Our news lately

Hey everyone! 

We're doing pretty good here in backwoods Montana. The studying, and upkeep of friends, family, and our room are enough to keep us busy pretty much night and day, haha. This continues to be a challenging, yet enjoyable season of our life as we embark from book to book, knocking down each one as the weeks go by. 

We just finished the Corinthians, and have a test right before we leave for Thanksgiving break which we are excited about. Erika and I are headed off to the Oregon coast to Salem to spend turkey day with a friend and his family. I went there last year, and have been to the wonderful state of Oregon many times, but this will be the first for Erika. 

The snow is hitting, and the weather is starting to look a lot like Christmas :) Which is one of the most amazing seasons. Very beautiful and rugged here. There will certainly be lots of hot coco to be drunk, and plenty of cold winter nights cuddled up studying in our beautiful room. All this to say, we're enjoying our time right now, and looking to Jesus everyday to be our strength to do this school. Thanks again for everyone's support, and interest in our lives. 

Love, The Goodfellows 

P.S. Here's some recent pics of Montana, this literally happened within a couple of hours. Snow here is like a white blanket being quickly thrown over nature. Its great. 

Pictures around the base

So this week, I thought I would share some pictures from where we live.  Hopefully it will give you a better idea of our surroundings.  

 Here is our water tower!  Yep, we have our very own water tower with the YWAM logo.  

 This is the student center.  It has a library, snack bar, weight room, gym, and hang-out area with ping-pong and foosball tables.  There is a nice sofa and fireplace, too.  :)

 Here is the library.  We spend lots of time in here studying.

This is one of the student dorms.  It is where all our fellow SBS students live. 

Another view of the library

This is our classroom, without all the desks and chairs set up.

This is the soccer/football/ whatever field we have for sports.  There is a
lovely little creek that runs at the back of it, by all the trees.  

 So this is a little taste of where we live.  There will be more pictures to follow, so keep checking!

SBS Week 5

     Well, it's been an incredibly busy couple of weeks for us.  We've been studying the books of Acts and Mark, and not doing a whole lot else.  :) I got put a bit behind in posting.  It is definitely fall here, which means that everything freezes during the night.  But, thankfully, we've had beautiful sunny days lately and can look out our window at the gorgeous fall colors as we study.
     I will try to describe a typical week for us here.  We attend class four mornings a week from 8am-12pm.  We have small groups that meet once a week and have a Thursday night meeting, which is basically just some worship and teaching that the whole YWAM base attends.  The rest of the time is for our own study and work time, which is much needed.  We basically write the equivalent of at least a 15-page research paper for every book of the Bible that we study.  Sometimes it may be more, or less, depending on the length of the book.  Our assignments are due every Saturday.  Though the workload is intense, we are enjoying what we are learning.  The characters in these books are coming alive to us in ways they never have before.  Most importantly, as we study the gospels, the character of Jesus is becoming more real to us than he has been before.

     The last couple weeks have been a bit hard as far as trying to balance everything and get our assignments done.  But, we are encouraged by what an incredible privilege we have to study the whole Bible in depth.  Many lives have been lost over the centuries just for the right to even own one's own Bible.  We feel very blessed to live in a country where we are free to read and study what we like, and that we have this wonderful opportunity.  We're really excited to see where God takes us from here, and how he will use this time as a foundation in our lives.  Thanks for keeping up with our adventures!  We would love to hear from you!

Some of our travels.....

    We spent some time near Franklin, NC with some dear friends right before starting out on our cross-country move to Montana.  They showed us all around the beautiful Smoky Mountains.  Our time there was incredibly relaxing and refreshing....we so enjoyed it!

A quaint bridge in North Carolina

Our wonderful friends, James and Rhonda Furr, shared their lovely
home in NC and took us on some great hikes in the area.

A gorgeous spot in the Smokies

Our view after hiking to the top in Great Smoky Mountain National Park

         We made a few stops across the country.  Now I am sad as I go through photos that we didn't document more of it.  We started out with a stop in Atlanta, GA and had an awesome time with Jason's family.  We got to see Jason's brother Sanders, cousins Shannon and Jay and their kids, Parker and Landon, and Aunt Connie.  We also got to see a dear friend of mine, Nancy Sepesi, who I haven't seen in ages!  It was great to reconnect.  Kansas City was our next stop, where we stayed with a family friend of Jason's, Ruth Noland.  I truly enjoyed meeting her and getting to know her a bit.  Then, we stopped in Denver and spent a couple days with my family, the Zieschang's.  It is always so good to see them and the visits are too short.  Uncle Paul and Uncle Mark took us on a drive and hike in the Rockies- Jason had never been there!  Then we made the long, final stretch to Montana!!  Some pictures of our home here will be coming soon.....so stay posted!

At the top of Loveland Pass in Colorado....about 13,000 feet!

At Lake Dillon with Uncle Mark......why didn't we take
more pictures with our Colorado family?

For some odd reason, I wore flip flops.....I guess I didn't realize we were going on a hike!
Jason was very patient, and helped me make it to the top.  :)

New beginnings in Montana...

Well, our first week of classes have been off to a good start.  There is so much information to take in, but it has only served to fire up our imaginations and get us excited about studying God's Word together this year.  But first things first.

Thanks so much for your prayers for our safety in moving here.  We and all our things made it in one piece and we are nicely settled into our cute new "home."  I say that in quotations because it is a little place, only one room and adjoining bathroom.....but it is perfect for our needs and an awesome first place together.  Jason and I have had so much fun the past couple of weeks setting up our house.  This included organizing, unpacking boxes, multiple trips to Target and Bed Bath and Beyond to spend those gift cards (so much fun!!), and of course garage sale shopping for furniture.  

As Jason and I look around our home, we have been repeatedly overwhelmed by God's blessings to us.  Almost everything in here has been given to us, by our amazing friends and family.  Thank you for blessing us with lovely wedding gifts, and wedding money.  Because of your generosity, we've been able to buy furniture, household items, and school supplies.  It also feels like we have pieces of all of you in our home.  We can look almost anywhere and see gifts that remind of us home and all of you who are so precious to us.  We are so grateful for you all and blessed to have you in our lives.

We love you and miss you, and hope to hear from you all.  We hope you enjoy this blog, and that it will help us keep in better touch with you all.  It is still a bit under construction, but it is getting there.  Feel free to check it as often as you like....we plan to update it at least once a week.  Please keep us posted with what is going on in your lives too!