Week 8 is complete and next week I will be home in Manitoba visiting my family and Noah has to see his pediatrician! But, that's getting ahead of myself! Let's review!
Week 8's topic was surrendering your rights and our speaker was Peter Xu, a founding father of the underground church in Asia and was imprisoned with Brother Yun (he's mentioned in the book Heavenly Man). It was incredible to hear his testimonies and to meet and talk to someone who has suffered such persecution for the sake of Jesus. He doesn't speak English so the whole week was through an interpreter, including conversations at lunch time. I was amused by my response around a man that I admire in the faith. I would go totally blank! I wanted to ask questions but was in awe of the incredible cost that this man has suffered for the sake of Jesus and then would go blank =) I did end up asking him how many times he's been arrested and how many years in total he has spent in prison. 5 arrests, 18 years in prison or hiding and he testifies with joy, conviction and strength. So beautiful and so provoking!
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| Noah and Peter Xu |
Highlights of the week:
- The time I got to spend hearing Peter Xu teach!
- 2 days of good naps
- Coffee with my lovely friend, Christina!
- A third one-on-one added to my usual two!
- Noah is developing in leaps and bounds over the last week! Last weekend he started crawling on all fours and this week he discovered how to pull himself to stand against furniture and now that's all he wants to do! He can take steps more consistently with us holding his hands and in the last 2 days he discovered how to crawl over to mommy, try to stand and communicate that he wants to be held =)
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| First day of a new skill! |
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| And now it's his favorite place to play! |
- Noah tried chicken, grapes, cauliflower, organic super puffs, ibuprofen, teething tablets, oragel and cloves this week!
- We got to participate in Appreciation Day at Chick-Fil-A as a family! We support marriage between a man and a woman and got to join the many who made a trip to eat chicken and support Biblical marriage values!
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| The line up around the building! |
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| Noah was very patient in line =) |
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| Posing for a pic while enjoying our chicken! (I'm even wearing a Sanctuary House of Prayer shirt!) |
- I found a very precious treasure this week. A group of women and moms who are doing a Bible study on being daughters/Father heart of God! We met for the first time this week and many shared their hearts. It was so special to me and I know the Lord has a gift for me in this group =) This was my biggest joy this week!
- Noah turned 8 months yesterday! Happy 8 months my Noahroo!
- Our class spent the afternoon at Mark and Karen Anderson's house yesterday (the president of Call2All). It was fun to get out with the class!
Low lights of the week:
- Sadly, we had to say good-bye to 3 people from our school. 2 students left this week and 1 staff member. Katrine (our staff that was in the hospital) is still in a lot of pain and had to return to the country she came from for medical attention. Please pray for her healing!
- Teething has been kicking our butt this week and our nights have been very tiring =( We've had some brutal ones and naps have been rough lately too. Noah's gums are so swollen and it looks like that upper tooth is ready to come bursting through anytime!
- My biggest difficulty this week has been my reaction internally to the neighbors upstairs. The walking around until midnight deal that the girls do is hard for me because I can't sleep because of the noise above. I had a cry over this this week and am looking forward to a week away to get a break from community living.
- My poor husband is having a lot of trouble with insomnia again =( He's averaging 2-3 hours a night this week =(
Praise reports from last week:
- The drama with students has been a lot less this week and that has been a nice break emotionally for the staff!
- We finally got our update letter out!
- My sore throat was super brief and never went into a cold! Praise the Lord!
Prayer requests for the coming week:
- Safety and grace for my flight to Manitoba tomorrow morning. I will be flying without Shane this time and Noah is much more active than he was last time we flew back in May! Please pray for good flights, naps, feeds, seats, and travels!
- That Noah and I would have a great visit in Manitoba (including good naps and sleeps at night)
- That Noah's tooth would come through and end this session of teething pain
- Noah's pediatrician appointment on Friday - that his head circumference would measure what it needs to
- That Shane would have a good week here in KC and not miss us too much!
- That Shane would sleep while we are away and not deal with insomnia
- Monthly partners to come on board our team and that people would be drawn to be apart of what we are doing by our friendship, emails, update letter, etc.
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| Now he can get into a whole lot of trouble quickly! |
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| And learning to crawl ON to things! |
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| And more places we find Noah! |
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| Now that the first shelf is discovered, he's on to the second level! |
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| A curious 8 month old makes packing more complicated! |
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| And the 8 month picture outtakes! |
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| It's hard to take these pictures when all he wants to do is eat the paper! |
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| In motion crawling for the paper =) |
