Summer travels...

Well... school is finally coming to a close. It was a big adjustment for the AAI community, with school being extended one month longer than last year to comply with the mandate from Ministerio de Educaccion (department of education).

So... today was my last day of actual classes. I will miss these kids. I'll cry later. I'll continue to be at school every day for the rest of the week, wrapping up paperwork and classroom cleanup. Josh is trying to do a lot of prep in the IT Dept. for when we return, as well as dealing with the everyday challenges. He will be done on Friday. He leaves for Denver on Sunday to attend an international IT in education conference with 15,000 people! Jessica, Bella, and I get on the 9:15am flight on Tuesday for the States. Josh meets me in St. Louis a day later. In our 5 weeks in the states, we will drive from St. Louis, to Danville, IL, to Green Bay, WI, to Mackinac Island, MI, to Speculator, New York, and back to St. Louis. At least most of that time we will be traveling with our family we miss so much.

We can't wait to spend some REAL quality time with our family and friends. We are exhausted in every way, and can't wait to recharge.

Dating Seminar

This year, Josh and I had the privilege of leading a a two-day dating seminar for the seniors for the third time. We completely scrapped everything we have done the last two years, because we felt like the needs for this year's senior class were unique. Some of them are completely checked out at this stage of their high school career, but we felt like most of them really listened and heard what we had to say. The main piece of wisdom we really wanted them to take to heart was that dating without the purpose of finding a spouse is completely selfish. That's a hard truth for many of today's young people to swallow. We pray that they would be involved in dating that is God-honoring, and with the aim to find out who they would like to marry.

Goodbyes...

Jessica with her great friend Abby - starting the goodbye process with 2 weeks left

Girls I have coached in the last two years of soccer - you will be missed!

It's that time of year again. Graduation... we just had the Baccalaureate service this past Sunday. Greg Collard, mentor for many kids at school, spoke about not wasting your life, and never knowing when you are going to die. It sounds like it could have been a little depressing, but he presented it in a really impactful, yet hopeful way :) It's hard to say goodbye to so many who were on my team - such beautiful, talented young women! I hope that maybe they experienced the love of Jesus this year...

Beach

A couple of weeks ago, Josh, Jessica, Bella, and I went to a little beach town called Jama. It's a crazy drive to get there through windy mountain roads, people passing on turns, and roads ending without any warning. Such an adventure :) We had a pretty good time - it was just nice to have some fresh air to breathe. The sun didn't show up, but the creepy crawlies sure did! A snake fell out of a tree a couple of inches in front of my face, which resulted in lots of screaming and falling backwards up the stairs onto Jess. We didn't notice any bugs, but all of us got eaten alive the first night! We got smart and drove 30 minutes to a bigger town to buy bug spray. We had a great time just playing board games, reading, napping, snacking, and enjoying the beautiful view!


From the first night -Owie!! I felt so bad

Sweet :)

The tide only went out around 4pm






Luckily these were too big to get in our rooms :)

Class Sponsoring

We finally got them to sit still for 1 second ;) We are sponsors for the class of 2012. We have a big year ahead of us, with several huge events to put on. It will be a challenge, but they are more than capable. We love them!!