california pictures

Here are a few pictures from my trip to LA earlier in June. The image resolution isn't the greatest as we've had to revert to our older camera.

my office

for those of you who know me (joel) well, you'll understand that I've wanted my own office for qute some time now. i think the idea of an office as a creative and personal space is something that has appealed to me for so long now. now, for some, the office is something to be escaped at the end of the day and week, but for me, while I love and need to go home at the end of the day, having an intentional space that is my own, is sublime.

so, now that we're here at New Tribes Bible Institute, I finally have my own office and I must say, it's quite spacious.

after several days of painting and prepping and moving in some furniture that I was able to borrow (after a while, I'd actually like to build my own furniture), began the task of making the space mine. I'd been collecting books and magazines, appropriate textbooks and journals, all kinds of things that I thought would be perfect for my office. and after a few different arrangements I got it just right.

now, there are a few of my teammates here at the school who don't know this side of me, the ametuer interior designer, the architecture buff, the creative type and several of them after giving good feedback made the assumption that Bethany must have helped, at least in arranging the pictures on the wall. I sheepishly said, 'no, actually I did it all...', not sure what they'll think.

but in the end, I love my office and am thankful for this unique to me blessing from God.

can you ever imagine anyone else saying that about their office...

Jack

 

Owen

 

Bethany and the Boys

 

Joel and Jack

 

Jack's new pediatrician

We have found a new pediatrician here for Jack and were able to get in to see him on Thursday of last week.  Going through the whole history with him was tedious but we were the last appointment of the day and he was a great listener through it all.  We asked him about transferring Jack's care from the Ped. GI specialist in St. Louis to one in Ann Arbor and he had some things he wanted us to try first.  Since we had some short success with taking Jack off of soy and milk, he wanted to try that again for a longer period of time.  He also wanted to get Jack onto a fiber supplement to help "bulk him up".  So this week we started the fiber and next week we'll begin elliminating milk and soy from his diet.  I am a bit intimidated still by this but being home in the states sure makes it a whole lot easier.  The labels here on foods are reliable and most even say if they contain milk or soy so that you don't have to read every ingredient.  After a few weeks without these things in his diet, we'll have a good idea if they were causing his diarreah.  Then we'll try reintroducing them one at at time and see how he reacts.  If we don't find that those eliminations help him, we'll begin to take him off of anything containing gluten.  The doctor felt like that even though Jack tested negative to Celiac disease, it was worth trying th elimination of gluten from his diet to see if that was causing his problem.  * He currently has a patient much like Jack who also tested negative for Celiac but has had success in eliminating the diarreah by eliminating gluten.  But we won't go there yet.  For now, increase fiber and decrease milk and soy.  Jack did weigh in within the 75^th % for his weight and the 95^th for his height so that was great news!

 

Thanks for praying and we'll keep you posted!

 

 

back-blogging - LAUNDRY!

Ok, so it’s proving to be difficult to keep everyone up to date with our lives having the internet isolated in our bedroom upstairs in our house.  I don’t spend much time up here so I don’t see the computer much through the day.  So I’m going to do what I call “back-blogging” today.  Let’s go back a few weeks, shall we?

 

Joel went to California for something like 6 days to handle the transferring of our stuff, which came by boat from Indonesia.  That trip went well for him as he got most of what he had to do done in a couple of days and then just enjoyed the sights of LA.  He actually had the audacity to call me from Malibu to tell me he was having lunch at a little beach café there, overlooking the water.  You can guess my response, while I was home with the two boys alone… “just be quiet!  You are not nice!” Or something like that!  I am glad though, that he got the time away and that it wasn’t all work and no play.  For that makes Joel a dull boy, as the saying goes!

 

He made it home safely and we three survived the week without daddy – Praise the Lord!  We have, since then, continued with some things around the house to get everything settled that we brought with us from Missouri, before the next load arrived and so when, last Friday, we got the call to go get it at the warehouse, we were ready to begin the process again. Or so I thought!  Little did I remember that we had shipped home box after box of clothes, bedding, and towels.  Ok so think with me on this.  How many loads of laundry do you suppose it took to wash say, 6 rubbermaids of “stuff”?  Thirty-six!  Yes that’s 3 – 6, 36 loads!  Thankfully I didn’t have to resort to only using our washer and dryer but was able to take everything over to the school laundry room and do 18 loads at a time.  The washing wasn’t so bad and the drying was actually easier, as they have industrial sized dryers that dry like 4 loads at once in about 30 minutes!  It was the folding that just about killed me!  I left the house at 12:30 and came home around 5.  Whew!  I was tired and hot but it was all done. 

