Slower Summer Days

It's hard to put into words how dramatically schedules shift here, once school wraps up.  And this summer has felt a bit different as we didn't have any guests after the Texas team departed. 

Nevertheless we've stayed busy.  Nathan is on a few boards for local organizations that have required some extra attention this summer. We've also had some travel, though not altogether as a family. Then there is the matter of our residency permits which expire in August.  It's been so nice to have big chunks of time to devote to the document chase our renewals have required!

The following photos are some highlights that have transpired...

This spring a neighboring farm had an explosion of baby goats -- we finally got around to seeing them this summer.  I regret that we never made it over to see them when they were newborns. :-(

This boy still loves cucumbers as much as ever!  And they grow like crazy here!

This is Ellie, sleeping in the Vienna Airport during a five hour layover on our return to Albania from WGM meetings that I (Cydil) attended.  At some point you might be so tired you use used airline blankets left by someone else because 'they looked like clean people.'  Please, no comments on how unclean and unsafe this probably was.  To be honest, "bed bugs" or the like never even crossed my mind at the time...

Got a great welcome home by the boys....

Our old neighborhood in Tirana... someone knew it was America's birthday and hung the stars and stripes! :-)  It's so refreshing to find pro-American support here and there.

Bonus about going to America in late June: all sorts of July 4 swag to bring back to Albania!

We had dear friends over for a good ol' American cookout on July 4th followed by water games and sparklers!

This summer Nathan has given the lesson at church several times... as we're walking through the book of Acts, it's been conducive to teaching through the 'storying' method and helpful for noticing new details in these stories.

This summer as seen a LOT of nerf gun battles in our home!  I'm perpetually picking up little blue and orange bullets from under and behind furniture. Below, Reni is pictured with one of his two besties from the village, Flavio.  The Star Wars masks are not necessarily for protection, but probably a really good idea!

One of the best aspects of summer... the sun moves north and provides us with some fantastic sunsets!  (In the winter it sets behind a mountain and we miss it completely).

We have lost track of the number of days we have spent tracking down documents, searching for government offices, made copies and had our photos taken, all in the name of renewing our residency permit.  The last time we did this was five years ago and our grasp of the Albanian language has made huge strides since then, allowing us to feel much more independent in the process.  Yet, this application is different than last time and government offices have moved.  It's been a roller coaster of emotions thinking we've done something wrong or missed a deadline or had to find another way to meet a necessary criteria.  The photo below was taken while grabbing lunch at a favorite Asian fast food restaurant in Tirana.  It was a reward for the kids who tromped all over Tirana with us to go to just 'one more office' and a place to cool our heels while Nathan stood in line next door.  Reni is demonstrating his 'kung fu chops' (in honor of the name of the restaurant, as well as how we felt we were tackling our list!).

As the temperatures rose, interest in really active games at the center has declined, finding the boys preferring play in the shade.  That's fine with Reni who still loves a good game of chess!

Our regular programs have continued through July.  I just had to share this pic of an adorable boy holding an adorable craft.  Any guesses on the story? (That's a camel puppet)

Every weekend Tiffany spends the night out in the village with us.  After a long day of kids clubs and extra planning for our summer party she was all set to return to Tirana when she tossed her car keys on the front seat with her purse to go open the vehicle gate.  As soon as she closed the door to pass by the car, the electrical system triggered the door locks and locked her out for more than two hours!

Ellie has been reading up a storm, and still sits in her odd positions, just like she's done since she was little!  We bought this swing chair for her birthday to help provide her some of the sensory input she still seeks.  Many a day will find her out there swinging with a book or playing her ukulele.

On July 18 Nathan and I celebrated 20 years of marriage!  We found some cheap tickets last winter on a discount airline to a lesser-known city in a neighboring country and after securing childcare for the kids, took our first multi-night trip away from them in more than six years! Turns out discount airlines are "discount" for a reason, but we made it home, albeit a day later than originally planned!

One of the highlights (in addition to just having time away with my favorite travel buddy) was taking a cooking class together!

As we considered some different activities to do for Reni's birthday, we had to measure him to see if he met a minimum height requirement for a local gym.  We're crossing our fingers to see if he will be allowed to participate!  The tape measure is locked at 110cm, the minimum requirement.  He's obviously much shorter... it makes it challenging for him to join in on some favorite activities with his peers!

