"We are not normal..."

Here is our latest email update. If you are not on our email list but would like to receive monthly email updates, please send me an email at hilvdenny@yahoo.com

Greetings,

In the past year and a half, Wayne and I have come to a conclusion…we are not normal! Not many families spend half of the month on the road, shop for baby toys that travel well, and have babies that have been in over 20 states before their first birthday! But that has been our life thus far. Things are changing though, this week in fact! Our travel will be dying down as we transition out of Iowa, but in some ways, our life just gets stranger and more exciting! Wayne is in his last week of work at Emmaus and then on Friday, we leave for a week in Senegal! We are so excited that the time has finally come for us to go to the country that God has called us to. We have no doubt in our mind that Senegal is where He wants us - everything we want to do and are gifted to do is right there – but we also would like to see it before we move there for good. So Friday morning, Wayne and I will leave for Senegal, and at 5:30 am Saturday, we will hit the ground running!

Here are some things we hope to accomplish on our trip.

-We do not yet know which city we will live in, so we will have an opportunity to visit both Dakar (the capital) and Thies (about 50 miles inland) and look at both the benefits and disadvantages of both.

-One ministry that I hope to be involved in when we move there will be teaching weekends for women. They hold 3 of these weekends a year, and one will be the weekend we arrive! I will get the chance to observe and meet some of the people there on Saturday.

-The Bible college that Wayne will teach at is located in Thies, so right away this weekend, we will get to see the school.

-Addie just turned one, but we are already thinking about where we will send her to school! We would like to check out our options as that will probably help us decide where to live.

-We have heard nothing but good things about the WorldVenture team we will be joining in Senegal, and we are looking forward to finally meeting many of them.

-We are moving to Dallas 3 weeks after we get back, but we still don’t know what of our stuff we will keep and move with us, and what we will just get rid of and start over with in Senegal. On this trip, we hope to scope out what is available there and what we really want to bring with us.

-Meet Senegalese people and get a taste for the culture. Everybody that we have talked to who has been to Senegal has loved it there, and we want to get a taste of this for ourselves.

Please pray for us as we seek to accomplish these goals. Here are a few specific requests.

-Jet-lag. Our trip is short (we will be returning on December 8^th). Pray that we will adjust quickly to the 7 hour time difference and have the energy to accomplish all that we want to in that week.

-Addie. Actually, this is more of a prayer request for me. I know Addie will be fine, but I have a feeling I will miss her a lot (Wayne will too, he’s just done this before!). Pray for my emotions and Wayne’s sanity J

-Wisdom. We hope to gather a lot of information on this trip that will help us make some big decisions (where to live, school for Addie, what to take etc…) Pray that we would have wisdom in these areas.

-Excitement. We are already incredibly excited to be moving to Senegal. Pray that this trip will even increase our excitement and desire to serve God in Senegal. Pray that we would also develop a real love for the Senegalese people.

As always, we greatly covet your prayers and know that God does great things though the prayers of His saints. We would like to keep you updated as we are in Senegal, and will be posting on our blog to do this. Please visit our blog at www.dennysinafrica.blogspot.com if you would like to hear how things are going for us and how you can specifically be praying next week.

Thank you again for your prayers and support, and we look forward to sharing with you the great things God will do and show us in our trip!

In Him,

Hilary (for Wayne and Addie)