Three makes a crowd

First things first.
We are happy to blog-officially announce the pending October arrival of the third Grimm addition to this adventure! Meet the Grimmling (gender as yet unknown):




I am four months along and doing well. We are happy, healthy, and very excited; even though, as you can imagine, this will change up our plans a little.








Cementing our partnership with Word Made Flesh is still in progress. We were thankful and blessed to meet with a few of the staff this last weekend, including their newest project manager. It was very nice to ask questions, hear stories, and pray together in-person.



Since the baby is due in October, our four months training with Word Made Flesh will probably be bumped over to January 2017.

Patience. Sigh.

Our current tasks are to propose a budget (email me if you want to see the first draft - mowen10@georgefox.edu - your feedback and advice would be very much appreciated), rally our prayer network (that's you), and wait patiently.
Pastor Clemence has informed us that Baku village in Papua New Guinea has begun building on our house. More than ever, we wish we could book a ticket for tomorrow and just go!

In other news this month:
We had a wonderful time in Portland announcing our pregnancy to family and friends and getting an ultrasound checkup.
We celebrated our second anniversary (May the fourth be with you) with a romp on Mt. Rainier. We climbed up to Muir Hut for a fantastic view at 10,000+ feet.
We were very blessed and encouraged by our visits to two Churches that have been partnering with us in prayer.
We are still working on the Bamboo farm (though not for much longer as the season winds down) and stashing away as much as we can into emergency savings. Ben already has work lined up for the rest of the summer, but I am job hunting.
We are pursuing membership with a Church community in Bellingham, WA called Oikos Fellowship. Finding this community has been a surprise and a great blessing to us.

Prayer and Praise:
We praise God for our village in Baku, for our friend and mentor, Pastor Clemence Komnapi, and for the many that have been praying with us, advising, encouraging, and supporting us.
Please pray that God would guide us in making good use of our time left in the States, that He would provide for our health and financial preparation both for the baby and for travel overseas, and that He would help us to be discerning and patient while we wait for things to unfold.

Thank you all for your prayers and love. As ever, we are blessed to be a part of your lives and to be engaged in this grand adventure.

The view from Muir Hut

May God bless and keep you.
Love,
The Grimm Crowd