We’ve been here in Oklahoma for a little over a week now! Thanks for praying for our trip and for the adjustment of moving. We are all doing well!
As you can see, we’ve included a few photos (click on the photos to see a larger version) but to see more photos of our life in Oklahoma, click here. We thought it might be interesting for you to hear a little bit about what goes on in a typical day for us. So, here goes!
Breakfast is served in the dining hall at 8 am. Our group of about 50 (35 adults – the rest kids) takes turns cooking meals. Following breakfast we spend the morning alternating between watching kids and doing homework. 
Many of the couples with kids have their language sessions in the morning, so one or two mornings a week finds us with several kids in addition to our own. 
On days when we don’t have other kids, one of us studies while the other watches Luke and Titus. Then we trade.
What, you might ask, does "studying" involve? Well, each day after lunch we leave our kids with one of our classmates and we drive into town to meet with Flo, our Cherokee language helper. 
Our task right now is to obtain several hundred Cherokee words and write them phonetically. We record Flo saying them so we can listen again later in the day. We also have to input data using various computer programs so we can organize and retrieve it to use for analysis of the language.
Our goal right now is not to be able to speak Cherokee, although we do learn and use some everyday expressions. We are concentrating on finding out how the language works – how verbs are formed, what the word order is for sentences, how questions are formed… all that fun stuff!
Here’s one little example: in Cherokee "he is smiling" is all one word; "he will be smiling" is still one word, just a little longer; "is he smiling?" is again one word, just with an added suffix. So, we spend our study time trying to figure out things like that!
After our session we usually come home and spend more time on homework. Once a week we also head back into town to a local laundromat 
so we can have clean clothes to wear for the next week. While we’re in town, we usually make a stop at the library as well to get a big stack of books for the boys.
Supper time rolls around at 6 pm. After that it’s time to begin the boys’ bedtime routine. Once they are in bed, we again go back to studying. We also have cleaning responsibilities (bathrooms, kitchen, hallways…) that we take care of then. 
And if all that gets done, there is occasionally time for a quick game of ping pong or something else fun before going to bed.
Then we get up the next morning and start all over again! It is amazing how exhausting it can be to listen to and analyze words all day. Cherokee is very different than English – lots of sounds that we don’t have! We are thankful for this challenge because it is one more step in being better prepared to someday soon learn a tribal language that has never been written down. I’m sure we’ll look back at this time and think how easy this was in comparison!
Thanks so much for praying for us! Please continue to do so!! Next week (10/20-10/26) begins our teams’ turn to cook. So, if you’re in the area and want to join us for chicken manicotti, beef stroganoff or porcupine meatballs, just let us know! What’s a few more people when you’re already cooking for 50?