Today, I flew to Dallas and met with my intern team for orientation at the Buckner missions office. There are three other girls on the Latvia team: Ramie Stewart, a senior at Hardin-Simmons in Abilene; Jeannene Parsons, a senior at Berry; and Leslie Troyer, a sophomore at Auburn. They’re sweet girls—I think we will have a great time together!
After our orientation, all of the interns went to the warehouse for Shoes for Orphan Souls, a ministry of Buckner’s that collects and distributes shoes to orphans and at-risk children in close to 60 countries around they world. This year, the number of shoes they’ve handed out will reach 2 million! We helped sort and pack shoes for a few hours before going back to the missions office to sort and pack the humanitarian aid and supplies we’re taking on our trips. My team is taking toothbrushes, toothpaste, soap, shampoo, and other hygiene products in addition to our supplies for VBS. It took some shuffling to get everyone’s bags under the 50 lb. limit! It will be nice to lighten our load as we leave humanitarian aid and supplies with the orphanages we visit. This is probably the only time in my life that I’ll leave for a month and come home 50 lbs. lighter!
I’m at the hotel now, getting ready to go to sleep. It’s 7:30 am in Latvia right now, so we were trying to stay up a little later so we could sleep on the flight tomorrow, but I think today’s activity has worn me out—off to bed!
