Specific Prayer Requests

1. The Air Force called and has extended Mike's "report no later than date" by 10 days. He is rescheduled to fly out 16 July. This will give us time to turn in paperwork while Mike is HERE in case I made some errors at 1 a.m. filling out applications. LOL This lifts a HUGE weight off my shoulders. I hadn't considered that PACAF would hear about our situation and offer an extension.

2. We are checking out of Seattle and heading to McChord for the night. We'll do as much business as we can today and hopefully leave for OR tomorrow. UNLESS something new happens in the next few hours - and it could. ::snort::

3. Some are asking how we want them to specifically pray:

• If it's God's will, that the passports would be recovered or turned in before the birth certificates arrive. Once the BC's arrive, we will send in the new applications and the old passports will not be usable, even if they are found. If the passports are recovered BEFORE the birth certificates arrive, we can fly with Mike on the 16th.
• Krista's identity is very compromised. The bank has assured her they'll refund the charges. Please pray they do, as this was her college fund. She also needs a new driver's license and military id (she'll need id that she has at home to do that).
• Josiah and Jamin hit the road for TX on Thursday. Pray for safe travels.
• I will have to replace a few things, certainly not all....ok it's silly...but pray I find some good sales on the things we really want to replace before we leave the country. ::snort::
• God's abundant blessings on those who have reached out and blessed us in the past few days.

4. We are still working on logistics for the weeks that the kids and I will be stateside. We've had two offers of vacant homes in the Seattle area, but I'd really like to head down to OR. ::snort::

5. We'll be on KOMO again at 4 p.m. and 6 p.m.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

WHINE

Here's the whine I've been holding in...WHY would someone take a van and steal things that mean nothing to them.

C'mon...Teddy Bears...MY BIBLE...my Inductive Study Bible where I've drawn arrows, marked words, done word studies for all these years...the one with the pressed yellow rose from Gram's grave and the daisies my 20 year old son gave me when he was 6.... WHY would they keep my BIBLE for goodness sakes? They just aren't very nice. I'm praying it ministers to them, but I'm ticked that they may have just tossed it.

We ARE rejoicing at what was left in the van...a Princess Pillow that means a lot to the girls. It was given to Bre by Krista and then passed down the line....STACIA'S BIBLE....Josiah's water bottle. It's o.k. but I really need my Bible now....though I'm amazed at how many verses I have memorized. ::snort:: I'll do more in the future.

I called a dear friend and wise military spouse/mentor in TX minutes ago.... she told me it's o.k. to stomp, it's o.k. to go home and it's o.k. not to bleed blue. Armed with this information I'm off to attack the day. Things are changing once again and I'll update as soon as they are set.

News stations are calling again. Hmmmm.....enough whining.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

Freakishly Large Family Stranded in Seattle

Humph....I hadn't realized how freaky it sounds to have NINE children in this part of the country. ::snort::

Interview with King 5 (pathetic popcorn scene but it was LUNCH and the kids were getting cranky and there was one more interview to wade through).

Interview with Komo News - better shots of kids. The one where Jared makes his infamous, "There's togetherness and then there's way togetherness," remark.

Not sure where the radio interview was.

The outpouring of prayers, concern and offers for "help" have been heart warming. I only wanted the passports back, but I must say that it has been a tangible sighting of God's love to have people stop at the hotel with games, $, notes of encouragement... The manager of the hotel says that both their hotels are receiving calls. I have a ton of messages on the phone, evidently, but can't figure out how to retrieve them. ::snort:: The manager last night sent up pizzas for us. He suggested drinks too, but I told him we'd all be better sticking with water. They've also cleared the rooms on either side of ours and above and below us. ::snort::

No one is stirring yet this a.m. I have a bit of time to answer some questions.

1. I'm quite sure that if we had team Goodfellow here pushing for us things would happen faster and the kids and I would be on our way quickly.....or at least sooner....but....

2. I now have a name and face of a Tech Sgt who is handling our passport applications. I have his address and name on the applications for passports and birth certificates. He is trying to help us move things along. I'm not sure he knows all the ins and outs that COULD be found if he were willing to push back at the State Dept...but I'm at rest.

3. We've been told that we cannot receive the quick turnaround passports because ours are "no fee military passports". That they MUST go through certain steps - regardless. Maybe that is why so many of you have heard cases of passports within 24 - 48 hours while we are being told the quickest "guaranteed" turn around will be 4 weeks AFTER the passports are applied for...which will happen the HOUR the birth certificates arrive.

