3 days left

9 suitcases are packed.
brookie has flown in from Texas to help us out and keep us running and having fun.
our visas just came in TODAY...a little too close in our opinion!
our van just SOLD today...to jeff westrup! thank you!
our Will has been notarized and sent off.
the last on our lists are being crossed off.
people are blessing us left and right.
kindy got me a massage last night...unbelievable!
it's all coming together
we are excited!
soon we will be on that plane!

on the other hand...
we are doing "lasts"...saying a lot of "see ya laters"
things hit me wierd and i can start crying at the little things.
i will miss "here"
i will miss people...a whole lot of people
i will miss a lot of this life that we have here...and we are sad to go.
this is the hard part...saying good bye to great relationships....and hope they survive the miles and miles between us! i am so glad that we have better internet and ways to communicate...but nothing is like sitting on couches and sharing hearts face to face. will that come again? it better! i hope so! we need our people! so here's a cheer to all of you for being close enough to us to even read this! thanks for listening and knowing us and loving on us! and many of you are already miles apart from us and we keep going strong...so let's keep it going!

our next post will most likely be on the other side of the world!...we leave on Oct. 2 @ 1:40 a.m. and we'll be in the air for 25 hours...we will land in Bali and stay there for a couple of days before going on to Salatiga...and our nanny will be traveling through all of this with us. we will meet her for the first time at the airport on monday night before we board the plane...this will be a great first impression!

ok...till we meet again!
totally sitting in HIS lap!
martha

Los Angeles once again...for the last time

we will be in LA from Sept 13-Oct 1. we want to see everyone. we want to say good-bye. we want to spend hours with each of you. please help us by coming to our party on Saturday, Sept. 29 at the Dykstra's home. we are going to have ice cream at 3pm and just enjoy each other and celebrate what God is doing! And just another informative thing... our computer is a bit broken...the lid is splitting and thankfully it is still under warranty and they want to fix it for us. :) so we will be without a computer from sept. 14-?? they promise we will have it back before we leave...so we will trust :D but if we are not communicating very well...it's cuz we have limitations. but we do truly want to keep in contact!
blessings to you all!

our kids are learning to walk this path with us...it's a journey we take WITH JESUS...it's not a door we entered way back when we first knew him...we need Him every day and this is just an example of some of the goodness on the path we have with HIM

God is bigger than we let him be! we met this Giant tree in Yosemite...

we love Larissa! she came to visit us here in Fresno...and we had amazing times at
chuckie cheese, bowling, swimming, going to the park, talking, processing, eating, and
just having some plain old good fun! Thanks for making life sweeter Larissa!

Oct. 2, 1:40 a.m.

yes! we have tickets! it's official! we are going to indo! we leave on oct. 2, 1:40 a.m. and we fly for 25 hours plus 2 stops on the way. we land in bali...angels will sing as we get off the plane!...and we get to spend a little time there before heading on to Salatiga. our field director was praying one day before he got up to speak at a church in Washington and felt he needed to talk about us taking our 3 kids...putting out the option for someone to come along side us and be our nanny...not one...but 3 people volunteered! and so Mari Yamamoto from NW Washington state will be traveling with us as well...and then when we get there, she will be our Nanny! this sounds so weird for me to say but i am grateful...since we will be in language school it will put us at a little more ease to know that the kids at least have someone who speaks their language with them. she is 21...just graduated and is looking to go on to more schooling for child psychology...let's hope this is an encouraging adventure for her! :D

we still need our visa work to go through...timing is everything!

we are still in fresno...fres=yes...and it's been good...hard but good...we have learned a lot of things to carry on in our lives and we are grateful for this time here...we are really eager to move on to the next chapter of life though...for many many reasons...one being that we can put our clothes away in their very own spot...instead of them hanging out in suitcases! another would be that we get to paint our own walls in indo! yeah! we haven't been able to do that for awhile! another is that our life just seems to have been directed there at this perfect time and we are eager to open the treasures God has for us there...eager to learn more and give more! we just feel it's going to be a rich time in our lives!

now we have to figure out how to pack 16 suitcases...cuz we are not going to crate anything. anyone have any good ideas?