Albanian hair cuts are SHARP.  Here's Reni gettin' styled after his last trim.

Reni's birthday came at the end of July and his main request was to spend it with one of his best buddies, Levi, who has his own birthday the day after Reni's.  Levi's family was gracious enough to come all the way to Albania from western Kosova for two nights.  We had a cookout and two cakes and some water games, along with lots of conversation and games, which I will share in a separate post. 

Our tradition is to eat at a "Western" themed restaurant in Tirana -- one of the only places in the country to find a pulled-pork sandwich. 

And because you can't flush the toilet paper in Albania, this sign posted in the restaurant bathroom was especially amusing... It translates roughly, "Whoever throws tp in the toilet is a villager, not a cowboy." :-)

So there. 
(I wonder if they knew their customers that day were visiting from the village, ha ha).

Coming up.... Reni turns 10

June with the Waggoners

To call this a June "recap" may not be completely fair -- I posted a few pics from the first week of June in my May re-cap, and I shared Ellie's birthday and piano recital in another... so this will fill in a few of the in-betweens!  The biggest event by far was hosting our friends from Texas!

Funnily, before they arrived, Reni was pretty put-out that it was an all-female team.  Of course, within hours, that was completely forgotten and he had a lot of fun with all the beautiful teenage girls. :-)

We always have an orientation and child-protection training seminar with all of our guests.  It's important that we set every guest up for success during their time here!

We also ply them with lots of drinks and sweets to keep them awake as generally jet-lag is in full force.

We divvy up household chores when groups visit and work is always more fun when there are friends to share it with!

Of course with a group full of girls we had to do a spa night.

We had a great turn out for facials and manicures!

 My friend below celebrated her birthday with us!

We held a VBS with a packed house every day.  So much fun with a super-hero theme!  The team from Texas brought nearly everything from the snacks to the artwork on the walls!  The kids thoroughly enjoyed it!

One of the lessons was on the great catch of fish (Luke 5, when Jesus calls Simon Peter to follow him).  We were able to review the story during snack time by showing an excerpt from the fourth episode of The Chosen.  If you haven't see that yet, check it out at www.thechosen.tv.  (My cousin, Dallas, is the creator/director, and we're super proud of his work.  They are currently filming episodes 5-8 right now and you can follow that on their Facebook page).

One morning the group split into two and we visited some of our neighbor friends who gave us cooking lessons on making a few traditional Albanian dishes.  It's a wonderful opportunity to visit a local home, meet a family, hear their stories, and learn about new kinds of foods!

Here Merita is soaking dried pita (almost like a big cracker or flakey tortilla) in a mixture of milk and eggs.  These are layered atop each other and then baked in the oven.

The pita rises up and gets puffy as it cooks and browns.  This is a staple evening meal in our community!

We are so proud of Ellie's involvement in much of the kids ministry through helping with music.  Her confidence and skills continue to grow!

This young friend lives just three doors up the street from us.  During music he whispered in my ear that it was his birthday.  Of course, we then had to sing to him! :-) Nathan threw him on top of his shoulders so he could be seen above the 50 heads of kids!

The snacks were theme-appropriate, including this class of blueberry jello.  It was so funny to see the various reactions as most of the kids in attendance (if not all) had never tasted jello before.  The oldest were most reticent.  The youngest gulped it all up!

At the end of the week we took the team to our favorite national park, about 40 minutes from our home.  While Reni wears his boots whenever he is outside, they are heavy and quite hot though, so he can't walk long distances in them.  Thankfully, his dad is still strong and we have found this new carrier that allows Reni to stand on a bar and clip in at the shoulders to safely ride along when we hike.

Last summer our friend, Jessica (below in black shirt), was sitting in our living room in Vlashaj when she received a phone call from the States from her doctor informing her that she had breast cancer.  I won't ever forget that moment!  She was already a widow and mom to five boys. After nine months of chemotherapy, surgery and radiation she has been given a clean bill of health! It was a treat to see her while she was back in Albania for the Kay Arther Conference in Tirana.  In fact, we saw each other unexpectedly at the airport as she was leaving with her travel companion, Amanda!

