A night out in Malawi!

We absolutely love it here.  It's a different life, that's for sure.  There are many things to get used to and learn but we know this is where the Lord wants us and we are grateful for this opportunity to serve Him!  Last night about 43 of us from ABC (missionaries and kids) all piled onto a "short bus" (no jokes allowed) and went to an Ethiopian restaurant on the other side of town.  Now, this restaurant was actually in a woman's home it seemed.  How she was able to seat all of us and serve us is beyond my comprehension but it was wonderful.  What a great time getting to know some of the ABC staff and attempting new foods.  All of us actually like it, some more than others.  But I'm proud of the Kysers for trying something new and enjoying it!  

A day in the life

 I'm sure that many are wondering what a day in our life is like right now.  Well, I am going to post this to try to help people understand.  I've now learned how to shop (for the most part).  It is true that you end up going to about 4 different stores to get the things you need.  For instance, one shop for meat, one shop for bread and dairy, and the market for veggies (if you're game for it).  Some amazing friends took me shopping this past Tuesday.  We went to all of these stores.  I am glad that I had a list since it's quite overwhelming to try to figure out each shop, what to get, and what is needed.  But I'm getting it down.  The next day LeAnne and I went to Shoprite.  I walked in and breathed a sigh of relief, it looked like an American grocery store (kinda).  I even took pics. Now, the pics really don't mean much to you back in the States because it looks like any other grocery store.  But walking in here made me feel much better.  I wish I'd taken pics of the other stores.  Maybe next week. I do want to preface that just because it's on the store shelves doesn't mean it's exactly affordable.  Actually, most of the items on the shelves are VERY expensive.  But at least some things are available if we need it.  I'm grateful for the pounding that our church gave us and the items we collected that will be here soon.  We are very blessed to have all of those things coming this way! Thanks everyone!

Wednesday night I decided to try some homemade spaghetti sauce.  The bottle sauce is about $6 a jar so that's obviously not in our budget.  I found some recipes online and put together some from each to make my own sauce.  It was AMAZING!!  Yummy!  And there was enough for two nights worth of food.  My salad items are soaking in the bleach water below.

And here is the sauce using real tomatoes, mushrooms, onions, bell pepper, etc.  Oh, so good.  And I'm just proud that I could do it!

Tink is making the ranch dressing from our dressing packets that we brought with us.  The packet dressing is much better than the bottle Ranch!!

This little girl has been such an amazing help to me in the kitchen.  She loves to cook and is always in there helping me!

 Here is the Jansen's dog, Sophie, that we are keeping this year.  We are renting the Jansen's house while they are home in the States on furlough.  And Lucy is by her.  They get along well.

This is our living room and the kids are doing puzzles.  This is taken right after our spaghetti supper and you will notice that the oil lamp is burning on the mantle.  The power was out.  No big deal, we just light a few lamps and continue with our night.  Each night after supper we either play a board game, read, or do puzzles.  Then baths and family devotion time. It's WONDERFUL not having t.v. or media!!!!

Daddy getting in on the puzzle action!

And of course there is always time for light saber fighting!!

Our trip across the world

We can hardly believe that we are actually writing this sitting in our home in Lilongwe, Malawi.  We feel so very blessed, loved, and overwhelmed all at the same time.  We are slowly settling in and are going to take our time and relax some, hopefully.  Here's how we got here:

June 21 at around 11am CST we left Jeremy's home in Montgomery, AL headed for the airport in Atlanta. After dropping our dog, Lucy, off at the pet mover's office we decided to go ahead to the airport early so that we could make sure there were no snafus.  Well, I'm glad we did.  Our flight was at 9pm and we arrived at the ATL airport at around 330pm Eastern time and the lady at the counter (that finally opened around 430pm) said that since we didn't have a VISA we couldn't fly on a one way ticket.  Our friends, the McDonald's tried to explain to the lady that Malawi wouldn't issue VISA's until we arrived in the country.  This didn't matter to her.  Her computer said that we couldn't enter the country without a VISA unless we had a round trip ticket.  So two hours later and phone calls to our travel agent we bought a return ticket (which we have already cancelled) and received our boarding passes.  Crazy!  By the time we said our goodbye's, grabbed a bite to eat, and settled into our gate waiting area we didn't have long before we loaded the plane.  Mind you, we arrived 5 hours early for our flight.

The kids were so excited about their first plane ride.  And they did very well!  I am so proud of them!  Our first flight was from ATL to London.  We were in the air over 7 hours and AJ and I didn't sleep a wink.  That made two nights without sleep for me since Jeremy and I stayed up all night the night before packing.

Needless to say, my head was spinning when we arrived in London.  We were going to leave the airport and tour London for a while but when we saw the hundreds of people in line to get through customs and we added up the travel time and the extra time we'd need to check in and go back through security we decided to play it safe and stay in the airport.  So we spent 9 hours in Heathrow.  Wow!  Here is what goes on with 6 kids, 4 adults, and tons of carryon luggage:

When we finally got on the next plane we knew our next stop would be Africa!!!!  Wow!  Even though the 10+ hours was very long we all slept great!  The trip really didn't seem that long.  All of the kids love flying and never had a problem whatsoever!  What a blessing!  I've heard horror stories but our kids were amazing!


