Random Ramblings

Something my family has missed since we moved is Buckeyes. People here have never heard of them. Buckeyes are essential to us "Ohioans", so my family decided to venture out into the unknown world of candy making and give some of these Ohio treats out to people for Christmas. Eli got all into it and mixed the peanut butter mixture himself.

The rolling of the balls, which Faith did a very good job with.

The finished peanut butter balls. This was everyone's favorite part: dipping the balls into melted chocolate.

The finished product. Not perfect, but pretty good considering Faith and Lydia did most of it.

We did our dance/play last night,(the one I blogged about earlier) and it turned out really good. We managed to get a Joseph, so we had a complete cast. He was a real live person, too, so no cardboard needed. I will try to get a video of it up soon. Until then, Merry Christmas!

My mom has had an expressive signing ministry for as long as I can remember. Expressive signing is a mixture of ASL, dance, and drama. I do a little of it as well, and when we came to Washington the doors opened up for us to start another signing ministry. Expressive signing hasn't been done in the western states as much as in the eastern, so people are intrigued by it. Our group consists of our pastor's wife, a woman from Peru who is still learning English, a Khazak woman who is wonderful in dance, a Muslim, and two other woman, along with my mom and me. My point in bringing this up is that we are doing a couple of songs that show Jesus' life on earth, and then him dying on the cross. The second song tells that he then rose again, and that he's not a baby in a manger anymore. We had the first song almost finished, but our assistant pastor, who is playing Jesus, came in and changed a lot of it. The changes were good, but the fact that we only have two more weeks is a little difficult. Also, I'm supposed to play Mary, but we have no Joseph. The guy who was going to play him can't anymore, so we have to find another. My dad thinks we should just paint him onto cardboard and stand him there. I'm thinking that since Joseph has to get up and dance during the second song, the cardboard version is not adequate. Hmm....

More Crazy Weather

It has been almost ten months since we left. Two days ago I got back from visiting Ohio. My dad drove up to Lexington, Kentucky to the National Missionary Convention after we got there, and the rest of us got to visit with people.
The night we left for our flight, there was a windstorm sweeping through Tacoma. We were a little worried we would get delayed because of it, but we left on time. A couple of days later, my mom got a text message saying there had been a level three earthquake in Washington. Then, just before we were leaving to come back to Tacoma, a foot of snow fell over the city. People were pretty much freaking out because of the snow. My dad is from Wisconsin, and we lived in Ohio for twelve years, so a foot of snow is not a big deal to us. There was about three feet on the ground when we left Ohio, and we dug ourselves out of the driveway. Apparently, Tacoma doesn't have enough snow plows or salt to lay on the roads, and people don't learn how to drive in snow, so a foot is a big deal. After all of this we were starting to get a bit concerned that Mount Rainier would blow...

For those of you wondering, this is not a picture of Mount Rainier blowing up a couple of days ago. The mountain managed to hold all of its molten rock inside.

Pictures of Faith

Here are some pics I took of Faith the other day at a pumpkin patch.

She got the giggles

Big grin!

This one was actually the first one I snapped. I told her to smile nicely, and this is what she came up with

Ministry pictures

here are some pictures of my family serving with the Street Corner Commission. The one above is my mom praying for John, a homeless man. He mutters to himself, but we have seen lots of progress with him. This is the first time he's ever let one of us pray for him.


Here, my mom is signing to the worship songs we play before we start handing things out.


Faithie signing the bus!

Faith praying

Gathering around to hear the Word

The gentleman in the blue hat is Popeye. He has only one eye, and has been homeless for some time, but he loves the Lord

This is my brother and I serving coffee

Lydia signing the bus

Salem, Oregon

On Tuesday my family, along with some other missionaries we are working with here in Tacoma, drove down to the YWAM base in Salem, Oregon. They have a huge base, complete with a cafe and rope courses. The reason we went was for a prayer meeting they were having, which happened to be done like the underground church. The reason for the prayer meeting was to remember our brothers and sisters in other countries who can't worship out in the open, or even in their own building. The room was lit only with candles, they didn't use any microphones or sound equipment, and everyone sat on the floor. It was an amazing service spent in worship, prayer, a teaching, and remembering our fellow Christian friends. Stories were told of people put in prison because of preaching, being forced to clean the sewer, and being put in isolation, all because of their faith.
Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of the Oregon base, but I will try to post some more of my family serving in my next post.