4. I don't know about hand carrying things to San Francisco. There IS a passport office and State Department office here in Seattle.... We've been told that they must go through the McChord office?

5. As for quick passports.....what we're catching is that they CAN be done quickly if you have the documentation....we don't. The van robbers do. ::snort::

6. I'm really not sure why I need to stay in Seattle.

Stay tuned....Thanks for all the prayers and encouragement.
Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

So much to write...

...but I'm too tired.

It's 1 a.m. and we will have Mike at the airport at 10:30 a.m. I JUST finished printing out all the new passport applications so that Mike can sign them before he leaves the country...in the a.m.

After the news shows, a radio station interviewed some of the kids. I think the interviews were o.k. I'll find links later. Someone saw the van after the news story. We now have a van! It has a hole where a lock should be. It has no luggage or passports or gps etc.....but we have it. I was praying for the passports and really was prepared not to have the van...but this is the way it is. ::snort:: This IS great....I'm simply too tired to fully appreciate the miracle at this point. ::grin:: OH....the boys bought me M/M's while we were at Mcchord trying to speed things along today...that should help me fit into those maternity clothes that are waiting in Japan. LOL

I've applied for birth certificates. I'm not sure what I'm going to do beyond that. I will stay here in the area until the certificates arrive. I'm having them mailed to the TSgt who is helping me, as we have no address. I had planned to go visit family in OR after I was sure the passports were processing. The Sgt would prefer we stay here until we leave the country. We'll talk some more. I'm not sure I see the reason to stay here. It will be a minimum of 6 weeks, by the sounds of it, before the kids and I can join Mike. I bought a TRAC phone as I also had no phone. ::snort::

I'm not sure much of my faith came through on the news...but I felt good to be able to talk to the newscasters. ::snort:: One of them asked me point blank if I felt that God was telling me not to go to Japan....I tried to explain that I felt that He was telling me to look for the door in the midst of the trouble.

Well...pulling an all nighter is not going to help me deal with the goodbyes and paperwork tomorrow. The older kids decided to stay one more day with us. They want to help and I need to convince them that we are going to be o.k. I think it is killing the boys to leave while we are still "unsettled."

Off to bed...

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

Recent Developments

Before I say a thing further - we NEVER leave valuables in the car. We NEVER leave our personal documents in the van....never...EXCEPT for this one time...and there you have it. We are fully aware that this is our responsibility....but we need to figure it out from here.

We're about to be interviewed for the local news. Now THAT will be fun....maybe the police dept will now take tips seriously...maybe the hotel will get a bit more interested in helping me out. LOL Now to ditch the boys' cowboy hats before the interview. ::snort::

Air Force PA says to go ahead and go for it.....looks like Mike is flying and we aren't.

Recent developments:

Tim and Kathy (of last week's water fight) have loaned us their mini-van.

The less than genius robbers "charged" with Krista's debit for gas, Verizon accounts, groceries....they even tried to get Krista's employee discount at Albert sons. Last night at 11 p.m. they got gas at Sullivans and groceries at Burien Albertsons. Police says that won't help them find them. ::sigh::

We're to get the whole city's eyes out looking for the van.

McChord insists that getting replacement passports is the same process as new and that I'll have to start with birth certificates and then apply for passports.....but they have a couple of rooms the kid and I can stay in. We've spent an hour on hold with the State Dept and can't reach a person to verify that there is no other way to do this.

NARHS (our umbrella school) said to send them a summary sheet, course description, homeschool transcript and the police report and they will accept that for Jamin's final grades....if Jared's portfolio doesn't show up in a few weeks we'll do the same for his Freshman year. They are doing this because of our long standing relationship, our "stellar records" in the past and their belief that we are people of integrity. They are also praying for us and our advisor reminded me that there is a blessing in this for us, if I will look for it. I'm looking.

I'm trying to figure out HOW to finalize a plan for the younger ones and I. Mike and the older ones will leave tomorrow.

A son just quipped that I should go ask certain political figures how THEY got quick birth certificates. ::snort::

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

We are NOT in Japan or Completing the Country Music Song or I'm living in a Frank Peretti novel....

Well.....no leads from the police on our stolen van and possessions.

Goodfellow has been AWESOME! Stellar even. We've heard from commanders and deputy commanders of various squadrons and groups. Family Readiness went in on SUNDAY and faxed all our passport applications, front pages of passports, birth certificate copies to us...and told us to get the police report and go to the state department in the a.m. The stance from GAFB is that we are NOT APPLYING for passports (we've done that and they've been issued), we are applying for REPLACEMENTS of stolen passports.

