Baby is Home

Jonathan and Mommy returned home on Thursday. We were happy to get them home and settled in. Both are doing very well. Mommy was able to get some much needed rest as Jonathan went to the kids' VBS performance. Everyone was very suprised to see the baby out and about so soon, but he took it all in stride.

David's brother's kids are still in town and Josh and Karina are having a wonderful time with their cousins.

Karina celebrated her 11th birthday on Saturday. She had a few friends over with cake and presents. Daddy took her out for a special night out on Friday night. She bought a new swimming suit, they went out to eat at her favorite restaurant China Buffet and then they went and played a round of mini golf.

Josh went camping with his cousins and Grandma and Papa.

See the photo tab to the right for more pictures.

IT'S A BOY!!!!!!

We are proud to announce the birth of Jonathan Daniel Mead, born at 8:56am today on June 24, 2008. Weighing in at 7lbs 14 ounces and standing (laying) 21 inches, he is the champ of the day!

He has brown hair with blond highlights and blue eyes.

Maggy started having strong contractions at 3:30 this morning and we started to the hospital at 4:30. We arrived just in time for her to have the epidural and she started pushing at 8:00. After a relatively uneventful labor the baby came out strong and crying! Daddy cut the cord and we have the first picture laying on mommies chest about 5 minutes after birth.

Please see the photo album for more pictures!

School frustrations, baby news and kids update.

David's school situation reached a low two weeks ago. Dealing with some of the issues with the interaction with the instructors became very frustrating and we looked into transferring to another school. There was at least one very attractive alterntative and we started planning to make the transfer. But after thinking and praying about it, it became evident that God's will was for David to stay and finish where he was at.

So after a short and very refreshing break, David is back at school and was able to catch up on all the work he missed in only 3 days. God is faithful.

Flying is actually beginning to bring an income and we hope and pray that it will develop into enough to cover all of our living expenses so that Maggy won't have to go back to work for quite some time.

Both mommy and baby are doing very well. The baby is in no hurry to come early even though we thought he would. She has dropped some and had two very intense contractions this morning. July 5 is the due date and it looks like he is happy to stay until then!

My 3 nieces (my brother Michael's daughters) are in town for the week. My kids are very excited to have them in town. They get along very well and are so happy to see each other as it is usually just once a year.

More as new happens!...

Overdue Updates

Well, I have not been faithful in updating but I have a very good reason. I have been very busy with flying and with school. Last week I set a new personal record and logged 24 flight hours in a single week! And I didn't pay for a single hour of it! In fact, I got paid for most of it; how exciting.

Above photo is a picture of my flight instructor, Pete Crawford, who signed me off for CFI. I am so glad that I met him. He is a very good instructor and I learned so much from him.

A&P school is going very rough and we are looking at making a change. The family visited another school today and we were very impressed. A lot has to happen to transfer and we are exploring options and praying a lot about making the decision.

Maggy is doing very well with her pregnancy. Less than a month now for the due date! No one thinks that the boy will wait that long, but we will see. He is very active still despite not having any room to move around. He pretty much makes his own room!

The kids are out of school now. Wed was their last day. They are very happy, of course.

Hope to be more faithful with updates.

Another Milestone!

One of the requirements to apply to MAF as a pilot/mechanic is to have 400 hours logged flight time. Today, I officially passed that mark! Praise God!

Since passing my CFI checkride, I did get the job at the flight school where I trained. They are a bit slow right now and have not picked up any new students yet. However, a friend of mine who is also a pilot is trying to get his commercial certificate. He asked me to finish his training and we have flown twice together now, putting me past that mark.

It is very fun doing instructing and I do believe I am going to enjoy it. We are confident that God will provide just the right number of students for me in his perfect timing.

Maggy and kids are doing well. More pictures soon.

Finally, I passed my CFI checkride!

Praise God! After 5+ months of studying and preparation, I have passed my Certified Flight Instructor's practical exam. I could not have done it without God's help. There were many times I felt that I just couldn't comprehend the material and commit it to memory, but God gave me the ability after asking him.

I am able to start instructing right away. I have a couple of students who are ready to go now and hope to add to them for a full schedule soon. My new place of employment is CAMS Flight School.

I still have more training to do and will start that right away. In order to expand my customer base, I will add the Instrument rating to my Instructor's certificate to instruct instrument students as well as familiarize myself with more technically advanced aircraft as the school has several of those.

Thanks so much to those of you who have been praying for me!

Idaho Bound

We had been invited to the wedding of one of the Trempert kids, Craig and since David hadn't seen them in a very long time and Maggy and the kids had never met them, we decided to make the trip. Everything worked out well for the trip.

The flights were messed up, as usual and we were rerouted with less than a good chance of making it to Nampa, Idaho as planned on Friday. We wound up with standby tickets and full flights in Salt Lake City, Utah. We still had quite a bit of daylight left and the weather was gorgeous, so we cancelled that last leg of our flight and rented a car to get to Nampa and the wedding on time.

It was a gorgeous trip. See the photos in the album on the right.

The trip was great, other than that. We had a wonderful time with the Tremperts, a family that David grew up with in Venezuela and also stayed weekends with when he was in California in the Marines as they were stationed in nearby Redlands. MAF has since moved its headquarters to Nampa.

The wedding was beautiful and it was wonderful catching up with the Tremperts and meeting new people from MAF. We stayed with a very nice couple who have been with MAF in several different countries for many years.

We also discoverd an additional opportunity for us to proceed with our desire to join MAF when David finishes his school. MAF offers a paid mechanic internship to build aditional maintenance skills before going out to the field. Maggy will also have a chance to be exposed to missions and her role as missionary during that time. It will last a year if we are accepted and will much better prepare both of us for missions work.

We will be in prayer about that decision to see if that is God's leading. Please pray for us as we make that decision soon.