Thank you so much for praying for our family in this time of transition after transition. Sometimes we feel like we are moving so much that we are not sure which move we should be processing.
Please continue to pray for our family as we continue moving and transitioning.
We made it safely to North Carolina after spending a week in Missouri for Jenny to get started on the 3 week process of doing her write up of findings based on the language data we collected in Oklahoma.
We are wrapping up week 1 here in North Carolina and Jenny is making great headway on her paper. The kids are enjoying the mountains and time with Grandma and Grandpa.
We have recently uploaded some pictures to our photos page. Feel free to check them out.
We called it home for the last 7 weeks. Our family stayed in one of the rooms in the building that had 8 bunk beds in it and 16 mattresses. We borrowed some from other rooms in order to complete “construction” of our home. It is amazing all the ways a bunk and a mattress can be used.
I thought I would share a short video of the camp where we stayed in Oklahoma for the Cherokee Practicum. Check out our video of where we were staying. Hopefully it gives you a little better idea of what life was like in Tahlequah, OK. We are in Missouri now for a week and then we spend two weeks in North Carolina during which Jenny will be working on the write up of her findings.
While we were in Oklahoma James started riding his bike on two wheels too. Both James and Jada are riding without their training wheels. Our little “babies” are growing up.
Hope you enjoy the video of James on two wheels and the other kids showing off some more advanced biking skills.
We are so blessed by the team that we are with here in Oklahoma for the Cherokee Practicum. This last Thursday night the singles and marrieds without children sent all of us parents WITH children on a date night. What a great time. The kids were well cared for and had a great time while Jenny and I had a chance to get out JUST THE TWO OF US. We went to the East Buffet and to see a movie. It was AWESOME! Here is a pic of us before going out and the nice surprise we came home to.
Heading out for DATE NIGHTRoses, Chocolates and a nice note from our TEAM
The kids have been going to AWANA clubs while we are here in Oklahoma. They are enjoying it so much. Sometimes it feels like they ask every day if it is the night for AWANA’s to happen. Here is a picture of James and Jada in their NEW cubbies vests on their way to AWANA clubs. They are really doing well learning their verses. It seems like they are often more interested in learning Emmanuel and Elena’s verses than their own.
Praise the Lord, He has blessed us with a WONDERFUL place to stay when we move to Wisconsin in early November. This is obviously one of the things that we are concerned about as a family thinking about moving… a place to move into. He continues to provide for us, and come through over and over again…and yet so many times we are surprised when He does. Like our housing situation for Wisconsin: we were unsure of how it would all work out, and the Lord allowed us to rent a place in the SAME neighborhood where we lived before leaving for training with New Tribes. We will actually be like 3 blocks from where we used to live. What a treat for us as a family experiencing so much transition and new living situations to be able to move somewhere familiar. On top of that the Lord worked it out so we are blessed with AMAZING rent for the area, a lower security deposit, flexible term on the lease so that we can move on to French study as soon as we are ready, 3 bedrooms, and the list goes on.
I will post some pictures of our new place when we get settled.
We are back in missouri for the weekend. Jenny went to the ladies retreat with Calvary Chapel Lake Ozark. We had a good trip up from Oklahoma except for the fact that I left the suitcase with all of our clothes in it behind. Thankfully we had brought our dirty clothes to wash, so we were able to wash them and have clothes until our suitcase arrived.
We thought you might enjoy a sneak peak into one of our language helper sessions that we go to as part of our Cherokee Practicum. We spend 2 hours a day with our language helper learning more about the Cherokee language.
One of the important facets of analyzing a language is the ability to determine how verbs or action words are constructed. In some languages the word for “we” that excludes the person listening to the conversation is different from the word for “we” that includes the listener. Using Lego People can be a big help in setting up these scenarios so that Jenny and I as well as Ord (our language helper) understand what we are looking for.
Please pray that we will be able to make the most of our language helper sessions and that the Lord would keep the lines of communication open.
Elena at the Powwow looking over the back of the bleechers
We attended a part of a powwow, a cornstalk shoot, and an ani Keetoowah dance this weekend. There annual celebration of the Cherokee nation was this weekend and so we were able to join in and get to learn a little bit more about their culture.
We ended up learning that the Cherokee don’t have much to do with Powwow’s that is more to do with the plains Indians…but we did have an “Indian taco” that night which was served on Cherokee Fry bread… It was still a neat experience for us to be able to attend the Powwow.
This morning the boys and I went to a cornstalk shoot together. They shoot at a stack of cornstalks and you get points based on the number of stalks you penetrate with your arrow. For the younger ages there is a time limit, and for the older groups were games to 50 points.
We were able to attend the Ani Keetowah dance with our language helper and his wife. That was a good time to be with our helper and develop our relationship with him. After the festivities we went out to dinner with him and his wife.
Jonathan and Jenny Roundy Reaching the Unreached 
Thankfully we had brought our dirty clothes to wash, so we were able to wash them and have clothes until our suitcase arrived.
