HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Well Stephen is a quarter of a century now! What an accomplishment. We had a great time celebrating his birthday yesterday. I thought this picture was great and wanted to share it with you all. I made my first ever German Chocolate cake completely from scratch!! I was extremely excited and as you can see so was Stephen . . . and Roscoe!!

What's Going on with Us Up North

I have been putting of writting anything in our blog, mostly because so much has happened and I don't know where to start. So I will attempt to catch everyone up on what the Lord has been doing in Stephen and my life in the past month.

Stephen made his last trip of the semester to Fairbanks and he scared me half to death! Let me explain. Stephen and I have talked every day except once since meeting again in Kodiak. Even if it's a two minute, I'm doing great talk to you tomorrow, we talk. Well, he left for Fairbanks on a Friday night, and Saturday evening I was expecting a call, but it never came. I finally went to bed expecting him to call, but he never did. Sunday morning I awoke, with no phone call, so I was extremely worried, thinking my husband was frozen somewhere in Fairbanks. Well right as I was getting ready to go to church the phone rings, and it was Stephen (Praise the Lord!). He had laid down to take a nap at 4PM and slept straight through the night, and didn't wake up until 9AM. WOW!

Stephen has been staying extremely busy with school and work. It amazes me how he can juggle these two things so well, and still have time for Roscoe and me. He's always coming up with fun new ways to teach these kids and it is impossible to leave the house without at least five different children saying "Oh, there's Mr. Foreman! He's my counselor" and when the kids don't know him, they seem to know me. We love what we do and the children, but are more and more thankful for our little home to come home to.

I have been staying busy with our After School Programs at the Mission. If anyone is looking for a ministry opportunity please let me know. We are looking to hire at least one more preschool teacher/After School teacher. It is such an amazing opportunity!! Anyway, we had some guys come up from Baltimore, Maryland to volunteer with us and the one younger guy taught some of our kids how to play lacrosse (I'm terrible at it). The kids had a great time, and I looked pretty silly the entire time.

We had our first big snow storm of the year last week and the temperature has stayed pretty chilly! We're hopefully to be ice skating on the lakes and ponds soon! Stephen and I are really starting to enjoy Kodiak. Last year at this time we were very hope sick, and while we desperately miss our families, Kodiak has become our home. Last week I got to head out to Ouzinkie for the day. It was great to see the Mission there and talk with some of the people. Stephen then flew out to Karluk on Tuesday. It's another village on the other side of the island. He rode in a tiny plane with a few others to do some work at the small school of 12 children. He had a great time, but before the plane could pick him up that night, weather set in and he had to spend the night. I love it when the Lord's plans are clearly displayed and we can see His hand at work. We are so blessed to have a God that is so invested in all our lives. He returned Wednesday afternoon and went directly to school.

We are both extremely excited for our Thanksgiving break! The kids only have one day of school this week and then Parent Teacher Conferences on Tuesday and Wednesday. Stephen has to be there, but should be able to come home on time!! We decided to do a couple of house painting projects. We're very excited! Oh, and we got our turkey this weekend!!

I put a lot of pictures on this blog, so I'd better explain them just a little bit.

1. Stephen took the first picture on his way back from Karluk on Wednesday morning.

2. On the flight back he got to sit in the front with the pilot. He's said he was ready to land the plane if anything happened to the pilot!

3. This beautiful shot was from my trip out to Ouzinkie on Monday, just off Spruce Island.

4. This was the plane Stephen road out to Karluk on.

5. The play ground in Karluk.

Some of our Friends

Here are some of the wonderful people Stephen and I get to work with. Joel is next to Stephen, then Katie, Corey and under Corey is Emily. The little girl by me is one of our little Ouzinkie friends.

My Favorite Places!

I have a few favorite places in this world. One will always be my room at our old farm house. I loved waking up on a beautiful summer morning. The great feeling of stretching my feet out from under my cool covers, hearing the beautiful music of the birds, and the busy farm yard full of hungry sheep and steers. Just writing it I can almost smell the fresh summer breeze. Another one of my favorite places in the whole world also come from that old farm house. I loved waking up on school vacation days and tip toeing to my sister's room and hopping in bed with her. We'd lay there and just talk. Well the old farm house is nearing destruction and I'm pretty sure Jess wouldn't appreciate me hopping in bed with him and Jill when I'm home at Christmas so I'm finding new favorite places. I found one of them when I was in Ouzinkie this summer and returning last weekend solidified it. There's an old bridge just off the road and every time I look at it I have to stop and take it all in.

