Lady Marmalade!

Heather and I had the opportunity to make strawberry marmalade (or in the south "jam") with a lady who attends our church...Frou Widmann (Frou=Mrs. in german....it is not her first name). Little did we know the process is relatively easy when you own a "therma-mixer." I had never heard of this contraption and do not think they are very popular in America but in Germany if you have one you are very lucky. They can do all kinds of things from blending, mashing, chopping, boiling, simmering, stewing....and whatever else people do in the kitchen. It was fun to actually make something that turned out good!

The only ingredients in our strawberry marmalade were strawberries and sugar...how can you go wrong with those two?! Heather and I were sneaking a couple strawberries while we removed the tops.

Our fingers turned red from all the berry topping!

Steffi was our fearless translator. Frou Widmann does not speak much English and we have not mastered the German language yet.

More sugar!!!

We of course had to have something to eat the marmalade on so Frou Widmann made a recipe called:

"Baguette auf die schnell"= Bread on the fast!

I kept saying it in German because I thought it was such a funny name for a recipe. Can you see how horrified their faces are that I am holding the bread?!?

The Results!

It was a lot of fun and the jam was delicious!

Enjoy!

Tuck and Run!

The softball team has been working hard to improve with the help of our new coach "Heather!" She is doing a great job motivating and pushing the team to be better. One of her ideas to help the outfielders learn to tuck our gloves and run after the ball was to tape our gloves in position. It was a fun drill that gave us all a good laugh and made for a cute picture.

Thank you for your prayers and encouragement as the work here increases in quantity and frequency. We are blessed to be serving the Lord and pray that He will provide the strength we need to complete the tasks He puts before us.

JT we love you!

One sad note about being in Germany over the summertime is that I miss a number of beautiful weddings. Fortunately the internet gives me a glimpse of what it would have been like to be there. This is from Emily and Jim's wedding and I love all the faces of my friends. Some are horrified by the thought of the bouquet, while others look like Justin Timberlake is serenading them with his newest ballad. Love it girls! Hope the wedding was fun and CONGRATULATIONS to the happy couple!

Photo by ABryanPhotography

Sunday Night Fellowship.

Sunday nights when we don't have church we sometimes head to the bowling alley. It is a fun activity that is not hindered by bad weather or lack of talent! Our last visit was quite the party. A couple friends from the Atomics club came with us which made our group strangely large. I think we almost used half the lanes in the building!

We had to take two pictures because we had so many people. Here is one half.

Now for the extra talented half!

Brain and Danellen Dehuff were visiting as well which was a great encouragement to everyone. Brian was giving Stephen a run for his money.

I am sure you can see my perfect form!

Stephen and Rob are really into bowling and have been collecting gear over the past year. Their most recent addition....WHITE bowling shoes! They have a slide pad on one shoe and a traction pad on the other. Fashion takes no priority when boys and sports are involved.

I must also add they are getting pretty good. Rob's high score is a 279 (the highest possible is 300) and I think Stephen's highest is a 249. Not bad for baseball players!

"Sous" is one of Stephen and Rob's good friends from way back. He likes hanging out with us on Sunday nights. He is a bouncer at a club and head-butted someone. Ouch! I am glad I am on his good side!

So tough!

Sweet Leonie. She is surprisingly good at bowling!

Atomics Walk!

Every year the Atomics club has a walk on one of the many summer holidays they celebrate. We do not typically get the day off on random holidays they celebrate so it was a treat to have the opportunity to go on a hike and enjoy the beautiful weather on a normal work day. We all enjoyed the fellowship and fun.

The boys had an intense game of whiffle ball while the girls took to a little sunbathing!

Matt blended into the German culture so well only his slight New York accent gave him away!

Stephen was swinging for home-runs and would fall over after every swing because the little boys loved it.

This is Sharon. She is an American that works here in Germany and attends our church. It has been great getting to know her and her husband.

If you did not know boys can make anything into a contest....hence this picture. On the hike back Stephen and Big A had a walking stick competition. I think Big A picked up an entire tree.

Hope you enjoy the pictures!

"The Outsiders"

My roommate Heather mentioned the other day that she loves NeedtoBreathe so I checked them out on Itunes and bought one of their albums. This song sums up how it feels being here in Germany at times. It is hard, but we are thankful that the Lord is working day by day.

Thanks for your prayers!

Our First Church Baptism.

Last weekend marked an event to remember in the history of our church, our first baptism. It is exciting to see how far the church has come even since I have been involved. Over the past year we have seen the church grow to the maximum capacity for our meeting space filling each chair on Sunday and prompting us to pray for a larger building. We have had the opportunity to see adults and youth come to faith in a culture that tells you you're crazy if you believe in Jesus Christ. We have seen the birth of a new covenant child to a family raising their three children to believe in the Gospel. We have seen answered prayers to situations that seemed impossible. It is amazing how the Lord continues to bless our congregation and our first baptism was just another glimpse of His power.

Hans and Chimmie have been coming to our church for about a year. She is from Zambia, Africa and met Hans through a mutual friend here in Germany. Talk about two different cultures! They have a one year old son named Sebastian that they wanted to have baptized.

(I must add that baptisms in Germany are a much bigger celebration than in America. All the children here have multiple godparents that are to be very involved in their life and sign a paper during the service to agree. All of the extended family comes and they host a coffee for the church as well as a day long meal, which you will see later.)

So as you can tell it was a lot of work to prepare for such an event. Praise God He provided a larger building to rent so that the 15 extra family members would all fit in addition to our regular attendees. The service went really well and everyone had a great time celebrating together. Here are some pictures from the day.

Here is Hans and Chimmie taking their vows.

Here is Stephen baptizing Sebastian....who was not very excited about having to sit still.

During the closing prayer Sebastian decided he wanted to sprinkle himself with the water. Chimmie told me that every time he takes a bath now he puts water on his head and says, "Jesus."

Here is Leonie and me. I was so proud she was on time, she tends to live on Paraguayan time now.

Here is Chimmie serving refreshments at the coffee time after. There was a beautiful courtyard outside that we used to fellowship.

Heather, our resident cheerleader!

Here is Sebastian. I think I may have scared him!

Stephen and one of his good friends Roland, who just had a third baby girl "Felicia Maria" with his wife Ulla.

Stephen and I had the pleasure of being invited to the family lunch and it was a wonderful time. We ate wild pig which Hans (who is in a hunting club) had killed for the lunch. I had to pull out my best sign language and sounds to get by but we felt really privilege to be invited.

This a picture of the whole group.

Enjoy!