March Madness: It's not just for basketball

If you know me, you know that March Madness is observed with holiday like status in my house. However, madness can also be used to describe the past week or so in regards to my journey to China.

First, yet another roadblock was hit. And unlike the other that required new paperwork or more official stamps this one has no clear ending which means a teaching visa isn't in the cards right now.

That leads us to plan B (or C, F, J who knows at this point!) A tourist visa!

So what does all is this means?

1. Most importantly, it means that I can go to China soon! In fact I have purchased plane tickets and will leave on April 24th!
2. Tourist visas are normally issued for 30, 60, or 90 day time periods. They are also either single entry, multiple entry for 1 year, or the new multiple entry for 10 years.
3. I have round-trip tickets for 89 days which means they will hopefully give me at least a 90 day 10 year visa.
4. I will be making a trip to Chicago in the next week or so to the Chinese Consulate to get my visa.
5. After the first short trip home to attend a family reunion and a friends wedding I will return to China. I will then have to leave the country again every 90 days in accordance with my visa.
6. This means that there is the added expense of travel for visa trips. At this point I don't know exactly how much more this will be, but I anticipate it being at least an extra $100 a month.

What can you do?

1. Continue to pray! Pray that the rest of the visa process moves smoothly and there are no snags that delay anything. Pray as I wrap things up here and prepare to move to China. Pray that the extra funds I need will come in.
2. Donate! Maybe you haven't been able to or couldn't give as much as you wished. Maybe you can't give a big chunk but something as little as $25 a month adds up! I treasure all of my supporters and know this isn't possible without them.
3. Donate! (yes, again) Maybe you don't want to give money but you want to give a tangible thing. One benefit of coming home for a short trip after three months is I don't have to pack everything at the beginning and will have more room for donations for New Day. If you are interested please let me know and I'll give you a list of most needed items!

I am continually seeing God through this journey and am so excited He is the one leading it. It hasn't been easy but it is so so good! It does feel like complete Madness at times, but isn't it more fun when the underdog wins :)