Beginning the Journey

I am going again to Togo to teach at Kara Christian Academy, a school set up for the children of the missionaries that I previously stayed with during my internship. I am so blessed to be accompanied by two wonderful friends of mine, Bethany Cannon and Jacque Breuer! They have been such an encouragement and a joy to have around whenever I have needed them this past year. I look forward to be living with them this next year :)

Leaving the states again.. So I've been very blessed to visit many places in the last four years, mostly thanks to a semester abroad and an internship during college. I was able to see most of Europe especially the French speaking parts. I also went to Africa the summer of my sophomore year. That was life changing! Of course, anyone who goes to Africa will tell you that. So I avoided malaria, and didn't suffer too badly from traveler's diarhea-- and now that I've graduated college I'm going back! Perhaps giving myself another chance to experience a foreign disease and more importantly giving myself another chance to serve. I'm praying I won't catch anything, especially considering the number of new little holes the nurse so kindly punched into my arm today and the bruises that are now taking residence on my upper arm area. I even have an exciting new pill regimen to keep track of! Yay! Today at 4:30 I take my live Typhoid vaccine pills :)

Preparing, packing and physicians. Three of the crazy P's we must deal with as we get ready to leave. The physicians will be poking us with needles giving us medications with long lists of side effects (eeks!). We're packing away all warm clothing and jackets and coats and when we come home next year we'll open boxes for the winter and think we have twice as many Christmas presents :) Yay! Oh and the preparations? We have to get ready in so many ways, emotionally, healthwise and financially! Let us know if you're interested in helping us in any way.

We would love all your prayers as we begin this journey! Please keep our health in your prayers especially after we fly to Ghana and travel to Togo where I'll be teaching for the next year. I'll keep you updated with all of the interesting and perhaps not so interesting portions of my travels.

Les Musées et Les Jardins

Being in Paris has been wonderful... I have been soaking up so many museums, castles and gardens lately :) We have been to so many amazing places and seen so much I will just give you a couple of my favorite highlights:


This is in Giverny where we saw Monet's Japanese garden.. it was beautiful to see where all his wonderful paintings came from and then the next few days we were able to see the art itself!
It was also amazing to see the house he lived in and where his large family ate :)

During our first week here we were able to see Palais Garnier -- The opera house from Phantom of the Opera!!! This is the ceiling which is very modern in comparison to the rest of the building, but I think it brightens the room :) It is very colorful and depicts famous ballet performances that often occur at Palais Garnier. (Sadly most of our knowledge beforehand about the opera house from the Phantom of the Opera turned out to be false... )

Les Musées

Sorry all for the lack of photos recently. I have been soaking up so many museums, castles and gardens lately :) I'll put up pictures as soon as I can. Our group went to see Monet's gardens which are so beautiful!! His japanese garden is the one he painted a lot with the famous bridge. Well, we were there and walked on that bridge.. it was so neat! It was amazing to see the house he lived in and where his large family ate :) We sadly weren't able to see Versaille due to strikes at all the museums the day it was planned.. but we were able to go to the Loire valley to see several amazing castles!