Fall 2008 Newsletter

New features on your right

Good day to you all hope your summer has been a great for you as well. We have had a great trip for the most part and are looking forward to the fall.

Wanted to bring a few things new to our blog to your attention.

1st - > We have added a new button on the top of the bar to your right. It is right above our photo. This is a button that will remind you who we are working with in our Ministry towards and in Nigeria. For all information SIM related just click on it, it will take you directly to their site.

2nd - > Just below that it reads "Join us in ministering to Nigerians. Click here to donate to SIM. You will need our STA# 12049". If you are interested in joining Christ in his Ministry in Nigeria thru our family just click on this and you will be directed to their site. You can then sign up there.

3rd - > Below our photo we have included an option for you to sign up and receive our posts along with other posts to one site. Along with our site and any of your other fav blogs you can receive them all in one place. So if you have many blogs that you read on a regular basis please sign up.

If you are already signed up to one of these sites please hook us up into your grouping.

We are trying to make this site more user friendly and give you many options that will help in keeping you updated in our ministry and ways you can join us.

We appreciate all of your Love and Prayers.

TAC
(Toby, Alycia and Caden)

Cheese anyone?

Yesterday we attended the State Fair of Wisconsin. For over 4 years now I (Alycia) have been hearing about this event...especially about the Cream Puffs. Now, I expected there to be a lot of food at a fair...but this one out-did the Texas State Fair- especially in dairy products! Did you know that there are 1.252.000 dairy cows in Wisconsin? Whoever says "happy cows live in California" has never been to WI. We enjoyed only 3 of the dozens of dairy products available- fried cheese curds, flavored milk (such as rootbeer flavored) and of course, Cream Puffs. Now, you might think all we did was eat...well, we also got to visit with Toby's friend Scott and his family as well as Deb and her girls. It was a fun, but hot, day. Here is a scrapbook of our day...enjoy!

Make a Smilebox photobook

By prayer

"By prayer"

We have some great things to tell you about our time here at Simco. There is one thing that I want to share with you that each of us has been greatly encouraged by during our time at SIM.

"By prayer". This is a motto that SIM has had for a long time. We are here to tell you that this statement is the truth. Each weekday morning the staff of SIM gathers for a half hour worth of prayer before they run to their desks to start their day of work.

They pray for specific countries each morning along with prayer requests from their Missionaries on the field and on home assignment. They also have one day a week they pray for their appointees.

The greatest day of the week is Friday. They have prayer time set aside to pray for supporters specific prayer request’s. We had the great opportunity to pray for a gentleman that has supported SIM for years. He has grown ill and his family has taken control of his finances and is not able to send in his monthly support as he has for so long.

We had a request from a Church that has supported SIM for years that lost one of their younger congregants. He was killed in an auto accident while on a short term trip to Peru. We prayed in celebration for the young man’s life in Christ yet praying for the Churches mourning due to the lose of life here on earth.

It was a great encouragement to see how the agency that is sending us is backing us.

They say "by prayer" but the greatest thing is

they show "by prayer" as well.

SIM

Here we are at SIM in Charlotte, NC for our two weeks of training. For the first few days we seemd to be on a roller coaster but things have evened out for now. We will share more with you a bit later. There is one communal PC and laptops for some reason are not allowing us to update blogs. So here is a quick one between sessions.

Here is "Caden's corner". In our room we rearranged our room completely except one piece of furniture. This way we could make room for Caden to have his corner to play.

Thanks and check back for more updates.

Tennessee to North Carolina

We started our way through Tennessee Wednesday morning. When we reached Memphis we stopped for lunch and playtime. Caden had such a big day... he made a fish face, drank lemonade, saw ducks in a fountain at the Peabody hotel, crawled around in the hotel (yes, as Toby mentioned yesterday he is crawling and moving so much it is hard to keep up with him!), and even figured out how to turn the water on and off in the bathroom! These events were all captured on film of course. Enjoy a scrapbook of our fun ... you can move the photos around with your cursor to see them better.

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Oops...I left one of the cutest videos out of the slideshow. Here Caden is turning the water on and off in the bathroom WHILE I changed his diaper...it's getting more challenging each day!


We stopped Wed. evening just East of Nashville for the night. Caden did the funniest thing when we put him to bed. We laid him down and he sat right back up! Then, sitting there, playing with his little bear blanket, he fell asleep...sitting up! It was the funniest sight.



Today we made our way through the mountains to Waynesville, NC...home of Larry and Frances Green, my aunt and uncle. It was a beautiful drive and Caden was such a great traveler! Here is a pic of Toby and he at the NC visitor center:

Well this has been a very busy day here in the Abtstra world. It all started with us packing up the car for our summer adventure thru the US of A. Well parts of the US but a good portion of it anyways. As we were doing that Caden wanted to share something with us, a new trick he has learned. I have tried to include a short snipit for you to view but it is too big of a file. I will continue to try and include it in a future post.

Well we made it to Hot Springs in about 6 hours with a few stops along the way. Having a ten month old little guy along for the ride certainly adds a bit to the travel time. Caden did awesome! Even after being locked up in his car seat after he shared with us in the morning his new trick.

Caden is now crawling! Wish I could have got the snipit posted for you, sorry.

Tonight we stay here in Hot Springs and then travel into Tennessee as far as we can get before a complete meltdown from each of us. So continue to pray for us as we move along towards Charlotte and two weeks of training.

And we're off

Tuesday morning and the car is all packed and rollin on to Charlotte for two weeks of training with SIM. There will be a ton of information packed into those two weeks so we are excited about all we will learn and all those others we will meet and get to know.

We are now on the road to our first stop in Hot Springs, R-Kansas. We are going to be staying with Alycia's aunt and uncle.

