Jesus is the Reason?

I am praying that you would have the best Christmas. Enjoy the friends and family and prosperity you have but please don't forget to celebrate the birth of our Jesus. If you are anything like me it will have to be a choice. I am still being intentional in pursuing what God has layed on my heart - I will choose to include the KING OF kings and LORD OF lords both on Christmas day intentionally - as a choice - my hope being that one day it will become as natural to include Him as it has become to unknowingly exclude Him. That is my deepest desire and prayer.

I'd love to hear how you made choices to include Jesus in your celebration this year. Let's encourage one another in taking Christmas back in JESUS mighty Name!

Out of Commission and a new kind of Christmas....

Well soon after my last post - I got very sick. I had a vicious virus that ravaged my body and left me out of commission for 13 days. Annie - who is sitting beside me - gave it to me. She's great at sharing. The first night I was vomitting so violently that I called the Nellie the Nurse at 2:30 am. Since you don't know her, you have no idea how sick I had to have been to call her at 2:30 am. I had thrown up 10 times in 3 hours and had no sign of things getting better. I lost count that night at 15 times - - it wasn't fun to count anymore. I was sick in bed for 4 days straight hydrating myself with energy drink and after that I began to eat crackers and digestives but the cramping and pain that went along with eating anything kept me to that alone for the first 7

days. I slowly recovered over the next week.

This week I have been able to eat normally and I am locating the 10+ lbs I lost last week and trying to stay hydrated.

There are a lot of things heppening this week to come - its the last week of the semester and is going to be busy for sure. 7 of our dorm students will not be back for next semester - some because they are graduating and some because they are moving back to a location where they will be with their parents. For all of them it is the best choice but it will be hard to lose them - I have grown to love them and to care for them deeply and this will be the hardest part of my job - saying goodbye....

Many have been asking what I am doing for Christmas - here's the update:

I will not be going to Canada For my break. I have no rich friends and so the 2500$ it would cost to fly home is not possible or wise when I have to pay for my flight home this summer. I am still hoping that God provides that money sooner than later because I will be staffing an international conference for ACSI (Association of Christian Schools International) in New York. It will be a great time of blending my gifts and my passion for equipping and mentoring as an advisor in the dorming strain. Kristi is going tobe on Staff for Pre-Field Orientation too as well as my good friend Sheryl, so it allows for ministry and fellowship with friends from around the world too.

SO this is what I will be doing this Christmas break in Malaysia...

THIS Sunday I will be having my my sister Carley's best friend Tabitha fly into Penang ! My first guest! I will be spoiling her in fine form. We are known for our food and I will be making sure she has her fill! She is a missionary with her husband in Thailand and I will be heading her way to visit her in January.

School ends next Thursday and then I am off for a while. My dear friend Brandi has offered her beautiful apartment and Toyota to use while she and her husband are in the states. It will be so good to be off campus - it will feel like a holiday. They have a nice pool and its ocean views are so beautiful. She and her girls set up all their Christmas decorations including a tree and and windows FULL of snowflakes so I will feel at home. She is pretty incredible that way. I am well loved. I will be spending some time with friends who are here for the break. We are going to explore this place I live. We are going to Kuala Lumpar for a couple of days with some of them.

When I think about Christmas this year, it just doesn't 'feel' like Christmas. I think that's because it hasn't been the focus. All things "Christmas" will be stripped away this year, no presents, none of the food that I am used to, None of our traditions, no stocking, no snow, no playing games or watching our Christmas movies, my nativity scene that I had lovingly packed up somehow did not make it into my suitcases, no seeing all the people who only come 'home' at Christmas and the sacrafice of all the sacrafices I have had in moving across the world, no family. I will not wake up in the same house as my kid JoAnne which is very hard and I have 8 nieces and nephews who get wads of quality Aunt Lana time at Christmas! I get to have my sisters both there and we love being together. We swim as a family and play games, watch movies and are focusing on each other and time. For someone with a primary love language of quality time - there are few things better in my life.

So now, facing a Christmas that is unlike any Christmas before - I am challenged by God to first acknowledge that Christmas has not really been about Jesus in these past years of my life. Its been about a lot of good things - but it is kind of odd to celebrate something that is named after Christ and supposidly has Him as the central focus and then realize that He hasn't been. SO I am starting some personal traditions this year - time to intentionally invite my Savior to His party. I invite you to keep me accountable and ask what I did on Christmas day. I confessed this revelation to the kids in my dorms during "God Time" this week (devos I do with each dorm each week). I am choosing to be intentional and want these traditions to stick and for Christmas to return to its intended celebration - My Savior, Jesus Christ who came to earth as a baby boy in Bethlehem. He came to save me and I would be living in death without Him in my life. That is something worth celebrating.

On Christmas afternoon, other staff from Dalat who are going to be around for that day, including a couple of close ones will be getting together to eat supper together. I am glad to have some people to celebrate with.

I am also hosting 3 of my friends from Saskatchewan, Melissa and her parents Steve and Colleen. They are all living in Taiwan right now and so will be coming her for their break. They will be coming to Stay with me from the 26th - 29th of December and I am very much looking forward to their visit! I haven't seen Melissa since last summer when she was home but we have been friends since I was in highschool and she is going to be special to me forever. Her parents have always been kind to me and fun to be around!

In the new year I am going to go to Thailand. My friend Bronwyn and I are going to Bankok for a few days and then meeting Shauna and Jasmane in Chaing Mai for a conference with Joyce Meyer and Darlene Zschech from Hillsongs as the worship leader. It will be a lot of fun!! We are looking forward to the Chaing Mai night market which is supposed to be awesome AND I am going to ride an elephant and ride a raft down the river! I am so amazed that this is my life.