Anyway, yes we went to Ouzinkie last weekend with most of the people from the Mission. It was great, but tiring. The kids were of course amazing as usual, and on Sunday two of them sat on either side of me with their heads laying comfortably on my shoulders. It was a great bonding time for the Mission and extremely exciting to see even more clearly the renewed vision of KBM.

We didn't get home until around 10PM. It made for a long week, but it was totally worth it!

Our Cone Head Dog

So our extremely healthy, mountain climbing, fearless dog Roscoe started limping a couple weeks back and being the farm girl I am there was no way I was taking my dog to the vet! Stephen and I were going to become vets and take care of our little dog. Well, that lasted a few days until we realized that things were not getting better and we also realized that Roscoe really has become our only child and we like it when he's happy. Well the vet gave us some medicine, and that was suppose to be it. however the worst was yet to come. Roscoe had to wear a cone and he never got us to it. The next few days were miserable as we watched Roscoe run into everything and try to knock himself out with incredible blows to his head to get the cone off. It never worked! Anyway, he's better now and we're sooooo happy!

Just a day in the Foreman family!

Our First Kodiak Brown Bear

In all our business Stephen and I have still managed to make a few great memories. One evening we were both pretty tired, but that morning we had decided that we wanted to go fishing. Well the weather had taken a turn for the worse and rain was coming down pretty good, but we braved the elements and headed to our favorite fishing spot! Right when we got there the Lord just cleared the skies and it was a magnificent fall evening. I don't think I can explain just how wonderful it is to have a husband that loves doing the same things as me. We were both in our element as we began fishing. Huge Silver Salmon were jumping all around us and it wasn't long before my line started moving fast! A beautiful Silver had taken hold and Wow! what a rush as Stephen and I worked together to land it. Just one Silver makes about four meals for the two of us, so of course we were excited.
Well as the evening went on Stephen snagged two, but according to the rules you can't keep them. So, even thought the few people around us said "They wouldn't say anything" we made the right choice. Anyway news had traveled down the river that a bear had been seen a little earlier and Stephen and I decided that it was time to probably get going anyway. Stephen began cleaning our salmon and I was watching. Well I happened to stand up, turn around and about 30 feet away was a HUGE Kodiak Brown Bear!!!!! I couldn't breathe and managed to squeak out a few words to Stephen pretty much "Bear" (in hushed tones). This big bear had himself all hunched over scooping up Salmon out of the river. It was one of the most amazing sights I've ever seen. Well it wasn't long before we both realized that our blooding hands (from cleaning the fish) probably needed to get moving. The bear was pretty interested in the river and we didn't want his attention to head in any other direction, mainly ours! So we quietly scurried away.
What a wonderful adventure!

Keeping Our Heads Above Water!

I can't believe it has been a month since our last post. So much has happened since then and I will try to catch everyone up!

Stephen is loving his job as an elementary school counselor, his only complaint is that the 6th grade girls at both schools think he's cute and always want counseling. He has also begun work towards his masters degree. Last weekend he had to travel to Fairbanks for some classes and left Roscoe and me at home for the weekend. He got back into Kodiak Monday morning and had to go right to school for the day.

We're staying busy with our youth group as well. We have been very convicted to speak as plainly has we can to our kids. It is truly our desire that they don't fit into this world but stand out as true Christ Followers. We keep thinking that we will scare them off, but the group continues to grow and that causes Stephen and me to be stretched more and more.

As far as I go, well I'm a bit overwhelmed, but loving my job at the Mission. KACLAC (Kodiak Alaska Community Learning Activity Center) an after school program designed for students that need a bit more academic help or just a place to go after school started last Monday. We bring our staff into the schools to do the activity time each day. At first it was very difficult for me because we cannot have our devotions or chapel time like we do in our programs at the Mission, but I'm convinced that we can speak the name of Jesus through our actions and how we interact with these children. I love when they ask questions about Jesus because we get to tell them all about where our hope comes from. Praise the Lord for the opportunity to speak his name throughout the community.

It snowed for the first time on October 6th! Yep! I was out on my run and it started coming right down. The mountains will be covered in no time!

Please keep us in your prayers. We need the strength of the Lord all the time and the powerful prayers of His people!