We have used a lot of Space Bags to pack all of our clothes. Nice invention, I think this is the first time we are traveling with a bit of extra space in the trunk. With all of this extra space I am now concerned that we will get to Hot Springs and see that we have forgotten something. But I am counting on the space bags for creating all of the extra space within our car.

We will update as we go so you can follow along with our travels.

Caden Dedicated

This little guy just was Dedicated this past weekend at our Church. It was a great time and had lots of Alycia's family there in attendance. In front of the Lord and his body we committed to praying for this little guy to grow to know Christ as his personal Lord and savior & raise him in a way that honors Him as well. Those in attendance have also committed to assist in leading him towards the Lord.

We would also ask you, the Abtstra Network, to be in prayer for Alycia and I as we raise this little man to one day know the Lord with a personal relationship. Pray that we love on him continually and make all the best decisions in raising him.

Pray also for Caden as he grows. For his physical health and for his health as a whole. Pray also that as he finds out more about this sinful world that he will keep his most wonderful smile and keep on laughing. His many smiles and laughs are worth everything we have to do for him that tire us out.

Happy MOM's Day dear!

We Love you!

April Newsletter

Here is our latest Newlsetter. Click on the pictures to zoom in..

March an(d) on

Wow, we have reached March in this awesome year of 08'. Where has the year gone? I know I have stated this before but it so hard to believe that as we turned the corner into 2008 two months ago the realization hit. Nigeria and our work with the Nationals within the most populated African country.

Here is a little trivia for you, Abtstra edition:

Six months ago we met someone for the first time, who is it?

Since I have you in the mind set of meeting new people I want to let you know what is now going on with TAC (Toby, Alycia and Caden). Tonight and every Saturday night during the month of March we have been invited to share our future ministry with 5 different Lifegroups (for those outside of Dallas, Lifegroups are small groups of people within the the Church that meet outside of the Church within the community).

This is a great opportunity for us to meet other members of our Church and for them to meet us and learn about our Future ministry in Nigeria. We are excited to meet so many new people during these nights and to share the Lord's vision for our family.

Please be in prayer for these nights as we seek to enlarge our Abtstra Network. We know and understand the more the Lord and his Children are behind us in our ministry how effective we can be as His hands and voice to the Nigerian people.

Thank you, our Abtstra Network we appreciate your support and prayers.

Love,

TAC

HE's BACK

Thank you for all of your prayers for the little fella.

Well last night around 7pm the Doc asked if we would be alright with discharging him then rather than to keep him one more night. Well we opted for one more night just to play it safe and make sure that all of his numbers and signs were best for him to be home.

So this morning we packed up his room and headed home where we are now to give him the treatments he received at the hospital.

He is happy, smiley and chatty once again so our little fella is doing great.

Prayer request

Please be in prayer for our little man Caden he is now in the Hospital with Pneumonia. It is such a helpless feeling to see our little guy hooked up with three different things in three different places.

So please pray that everything turns out alright and that this will pass in a speedy time. Thank you in advance.

Caden's Big Trip

It was a short trip but we had a lot of fun. We were able to see Toby's brother and his family, as well as Toby's grandma and many friends.

Here are more pics from our trip:

On our way...

God is good! We have started building our support team and have 1/8th of the total funds needed in our account. Praise God! We are so excited about beginning this journey to Nigeria. We have applied to a couple of churches and have a few more to speak with. We also hope to visit with LifeGroups, Sunday school classes and other small groups of people, as well as with individuals. If you would like for us to come and share about our ministry in Nigeria with your small group, please let us know...we would love to share our excitement with you and your friends!!! E-mail us and we will set a date.


We are on our way this weekend, too. On Friday we head to Wisconsin for the weekend. I (Alycia) am worried that Caden and I will freeze! But we are all excited to see snow (Caden is excited - but he doesn't know ir yet!) Toby is especially looking forward to watching the Packer's/Giants play-off game in GREEN BAY!!!! Most of all it will be great to see Toby's brother's family, Grandma, and friends.

The passing of an Uncle

This morning (Saturday) Alycia lost a beloved Uncle who not only made an impact within his family but within his community. He was known to many and greatly respected by so many more due to his position as Athletic Director of Lewisville Independent School District here in high school sports crazy Texas.

We ask for your prayers for the family and community thru this time as they honor and dedicate this time to a great man. The family lost a husband, brother, father, uncle, grandpa, friend etc. while the Lord accepts one of his children home for eternity.

Below is an article from the online version of the Dallas Morning News from today's news.

Former Lewisville athletic director Neal Wilson dies

He started with district in 1965; had been battling leukemia for several months

02:06 PM CST on Saturday, January 5, 2008

From Staff Reports

Longtime Lewisville ISD athletic director Neal Wilson died Saturday morning, a school official said.

DMN file

Neal Wilson

Wilson, who turned 65 on Dec. 28, was hospitalized in late October after being diagnosed with acute monocytic leukemia, according to assistant athletic director Rody Durham.

Wilson had been with the LISD – either as a coach as the athletic director – since 1965.

For his contributions to the district, Flower Mound High School renamed its football stadium after Wilson.The Neal E. Wilson Jaguar Stadium was dedicated in 2005.

Wilson's 40-year career began and ended in Lewisville. In 1965, he took his first coaching position at Lewisville Junior High School after graduating from North Texas State University. He went on to coach football at four other schools, including Lewisville High, where he posted a 67-19-5 record. He became the district's full-time athletic director in 1986.

At that time the district had one high school. The district would add four more – Marcus, The Colony, Hebron and Flower Mound – before his tenure ended.

Staff Writer Damon L. Sayles contributed to this report.