Rough Day for Joel

Joel recently started working full time at a place called Furniture Rescue. They basically take your beaten up old furniture and make it look good again. This involves a lot of grunt work which is where Joel is finding himself, but he likes it. It's a 40 hour a week job. Once school starts his boss will work around his college hours.

Today I got a call from a gal in the office there saying that they'd sent Joel home. He had some stripper solution splash on him. He's had tiny bits on him before and he says it burns like fury. You have to run and hose off. Today he was getting an end table out of the solution and didn't realize that some of the stripper had pooled in an area where there was a cubby space on the table (hard to explain). As soon as he leveled the table to begin scraping it, the stripper came rolling at him and splashed over his apron. He ran outside and started hosing off. In the process of taking his shirt off he got his face too.

When he got home I decided to call poison control to see if he needed medical treatment. Basically after a few phone calls I found out that the shower that Joel took would stop the burning. It basically took the top layer off. It's not supposed to get worse or blister so the poison control lady said to just have him put hydrocortizone cream on it and neosporin to keep it from getting infected. Close call! Of course he had to look tough for the camera!

Until the Next Grand Adventure,

Yvonne and crew

p.s. Why does he always get hurt when Jim's out of town?

Guess What Today Is?

Four years ago today is when Jim fell through the ceiling at church and we started that huge stressful time. Joel and I were just talking about it the other day and neither of us could talk about it without choking up. How blessed we are to still have Jim here! I seriously don't know what path our lives would have taken without him. I do know that God would have been with us no matter what. I'm just glad He chose to heal him.

The month before his fall we had given Jim a Father's Day present that said that we wanted him to fulfill a lifelong dream to skydive. He was pumped. The accident happened before that could take place. This year for Joel's graduation present it was decided that he and Jim would make the jump (moms...don't be mad at me!)

Last Friday was the day. There's a place not far from here that does tandem jumping so Jim scheduled the appointment and on the long awaited day we made the trip. Lots of people had the same idea that day so all total we were there about 4 hours. I was so mad at myself because I brought my camera, but left the memory card in my computer. I do have pictures, but they're on the camera and I can't get them off until Kayla comes home. She borrowed my cable for her camera. Anyway, both jumps were filmed by another jumper and Joel ended up buying the still shots too which is what I'll post a few of here.

I was totally shocked how soft the landings were. They sort of just softly touched down rather than my idea which would have been rolling head over heals until they came to a stop. After seeing lots of other jumpers land I felt better about the guys' jumps.

Now those of you that know Jim know that he has motion sickness when in enclosed spaces so the plane ride did him no favors. We totally didn't even think about him taking medication. He said the plane ride was miserable, the free fall awesome and then the parachute part really turned his already sick stomach. By the time he reached the ground he was as white as a sheet and his motion sickness really stuck with him the rest of the day...bummer for him. He says that next year when we give Kayla her jump for graduation that I'll be the one to have to take her....um not so sure about that!

All in all it was a good day and now he can say he's checked one of those "always wanted to do things" off his list. We're just glad that he was able to be here to do it.

I'll leave you with some shots of Joel's jump which he said was awesome! Just think...some day we'll be doing that trip in reverse! What a ride that'll be!

Until the Next Grand Adventure,

Yvonne and Crew

p.s. We talked to Kayla last Sunday night and I'm afraid we've officially "lost" her to the mission field. She's already talking about how she can get back to Taiwan.

Some Kayla News

I thought I wouldn't have a picture to post, but this is a screen capture I did of Kayla when we were talking on the computer.


I just wanted to catch you up on what Kayla's doing. We've been able to talk to her a handful of times (not enough for me!). We have downloaded Skype (free...there's other stuff on there that costs, but the part we downloaded didn't cost). The Pagels have Skype too so we can talk over the Internet without a phone bill, but the cool part is that both our computers have a webcam so we can see each other. If you have the capabilities you should try it. You'll need to search for ThePagels <---typed just like that. They are 13 hours ahead of us so the best time to talk to her is after 8:00 at night here.


She looks great and is having a ball. From the activity we see going on behind her, the Pagel kids love her. Scott and Angie Pagel love her too which is understandable. She's a super helper. Scott told me that she embarrassed herself once though. She has a habit of calling everyone "darling" and one night right after she got there they all were playing a game and Scott didn't realize that it was his turn so she told him, "It's your turn, darling!" Then she was embarrassed so she tried to explain herself by saying that at our house we're not allowed to use words like stupid or dummy so she came up with a nicer word. Scott told me that he chuckled inside because she was really telling him, "It's your turn stupid!". It now makes me think about all the times she affectionately called me darling! It's usually when I'm driving hmmmm....



This week and next she is away from the computer so there's no contact or news (which I'm struggling with greatly!) She's at a missionary conference with the Pagels and then the following week she'll be helping teach English at a sports and English camp. This week another girl from the youth group went over so she'll have someone else over there to hang out with (even though the Pagels are great!). I asked Kayla if she needed me to send anything with Audrey and she asked for a couple more shorts and brown sugar since they couldn't get it over there. I was able to get that together for her so they should be baking soon :0) Kayla said that when they go to Costco to shop all the people walk up to their cart and peer in to see what Americans shop for. She said she does stand out and that it's weird. She's been shopping and told me that she bought a shirt. Bethany the 12 year old pipes up from the background and said that it's a very BRIGHT shirt with lots of colors. I can't wait to see that one! She also bought a Chinese dress.


Please pray for her and for us here missing her. She's doing a wonderful work and we're so proud of her.

Until the Next Grand Adventure,

Yvonne and Crew