Tacoma Weather

Something very interesting about Tacoma is the weather. During spring, fall and winter it rains almost every day. But activities don't stop! Where in Ohio all the rides at the fair are shut down for a sprinkle, people still go to the fair in the pouring rain and nothing is shut down. People go hiking, biking, or whatever they had planned for the day. They just go do things in spite of the rain and act like they aren't getting totally soaked. It might take a while for my family to get used to this.

My brother and I got an opportunity to go water tubing in California with a couple of people from our church last weekend. We rented a boat and glided across Shasta Lake, which is a beautiful body of water, and also very warm for a lake. The main purpose of the trip was actually visit a church called Bethel (maybe you've heard of it)which is a huge and amazing church. On Saturday morning we went to the church for a treasure hunt, which is a really cool thing where you pray and ask God to show you people to pray for in the area. Then you ask God for a location, what the person might be wearing, etc. You write all of this down on a "treasure map" and then divide up into groups and go to one of the locations on one of the maps. My group happened to go to a Barnes and Nobles bookstore that had a coffee shop in it, where we prayed for several people. One girl we prayed for was Buddhist, but she thought what we were doing was really cool. I loved the experience and opportunity to share the word in downtown Redding, California.

Some know that I am not the loudest person on the face of the earth, but many quiet people have a lot going on in their heads. I should hope that whatever it is happens to be of the things of God. Something I have been thinking about is observing. Observation is one of my favorite words. By simply observing things, one can learn a lot. My favorite thing to observe is people. You can tell if someone is hurting, lonely, angry, or full of joy based on their body language, voice, and face. However, sometimes peoples’ faces do not tell what they are really feeling. One can put on a happy face, but inside be feeling desolate and alone. So these are just a couple of random things that jumped into my head.

Back in Tacoma

The Henry family is getting back into the swing of a semi-normal life in Tacoma, Washington. When I look back at how we got here I have to think “WOW!” It has certainly been a while ride. My dad went from having a good job to none at all in a week a little more than a year ago. We loaded all of our stuff onto a small trailer and began our trek across the country to Colorado six months later, and then after a short stop in Montana, we ended up in Washington. Now we are settling in and working with all of the ministries here, and God is blessing us.

Green Bus

Outreach is unofficially over. I say unofficially merely because my entire life is dedicated to reaching out. Our Tacoma, Washington outreach was amazing. We spent our time feeding and clothing and praying for the less fortunate part of Tacoma. This included drug addicts, homeless people, and people who just couldn't afford to feed their families. One of my favorite ministries was nicknamed “the green bus” ministry. Why the nickname? This ministry loaded up a bunch of food, clothes, coffee, a tiny dog and volunteers dressed in green tee-shirts onto a big lime green bus and headed off to the street corners. Prayer is constantly going on; all the way to the corner, while there, and the whole way back. On the way to the corner prayer is lifted up for the people we reach out to and for protection; at the corner the prayers are for the people as well, and the ride back is to break off anything that may have affected us. Serving coffee and chocolate muffins to the homeless on Saturday mornings does not sound ideal, but once you get into it and start enjoying handing a cup of coffee to an elderly man who may not have eaten in a few days, you will want to go back and serve again and again. The green bus offers clothes, care packages with socks and items for personal hygiene, a cup of coffee or hot chocolate and a muffin, and prayer for anyone who simply asks, as well as to those who don't ask. It is for all of these reasons that the “green bus” ministry is so wonderful.

Hey all! Just wanted to let everyone know that since I'm on outreach, my next blog won't be until after I'm done. Thanks for reading!

Montana

A little less than two weeks ago our outreach team arrived in Montana. We are staying in a little valley, with majestic mountains on either side of the countryside. This valley happens to be a Native American reservation, and the reservation is why we're here.
We are here to reach out to the very distraught and broken people that live on the reservations. We're working with Tribal Waves, an organization that reaches out to these people. One of the ways Tribal Waves is reaching out to the kids is by running the Zone, which is just a safe hang out spot for the kids located in a bakery. Here the kids can play games, have snacks, and hang out while Christian music is playing. Another way that the team I'm with is reaching out is by doing yard work and other community services. We have been getting up early almost every day and working until about mid afternoon.
Tomorrow we leave for Tacoma, Washington where my family as well as one other team member will continue our outreach and the rest of the team will travel on to the nations. Continue to keep us in prayer!

