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Follow Up Letter

Dear Friends and Family, I want to thank you for your prayers and support through my trip to Uganda this past summer. It was easily the most amazing experience of my life. I miss all the people and culture so much and find myself thinking about it regularly. We built so many new friendships with the most incredible people I have ever met. They taught me so much about passionately pursuing Jesus and trusting Him for everything we need- and for them that means trusting Him with the things that we so easily take for granted. Our team came face to face with so much brokenness and corruption, but what we could not deny was that this was still the most beautiful and amazing place we have ever been to. Whether we were hanging out and working at the local church or feeding thirty orphaned babies spoonfuls of mashed up potatoes and veggies or fellowshipping with the house women at the babies home, each day we interacted with the most loving, accepting, wise, Jesus-loving people ever. I st...
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June 26

When I looked at the last blog entry I wrote, it was 13 days until take off. Now its 13 days until we come home. I'm blown away. I really am just so thankful for this trip. I have learned so much over these seven weeks...more than I have any other time in my life. This past week we enjoyed a dinner out to Pizza Hut with our friend Isaac who has been with us for the entire trip. He has been the one to take us where we need to go everyday, make sure we have everything we need, etc. While eating our pizza, we reminisced about our first impressions of each other and how we felt when our team had just landed in country. Isaac told us the story of how he got roped into being our "go-to-guy". As we sat there until 10 pm, we all just realized more how much we have all grown together as a team, with Isaac being a part of it. He's more than just our "go-to-guy", he's our brother and our friend. That night at Pizza Hut was when things started to get real... we only...
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Its Been A While!

Its been a while! Its only 13 days until we take off! I cant believe it. Time has flown by so quickly...and if im honest i hold alot of fear to leave home and my loved ones. But, despite that, i do feel alot more excitement! Ive been able to talk with people who have been to Uganda and get some advice and hear wonderful stories. My team and i also got to skype with one of our guides from Uganda and get some more info! We've received an itinerary aswell! After reading that, i am excited to announce that we will be doing alot of orphan care in a babies home called Loving Hearts Babies Home. We will also be serving in Gaba Community Church, which is home to over 1,000 attendees. We will be helping in the youth group and visiting Bethany Village and so much more. It feels so good to finally have so information and a slight idea of what our two months in Uganda will be like. Please continue to pray that our hearts will be prepared and ready for our trip. We are all so excited and im...
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FULLY FUNDED

This announcement is a little late....but IM FULLY FUNDED. Thank you all so much for your generosity and prayers. Its amazing to have my trip locked down and loaded, now all thats left is preparation. Thank you for partnering with me. Please continue to pray! Love,        Tess
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Flights!

Flights have been booked! Its official! We fly out May 16th and come back July 10th. Its exciting to have dates set in place! I'm also excited to announce that I am well passed by 75% mark of fundraising. You guys have blessed me so much-because of you I don't have any added stress thinking about getting all the money needed to go. Thank you so much!
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Thank you!

I just wanna say a gigantic thank you to all who have prayed and donated so far. I'm truly blessed with the most incredible and generous people in my life. I'm getting close to my goal, but I'm not quite there yet! Please continue to consider and pray what it looks like for you to partner with me in God's work in Uganda. Thank you, I love you all! Blessings!
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Real Talk

I'm gonna be honest here, I was not exactly ecstatic about the thought of travelling for an entire day to and from Africa. I wasn't overjoyed to know that I will be spending two whole months in a completely separate continent from all of my loved ones. I have never experienced a culture like the Ugandan culture, so I have no idea what to expect. All of these thoughts in turn created a spirit of fear in me rather than excitement and anticipation, which was discouraging. I mean, come on, this is supposed to be an incredible chance of a lifetime! So why wasn't I excited? I don't discount those feelings I experienced. I believe they were an important part of processing what in the world I'll be going to do just four short months from now (that's crazy to think about). But I am so thankful to say that while yes I do still have those feelings to an extent, I'm more excited than ever about the trip. After talking with my friends and family, seeing pictures of Uga...
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