2 Years

So we have been celebrating alot of milestones around here. Keri's Birthday, Drew's first 4 weeks of school, our 5 year anniversary, and now our 2 year mark in Jamaica. Below is our first update sent two years ago. While we only cringe as we think about how rough our first month was, I dont know that we feel much more confident in ministry today. We remain pretty rough excuses for missionaries and we still have many more questions than answers. That is not to say that we have not been blessed, but without these blessings, we would not still be in Jamaica. So, Praise the Lord. If you want, you can reminisce with us back to our first update sent at the end of October 2007 and check out the picture of the boys from our first month.



Greetings in the Name of Jesus. Hello from Jamaica! We have arrived and are presently trying to settle in to our new home. We are thankful that home is where the heart is because it feels like we don’t have much more than heart in our home right now. While our heart is here because we are together as a family, we feel very much out of control. They explained this to us in training, but it is very different to experience it in reality. We feel like we are unable to do anything. We have a language barrier with the majority of the campus and culture differences from everyone. We don’t want this to be all gloom. The people here are very nice and the kids are instantly warm and welcoming.

We left on Saturday and had a smooth trip through Charlotte to Jamaica. When we got to Jamaica, we handed our documents to the customs officer and he said “when are you leaving Jamaica.” We said that we had a one way ticket and that we would be leaving in 5 months or so. He instantly said that we had a problem and we could not be granted entry. He explained that you can not enter the country on a one way ticket and that we would have to buy a return trip ticket before we could enter. So, we proceeded back to a room where, I guess, they hold people like us. Keri stayed there with the kids and I went with the officer to purchase a return trip ticket. After maybe an hour and some trouble with our credit card, we got our tickets. We purchased them for a return trip in three months and thankfully they weren’t ridiculously priced. We then were granted entry and we took the long and curvy trip to Mandeville. On the brightest side, our kids did great and they slept through the worst parts of our trip.

Now that we are here, we are unable to move into the apartment we had planned on living in because some of the staff are still displaced from Hurricane Dean. So, we are living in the apartment that work teams stay in for their trips. The apartment is big, but it is messy and full of bunk beds and old furniture. This has been an adjustment but we are starting to get things cleaned up. Actually, we have come to believe that the ants and bugs own the place and they are just letting us stay here. They even let us eat some of their food. We are hoping to evict them very soon with lots of cleaning and maybe some spray. Our kids are adjusting slowly. Truitt has been very fussy and just off from normal. Drew is doing the best of all of us as he has even withstood some mobs of children touching him all over. Drew even on occasion will see a group of kids and say, “theres the kids, hi kids” while waving at them. I think it will take him awhile to realize that they cant hear him.

On the ministry side, we are as confused as ever, but we do feel excited about the opportunities. I think we will be doing “work team” stuff for a few weeks so that we can get to know people and understand how things work. This will be good as it should not involve in responsibility as we already feel overwhelmed from the transitions.

Thanks for your love and support. Please let me know if you are not interested in receiving these emails and likewise, please let me know if you know of someone who would like to receive them.