How the journey began...

First of all, you will notice as I post that I like to use a lot of punctuation marks, such as five exclamation points at the end of a sentence. This is how I write-thanks, in part, to Amy who is a great influence on me! You have been warned. I wanted to let all of my prayer warriors/partners know how this journey to Sonrise began. This will give you an inside look at how God truly does work even when I can't see it happening. He truly is an awesome God!
I must begin by saying that God has always placed in my heart a desire to go to Africa. Another desire of mine was to go on a mission trip to work with an orphanage of some kind. Never did I think He would meld the two together in such an amazing way. I have been on overseas mission trips before - two to Nicaragua and one to Romania - and really do have a huge heart for missions whether here in Georgia or internationally. When I graduated college in 2008 I thought that my dreams of going to Africa were going to be put on the back burner because I would be getting a full-time job and there was no way that my employer would let me off for a 6 week vacation and still hold the job for me when I returned. Basically, I had resigned myself to waiting until later in life to hopefully fulfill this dream.
My friend, Amy Washington, went to Uganda this past summer 2009. She wanted to work with a baby home, but the ones in the area were not accepting any volunteers during the time she would be over there. So, she was very flexible and decided to spend her time with a children's home for five weeks (Musana Children's Home). After arriving, the workers at Musana told her about a baby home that had just opened up the week before. Amy and Jessie (another friend who was on the trip) didn't need to be asked twice about taking a little weekend visit over there. Once they got to Sonrise Baby Home they fell in love with everything about it. You can imagine how little Sonrise had to offer to the babies, but it was very evident to both Amy and Jessie that this was a place that they were called to work with. So, after Jessie left to come back to the States, Amy spent the last two weeks of her trip strictly working at Sonrise Baby Home. We would get occasional e-mails from her throughout her summer there and she would tell us about Sonrise. It was very evident in her e-mails that she felt called to further ministry with them. When she came back to the United States at the end of the summer, she felt burdened to continue to help Sonrise. So, she began fundraising a little and overseeing the process of becoming a non-profit ministry. Then, Amy started talking about going back...
Amy left her heart with those precious babies in Africa and when she talked about Sonrise and the ministry that the workers have you couldn't help but wish that you could be apart of it. One night in early September, she came over to my house and we just sat and talked for about two hours about life. The subject of going back to Uganda in January came up and she was saying how badly she wished someone could go back with her. But due to school schedules of her sisters and work schedules of other friends it was hard to ask someone to take off from January through the end of February right after they had been off for the Christmas holiday. Then she asked me about going. My first thought was "There is NO WAY that I can ask off from my job at Mercy Health Center for 6 whole weeks"!!! So I told her this and she kind of understood. The subject came up again about how she wished that I could go with her. We started talking and the wheels started turning. I am a fill-in dental hygienist which means that I can choose when I want to work. At Mercy Health Center, I work about three days a week with the dental clinic on Fridays being the busiest day of all. Then I remembered my wonderful intern, Chad. He has truly been a lifesaver (I don't know how I have run the clinic without an intern for the past 2 1/2 years!). Anyway, Chad has caught on very quickly to how things are run and is able to pretty much handle things by himself. Then I was kind of worried about what my parents would say about me taking off on such short notice. After Amy and I talked more about it, I started getting excited. Maybe it would work out after all. I could just let people know that I wouldn't be available to fill in during those six weeks, and if Chad was able to handle the clinic (which I knew he would be very capable) then Tracy (my boss) would be more inclined to let me be gone. By the end of mine and Amy's conversation we were both pretty excited because I basically told her that I would try to ask off and if that was a go then I would make this trip with her.
After she left that night, I had the biggest peace come over me. I felt as if I had taken a turn in the road and realized that I was actually heading in the right direction! I was in constant prayer about everything. When I arrived at work that next week I went into Tracy's office to see what she thought. She immediately said that if my intern could oversee the clinics that she would be fine with me leaving. Well, that just fueled the fire to let me know that God was opening the door for me. When I approached Chad about how he would feel about me being gone for 6 weeks he was so excited about the possiblity of running everything without me there - and he doesn't have any classes on Fridays that would conflict with the dental clinic. Victory #2!!!! Finally, I approached Mom one morning (I think I scared her a little bit because I opened up the conversation by saying "Mom, I need to talk to you about something...") and she said "Go!". At this point I still wasn't quite sure if my final decision was made, so I continued praying about it. Amy got in touch with a travel agent to reserve seats for us and still I prayed.
Well, it's been almost three months since Amy and I had that conversation and I am so happy to inform you that I WILL BE GOING TO AFRICA!!! The Lord has opened door after door and provided funds that I didn't know were possible. Almost as soon as I started seriously praying about going, I received several calls from dentists about filling in for different days as a hygienist...I could work almost every one of them! I have a jar on my dresser that I've been putting money aside in. It has been so cool to watch that thing fill up!
My dream of going to Africa wasn't put on hold after all. God was busy working behind the scenes formulating His plan for me until He was ready to reveal it. I'm so glad that He doesn't show it to us too soon. I probably wouldn't have been able to handle it. I am learning that God doesn't waste anything in our lives. He always uses it for something good...always!
And so, as I begin to share more and more about our trip and then let you know what we are doing while we are there, I hope that you will journey with us to Uganda. Let the countdown begin...51 days until we leave (January 11, 2010)!!

Thank you so very much for your love, support, and prayers!
Leah