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There are so many things going on!  We recently finished our Missionary Tech class. I’m not going to say it was my favorite class; it was a lot more up TJ’s alley if you know what I mean. I was exposed to a lot of things that I haven’t been exposed to before and that was definitely beneficial, but I’m probably not going to remember all the facts about how to set up my solar panels:) However, I did learn how to solder and feel like I could do that again confidently and by myself if I needed to… so Yaaaay, there’s an accomplishment!  🙂  We recently started our field health class, which has been really practical and informative. We also learned that there are several different kinds of worms we can get, so that means, wash your fruit and wear shoes! Also that the malaria mosquito only shows her face from 5 pm to 5 am, but not to worry there are many other mosquitos that can infect people with other diseases all through out the day… yipeeeee!
Since Ava and I didn’t get a chance to make Christmas cookies, for Valentine’s Day this year I decided to decorate hearts with her. I resigned myself to letting her make a mess and do whatever she wanted to with the cookies and frosting (except for pouring the whole container of sprinkles onto the cookie, although now that I’m thinking of, it that DID happen… Oh well!  🙂 It was a great time and a wonderful memory.
We have been very busy with school and have been loving church! TJ is still leading worship at Graceland church every Sunday and also plays every 3 weeks in Chapel here on campus.  Through our church we started attending a small group on Wednesday nights, which I love.  TJ wasn’t sure about adding one more thing to the list of things to do, but it has been a real blessing to me and something I really look forward to every week.  We also started going through The Stranger on the Road to Emmaus by John Cross with some new friends of ours and are LOVING that! We eat dinner with them and then do the study together. They have 2 young girls about our daughters’ ages so we really look forward to that meeting every week as well!

We are still praying a lot about what country to serve in and we have some ideas in mind, but are not able to share right now. If you could be praying that God would clearly lead us in this area we would be so grateful!
My good friend Valerie duMee is getting married in April and our family will be heading out to Arizona to attend the wedding. I am honored to be in the wedding and am so excited to see her and her man start their new married life together!

soldering in our Technology lab class… woop woop 🙂

Someone’s attached to my leg as you can see

someone approves 🙂

decorating cookies

TJ says he never wants a sugar cookie again

Today is one of those fulfilling days where I feel like I have just done what God made me to do. This is not a “toot my horn” ceremony to tell you all the wonderful things I have done… I just want to share this because I felt like a kid in a candy shop. We just moved to this bigger apartment, and not only did God bless us with a bigger apartment than we had, he blessed us with the biggest one possible, and on the end too… with lots of extra windows, why do those things mean so much to me? Why does just a little thing like giving me a bigger apartment prove to me how much God loves me and cares for my desires? It’s not because I want to live in a big house, I was content in the teeny tiny one. The fun thing is that I GET to share it, and my God knows that’s what I LOVE to do… share my home, my food and my heart with others. My good friend Sarah from church is having a baby in a few weeks, and is in need of diapers and things… why not have a baby shower? Can I do that in a teeny tiny apartment with 25 people + 10 kids running all over the place? No.

I got to make quiche, caramel apple sticky buns, serve my favorite coffee with sugar and nothing other than half and half itself. I got down my pretty serving dishes from the woodwork. I made some raspberry sherbet punch, other people brought breakfast pizza, fruit, and chocolate chip scones. We prayed to the God who loves us, and cares for us… everything that we are, and started to eat the food he provided for us. My attention was being pulled in all directions, I keep asking if it’s hot in here or is it just me?… it’s just me 🙂 I see Ava out of the corner of my eye wearing her new “dress up” dress that she got for Christmas which someone graciously helped put on her :/ … she’s reaching up on the counter grabbing blueberries and strawberries eating to her little hearts content…. I’m concerned wondering if I should help her, but no someone else does. The activity was fabric painting several Onesies for the new baby girl, which took a little while for everyone to get involved because they all felt helpless as far as art goes, but eventually they joined and created lovely new clothes for the little one. We played a mad lib game of Sarah’s birth story, and also played “I never” with the theme being pregnancy, birth, and children… not your typical shower game, but it was fun. Sarah opened her gifts and we prayed for her as she is about to have her 3^rd child.

So at the end of the morning when everyone has gone home, and I’m cleaning up from the delightful mess I can’t help but be thankful to God for being so good to me in ways that are so far beyond what I need, to fulfill my desire to have people in my home to feed them and serve them, and I pray that his name will be glorified in this house, or wherever he has us. To God be the glory for all things good.

