Adelle Pictures

Thank you so much for all of your prayers! Amber had the baby safely and they are resting at the mid-wife's still. I'll post back later for more update, I have some photos for everyone!
(Note: Blogger wouldn't let me upload more photos, working on it now)
(Update 2: It seems that at this time, Blogger will not allow me to upload any photos at all, not even on a new post. However, I do have all of the pictures I was going to post up on my facebook. My FB is Russell Spearman - Should have a picture of me, Adelle and Amber :) )

The Upcoming!

Yep, there's a lot of new things that are going to be happening in these winter months!

First up is going to be....Our baby~! That's right, this month, our baby [Secret Name here], will be coming soon. As of this morning, Amber has gone off of the Pre-mature birth safety medicine. Also as of today, even if the baby is still early (Technically due on Christmas Eve), she can now safely deliver at the mid-wife's place. Praise the Lord, really. He has really taken care of Amber and the baby through the pregnancy. There was more than one complication that the Lord just took care of.

There's a lot of events going on with Christmas, parties and plays and the such. There's a lot of fun to be had, and also a lot of work, so please be with us in prayer that everything would roll out just fine.

One other thing I'd like to ask prayer for is that the Lord would guide and lead us concerning moving. We're likely to move in January to Fuchu, so that I can be close to the pre-school that I work/minister in. This would cut about 3 hours of commuting out of my day, which would help a lot with just relaxing and family time.

Please pray that the Lord would give us favor with all things moving considered. That we would be able to find goodness in the new place and favor with those who we are moving from. Thank you, we'll keep you all posted with the baby and the move!

Don't forget to add us on facebook,
Russell Spearman and Amber Spearman.

Tomorrow is December!!

Well guys, only one more day left in November.
I don't have any pictures to share with you, just a quick disclaimer.

We are approaching the 37th week of the pregnancy and that means we are entering into the safe zone for birth. The doctors where a bit concerned about a month ago, that I would go into labor sometime in November so they put me onto a medication to tell me to relax. Its worked but once the 37th week rolls around the doctors had no fears and its perfectly safe to have your baby so I will be discontinuing my medication.

So we will see what happens. She could decide to make her way onto the scene only hours after I stop the medication or she could push past her due date. Officially she is scheduled to be born December 24th, Christmas Eve. But at this point, I think it's anybody's guess.

So, with that in mind, we may miss or postpone our December update.
Once we're home and settled, of course pictures and an update will come, so stay tuned for that.

November smells like a baby

November is here and its about time to get you guys up to speed!
We have been having a blessed month as the weather is now much cooler and we can almost taste Christmas around the corner! Ive already been around to the stores to see what kind of christmas decorations are available and will soon begin to make some good ol' homemade decorations to go up with our tree the first week of December.

We also had some visitors this last week! Our friends Tommy Ruiz and Eder Diaz stopped in for the annual Calvary Chapel Pastors Conference from Okinawa! I was blessed with the time I got to spend with them and I heard the time up at camp was a blessing for all the guys. Their text was Philippians and the topic was joy. I am planning on studying Rusty's notes from the sessions starting this week.
Also, during the first week here the church held a baby shower for us!! We really had a good time and good fellowship. Our military families hosted the event on base, so it was exciting for us all to go to "America" for the day. We played silly games and of course had a bite or two to eat!
We are truly grateful for all the gifts and support we have received. Ive included pictures at the end of this post but they are so packed full of baby stuff you might have a hard time even seeing what we got! Its just a mass of pink and white cuteness!!
We often thought of having children but always firgured it will still be in the distant future, and we often thought "How would we even get all that baby 'stuff'?" and we should have known God would indeed provide for us. We thank you so very much for supporting us in this time of learning and depending on God.

Thank you.

The Diaper Cake!!

We are blessed to have our baby crib. It's a pack-and-play and fits into out Japanese house. A regular crib just would never fit.

Its quite full right now.

Don't forget all those good smelling bath soaps, and of course you can't forget the Butt Paste!!

We are so excited and blessed, and not to mention, our house is smelling a lot like a baby now!

"A woman, when she is in labor, has sorrow because her hour has come; but as soon as she has given birth to the child, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world." John 16:21 (nkjv)

Jamie Harris

Hey everyone, we're going to give everyone a late October/November update soon, but I wanted to introduce (as you can see at the top of our page for the weekend) Jamie Harris. He's my best friend and I wanted to link some of his new stuff he's been working on.
BY THE WAY: Amber did the graphics for Jamie ;)

Please keep in prayer:

Amber and the baby (the time is getting close!)
The men's conference coming up soon, should be a blast!
Tomorrow is the Harvest Festival alternative, Family Fun night at Fuchu!

