India: Our Hearts…an Update

So I have been meaning to write this for awhile.  We kind of got cut off at the end of the trip and wasn’t able to post because the internet got a little fishy the last several days we were there. But we had some great opportunities to meet people that we didn’t even think we would get to meet. 

We have been back in Kansas City now for two months; although, India seems like decades ago.  Lil’ babes has cut two teeth, started eating food(on Friday; He loves his sweet taters), and talking like nobody’s business in that amount of time. We have also done too much processing.  If you know anything about me, I want to know immediately how I feel about everything. So for the first two weeks, I did not stop asking “what was that trip about?” It took longer than two weeks to hear these things from God and even put them into words. But hear is what we learned in a nut shell. 

• India is for us. Its hard, we felt taken advantage of, out of place and seriously at home in all the same moments. Here, we feel the roads don’t have enough cars on them, not enough people standing, sitting, walking everywhere. We miss it.

• that being said it feels like a time that we wait for God to place something in our laps. Both of us feel a complete peace and pursuing what He has put in front of us(like looking around a bit at Cerner) but don’t feel like we should go scrounging for something. To make space for the Mighty One’s hand if you will.

 

• it’s lonely out there…we need a better sense of how to make friends where we go. Will it be mostly through Babe’s job? I originally thought I would maybe have a job but it’s seeming harder and harder even in the states to leave little babes. Some of this is just trusting God but we feel like this is the biggest thing that God showed us while we were there and perhaps aren’t just supposed to know that it’s going to be hard.  Seriously, we don’t want to die emotionally and spiritually while we are over there.  We are either praying for someone to go with us or for God to even just to show us a place to live that is known for its community. Also, what it would look like to have spiritual community with people of like minds for contextualized ministry. Anyone interested in this??

 

• we also seriously miss our family and desire for our parents to watch the lil’ babes grow up… This is hard and probably will be. Makes me sad but we want to be obedient to where He leads us.

Will you pray patient discipline for us while we wait?

-jen

India: Mumbai, a great city in December

The last time I was in Mumbai, it was in June of 2009. The rains were late, as I stepped off the plane it was like walking into a brick of humidity and hot, unbearably hot. This time I was pleasantly surprised; it was a hot day but not anything worse than those hot spring days in Oklahoma. We stayed right on the beach to the Arabian Sea with our friend, Nishant’s dad (his mom is in the States with Nishant).  Uncle took us on a long tour of Mumbai seeing the beautiful peninsula/island. Here are a few pics of our tour and stay at our friend’s place.

The view from our room

The view from the living room at Uncle and Auntie’s

Row and I hanging out in our room for the night.

Mosque, Haji Ali Dargah, is on a peninsula jutting out into the water. Beautiful!

Marine Drive Area from a viewpoint on Malbar Hil… when its dark the lights make an arch that they call “the Queen’s necklace”, referring to the Queen of England. The main downtown area has a lot of the buildings from when the Brits ruled and they look very European.

our selfie at the Malbar Hil Park

Marine Drive

Uncle!

We sure enjoyed our stay and tour! It was fun to see how much Nishant was like his dad .

-jen

India: A Dear Friend’s Wedding

We absolutely love that we got to see our friend, Aditya’s wedding. Aditya lived next to me for about 3 years in college and now lives in Lincoln. We met his beautiful bride, Madhur! So this last weekend, we trekked to Mumbai and enjoyed a less traditional Maharashtran wedding.

giving their kids away

The ring ceremony…In India, the woman gets a gold necklace instead of a ring.

The guy gets a ring, only on the right hand.

Row made friends…a lot of them.

The puja part. The priest leads this and the bride and groom offer different things into the fire as they pray for blessings on their marriage. The crowd participates in praying as well.  They show it by throwing rice after each prayer.

We met our friends from college, Vishal and Abhishek and had the pleasure of meeting Vishal’s wife, Vidya

A flattering picture with the groom

We pray that God would bless your marriage! That He would bring all the happiness and babies! and that when things get rough that you would look at each other and feel that ole magic spell (“We Already Got it”, Song by our favorite group, Waterdeep)

-garett and jen

India: Old Friends

Tuesday night, we were able to eat dinner one of our good friend’s sister, Neha.  Last time that I was in India, my friend, Becki, and I stayed almost a week with her here in Bangalore.  Neha is now Becki’s sister-in-law . Anyway, Neha is so fun and spunky; we had a blast together when I stayed with her almost 5 years ago! She is now a Manager of Operations at an international hospital on the out-skirts of Bangalore. Below are a few pics from that night!  Hopefully, we will get to hang out again before we leave.

Row and I have been busy shopping lately and writing my winter newsletter(click here if you want in on that). Here is a pic of the traffic; we have been riding in autos since Babes works so far away and feel bad for making his driver drive back to take me someplace that is a 5 minute car ride. Here is Commercial street where we went shopping last night.

