Driving in Circles

Ellie and Reni rode laps around our next door neighbor's front yard in his "tri-cycle", as he calls it. They were thrilled, as you can tell, and our neighbor was dressed so spiffy as we had just taken his portrait project photo with his wife.

These days have felt a bit like we've been driving in circles.  Not that we're not being 'productive', but sometimes the days feel sort of the same, that there hasn't felt like there's been much of anything unusual to document on the blog.

At least that's what I tell myself. But it's not really true. 

We've had a lot of highlights -- like...

• a workshop we held for the kids at the Hope Center,
• having our neighbor in Tirana out to the village for supper,
• good home visits with our neighbors in the village,
• encouraging learning moments during the weekly programs,
• first time visitors at church and kids club,
• preparations crystallizing for the upcoming craft shows,
• seeing our children too excited to sleep at the prospect of having (English speaking) friends over for an overnight visit...
• finding a new game for the young kids to play at the center (4 Square) when there's no room to play volleyball with he 'big' boys...
• finally getting to watch a college football game online, even if it wasn't the Buckeyes (okay, maybe more of a highlight for Nathan...)
• having a wonderful village friend call his electrician friend to repair our electrical system at 8PM on a weeknight when one of our lines completely melted down. So thankful we stayed safe and it was very quickly repaired! (there's never a 'convenient' time to go without power, but this night was particularly hectic for us)

So I've failed at documenting those moments with pics. In the mean time, here are a few other assorted highlights from this past week...

(below) Reni told me on Thursday that Lenci was his 'best friend'.  Lenci takes time to play catch with Reni on the steps of the center or carry him around on his back so Reni's not always sitting on the sidelines watching while everyone else is playing (we open the grounds up for games nearly every afternoon for about 90 minutes while we supervise and chat with neighbors walking up and down the street).

Friday night we held a game night after church.  Below is the 'Sheet Name Game' where they had to say the other person's name as soon as the sheet dropped.

Nathan joked that we could say these youth are deep in prayer, but no, they are closing their eyes while I select who is 'it' in the next game of Killer Wink.

This morning Ellie meets a baby calf belonging to our new friend, Bajram.  I think she prefers her little insect friends. ;-)

 

Looking forward to more highlights to come!