Update

We have an important update to our outreach. The leadership felt strongly that they should offer our family (as the only family in the DTS) an opportunity to serve for two weeks on the Flathead Indian Reservation with YWAM Tribal Waves , then afterward to go on to serve with Freedom River (http://freedomriver.net/) in Tacoma, WA for the rest of our two-month outreach. Freedom River is a multifaceted ministry, but its main focus is on serving the homeless community in the Seattle/Tacoma area. We have chosen to take this opportunity, after much prayer, for several reasons.

First, the leadership here felt that since our family had already been doing missions short-term, and were now planning on staying long-term, that we could meet the DTS Outreach requirements in full by serving in Montana and Tacoma. We were well on our way to being fully funded for the other trip, but this option allows us to return to the Springs with funds available to get settled in and get to work. Our leadership here feels, and we agree, that this is a better use of the funds we have received and of our family's giftings.

Second, the Freedom River leadership came and taught for a week during our lecture phase and put a burden on our hearts for their ministry. We've seen that our family can serve as a whole with them as they have ministries where even Faith and Lydia will be a blessing.

Third, Freedom River is also developing an aviation program and have a need for my Dad's expertise in a consulting role. This will also create a working partnership for the future between the two aviation programs.

Finally, there is another student who found out that she could not go overseas with her team due to fairly recent chemotherapy disallowing the necessary inoculations. No one should be a one-person team. Please keep Nicole in prayer as she travels with us.

Although we were enthusiastic about going overseas, we are truly excited to be going to Montana and Tacoma. We've learned a great deal about our giftings and calling during the lecture phase of our DTS, and feel this will be a great opportunity for our family to serve together.

Thank you to everyone for your prayers and financial support. God has been meeting our needs faithfully, in ways that we would've never dreamed, and consistently growing our faith; so we've come to know that He will provide for whatever He tells us to do.

Rain

The other day Rachel and I decided to go to a movie. Afterward we were hungry, so we went and got Chinese takeout and took it to a local park to eat it. It started pouring down rain, so we packed up our lunch and ran to the van. By the time we got to the van it was hailing. We finished our lunch in the van, although it was a little soggy.
At the library, surrounded by books, it seems you can enter another world. Actually, thousands of other worlds. A world with no pain. Escaping into books allows you to forget about the past, future, and present. Books are full of color, illustrating remarkable scenes of beauty. Many people wish to escape out of this dull and gray world, to escape from hardship. But if they were to open their eyes, they would see that the world isn't such a gray and dull place. The fact that they don't know or understand is that we are only here for a short time, and God put it here for us to enjoy while we're here.

A couple of members of our school got baptized the other night. Did I mention it was outside? And it was about fifty degrees out? Or that the water still had ice in it? Anyway, it was a beautiful spot. The snow just added a bit of glitter. The three getting baptized were literally thrown into the water, and the third was dropped. I don't think any of them will ever forget that experience.
One if the students is from Hong Kong, and she is teaching me Mandarin. I'm excited about this because it's a language I've always wanted to learn. It's very complex, and I only know a few phrases so far, but I have five years to learn (it's also for high school credit). I don't think I'll be learning any characters anytime soon.
Faith and Lydia have a new friend named Ellie. She's a native American that does Origami, and Faith and Lydia have figured this out. Now every evening before dinner, poor Ellie is stuck making paper elephants, swans, and baskets. She finally told them to go find her a pink elephant, but Faith and Lydia figured it out after a few days. Little girls, you gotta love 'em.

On Saturday, the DTS team reached out to some homeless. We fed them pizza and gave out clothes. These are people who live in a tent, even in the cold, with little babies who don’t get enough to eat. Most of them live on a “homeless site”, where they are given a free place to pitch their tent. A few of them found out that the government is evicting them from their site. They don’t have anywhere to go if they get evicted. Please keep our homeless neighbors in prayer. I’m looking forward to doing some other things like this every Saturday for the next two months.
Ah! Warm weather is amazing! It’s almost seventy degrees here in Colorado, and it feels so good! However, it’s supposed to snow this weekend. With all this weather change, I wonder how they keep their plants alive.
As I said before, if you ever have any questions about what we’re doing here in Colorado, write a comment and ask.

