All Moved In

It is time for the new apartment game show ... Guess that Price! At the top of this blog entry we have displayed pictures of everything Bethany and I have used to furnish our apartment. The game works like this. Make a guess at the cost of each piece of furniture, add up the total, and then send us the final amount in an email or if you have a Google account then post your guess to the blog. After you have made your guess check your answers at the bottom of the blog.

The items are:

• Coffee Table
• Futon/couch
• Entertainment center
• Table and 3 chairs
• Queen size mattress and box spring
  
• Computer Desk
  
• Bureau and 2 matching night stands

The Costs: (highlight the text below to see answers)

• Coffee table = $15
• Futon couch = $60
• Entertainment center = $25
• Table and 3 chairs = $75
• Queen size mattress and box spring = $120
• Desk = $50
• Bureau and matching night stands = $150

Total Furniture Costs: $495

3 Months after marrying Bethany, Eric is finally able to offer her a comfortable place of rest and the security of a job. Thank you God for providing nice furniture at such a nice cost. The moral of this story is God seems to care about even getting furniture, so ask Him for help!

Last New Respite Family

I learned a hard but good lesson this respite. I learned that I don't have to always be in control in the foster homes. The simple reason is this...you can't be. There are some days that the children go through so much angst and so much confusion that they lose control. And when they lose control, so do you. Pictures may get smashed, furniture may be broken, and no amount of angry words can get them to stop and you are not allowed to restrain them. Then your response to the child needs to be like your response to a hurricane. You watch in awful interest as the natural disaster takes place and try to make the best of it. Humor and prayer help.

I had my first blow up from a young girl that would simply not be told what to do, she had lost it. When the parents came back they gave me a short reprimand and then sympathetically explained the many times similar youthful explosions had happened on their watch.

All that said, we had a good respite. Here is a clip of one of the kids trying to learn to play Ninja Turtles on the Wii game system. Notice how fast his gaming hands have become. I have convinced this poor child that I know a secret move and am trying to teach him how to do it. To do the move I told him you must twitch as fast as possible while pressing the A and B buttons. (I elegantly demonstrated this secret move to him before his attempt shown below)

Praises: For the hard, but good, lessons we are learning. For God continuing to provide for our apartment. (I know our apartment isn't too important to the great commission but God keeps providing in crazy ways!)

Prayers: For our relationships with Jesus to grow. We feel like we are doing things for God but not really spending any time being with him. We miss Him.

More Furniture and Ribs

I'm not sure who prayed last night (other then us) but somewhere between the time that I posted last nights blog and this morning, someone prayed for our provision of furniture and today we were able to buy a used dresser with two matching night stands! Yay! You'll notice in the picture that we no longer have filing cabinets for night stands.


This has been our most expensive purchase but these three pieces are completely solid and fit so well in our bedroom. The dresser has a few nicks and dings in it but it is solid and works so well for us.

Another house parent with a truck drove Eric down to the other side of Tucson to pick it up while I helped his wife back at home with her baby. They have a 4 month old boy who is quite adorable. The mom is only about a month older than me and has the baby plus 8 kids at the house so she seems like super woman to me!

After the furniture was brought to our apartment, we feasted on beef ribs that Eric worked hard on all day. He was very excited to taste them and find out that they were very yummy.


The food pantry for the ministry frequently has good meat in it so that inspired us to take some ribs and try to cook them.


Tomorrow we start another short respite that will go until Monday at noon. At this house we will be working with a deaf teenage girl so I am particularly nervous about that but my faith has been strengthened through all the ways God is taking care of us and providing for us. I know that He will be there with us in this house.

It has been great to hear from some of you who are reading our posts. We'd love to hear from our friends and family at home. It encourages us a lot!

Praises: A dresser and matching night stands which are exactly what we wanted! A wonderful little space of our own.

Prayers: Another respite starting tomorrow with 4 elementary age children, a deaf teenager who can be manipulative, and weather in the 100s this weekend.

Splash House Reflections

You could totally go quail hunting from our balcony.

Our GAP job continues to be quite the adventure. We have only one more family to meet. Bethany and I just finished a respite at Splash 9 which went well. There are three teenage boys who I got along with quite well. They liked me because I am athletic and can play guitar. It is always interesting to see what helps you get your foot in the door.

This week one of the friends I have made down here had to give up a child he had raised since the age of seven months. It was hard to watch how that tore him up and I was reminded how deep love often goes hand in hand with deep pain, and yet God wants us to love deeply regardless. It is great to be around people who are taking God’s word and kingdom so seriously and going through trials because of it.

