So one of the joys of this calling are all the different hats we get to wear. To be sure, we want to be good stewards of our time and ensure that we do not over commit or get distracted from our primary purpose for being in Albania. But there are certain causes we like to support with our time and abilities and the Jonathan Center for children with down syndrome is one of those...
For the second year in a row I was asked to photograph some of their beautiful children for their annual fundraiser calendar. It was fun this past year to be walking through the airport bookstore or the World Cup fan zone in Mother Teresa square and bump into images of this past years' kids.
Earlier this month Nathan, Ellie, Reni and I made our way to the new center on Rruga Kavajes to see some familiar faces and meet some new ones! The staff at the center is so good with the children and there is a wonderful sense of community between the kids and their collective families.
We captured photos of the kids in their music therapy room, the PT room, the craft room and the developmental intervention room. It wasn't until we were all finished that we learned the center is renting a home that was formerly occupied by the mother and sister of Mother Teresa herself! How neat is that?
The photo above is one I captured that won't be used in the new calendar, but I loved it so much I wanted to share it here. Isn't he a handsome fella?
It's fun to pull out the camera and dust off my portrait-taking skills now and again, especially for a good cause. Can't wait to see the new calendar unveiled next month!
Our family blog wouldn't be complete if we didn't document our September visit from my college friend, Jan!
It's always special when friends and family go to the time and expense to visit and get a glimpse of our lives here. I suppose that can put a certain level of pressure on our roles as hosts, but visits from Jan were a normal thing before we lived in Albania, so having her here wasn't too different, in some respects!
She was amazingly flexible and accommodating of our ministry schedule and home school routine, but we did make time to show her some of our favorite places 'in the neighborhood.'
I have to admit I just went through the folder of her photos and am sharing a few of my random favorites here (in other words, all photo credit belongs to Jan!). This post might set a record for the number of photos including yours truly, ha ha.
One of our first days included a trip up to Darshen to distribute back-to-school backpacks of supplies. It was wonderful to have someone else document the experience and not bear that responsibility alone!
We had gorgeous weather and sunshine as you can see!
Ellie (and her parents) taught the kids a new song, which was a lot of fun...
After handing out backpacks we paid a visit to our friend, Xhesi, then Nathan pulled out the drone for a new perspective on this mountainside community.
Here is some of the footage he put together:
On our return trip, Jan and I crossed off one of my Tirana "bucket list" activities which was to finally climb to the top of the clock tower in the center.
Just looking through these photos I think Jan picked the best time of year to come! Look at that sunshine and clear, blue skies!
Jan also got to try her hand at some Albanian cuisine! (below: fergese -- a baked dish of cheese and peppers)
We took a Sunday afternoon trip to my favorite city, Berat, to photograph some quaint Ottoman architecture.
And then some days, just because you have company, on the way home from grocery shopping you make a spontaneous stop at an old castle for coffee (or, if you're a child, a peach soda) and to watch the planes land. Where else can you do that?
(the aforementioned spontaneous coffee stop was at Preze, a place we can see from our living room window but which we had only visited once!)
One of Jan's greatest contributions was helping me photograph dozens and dozens of knitted goods for the village knits online shop! You know how some projects can seem overwhelming until the cavalry comes to the rescue? Jan was the cavalry! We spent at least two long afternoons photographing the products on models and Jan took over the (very hard for me) role of wardrobe consultant! On top of that, she took dozens of detail shots off models and tagged all the items as they were posted online.
So the least we could do was pay her in scoops of gelato.
Jan is a wonderful game player, not to mention she's great with kids, we all enjoyed many a game and puzzle together!
For the sake of time I'm not including photos from the kids clubs and church services she attended, nor the suppers she made and the babysitting she did while we were at meetings... but hopefully we balanced the work with some 'play' and she got to see a lot of new-to-her places.
Jan, thank you SO much for your partnership and friendship with us, going back more than 20 years now. I'm so glad you came to see this part of the world which is so special to us and add to our collective memory bank of shared experiences! See you next summer in DC!
Sunset from my kitchen window -- they are pretty spectacular and I can never seem to do them justice, but Jan got one too good not to share!
