Home Sweet Home

I made it! My parents and I arrived in Columbia on Wednesday. It was a long, but very beautiful drive. The Smokey Mountains are beautiful! We arrived on campus early afternoon and after checking in and meeting one of my housemates we made it to the house where I will be living and moved in.

The house was not anything like what I had expected. I am sharing a room with another girl named Robyn, who is from Tennessee. We have a bathroom attached to our room that we share and out another door in our room is an enclosed patio. Sarah is my RA and housemate. She has a room that also opens onto the patio. Down the hall from us is Jennie from California and across from her will be Linda, a Chinese girl now living in Boston I think. Linda is not here yet as her and Sarah were both her last year. It was nice having new friends to get lost with on campus! I really like my housemates and I think we are going to have a lot of fun together this year!

The other side of our house contains the living room with new furniture that is very cozy. A fireplace (real fireplace, not gas or electric!), a kitchen and a dining room and another enclosed patio that leads to a laundry shed in our backyard. We have a large backyard with lots of trees. If you walk down the road to the left you get to campus, if you go to the right, you come to the point. That is a great place that overlooks some beautiful scenery. There is a gazebo, swing, benches, picnic table and bonfire pit there. I have already been there a couple of time with my housemates.

A fun thing to see here is the geckos! They crawl on the outside of our house and are so cute! The huge spiders aren't so cute, but we haven't found any inside our house yet! I have been having a lot of firsts here. I got to eat my first funnel cake at an IHOP, go to my first Sonic, all sorts of fun things!

I have been on overload with all of the new people and places, but it really has been quite good. I have already been to a meeting about mission trips for this summer. I don't know if I will get to be on one. The school has adopted 4 people groups and this year they will add another. They send teams to these people groups each year to build a consistent relationship, study their culture and share the gospel. It is really an amazing program.

I was very happy to sleep in today and catch up on some much needed rest. Tuesday is our first day of classes, but there is still much to be done before then! Thank you all for your prayers during this time of transition in my life. It has gone quite smoothly so far and I trust God will sustain me and help me through my very difficult (academically) year here. I miss you all and think of you often.