Bethany and I have been frantically running around and as a result we are having trouble finding the discipline to cultivate our spiritual lives in any way beside loving others and daily prayer.

But God has been providing for us and has stayed with us. In Mark 10, Jesus says, “No one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age (homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—and with them, persecutions) and in the age to come, eternal life.” The good part of this verse has already been seen in our lives. We have a wonderful little apartment and God has absolutely been providing furniture for us. God has provided a mentor couple for us and two youth pastor friends who inspire me. Bethany is going to a bible study tonight with a group of newly married young women.

So thank you all for your prayers. I really believe God is using them to work on our behalf in many ways. May God’s will be done and His kingdom come.

Here is a picture of the wall above our fire place with the sword hanging up. We printed and framed our first two wedding pictures to go on either side of the sword. We are looking forward to more decorating and making our apartment our little nest.

Prayers: Pray for Bethany and me to continue to build our relationship with Christ and that we will have chances to spread that good news to these children. Also continued prayers for the provision of furniture, specifically a couch or futon and a dresser for our bedroom. Bethany would also love a set of matching night stands.

Praises: Praise God for the family, friends, and home God is providing for us.

One Sweet Table

Today we are giving thanks for a table and chairs that we found at Goodwill. Although we were just at Goodwill yesterday, we went again today to find out if anyone had dropped anything off. Our hope was to have a rectangular wooden table and when we walked into the furniture room the first thing we laid eyes on was a solid wooden rectangular table with 3 matching chairs. It took us about 10 seconds to decide that we wanted to buy it. The chairs are a very common style of chair so we should be able to get matching ones either new or used. It is SO nice to have a table and a place to sit at for meals. We are also very thankful for one of our friends down here who has let us borrow his truck every time we need to move a piece of furniture. Tonight I baked him some cookies in my new kitchen. These cookies are good. Good things come to those who are generous, in this case... cookies.

Praises: For the generosity of this couple with the truck. And praises for the way God has been providing us with nice furniture for cheap. The search has gone so well and things have been provided so readily for us that it really seems God is helping us get settled.

Prayers: One of our potentially hardest respites will begin shortly and we are leading worship together tomorrow!

More Shopping

Slowly but surely our apartment is starting to look more like a comfy home. The only thing we are feeling is a lack of chairs. There is no place to sit down except on the floor or our bed so that item is moving towards the top of the priority list! Today we took account of how many gift cards we had and how much store credit we had at Bed Bath and Beyond and then we headed out with our list of items. Top on the list was a vacuum cleaner because our apartment is mostly carpet and second was to find the microwave that we received for our wedding and then returned to save on moving space. We found both items at Bed Bath and Beyond and went to the check out lane where a very nice lady behind us gave us one of her 20% off coupons so we saved $30 on the vacuum cleaner! We also still have lots of store credit and gift cards to the store even after those purchases so that will help as we slowly discover items we would like to have.

Our next stop was Target to get lighting for the living room and a humidifier because air conditioning dries out your throat as much as wood heat does. Hopefully that will help Eric to sleep better because his allergies have not sub-sided in this state even though we were hoping they would. Finally we stopped at Goodwill again to see if any new furniture had come in and sure enough, we found a nice computer desk for $50 and now it is nicely situated in our bedroom after taking it apart to get it through the door.

Praises: We are starting to have a comfy getaway spot we can call a home. We found some furniture that is both nice and was cheap.

Prayers: Prayer that we will be able to continue resting up and getting settled so we can relax before our next respite. We will be leading worship together on Wednesday, prayers that it would go smoothly, we could enjoy leading together and God would be glorified.

Tucson Pops

It wasn't Keith Lockhart and the Boston Pops but it was free so Eric and I drove down towards the middle of Tucson tonight and sat outside for an evening of music from the Tucson Pops Orchestra. Among the highlights of the evening were a great alto sax player and music from the Chronicles of Narnia. We enjoyed using our picnic stuff and eating dinner out on some nice green grass. The park was a big park and home of the spring training grounds for the Colorado Rockies who were National League champions last year but beat by the Red Sox in the World Series.

The conductor of the concert was from Hungary and he had a great sense of humor and kept us entertained with his explanations of each of the pieces.

We quickly discovered that we were the only young folk in a sea of the 55 and over crowd but at the end that meant we got out of there a lot faster than everyone else!

Tomorrow will probably be another work day and then Tuesday we want to explore some more of the area. One point of interest is a place where they keep a huge missile underground and take you 137 stories underground to see it. We also want to explore the desert and see if we can see some of the wildlife. More pictures to come!

Moving In

Bethany and I have started moving into our apartment. It is a lot of work and we do not have a lot of furniture. Here is a picture of the apartment when we bought it and it was totally empty.

