Jesse and I rolled out to the North American Mission Board this morning. I did my seminar on the 5 Levels of Engagement for mobilizing people. They were an enthusiastic group!

It’s always fun to share with people who love what you do!

We met up and had lunch with a new friend from Kenya, Pastor Museli Ndonga. This picture is with Museli, Jesse and two men from the Video department at NAMB.

He’s a great guy! It’s so much fun for me to speak Swahili with another Kenyan. I usually speak a kind of Swahenglish. I’ll be going along in English saying something like, “And those guys better get their act together or there’ll be shida mkubwa!” And Museli would say, “Kweli!” Which means that’s True!

We went on for about 2 1/2 hours talking about missions, church planting and how to go about doing outreach in the area. It’s unbelievable how patient Jesse is!

After lunch, we stopped by Barnes and Noble (my favorite thing to do when I have twenty minutes to spare) then over to Azalea to work with the kids.

One of our volunteers is a wonderful lady named Linda Smalls. Today I took her over to Jemilllin’s house. Almost everyone that comes to the mission are boys and young men. We don’t have a lot of girls come in. My prayer is we’ll get some other lady volunteers soon and I’ll let the girls have “their” room. That seemed to help in the past.

The kids at the mission are doing well. Jesse and some of the kids got the Nintendo consoles going, so they’re having fun.

I really do love those kids.

Today I spent most of my time with Mohammed working on the Periodic Table. I love Science and Nature stuff. I enjoy studying the material again.

This mushroom log that Jesse bought that grows edible mushrooms is fruiting. We had one mushroom about two weeks ago. This time we’re seeing about 8 little buttons come up. I find this stuff fascinating.

Did you know that mushrooms grow with trees and their roots? They work together so the tree can absorb certain nutrients not produced by photosynthesis.

I am always amazed by the great complexity and beauty that God has created. Even on tiny levels. All that beauty and we just walk by completely oblivious.

Came home and ran 4 miles. Took Sugar with me. She does ok the first mile. Really bad the second half of the second mile, good on the third mile and just fine on the 4th. Definitely slowed me down.

One part of my run was funny. There was a couple riding up one of our hills on bicycles. I was keeping up with them!

Admin work now.

Usually every evening I start out by going through my email. While I’m doing that I check on Twitter. I finish up my email and start uploading pictures. I then write the blog and insert pictures. I pick the top three pictures, put them in a file for uploading to Facebook, write the status update and upload the pictures.

Depending on what’s going on it’s usually two hours every evening.

On to the next thing!

BTW, we just went over 120,000 pictures in our Photo Gallery at whirlwindmissions.org! We started out account with Smugmug on December 5, 2003.

May 19th, 2004 was the first day I went on line with a blog! Over 5 years now with nearly daily updates.

50 Videos for Story Tim–my favorite stories from 50 years!

That’s a lot of Mr. Tim!

My wife always says, “You live to hear yourself talk.” Perhaps she’s right.

Today I had a disappointment. I was looking forward to meeting up with my new Kenyan pastor friend. Unfortunately, he had wageni (visitors) in town so we had to put it off until tomorrow. Bahd luck.

The good news is that he’ll meet me up in Alpharetta at NAMB so that’ll save me lots of miles on the car!

Probably worked out for the best. I stayed up till about 1:30am working on admin stuff. Little extra rest is always good.

Had a fun family lunch today!

It’s been rainy and damp for about a week now which means that there are lots of mushrooms popping out. I walked about a mile through the forest searching for cool new species I haven’t seen before.

Beauty!

Went to Clarkston this afternoon to help the refugee kids with their homework while Jesse taught his guitar class.

Also took Bennett over to pick up his van. Glad I could help!

Back home now working on my home work.

I’ll lift weights later.

Kathy is running a slight temp and has a cold. Pray for her!

Today was one of the “light” days that kept going and going and going.

Started out doing the shopping at Kroger for the week.

Came home and picked up Jesse.

It’s been another damp day, which means plenty of mushrooms poking up their little heads. Beauty!

I liked these little yellow ones.

We went to lunch with my Pastor from FBC Mountain Park, Dr. Bill Blanchard. Always great so spend time with him!

We went to Staples, Best Buy, Kroger (again) and Publix picking up equipment for the mission and checking out prices on stuff we might need later.

Over to FBC Doraville to check on the office and pick up bills.

Then to Azalea to help the kids with their homework. Some of them are SO hard to keep on track. Still love ’em!

Came home, ran 4 miles.

Started on my office work. Need to complete my financial report. Always something!

This morning Kathy and I went Clarkston to go to church.

My partner Kevin Riley spoke on prayer. He did a good job. It was good to see friends!

Rainy day today.

Kathy got her hair cut.

Saw the blimp again flying over Clarkston.

Hope to get some exercise if it dries up some.

This morning I went to Kroger to gas up my car and pick up some subs for the family. On may way, my iPhone wouldn’t power up.

Not zesty. I put it on a charger but it wouldn’t take a charge. Got home, tried to sync with the computer. Still had issues. Stress city.

