He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love.

Martin Luther King,  Jr. 

Anderson's new favorite commercial

Dear ex-English teachers/daughters,

We thought you might like this.



P.S. Ans, who does the lady at the end remind you of with her accent?

B's Day!

Today is a special day for our family.  Today is Bronwyn's birthday.

Bronwyn, we all love you so much!  Here are our thoughts for you!

Gi: "Happy Birthday and I'm really excited when you come to our house. It will be like a big, big, big visit over. It will be fun. It will be awesome. We can like play and stuff. There is no like no space for beds and stuff but you guys can sleep on the floor and stuff. There's going to be a lot of people. Jenna, Adwee and Stephen and you are all going to wear black shirts and I do love you. Happy birthday!"

Anderson: "Hey B! Super happy birthday! I really, really, really, really miss you and love you even more. I hope you have an awesome birthday! Say hi to everyone at ACU. And I really, really, really love you! Happy birthday."

Carys: "Ponnie!!! happy birthday! first i just wanted to say that i miss you a lot and love you soooo much!! i want you to have the best birthday ever (just so you know according to me every birthday is going to be better than the last) i really wish i could be there with you and watch all of our movies and scoopie you! thanks for being awesome, and being the sweetest person i know.  love you, XOXoxOXo!

Garrett: "Happy Birthday B!! I cant believe you are 23.. You gettin old dog! I hope you have an awesome day with your friends and Stevo! Cant wait to see you in a couple of months! Miss you and love you a lot!! 

Ansley: Happy birthday to my best friend. I am beyond thankful to have you with me at acu and don't know what I'm going to do next year. Thank you for always being the bigger person and loving others in your unique, sweet way. Love you brahwee!

Stephen:  "Bronwyn, I love that I get to be married to a person as cool as you. You are the best. I am so lucky, and so are your friends and family. I hope that you feel as special (short bus) as you are today. You are beautiful. I just love you so much. Happy Birthday. I hope its VERY NICE AND YOU LIKE."

Mom: "Bronwyn, you are awesome and incredible in so many ways. Just today I was walking to my Bible study carrying all my stuff in the cute red and black bag you made me. You are so talented, even if you refuse to admit it. I am so proud of the great job you have done in school - you are going to be a great nurse! I'm so proud of the sweet and loving wife that you are. You are kind, generous and good to everyone. You are a great friend and a great friend to me. I can't wait til you get to come visit soon. Hope your birthday was just as special as you are! I love you!"

Dadster: B or Dork or Nerd (it's your birthday, take your pick), Just wanted to say how proud I am to have you as a daughter. You are a blessing to those around you and you always try to put others first. I loved getting to see you and Stephen in your ministry at ACU. You bless a lot of people there and I love how your home is a safe, open place to everyone. I know wherever God takes you guys you will be Jesus to those around you. I know people in your new home will be blessed if they can concentrate on your actions and words and not your giant forehead. Did you really think it would be all mush from me? Even though you are so weird I love you a whole bunch and can't wait to see you guys soon! Hope you've had a great day. You are a blessing to our family and we thank God for you.

Crane Giftedness

You know those goofy cranes that you see in malls, some restaurants (like Chuck E. Cheese) and game rooms?

They look like this.

I hate those things. They are money pits. The claws never seem to grab onto anything and the prizes are usually pretty nasty. But once you start you keep thinking you can get something and you keep wasting 50 cents trying.

Unless you are Carys.

Carys has always loved those cranes and she has a gift of grabbing the prizes.

In January we were with my girlfriends parents. One day we went to the mall and I saw one of those dumb crane games. I tried to go a different way but the crane was right in front of the store we needed to enter. I knew what Carys would do when she saw the crane and she did. She saw it and asked for 50 cents to play.

I said no. She PROMISED she would win something. I said no. She PROMISED she would pay me back. I said no. She PROMISED she wouldn't bug any more if she could just play it one time.

So we let her play ONE time. She won. Her brothers saw her skill and asked for a toy.

She ended up playing three times. This is what happened.

That's right. Three plays and three toys. A Wolverine doll, a teddy bear and some kind of squishy purple ball.

Granted the toys weren't "top of the line" but with Carys it's more about the thrill of winning instead of the quality of the prize.

