Day One: Saturday, April 4, 2009

Day One: Saturday, April 4, 2009

After much planning, preparation, and prayer, the time is finally here. This morning the rest of the 32 members of Team Texas begin moving out.



We made it to the airport! So far I have seen Gary and Joel Frey, Emily and Walter Peterson, Bill Hudson, Matthew Bragonier, Chuck Arnold, Jeremy Petersen, Julia Sturdevant, Zoe, Hannah and Sara Nemy.

Gary and Joel Frey. They leave at 9:30.

My group. We leave at 8:25. Notice Bill Hudson lurking in the background.



Our flight was quite unique. We had four segments. We flew first to
Burbank, then to Phoenix, next to El Paso and finally arrived in Houston at about 5:20 p.m.

The six of us were the last to arrive. Soon after we got our luggage we were picked up in one of the vans by Casey Noland. We crammed all our luggage in and squeezed about nine or ten of us in and we were off to meet every one for diner before heading over to Orange.

Of course Stuart and Renee had found the greatest barbeque place in Houston-Papa's. Most of the group was already there. So we all ordered and had a great meal together. The ribs,, both pork and beef were fabulous, and I had a great "chopped" beef sandwich.



All 28 of us got back on the road and headed over on Interstate 10 toward Orange. We all were there except for Jeremy and Erin who currently are stuck in San Francisco. Two of their plans today were cancelled. They are supposed to be shuttled in from Houston Bush at about 4 a.m.
Our final two Gary and Peggy Gubitz do not arrive until sometime tomorrow.
It was about a 75 minute drive to Orange and we got in about 8:30. We were greeted by Lisa Ellerman, the representative from the church.



She did a great job orienting us to what we will be blessed by this week and how God will use us. Then we all prayed together asking God to bless our week together. We also prayed for Trudy and Ben Klaafke. Apparently Trudy has not been doing well after her last transfusion and she was going to be admitted to the hospital in Folsom. We also had gotten word that Oscar Anderson had pneumonia.so definitely much prayer is needed for our body back home.

We took a tour of the place here which apparently is like their youth church. It may have been a restaurant before but it is huge. We were shown the kitchen and the TWO showers. This will be interesting. We found our sleeping quarter and began bringing in the luggage and setting up our air matresses and other amenities. It is now nearly 11 and kids are hanging around playing ping pong, pool and just talking.

I am currently using Stuart's computer with its wireless cards so at the moment I am having trouble posting photos.

Pray for us and post words of encouragement if you are reading what God is doing with us.

Please be in prayer for our body back home.