Once Upon a Time....

It was four years ago this week that Jonathan's DTS started in Kona, Hawaii. He says he remembers meeting me...or Anne...the first night. I don't remember it, so maybe it was Anne. But I remember calling Cambria before she came, telling Lulu and Naomi the first week that we'd be friends. I remember random weekend hikes and drives.

Sweaty errands all over campus and outrageous outfits from the boutique.

I remember The Great Giveaway of 2009...Naomi gave me her last $5.

I remember learning a lot and being amazed at the way God was moving in all our lives.

Here are some snaps from one of our first field trips. Guys, who knew the future we had in store.

(Linds...no words.)

I, for one, didn't know I'd get to travel the world with so many of you. I didn't know I'd get to come to your weddings or that some of you would come to mine.

I didn't know I'd get to stay at your houses and meet your spouses.

I didn't know that Jonny G. Photography would be permanently a part of me.

But I'm so glad. For you, for all of it.

Thanks for living courageously and taking risks, peeps.

Jono! This was the weekend The Crush happened (on my end.) Look at that face. How could it not?!

And some other randoms from the DTS (I didn't have a camera during these months so I have little documentation.)

Naomi + my bed = commonplace.

Staff hike before the DTS began. Di, Anne-our faces (our souls!) were so innocent. Sigh.

Some outreach pics...really only a couple.

Oops, here are some more photos of the cliff jumping day.

Look at that belly. (Jon's, not mine of course.) Sav battled with the bumper. And lost.

Go, Cale, go.

Jaylene! Remember how we didn't realize your hair was permed for something like two years?! Hahahaha.

Love your face, my dear Cams.

Rachel, have you deleted me from FB yet? I guess I should go look....

And 12 hearts, of course. Love you guys.

And the blessed end...or the beginning.

Just a little bit of sentiment for this Sunday afternoon.

x.

Word from our Peeps.

One of our teams is starting their book production this week, and our other team is leaving Peru for Thailand. Here is a brief update from the latter. We are so proud of them!

PhotogenX Goes to the Amazon!

Posted on March 28, 2013

WE SURVIVED THE AMAZON! One of the hardest weeks of outreach so for was also one of the best and most interesting.

For a week our team went out into the Amazon rain forest and worked on creating the new property for El Arca, an orphanage currently located just outside of Cusco. It’s home to around thirty-five orphans, who now get the chance to live healthy, fun lives in a family environment.

Bud Lenz and his wife Laura founded the orphanage in 2005, and ever since have been taking children into their family and raising them as their own, loving them and caring for them and teaching them how to live life. The Lenz family purchased land in the jungle five years ago and is now in the process of creating an oasis for the orphans of Cusco and Amazon communities.

After doing some research and discovering some really heartbreaking statics about children in Peru, we started to have a heart behind the project. The sad truth is if the children don’t get off the streets and into a loving environment, a lot of them end up involved in prostitution, gangs and drug use. It’s an awful reality.

We had the opportunity to help with the process of creating this new, fresh paradises. Our main job for the week was to weed around the 300 banana trees they have there. The bananas are used as a source of income for the orphanage as well as food. It was extremely hard work. We would go out daily and pull out weeds that in same cases were taller then the banana trees. We used a bucket instead of a toilet, got attacked by bugs, and took jungle showers in the fresh air behind a tarp. We got out of our boxes and worked hard for other people. And honestly, it was fantastic. Even if in the moment I, Cass, felt terrible and felt like my body was going to die, looking back on it now I wouldn’t change a bit. Yes, I had to step out of my comfort zone and get out of my box, but I did it for others in need, and that’s what’s important; that’s what we’re here to do. Currently, our team is working on a promotional video for El Arca. The Lenz family is still in need of long-term and short-term volunteers/staff, as well as financial support. Our video will be out shortly but in the meantime check out their website here.

You can follow their adventures here!

There is a Korean Chorus right outside our window as I write this....

Meet the Voice for the Voiceless media school. Aren't they cute? I know. I've been pretty happily looking at their faces all week.

Today is our last day together, so we wanted you to meet. We've been talking all week about identity, dreaming and destiny.

Pretty big stuff, right?

It's been fun.

And Jono has been teaching photography, Photoshop and Illustrator in the afternoons-equally big topics on another scale.

We promise we'll write funny entries next week, you'll pee-your-pants funny.

But for now-HAPPY WEEKEND.

x.

HELLO, Hawaii.

Okay, so....we have only actually been to the beach once this week, for a sunset picnic....not as romantic as it sounds as there were about 30 other people around.

Layne is teaching every morning and I am teaching every afternoon.

Blah, blah, blah.

And yeah, here are some photos!

The Mama in her Greene Shorts.

Orange Tree. (Anne-Layne wants to know where you are for all these guilty pleasures.)

You know you are on a YWAM base when...

you hear saxophone lessons to the tune of "Jesus Loves You" on the front lawn in the middle of the afternoon.

Mama + beer...=giggles. Correlation? Tarryn serenaded us all at the BBQ.

What a stud.

For a strict photojournalist, Laynie gets semi-taken with sunset photos.

This photo was found on the board in Mama's room. Note who is cut of the photo. Should I be offended? Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Shut.Up.

{Lucas L., I think you especially will appreciate this story.}

We Grimes love simplicity, but sometimes, quite frankly, things get complicated. ...Like the time a few months ago when I {Layne} tried to book our tickets for this trip from Redding to Spokane to Kona to home. Six hours later...I got off my third phone call with a United agent 30% frustrated {working on my kindness level peeps} with Jono + Laynie getting to Kona on separate flights.

Sigh. Despite the inconvenience, we have since accepted the inevitable and hugged each other goodbye at 4:30 this a.m. when Jonathan left to catch his flight.

I went back to sleep for two more hours before I headed to the airport alone. {How did he end up on the 6 a.m. flight and I on the 8:50 a.m. one? Hmmm. Sorry babes!}

...I arrived at my gate about half an hour before we were supposed to take off...only I couldn't actually get to my gate because of the masses of people standing in my way, so I went next door for a coffee instead.

Then they announced they were giving away vouchers for people to fly to Kona tomorrow instead of today. This wasn't an option for me as I'm teaching tomorrow, so I ignored them until they paged me to the podium by name 3 times.

It turns out that right before flight time, the planes got switched and United was suddenly 100 seats short for people who want to get to Hawaii today. Oops.

Before I knew it, I was being handed a first class ticket to Kona for later today.