Small Town USA

My favorite country song on the radio right now, and since i've been back from Taiwan, is "Small Town USA" by Justin Moore. Perhaps it's because of how much I missed the United States while I was gone, or because i'm partial to a country that speaks the same language as me. Either way, everything I see about America, and especially Northern Michigan, the Autumn trees exploding in color, tree's in general, Lake Michigan, meat and potato dinners, and clean smelling air, makes me say I love this place.

Currently, I am a college student at Baker College in Cadillac, Michigan. I'm in my first quarter there and studying for my degree in Medical Assisting. I'm looking forward to poking people with needles, learning about diseases and working in a clinic or small Doctor's office someday.

Spiritually, I've been tremendously encouraged by a bible study i've been apart of for a few months now. It's an honest, sincere, open, college age group that has been reading through the book of Judges. The thought provoking questions, funny comments and parallels that are brought up in discussion help me to understand the passage and apply it to my life. Scripture is alot easier to understand when you read and work it through in a group setting. Other perspectives really increase your comprehension of the text.

In my own personal bible reading I have decided to take on one of the most (personally) daunting books of the Bible: Isaiah. Not only is it super long and not all that cut and dry, it has just been one of those books of the Bible that i've avoided for a LONG time. However, if I can understand and learn from the stories in Judges I'm pretty sure I can do the same with Isaiah. It would be really FANTASTIC (and one of the main purposes of this blog) if those of you reading comments and questions I post, would share your own thoughts regarding the book of Isaiah or other topics posted. Consider this blog an open discussion board. We all got a lot of different backgrounds, ways of thinking, and perspectives. When it comes to learning about God, understanding the Bible, and applying it to my life, I say, "the more the merrier". :)

Dragon Boat Festival Vacation

Megan and I had a 5 day vacation from school in celebration of the Dragon Boat Festival! So we packed up and headed to Taipei to meet with Michael, Emily and a few others before traveling to Fulong. Fulong is a great little surf town about an hour and a half from Taipei. We camped on the beach for free with 8 people and 1 tent. Several of us slept on the sand in our sleeping bag, waking up to the cool air and sound of crashing waves. One of the days we went out hiking on the Taoyuan Trail which goes up a mountain and follows the ridge for 6 hours. It was a really great hike although super tiring. This was a great vacation. I loved it.

Lessons from God Part #2

Most recently God has been teaching me about abundant living coming from service. The more I get to do for people on my own initiative, the more abundant and fulfilling the day seems- even if i'm not running around doing wild things and riding motorcycles. *grin* An example of this is Megan and I had my 6th grade girls over to make cookies one Saturday. I have made cookies a hundred times before.. I can whip them up in no time at all. These girls have NEVER made cookies before. Much to my surprise, it didn't bother me at all that flour was everywhere and eggs shells had to be picked out of the cookie dough. Might as well not worry about it. No need to pick up the flour right away.. we'll probably spill more in a few seconds. So what if all the cookies aren't the same size. All this to say that 2 hours later we finally were able to eat some fresh baked homemade cookies! And we ate them ALL! haha The highlight of the afternoon for me was introducing the girls to the wonders of eating cookie dough out of the mixing bowl. They were like "oo really?? eat it out of the bowl??" One taste and they were all hooked. " O my gosh! this is soooo good!!" I'm just sitting there thinking, "I KNOW RIGHT?!?!!!!". We bonded over cookie dough. The 6th grade boys are eagerly waiting for their cookie day to come...

Lessons God has been/ is teaching me while in Taiwan

It is impossible to completely and adequately express this in written words. We'll see how close I can get..
First off God taught me, by way of removing me from people to whom I'd "anchored", to only anchor on him. Other people can't hold me up forever. God can. This has probably been the hardest lesson I have learned and I have to keep relearning it unfortunately.
Another thing God keeps reinforcing is to trust daily. Some Mondays I wake up and realize that I have zero experience, zero knowledge whatsoever about teaching English and here I am responsible for 172 kids English speaking abilities. Add to this moments where MY English appears challenged. For example, last week I spelled Caterpillar wrong on 29 first grade projects. whoops. Apparently, just because I say a word one way does not mean it is spelled the way I say it. And naturally our homemade Sowash words do not translate. Amazingly enough these days that start out seeming impossible always turn into the best classes of the week when I pray out loud, " God this day is in your hands and I really am going to need help." It's great because when I pray that I really believe it. I still feel incompetent or tired maybe but I know God is going to do something and that really the worst that can happen is that first grade spells caterpillar "Catapillar". They'll survive. Thanks for reading! More lessons when I learn them.

Easter Event

I am terribly behind in my blogging. So I will start with the Easter event we had at my school. This idea was totally from God and he gave me the energy and desire to carry it out. Usually I get all excited about ideas I have but never get past the planning stage. This event was planned and executed to success! There were a total of 80+ kids from my school who came at 8am on the Saturday before Easter. I had 4 other teachers there to help including Megan Jefferies. Splitting the kids into 4 teams aided with "crowd control". I was the egg decorating station person. Each team went through a rotation of games and Easter egg decorating. The eggs ended up so beautiful and the kids loved making them and taking them home to eat. First time they have ever done this. The most popular game played that morning was the water balloon toss. Thankfully, the weather was hot and sunny after a whole previous week of rain. Megan gave a wonderful Easter story message and everyone was very attentive. Praise God that it went so well. I know the kids had a great time, the parents and teachers had a great time and I had a
great time!

Shoes

I've decided that I definitely couldn't live in Taiwan forever because I would go totally broke buying shoes. Shoe here are like the most wonderful things ever. Generally I try to avoid common "girl- y" things but I must confess that I too (like every other girl in the world) love shoes. Red shoes, blue shoes, yellow flats, silver gladiator sandals, black heels... love 'em. These are of course all described (by me) as accessory shoes- neither practical, or necessarily comfortable, and goodness knows they aren't actually needed so much as wanted. However, having this facination towards shoes has great increased my Chinese vocabulary. Not only can I describe the size, color and style of the shoe I desire to purchase, I can also ask how much they cost. In getting the price of the shoes I usually make a little gasp and shake my head.. " O no. Much too expensive" I say. And then we go back a forth once or twice and then I walk out of the store happily wearing wonderful new shoes for a price equivallent to 6 American dollars. Payless Shoes has nothing on Taiwanese shoe shops. They wouldn't stand a chance. *smile*

I think i'll keep 'em around

I have a fan club of several little 2nd and 3rd graders at my school. They bang on the door to my dorm yelling "teacher Jenna!!" and follow me around all wanting to hold my hand at the same time. If you are ever not feeling beautiful come to taiwan and hand around a bunch of little kids. Even on my worst hair day ever they tell me " O teacher Jenna you are so pretty." I tell them to follow me around anytime they want. *grin* This video was totally spontaneous. I was hanging up laundry in our laundry room and my little fan club came around and was just chattering. I have no idea what they were talking about but it was cute. Then they just started singing and waving their little arms around. HAHA! it was the funniest thing ever and it made me feel so special. It definately made my day. *smile*

On the right is Vivian, middle is Amy and in back is Nina :)