Today, Row and I are planning to go get some sarees for friends and go to the grocery for the makings of cookies that I am going to bake for my “friends”, aka people that are serving us at the hotel. Maybe I’ll make some real friends if I can figure out how to use this oven…

This weekend, we are headed to Bombay for our friend, Aditya’s wedding! We will be staying with our friend, Nishant’s family. Don’t worry, we will post lots of pics when we get back!

The “man store”

-jen

India: A Directing

This past weekend, we went to Chennai to see a family that is working and living intentionally there. We took a 5 hour train ride on Friday night.  It was a really great time just seeing what it would realistically look like for us, ie. what the apartment might look like, showers, toilets , cooking, etc.

We were able to finally catch up on some of the sleep that we hadn’t had for the past 8 days because Lil’ Babes was having trouble with jet lag.  They also have a three month old that was born four days after Row, so really that was great to have solidarity in being a mom of a three month old in a foreign country. Saturday morning, we all took a walk around this nature area which was a botanists dream.  Unfortunately, we forgot the camera The coolest thing we saw while there was a Banyan tree.  Basically they get really huge because every time the send out a branch they also drop roots from that branch.  Amazing. After going on the nature walk, we got some breakfast at this veg restaurant called Sangeetha. Seriously amazing.

We basically laid around all day and talked about everything under the sun. We asked lots of questions. What their struggles have been, what does it look like to actually contextualize the Truth, what have their relationships looked like, what does community look like for them; just to name a few. Jesus used this weekend hugely in directing in our hearts.  We aren’t sure what all of it means but its starting to feel okay to be open handed with our life. I just was so homesick, I think I had closed my heart.  However, I want to want to be like Mary that when she found out that she was going to bear the Living God; her response was “Let it be so”. And Jesus, when He was in the garden of Gethsamine, He said if this is the only way, then let it be so. O God, I wish to have a pure heart when saying that “Let it be so” whatever you have for us.

The train station in Bangalore.

-jen

India: Purpose

It seems things are a bit different here then what I imagined they would be.  My role has shifted a lot since the beginning of all of this.  At first I was heavily involved with all the Indians and now it seems especially after having lil’ babes that my role in all of this is shifting much more than I imagined it would.  I am not certain of what that all means but I do know that it feels freeing to not have guilt hanging over my head.  Because really the fact is, God has called me to be a mom and wife and those come before all of this.  These days that is a little bit more demanding. This quote from Jim Elliot has guided me in many transitions in my life. “Wherever you are, be all there.  Live to the hilt every situation you believe to be the will of God.”  But its funny how the things that can challenge you can also become a thing that throws guilt on you, which clearly is not from God. So Jesus, help me to know what it means to “be all here” right now, here in India, on this trip.

Needless to say, yesterday was a normal day as just a mom. It was mostly about trying to get Rowen to nap at normal times, so we could sleep at night(which worked!!). All we did was go out to exchange money and hang out by the pool a bit. Rowen rolled over for the first time!, which I thought was a fluke, but he did it about 4 times in his 10 minute tummy time this morning! What a pro This morning we also got to Skype in to our Missional Family’s white elephant party which was such a blessing.  We couldn’t imagine life without them.  Lil’ Babes and I also got to skype my Mom, which was just really fun to see Rowen really excited about seeing her.

This weekend we are going to Chennai, a 5 hour train ride from Bangalore, to see a family that are like-minded.  We are really really excited to get to hear their hearts and share ours/get wisdom. Please pray that this would bring clarity to our lives, and that we would mutually encourage each other.

We are so thankful for all of you who are praying for us and following our trip.

-jen

India: Adjusting

It’s an early Wednesday morning here in Bangalore.  We got up at a grand ole time of about 2:30 am once again. Can you say jet lag? Yikes.  Here is a recap of all that has happened this week.

Monday:

We slept in till about noon cause we didn’t get to the hotel till 6am… and then went outside of the hotel to get some lunch and head to get some groceries.  We are staying in a part of town called UB City, which is apparently India’s first luxury mall.  It has stores like Rolex, Louis Vuitton, and Burberry.  I remember coming to UB City when I was in Bangalore almost 5 years ago.  This was seriously the fanciest place we visited in India and now here I am staying in the hotel there. I feel a little weird about that.

Tuesday:

Yesterday was Babe’s first day of work, and it went great! He met several guys and went to lunch with them. He found out that he will be doing 4 or 5 trainings over an area that he sort of specializes in at Cerner.  It seems that almost all of Cernerworks India is signed up for one of these classes (almost 50 people). My husband is a rockstar .

Wednesday(today):

After much crying, praying and asking people to pray, I had enough guts to actually get out by myself (and Rowen).  For some reason I thought this would be easy when I was planning everything; however, I didn’t realize until we got here that the last time I was in India, I had people with me 24/7. I now realize that I am completely naïve and scared because of it! But this morning, I had Babe’s driver drop lil’ Babes and I off at the money exchange place when he took Babes to work.  Apparently everything in India, or at least the shops and whatnot don’t open until later, like 10. So they dropped me off only for me to find my way back to the hotel without getting run over .  Later in the morning, Row and I went to a chain coffee shop, Café Coffee Day, here pretty close to the hotel.  He slept a little while I studied some Hindi and drank some coffee. I wasn’t crazy about the environment.  I wanted to do this every day so that I could meet some people but I don’t think that is the place.  In Luke 10, Jesus talks about finding peace in a person/place, and it just wasn’t there. So I will “dust off my feet” and move to a different place next time.

