Pictures from yesterday's blog

 down the road for a walk

 The girls on the bridge

 These girls constantly want to take my picture

 and want their picture taken

 The pond in our yard

 Calla Lillies are everywhere they are considered weeds

 Walked to a waterfall

 Walking the Bush

 Bivouac

 Found  a birds nest

 Dried kiwi fruit

 I got a letter from the amazing Lina! It made my day!! I love receiving mail!

Bivouac's and girls club

Pictures to come soon sorry they would not load.

The last few days have been crazy! I have had such a good time seeing the Lord in everything and getting to know this family!

The Welsh family has invited me to stay with them for as long as I would like or as long as I can handle their family They have been so nice and loving. The youngest girls are constantly asking me to do things with them and I am definitely learning what it would be like to be a part of a large family! I am so thankful for having a small one. Big families are not for introverts

Monday night I went to girls club. This is a group for at risk teen girls in the community that gets together to do activities. It was really great! The girls are so funny. This week we played games just a little softball type game and basketball and just hungout with the girls. I really loved getting to meet them and look forward to the next group when we are going fishing.

Wednesday I went to the local homeschool group hangout. Every fortnight (everyother week) they do something together. This week we did a bush walk (hiking through the trees and such) and built bivouac’s (shelters) in the bush. It was a lot of fun. It’s funny because there are no poisonous animals or insects here. In fact there is nothing besides other people that will try to kill you (even the people are few and far between). Because of this you can tramp all through the bush and play with anything you want without fear of getting bitten by a snake or a spider or eaten by a bear.

While at the homeschool group we met this girl Tina who just got saved 3 weeks ago. She really wanted to get babtized so one of the women went with her and baptized her. It was beautiful and Tina’s testimony is amazing! It is really exciting to see the Lord take hold of someone that is so far away form Him and transform their life.

My new home and missing family

Last week with the Abascal family was fun. We played more games than I can count and I enjoyed playing with the kids.
 
Most of you know I love cemeteries everywhere I go. So here is my first one in New Zealand.


Saturday was a really hard day for me though. My grandfather's memorial service was going on back home and it was really hard to be away from my family and not be a part of it. I did record the navy hymn for it as that was a song my grandpa wanted sung. So I felt like at least a little part of me was there. I also recieved a package from my mom that day so it helped to have a little piece of home.
 He was a Marine so the service was done right :)

Yesterday (Sunday) I moved in with a new family. Praise the Lord for providing another place for me to stay. We haven’t discussed how long I will be staying here with them but I know the Lord has a plan. This family is a family of 11. But only 8 live in the house (6 children and the parents). I am living their spare bedroom/attic. It is actually quite cute and I have a lot of privacy up here.

This is Amelia and Shiloh they love me

 This is my little room!

We live basically in the country surrounded by farms. We have 9 chickens (chuks as they are called here), 5 birds, a dog, and a rooster. It was quite interesting being awoken this morning at 5am by the rooster and then at 630 by the neighbors horse.

 This is the view out the window of my room
 this is the puppy Jed. He helps me not miss my pup so much :)

As part of my living here I am working around the house and helping with devotions and homeschooling their children. Their youngest daughter Amelia and Shiloh the next youngest love me. They are constantly asking to sit next to me and for me to do their hair. They think I came here just to play with them. It is quite cute.

 hanging laundry to dry

Today starts the first day of school term. So it starts craziness for me. Tonight I am going to girls club, which is a group for at risk teen girls. We are going to the beach it should be a fun time.

I am still praying about a car as it is about a 30 minute drive to town from here but I know the Lord will provide something hopefully soon! Prayerfully things workout with this family and I can live here with them for the remainder of my time in New Zealand.

Be anxious for nothing

I’m so excited for what the Lord is doing in my life. I wake up every morning and can’t believe the Lord has brought me to this amazing place. It is crazy to think back about how He led me here and how incredible it is to have it be real. I was reading about The Lord being our Shepherd the other day and walked outside to see sheep on our lawn! It's awesome to see the word come to life.

 

Last Friday I started discipling a lady from our church. She is so beautiful and I love that I get to meet with her. She has such a desire to seek the Lord and to have a real relationship with the Lord and just doesn’t know how to do it. We just started talking about the Lord and started going through the book of Mark together. She wants to be able to teach her kids about the Lord, so we started with Mark so she could teach her kids what we talk about. We have only me once but I am excited for our future meetings.

