April Cell Phone Dump

Forgive all the random, catch-all nature of this post, photos courtesy of my cell phone...

My favorite thing about spring... the return of gorgeous sunsets as the sun makes its trek into the northern sky from behind the foothills to the south.  I will so miss my Albanian sunsets this summer.

One of the happy 'accidents' of starting our visits to Kids Club in the village next door with a big group of visitors from America is that we had to hire an extra driver for those first two meetings... and then we never let him go and just have him drive our big ol' gang every week.  We have a lot of fun!

Thanks again, to anyone who has donated craft supplies to our supply closet.  These were perfect for Easter!

This sweet girl came from our village to help me run crafts one Saturday -- we never have 'too many' helping hands (well, until the van is full, that is)!

The kids were totally quiet during this week's lesson...

Earlier this month we brought Bocce Ball to the Hope Center, little knowing that they had never played before.  It was a big hit!

Then Pam planned a fantabulous Easter Egg hunt (minus the eggs, which I just couldn't find in spite of crawling in tight spaces and opening many boxes and suitcases -- of course, I discovered them the day after, right under my nose).  And no, you cannot buy plastic easter eggs here.

This boy... check out his belt.

Chocolates from a friend in Lithuania that tasted as amazing as they looked in this so-cute paint palette.

Reni is SO Albanian in that he LOVES anything fresh grown here, including these green plums (which are way not ripe enough for Nathan and I to eat, but this is how everyone here eats them).  In this case, our buddy L brought these just for Reni knowing that he would enjoy them.  Of course he gobbled them up.

We got a care package right before Easter that arrived just in time.  It contained this beautiful, lit pop-up book of Jesus' last week on earth.  I asked Elio to share it with the kids during our Good Friday service.  The children were absolutely enraptured!

At our kids clubs the day before Easter we colored eggs at both.  They had never colored eggs before and really, really enjoyed it.  We gave them a white crayon to write messages or draw designs on the egg before coloring it.

Aren't they so colorful?  They didn't last very long!  As soon as they were dismissed, the eggs were gobbled up!

We went straight from coloring eggs to making a banner for the Easter Sunday march in Tirana...

The church of V declares Jesus is risen!

Sunday's march in Tirana...

The experiencing of singing worship music in Mother Teresa Square was beautiful (in spite of the heavy security presence -- note the top right side of the photo)!  The worship team did a fantastic job.  Ellie was giddy to see her piano teacher on keyboard (left, in red).

Reni and "A" get along so well when we visit the Hope Center.  I love seeing Ellie and Reni reaching the age that they are playing along with the kids at the center instead of just being the token "little siblings".

Below -- teaching Rummikub (followed by SkipBo).  We will be stocking up on games this summer!

Comment if you have any favorites that are not English-language only.

photo courtesy of Pam Arney

I love that Ellie has clothes folding down (mostly).  Now to work on sorting...

Earlier this month Pastor Genti preached on the covenant-keeping nature of God. I had the idea of soliciting favorite Scriptural promises from friends and family on Facebook.  They promptly responded with an abundant number of verses.  I printed them in Albanian and Nathan distributed them at the end of church.

We had some glorious weather this month.  One Sunday evening we went out for a walk.  Along the way, Reni got too close to the ditch and fell in on his seat.  Only the top of his head was visible!  We all got a good laugh out of it!