I come back here to go to Staff retreat for a couple days and then we have 5 days more to rest before the kids show up. It will be a perfect blend between restful and heart-full.

What are you doing this Christmas to invite Jesus?

OUT OF ORDER

The Posts you are about to see are out of order - but You'll catch on...

It should go - Botanical, Spiritual Retreat, Momma Mia - What I saw today...

I just uploaded the pictures in the other order and then finished the posts and they decided to publish in the order that the pictures were downloaded instead of the order I published them in... Oh for the love of technology!

ENJOY anyway :) I have just made it easier for you to leave a comment so feel free to do so on any or all of these new posts!

Love You all!

Spiritual Retreat day...

This is me on my spiritual retreat day... It was my very first day in 14 weeks that I ventured out in a car alone (other than to dorm). I had meetings till almost 11 with my dorm team and then I borrowed Aunt Nellies car and went out to the Farthest Coffee Bean I had been to and thought I could navigate alone and spent the day there. I got a fun drink and if you look out the window you can see I am just a stones throw from the water. It was a nice view - airconditioned - had a great drink - only 2 people actually came in the whole day and both bought and left - I pretty much had the place to myself! The wireless was down which was good - no possibility of distraction!

As I prayed about what to 'do' on my spiritual retreat day - i felt God just asking me to spend time with Him. To rest and to just enjoy a day away from my life and in His presence.
What a joy
The Creator of all things, the King of Kings and LORD of Lords,
He wanted to just spend time with me.
Overwhelmed
I was intentional in inviting Him into that time. I prayed, journalled, read the first 6 chapters in "THE Shack" - a book I have wanted to read but just have't found the time and I even dozed a bit here and there. It was entirely peaceful and I loved getting away with Jesus.

When was the last time You set aside a day to commune with your Saviour?

I am blessed that our bosses see such value in this and put our spiritual health as a priority in meeting with us each week and also in making time for us to have 2 spiritual retreat days a semester. What a good investment...

Botanical Gardens and the Monkeys I saw!!!

ON Thursday my 4 middle schoolers in Jackson dorm had no school because of parent teacher interviews so I had them home with me. It was a great chance to spend time with them in a small group and just have more of those moments to feel special than they would get in a group of 16. It was a pretty incredible day together. We started off with them all getting up the same time as the rest of the dorm for breakfast - now I saw no logic in that but evidently the boys had been waiting all week for my special eggs and couldn't wait to get up!

The girls both have an older sister who had to go to school and though they tried they couldn't sleep through that.

I definately slept in if I could on days off even when I was in gr. 7 and 8.

A flower floating down the river on the water.

There were beautiful flowers and trees everywhere in the Botanical Gardens. It was very rainforest'ish and Brandi and Kyra were with us... or we were with them! Brandi texted me to say they were going and asked if I wanted to come.

I said "SURE! if I can bring my 4 kids along".

We had the best time with these four...

This is a Frangapanni. They are very common here and often have pink in them also. This was one that had fallen from the tree it was on. My kids were having so much fun running all over the grassed hills and hanging out. We had a frisbee and football and they just were enjoying being out and free. I told them to stay together and within Whistle shot... :) Brandi was amazed at how much like real brothers and sisters they were. That is the cool thing about our family style dorms. They have boys and girls of all ages in each dorm to encourage the family atmosphere and it works marvelously (most of the time!) .

The Botanical gardens are quite famous for the 'wreched monkeys' - lots of people carry a stick which discourages them from approaching. You shouldn't bring food and its a big no no to feed them though we saw a guy doing it and thus I captured a few good close-ups.
They look cute but will scratch you for food.

There are a lot of kinds of monkeys in the park too - we saw ones much bigger than these but they were a long ways off. Overall - is crazy to me to walk in jungle rainforest areas and see wild monkeys wandering about.
I always say to myself "Dorthy, you are not in Kansas anymore!"


And these are the real monkeys! There was a waterfall that ran down into a river that was as deep as past the knees in places - well - being a responsible adult, I suggested that we all get in! I am sure that will not come as a big surprise to most of you!
I took pictures and so I wasn't in on the waterfights... next time!
Brandi and Kyra, myself and the kids played in the water for a long time.

The girls and their Aunt Lana!

These are some of the beautiful kids that I get to love on every week!
Where else in the world would I be spending time with an American (who grew up in Africa and Cambodia), a Tanzanian, A Korean and a Cambodian student in one day. This is a picture of my life at Dalat and there is no where I'd have picked to be rather than with these 4 that day.

After we finished we stopped for Slurpees on Aunt Lana!

What a great joy my job is - If you are jealous right now - you should be!

Momma MIA!!!

A woman who teaches part time at our school is the PARTY Queen. She love throwing parties and has a great space to do it in. She invited a whole wack of ladies over to watch "Momma Mia". We didn't have to bring anything - and the spread was all greek food and AMAZING - BUT we did have to 'dress-up' as a traveller or as someone from the 70's (as the movie was set in the 70's and is all based around ABBA songs).

Me and My friend Brandi!

Here's Bron, Me, Jas and Tracey posin for the camera!

Me and Vi and Sharla (she has the same name as my SISTER!)

Well, about this point in the evening my camera died! But so many good memories are better left on other cameras or etched into our brains... SO many funny moments were had and I was glad I was able to go! I am usually working till 12 on Friday nights and miss out on so many of these fun times so it was such a blessing to have my

spiritual retreat day followed by such rich fellowship!

What I saw today...

I spent the morning on the beach with Brandi and her 3 incredible and Beautiful daughters and then went over to the resort next door to swim with the girls for a bit before they went home for lunch - When they went I stayed and swam and read and swam and read and finished my afternoon with a nap on a lounger under these palm trees. When I woke up - this is exactly what I saw... I love my life... Come Visit anytime...