Good Grief!

Okay...so I've changed my mind. While I initially started this post to keep people informed on the "exciting" things in my life...it seems as though there aren't enough of those happening to keep my blog alive. So I've resorted to posting, much more frequently, my daily events and thoughts. I'm sure that's all very exciting for you to hear. :)

And the picture thing is frustrating! I don't know is wrong with this thing, but it will only let me post certain pictures. So I'm doing the best I can with its swinging moods! Anyway, allow me to blog about my "exciting" events of the past few weeks. After Daleena left, I had 2 weeks by myself before Mellisa was scheduled to come. Seems I didn't do much those two weeks, as I have no pictures to represent that time! Ha! Oh wait...except it was confirmed that my sister and her husband John are going to be stationed in Germany!! Yay!! I'm soooo excited about it, but no one else is....and they don't appreciate my joy....so I have to keep my mouth shut. Charity is now 17 weeks pregnant with her first child. I'll post a picture when I can...she is just so adorable!! :) :) John is already over here, and she will be joining him as soon as she receives her passport. Yay for foreign countries!!

So my second teammate, Mellisa, got here on June 20. That weekend, I had a scheduled bus tour of Eindhoven, since I have applied for residency, and I took Mellisa and one of my readers along. It was quite a long ride, but we got to see some highlights of the city that we wouldn't have gotten to see otherwise. Then Lucinda (Mellisa's aunt) picked us up and took us to a hot air balloon festival. I loved it for two reasons: I am DYING to go in one (and there was a drawing for a free ride!!) and they had the coolest balloons!! Wanna see?? Okay!! They started with the simple ones first, and saved the "cool" ones for last. Look at these!! A matching boy and girl...and then...the coolest of all...Van Gogh!! Look how huge he is!! This was definitely the hit of the night. Is my life exciting, or what??!! :)

Holland lost against Portugal that following Sunday, so it was a sad, sad day. Comparable to losing a pet...but worse. Friday, the 30th, there was a hootenanny held at the church. It was so fun! About 35 people showed up to eat hotdogs, sing silly songs, and talks for several hours! I have a wonderful family in Eindhoven. I love them tons!!

Then Sunday, it was Finn's birthday. He turned a big 5 years old! His parents invited a few families from the church over for a barbeque and "party". The adults ended up having a water fight, due to the boiling hot weather!! Mellisa, Nadine, and myself chose to hang out in the shade and watch the fun from afar. Nadine is tons of fun! She got to stay the night that night, and I can't tell you how hard we laughed at times. Just to let everyone know...I can still laugh a good 10 minute solid!! I have witnesses!!

This past week, Mellisa and I have been working on painting murals on the classroom walls. I have had SOOO much fun and am so excited about the mural I've been working on. Mellisa is doing a Noah's ark scene in the infant room, while I am doing a scene of the shepherds looking up into the sky at the angel on the night of Jesus' birth in the 3-6 years room. And I'm almost done! One woman cried when she saw it. That's GOT to be a good sign! We have one more scene to paint (although I've already drawn AKA traced it). It's a scene of Jesus being baptized by John the Baptist. This is for the 12-year old classroom. Hopefully, I'll be able to post the pictures of the finished product on here. I'm so proud!!

Oh...and I got all my holes filled in my teeth from my bicycle, too. Yay for whole teeth! A lot of the Americans from church met at James and Stacy's house for a barbeque and games on the 4th of July. We played "Mexican Train" and had a blast!! I'm going to have to get that one! Then later in the week, our upstairs neighbor, Harold, was supposed to come over for dinner, but found out his sick dad had taken a turn for the worst and could possibly die over the weekend. I was crushed for him. I neither knew what to do or to say to him. So he left pretty quickly to go home, and didn't come back for 4 days (cause he had to work again on Monday). I haven't seen him since he got back...but I pray that his weekend home wasn't the last time he'll see his father. That idea kills me.

Anyway...I think that's a good enough update. From here on out, it's short, simple, and more frequent posts. So I say...