Maybe I should let her play more often. She alone could run the crane games out of business. Then I wouldn't have to see them anymore.

For now, I'll keep trying to hold on to 50 cents and marvel at Carys' ability to beat the scamming crane business as she weasels the 50 cents out of my pocket.

For Jerry, Angie, Abigail, Madeline and Joseph

Hey Adkins Family,

Here is what you get to see, with a little long range zoom in on the best stadium in the world, a year from right now.

We are excited!

1st Day of School and Jet Lag

Gi's been having a hard time getting up since we've been back home.

He's been enjoying his sleep and we've been allowing him to sleep in a bit until he gets his body back in our time zone.

On his first day of school he wanted to dress himself and he did. He topped it off with his awesome hat. He was super excited about going back to school to see his friends.

I decided to take a picture of his first day.

I didn't like that his eyes were closed. So I asked him to let me one more. We then went on an adventure of "one more."

Below are the pics I took in order.

Almost open.

 Nope.

 Still no.

 Better but no.

 Trying real hard.

 Uh no.

 My personal favorite. He's either trying real hard or he's just given up. I have no idea where he was at this point.

We moved spots and this happened. For some reason he was finally able to open both eyes.

I'd like to say he was goofing on me with all the pictures but he literally was trying to leave them open on every picture but just couldn't.

We'll chalk it up to jet lag.

1st game back

Two weeks before we came home American Airlines changed our flights. My girlfriend actually spent 2+ hours on the phone trying to readjust our schedule after we got an email letting us know they changed everything.

We were originally scheduled to land in Porto Alegre at 8:23 on Wednesday morning. With American's changes we were scheduled to arrive Wednesday night at 9:40. We only had a 12 hour airport stay in São Paulo. Sounds fun right? If you know that airport you know it might be one of the worst in the world to have a long layover.

We talked about trying to get an earlier flight home from São Paulo. Garrett told his friends and they were excited because his team had a game that night and they wanted him to play. An earlier flight would make that happen.

We were able to get an earlier flight thanks to TAM Airlines and we got home at 4:30.

Because of being worn out from the long trip Garrett changed his mind and told us he wasn't going to play in his game.

Around 8:00 that night one of Garrett's best friends, Bruno, came over. We love Bruno. Bruno talked him into going to the game and playing. We took this picture on their way out the door.

Good thing Bruno came over and twisted Garrett's arm. Otherwise Garrett would have missed scoring this awesome goal.



In Brasil jet lag can wait when it comes to soccer.

Home

Tuesday we left one city by the water in the states....

.....for another one back home in Brasil.

We had an amazing visit to the states that lasted almost 3 months but are happy to be home and sleeping in our own beds.

Thank you for your prayers for our safety.

Going Home

Tomorrow we get on a plane to go back home. We've had a very encouraging and fun visit to the states.

Last night we got to spend time with some of our brothers and sisters in Memphis. They laughed with us, shared a meal with us and prayed over us. It was a great send off.

God constantly uses these people to bless us! This is His family.

Monrovia Interview

We just came back to Memphis after spending a month visiting our sponsoring church (Monrovia) in Huntsville, Alabama as well as our two sponsoring churches. One in Franklin, Tennessee (4th Avenue church) and one in Huntsville (Fresh Wind Fellowship).

We were blessed and encouraged by our time with our church families. I think it was the best visit we've had in the states.

Last Sunday we were at Monrovia and Ray Palmer, our minister/preacher/pastor, did a mini-interview with my girlfriend and myself. If you have any interest in hearing what we shared about our ministry, our struggles, etc. then just click here to listen.

I used to think I had to be somebody important to accomplish things, but now I know Jesus uses ordinary people more.

Bob Goff

Next Stop..........The Pros

Last night we had one more graduation. This time it was Garrett's graduation from high school.

Computer problems keep us from putting any video on here but we are able to show some pics.

It was hot again yesterday. About 90 degrees. Thankfully it was a little cooler in the place where we had the graduation.

Giovanni is our hot natured kid. He is always hot. Yesterday he was hot and tired and he crashed during the graduation. First he crashed on my girlfriend and then we switched and he crashed on me.

