Family & Friends,

For a number of reasons, I am finally buying into the "blogging idea"! I mainly am doing this to keep you updated on my "day to day" news, as I am here in Ooty, India for 2 months working with a wonderful organization called Freedom Firm! For those of you who don't know, they are an organization that targets sex-trafficking for underage girls specifically in India. The organization has an effective fourfold strategy that involves: investigation, intervention, prosecution and aftercare. In my time here, I have the honor of working with the Aftercare program as a volunteer A number of you are supporters of me in more than one form or fashion, and I feel it is your right to now what is going on! Also, this will help provide a "back up journal" for me personally! So without further adieu, here I go!

First off, I want to provide you with some of the background information that led up to this miraculous trip -in -the- making. . . The Lord's hand has truly been in this whole process. In regards to Freedom Firm, this organization has been on my heart for FIVE years! I was a senior in high school when I first heard about it, and about the same time I remember attending a certain “Disciple Now” (a youth retreat for teens) weekend where the emphasis on the weekend was on justice. I began to hear about sex-trafficking and recall praying intensely with the youth group for their specific ministry. The Lord proved faithful that last day of the retreat, because when Sunday morning rolled around we received an email saying they had rescued another girl from a brothel! A few years later the founders of Freedom Firm came to speak at Grace and I felt a strong longing to help. I remember talking with some other high school girls to Mala (the founder for the Aftercare program for the girls) after their presentation and asking her what we could do. She said to keep praying and that she would love to have some of us actually come over to India because there is an age barrier between the volunteers and the rescued girls and we could perhaps relate better to them and help assist them in learning a new trade so that they could take care of themselves...

Well the desire was definitely planted then and there to go, but I knew I had to finish high school and attend college, so although the idea was still buried in my heart, it was clouded by circumstances. However, God in His sovereignty has the perfect timing and order for everything. . . Sometime this past Fall (2009) my mom was hosting one of her piano recitals for her students at our church, Grace Evangelical. While she was there, she "happened" to "stick her head in to say hi" during a meeting with the associate pastor and one of the members of the missions board who were discussing the ways they wanted to rewire or revamp the way our church did missions. Apparently a new goal for them was to send a few people from Grace on a few 2-3 month mission trips and thus make missions a more inward focus. Well, to my mom's surprise, they said that they had JUST been talking about me and wanted to see if volunteering at Freedom Firm would be something they thought I would be interested in doing! This is amazing because neither of them had ANY idea that I wanted to go, which means it HAD to have been the Lord prompting the whole missions board! My mom could barely contain her excitement and called me right away! We agreed to prayerfully consider, but it was basically a "no-brainer"! The Lord was giving me the desires of my heart...which also turned out to be His heart!

Working out the details for my graduate schooling was also a test, because grad. school was supposed to begin in June, but through a long journey of sorting everything out, the professors were not only supportive but one of them actually rearranged the entire schedule of one of her classes for one other girl and myself (and she is a stickler about her schedule)! Furthermore, though I felt like the least likely to deserve it and get hired for the desirable "assistant positions" with a professor, one of the professors hired me the day before graduation as his assistant! There are more details to how this happened, and I would love to share with you if you would like to know more!

Other obstacles included passing one of the most difficult courses I have taken since college (in which class I studied for more than all my other classes this past semester combined) and purchasing a brand new plane ticket when my entire flight was cancelled a week before I left! This too was the Lord, because my previous ticket had me on five different plane rides to get to India (we were trying to find the most inexpensive deal) and this new ticket had me dealing with 3 airlines instead and was almost the same exact price and left the same day! Truly unbelievable!

. . . Well on Saturday May 8th I graduated from Georgia College & State University with a degree in English (literature concentration) and a minor in dance, and on May 9th I was at the airport ready for my departure!