Rachel

We enjoy getting to know our volunteers and Rachel Mohr is no exception. Rachel is a student at Ohio State and has been volunteering in our hangar this month. She is no stranger to missions, having grown up in Madagascar. She also has a passion for flying and just earned her flight instructor's rating.

Young Swimmer

I (Dwight) got home from work yesterday and Rena asked me if I wanted to go observe Javin's final swimming lesson of the summer. I'd planned to get an early start fulfilling my duties as treasurer of our church, but knew I couldn't pass up an opportunity to watch my grandson learn to swim.

Javin is learning rhythmic breathing and the crawl stroke. He is very comfortable in the water and made a fine effort to coordinate breathing and swimming into a seamless operation. Later, he and the other kids in his class had a great time jumping off the diving board at the deep end of the pool.

The swimmer just two weeks before his sixth birthday

I did get the church's bills paid last night, finishing a bit after my normal bedtime. All in all, it was a good evening.

Missionaries needing prayer

The mission aviation community suffered a severe blow on August 1 st when the airplane piloted by missionary Frank Toews went down. Please remember Africa Inland Mission (AIR Air) and the loss and grief they are experiencing right now. Especially remember two wives who are now without husbands and eight children who are without their fathers. Check this link for details.

It Really Works!

We had talked about how we really missed garden ripened tomatoes. Since our tiller went out of commission a few years ago, we gave up putting in a garden. Frequent summer trips also made it difficult to keep ahead of the weeds. When I (Rena) saw this item at our local discount store I couldn't resist the idea of fresh tomatoes again. As it started to grow however, the poor plant kept trying to grow upright instead of upside down. We wondered if the stalks would break off as the tomatoes started to grow. But you can see from the picture that the weight of the tomatoes has pulled the tomato vine downward gradually. So now we can have our fresh tomatoes - yum! Now we just need to keep ahead of the raccoons!

Back Home and more updates

We are happy to be back home from Wisconsin and are settling back into our routine. The MMS blog has more updates on the trip to Airventure in Oshkosh. Be sure to check it out.

Busy at Airventure

We are being taken care of by the wonderful dedicated people of the Missionary Aviation Support Association (MASA). In our newsletter, we mentioned that the number of missionaries at this event was much larger than last year, (from 85 to an anticipated 250). It turns out that there are more than 400 this year. We have been eating in four shifts for each meal and that has worked out well. Area churches have been providing and serving meals, which has been quite an accomplishment for all of them.

Eating inside the tent

Sign on the meal tent

The focus of our time here has been between two tents. The IAMA (International Association of Missionary Aviation) tent houses displays from many different mission aviation organizations. MMS has a display in this tent. I (Rena) have worked shifts at this tent.

Dave Shelly stands in the entrance of the IAMA tent

Dwight has been working shifts in the "Fly-4-Life" tent. There are a number of large poster-like banners that tell the overall impact of mission aviation around the world. Missionary and Humanitarian flying is a feature of Airventure this year. This tent is in the main display area for the whole event.

Dwight speaks to a visitor in the "Fly-4-Life" tent.