August update

The air is cooler, although the path outside our house still teems with kids in bathing suits and cooler-and-tent-laden parents on a saturday morning. Tubing on the river that runs along our path is one of the most popular activities in our town.

Sleeping sisters

I've been reading a book from my sister in law (very slowly - on page 201 after 2 years). It's about shame and courage, called Daring Greatly by Brene Brown. Brown talks about the courage to engage in relationships in a real way, allowing that real relationships require vulnerability, the openness to being hurt. It's a challenge for me, since I strongly prefer to avoid uncertainty, unpredictability and discomfort. Yet I'm growing to understand and engage with the inevitable cognitive and emotional dissonance that comes along with real relationships. A quote from today's reading: "The biggest challenge for leaders [or teachers or parents] is getting our heads and hearts around the fact that we need to cultivate the courage to be uncomfortable and to teach the people around us how to accept discomfort as a part of growth" (199).

One week old!

Thanks for praying for us as we welcomed our baby! Waiting is always a refining and exhausting process. Amusingly, our neighborhood waited with us, with many friends peeking their heads in the window every morning to ask, "mada? not yet?" She was born after a quick (3 hours) and straightforward labor. She is a calm and relaxed baby so far, patient with the intense adoration of her siblings and cousins! We named her Vera Izumi (means spring water or clear, discerning thinking).

As usual, the school year begins with an intense wave of work and renewed responsibilities. Ryan is delighted to be teaching industrial arts alongside his Bible classes again this year. There's something about smoothing and shaping wood to create new shapes, and seeing students wrestle with problem solving in tangible ways that accompanies the more cerebral work of a Bible or English class so nicely.

Thanks for praying with us!

1. We're so grateful for a healthy new baby and a wonderful little person to get to know. Please pray for us as we learn to parent three kids with wisdom, patience and humor.

Meeting grandpa

2. We're excited about our work for this year: Ryan will be teaching HS Bible and Industrial Arts; Nelle Caitlin will be working part time in the Academic Counseling offices, managing the publication of the Japan Harvest magazine, and getting to know other moms in the community. Check out Japan Harvest online! Please pray with us as we work out the details of our daily schedule for the new term.

3. Please join us in praying for our dear friend Eri; we've mentioned her several times in the past six months. Her cancer has returned, and she is now undergoing another round of chemotherapy. Please pray for her wonderful husband, Hideo. He is not a Christian, but is very devoted to his amazingly Godly wife. When our pastor visited Eri last week, Eri wrote (her vocal cords were removed in a previous attempt to eradicate the cancer): "She is now more convinced than ever of the power of prayer, and that she feels prayer has sustained her."

And then there were three!