Sushi...on Cumberland Island?

No, no. Jen and I made sushi at Christmas time for the first time and I was really proud at how our rolls turned out considering it was our first time making and eating sushi. So we took pictures but we keep on forgetting to post them to the blog. That and they never seem to be relevant, and even now they aren't relevant but I have to show them sooner or later...anyway eat your heart out...hehehe...eat...

So yeah Jen and I went to Cumberland Island to go camping a couple of weekends ago and we loved it. Cumberland Island is amazing. I've been there many times as a kid, but never to go into the wilderness area or to go camping so this was a new aspect to it. It was crazy becuase we saw that it was going to be a nice weekend so Jen called them on a Tuesday to see about making a reservation (You have to make a reservation because they limit the number of campers, and the space is limited on the ferry ride which is the only public way out there). They said that two people had just cancelled for that weekend. So then we asked when the next available time was to go over there and they said July so we said "we'll take this weekend".

So we got there and I had already decided that I wanted to hike all the way to the other end of the island from where the ferry drops you off becuase for one it's a wilderness area and two I didn't think many people made it back there. So there Jen and I set off to hike 11 miles one way without having trained at all. So yeah, maybe next time we shouldn't try to go that far cold turkey with full packs on but we made it only slightly injured in our feet and set up camp with daylight still.

Our weekend was full of solitude (we only encountered 4 people all weekend in the backcountry besides park rangers taking a wild horse census) and wildlife. We saw horses, hogs, turkeys, deer, woodpeckers, dolphins, an alligator, and lots of little armadillos like this one. Nice pose huh?

It was just the weekend retreat that the docter ordered. Nothing like the great outdoors to clear your head and clear out the noise so that you can hear God better. The only thing that could have made the weekend any better would have been sushi, but we didn't encounter any Japanese campers...

Top Story in our life right now

The other day Jen and I had a very relaxing Saturday about an hour from home. We went to see a place called Ft. Frederica and then we decided to go have a picnic lunch by the water. The whole time we were entertained immensely by these little guys as they dive-bombed the river for fish. I think pelicans are officially my favorite bird to watch. They are just so much fun. We counted over 20 in all just sitting around, although it appears that only 7 could appear in this shot. But thats not the big news

Jen and I have been talking and praying about what the future holds. We have made a decision that we are going to continue with New Tribes Mission, but we are pushing back our next phase of training at the Missionary Training Center from this August until August of 2008. Why postpone this long you ask? Since Jen and I have been married life has been very rushed and very stressful for both of us. We feel its just in our best interest to deepen our partnership to each other with life going at a slower pace. We've prayed and talked to our pastor and we all agree this is for the best. It will also give us more time at our sending church to educate them about Tribal Missions and strengthen the bond between sender and goer. They are already excited about the prospect of directly supporting missionaries and this will only add to this excitement.

Please continue to pray for us. We still have alot to do before August 2008. Thank you for your part in Expanding The Reach of the Gospel!

It's Working

Or should I say "we're working?" I know that its only Friday, but I have the day off from my job because my construction job is awesome and I work 4 - 10 hour days instead of 5 - 8 hour days. I have the option of working Fridays for overtime, but this week I opted for the 3 day weekend to get some stuff done.
Jen starts her nanny job up real soon and is psyched about that. The extra income there will be nice, and we have the same days off.
Things around here are going well. I can say that we are completely settled in at our apartment and we are starting to reconnect more with friends and church. Church is especially fun because this year our theme is "Going beyond the Walls: A challenge for missions." This is the perfect time for us to be at First Baptist Church. People are excited and interested in our future work with New Tribes Missions. Please continue to pray for us.

Jen is going to be a nanny

I am very excited to let you all know that I will be a full time nanny starting in February. I will be taking care of a little boy named Jonathan, who right now is only 3 weeks old. I've been babysitting off and on the last two weeks but I found out yesterday that I have the position. My job includes carring for the baby's physical needs (feeding, diaper changing, bathing), along with doing his laundry and stiralizing bottles and the best part is its a M-F job, hours running from 8am to 7pm.
Thank you to those of you who have been praying!

Jon's Job

It is official that I am an employee of L.C. Gaskins Construction Company. I'm not really sure what we build yet. All I know is I start at 7:00 am Monday morning. We work on the military base so I have to go get some clearance so I can actually be there, but thats not too long a process. The job is essentially an 8-5 monday-friday. You can't beat that. Thanks to those who prayed.
We'll be getting some more pictures up here sometime. Right now we go to the public library to use the internet so we have to bring the pictures from home first.