February and A Little of March 2009

At the beginning of February, we headed over to Detroit for a day (actually less than 24 hours) for Cornerstone's missions fest. They had a seminar called Track 2 for those interested in pursuing what God might have for them in full time missions. Throughout the day we heard from several missionaries and learned many valuable things from their experience. It was great to reconnect with familiar faces and friends, many with similar passions and life goals. It was a short and snappy trip because Andrew left the next morning for the Biblical Counseling Conference in Lafayette, IN.

Before he took off for the conference, we had a romantic brunch at a little restaurant in Holland. Did I mention that was the most we've ever paid for breakfast? It was worth every penny. Good thing we had Holland Bucks (gift certificate for many stores in Holland). At the conference, Andrew really enjoyed learning and being in a class type setting for 12 hours a day. The biggest thing that emphasized at the conference was that God's Word has all the answers for life's problems. By far though, the highlight had little to do with the content being taught at the conference. After the first break on the first full day, Andrew came around the corner and much to my surprise was Chip Dean (his best man in our wedding, who he hadn't seen since that day since he lives in Alabama). It was good to hang out and reconnect with a good friend. By the end of the week, he was ready to get home to his beautiful bride :)

Meanwhile, back in Grandville, Kate was plugging away at her clinicals. She finished up her med/surg clinicals. It was really neat to see how much she grew in confidence from the begining of the clinical until the end. By the last week, she was asking to have two patients! In the week between finishing med/surg and begining pediatrics, Kate had her second nursing theory exam and got an A (finally) on the test! The next week, Kate started her pediatric rotation. She has been waiting since the begining of nursing school for this clinical! She hopes that God will allow her to be a peds nurse when she graduates.

Kate realized this month that she is half way through the actual nursing program and so she went to a health career job fair here in Grand Rapids. She was going more for the experience for when she will graduate and have to be interviewed. She talked with a number of different people from hospitals across Michigan, including a recruiter from Metro Health Hospital here in Grand Rapids. He told her about a summer nursing externship (basically she would follow around a nurse for 24 hours a week and not get paid...but it would look good on the resume for the future) and she went home and applied for it that night. Got a call the next morning for an interview and sat down the following week with someone from the hospital. The interview went really well, but still uncertain if she could sacrifice that many hours a week on top of the class load she is already carrying for the summer. We are waiting to see what her class and clinical schedule will be to determine if she can do it.

January 09

We can't believe that this month is practically over, and February is almost here. The time has flown by. Andrew has had a change in his work schedule which has made our schedules pretty much the opposite of each other (Kate has classes/clinicals during the day and Andrew is working afternoon shift usually). The new schedule allows two ES supervisors to be working at the same time, so it is nice that they can interact and hang out with the men more then they were able to before. Kate is enjoying her new semester. It is keeping her super busy! She is in her Med/Surg clinicals at the hospital, taking care of progressive care patients (its a step down from ICU and a step above a regular adult medical/surgical floor). They are really sick patients, but she is learning SO much from them and able to do so many more things than before. This week she had her own patient for the first time this semester and really enjoyed helping the patient and meeting their needs. Andrew has also been preparing for the Biblical Counseling Confrence (in Lafeyette, IN) that is coming up February 8-13. He is reading a book called How People Change, by Paul Tripp, to help get ready for the confrence. Please pray for him that week as he learns and is challenged to grow. This conference is something we can be doing now to help us with present and FUTURE ministry opportunities.

Hope you have had a GREAT January and not too much snow :)

Journeying Into 2009

We finished off 2008 with a Sunday School class party at Zach and Anne Gembis's house. We had a fun time playing games, eating, and fellowshipping with our friends from church. Kate had an allergic reaction to something she ate, and her bottom lip was pretty swollen. She took some Benadryl and it went down though the next morning. On Sunday afternoon, we went to the Stauch's house, ate lunch, and the same thing happened…but this time it was the top lip and her fingers and it was a lot worse. So we spent the afternoon at the doctor's office. They don't know what caused it, and we can't seem to find the correlation between New Years Eve and Sunday (had completely different foods). So now we have steroids and two other meds to help Kate get better. Please pray that we and the doctor can figure out the cause…it is unsettling not to know the source of the reaction.

Closing the door on 2008, we want to remember many of the GOOD things God blessed us with this year.

· Kate got into Nursing School, started it, and has already passed 2 semesters. She really loves school and learning how to care for people.

· Andrew has been able to reach and impact many men's lives at the Holland Rescue Mission.

· We have loved becoming involved with our church family, Sunday School class, and small group.

· We celebrated our 2^nd year of marriage in July.

· We were able to take a vision trip to Bethesda Outreach Ministry in South Africa this past August. We loved learning more about this ministry and being able to serve the kids, houseparents, and missionaries.

· Dad Dodd's surgery, in June, went well. The doctors got all the cancer out, he lost 40+ pounds, and he got to spend a week here in Grandville with us as he recovered.

· Grandma Galloway was promoted to heaven in February after a battle with ALS. We miss you Grandma and can't wait till we see you again.

· We welcomed our first niece, Elizabeth, into the Schneider and celebrated the 1^st birthday of our first Dodd niece, Natalie.

As we journey into 2009, we are eagerly anticipating how God will use us at work, school, church, and the relationships we are able to have with the people around us. We are looking forward to Kate's graduation (12/12/09), the Eagles winning the Super Bowl J, the Biblical Counseling training Andrew will do in February, Kyle's graduation from high school, Kate graduating (we are just a tiny bit excited to graduate! Can you tell?), and whatever is next in the journey that we may not even know about yet. Happy 2009!

