Preparations

Sunday was a day of preparation. Here are the boys preparing for a busy day with a big breakfast: Honey Balls, Musli and some of the best nectarines they've ever had.

The day before I had spent time with the boys making the KIBA sign for outside of the church. We were all so happy to see our sign when we walked up.

With fresh KIBA shirts, we took the opportunity for a team photo. Even the babies got dresses shirts. Aren't they cute?

Here is our family before the church service in our KIBA gear.

This Sunday was family Sunday so the service was more kid oriented than usual. Most of the songs were from last year's KIBA so the kids knew them and could sing along and do the actions. There wasn't a separate nursery or children's education hour so all the kids stayed for the whole service. Evie enjoyed discovering all the new toys in the box at the back of the room. I really enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere and the opportunity to worship and listen to the sermon despite needing to be moving around to take care of Evie.

This is Dave leading the service.



Brian taught us about Noah this week.



Clearly his family was engaged :)

On our way home, the boys discovered that if they linked arms, they could just barely reach all the way around this tree.

The girls woke from much needed naps and prepared for dinner with a snack.

We had a few minutes of down time so we took the chance to learn a few line dances in preparation for what we'll be teaching on Friday night. Evie was not content to just watch. She had so much fun holding my hands and dancing right along with me.

On Wednesday evening we're giving a talk about what it's like to live in Minnesota. We'll serve a variety of snacks typical in the US and/or from Minnesota. However, I'm sure what will be most memorable are Sarah's famous chocolate chip cookies. Sarah and I spent the evening preparing cookies in the apartment right below ours {the tenant is the landlady who told us we could use her oven as our flat doesn't have one}.

Eight

dozen



cookies



later...

we thought we'd have enough to go around.

As you'll find out tomorrow, this was the first of many very busy and full days. While we are all exhausted at the end of the day and can tell we're being stretched, we are confident that God is allowing us to grow in our love and knowledge of Him by serving where we're needed {or where we are}.