My mind spins at all we've seen and done in the last month!
Here's a re-cap via my cell phone...
Our last Sunday in the States was at Crosswalk Fellowship, pastor-ed by Nathan's brother, Stephen. Nathan's parents and sister also made the trip to Illinois to send us off. Sunday evening's supper was a cook out at the farm. We ended the evening singing around a bonfire. I couldn't think of a better way to spend one of our last night's with family.
(Above) The last few weeks we were in Illinois we were joined by my dad's cousin, Dan, from Texas. He was a lot of fun and it was nice to reconnect with him. He helped drive grain trucks and tractors during harvest and also cooked some mean meat on the grill.
Loading up to depart for the airport (above)
Traditional family pic on the way out (below)
Goodbyes don't get any easier -- if anything, only more difficult.
(below) Let's splurge on a favorite candy to take our mind off of goodbye's and fears of things like ear pressure from altitude changes! :-)
Yay for having nice and helpful flight attendants on our big flight to Vienna!
And then we crashed hard in the Vienna Airport.
We are back in sunny Albania!
We brought video greetings to the church in Vlashaj from Mom and Dad V.O....
...and a nifty card shuffler from Mom and Dad Waggoner for game nights...
We have a new part time helper for Vlashaj Kids' Club on Saturday morning. She's fantastic, shown below using our new curriculum from CEF (thanks to Nashana Jackson's church's VBS for buying that for us)!
It was fun to see the kids immediately reconnect with their village friends...
And we returned right at the beginning of pomegranate season! (below)
The year the kids are starting off school with the age of the explorers. The first week of classes Miss Pam had them building boats and floating them in our packing trunks, which conveniently held a good amount of water for such an activity.
I'm frequently asked what some of my favorite Albanian foods are.
Here's one: perime zgare (grilled vegetables, drizzled with balsamic)
That's sweet green and red peppers, zucchini, carrots, eggplant and onions.
You better believe I ordered it the first time we had an opportunity to eat out. And it costs a whopping $2.50.
Great object lesson during Vlashaj kids club one Saturday...
And bless him, Steve culled ALL the pics we both took. Culling is my least favorite job in the photography process!!!
They also prepared a special time of Bible study and encouragement for our staff.
We are grateful for their sacrifice of time and resources to serve us!
(below) An adoptive family from America stayed at one of the Planters apartments in Tirana for about a week while they finished up the process of adopting a 10-year-old girl (not pictured). Our kids enjoyed getting acquainted with theirs...
We were also able during the Bookers' visit to coordinate the photo shoot for the Jonathan Center's fundraising calendar. The Jonathan Center serves families and their children with Down Syndrome.
We couldn't believe our eyes -- we round REAL Oreos and they were on SALE!! Of course, we stocked up because you never know if you will ever see them here again!
Ellie continues her proficiency on guitar. Here she is watching a YouTube instructional video for a favorite Chris Tomlin song... (pardon the messy desk, though to the right of the computer you can see last year's Jonathan Center calendar!)
And finally, a photo during Girls Night. It continues to be one of my favorite nights of the week and I dearly love each of these precious young women. Pray for our friendships to only deepen with time.
Okay, these pics haven't been beautiful, but I got a blog post up! I feel like (maybe) life is getting back to a normal schedule...???
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