 

Meanwhile, Joel was home doing load after load of dishes, by hand, mind you, to wash all the pots and pans, tupperware, etc. that was shipped home.  After a month on a ship, no telling what nastiness was on it all.  It took us about 4 days to get everything put away, but now I am happy to say, we are settled in with no boxes to unpack!  I am happy to be “home” and to finally get our lives in order again!

Father's Day

I asked Joel the other day what he would like to do for Father's Day and we came up with a picnic at the park Saturday.  Great idea!  Well, this is Michigan and that means the weather is completely unpredictable.  We actually decided to wait till the boys got up from naps that afternoon to go so when it rained that morning, we were thankful we still had several hours for things to dry out.  At around 2pm, things were looking good. The sun was out, the grass was green, not too hot, not too cold.  Joel and I had a relaxing Saturday afternoon curled up on the couch watching movies and reading books.  Perfect day.  We got the boys up a little later than planned but then headed to the park.  As we drove away from the house, Joel looked to the sky and noted the very BIG storm clouds heading our way.  He looked at me with that question in his eyes, "do we keep going, or do we turn around and go home?"  I said, "let's go!" so we did.  Jack was totally excited to get to play at a park and I just couldn't dissapoint him. 

 

We got to the park and it was full of people, so we obviously weren't the only ones with this great idea.  We laid out the blanket, unloaded the van, and then took note of how much time we had before it dumped rain on us.  I guessed 30 – 40 minutes.  Enough time to grill some hot dogs, right?  Well, yes if you remembered the matches to light the grill.  Ooops!  What now?  There's a Wendy's around the corner, we could go get hamburgers to have with the other food we brought.  Ok, sure, great idea and that will give us a chance to see if the rain will pass by.  Now, load us all back in the van and drive to Wendy's.  We got the burgers, parked the van in front of a much more empty park, hmmm, everyone's leaving – ah, they're just chicken of  a little rain.  Not us! 

 

I set out the blanket again and got Jack out and as we began unloading again, it began to sprinkle.   Ok, so we decided to feed the boys in the van and wait it out since it looked like it would pass over quickly.  We fed the boys without a drop of rain falling the entire time!  Hmmm, ok well we'll go play now.  As soon as we got out and I laid the blanket out once more, it started raining again!  By this time, Jack and I were already on the blanket and I had grabbed our big umbrella so I looked at Joel and Owen over at the van and said, "we're not going anywhere.  Come on, we'll eat our popsicles in the rain, under the ubrella.  It will be a great memory!  So that's what we did!  And when we were done, so was the rain and we finally got to play. 

 

It wasn't an ideal picnic but it was a memorable one.  Joel won't easily forget this father's day!

a long overdue update

This will be brief as it's been a long day and several more like it lay ahead.  Joel left today for California, just arriving a few moments ago.  He will be there till Saturday and tomorrow and Wednesday will be arranging for the transfer of our container which arrived last week.  He has to get it from the shipping company that shipped it from Indo to the shipping company that will deliver it here to us in Michigan.  Lucky guy couldn't get a ticket back using his frequent flyer miles till Saturday so Thursday and Friday he'll spend bumming around LA and lounging at the beach, while I, Bethany tough it out here with the boys alone!  He owes me now, don't you think? 

 

We are settling nicely to our house here in Jackson.  We feel so blessed by how God has taken such good care of us here.  We had a warm welcome when we arrived and have just been surrounded by great people.  We haven't posted lately because, well you've heard it all before, the Potters are settling in…again!  Things will pick up again when Joel gets back and we get this next round of boxes unpacked.  I am guessing that midway through next week he'll start working over at the school.  He is taking over for a guy who is leaving  so he'll be learning the ropes from him as to what his days will look like.  Joel is super excited about this ministry and can't wait to get started.  For the boys and I, the rest of the summer will just see us settling into a routine.  I am learning to enjoy being home all day with them, with only Joel, the boys and the house to occupy my time.  A few weeks before school starts, I'll begin working a few hours in the office and then when school actually begins, the boys will start into the childcare program in the mornings while I work in the office. 

 

We have already begun getting excited to see who God will bring our way as far as the students go.  With Joel leading the worship team, we think that God will probably have them be our focus for the first semester at least.  We can't wait to meet them, have them in our home and just be able to plug into their lives.  I know we'll learn from them as much or more as they will from us!

 

So that's our life in a nutshell right now.  Thanks to the annonymous commenter for reminding me to update the blog.  Sometimes we need a little kick in the pants to get us going!

 

Bethany