Only a fraction of everyone there

Everyone’s lovely art to be worn by baby Ivey

Miss Sarah and her daughter Wednesday

Penny Kate Shropshire… she is growing so much!  I think the biggest milestone this past month is that she started eating solid foods and is LOVING it.  At first she wouldn’t eat banana, or avocado  or anything that doesn’t have applesauce in it.  But she is loving eating so much now that she will eat most anything I add applesauce too… did you catch that?  Apple Sauce is the key.   I just make sure I put enough flax seed so that she doesn’t struggle too much with pooping which is a struggle regardless because solid food compared to mommy’s milk is a lot more work to push out, so her body is getting used to that.  🙂  (I know some of you are thinking TMI Lily T.M.I.!)

She can stand up on her own (with out holding on to anything) and has taken one step, but that’s it, she’s capable, we’re just waiting for her to figure it out  :).  She says some form of “Ava”, “mama”  and “dada”  but not (dada) very often.  She will “read”  books which is soooo cute.  She’s learning sign language, she has “all done”  down… still working on “more please”  She’s been waiting at the bottom of the stairs staring up at them wishing she could climb them, then one day…  she realized she COULD!  She climbed all the way up them in about 20 seconds… we quickly found a baby gate to prevent that, and work on chaperoned stair climbing sessions instead.  She’s not the quietest baby anymore, she has a lot to say, and lets us know when she’s not happy.  Her main game right now is searching the floors for things like rocks, fuzz balls, plastic, and of course finds chocolate chips from I don’t know where…  you know most things we would WANT to find in her mouth (sarcastic inserted).  Our kids have not failed to be chocoholics just like some other people I know ;).

Penny will be turning the big 1 on March 1st, I don’t know what I’m going to do yet, but I’m excited to celebrate her life, what a ball of joy she is.  She’s like waking up to a Christmas present every morning, seriously I love her more than words could really express!

Happy 11 months Penny!

Hehe

I Love this little beauty!

silly baby

She’s curious alright 😉

There’s really not much else to say in this post, it’s pretty much the tour of our house, so many people have been asking, so that’s why there’s so many pictures… sorry if there’s too many.  I wish every one of you could come visit us here and eat around our table.  God is so good and has  blessed us.

Our bedroom

Upstairs bathroom

Penny climbing the steps… making mommy worry

Girl’s bedroom

Downstairs bathroom

back entry way

laundry room

First floor, I love how open it is

my huge kitchen… woooo hoooo!

yaaaay!

Preparing for Breakfast

The infamous Kristiana Kringler on Christmas morning

Christmas Breakfast

Talking to Del and Arielle on Skype during Christmas festivities

Ava and her cousin Bella in their new dresses from Nonnie

Playing with cousin Bella

Jan 1st Penny Turned 10 MONTHS

hang’n out with Po

eating Breakfast with Nonnie and Pop’s

Ava couldn’t help but love on Moses… he didn’t mind

Loved being with my grandmother “Mormor”

Took a train to go see Barry and Helen

Ava LOVED the train!

This Holiday we were really looking forward to going to California for Christmas, and were so glad we were able to go.  The first week and a half TJ and the girls were sick, but it was still really nice to just hang out with my parents and family.  We loved going to my home church, and seeing old friends.  Other than my blessed family, we got to hang out with Jared Young, Jeb and Jenna James,  Julie and Noah Ray, got to see my friend Brooke, but didn’t get to hang out with her :(.  I hung out with Sienna Paulsen for 15 minutes… wish it was longer, had a wonderful visit with Jana Heirendt… sorry Dwight wasn’t there 🙁

We spent a lot of time with my mom and dad, which I really loved, we watched movies while falling asleep to them, watched football, played a game or two, went to our cabin, played in the snow where Penny got to see it for the first time.  We played Settlers of Catan, which was a typical Griffith game all personalities clearly shining through.

It was a different Christmas without Del and Arielle and their kids of course, we really missed them.  At one point before a picture Barry started looking around the house for the missing person and realized it was Del and Ari :(.  We can count the cost and know they are in a different place for such a great purpose, but it was hard to be with family when part of them is not with us.

