Anniversary

Five years! Five years. Five years? Woah. What a ride this has been- living a "normal, American" life for a year, packing up and moving to Indonesia, language school, packing up and moving to Papua, Indonesia, travelling the world (with my bestie), and serving the Lord in an incredibly beautiful place. All I can say is, I am blessed. Blessed beyond measure, beyond words. Thanks to you for your prayers and support through the past five years! Here is how we celebrated life together today.

Josh arrived with two bushes/trees for our front yard. I have always said how I would like to buy some potted plants for the house. There is a nursery about 45 minutes away, so he drove early Saturday morning to buy these two beautiful bushes/trees. I write them as "bushes/trees", because when he bought them he thought they were bushes. The man selling them said,"If you want them small, keep them in the pot. If you plant them in the ground, they will grow huge." So we think they are actually trees- trees that will stay in a pot.

I was cleaning up my computer and came across a folder named "Wedding". Inside that folder were our vows that we promised before our family and before God five years ago. We had forgotten what we had pledged to each other that day, because we were both so overwhelmed! I decided to put them in a place where we would always be reminded of what we promised each other that day.

A friend of ours had her birthday on the same day, so we combined our celebrations and had a picnic on a hill that overlooks Sentani. We invited another family who we are very close with. The afternoon was spent talking, swatting mosquitos, and watching the kids enjoy creation.

The Whited Family- Melinda (Red Shirt-backrow) celebrated her birthday.

The Reynolds- you may recognize them from a previous newsletter.

After spending the afternoon at McArthur's Hill (the location of one of the major military campaigns of WWII) we headed home and tag teamed an apple pie. Josh made the crust, and I made the guts. It was the best pie we've made! Although a friend, who will remain nameless but has three boys and was pictured earlier in a red shirt, rated it a B+. I'll take a B+. Like I tell my students- I don't care about the grade, what I care about is you doing your best! So now we have a challenge- to make an A+ worthy pie for our "nameless" friend. Challenge accepted!

We had dinner with another sweet couple who will leave for Bali on Sunday to prepare for the birth of their first baby. :) Thanks for sharing your ice cream with us!

It was a wonderful day of celebrating life together with special friends. We are so thankful for how the Lord has provided for us in this amazing place we live in. Thanks again for going on this journey with us!