This is Tara...

again. I'm blogging for Chad because he did not get a chance to this morning before he left. I just spoke with him and he is on the plane in Colorado Springs waiting to take off. They are flying to Anchorage, AK first to refuel, but they will not be able to get off the plane. Then, they will fly to Kadena Air Force Base in Okinawa, Japan. They will arrive there on Sunday night at about 5:30pm Japan time. They are 14 hours ahead of Birmingham time, so it will be 3:30am early Sunday morning for us. He has been very busy since he arrived in Colarado Springs on Thursday. Each time I've spoken with him he is out of breath from carrying things, rushing off the the next scheduled event, or about to help with another activity. Hopefully he will get some much needed sleep on the plane since he still has not slept much. He was told he would get a whole row to himself, so he was excited that he would get to lay down and stretch out. Well...when he got on the plane he was assigned to a row with 4 seats to himself, but the armrests in his row do not lift up and are pretty bulky. He is also in the middle of 2 rows, so he does not have the side of the plane to lean against to sleep. I'm thinking he is so tired that he will be able to sleep in any position at this point. He functions pretty well with no or little sleep for a while, but after a while he tends to get sick. So, I'm praying that he will get some rest so he won't get sick on his big trip. That's all for now! He is going to try to e-mail me as soon as he can after he arrives in Japan so I will know he is safe and when I hear from him I will blog again. Please pray for their safe travel and that Chad will get rest and be able to focus on his important task at hand.