surface has tags.
-They don't have ranch dressing here or chocolate chips.
-Soft pretzels are really popular here and are quite cheap and good. They are 60 euro cents each, which is about 80 dollar cents. These make for a good snack/lunch on the go!
-The main type of pen here is the "sharpie pen", different brand obviously, but I am quite happy with this because I love writing with marker tip.
- The traffic lights go "green, yellow, red" and "red, yellow, green"
-Milk isn't refrigerated
-You have to pay for the size of your trash can, and trash is only collected every two weeks, and recycling is on the alternating weeks. This is slightly problematic with 4 kids. There is a lot of trash.
-They don't cut pizzas in Germany.

 

I am at about 75% of my support needed to stay here the whole 10 months! I still need about $5,000 to be fully funded. Would you consider joining my support team with a tax-deductible donation of $10, $20 or $50 a month?  If you would like to give a one time gift you can go to https://my.omusa.org/OM-Missionary-Search and search for my name. If you want to pledge a monthly donation, you can go here https://www.omusa.org/automated-giving  my account number which is (1000330485). Thanks guys!

I made it!! (and I write really long/detailed blogs)

I really hope that some of this blog makes sense. And its quite long. Enjoy!

I was officially approved to leave Friday on Monday at about 5:30 pm. I booked my flights and started the process of packing!!
My flight left at about 9:30pm US time on Friday and was to arrive in London at about 9:45am. And I was to have a 10:50 flight to Frankfurt to arrive at 1:35pm Germany time.

My first flight ended up being 7 and a half hours, getting into London around 10:15am. The flight was good, despite some awkward moments with the guy I was sitting next to, including him being right handed and me being left handed and having to eat "dinner" (it was like 11pm) without hitting each other. I thought the food was very good though and if it wasn't good then I had left over Chipotle that I brought in my carry on. I also thought it was a good idea to drink out of my water bottle at about 2am which then proceeded to fountain out of the mouth piece all over me and the poor woman who I was standing by. She did have a very lovely British accent though.

My ticket to Germany said you needed to board by 10:30am. And when I say we got in at 10:15, I was walking (running) off the plane then, at a satellite terminal, where we then had to bus over to the airport. Little did I know that this wasn't like BWI, or any other US airport that I have been to where you get off the plane and can either change planes or go down to baggage. You had to go through security again! So if you had filled up your water before boarding your first flight you then had to dump it into a trash can. Luckily there was a fast track lane through the little customs. So I at least got to skip one line. When I got up to the customs lady she scanned my ticket and I told her I may have missed my flight (because at this point it was 10:35am) she said I didn't miss it, but she did not tell me that it was delayed, so I was still in a state of panic as I was rushing up the escalator, to wait in the 15 min security line.

Waiting for the bus to the airport

I have never traveled internationally by myself before, so I was kinda freaking out this whole time worried about missing my flight and having to reschedule on my own. But I ended up getting through security and saw the departure board and saw that my flight was delayed until 12. Thank God! Because I would have never made it if it was on time.  Now I had a little bit of time to chill out because at this point it was almost 11am. The airport ended up having 45 min of free Wifi, so I was able to sit at the gate and get on Facebook and text my parents to let them know I made it to London, even though it was 5am US time. I also emailed Gary and Helena to let them know that my flight was delayed.

Flying into London

The flight from London to Frankfurt was only about an hour and 30 minutes long. I had the window seat again. After not sleeping more than 30 minutes on my "overnight" flight, and adrenaline getting me through the airport, I was quite exhausted when I sat down. I ended up sleeping about an hour on this flight. There was a lady that was sitting on the isle (the middle was empty!) who was quite the character. She was on her way home from Australia, and had spent about 4 weeks there and was on her 30th hour of travel. Initially she started talking to me in German and when I didn't respond she realized that I was American and started talking to me in English. One of the things I've realized so far is almost everyone speaks English here, and if they don't, there is likely someone in the room who does and can translate. And the kids speak German and English so last resort I can get Carmen to translate for me. For instance, she ordered me a Jelly Dodger today at the market. :)