Jesus in our days:

It seems Jesus requires obedience from us; however, you have to actually listen to what he is saying now. I had set all these goals for this time(not that goal setting is a bad idea because I know those were prayerfully considered). However, my piece of obedience for yesterday was to sit with him and to sleep. Today, my obedience piece took a little more courage but I am thankful that he provides that.

“My grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in weakness”. 2 Corinthians 12:9

Thank you Jesus

-jen

India Trip: Extended Stay

Tonight/Today whatever day it is we are stuck in the Park Inn in Frankfurt, Germany.  Babes is sleeping cause he didn’t sleep much at all on the Frankfurt flight, probably because I was sleeping and somebody had to watch lil’ Babes. Really I was trying to do him a favor so that he would be sleeping during the right time that way he would adjust faster…

Here are our ups for the day:

• Lil’ Babes did amazing on the flights.  He slept through almost all of the long one and loved the extra eating time on the way up and down . He is quite the World Traveler, I must say so myself.
• We got to stop in Germany.  I was a little bit nervous about only having an hour between our long flights. But since we had a delay from getting off and on the plane while they fixed it, here we are sitting in Germany, catching up on sleep, on the dime of United Airlines.
• We got to try some German sausages and kaut

Some downs:

• a little homesick on my end. Maybe it’s missing normalcy cause this is exactly how I felt when lil’ Babes was born
• tired

Jesus in our day:

• Grace for Babes and I for each other even in stressful times!
• A flawless baby- I was soo nervous about his ears and just kept asking Jesus to protect his ears. I feel like He kept saying every time I uttered that prayer, “Do you trust me to take care of this?”  Why do I worry.

Tomorrow we fly out at 12:55pm or 5:55 am cst.

We can feel you praying!

Thank you!!

-jen

Good Eats: Jambalaya

Friends, this on the common cook list in the Dunn household.  I think Babes would attest that it is his favorite dish that I make…. of course when I don’t make it too spicy.  This recipe is adapted from here. I have left out some stuff and subbed some stuff, so here is my version below.

Jambalaya

Serves 4

Ingredients:

• 2 Andouille Sausages (can sub for a mild tasting sausage)
• 2 cups of small shrimp, shelled
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1/4 cup onions, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/4 cup bell peppers, chopped
• 1 can petite diced tomatoes
• 2/3 cup long-grain rice(we have used several different kinds, jasmine, white, and basmati and all of them work great!)
• 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
• 1/2 teaspoon dried basil
• 1 1/2 teaspoons Cajun spices (perhaps less depending on how salty yours is)
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 1/2 cups low sodium chicken broth
• 1 teaspoon Tabasco sauce
• 1 bay leaves

Directions:

1. Melt butter in a large skillet.
2. Sauté the onion, garlic, and bell pepper until tender.
3. Add canned tomatoes with liquid, rice, thyme, basil, Cajun spices, cayenne pepper, chicken broth, Andouille sausage, Tabasco and bay leaf.
4. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to a simmer.
5. Let simmer for about 15-20 or just before rice is tender; add shrimp, cook for approximately 2-3 minutes or until shrimp is pink.

 

Enjoy

-jen

Wedding Shower: Reusable Chalk Food Labels

For my brother-in-law and soon to be sister-in-law’s couple shower about a month ago, I made up some pretty non-fancy food labels.  They were super easy, so here is a short tutorial on how to make them yourself!

Materials:

• cheap wooden plaques(found in your local craft store)
• desired acrylic paint of your choice
• ruler
• peel and stick chalkboard labels (these are generally used for containers in the kitchen, found them at Hobby Lobby)
• chalk
• miniature wooden hearts
• hot glue gun

 

Instructions:

1. Paint the wooden plaques and wooden hearts desired color.  I used Anita’s acrylic paint, spice red. It may take several counts to cover well. Heat up your hot glue gun.
2. After the paint is dry, place the chalkboard labels onto what you want the front to be.  They are forgiving so if you don’t get it the way you want it the first time, peel it off and try again!

3.  Turn the plaque to the back, mark a straight line about 1/3 of the way from the bottom with your ruler.  This will give you a line to line up the top of the heart when you are gluing.

4.  When gluing, figure out a good angle for the sign to be able to stand up.  Use the first one as the standard.  It’s okay if the angle isn’t perfect!  It is forgiving since it is short.  Use a thin line of hot glue below the base of the heart.

5.  Let dry completely.  Make sure to store them in a small box where they won’t get tossed around.  It may even be a good idea to bring the hot glue gun to the party for repairs.

The great part about these are that they are reusable since they are chalkboards.

Happy food label making

-jen