First Two Weeks

It feels like these last two weeks have just zipped right by. Starting off, classes are going great. We are currently in Foundational Bible Teaching, Communication, Worldview Analysis, and Learning Styles. We just got back home from working on our group project for Learning Styles. We are creating a media presentation showing a conflict due to people having different learning styles. We will try and get some of the pictures we took up on the blog and explain some of what is going on.

I'm loving working over at the MKEC (Missionary Kid Care and Education Center) for my campus ministry. They will be training me to be a home school consultant. We have also discussed various other training opportunities for me. I look forward to learning as much as I possibly can from them. For my outreach I am volunteering at a Pregnancy Center. My team narrowed down each of our roles into pairs. My partner and I are going to ask them if they want to learn to sew. :) Please be praying as we build relationships with the moms and workers there; we will be visiting the center on Monday evenings.

John's campus ministry is grounds crew. His team takes care of the campus grounds. What a great crew! They were weed-whacking earlier this week. John came home exhausted, but his area looked great! On Tuesdays John will be doing his outreach with teens at a new center. Please be praying for him as he builds relationships with the teens.

The Klines, will be our staff mentors. We had dinner with them last Wednesday, and enjoyed catching up with them. They are good friends of John's parents when they went through Bible School. Rumor has it they were in John's parent's wedding! We look forward to spending time with the Klines while we are here as students.

Thanks so much for your love and support! It means so much to us to know that we have people standing behind us in prayer, and encouraging us to keep moving forward.

John and Amanda Strozewski <><

Visiting Uncle Bob and Aunt Raye

Wow What a great time we had visiting John's Uncle Bob and Aunt Raye! Most of the weekend was John and Bob heavily discussing hunting, while Raye and Amanda enjoyed getting to know each other. What a joy it was to sit back and relax. On Saturday they took us to the site where the initial point for surveys of the land, for the Louisiana Purchase. It was so interesting looking and reading about the science and history behind this particular area. If you look carefully by John's shoulder you may be able to see the gap in the trees that creates the base line for the surveys. It was also Amanda's first experience in a swamp. Praise God the mosquitoes were not as hungry as anticipated.

We also enjoyed the drive out and back. It was interesting to note the changes in the land. It was fascinating seeing all the ranches, and farms that would stretch for miles on end. One unusual thing we noticed, while driving out to visit Uncle Bob and Aunt Raye, were the number of buses parked in people's lawns. We entertained ourselves by coming up with theories about how they got there. Our favorite was that the bus drivers felt compelled to go off-roading and then got stuck. :P Who knows!? We also entertained ourselves by counting the number of "off-roading" buses. And the grand total was 20! Yay for random!

School starts soon!!!

So here we are 6ish days before school starts!!! I am super excited and John is getting there. What a blessing it was to take a year off but the teacher in me wants to get back into a classroom and learn. :P Silly I know. School here doesn't just contain classes, there is work detail, outreach, and E-link.

Work detail is basically a program that was established for students to help out around campus/ learn new skills. Students are asked to put in about 8-10 hours each week. I will be working at the MKCE (Missionary Kid Care and Education Center). I am excited to join the team of missionaries that currently work there. I can't wait to learn what they have to teach me. I will be trained later on this semester to be a home-school consultant. (Basically a go to person for homeschooling moms.) We aren't sure where John will be...he could request to be back on the construction crew, but he wants to see where they will put him. We will find out the first week of school.

Outreach is basically where students plug in helping out the local community. There are many different avenues in which people do this. Some women help out at the local pregnancy center, and other women to women ministry opportunities. There is a rehab center that a portion of the guys help out with. There is also a Young Life program out here that a number of students help. Plus a few more opportunities. Not sure where we are going to plug in just yet. We are waiting to hear about each of the different ministries.

E-link is a program where students/couples are partnered with a staff/couple. Basically a discipleship program. We are excited to see which couple we are partnered with!

Classes won't officially start for us until after the first week of starting up. We have a week of orientation. :P Not so excited about that but it's needed! Please be praying that we are patient during this particular week.


Other Prayer Requests:
-Our visit with John's Uncle Bob and Aunt Raye. They live in Tennessee and we are going for a short trip before school starts.
-We use our time wisely as students.
-Child Care: there is not enough staff to properly run it this year so all female students are to work one morning a week. Some of the students I have talked with thus far are very upset with this decision. Please pray for their attitudes! It's a great opportunity to serve our fellow student Moms.
-Our marriage would be Christ focused. One year down... so far so good! ;)