LOTW and Sunday Spotlight – Becca1976

This week as I was browsing through the gallery I stumbled across Pricillianna’s Kiss 6  layout and immediately fell in love with it! I love the photo sequence or shall I say repeating of the photo in different sizes, the vintage look of those photos. The photos are something that you would see on a Hallmark card! I love the flow of the circular frames with the scattering of the elements. What I especially like is the font that she used for her journaling! It is the perfect font for this layout! The simplicity of the layout is the perfect touch to this beautiful creation!

Be sure to head over to the forum and leave her some love!

Wendy

And now..

1. What is your username and does it stand for something?

My user name is Becca1976. It doesn’t really stand for anything in particular. I mostly signed up on digi forums for freebies when I first went digi and every Becca name I could think of was already taken…until I came up with this one.

2. Who/what makes up your family?

I’ve been married to my husband, Ben, for 10 years. We have four beautiful children, Andrew (9), Kate (7), Emma (5), and Faith Ann (3)

3. Can you tell us a little bit about your family and life?

I’d love to! My husband and I are both believers…we put our faith in Jesus Christ when we were both 12 years old. We met at Bible College, were married after graduation, and began our preparations for what we knew God had planned for us, which was to be missionaries. We spent a year teaching in a Christian school that was under our church and from there headed out to raise support to head to Cameroon, West Africa. Before we began traveling to churches to raise our support, our first child, Drew, was born and was very sick. He had neonatal hemochromatosis; a big word for liver failure due to an overload of iron. Within the first weeks of his birth he was rushed from our local hospital to a big children’s hospital for a liver transplant. The story is a long one, but in the end Drew never qualified for a transplant b/c he was too sick. We sat with the doctor in his office and he told us that Drew would die within the month. We began to pray…and God did a miracle. Once the doctors admitted they could do no more, Andrew began to heal. Every day the numbers got better, when they were previously getting worse. Two months from the day of his birth, he came home from the hospital and his only side effect of the entire ordeal was his vision. His liver completely regenerated and he is by far the healthiest out of my 4 children. This event in our family really defines us…we saw God work when there was absolutely NOTHING we could do…I know that HE is faithful!

4. For the readers who don’t know what a missionary is, what exactly is the role/job of a missionary? What part do you play as a woman in the missionary field?

Today there are many different types of missionaries, but we choose to follow the pattern in the Bible of the first missionary, the Apostle Paul (in the book of Acts). Our goals are to share Christ with those we minister to, start local churches, and train up nationals to take our place. My role is very different from my husband’s obviously. Life here is so much simpler in some ways, and complex in others (like in the kitchen!) I spend most of my days caring for my 4 children and teaching them in the home. I am also involved in ministering to the people. I teach children and ladies on a weekly basis.

5. Where is home for you when you aren’t a missionary in Cameroon?

When we are in the states about every 2 years, our home is Tennessee!

6. Were your children born overseas?

None of my children were born overseas, though I was present at my friends delivery of her son here…very, very interesting! Because Drew was so sick, we were told there was a very high chance any other children we had could possibly have the same disease. For that reason we planned to have all of our kids in the states to get the best possible medical care.

7. Have you always wanted to be a missionary?

Since I was in junior high God gave me a love for missions, and Africa in particular.
8. How long have you been a missionary to Cameroon?

We have lived here over 5 years now.

9. How long will you spend in Cameroon being a missionary?

We plan on working in Cameroon ‘til we are old and grey or until God changes our direction.

10. Do you come home to the States for vacations?

We come home every two years as mentioned previously. We take this time to get some rest, take family vacations (looking forward to Disney World!!) and spend time with our family. We also do a bunch of traveling. Because we are Americans we cannot work in Cameroon, so we rely on churches to donate money to help us live here. When we return home, we travel to these churches to update them on what their money is being used for. We have about 35 churches that support us. We don’t visit every church that supports us every time we are home, but we do visit a lot.

11. What is one of the greatest blessings that you’ve seen while you’ve been in Cameroon?

By far the greatest blessing is to see someone realize that they are a sinner and accept God’s perfect gift of salvation as described in the Bible in John 3:16.

12. What type of critters do you encounter on a daily basis? Are they poisonous? Also, do you see any wildlife?

We do see lots of crazy critters. We had a big huge hairy tarantula in our courtyard a couple years ago. He was a lot of fun to get pictures of. I’ll have to scrap a page one of these days of all the stuff we have seen. We saw a green mamba in a tree next to our girls window…our neighbor knocked him down with a machete and killed him thankfully. I’m not sure I would have slept until that guy was found. Just last month my husband walked out into our laundry room and on top of some trunks was a cobra staring him in the face. Thankfully he was pretty docile and Ben was able to kill him. We did get some good pictures though! We see some cool tree frogs, chameleons (that we often keep as pets to keep the fly population down), and the kids love to go hunting for snails and lizards. The people here love to eat grasshoppers in grasshopper
season. They turn big bright lights on at night to catch them and boil them for dinner. My husband has even tried one! I’ve not gotten up the guts yet! We don’t see too much crazy wildlife. Most of the animals you associate with Africa live in the northern region of Cameroon where it is less populated.

13. What is the terrain like where you live? Is it desert, jungle, mountainous, hot, humid, cold, dry?

We live in the mountains. The temperature is an average 80 degrees….paradise! I have huge picture windows in my parlor overlooking mountains with a beautiful waterfall running down the side! Just breathtaking! But Cameroon itself is very diverse…even called little Africa b/c the country has so many different terrains. Including all of the above in your question!

14. Is there anything you miss there in Cameroon that you had in the States?

Wal-Mart! Kohl’s! Taco Bell!!! Yes, I do miss my shopping! We used to save a lot of money being here b/c I wasn’t always traipsing off to the store…but now I shop at ScrapMatters!! LOL!

