Christmas Holiday and Oman

This Christmas we spent time with Lacey's family in Arkansas. It was nice getting to know her family even more. Currently, we are still living near Raleigh, NC. Lacey is helping resettle refugees to the area through the AmeriCorp program. She is attending school at a community college working on her general education. I worked for Best Buy over the holidays as a delivery helper, but now that this is finished I am looking for more work. I applied for a Fulbright grant to research in Oman so we hope to hear back from this in a month or so.

Going to Antalya, Turkey

We have recently been given a grant to be trained in peacemaking in Antalya, Turkey from May 26 to July 4th.  We are very excited about it and are trying to raise the remaining finances needed to cover our bases back home and to cover the plane tickets.  The training is challenging.  We are only allowed to bring $100 each with no credit cards, no cameras, only 1 carry on bag, etc.

Our little dog Chantilly is about to have puppies any day now.  I am working a new job setting up and tearing down for weddings and also running the sound.  Lacey is no longer working with refugees and is working at a women's clothing store called Anthropologie.

Books I Have Been Reading

Muslims, Christians, and Jesus by Carl Medearis

http://www.carlmedearis.com/

A Deadly Misunderstanding: A Congressman's Quest to Bridge the Muslim-Christian Divide 

by Mark Siljander

http://www.adeadlymisunderstanding.com

Life in North Carolina

Since Egypt it has been a whirlwind of trying to find jobs and making new friends.  We lived in Raleigh, North Carolina for a few months and then moved 30 minutes SW to a small town called Fuquay Varina, NC.  Moving back to the USA we had plans to be around family.  Lacey's mom, Shelly, planned to move to NC from Florida, but plans were slowed by the economy.  We moved in advance hoping they would follow soon, but they haven't quite yet.  

Lacey interviewed and received her first job resettling Iraqi and Burmese refugees into the Raleigh-Durham area.  I sadly have applied to hundreds around the world and have landed with my wonderfully earned degree:  a temp job at the state fair, a temp job a the NC State bookstore, and a pharmacy tech position at Walgreens.  We had ambitions to pay off debt and work towards moving back overseas to an Arab country.  However, we have been slowed by my lack of landing a well paying job.  

In the meantime, we have connected spiritually with many people mainly Jews, Muslims, and Christians.  We have become great friends with two Iraqi families, a hospitable Palestinian, Rhett and his family (see http://rhettandlink.com) and many others including great friends through an internship where we compare the Bible and Qur'an.