We finally had a little Christmas party and opened up all the boxes we had packed about a month ago. It was almost like playing the time capsule game. Every time we opened a box it was something else we wanted and needed! We then began the long task of finding a home for everything in those boxes in our new apartment. Yeah that task is still going on. We still have not gone back to Bed, Bath, and Beyond

Bethany and I tried to go yard sale hunting in the city of Tucson but every time we showed up at a house all the furniture was gone. We later found out the Mexicans come up from across the border with large trucks and literally buy everything at a yard sale and then bring it back down into Mexico for sale. Blast. So we will try again probably next break. We did, however, manage to get a nice small entertainment center that fits perfectly in our living room. Now we just need a TV. We also found a great coffee table at Goodwill for $15. Our next place to explore will be a big furniture warehouse where they may have cheap stuff that has been knicked up a little.

Second Respite Down

Bethany and I have finished out second respite. This house was loaded with testosterone and wild men. They wanted to wrestle, fake-fight, call names, yell, skateboard, eat hot wings, skip their veggies, and never back down. I actually seemed to get along a little better with this crowd then the house before but the yelling was a little much for Bethany. She was one of two girls in the house of eight. But she was a trooper and did very well with all the boys.

I got to go to my first University of Arizona football game which was a very neat experience. UA won the game by a large margin which meant that all ticket holders got to redeem their tickets for tacos at the local Jack in the Box. The second half of the game pushed late into the evening when swarms of locusts started to bombard the poor fans in the stands. The locusts were attracted to the stadium lights. There were so many locusts that my kids started throwing them at each other and even at people they did not know. One of the young ruffians put one down my shirt.

At the end of our respite Bethany and I finally managed to pick an apartment complex to live at and today were able to reserve it. We then consulted CraigsList to find a cheap queen size bed for the two of us. We drove all the way across Tucson to find the mattress, pay for it, and lash it down in the back of the truck only to hear the sound of rain beginning to fall. Bethany and I flipped out lids for several moments and then decided if kids pee on mattresses then a little rain can’t hurt it too badly and started to drive home. Upon arriving home it was still raining and we found out we had locked ourselves out of the house. Oh my, I guess our plan doesn’t always work. It was a crazy day and a crazy week but God seems to be taking care of us in all of it.

Praises: We had another good week with a different group of children. I was able to talk to a child about how life without Jesus does not make sense. Bethany and I found a bed and an apartment! We also are starting to feel a little more at home here in AZ.

Prayers: That moving and finding furniture would go well and God would make sure we have enough finances for all of this. Also please pray that we would we be able to grow more in love with Jesus and learn about Him here in Tucson.

First Respite Is Finished

Bethany and I have finished our first respite. Whew. Here is Bethany playing "tackle" with a very cute three year old who was born addicted to crack. The first respite I am sure will be the hardest (three more to go). The first week went pretty well and relationships were begun with the kids. Some of the kids really struggle in school so we do homework with them and teach them as much as we can. (As you can see we are not allowed to put up pictures of the kids so you will see no young faces on this blog)

The largest blow up this week was with one of the kids I usually get along best with. When a kid has a blow up or makes a big mistake it is often one of the best times to talk to them because “teaching moments” can open up. This seemed to be one of those times. The child was very worried about getting in trouble because he wanted to be able to go back to his dad. The stories are sad but it rewarding to be there for a kid who really needs love and a good example. I have been able to talk about Jesus and the difference He has made in my life about four times with kids already as situations have arisen. So praise God because these kids need Him!

Sadly it seems we have to do our first two respites back to back. So tonight we will begin another six day respite at another house and will be done by Thursday next week to start getting in touch with our loved ones again. The couple we will be providing a break for used to do youth ministry and both of them are very cool. The minister says he prefers this job to his old job in the church. I thought that was very interesting.

After this next respite we will have a one week break to go ahead and hopefully get moved into our own apartment…finally. I am excited to settle in and have a place Bethany and I can really call our home. We are hoping to move into a more urban setting then we have lived in, in the past. We may even have a mall in our backyard!

Bethany and I have also found a place that has a really good salmon appetizer which is half-price on weekdays between 3 PM and 7 PM.

Prayers: For energy, love, and patience to work with each other. Prayers for Bethany and I as the foster kids can put some growing pains on our own relationship.
Praises: We have been given a mentor couple through this ministry who we really like! It seems God has been providing mentors for both of us at all stages of life: high school, college, pre-marriage, and now here at GAP. Perhaps God has something special in mind for us. The first respite went well. It looks like Tucson, AZ might be a good fit for us after all.