 This is my friend Ellen we played a game with her family

 I have also been baking a lot of bread. It's so good and cheap to make.

I also got to go to a Rugby game last Friday. The game was really fun to go to but our team lost really bad. After the Rugby game we went to a bonfire that someone was having at their house. It was huge but didn't last long. about 20 minutes after it started a fireman showed up and made us put it out. It was fun while it lasted.

Yesterday I spent half the day with a couple of guys from the church sitting on a street corner singing worship music. I was walking down the street and saw them and they invited me to join them. They were raising money for a Tonga mission’s trip that they are leaving on this Sunday. It was really fun to sing with them and talk to people that came by. Please keep the Tonga team in prayer. They will be there for 2 weeks building a house for a family.

 

I am so blessed the last 2 weeks to be able to Google+ hangout with my family. This last Sunday (well my Monday) cracked me up. My sister had me on her I phone while my cousin Cameron got my cousin Zach (who is at school in Santa Barbara) on his I phone. It was somewhat chaotic but it was fun to see everyone and talk.

 

Yesterday I moved from the house I was at to house sit/kid sit for the pastor and his wife while they go to Queenstown for a few days. I am glad they are able to get away and enjoy each other. They told me that they have not gotten away just the two of them for 15 years. I am praying there trip is relaxing and enjoyable without too much worry. I am having a great time with their kids. I am watching them play with homemade play dough right nowJ every night after dinner they do family devotions so we are going through 1 Thessalonians this week. I can’t wait to hear what they say about the book.

Now I am just preparing for the term to start. I have to plan a few different bible studies for different groups. As well as discipling and other stuff I will be doing. I’m excited to see what the Lord does and what things He has me involved in.

Please keep praying for Him to provide somewhere for me to live. He has been teaching me to wait on Him and not worry. (Be anxious for nothing) I know that He is going to open the door somewhere it’s just in His timing which is never late but sometimes right up to the minute J

 

 

 

Cape Reinga

It has been great these last 2 weeks to be able to take time to see New Zealand and just have the responsibility of leading worship on Sundays. I have loved every day getting to enjoy God's beauty and read the word. It's been awesome to soak up the Lord before term starts and I am thrown into the middle of craziness.

This week Ellen’s cousin Tahlia and her husband Phil are in town from Brisbane Australia. Since they do not live here we have gone on quite a few adventures, which has been great for me to actually get to see some “tourist” type places. Yesterday we went on a road trip to Cape Reinga. Cape Reinga is the northern most point of New Zealand. It was amazing. The reason they wanted to go there is because the 2 oceans meet there and if you have enough of a westerly wind you can actually see the dividing line where the two oceans meet. We were able to see a little bit of that line.

 My it's way to early and cold to take pictures face :)

We departed early in the morning as it was a long drive. On the way we stopped at Kawakawa because they have amazing toilets. Check out the picture. It was really cool. Most of it is built out of glass. Then we continued to head north and went through a lot of small towns. The entire drive was green hills everywhere. Just picture the shire in Lord of the Rings and you have a close idea of what it is like.

When we finally made it to Cape Reinga we walked around and went out to the point where there is a light house. (I took pictures of this one just for mom because it was much nicer than Tutukaka) You can’t really see in the pictures but there is a color change between the 2 oceans.

  

 

 

After a while walking around and hanging out we started our drive south. First we found this little bay and stopped there to take a look. It was beautiful and my first time on at a New Zealand beach. We walked around the rocks and walked all the way around the corner looking for anything in the rock pools. After about an hour we headed back to the car and made our way south.

we decided to climb a tree

We stopped at a little fish and chips shop for a late lunch and ate our food at the bay nearby.

Then we realized we needed to get fuel asap. We kept driving and driving only finding closed gas stations. Finally we reached a town with a station with 8km(4.9 miles) remaining in the tank. It was close but thankfully we made it.

We then headed back north to the Gumdiggers buried forest. It was pretty cool. At one time there was a major catastrophic event that buried an entire forest of Kauri trees. The Gumdiggers would dig to the trees to get the Kauri gum out of them. This is why Rain boots are called Gumboots in New Zealand.  It was amazing seeing all the trees underground. While talking about it, we decided that it was probably Noah’s flood that wiped them all out. It is kind of cool to think that we were looking at trees that may have been buried during the flood.

 
The picture on the right is one of the massive Kauri trees that was burried.

After the gumdiggers forest we made our way back south and home. We drove through a lot more towns and saw a lot of northland. It was a beautiful day spent with beautiful people.