Last month the members of our little village church made me proud as they shared of their time for a neighbor in need.
We have a family in our village who had recently welcomed a new baby. Knowing that they needed some help to get their house in order (what new mom doesn't need an extra set of hands while caring for a newborn and a toddler?), some members of our church spent the good portion of a day 'spring cleaning' their house and making some repairs to their furniture and bedroom walls.
It turned into a bigger job than we anticipated, spanning two days (due to hosting responsibilities, I wasn't there to document the 2nd day).
This little sweetheart blissfully slept through a lot of our ruckus of moving, sorting, purging and cleaning!
Many hands make light work!
Nathan and Luli work on reinforcing and replacing slats on the baby's crib so she could have a safe place to rest
Precious L washed clothes and dishes for HOURS then took bedding home to finish up the last of the laundry.
[editor's note: this was started Sunday, but finished several days later...]
Happy Sabbath day! What a gift!
We all need rest, though I'm the first to admit I struggle to take breaks. So much of my identity is wrapped up in my 'performance.' (This blog is probably a prime example). I want to make sure the work is being done and I can't really relax if I know there is work yet to do.
That's why it was good that this past week was a sort of 'forced' sabbath for our family. On Tuesday we drove 90 minutes past the northern Albanian border at Muriqan to attend the AEP conference outside of Budva, Montenegro.
AEP is an alliance of evangelical organizations working in the country of Albania. As the only missionaries for Planters Seed Foundation and WGM in this country, we have found membership in AEP to be a huge blessing and benefit -- not to mention safeguard -- to our ministry. They have helped us with our residency visas, collected our mail, shared timely announcements about legal matters, made us aware of various resources and conferences available to us or the people of our village church, and provided valuable networking opportunities with other individuals and groups throughout the country.
To maintain our membership we are required to attend their annual conference at least once every two years. But if I am honest, I admit that at times I wasn't so sure I wanted to go this year -- the idea of rising early to get us all out the door and to breakfast before morning sessions, then staying up late for evening sessions that didn't start until 8PM sounded more tiring than refreshing.
But as is usually the case, my expectations were misplaced.
Before we even left, the kids started counting down the days until we were to leave. The night before we left, Reni trudged into our room with not one, but THREE, backpacks that he had 'packed' for the trip. :-)
That was just the start. The kids started praying about making new friends at the conference (they had their closest English-speaking friends in Tirana all move back to the States over the summer) and talking about fun at the hotel pool. Suffice it to say, just seeing how excited the kids were showed me how much our family needed a change of scenery and a time with others like us.
Reni set up his own personal bed side "mini bar" with snacks we brought from home.
After we arrived Ellie asked why the floor at the hotel was so soft.
"That's something called carpeting, Ellie," her dad said.
Reni didn't comment on the carpet but couldn't stop running up and down the halls. Normally I'm annoyed by kids running up and down hotel hallways, but I couldn't bring myself to stop him. It obviously felt better for him running on carpet than ceramic tile and he seemed to relish running at top speed!
It wasn't long before the kids were pointing out their friends during meals at the cafeteria and asking about when we'd get to see them again after the conference concluded.
Playing video games together in the "Kid Room".
Ellie was in heaven watching an impromptu jam session between some of the youth. Then she proceeded to ask me why she wasn't 'allowed' to bring her guitar, ha ha. (It honestly hadn't crossed my mind that other kids might bring instruments!)
But that's just Ellie and Reni... Nathan and I reveled in special worship times surrounded by brothers and sisters from around the world, including many Albanian believers. Someone later pointed out the uniqueness of the group -- individuals from around the world with little in common 'except' for a mutual love for Jesus and a passion to make him known in Albania. That was treat enough in itself!
It was a treat to reconnect with Fiona after meeting her once before during our adoption of Reni. We had never been able to connect before!
Furthermore we made some divine connections that will be so helpful as we move forward in implementing strategies. These just scratch the surface of opportunities we learned about:
We met the missionary who brought CHE (Community Health Evangelism) to Albania 16 years ago in the city of Korca and she is going to share all of the materials they have translated into Shqip for us to use as we move forward in implementing this strategy in the village work!