Helena picked me up at the airport. I made it through customs and unfortunately, the guy stamped my passport over top of the only other stamp in that book. (I just renewed my passport last may). It was very frustrating. Hopefully they can stamp in a different place when I go up to England with the family in less than two weeks. (11 hours in the car with 4 kids is going to be an adventure in itself)
 

It was about an hour and a half drive to Mosbach from Frankfurt. When we got to the city we went over to the place I am staying to get a key. (I will post photos once I get everything organized and set up). Then we went over and I met the kids. They are quite precious. I ate my leftover Chipotle for dinner and then I went over an Gary helped me bring my 150 lbs of luggage up to my room. I did a little unpacking, went back over to the Witherall house, got some bedding and then passed out for the night, (at about 9pm). I was very determined to make it to 9 without a nap. I ended up sleeping pretty well. Considering it was 3pm US time when I went to bed I woke up on the hour to the church bells the first three hours and then slept from 12am-8:30am.

These are the steps up to the Witherall house.

Church (It was all in German, but luckily one of the OM workers provides translation)

This is the church building

This morning we went to church and I met a bunch of people that work with OM over here, and of course I don't remember any of their names.  After lunch we went to the little restaurant that I live above for lunch. Today is actually their last day open, because they sold the building and are moving. But we think the new owners are going to turn it into a little coffee shop.  So that should be fun! After lunch I took like a 2.5 hour nap then I went and walked down the street to try and find an ATM, but after about 30 min and some painful window shopping I went back to the family's home and then we all went to explore the little festival that was happening outside together. Usually all of the shops are closed on Sundays but they weren't today for the festival so we were able to go in some shops and the kids got their faces painted. We went back to the house and made waffles for dinner, they were quite yummy. And I helped clean up while Gary and Helena put the kids to bed and I have been writing this mammoth of a blog ever since.

Carmen (7 years old on Tuesday) wanted her face painted like a clock, Juliette (3) got the same.

This is the center of town!

The marching band coming down the pedestrian zone that woke me up!

 

My view to the right

The view to the left

The view right out front of my apartment.

Its been a crazy few days. Tomorrow I am going to the language school to meet with the teacher and get my books for the first Module. I have been teaching myself German through the Duolingo app on my phone but so far I haven't learned anything that has been helpful. 

I need to start working on my personal statement and my grad school applications in these next few days. Hopefully I can get everything done this week and then I won't have to worry about them anymore, but we will see how that goes between jet lag and adjusting to living in a new Country.

So it looks like I am leaving Friday!!

 Thanks to everyone who has already joined my support team! I currently have 43 people joining me in my ministry in Germany and many more on my Prayer team. How amazing is that?!? I think it's pretty great!

Because I am so close to my goal, and assuming that my contact at OM approves. We are going to do a little trickery so that I can book my flight Monday and leave for Germany on FRIDAY! Yes, this Friday. That is only 5 days away Yay!!! I am so excited!

Since I have more than half of my support physically coming in, the rest of the support just needs to be in commitments meaning they don't actually have to see it coming in to release me. So my Mom is going to "commit" to support me the rest of my budget so I can be released to the mission field! In the mean time, I will continue to invite people to join my support team!

I am at about 75% of my minimal budget for Germany, meaning I need just 12 more people to join my team at 50$ a month to have that budget fulfilled! It would be so amazing if I could walk on that plane on Friday knowing that I had all of my support raised.

The flight I am looking to book leaves BWI at 5:15pm, I'll have a quick plane change in NC and then I will be on my way to Frankfurt, arriving around 11am Saturday morning. Leaving on a Friday works out well for everyone. Giving me Saturday to jet lag and then Sunday to explore the city, before Starting Germany classes on Monday. The classes actually start Tomorrow, so I am already missing a week of classes. Because I am going to be missing another week, the last week in October for fall break with the family in ENGLAND, it doesn't make sense to keep pushing back my leaving date, missing more days of school.

 I think it's finally starting to hit me and my parents that this trip is a reality. That I am actually going to be getting on a plane and leaving the country for 10 months. I am so excited for the experience and for all of the things that God is going to teach me along the way, seeing as he has already taught me so much. Though the excitement doesn't make the goodbyes any easier.

