"On the road again...Just can't wait to get on the road again..."

How many of you Willy Nelson fans remember that song???

After living in a house for four months, it looks like the Springs will be "on the road again" - at least for a short trip in the RV to California. Our next MMAP project starts on February 4th in San Bernardino, a short 320 mile jaunt from Sun City. We will be there for three weeks working on a project at Community Bible Church. The information we have about the work is that we will be doing a remodel on an office and a bathroom. That (as we learned on our first project) can always change. But we go with the knowledge that whatever we do we "do unto the Lord". We look forward to helping this church out and we also look forward to meeting five other MMAP couples. Our project leader and his wife and another couple come from Oregon, the third couple is from Montana, the fourth from Washington and the fifth from Alabama. We are excited to meet them all and find out how long and where else they have served with MMAP. The couple from Montana will be going on to a project in Payson, AZ in March where our good friends, Sam & Mary Tozer will start as new MMAPers. We are equally excited about this. We had hoped to be together with Sam & Mary when they did their first project, but scheduling didn't allow it. However, Payson is not that far from Sun City and we plan on taking a drive up to see them in March and check out the camp where they will be serving. It may come up for us as a project in the future. [BY THE WAY - if any of you reading this blog are retired, have an RV and a love for travel and for helping others - check out Mobile Missionaries Assistance Program at www.MMAP.org ]

These last four months in our new home have been jammed packed with lots of activity. And we are loving the mild winter weather. We have taken some drives to see the sights. One day trip was to Boyce Arboretum near Superior, AZ. It's only about an hour or so from our house and filled with hundreds of specimens of desert plants.

We have also gone to several concerts with friends, played a few games of pool and miniature golf at the Sun City rec centers, started a few house remodel projects and scoured the garage and estate sales and the thrift stores for furniture to fill our house. We got rid of almost all our furniture last year when we sold our house in Washington and committed to being "full time" RVers. (Doesn't God have a great sense of humor?) Anyway, it has been fun looking for items that will fit our life style and not break our retirement bank account in the process. We have done really well and are learning how to find those bargains. We've settled on a combo western/southwest look for the decor in the living room, but the most important feature is to have lots of sitting space to entertain guests. We hope to do a lot of entertaining.

We made a good start at entertaining in mid January when our oldest granddaughter, Erica came for a one week visit. We flew her down from northern California in hopes she would settle on a local university here in the Phoenix area. Alas, although she liked it, it didn't offer her the course work she hopes to pursue in anthropology/archeology. But in the meantime, we were able to take her to several interesting places for sigh-seeing outings. We took her to Wickenburg, stopping along the way at Lake Pleasant:

Erica and Jim "hug" a cactus at Lake Pleasant

Erica checks out the statue of the school teacher arriving at the Wickenburg train depot.

Hamming it up with the old miner statue

Erica trying to make a lady out of the Wickenburg dance hall girl

A second trip with her was to Sedona:

Yes, the rocks are truly red!

A day following Erica's visit, our friends Sam and Mary came for a five day stay. The day they left, Jeff & Stacy Johnson, a young couple we met last year in our travels to Bryce Canyon, Utah came for an overnight stay. They live in Alaska and were down in Arizona "thawing out" for three weeks. We were excited to have them stay (even if for a short time) and get to know them better. We are so blessed to have so many old and new friends.

Other events that took up the last four months included Helen's flight back to Washington in October (as we told you about in the last update) and our one week trip back to Washington for Christmas. That was a very special time with family.

The girls make a Christmas gingerbread train

The finished product and two happy sisters

We "entertained" the family with our new Christmas song - "Living in a Phoenix Wonderland"

And since we flew in and out of LasVegas (instead of Phoenix) we were able to spend a few days in Kingman, AZ with the Tozers. In fact, our decision to fly out of LasVegas was because they offered to take care of Zoe and take us the one hour to and from the Vegas airport. They are such great friends - but we almost didn't get our dog back since they love her almost as much as we do!

One sad event in these past months was the loss of our friend, Cindy King. Cindy was only 62 and had fought a valiant ten-year battle with cancer. In spite of her cancer, numerous surgeries and the pain of all kinds of chemo treatments, Cindy never lost her passion for life. She was a long time friend of our son-in-law Scott's parents, and we met her and her husband when we visited Arizona three years ago. Soon after that,  Scott's dad Jay found out he had brain cancer and passed away a short nine months later. In spite of her cancer, Cindy was a bright light for Scott's mother after Jay's death. It will be an adjustment knowing she is not here to bring us a good laugh and a bright smile. But both her passing and loosing Jay as well just reminds us that we never know how long our days on this earth will be. So, we ask you to consider two very important things - how will you spend those days, and once they end, where will you spend eternity? We know....and we hope all of you reading this do as well.

Until the next update, just ponder this:
Make the most of every moment as God would want you to. Don't spin your wheels in vain and empty pursuits. The Bible tells us to not worry about what we will eat or drink or wear. God knows what we need. Seek first His kingdom and all these things (food, drink, material possessions, etc) will be provided to us as well.

Take time to enjoy a sunrise or a sunset. These are taken from our front yard:

And, if you have a personal relationship with The Maker of Heaven and Earth, don't fear death! The poet, Calvin Miller said it so well -

"I once scorned ev'ry fearful thought of death,

When it was but the end of pulse and breath,

But now my eyes have seen that past the pain

There is a world that's waiting to be claimed.

Earthmaker, Holy, let me now depart,

For living's such a temporary art.

And dying is but getting dressed for God,

Our graves are merely doorways cut in sod."