HOWEVER, there is a msgt at McChord that says all USAF no fee passports must come to him and that he cannot do a thing to speed things up. He says that I will need to get originals of all our birth certificates sent to us again and start the entire process over. This means that I will be here with the kids for weeks to come. There is another sgt that Mike has contacted who is at least willing to talk to billeting about getting us lodging. They are full and insist we are low priority as we are "pcsing through." I'm STUCK....it seems they ought to have a new category for me and the children....."stuck while trying desperately to pcs through". ::snort:: Honestly, I don't mind staying at the hotel a couple of more nights, but I have to figure out where to go after that....possibly back to OR. We are weighing the benefits of camping out with Zander and Stacia (who is whining constantly about wanting a home, our dog and a van) in their Family Readiness office. ::snort:: It may be good to stay near a base....but it seems that after I get all the applications in, I may as well wait in OR and have them call me when they arrive. I don't know.

Meanwhile the Family Readiness honcho (not his official title ::grin::) at GAFB has called back and told Mike to go ahead and try the State Department anyway and see what THEY say. I so miss being at a small base where you KNOW folks and where you are a FAMILY and a TEAM....

Last night and this a.m. Isaiah 26:3 kept running through my mind. In fact I had just told all to gather together and was going to share how God was WITH us in the next few weeks, that the key was to keep our focus on HIM and that He would keep us in perfect peace, that He wouldn't ask us to do something that is harmful to us....and that we can walk forward with confidence.....when the call came that our van was strangely missing. Dad wondered where we had gone, we were set to meet for breakfast and head to the airport. I've really been at peace most of the day. The past hour has stressed me. Mike said I'm tough if I'm just now feeling stress.

Mike flies out on Tuesday. IF the van is returned and IF our passports are in it, we will fly out too. If not, it looks like I will be starting the process over again for passports and will be flying to Japan with the children at a later date. IF GAFB is right, and the State Dept will handle this differently than a first time application, then we may still be able to fly on Tuesday with Mike.

The magnitude of what we've lost and what is at risk is starting to dawn on us. You take your favorite things in the airplane with you....and the important documents....and we are still kicking ourselves that we walked off and somehow left the briefcase with all our important papers in the van. I have no clue how that happened.....we certainly are paying a price for the mistake. We did have three suitcases in Mom and Dad's car. It turns out they are Jared's things, Mike's uniforms and the little kids' clothes. Arielle and I have 4 outfits each....she has clothes that will fit when we arrive in Japan....I have size 10 (won't fit) and maternity clothes (may fit if I spend much more time stressing out in the NW ::snort::).

ALL of our vital documents are gone...this means all of our identities are vulnerable. I will have a long list of calls to make and such. I'm currently trying to get a fraud alert put on all of our names and social security numbers...but it appears that I'm only allowed to do one......so I'm off to find other computers. LOL

I'm so thankful that Tammy and Christina talked me into shipping our photo albums rather than bringing them in my suitcases. I'm thankful that our laptops were in the hotel. I'm thankful that Mom and Dad were here this a.m. to help steady kids while Mike and I dealt with the first reports etc. I'm thankful for an extra day with our adult children. I'm thankful that our credit card was not taken. I'm thankful that Mike did not fly out tonight. I'm thankful our adult children are hear to help entertain our younger children. I'm thankful Target is across the parking lot and if need be I can go buy 5 lbs of m/m's.

Whoa - Krista went down and talked to the front desk and they brought us up a microwave. She wanted some popcorn. ::snort::

I'm off to try to set some more fraud alerts...and to rent a car....

OH - the title - Arielle and I were discussing that we felt we were living in a Nancy Drew novel....but as the day went on we decided it's much more like a Frank Peretti novel. Seriously, I think God is going to do GOOD things for us and for the kingdom while we are in Japan....and I think that there is a touch of spiritual battle going on....so as Krista says...a Peretti but not quite a Decker.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

Keep praying....

The police think the van will be found "in a couple of hours" and the luggage will be gone...that's fine...we need the briefcase and Krista's bag.....pray.

The AK dmv's computers are down and we can't report the van stolen. The police here are on it.

Did I tell you that God has been stretching me with this pcs? Mike and I are still talking and it has certainly been our most stressful move. ::snort:: God is STILL on the throne, His timing is still perfect and I'm still....choosing joy!

Hope to be on an airplane in a couple of hours.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...