We met another missionary who has made a website of FREE Sunday School lessons from Genesis to Revelation, all in Albanian, with links to corresponding songs and crafts for each story! (Before she even sat down I was sending the link to Eda for possible use in Metalle!).
I met an organization that publishes Sunday school curriculum in Shqip that I want to check out and possibly purchase for children's church. I hope to visit their office when we go to Tirana on Thursday.
We met Albanians who run Christian summer camps for children with special needs.
We learned about the status of foster care in Albania and the possible expansion next year (through our former adoption agency, Bethany Christian Services) to include Durres county, where we live. We got materials to share with a few Christian families whom we know and want to encourage to participate in this pilot program.
We have been assigned to participate in the Albanian Prayer Network that assigns each church in Albania to fast and pray for the nation on a specific day each month.
The theme of the conference was "Past, Present, Future" -- celebrating twenty-five years of the AEP and freedom of worship in Albania. One of the speakers included a founding member of AEP who shared stories of the first days of renewed missionary efforts in this country. It was a bit like sitting at a family reunion, hearing names and stories I've heard from my parents and other friends who worked here in the early 1990s.
(since there are so many Reni photos in this post) The last afternoon of the conference they scheduled an excursion to a nearby town, getting us out of the hotel for the first time since we arrived. We had coffee and juice at a little cafe in an old town square. We felt very "European". :-)
Suffice it to say, we thank God for such a refreshing and encouraging five days away. I want to close by sharing a song that we learned during the times of corporate worship. It's based on Psalm 23, entitled "Shepherd of My Soul." This week felt like a time of spent in 'green pastures' and being lead by quiet waters, of restoring our souls. May you see the Good Shepherd in your life today as well!
(If you cannot see the embedded video below, click here.)
In Nathan's family, much significance was placed on the meaning of one's name and as such, names were thoughtfully chosen accordingly.
I appreciated this tradition that I married into and so I remember when we were first matched with Ellie in the process of adoption, one of the first things we did was look up the meaning of her given name. Would we keep it or would we mark this new beginning in her life with a new first name, too?
In case you don't know this part of her story, we chose to keep her given name, Elisona, which means "[her] parents worship Jehoveh".
In Reni's story, as we were considering his file given us by our adoption agency, we learned that the name this baby was given at his baptism when he was taken into the Sisters' of Charity home happened to be the same name his soon-to-be grandfathers shared.
It also belonged to a young boy in the Old Testament who was nearly overlooked because of his lack of height, but chosen by God for what man couldn't see. You know him as David.
In both cases, our children's names were powerful signs to us of God's involvement in their lives and confirmations that they were ours. They were faith builders in journeys where human frailty can often find us walking in doubt and fear.
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Last Saturday marked the return of our family's visits to the Hope Center. The first few visits are always a bit of a challenge because it involves meeting to new friends and starting a new relationship from scratch with the new kids who've just moved in.
This year we knew that there would be six new ones to meet. In contemplating our first activity together, I chose to borrow from a devotional message my friend Anne, along with her daughter Lydia, prepared and shared with the girls from our village this past summer.
Nathan introduced our family, then told the kids we were going to lead them in an activity which would not only help us to know their names, but share with them, perhaps for the first time, the meaning of their names.
We wanted to remind them that God knows their names, and has known them personally by name, since before the creation of the world.
We then handed each youth a card with their name, meaning, and personal Scripture verse to read out loud.
Then, so they wouldn't lose track of the card, we showed them how to make journals and affix their cards on the cover or just inside.
Jenna -- we had just the right number of left over journals from this summer for this activity!
Then, once they got started, Nathan pulled out the blender and whipped up some good ol' American milkshakes. Milkshakes are just starting to hit the scene in select places in Tirana, so needless to say, they are a novelty...
...but were a big hit with the kids.
As we were about to leave, one of the students handed us his notebook. He was a bit confused when we told him it was his to keep!
All in all, it was our best beginning-of-the-year visit to the Hope Center yet! But more importantly, we hope that what might just have been a fun activity to some would be a powerful reminder that they are known, loved and treasured by the God who made them.
