Young Love

There is a young man spending a lot of time at our house these days!

The new man in Katie's life has captured our hearts, as well, as we spend time with him. Ken definitely approves.

He has blond hair and big brown eyes.

He will be going into the Service, and already has his uniform.

Meet Chester:

Katie has always wanted a dog, but it hasn't been an option until now. She is raising Chester to eventually be a service dog for an autistic child. He will be in our home for 12-18 months learning basic skills and then on to more extensive training as he gets ready for his child. Katie and Chester will be attending puppy training classes each week for a while and then it will go to every other week. She is required to take him on three outings a week when he gets a bit older, (at this point, he is just learning how to climb stairs), malls, grocery stores, parks etc.... Even school when he gets older. The trick is to train him to not be distracted by crowds, traffic, other dogs, food and anything else that will affect his "job" when he gets older.

We realize this will alter our lives for a bit, but what a special cause. Service Dogs have always intrigued me and I am excited to see the process that makes a good service dog. Of course the breed has everything to do with it. Chester is a golden retriever/lab.

I have never cared to have dogs in the house, but our house is situated real well for this, as Chester will spend his time in the basement and will not have to go through the main part of the house. The great thing about this program is that the NSD (National Service Dogs), pays for food and vet bills. You can find out more about the program at www.nsd.on.ca

One Year Ago Today

One year ago today we woke up in Detroit Michigan.
One year ago today was the "day after" Katie's 16th Birthday.
One year ago today we sent Audrey, our special travel companion, off to fly home.
One year ago today Ken, Katie and I crossed over the Canadian Border to a new adventure.
One year ago today we arrived at our new Home in Guelph, Ontario.

It is hard to describe all the feelings that we each had.

Joy!
Excitement!
Gratitude to our Lord!
Some uncertainty!
Happiness!

The list could go on. We experienced Gods Hand so many times in our move and as we traveled.
He showed us over and over again His Faithfulness and His Loving Care.

As we look back over the year, we see His Continual Faithfulness. It is hard to believe a year has passed. A year full of exciting new adventures. We have been through an entire cycle of camp and conferences, an entire year of school, and an entire year of seasons.

We are still getting to know our new home and look forward to "year two" and all that God has in store.

To be in God's Will is the most wonderful place to be!

We thank you for your Prayers and are still looking forward to visits!

A Special Announcement

We are happy to welcome Bill Lawrence to our family!

Bill asked Mom to marry him on June 25th,

and she joyfully accepted!

Mom and Bill plan to marry in September

at Black Lake Bible Camp.

More Details to follow.

Spring Time

This is my small little edible garden. Strawberries, Raspberries,

Tomatoes and Rhubarb.

We will see how that goes!

Just in the nick of time

We loved driving around with California plates all this time. It was a pretty good conversation starter, but the time has come to turn in our cool plates for even cooler ones.

Registering our truck in Ontario was a long process that God had His Hand in once again. I will just say that because of the delays and complications, enough time went by so that we were able to avoid the Duty charges that we would have had to pay if we had registered our truck right away like we had tried to do. Everything just fell right into place the day before Ken left for California, May 27.

This was the last of the details that needed to be taken care of for our move to Canada.

From our Work Permits, to

bringing our belongings in, to

our Social Insurance Numbers, to

our Ontario Drivers Licenses, to

our Health Cards, to

Filing Tax Returns (both), to

The Vehicle Registration.

As I said before, God has gone before us every step of the way.

So much to be Thankful for!

Hard at Work

Lisa leaves Thursday to go back to Oregon after being with us for six week. She has been away from Salem for six months and is eager to get back to set up her apartment, see her horse and find a job before she starts her last year at Corban (now University). It has been so much fun having her here and

of course, the time has rushed by too quickly, but it has been so neat for her to be involved with the "everyday" part of our lives here. She has gotten to know the people we work with and they have gotten to know her. There have been coffee runs with her Dad, walks along the river, a little sight seeing and some adventures with Katie (tonight its Sushi and a move). There has been lots of laughing, good talks, and many moments to cherish.

She was able to earn some money and was a great help to us in many ways. She did everything from the dish room, to the lawns, (mowing, weed-eating, trimming), to working in the dining room, to setting up meeting rooms, to helping me in the office. I really don't know what we will do with out her!

Master Bedroom

People here thought that we would love our American Flag room. How fitting, we were from America. We would appreciate a bit of Old Glory over our heads when we slept.
Although the person who painted this ceiling did a wonderful job and I can just imagine the neck and shoulder pain that went with the project, we just couldn't do it.

Not only was the flag on the ceiling, but all the trim, baseboard included, was red and the blinds behind the sheers were navy blue. Very Patriotic! This is how we found the room when we arrived.

After

Ken painted the ceiling and the trim Swiss Coffee and we left the wall color a light taupe.

Some of you have heard the story about the Bed, but here it is again in a nut shell. It is always good to hear and remember God's Blessing and how He really does care about the little things in life.

After summer we drove to the boarder to get our temporary work permits and take care of some things, one of which was to buy a bed. We did some switching around with beds when we moved, as the double mattress that was Lisa's (which was mine when I was a teenager), landed in the dumpster before we left Palomar. The queen that was ours went into Lisa's/Guest room and we finally have a bedroom big enough for a king size bed. So the shopping began. We had kept some $ aside for just this purpose and in talking to the Chairman of the Board and chatting about what we were needing and wanting to do while in Windsor and Detroit, he said he knew a guy who owned a mattress store. He would give us a deal. Great! We headed over there the next day and chose our mattress. The owner said "You will need sheets and a mattress cover. Do you need pillows? OK." We were quickly trying to calculate as he was adding items to our list. We hadn't heard what kind of a deal he was going to give us, so it was a little unsettling. Well, to make a long story short, we walked out of there with out paying a dollar (or loony, if you will). It was his way of supporting our new Ministry and GBCC. It was such a blessing. Anyone who has gone to buy a mattress lately, knows just how big of a blessing it really was. it was delivered about a week later!

The reason we were looking to buy a king size bed, was the headboard that we had been keeping safe for all those years at Palomar, was built by my Dad. When we built our home in Nevada City, we had to cut down some beautiful Oak trees in order to build the house. Ken and Dad found a mill there in Grass Valley and Dad took some of the lumber home and built this beautiful headboard.

We still have to add the fininshing touches to the room, but we are happy with it. Oak is not really "in" right now, so we are having a little trouble finding things to go with what we have.

I am open to ideas.