15. What is shopping like there in Cameroon? Is it hard for you to find ingredients, everyday items, clothing, etc.

I bring clothes for the kids from the states to grow into. It is hard to find clothes here that they can wear. I have had some made but it is a bit of a challenge ordering them, shopping for material, going back for fittings etc…I have a sewing machine and ultimately want to learn to sew. Anyone want to teach me?? I’ll have to hit YouTube while I’m here to learn. I send favorites for the kitchen that I can’t get here like Velveeta, pepperoni, parmesan cheese, chocolate chips and certain spices…the list goes on and on!!

16. What is life like living in Cameroon for your family verses how the nationals live?

We do live very differently b/c it is how we are used to living. The Cameroonians understand that. We do love to try their food and I am learning how to cook some of it too. But, there is no getting around it…our lives are different.

17. Obviously you have electric by being able to get online and participate at ScrapMatters, but is electric something that you have all the time or is electric rationed like it is in other countries?

Our electric isn’t rationed thankfully. I know some other missionaries who only have electric on in the middle of the night (who wants to do all their laundry while they could be sleeping!?!), but there are challenges. We have been out for a week at a time. Right now our electric is being repaired. We only had light for four hours today. So, it has challenges. My laundry is PILING up. But, we have a generator that runs our refrigerator and lights and computers, so that is thankfully how I stay on top of my ScrapMatters challenges!!

18. Have you ever done anything with paper scrapbooking prior to finding Digital?

Oh yeah. I started scrapbooking with paper when my son was in the hospital in 2000. It helped me keep my hands busy and made me feel closer to him even though I could only be with him during visiting hours.

19. How/when did you find Digital Scrapbooking?

I had seen some digital layouts in a Memory Makers Scrapbook Magazine that I had a subscription to at the time. At first I kept staring at that page thinking, There is NO way that is digital! It looks so 3-D! I kept thinking to myself though, why would anyone want to do it on the computer? It takes all the fun out of scrapping when you can’t do it with your hands. My aunt had given me a Creating keepsakes Scrapbook CD program. I had used it for the fonts and printed up titles with it for my paper layouts. Then one day I was just playing around with it and created a layout using the program digitally. I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it. The only thing that absolutely drove me crazy were the shadows. You couldn’t adjust them and they looked so fake. I got my hands on a copy of Photoshop 7 that my brother had and about pulled my hair out trying to figure it out. I spent the day on YouTube trying to get my first layout done. Once I got the basic concept…the rest was history. My husband got me CS3 for Christmas that year and I’m completely hooked. All my paper supplies have sold on eBay!!

20. What is your favorite thing about Digital Scrapbooking?

Well for me it is constant access to scrapbooking products. When doing paper I’d have to send stuff over with visiting groups. I couldn’t just run to the store to pick out embellishments for a page I was working on. Being able to hop online and buy a complete kit in a specific theme is awesome. Another thing with paper is that it was so expensive. I never did LO’s with multiple coordinating papers b/c they cost so much! It just killed me to cut up a piece of 12×12 paper!! With digital you can use papers over and over. I love it!

21. How/when did you find ScrapMatters?

I can’t remember when I found ScrapMatters exactly, but I think it was through Britt-ish designs blog. I was looking for a Christmas kit and Britt had just come out with Very Merry and I saw it on IkeaGoddess or something and hopped onto Britt’s blog for a freebie. Then I saw all the Disney kits she had and all the other amazing goodies that were there. But it wasn’t until a few months ago that I really hopped into the forums. I became a member, but I had no idea what a forum was or how to even post. When I saw the challenges though, I thought I’d give it a try. Once I got going, there was no stopping!

22. Are you able to incorporate digital scrapbooking into your ministry at Cameroon by scrapping about Church Progress, purchasing the van, etc?

I haven’t yet. So far I’ve only done it for our family’s enjoyment. I would like to create a book though that people can look at when we travel to our churches.

23. Do you remember what your first layout was about? Can you share it with your readers?

Well, my first layout was with that creating keepsakes program I had. Another missionary friend here was having a baby and I was watching their three kids. That night I had all the kids make personal pizzas and I scrapped that layout. The shadows bothered me so much that I never actually kept it. I still haven’t redone that page! Gotta dig out those pictures!

24. What is your favorite layout and why?

That is a hard one. I was recently asked that on a CT application and I had a hard time narrowing it down. One of my favorites is a picture of Faith Ann that I scrapped called Natural Beauty

I love the picture b/c it was so candid. She was staring at a spider in one of our window sills. I’m in love with blending in layouts and this was the first blending job that I was super happy with. I love the picture of course, and the blending and the shadows. I just love that layout. I have a lot that I really love and a lot that I keep looking at and say, “I need to redo that!”

25. Is there a certain element that you find yourself constantly using on your layouts?

I love ribbons, and I use stitches a lot. I love string too…love to play with the shadows on a piece of string.

26. What type of camera do you use?

We have a Sony Alpha A200 and I love that camera. I have no idea how to use it to its potential, but I’m learning little by little. I love the Matter of Snap Challenges here at ScrapMatters. It stretches me in the area of photography.

27. Do you print your photos/layouts or for now are they just stored on your hard drive?

I print! I have had about 140 LO’s printed. I printed a bunch in my first batch that I wish I’d held off on…I’ve learned so much since the beginning, but oh well. I’m planning on being a little more careful in the future…making sure I really love the finished product before I put it into print.

Thanks Becca for letting us get to know you better! Check out Beccas full gallery here!
Wendy (Neverland Scraps)

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 8th, 2009 at 5:58 am and is filed under Sunday Spotlight. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.