Christmas Celebrations 2008

The last two weeks have been a whirlwind for the Dodds. We left on December 23 after Andrew got off work and headed up to Lake Ann through a snowstorm. It took us 4 hours to make a normally 2 to 2 1/2 hour trip. It was snowing and really windy and so we just took our time getting up north. We made it safely in and our new car was such a blessing, not sure if we would have made it up some of the hills and around some of the turns if we had been in the 99 Ford Escort. We spent Christmas Eve and Christmas Day at Mom and Dad Dodd's home. It was so wonderful to relax and have fun with them. On Christmas Eve, we played games, watched the old version of the Christmas Carol, ate beef stick and cheese, and made Andrew's new favorite pizza "Buffalo Chicken Pizza". It was so great to celebrate old traditions and enjoy time together. We had Monkey Bread and Sausage, Egg, and Cheese Muffins on Christmas morning when we woke up. We had a wonderful time of giving and receiving gifts (we had been saving some of their gifts since our trip to Africa). Later on, we all bundled up and went and took pictures out in the snow! It was SO fun and crazy!! They had at least 3 1/2 or 4 feet of snow. It was taller than me in some of the piles. Made snow angels and had a great time laughing and playing in the snow. After warming up and hot cocoa, we had an amazingly yummy Christmas dinner and played some more games together. Our time with them went by too fast! It was a blessing to celebrate and remember the birth of Christ together.

Friday morning, the 26th, we packed up our car Roxy and headed diagonally across the state to Clinton Township. The weather was much better for this traveling day. We arrived at the Schneider home and spent the evening playing a new game we got from Andrew's parents called Balderdash. The next morning, we woke up early and headed to Grandma M's house to take her out to breakfast and celebrate Christmas with her. Grandma can no longer see, so we got her a carved ebony elephant from South Africa as a gift. It was so neat to see her face light up when she recognized the shape of the animal and she was so appreciative of us thinking of the perfect gift for her. We we got home, later that morning, Kevin and Angela and Elizabeth arrived. We spent the afternoon with them and the rest of Kate's family (and G as well) talking, playing with the baby, and playing a new game Kevin had gotten (we sure do like to play games huh?). Mom made lasagna for dinner, and afterward we all exchanged gifts and had the annual Christmas stocking game (you have to guess what the wrapped gifts in your stocking are, whoever has the most points wins). Fun times, lots of laughter and smiles, and memories made. We headed home to Granville the next afternoon after church. It was great to be back home and back into the routine of life here.

Our families are such an important part of our lives, and we are so blessed to have such wonderful, loving, encouraging people who care about us. We thank the Lord for each of you for the impact you make in our lives!

Our 2008 Christmas

Merry Christmas Everyone!!
We woke up on Christmas Sunday and there was SO much snow and it was really really windy with super cold temperatures. Church was canceled :( so we decided to celebrate Christmas early, since we will be traveling and visiting family for Christmas. We exchanged gifts with each other. Andrew surprised Kate with many fun things including a digital picture frame and she surprised him with a photobook of all the blog postings we made while in South Africa. We like pictures...can ya tell by our gifts? It was so fun to spend the whole day together and celebrate Christ's coming to the world. We also had Christmas dinner later that day and made steak for the first time in our apartment. Yumm! We can't believe that we already were celebrating our THIRD Christmas together. Time has been flying on our journey together. We are praying that you have a wonderful Christmas!

Here is our Christmas Card for 2008. We decided that since we had sent out multiple mailings this year, we would do an E-Card for Christmas. Enjoy!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Roxy

We had an unexpected week. We found ourselves on Monday afternoon car shopping. Sandy had died, while slipping on the ice and hitting a cub and the damages to repair where more than she was worth. Kate being off of school was a blessing first because Andrew could than use her car to get to work and secondly because she got to have a lot of time to do the homework of finding and researching a car. After looking at several cars, we test drove a car on Wednesday night and were lied to several times by the salesman and so we got up and left. We regrouped and continued looking for cars. It was important for us to find a fuel efficient car (Andrew drives 40 miles to and from work each day) and looking to the future, something we could grow into someday. Saturday, we test drove a 2004 Pontiac Vibe, and we loved it! We were able to get financing we could afford, and we drove away with Roxy that afternoon. We were so thankful for God's provision even in uncertain times.

Andrew and Kate's Christmas Tree 3.0

Oh Christmas Tree! Oh Christmas Tree!

This past Saturday, December 6, Andrew and I braved a snowstorm to get our Christmas tree. We had been planning to go on this day, so we stuck to our plan and headed out to the Christmas Tree farm. Last year when we went and chopped down the tree it was pouring rain, and our frist christmas we went and got our tree when it was snowing lightly...we always make it an adventure when we go! We found the perfect little tree, a 5 foot Douglas Fur Tree, and Andrew chopped it down. It is always an adventure afterwards to figure out how to fit the tree in our little Ford Escort, but it made it in and we got it safely back to our apartment.

Since it was finals on Monday and Tuesday, I studied all weekend, and we waited til Wednesday to decorate the tree. Finals went well, but I am still waiting for my grades. So glad to finally get a little break to relax. We decorated the tree today (Wednesday). I love decorating the tree and putting all the ornaments on it; each ornament has a memory and means something special. Looking forward to making Christmas cookies and Grandpa's fudge and seeing all of our family for Christmas!

Thanksgiving 2008