We are so thankful to my parents for helping us get to California where as otherwise we would not have been able to come.  There’s not too much to say as the pictures explain a lot, so take a look  🙂

~Will update on our new apartment soon  🙂

So… we have been all the way to California and back, but the first thing I want to post about is how our time went at Auberry Community.  As you may know we got the chance to be guest speakers at Auberry Community Church which is the church I grew up in.

My last post I shared the reason why we are choosing to go into missions which I will just quote my self here

“The sole reason we are doing this is just simply through following God.  He directed us in this direction, he brought us to this place.  He has specifically called us to do this.  So it’s not that we don’t have a heart for those who aren’t saved because we do, but that’s not the reason we are diving into full time missions, it’s because of our relationship with the Lord, and his leading in our lives.  It’s not some incredible thing we’re doing, it’s just as simple as someone being sensitive to the Holy Spirit and taking the next step.  I wouldn’t say this was one big decision, I would say it was and is the Holy Spirit leading us one step at a time.  We have a heart for the Lord, and our relationship with God should be effecting people wherever we are, because HE is worthy, we are to proclaim his name.  Our heart and desire is to follow God where he is leading us.  Right now we don’t know what country we will be going to, nor what job we will be doing, but I do know that God is faithful to lead us, and will never change in that.  He is giving us the desire to be a part of bringing the gospel to those who need it.”

This is basically what TJ shared along with some of the struggles we’ve have faced in the past year, and how God has been faithful in that.  I shared what I’ve been doing the past 5 years, and how God used that to lead us to up to this point in the direction that we are heading right now.  We wanted to make it clear that our heart is for the Lord, and to follow him in whatever direction he leads us.

Auberry Community (ACC) was so encouraging to us.  All the church’s missionaries are printed in the bulletin, and which I have looked at a million times.  Pastor Blake announced that our names would be printed there as well, and just shared how excited they were to get the chance to be behind us, and support us in what God is doing and going to do through us.  I don’t think they know just how encouraged we felt/feel by them.  We are excited to go back there when we have finished the training for several months to build more relationships there.

Just to let anyone who lives in Central California area we are going to be doing a presentation of what’s been going on with us, and what we’re going to be doing This Sunday:

The first Service is at: 7:45 and the second service is at 10:30

December 30^th at AUBERRY

COMMUNITY CHURCH

We just started (and are half way through the class) our “Ministry Partnership Development” class, which is basically about building partner’s with people in order to do God’s work, and bringing his words to those who don’t have it.  Some really amazing yet so simple things have been brought up, and revealed to me.  You would think this was a class on how to get money from people to do your ministry, or what presentation to give to a church so that they want to support you.  This class so far is bringing out the reasons we came here for training, the reason we desire to be a part of reaching the lost… getting down to the deep level of why we’re doing this.  So why are we doing this?  Why did TJ and I decide not to live a “normal” life?  Why are we choosing to leave our family? Why are we choosing to take our kids away from their grandparents and cousins?  What changed deep inside us that has caused us to do something so drastic as moving our family to another country to live in a remote place?  …

Note:  I’ve been working on this blog post for a long time, and now I’m finally finishing it  🙂

…TJ and I were discussing the other night why we chose to be missionaries, why we chose this route for our family.  Some people have a deep burden in their hearts for the lost, and want to “GO” some want to teach in an MK school, or be specifically a mechanic, or a church planter.

The sole reason we are doing this is just simply through following God.  He directed us in this direction, he brought us to this place.  He has specifically called us to do this.  So it’s not that we don’t have a heart for those who aren’t saved because we do, but that’s not the reason we are diving into full time missions, it’s because of our relationship with the Lord, and his leading in our lives.  It’s not some incredible thing we’re doing, it’s just as simple as someone being sensitive to the Holy Spirit and taking the next step.  I wouldn’t say this was one big decision, I would say it was and is the Holy Spirit leading us one step at a time.  We have a heart for the Lord, and our relationship with God should be effecting people wherever we are, because HE is worthy, we are to proclaim his name.  Our heart and desire is to follow God where he is leading us.  Right now we don’t know what country we will be going to, nor what job we will be doing, but I do know that God is faithful to lead us, and will never change in that.  He is giving us the desire to be a part of bringing the gospel to those who need it.