Should be getting a few pictures too! :)

Mid October

October is just about half way over now. Its begun to cool down significantly around here and we are really enjoying the Autumn nature. Here are a few snapshots from whats been happening this month!

Yeah, i know. Its just dinner, but it was really good! We stepped out with a friend in Kokkubunji and had a great dinner with him.

On a more "regular" note, we had the preschool's Sports day earlier in the month. We had a good turn out of about 30 kids and most of their parents. No one suffered any injuries and we had some really fun games with both the parents and the kids. Sports day can be a really big deal in japan and the parents always try to get to the event. It was great to see everyone get into it.

Our most recent event was the Calvary Chapel Tokorozawa Family Camp!
We went almost over to chichibu, to Hanno and booked us a few cabins and fire pits at a prefecture campground. Kind of like a State Camp Ground back in America.

Most of the church was able to make it out and we really had a good time. It rained the first day, but after than we had a beautiful blue sky and even got to have a huge campfire.
The kids are already excited for next year and we just about have the campfire smell out of all of our clothes. All in all, it was a fantastic family camp.

Summer 2010. One year in mainland.

It's September.
Already?

I can only assume that I'm not the only person on earth saying that, but I can't believe it's been over a year now since we moved to mainland Japan.
Life has changed a lot, and as I notice my maternity clothes starting to fit "right" I can see how things will only change more.Tokyo life has gone so fast and we've faced more lessons than we really intended to over this last year. We've learned how important "Family Time" is and how important it is to keep the doors and windows shut when the AC is on.
We've seen how drastically different a day can go when you begin it by reading your bible and how your entire life perspective can change just by taking an at home test.
I do have to say, for those of you who follow the blogg (even for as slow it is to update) that we are so thankful for your prayers and support. It's been a rough year but that is how we learn what the good times truly are.
God has been so consistent and faithful.

We've never gone hungry and we've never been stranded inside of our problems. We've always had plenty and never lack.
It really is something, when you begin to see the books and chapters of the bible in your life. Not just something you read or try to memorize, but when you are challenging yourself to live them out day to day.This summer has gone by very fast, and unfortunately we don't have many pictures to show for it. I have a few and I'll share them with you with a small caption if I can remember why we took them.

Life continues on at the preschool :)
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We held an end of the school year fun day to kick off the summer. Balloons where a big hit.
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We got a chance to go up to Okutama camp and have a church picnic and baptism. The water was cold and the food was great. Plus their was a guy with a star on his head.
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We also concluded the preschool with a play. Noah's Ark. One of Noah's sons was just too worn out.
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Next we flew back to America to spend a month visiting with Family. It was both a hard month and a beautiful month. As most of you know, my father passed away the morning I flew into Idaho. Another life changing experience to add to this year, but the very fact that I was even able to be in America during this time was like God was saying "You are mine."
We spent the month with my mother and got a chance to fellowship. God blessed the time we had and is still continuing to teach us from it.


We also got a chance to spend some time in Idaho after our time in Texas. Our closest friend, Jamie got married! Rusty attended the wedding for the both of us (I was in Texas with my mom) and served as Best Man. Weddings are such a beautiful thing. God created a beautiful covenant and I'm so happy that we could include this into our summer.

Again, thank you everyone for keeping up with us and we'll see you more as the months progress.

-Amber, Rusty and baby S.

Well, i guess its about time for what has become our monthly update and picture

This time isnt as clear, unless you are pro at reading ultrasounds. Good luck for those who are not.

You can probably see the head and backbone, but the rest is kind of hard to see :) But we where blessed to see the baby again and when we took a look, the baby happened to be quite awake and active. Jumping around and moving all over. Things looked magnificent. I cant feel anything yet, but im sure im pretty close to it. Also aside from feeling tired earlier in the day, im feeling pretty well. God has really been keeping his hand over me and my morning sickness and i havent missed a day of work yet.

Fast changes!!

Well amber went to the doctor again today and we got to take home a few more ultrasound pictures. What a difference just a few weeks makes!


The head is distinguishable and in a few angles you could see a hand near the nose. Things are moving fast and the doctors don't see any problems.

Thank you for your prayer support! We hope this picture encourages you to keep it up!

Coming in December

Hey everyone. W e just wanted to let all of you look at a picture that we received recently :D

He or she is due Dec. 24th.