I have so much to do this last week, including but not limited to: Packing (I still need to find suitcases), seeing friends/family, deciding where I want to apply to Grad school, starting applications, getting stuff for my recommendation letters together, and buying a few last minute things.
But hey! I love to be busy!

If you have not joined my support team yet and would like to do so you can go to https://www.omusa.org/automated-giving to set up a monthly donation (account number: 1000330485) or go to https://my.omusa.org/OM-Missionary-Search to set up a one-time donation. Reminder that all donations are tax-deductible and any amount helps! Also please let me know if you send one in! 

The Cutest Little Town in Germany awaits...

 If you just Google pictures of Mosbach, Germany you can see how cute it is. Here are some of my favorite pictures that I have found. I can't wait until the pictures I am posting are my own!

 

My apartment will be just a two minute walk from the center of town!  Pretty much everything I will be doing is in walking distance from where I will be living. I guess its a good thing I have been walking/running a lot lately!

I just found out earlier this week that my German language school starts on October 7th. Which is great because that was the day I had hoped to arrive in Germany! In order for me to be in Germany on the 7th, I would need to book my ticket TODAY! Which also means I need to be fully pledged/funded by today. If God doesn't perform a miracle (though that would be totally awesome, and completely welcomed), then my departure date will be pushed back by a week.

 The hardest part of the support raising process has been actually asking for money. It's absolutely necessary to ask for it, but I hate doing it. It's not that I am afraid of people saying no, I understand that not everyone is called to support every cause. I would love the money to just be in my account; to just be there one day, but I don't think God wants that for me. I believe that so many things can be used to test our Faith, and this is certainly one of those times. 

Before I started this whole process, Helena sent me a support raising book that I read back in July. It talked about how we shouldn't make a decision for people, by thinking/assuming "Ohh I won't send a letter to ______ they don't have a good job, or they wouldn't want to support my ministry".  My job is to ask (and pray). That's all, ask as many people as I can, and let them make the decision for themselves. I don't want to exclude anyone from the opportunity to join me in this journey so I am asking and trusting that God would call the right people at the right time to join me in this ministry.

 I am so excited for this opportunity and I can't wait to get on that plane! But I really cannot do it without your help! I have been praying that God would put together a support team to send me to Germany and I know that he has been calling people to give!

 

I am truly amazed because I already have more than 50% of my support pledged! So many people have been jumping on board and joining my support team it has been overwhelming! In order to book my ticket I still need another 24 people to join my team this week, by committing to give 50$ a month now through July 2014. Though obviously any amount helps! 

If you would like to give, you can go to https://my.omusa.org/OM-Missionary-Search and search for my name. If you want to pledge monthly, you will need my account number which is (1000330485). Thanks guys! 

P.S. If you give, could you please let me know when you do and the amount? Sometimes it takes a week for donations to show up, and since I am trying to book my ticket ASAP, it would be a great help if I know donations are on the way!

I am 38% funded!! And other fun updates!

Hey Friends 

I hope the start to your week is going well! I have been pretty busy lately doing a lot of running around and of course hanging out with all the kiddies. I also chopped about 6 inches off my hair, so I unfortunately/fortunately get to go shopping for headbands because it no longer fits in a ponytail.

Thanks Kelly! I love it!

 I made some new friends today in Mt. Airy. Aren't they cute!

 As of Saturday, I am officially CPR certified! Yay. After only 10 years of regular babysitting. (I did take friend and family CPR when I was 12, but that expired long ago)  Luckily, I was never in a situation when I would have needed it, but I am glad that I am officially certified now.

I have been in contact with Helena in Germany, and we are starting to talk logistics, specifically what I need to pack/buy before I head over there in hopefully just three weeks. I bought a new winter coat on The Clymb last week ( http://www.theclymb.com/invite-from/LindsayRoberts2) for 5$ (13$ with shipping) and its pretty sweet. I also ordered some snow boots. The last major thing I need to get are suitcases. As the one I currently have is busted, and I'll need at least 2, most likely 3. Hey! I'm going to be there for 10 months, give me a break. Plus, I'll be traveling with my Guitar and a backpack, Yes, I am going to be that girl in the airport.

