September already??

Oh my word. I can not believe we are less than three weeks away from our departure date! Oh whee!

We had our last team meeting on Friday to go through our packing materials, and to go through our check lists of travel insurance, shots, meds, etc. It’s amazing how Zimbabwe is not covered by ANY travel insurance…eek! It’s not that it’s unsafe…it’s just that there’s nothing there. It’s like one of the few places you can’t get copter’d out from. Some of the other countries include Bosnia, Serbia and Macedonia…all of which I have been too. So thankful I had good health during my time in E Europe!

I am now taking suggestions for reading materials to take on the plane with me. My great friend, Carl, is letting me take his Kindle (woo woo!), but I wanted to take some books I could leave their with our friends. So far, I am taking, “Crazy Love.”

Much love, friends. Africa or bust!

A Few Steps Closer.

I was greatly greatly blessed this weekend by a business from my home town who has agreed to sponsor up to $1000 of my trip, depending how short I am on fund-raising as of September 15th. AMAZING! God is so good!!!

Our team has been in and out of the Doc the past few weeks getting shots and medication for malaria. September 15th we have our final team meeting before we depart the USA. So excited to get on the ground in Africa. Should have some updated, and more specific prayer requests soon!

Love.

We Have Our Tickets!

I can’t believe we are mere weeks away from our departure! So many things have happened. I’ve been a horrible blogger, but now that things are really picking up, you’ll be getting more updates!

First of all, we purchased our tickets! We depart from Austin on Thursday, October 7th, and connect through Washington DC to an EIGHTEEN HOUR FLIGHT to Johannesburg, South Africa. That…is a long flight. But I’m super excited…it will give us a chance to (hopefully) rest and build momentum as a team. From Jo-burg, we’ll drive north to Musha Weavana, Zimbabwe, and stay with families for about four days. We will spend time with the locals, and at the Orphanage, and spend a day driving around the country doing more research.

After our time in Zim, we will drive back to Jo-burg and fly to Cape Town for the remainder of our trip. We’ll be connecting with all kinds of local leaders, pastors, and people who want to help. I’m so ready!

Secondly, I have officially reached and surpassed my halfway point in fund raising! We are aiming for $3000 but believe our final costs may be as low as $2600. I’m officially at $1804, so I’m almost there! Praise God for the provision through His people!

So lastly it just comes down to being patient! Waiting on the funds and final details to fall into place–praying that God goes before us and that He continues to draw our team closer to one another.

Throughout the rest of August we’ll continue planning and fund-raising. In September I will get my shots (just Tetanus, thank goodness! HA!) and malaria meds.

I’ll keep you all updated! Thank you for your continued love and support!

All Kinds of Updates

As we draw closer to our ticket purchasing date, our team has begun kicking the fund-raising into high gear. I recently sent out a small round of letters to friends and family, while Sherry and I are also preparing for a garage sale this Saturday! I’ve updated my support page and encourage you to take a look to see how you can pray and donate!

We had our second team meeting last week. It was great, as always, to sit and talk about Africa. We need to be reminded why we are doing what we are doing, and not stress over the details! We talked and prayed together about who we don’t want to have a ton of planning. Yes, there are essentials like plane tickets and places to stay–even our car rentals (this is a HUGE endeavor in South Africa!). But we want to leave space to be lead by Christ and our purpose there. We want eyes to see a different culture, so that we may engage her fully and be able to tell others what we see.

Thanks for reading, friends! Please feel free to leave a comment or shoot me an email!

Social Media, For the Win!

I am so excited to report that yesterday I raised $124 via Facebook, by posting my donation link to my status. How cool is that?! Many generous souls donated anywhere from $1-$50 a click. With 2,104 friends, I knew someone would have to bite, ha!THANK YOU EVERYONE! I love that we are building our tribe with so many folks, who are graciously becoming involved in this process.

So how will I get the rest of the funds? I also sent out support letters today and I’m also waiting for Uncle Sam to send my tax refund. So far I’m banking just under $1000. Sherry and I are planning a Garage Sale in July. So, if you have junk you want to get rid of–let us sell it!

Thanks for reading!

The Plan

Our Team met last Saturday to discuss our plan to get to Africa and what we will be doing while we are there. While we’re still hashing out our plan on-the-ground, we know we are going to be spending approximately five days in Cape Town (the most southern red star) and five days in Zimbabwe.

As I previously mentioned, there’s a family who works for HELP that lives in Cape Town. They work so hard to help support our vision day to day. We will get to put a lot of faces with names, and connect with local leaders and pastore. While in Zim, we’ll be visiting our orphanage and staying with locals within the community, and basically just taking it all in–learning.

Our primary goal here, is relationship building. We also hope to encourage locals on how to give back to their community–helping to care for the widow and the orphan. It’s going to be exciting to get there!

Also, I have launched a donation campaign via Facebook today. I have over 2,000 friends on Facebook, and if they each gave one awesome, tax-deductible dollar, this will pay for my trip! For more information on how to donate you can visit the donation link at the top of the page, or go to: www.emily.bbnow.org. I have already raised $53! YAY! Social media rules.

Love to you all, and thank you for being part of my story.

The Journey Begins

I have been a volunteer with HELP since January when I worked my first garage sale. I immediatley fell in love with the vision, the plan and the hearts behind this organisation and knew when it was time to make a decsion about traveling abroad, that this was something Jesus had called me to.

I have always been a big advocate for, “if you pray for something, God will give you a heart for it.” I have seen this happen in my own life for other countries, people groups and even individuals. The power of prayer and the joy and strength God gives in our weakness is real, and this is exactly what God is doing between me and Africa.

I wanted to create a blog to document the entire story. The time I spend in Africa will not be the bulk of what happens. Our story begins now…in Austin Texas, as we prepare for this trip, and will continue upon our return as we implement new strategies on how to love and care for the orpahns. This is not going to be a place full of frilly words and pretty pictures, but rather an authentic account of something God is doing.

I’m most excited about meeting the people. Not only our friends working on the ground in Cape Town, but I will get to see the orphange that benefited from the garage sale we did back in January. Amazing! This is going to be a truly awesome experience.

Thanks for reading!