All those sleepless nights

Hi Everybody!

Well, here i am, sleepless in L.A. again. I've been having a hard time sleeping at night lately. Now, i'm having a hard time falling asleep. I think it's partly due to excitement of the road ahead. We're about to journey back to Lake Charles and then on to our vacation in Canada and Washington/Idaho. So this has got my mind reeling. Also, i've gotta load that container starting tomorrow and i'm a bit nervous about it because i'm all alone and it's all up to me. Although in many cases, i'm glad to be alone because when i mess up (which i will) no one is around to see it :) Like today, i got a tire changed down the street at a mainly hispanic shop. They all spoke spanish and i felt a little foolish. I need to be more bold and try to put some of my 3 years of spanish from high school into action. But yeah, they changed the truck tire and i brought it back to the warehouse to put it back on the truck. When i was done reinstalling it, i stepped back from the truck and realized that i'd installed it the wrong way out. The large box truck looked like it had one "monster truck" wheel because it stuck out from the truck instead of being tucked away underneath it. I did have to get Dess to come and help me take it off and switch it around, so she's the only one who knows that i did it. Man i felt silly.

Honestly though, i do enjoy working alone. It gives me peace and a feeling of accomplishment because whatever i do in a day i know that i've done. Also, i get to be hands on with work again around here because there's no one to manage. I've been preparing pallets and cargo for the container to the Philippines, i replaced the tire on the truck, i've prepared and loaded some pallets into a container for Port Mercy and lots of other odds and ends. I'm having fun. One thing about working alone is that i've got time to think. Lately i've been finding that i've been getting attacked in my thoughts though. I've been having doubts, worries, frustrations and anxieties that i normally wouldn't. It keeps me praying and seeking out God during those times though.

I have had good times working with other people too you know. Just in case any of you are reading this blog and think i only like to work alone, it's not true. I've enjoyed working with people like Dan, Jason, Matt and others. I'd probably enjoy working with my Dad and brother too, but we don't have many opportunities for that these days. Work seems to be a good bonding experience for me. I enjoy learning from the knowledgeable and teaching the less knowledgeable.

I think i'm going to sign off for now and try to get to sleep again. I just gotta shut my brain down or something. Oh well, as long as i'm productive in my sleeplessness i guess it's all good.

signing off,

joel

Yeah Vacation Is almost here!!!

Hey Guys,
It has been too long!!! Too Long for Vacation coming, too long since seeing the family, too long since anything really.

Things in Los Angeles have been good but hard. I can see this is not going to be a cake walk like I thought it was going to be. But being an on fire for the Lord person for the past 4 years I have come to realize that the really good things GOd has for us are not easy to come by and the process, well as the bible puts it, a refining fire. YOu would think after being in one place for so long (example: Friend SHips) that you wouldn't have to go through a fire after soo much time. Yeah right I can see it coming now and even feel it these past 4 weeks. New enviorement + new people + new job = Fire. Didn't they teach you that in school.

SO yeah this is what I have always wanted to do since being part of the food minstry with Friend Ships. This is the big DOG. This is where the rubber meets the road. I am going to be in charge of the churches coming and getting food. Seeing if they are reaching the people, building the kingdom, and showing people CHrist. Praying with the churches. Making sure every group that receives food from us is prayed for. We are talking about having classes for those that don't know how to reach people for Christ with food. So this is what I have always wanted to do.

It is funny how God works because for so long when I was in the food ministry at Lake CHarles all I wanted to do was be apart of a huge food minstry. Every day I would think about it and kind of not be satisfied where I was at. But what happens BOOM!!!!! EXPLOSION . . .. I get satisfied where I am at, Thanking God where I am, and what does He do bring Joel and I to Los Angeles where I have always wanted to be. Funny how that works. But Praise GOd because He knows best.

So I am in the food ministry Joel is hands on in the warehouse shipping things to other countries for churches/organizations that want to help the poor or shipping items to Friend SHips in Lake Charles so that the warehouse can be fully on the food ministry.

So that is where we stand. But in the mean time Joel and I leave on vacation in a week and a half. We are so pumped. The awesome cool thing about this is that God is making the time ZOOOOOOOM by. I mean ZOOOMMMMMMMMM baby. Because Joel has to get a 40 foot container filled for the philippines by saturday. SO time is flying because we are on a schedule.

Yeah. SO this blog was kind of crazy because I am pumped what GOd is doing and where we are going to go for vacation.

Love you all. HOpe to hear from some of you who read our blog. Matt Craven you should at least comment once if you are still reading our blog. We would love to hear from any of you.

Blessings blessings from Christ,
Dess

Back in Business

Hi Everybody,

Well, you may not be checking out our blog as regularly as you used to because we haven't been posting much. We've been moved out to L.A. as a part of Friend Ships and the computer is really old and the web server wouldn't let us use blogger for complicated reasons. So, we finally realized we could use Internet Explorer to post our blogs, so we're back!!!

All is well in our lives. As i mentioned, we're in Los Angeles for a little while. We've been here for 3 weeks and we've got 1 more week to go. From there we will be road tripping back to Lake Charles and then flying out of Houston to Canada for our much deserved and longed for vacation. 4 weeks of Canadian bliss and then 3 weeks of more relaxing in Washington with Dess' family. How exciting is that??? Very exciting!!! We can't wait.

This week is going to be a busy one for Dess and i. We've got a lot of work to do around the warehouse, cleaning up and preparing for filling a container which will be sent to the Philipines. We've also got meetings and the usual day to day stuff to do. It's so cool to realize that we'll be on vacation within 2 weeks.

For anyone in Canada who may be checking this blog and would be interesting in seeing us, drop us an email or make a comment and we'll be sure to get in touch. Home sweet home.

Okay, well, i can't write long right now, i just wanted to touch base. We'll try to get more in depth in our blogging... but no promises :)

joel