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Hello all,
Joey and I got back at around 4:30 today. Nathan seems to be doing well and Jane's fever broke this evening (hopefully for good).

Thank you for all your love and prayers,

Jon

Ups and Downs

Dear friends and family,

Our life reminds me a bit of the opening line of A Tale of Two Cities... in some areas of our life it really is the best of times and in other areas it is pretty tough. When I think about all that is going well (which I like to do!) I get excited, wax eloquently (or at least rapidly) about all that is going on and my hopes for how it might turn out. On the other hand when my attention turns to some of the short term and longer term challenges we are facing I become more sober and my focus necessarily narrows on the important issues right before us. My prayers alternate form gratitude to intercession, from "more Lord!" to "Lord, have mercy".

So what do you want to read about first? In order to not sound completely superficial by the end I will start with the good stuff.

For me, business is looking very promising. I was recently contacted a phone manufacture and some wireless carriers about pre-installing of one of our applications on their phones. We have sent them our terms and are awaiting a reply. We are obviously praying for the best but are happy to simply have been considered.

Our newest application, Todoroo, made it to the second round of the Android Developers Challenge. There are 200 applications in this round and 30 of them will win a cash prize and get some free publicity from the award. This would be huge for us. Not only would the infusion of cash be helpful for our company, the award would help validate what we have been doing. You might be wondering what Todoroo is since it isn't released publicly and our website isn't up. Below is a fun description that captures both the idea and some of the excitement I have about it.

Todoroo is a solution for the nagging spouse, a secret weapon against evil advertising geniuses and a cure for the common cold all on your phone!

How? Todoroo populates your phone with a team of mobile mentors (we call them Roos) who know you are forgetful, lazy and easily distracted. They help by supercharging your to-do list with the wisdom of coaches, experts and friends and provide creative nudges to keep you moving in the right direction.

Current coaches include a piano teacher, money saving adviser, and a relationship guru. Our 'Paranoid Roo' (under development) will help you avoid getting sick… and yes help you avoid the common cold! Maybe a cure is an overstatement but you get the idea.

We are opening our platform up and reaching out to publishers, authors and folks like you to bring the world a wide range of mobile mentors. The possibilities are endless.

I could go on and on... about some of the content from world class authors that we are bringing into our platform and our plans to serve delegates of the Urbana Missions Convention but it is getting late, the email is getting long and you are wondering what challenges we are facing.

The challenges

The most pressing challenge we face is Jane, Joey and Nathan have all been really sick for the last few days. Joey missed school during the end of last week and will probably stay home through Wednesday. Jane came home sick from work on Friday and has had a fever throughout the weekend. Nathan joined the club on Sunday and continues to be miserable. For some reason I have been spared thus far. As a result we spend most of the weekend camped out in our smallish apartment watching Hulu.com, Pixar and Bob the Builder and driving each other a little crazy. As you can probably tell the pressing challenges we are facing are not all uncommon ones, and for the most part we are hanging in there.

If you have been reading our email updates/blog posts you know that Joey's tumor has grown in recent months. Today he starts his second round of chemotherapy. He is such a trooper. In recent days he has begun to talk more about God and we have caught him singing a worship song that he is making up as he goes. From time to time he observes matter-of-factly that one day Jesus will fix what is broken and bring to life what has died. In moments like these Jane and I often catch one-another's gaze and share a knowing look that we both long for that day to come quickly.

Joey's sometimes silly songs remind me that even in the best of times they are not as good as one day they will be. And in the most difficult times we join our son in putting our trust in Him who has suffered with and for us.

Thank you for joining us in this journey.

With Love,

Jon, Jane, Joey and Nathan Paris