Helena said she already talked to the local business school in Mosbach about having the students over for dinner and a movie/game night once I get there! I am so excited to be involved in that Ministry! I am excited to meet new people and just hang out and while being intentional about sharing the Gospel and how God has been working in my life.

I also learned that I have money built into my budget for me to go on one of the Transform Mission Trips! I am pretty stoked about that. I could potentially go to Italy and work with human trafficking survivors, but there are a lot of different possibilities. The Italy trip stood out to me because my heart has been heavy for the 27 Million people still enslaved around the world since Passion 2012. But there are about 30 different trips I will be able to choose from. If you are interested you can learn more about Transform here: https://transform.om.org.

As of today I am officially 38% funded for my trip to Germany! I have been completely overwhelmed by the generosity I have seen! God has been doing some amazing things in my life through this and I feel so blessed. Thanks for all the prayers too! I know a lot of you have been praying about this support raising process and my journey to Germany and I just wanted you to know I really appreciate it! 

If you haven't gotten a chance to give yet, and God has laid it on your heart to do so, would you consider giving this week? My goal is to be 60% funded by this Friday and I am only 22% away! I would love to be 100% funded/pledged by next Friday 9/27 so that I can book my ticket and be on my way to Germany on October 7th!

Helena and Gary have offered to send a copy of Gary's book "Total Abandon" to the first 20 of my supporters. I think there are at least 5 still available.

To give you can go to https://my.omusa.org/OM-Missionary-Search and search for my name! Or send in a check with the response card at the end of my support letter! (https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B3kIf2j3oOahSmhoeERqeWZGWFU/edit?usp=sharing)

I think that is all for now! I am babysitting most of tomorrow so I will be away from my computer. If you have questions about anything I will do my best to answer them! Just Facebook/email me. Have a great night!

- Lindsay

Colossians 1:17 says that "He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. I have a new awesome ring to remind me of this everyday! Team Jesus!

P.S. If you are sending in a check or plan to make a monthly donation either online or via check, If you could please send me an email/text/fb message and inform me of the amount. This way I can add it to my support tracker to be more up to date with the support coming in.  Sometimes it takes 2 weeks for the support to show up in my online account. I will be able to book my ticket if I know that it is on the way! 

So I guess I'm going to Germany

It was about 12 weeks ago now that I first heard about the opportunity.

I planned on taking a year off from school about this time last year. And I knew that while I loved Audiology, I wanted to give myself a break from school before committing to another 4 years of classes, exams and assignments. I would have been happy doing just about anything during that year break; nannying, going on a mission trip, traveling, getting a job in my field, bumming it in College Park pretending I was still a student. You know, just about anything.

I had applied for a few jobs related to Audiology at the beginning of the summer, but hadn't heard back from any of them. Kelli, my roommate at the time, knew of a friend who was leaving a position in Lutherville, and told me to apply. So I did, and I got the interview! I went in on a Tuesday for the interview and I thought it went great. It was only a part time job but it paid well and it was in my field! I heard back via email on Thursday that they were no longer going to fill the open position but just spread the job out among their current employees. I was pretty disappointed, but at this point I knew that apparently God had something much bigger and better in store for me. I just had to wait.

Not even 24 hours later I received a call from Gayla Parker, whom I had worked Girls Camp under for 6 years. She told me that her best friend had just finished having lunch with Gary Witherall.  He mentioned that he was looking for a nanny for his 4 children in Germany for the next year and she wanted to know if she knew of anyone that would be interested in the position.  So she called Gayla and Gayla called me to see if I was interested. I told her I was and that I would like to know more information. I found out later that day that they were a missionary family and that my work over there would involve some ministry as well. (Perfect!) Gayla sent the Witheralls my information and I was hoping I would hear from them soon. I spent most of the night praying that God would open doors that needed to be opened and that he would close them if this isn't what he wanted me to do. I was really excited I didn't know much about the opportunity but it seemed absolutely perfect for me.