Random Ramblings

Here in Colorado, the weather is quite mysterious. On Monday, it was freezing cold and snowing (I went for a run). On Tuesday, it was really warm and we didn't need shirts (Rachel and I took the kids to the movies). Yesterday, it was cold again and raining, and now today, it's sunny out and looks warm, but it's chilly.

Our days look like this: in the morning Mom and Dad go to the base, while we (meaning my siblings and Rachel and me) stay home and do school and clean the house. Then we join the DTS students at the base for lunch, and while they go back to class we take the kids to the library or some other fun activity. Then we head back to the base and hang out until dinner, after which we leave for home. Kind of a chaotic schedule, but everyone is adjusting.

On Sunday afternoon we went for a hike in the mountains with one of the staff of YWAM as our guide. It was about a two mile hike, and as we got higher, instead of getting colder, we got warmer. After traveling back down the mountain, nine of us crammed into an eight passenger SUV. At least the view out the windows was beautiful, even if I couldn't feel my feet. :)

This has been Random Ramblings of a homeschooler, thanks for reading.

Lydia

My sister Lydia is not enjoying having Rachel be in charge. The other day Rachel was sitting across the room when Lydia tripped and fell. Lydia said, "Rachel made me fall, sissy!" with tears running down her face.
Then Lydia goes: "I don't like you, I don't want you in this family, so can I have some gum?"
So now Rachel has been rejected from the family, blamed for everything, called stupid, mean, and Frito, all in a week.
Lydia also has nicknames for several people in DTS. We have Lord Fluffy, Little Turtle, Lollipop, My Friend, and Jungle Tim. She also confuses two names and came up with Hellie.
Three year olds, you gotta love 'em, right? Don't worry, Rachel doesn't take anything personally. At least as she gets older she will hopefully be a very sweet person.

We're in Colorado, safe and sound. We are staying with one of the staff members, and we have the entire downstairs of her house, which includes three bedrooms, a bathroom, and a living space. We were really blessed in that area. Today is the first day of DTS. It's going well so far, but Lydia is having a hard time with being separate from Mom.
Driving from New Mexico from Colorado, our trailer popped a tire. We unhooked the trailer, drove to a town, and got a new tire. Dad was getting discouraged when it took a couple of hours to start to put the tire back on the trailer. Finally a man who worked on trailers for a living stopped, and he had everything Dad needed to fix the tire. I believe the man was sent by God-it's not everyday a really nice man who works with trailers for a living pulls over, has all the tools needed, and gives up an hour and a half of his time to help complete strangers. We were delayed four hours, but we're all here safe and sound, the trailer made it with all of our stuff, and we're jumping in to learning more about the Lord.

Pictures of the Trip

Here are the pictures I promised everyone, including some of the Alamo.

Greetings from Texas! We're finally down south where it's warm. Traveling with my family is quite interesting. When we entered Kentucky, Lydia said "Are we in Chuck E Cheese?" Lydia also was glued to me the first day, wanting to sit with me the whole time. But the second day, she "didn't like me" anymore. Does that make sense to anyone?
Tomorrow we get to go see the Alamo. I'm pretty excited. So our sightseeing begins! There hasn't been much to see until now, except for the swamp and alligators in Louisiana. We actually camped right next to the swamp and heard the alligators barking. It was awesome!
Hopefully I will have pictures up soon, especially of the Alamo. We only have internet when we stay in hotels.
Please remember to pray for my mom. She has a fever. We are hoping she'll be okay to go sightseeing tomorrow. Thanks!

Airplanes

Being an Aeronautical Scientist's daughter, I naturally have to share a post or two about airplanes. So, here is the first one:

I love the "old fashioned" planes with the propellers on the nose. I think they are intriguing. That one small propeller is holding that humongous aircraft in the air, spinning so fast you can't even see it. In a way, the propeller can remind us about Christ.
First of all, there are the three parts that jut out from the middle. Those parts are like the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. The part in the middle is a person walking with Christ. When one walks with Christ, one has the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost all connected to the person (please excuse my old fashioned writing, I read a lot of old books).
I was at the woman's retreat that my grandmother leads this weekend, and one of the things she mentioned in her message was that Jesus is our propeller. Jesus holds us up while we're soaring through life, and when we're down on the ground, He's there to pick us back up.