So what’s partnership development going to look like for us?  Well i’t been going on for several years now, it’s basically building relationships with other believers, in order that we may edify and encourage each other.  There are people that we know and are getting to know better who know us well enough to admonish us, and encourage us in the Lord, to pray for us.  This is part of a team, we need people on our team who have a heart for the Lord, and to do his will.  I believe God is preparing people’s hearts and burdening them to be apart of our ministry, even though I don’t specifically know what that is.  I’m learning not to feel guilty to share what we’re doing with people like their always going to think I’m trying to get money out of them (I’m too self-conscious, but you know what I’m talking about).  The fact is that we are going to need money, and God will provide for that through his means.  Not only are people going to be on our team, but we are all in this together, and I think that’s so cool, because I believe I will be responsible for praying and encouraging those who are going to join our team.

This whole partnership development thing sounds so daunting and scary, but at the same time, like I said we are following God, and I know he will lead us to the right places and people to play different roles in this ministry.  The other thing that I’m realizing is that it’s not a burden for people to be a part of missions, it’s an opportunity, and a blessing if it’s ordained by God.

Just some thoughts thanks for reading.  🙂

Soooo… TJ shot this deer a week and a half ago, and we are still finding pieces of meat around the house, kinda gross I know, at least your not the one living with it right?  No, I’m just kidding, we are very thankful for all this meat.  We have lots of roasts, and stew meat, lots of breakfast sausage, and Italian sausages.  It was a lot of work, and I’m looking forward to not doing it for a while, but I am also looking forward to experiencing the fruits of our labor, and the money we are saving through it.  🙂

This Thanksgiving break we decided to stay on campus to relax and regroup, it was really great and we were glad we did!  We hung out with friends, watched some movies, went on walks, went fishing, hunting.   Ava had hand, foot and mouth disease, but got better by the time classes started.  It was good to just spend time as a family and chill for a few days.

Our 2 main classes have been team work and phonetics.  I have a picture of our phonetics class, we are learning so many different sounds with our mouths and how to write them.  TJ and I just took the word craft test to see if we have any aptitude for taking the linguistics class, and we did horrible!  If we had any aptitude for taking the linguistics course, we would consider staying, but considering our in-aptitude we will not  be doing that.  So our time here will be shortened to 1 1/2 years unless TJ decides to take the tech course which could give him more skills, he’s going to be looking into that and will make the decision as the time comes.  If we choose to do nothing extra then we will graduate from here December 2013, and if TJ does the tech course then we will finish May 2014.

Time seems to be just flying by which is crazy,  I wish it didn’t go by this fast.  People have been asking how our time has been here so far, and the main answer I have come up with is “rejuvenating”.  God has really blessed us here with a great church, with friends that I didn’t expect to make but have been an incredible encouragement, ministry that fits our family perfectly and so many other things… it’s like God knew exactly what we needed.  The community here is wonderful, I know it’s temporary but I am so soaking it up.  I want to get to know staff better and hear about their experiences as missionaries on the field, and I have gotten to know a minute amount of information about such amazing people, but I want to know MORE!  The time just seems to be slipping away, and I want to get to know these people better, but the time is not up and there will still be opportunity, we just need to be intentional.

As I look back on our lives and how we got to this point of being in this training I am amazed at what an amazing God we serve, and I have this feeling like we’ve barely started.  God’s hand has been so clear in every part of our lives in our direction and for what he has for us. I realize I don’t need to doubt God, he has a plan for us a country for us to serve in a people group that he has and is preparing.  Here we are wondering what country we will go to, and how we will be used there.  The time is getting closer for us to start narrowing down a specific field, and it seems like such a big task, but I am needing to be reminded of who God is and that he has this all under control, we just need to seek him and trust him.  And speaking of becoming a missionary to the un-reached people groups… I just need to say that I’m scared out of my mind, I don’t feel like it’s something I can handle, I don’t expect it to be comfortable, I am actually wondering how I’m going to do it at all… how am I going to survive?  I know God has called us to do this, and that’s the only reason I can rest at all, and I know we are going to need to continue to rely on him, even more than we are now.  So all of you that are thinking you could never do something like this?  Well… I don’t feel like I can either, with God’s strength alone!  Things I often wonder about:  What will I do if my husband has to go away for a night?  Will I be safe?  How do I keep my kids safe?  Who will watch my kids if I need to do language study?  How often will house help come into my home?  Will there be cheese where we’re going?  Will there be mosquitoes?  Will we get Malaria?  What happens if my husband dies?  What if we all get sick and don’t know what to do?  Is there a doctor to see if we need one?  What if TJ breaks his back?  What if we need a chiropractor and are in the middle of a tribe?  So many questions that enter my mind.