Helena Witherall (future nanny mom) called me the next day (during Kelly's Graduation party) and I learned that they were Missionaries serving through Operation Mobilization in Germany. Gary is in charge of planning and publicizing an annual conference called Transform that aims to mobilize Christians around Europe and the Mediterranean to go on short term mission trips. His job required him to travel frequently and by having a young lady like myself on the field with them, it would make his job a lot easier knowing that his wife wasn't home alone with 4 kids for 12 days out of each month. I also learned a lot about their history and how Transform came to be. At this point I was getting so excited for the opportunity. I couldn't wait to apply! I was told that in order to have a visa for my time there I would need to take 16 hours of German classes during the week.  Helena talked about how the international students in my German classes would be like my personal ministry while I am there.  Their current nanny. Katrina, has befriended a few peers in her class and meets up with them regularly to disciple them.  Katrina also traveled with them to Austria in the fall and went with them to Rome in July. So wait I get to travel too?! :) During this conversation I also learned that I would have to raise my own support in order to serve with this family for the year (at this point I was thinking that I would be there by September 1) and that I would have to raise somewhere between 25 and 30k dollars in order to cover all of my expenses over there. That was a shocker, and slightly intimidating. But I didn't see this as a door closed, just a new experience and an opportunity to grow in my trust in God to provide for all of my needs.

That Sunday I went back to College Park to go to Maranatha, the church I have been attending since September.  I told (my now housemate) Noel that I was going to go up for Prayer for this opportunity during the service, and she said she would go with me.  We went up together and I was just crying hysterically (if you know me, you know I don't cry very often so I was like what the heck is going on) I couldn't say anything. It was ridiculous. So she explained my situation and as they were praying for me I realized that the song that was playing was Amazing love. This is the song that was playing when I made the decision to be saved when I was 9 years old back at Lake Shore Baptist Church.  It was then that I knew that I was going to Germany. And to further confirm the call, the sermon that day was on trusting God, and at the end Pastor Ben said something along the lines of "So are you going to make the jump and trust that he will catch you or stay here?"  And I felt that he was clearly talking right to me. I guess I'm going to Germany for real.

After church I called Helena and told her that I was feeling called out to Germany to be their Nanny.  It was then, 12 weeks ago that I started this process. We soon learned that OM was in transition and that they would not be accepting any applications until August 1st. So I basically had a month to wait until I could do anything. And by wait I mean working 40+ hours a week nannying for the Small family and coaching at the gym. I was in constant contact with Helena during this time and we were just waiting for August 1st.  The people at OM who would be processing my application knew that it was kind of a rush and that we were hoping that I would be on the field by mid-September early October.

I applied on August 1st (while I was in Myrtle Beach on vacation) and very long story short, I learned the next day that I needed to apply as a long-term missionary instead of a short-term one, and the whole process involving seven two-page essays, many more questions, 4 references, a background check, a physical, and lots of emails.  On top of that my contact was traveling in Holland for work and so I was not officially accepted as a missionary through OM until almost three weeks ago (8/22). Finally! Hooray! My goal now is to leave for Germany on or around October 7th. Assuming I can raise all of my support by then!

As of right now I am living with the Veihmeyer family in College Park, helping with the kiddies, working on support letters, applying to Grad School and subbing at the Gym occasionally.  Kelly just moved into UMD, so I am sure there will be many lunch dates of me bumming Testudo waffles and buffalo chicken wraps off of her meal plan, which I know she is super excited for.

Thanks for reading guys.

If you want to support me on my trip next year, you could start by praying. I have a lot of money to raise in not so much time so it is a little overwhelming. I am currently in the process of sending out support letters. If you would like to receive one and I haven't asked you yet, send me your email and I'll send one over to you!  I am hoping to raise monthly support starting in September so if you would Pray and consider giving up two, or three Starbucks' a month to support my ministry in Germany I would love you forever. 

Helena and Gary have agreed to send a copy of Gary's book "Total Abandon" to the first 20 people that join my support team!

Helena and Gary Witherall and their 4 kids, (left to right) Juliette (3), Elsie (1), Carmen (7), Jonas (5)