After a 2 hour layover in Johannesburg we were finally on the plane for Lilongwe, Africa!!!  We were so exhausted at this point it was hard to fully comprehend what was going on.  But we landed and got all of our bags (14 total plus 10 carryon)  and through customs without any problems at all.  Now, it was hectic and crazy but we didn't have any problems.  There were two families who came to pick us up and they have not left our side!  The Whites and Hirotos are amazing!  They have helped us with food, figuring out how to get cell phones, exchange money, help us buy a car, and tomorrow they will take us shopping.  We thank God for these new friends and for their time and help!  We can't wait until we are settled and sure of ourselves here so that we can be the helping family instead of the ones needing help.  But for now we are so very thankful for their help!

Christian is sick with some sort of stomach bug that he picked up along the way.  No telling which continent he picked it up at but he's pretty pitiful!  Thankfully we have amazing friends at the clinic already and Carson and Becky hooked him up with a Phenergan shot.  So he's sleeping soundly!!!  We pray this is just a little virus and it will be gone by tomorrow. But please join us in praying for him.

We love you all and would love to hear from you.  Email us at the address on the right of the screen!

Jill

ABC Malawi Container Arrival

We have "stuff" in Malawi!  I am amazed that the container which left Jackson, MS the first week of April is already in Malawi!  We expected it to get there sometime in July but somehow it made it in around 8 weeks!  We have some amazing friends who are gathering up our boxes and items and taking care of them for us until we get there next week.  Many thanks to the Trumbles, Whites, and Michelle Halemeier for taking on this difficult task with a servant's heart!  We can't wait to see you!

Well, let's see some pics:

opening the doors! "JKJK" is our stuff!

The Kyser pile!

Academy stuff!

In the gym where it is all unloaded to:

Thanks to Dan Trumble for the pictures!

Backpacks and Bibles

We have an amazing church family. They have been so supportive to us over the past year and we are so thankful for all they've done for us.  Sunday, May 22 was our last Sunday in Morrison Heights for a few years.  The children's ministry decided to throw our kids a surprise going-away party for their last Sunday.  It really hit home that we were actually leaving very soon.  The children's ministry gave them brand new Bibles and backpacks full of goodies for the trip. How precious these people are to us!!!!  What a wonderful joy it was to our children.  They were so proud and so excited!!!!

Homeless but happy!,

One thing that the Lord has taught us over the past year is that THIS is not our home!  We will be here on this Earth for such a short time and it's what we do during that time that matters.  It's all about Him!  It's all about how we can glorify HIM!  We are to hang onto the luxuries of this world loosely and not get caught up in the American dream and our own selfish desires.  We are to seek His will for our life whether that means living in Malawi, Africa or ministering to the poor and needy of your hometown.  He has a plan and purpose for all of our lives and all we have to do is ask Him to reveal that to us.

Our family has been through so much over the past year.  Yet we've learned that "stuff" doesn't matter much.  We are happy with so little now.  We've sold almost everything we have and have packed up what's left.  We leave the States in less than 2 weeks with a few suitcases and excited hearts.  Now, please don't think we've given up everything.  We have a container full of "stuff" on it's way to Africa as we speak.  However, if it were to fall in the ocean (knock on wood....) we'd be ok.  We hold loosely to those things.  It's just "stuff".  We have the one thing that really matters and that is faith in our Lord Jesus Christ! Nothing else is important.  And that's what we go to proclaim.

We left Clinton a couple of weeks ago and have been staying with Jeremy's parents in Montgomery, AL.  Our baby girl, Sarah (age 3) asked the other day when we are going home.  I told her that Nana and Pawpaw's was our home for now.  She said, "no, when are we going to our other home in Clinton".  It made me realize a few things.  She just has no idea what is going on. And how could she?  She's three.  Please pray for her and pray for easy transition for her.  It also made me realize that we are basically homeless.  It never occurred to me really, but we are.  And we are ok with that.

We have been blessed with amazing friends and family who are offering to have us stay with them over the next 2 weeks and visit their churches so that we can share what the Lord is doing in our lives.  We are currently taking a much needed vacation on the beautiful beaches of Orange Beach, AL.  Oh, it's heavenly!!!  We've been so busy and stressed over the past few months that this is some much needed rest!!!!  I'll post pics soon.  This weekend we will travel to FL to visit some wonderful college friends and share with their congregation.  We can't wait to see Dax and Laurie again and meet their beautiful children.  Oh, what a wonderful time we will have.  Then on Sunday we will travel back to Picayune to visit my family and speak to a VBS that supported us last Summer.  We are so excited to share with them and let them know a little more about who we are and what we will be doing.  From Picayune we travel back to Montgomery for our last week in the States.  We will speak at Jeremy's home church Sunday evening the 19th.  Then on Tues. the 21st we will leave Atlanta headed for Lilongwe, Malawi.

We will keep everyone updated as much as possible.  We have been working on a new format for our newsletter and hope to get it out in a couple of days.  If you're not on our email list please send us your email address to kysersinmalawi@gmail.com and we will add you.  It is the main way that we will communicate from Malawi.  So if you are interested in following our family then please send us your email.

Well, I hear the sand and surf calling (as well as the seafood I'll eat for supper) so I better go for now.  We will post more soon.  Please email us with any questions and please continue to pray for us as we are so close now!!!!

In His Service,
Jill