Our schedule has been to go back to America every-other-summer, however for a variety of reasons, chiefly that our residency permit to be in Albania expired in mid-August and we could not start the process to renew it until June, we decided to postpone our bi-annual visit to the States until the fall.

However, Nathan has been appointed area team leader for WGM and was requested to attend some leadership meetings with our agency at the end of June.  It didn't make financial sense for our family to fly over to America for two weeks, then return to Albania to finish up our residency process for 7 weeks, then go back to America... so we got permission for me (Cydil) to attend on Nathan's behalf.  Ellie and I had airline credit in our names from some cancelled flights last year when we went home to say goodbye to my dad.  It was expiring at the end of June so the trip didn't cost us any extra money out of pocket.

Below, Ellie sits in the Vienna Airport during our 5-hour layover.  She's becoming such a good traveler!  And sweet girl always suffers from significant ear pain when flying.  We discovered "ear planes" and they made all the difference!  She said it didn't hurt one bit!

I know this is probably a really random photo, but this is what my mom asked me to bring her from Albania.  Decorative/printed toilet paper for her guest bathroom.  I guess America doesn't have everything!

I stopped at Mom's for a few days to drop off Ellie and get over jet lag before heading to Indiana for my meetings.  My sister and brother-in-law flew in from Vermont for a day to drop off their girls too for a week with Ellie and my mom.  This is the only photo I have.  My brother-in-law pressed into service rearranging furniture... with nary a complaint.

When the kids were younger I used Twitter to record Ellie and Reni's best quotes.  Apparently my dad kept of my sister's and my quotes too!  Mom found this gem while she was sorting through his belongings.  Jenny's is the best.

Dad:  What time is it, Jenny?

Jenny (age 6):  Daytime

While in Indiana I got to see our dear friend, Charisse!  Her family hosted me for an amazing cookout of hamburgers on the grill, root beer, salad and water melon!

Proof that I was in meetings, ha ha.  Lots of interesting information!  Great to reconnect with old friends.  Hard to believe that this summer marks 20 years of service with WGM!

Of course, on the return to Illinois, the sign one is getting close to home... all the windmills.

Not in order, but before I left for Indiana we were able to see the tombstone that arrived this spring to mark Dad's grave.

Mom chose the verse that we used at Dad's service in Vlashaj to be engraved on their stone.

I also love her choice to go with Dad's 'rebellious' choice to 'lower case' the 'v' in a sea of "VanOrman" tombstones with capital "Vs". :-)

Albanian tradition is to mark the one year anniversary of a loved-one's death with a special meal and family gathering.  I never really understood the significance until this visit transpired.  I hadn't been 'home' since Dad's funeral last year, and the timing of this return trip was so close to last year's journey home to say goodbye to him, I was surprised by the emotions that overcame me that first morning over breakfast with Mom. 

But when Ellie and I flew back to Albania two weeks later, it felt like I had walked through a door and entered a new season.  The previous 18-months had been full of so many complex emotions but I was able to return to Albania this time with some closure and a sense of being more settled.  Of course, I will always miss my dad and mourn the loss of so many things we could have shared together had he lived longer, but it felt like something finally shifted in my mind and heart, that this is how it is and will be going forward. I don't know if this is normal or just a side-effect of living so far away and removed...

Looking forward to sharing about July soon!

Ellie Turned 14!

I know she's been a teenager for more than a year, but it really hit us what a young lady she's becoming!  We are so very proud of our girl -- with her sweet spirit and gentle heart.

Ellie's actual birthday found us hosting a team from Texas, so we blew out the candles on her cake at breakfast after feasting on waffles with bananas and Nutella (her request). 

The following day she performed in an end-of-school-year recital in Tirana.  I video-ed her actual performance so the only pic I have of her warming up before hand below.

It meant a lot that these two friends attended the recital to support Ellie!  They were visiting Albania to attend the Kay Arthur Precepts conference in Tirana.

Ellie's recital took place at "the music school" in Tirana.  Dad and Reni missed because they took the team was at their 'end-of-trip' visit to Kruja.

We celebrated afterwards with cold drinks on a hot day!

We love you, Ellie!