Safari Trip

While we were in Tanzania, we were able to go on a safari to a local wildlife preserve called Mikumi. We were able to get landcruisers that the tops opened up and we drove 6 hours to the park and spent Saturday afternoon there. We spent the night in a hotel nearby and got up early the next day looking for lions. Here are a few of my favorite pictures:

Here is Ian using Stacy's camera taking some pictures.

We were in two vehicles and this is the other vehicle coming up on some zebra's.

Here is a picture of a mom and her baby. We looked all day for lions and did not find any. The grass was pretty high so the chances were slim.

We're Back!

Hi all,
We are back from our trip to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. It was a wonderful time and I might add some notes here as I see fit later (also pictures of course!) Above in the title is a picture I took at the Mikumi Wildlife Preserve at sunset near the hippo pool.

On Monday of this week we woke up to our Golden Retriever Cosmo not being able to get up from his lying down position. He eventually was able to get up on all 4's but hobble around on 3 of them. After taking him downstairs to relieve himself he could not climb back up the stairs. Patty and Jessica took him to the Vet to see what was up. (That was a challenge in itself for a 90 pound dog!) In our minds we were seriously thinking that we may have to put him down. The vet later in the day was able to take x-rays and determine that he had 2 discs in his vertebrae that are deteriorating due to age. He gave him a cortisone shot and some pills for a muscle relaxant. (That muscle relaxant also works on his urinary tract too!) The doctor also suggested that he not go up and down the stairs for a week. When we picked him up at the clinic he was walking on all 4's again without much effort. The doctor saw this and was surprised and mentioned that that was a real good sign.

He is doing better each day. I purchased a roll of sod and put it on plastic and a cardboard box so he has a place to urinate. #2 is more challenging!

For those of you that are a regular reader of this blog, you know that Cosmo is a very important part of the Center and he enjoys a very good relationship with everyone! It would have been sad if he did not recover so quickly. We are also very thankful that this did not occur while we were in Africa.

A Day at Happy Hollow

Patty took a few kids to Happy Hollow yesterday. School is out so lots of different activities set up for the summer. I bought a Flip Video camera and she recorded some video. I took it and was able to do this little movie from the software that came with the camera.

Testimony

Below is a written testimony of someone who grew up in the Farm Drive neighborhood and just recently graduated from high school. She is going to spend her summer as a counselor at Camp MayMac. Thought it would be cool to post her testimony here:

My name is My (Mimi) Nguyen. When I was four years old, I lived in the Farm Drive neighborhood and my best friend started taking me to a Center called "Friends of Farm Drive". Every Saturday, Farm Drive would have a program called Bible Club, which is a place that allows kids to play and eat and learn about God. I am glad that I'm still able to attend Bible Club. When I was 10, through Farm Drive Center, I was able to go to a Christian camp called Camp MayMac where it gave my life to Jesus. I loved going to camp as a camper and for the last two summers , I've had the privilege of being a volunteer staff “Staff in Training”. I am graduating from Oak Grove High School in another week and plan to begin college in the fall. I am now 17 years old and I've been invited back to Camp MayMac to be a part of their summer staff. I'm writing this letter to you, asking if you could support me in becoming a summer staffer at Camp MayMac. Summer staff need to raise their own support, both prayer support and financial support. I will understand if you are not able to help me financially because everyone has their own things to take care of. I would appreciate it if you would be so kind as to pray for me this summer. I sincerely thank you for just taking time to read my letter and anything that you could do is very much appreciated. I hope you have a wonderful day and may God bless you this summer.

Yours truly, My Nguyen

Quilting

One of the things we did to raise money for our trip to Tanzania was to make quilts that we auctioned off at Hillside last Sunday. We had both a silent auction and a live auction. The quilts that Patty and I made ended up being auctioned off together and were purchased by a missionary family that is back from Poland on furlough. They plan to go back so our quilts will end up in Poland! Very cool. By the way the name of mine was Blood, Sweat, and Tears. If you look hard enough on it you will find all three!

Here's the Africa Team with 2 of our quilts.

Tanzania 2008

I kind of just realized that I have never mentioned that Patty and I along with 7 other people from the Gathering (college group) are going to Tanzania later this month. We are going to help Gil and Amy Medina with a summer camp for junior high and high school kids and also a day camp for younger kids. I will post more info later and probably be posting blogs about the trip also. I also put Gil and Amy's blog link over to the right here for you guys to go check out what is going on in their lives.

Also a link below.

http://www.gilandamy.blogspot.com/

If you would like email updates during the trip, you could email me at the following address and I will add your address and name to our contact list.

tanzania_2008@yahoo.com

Never a Dull Moment

Last night (Friday), as we were settling in for the evening to watch a movie (a great classic called "Shoot Em Up") ;) some of the kids came running up to our apartment saying that a little Asian boy just got hit by a car and is bleeding pretty bad. Patty and I went out there and and a little maybe 4 year old Vietnamese boy had run out between 2 parked cars and was hit by a car driving by. He was not seriously hurt (bloody nose and bruises as far as we know) but his uncle and another man were keeping him still until the fire department and paramedics arrived. Patty recognized the driver of the car as one of the guys in our college group at church. He seemed calm to me but after talking to him I could tell he was pretty shook up.

After seeing the video on TV the previous night where a pedestrian was hit and the car did not stop, nor did anyone stop to help the pedestrian, nor did anyone call 911, it made me feel better about mankind when I saw that the driver stopped, 2 men were helping the boy, 911 was called almost instantly, and lots of other neighbors came out to see and help if necessary. I was very proud to be apart of this neighborhood.

I had the chance to pray with 3 boys for the kid, his family, and the driver of the car. (That was really cool) I talked and tried to comfort the driver. Patty talked with him also and she also talked to and comforted the mom. The boys and the mom have all been to the Center and are known in the neighborhood.

The driver said to me that he hopes that this accident can become a tool. A tool to be used to tell the kids about running out into the street and be careful and look both ways. I told him it would be but also they would learn about helping others in time of need. Hopefully they'd also learn that prayer is needed in these types of situations. Too often we hang around to see the blood of a victim but forget to seek intervention to help the victim.

UPDATE

The little boy (Alex) who was hit by the car showed up at Bible Club this morning with his brother and mom. He was OK except he had a fat lip and his face was scraped up. He was bouncing all over the place. I found out that he came to Bible Club for the first time last week. He came over for breakfast and was hanging around and the leaders invited him to come in. He came back today with his brother and his mom also came by. Mimi was able to talk to both the boys and the mom in Vietnamese which was cool even though they speak fairly good English. The mom said things like she was thankful for the people here (adults) that can help her with her boys. A problem she has is they both like to hit people, for no reason at all. They do not obey her and hopefully we can help teach them about obeying their mom and making good choices. God is using different people in different ways to reach out to this family. Hopefully this family will be more a part of the Center and we can introduce Jesus to them.

Cool.