Whirlwind month! Off again!

Kari and Jonathan left on Tuesday morning to return to France. It was so sad to see them go! After Glenn dropped them off at the airport, he left for a regional leaders retreat in the Czech Republic, and I left for a retreat about 1 1/2 hours outside of Budapest for all the ladies that are in the Central Europe field, which includes Hungary, Moldova, Slovakia, Czech Republic and Romania. Because I am the one that took the camera, and I am the one who updates the blog, you'll hear about the ladies retreat instead of Glenn's regional retreat!

FBC, Jacksonville, Florida sent ladies to host the most wonderful time of worship, fellowship and encouragement for 50 female missionaries!



One of the best parts of the retreat was the worship time! I have really missed singing praises in English!! We had worship and small group Bible studies in the mornings and evenings, and the afternoons were free.



In the afternoons during free time, the volunteers from FBC gave all of us haircuts (much needed; I had trimmed my own hair twice since arriving), manicures and pedicures, and brought supplies for several craft projects that they taught us to do. We also could have massages (I had two!) and walk out in the country (which I did every day) or ride in the hotel's horsedrawn carrage across the countryside, which was beautiful! After the evening worship, we had fellowship time.


"Chubby Bunny"

Have you ever had to see how many marshmallows you could stuff in your mouth and still be able to say, "chubby bunny"? I think these two ladies were able to get 15 in each of their mouths before gagging!



We also had game night, a pajama party (and the ladies from FBC brought all of us new pj's!), roasted (or burned) marshmallows and made good ole American s'mores, and on our final evening there was a fashion show. The ladies brought each of us a tote bag full of American goodies such as Bath and Body Works lotions, books, CD's, snack foods, Mary Kay cosmetics, Oreos, and M & M's and much more! We were pampered and refreshed!



FBC ladies put on quite a fashion show!

But then, Sunday I had to go home and unpack, do laundry, and repack for my trip to the US on Tuesday.

Before the retreat, we received word that there were two packages on the way to us from friends at our church in Marietta, and they should arrive while Glenn and I were on the retreats. When we checked our mail, there was no notice of an attempt to deliver them, so on Monday morning a bilingual friend called the Post Office for us to check on the packages. They were delivered to our house shortly afterward! Evidently, the postman had noticed that the shutters were closed and the car gone, and figured we were out of town, so he held on to our packages for us.

Christmas in April????

Goodies from our friends in our Sunday School class

There were cake mixes, tubs of frosting, pasta sides and salads, lifesavers, ziploc bags, bacon bits, Jiffy mixes, Kraft macaroni and cheese, stuffing mixes, Kool-aid, dressing packets, toffee bits, cream of tartare....

Glenn's favorite color!

but Glenn especially liked the nail supplies sent by Tassie to "Glenn and Cile".

I think we will have enough lifesavers! 3 lb bag!

The second package was from a young friend, Adam Doughty, that I knew from NCCS and WCBC. Adam is very special to me, and is one of my prayer warriors. (His mom, Pam, is a good friend too!) Their package included Brownie mixes, lifesavers, tons of licorice (that I will share with my favorite son-in-law, if he is nice to me.), pasta sides, Kool-aid, candy bars, and 3 different kinds of chips (mint, peppermint and toffee).

Included in Adam's package were wonderful Easter cards from some young children at WCBC that I enjoyed reading! Thank you!

We feel really spoiled and will not have to buy groceries for the next year! There were so many things from our Wish List that I had to go in and delete most of the list! We are so blessed to have friends that would go to the trouble and expense (it costs an arm and TWO legs to mail the packages!) to do this for us, and we are not sure how we can adequately express our love and appreciation for them. It really means a lot to us, and your love in action is such an encouragement to us. May God bless you as you blessed us.

As I said earlier in this blog, I leave for the US tomorrow (Tuesday) to go to a conference on MK Education (MK=missionary kid) at the International Learning Center in Virginia, which is where we were from October through December. I will return on April 28th. While I am there, Glenn will hold down the fort. Please pray for him as he handles everything that comes our way while I am in the States. Pray that I will be able to learn at the conference what I will need in order to help our missionary moms that homeschool. And while you're praying, pray for our language skills! We have missed language class for the past two weeks while we were at AGM and the retreats, and it has really shocked us at how much we have forgotten! Thanks!