Went out for a 4 mile run. I always run harder when I’m kind of upset.

Came home and felt better. I took the cradle sync off and plugged my iPhone straight to the wall. This time it worked ok! I sure was relieved about that.

I could remember most of the stuff for next week, but after that I got shaky.

I also got my MobileMe account to back up the device. I think I’m pretty much good to go now.

Crazy how dependent I get on these devices, but when you don’t have a secretary, you better have a PDA that works!

Watched TV with Kathy tonight. We’ve enjoyed watching the Lie to Me series on DVD.

It’s been rainy weather. Always looking for my fungi friends! Check out this tiny guy!

I thought this was pretty cool.

Ashley has some friends over this evening. She made spaghetti. It was really good!

Man, it has really rained! My rain gauge said 3″! We need it! Water from the sky still seems like a miracle.

I spent most of my day writing newletters.

We sure have some great supporters!

Jesse has been working on his new desk.

Looking good!

Enjoyed watching Lie To Me, the TV series with Kathy this evening.

I worked on admin things this morning. Got the newsletters all ready to go.

Worked out on weights. Feel great!

5 hummingbirds in the yard this morning. Supa groovy!

Jesse and I went to Staples to pick up supplies for the newsletter and to drop off the originals so they could make the 238 copies this month.

Met up with Ashley and Kathy at Vikhyat.

Enjoyed some of the best Indian food and fellowship ever. Double blessing because Miles also got to eat with us.

Jesse and I rode with Ashley today. We needed “Big Red,” her Expedition. We went to Staples to pick up his new desk. Super heavy! When we got home this evening, we opened the box while in the car so we can split the heavy stuff out.

He also got a 5 shelf bookcase. On sale for $35!

We went to Azalea to help the kids with their homework. Seemed like we had a LOT more yesterday.

Rained really heavily while we were at the mission!

We had a volunteer come help us today. Linda used to help us a lot a year ago. Great to see her back.

We picked up the newsletter copies on our way home.

We still need to put Jesse’s desk together. He is a very precise person. He’s more like my brother. I tended to be the one who could get it done in record time. Jim’s work would be absolutely perfect.

I don’t mind not having to do the heavy thinking.

That’s why he’s the beta version.

Jesse and I met up with a group of our partners from Dunwoody BC.

Tom Frost has been instrumental in bringing new people interested in doing missions in our area. They include the Zamora family and Bayo Otito! Great folks! We at a favorite Colombian food place, La Casona.

After lunch we went to Walmart and Lowes to pick up supplies for the missions.

Also checked out desks for Jesse at Office Depot. We’ll pick it up tomorrow when we’re with Ashley and her big ol’ Expedition!

I also enjoyed looking at the beautiful orchids at Lowes.

Fabulous!

Also went to Azalea to help the kids with their homework.

Took hours.

Had some great conversations with new partners, in particular with a Kenya pastor in Marietta! Look forward to helping them reach out to their community!

Came home and ran 2.2 miles.

This morning I went over to my mechanic at T&G to pick up my car.

It has been having some problems starting. I was glad they were able to get it fixed so quickly.

Worked on admin stuff this morning at home.

Also went for a 4 mile run. Pretty nice weather. Still pooped.

Went to Willow Branch to work with the refugee kids while Jesse taught his guitar class.

Know how to find the Greatest Common Factor and the Lowest Common Multiple?
How about naming the 6 Kingdoms or explaining the life cycle of Fungi? Welcome to my world!

After the class I took him to get a hair cut while I worked on phone calls.

Got some tough news from my brother Tito. Looks like the bank is going to foreclose on their church building. Very sad. I don’t understand these bank guys.

I enjoyed some quiet time this morning. Here’s what my area looks like.

Today Jesse and I thought it was going to be a slow day. Wrong.

My car didn’t start well this morning. You may remember that we had to get towed last month when it didn’t start. I wasn’t taking any chances this time. Ashley helped me get my car to our mechanic this evening after I got home.

We picked up Bayo Otiti, our missionary at Huntington Terraces, and Ruthie North, our missionary at Huntington Creek. We took them for lunch to catch up on how things are going at the mission.

It was great to see all the good things that God is doing. We all face challenges, and our missionaries have plenty of them!

Our goal today was to clean out one of the rooms at the mission at H. Terraces.

We loaded stuff into my car and went to FBC Doraville where I have a storage area. But we had to clean that out to make room for more stuff! We dumped some of it and put the painting stuff in another area at the church. Storage space is always an issue. People want to give me stuff all the time, but unless I have a place to take it, I don’t get it.

We got the room cleaned out and Bayo will have a party soon to give a lot of the extra stuff that we have to the needy families we work with.

We went to Azalea to check on the kids. We had a bunch today! Lots of kids need help.

Also went to Office Depot. I want to get Jesse a decent desk. He’s been using a folding table for the last year. He’s in charge of all our computer/web work. He needs a decent place to keep all the electronics and gear he uses. We found a couple that I think will do the job. I’m very proud of Jesse’s great work for us!

Slow day became a Go day!

I’ll work out on weights this evening. Burn off some stress.