Videos

Hey everyone! Well, they aren't in a perfectly clear view due to the uploading, but beggars can't be choosers ;)

There are three videos so far, and more to come.
1~2) English schools We Go Eigo Fuchu and Tokorozawa team up for a camp every year and these are 3 out of the 4 skits that we did. One of them didn't record super well, so we didn't get it up, but the other three are still pretty good.
3) This is the Pre-School at Fuchu, just a cap on some the fun stuff that happens :D

Again, we're going to be getting up a few more videos, they should be focused on what we do outside of work (but there is going to be a photo video of the Okutama Camp too).

Thanks guys, keep us in prayer :D

Hey everyone, I got a couple movies ready to post, but I've had some problems exporting them to the correct file formats. Unfortunately, every export takes time, so please bear with me while things are being exported!

Thanks :D

Hey guys

Hey everyone! It's been a long while, we apologize.

Tomorrow, I have some free time and I'm going to put together a video for everyone to watch. It will include bits and pieces of what kind of stuff is going on.

Just as a forward, we have two main ministries that we are a part of:

1) Our church in Tokorozawa - Helping in whatever is needed, Sunday school, fellowship, Friday nights home fellowship at Travis' and some other stuff like that.

2) Our sister church in Fuchu has an international Christian pre-school and after-school English programs that we assist in daily, it's great to see the new church growing, largely due to the fact that Rich and Candis (us included) are living real Christian lives and it's reaching the parents. What a blessing to hear Japanese kids singing kids Christian songs that they learn in English like, The B-I-B-L-E, Jesus loves me, and many others.

Please be in prayer for our ministries and for the Japanese people. Pray that we would be obedient to the Lord in all things and that we would put our faith in Him alone!

Thank you everyone for your support. Look for us tomorrow!

Prayer and Spiritual Warfare.

Just wanted to drop by and share a with you guys a little bit.

This week the topic of spiritual warfare has been on my mind a lot. Last week in our midweek womens study thru 2nd Corinthians was the beginning of it. Ive always liked the topic because I think that understanding it helps a lot when you run unto it. I also like it because its one "problem" that we can always fix and win against. We find much encouragement in Ephesians and Galatians about it and thru a deeper understanding of it we can learn to use the defenses God has given us.

Even this morning (my day off) I was hit with a good chunk of it. It can be easy to give ourselves excuses and say things like "im just off today" or "its the weather" or whatever. Ive even found myself saying "its just my emotions" as if thats even a real excuse anyways. In all honest those are just thin coverings for what we're really saying; "I care more about myself than anything else" or "I matter most." If we are honest, thats what we really mean. And when we are feeling that way, of course we're going to get down because we are humans with a smelly aroma of sin.

But this morning I remembered to rely on Jesus. The battle was hard but it was also beautiful. In Romans 8 we are reminded to be "more than conquers" thats a verb you know. It means "to be more than a conqueror, to gain a surpassing victory" and that is exactly what Jesus has in mind for us because He has already done the fighting for us.

In a world that tells us to stand for ourselves I would like to stand without my own defenses, but I want to stand under the defense of Jesus. I know I cant do it on my own, so I don't want to try putting up all the philosophy and sociology I have been subliminally taught all my life.

I just want the Cross. I want to let something so simple fix all my problems. Ever since I have decided to live this way I have joy and a real purpose in life.


-Amber

2 weeks, one post.

Here we go guys. See if you can keep up!
On the 6th, we went to the Karaoke as a church. Travis waned to do something special for everyone who helps out in Childrens Church. So everyone who could met us at a Karaoke joint not that far from the church. As you notice from the pictures, it trumps any kind of Karaoke you may find in the states. Its a real sport out here!! We got a room that sits 20 and two microphones. We had lots of shakers and tambourines too. You can order all kinds of foods, sweets and drinks at one of these places.

Just about everyone came, and all but maybe 2 sang!


Looking for the perfect song...

But last week was the real party. One evening, just before we went to bed, we noticed that it was snowing like crazy outside!! I know we weren't the only ones who threw on some snow gear and headed outside.

Kicking back almost another whole week, we had Koinonia Klub like usual. Monopoly in full swing. We had the most kids we have ever had come this time, which was really great. We want the kids to come bcause they like hanging out, not because they are use to coming. With more kids, they get a bigger oppertunity to build friendships and choose how they want the evening to go. I left my camera out on accident, and this is one of the photos i ended up finding. A pretty good shot!

Please remember to pray for Daiske (dai-skay). He doesnt know Jesus by any other form than christmas but he still comes faithfully every week to hang with us.

We also thought you would like a peek at some bonsai trees from the nursery close to our house.
We are pretty sure they are plum trees. Ume. They look like the famous Sakura flowers, but they bloom earlier, have deeper colors and cost significantly less.

And yo end it off, catch a smile from some of our friends. They had a great time with the chalk!!

-The Spearmans