His head was soaking wet with sweat. It looked like someone had poured water on my shirt where his head was.

So while he slept we used the sweat as gel and spiked his hair.

The hot day kind of zapped Anderson's strength as well.

The graduation was good and fun except for the goofball that sat next to us who kept blowing his air horn right in Gi's ear while he slept.

Garrett has a really great class and lots of good friends. We like all of his friends. It was a fun night.

Some post graduation photos:

This is Elias. He's been one of Garrett's best friends for the last 4 years. They make me laugh any time they are together. He may get to spend a couple of weeks with us when we are in the states. That sure won't be boring.

Garrett has never owned a suit in his life. He found out he had to wear one for graduation so a couple of months ago my girlfriend took him suit shopping. They found one and had it tailored. He didn't decide to wear a tie until 2 hours before the ceremony. He said he owned one tie but it was ugly. I told him I had some old ones that he could look at. I haven't bought a tie in 20 years and have used one once, that I can remember, in the last 10 years. We aren't big dress up guys. He looked over my choices and wasn't too impressed with any except the one he is wearing. It says Jordan 23. That's right, it's a Michael Jordan tie. After the ceremony he told me everyone was talking about how cool his tie was. Who knew a 20 year old Michael Jordan tie would be so popular at a Brasilian high school graduation in 2013?
Garrett with his soccer coach. Playing for this guy this year Garrett won the city high school championship as well as the FC Bayern Youth Cup in our city. He got selected to go to São Paulo and play in April and his team was one minute away from getting to go to Germany in June. I think it's safe to say he's a good coach. 

Garrett's graduating class was made up of four different classes of about 30 students each. Each class was called to the stage and there they were presented with their diplomas. After Garrett's class had come off the stage and returned to their seats they called Garrett back on stage to present him with this:

It's a Brasilian World Cup soccer doll. His friend, Ivan, told the audience that one of their classmates was getting ready to move to the United States and they wanted to do something special for him. They called Garrett back up to the stage and gave him the soccer doll along with a big piece of paper signed by all his friends with messages about how much they will miss Garrett. . When Garrett got to the stage he told Ivan, "Why are you doing this? You know I'm coming back in March." and Ivan told him that they loved him and wanted to do something for him in case he moves to the states to go to college some day. Somehow, since we bought our plane tickets, some people have understood that Garrett is moving to the states today to live. We've had parents coming up to us over the last couple of months with tears in their eyes talking about how much they are going to miss Garrett and are sad that he is leaving. We repeatedly tell them our trip is a visit and NOT a move and yet people still think he's leaving for good. He got home this morning from his post graduation party and told us that people were crying at the party because he is moving back to the states. His friend Bruno, who seems to be the only one who understands what is going on, finally said, "Guys, he's coming back in March. He's not moving." Even though his visit to the states has taken on this life of it's own  I love the fact that his friends did this for him. It showed me the love they have for our son and the example he is to them.

Today we get on a plane for our almost 3 month visit to the states. When we get home in March we begin testing at different pro teams to pursue Garrett's dream of being a professional soccer player.

The soccer world needs a soccer player who shines the light of Jesus. Garrett would definitely do that.

We leave the future to Jesus. For now, we celebrate with Garrett on his victory over high school. It was hard fought and Jesus gave Garrett the victory.

And we are so proud of him.

Next Stop.......High School

Last night we went to Carys' 8th grade graduation (formatura in Portuguese).

There were three different classes. Each class walks in holding hands with each other and their teacher as she leads the way.

The graduation started with some opening comments and then a pastor spoke for a few minutes. This was followed by the representatives from each class sharing about their year. Then each student was called up and given their graduation diplomas along with a big hug from their teacher.

It ended with the school director speaking. Garrett bet me he would go longer than 10 minutes. He said he was long winded. I noticed the directors shirt when he got up to speak. It was soaking wet with sweat. Did I mention it was 90 degrees? I figured he would do his best to shorten it so he could go home and get out of the heat so I took the bet. I won. The director went under 5 minutes.

Carys was happy and excited on her special day.

So were some of her biggest fans.

I'm glad we got to share the day with her.

Here she is with some of her buds. God has blessed her with lots of good friends.

Now bring on high school!