Christmas family arriving
Krista’s parents arrived yesterday and are staying here for Christmas and New Years. It exciting as we haven’t seen them since they left Charlotte to move to Kenya. That was almost 2 years ago. Grandma is having fun giving Alex airplane rides (she lays on her back and lifts him up by her legs) just like they did when Alex was younger. Only now he’s much bigger so be praying she doesn’t hurt herself.
Today, we took them into Basel to check out the Weilnachtmarket (Christmas Market) and hit some of the tourist spots. You can check out my camera fun in the Photo Album.
Have a Merry Christmas!!
More photos to check out
Glow Strings and Family Fun – More photos here
The big Christmas party in Kandern – More photos here
Alex and the elementary school sing some Christmas songs – More photos here
Are you ready for Christmas yet?
We three kings……
Have you ever wondered how many wise men (also known as kings) there really were that came to see Jesus after his birth. According to the shrine for the “three” kings in Köln (also known as Cologne), Germany, there were only three kings and they have their remains to prove it. They really do believe that the bones are contained within the three segment sarcophagus in the Dom (the big cathedral). Well, all this to say – I’ve been published. The makers of the online travel guide Schmap.com selected one of my photos that I published on my Flickr.com site to be apart of their write up about the Shrine of the Three Kings. I feel really privileged.
But it makes me wonder as we go into this holiday season as to all the different traditions and stuff that we do. Is it just tradition that we do them or is there some significance as to how we relate to the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ that we do these things? Remembering the gifts that the wise men brought is significant to remembering who Jesus is but to dispute over how many there were – well, that’s just tradition but not of eternal significance. This Christmas is going to be different for me as it will the first Christmas without my parents or my sister. With that, my wife and I are trying to evaluate what traditions we want to have during our holiday season. As for my parents and my sister, they are just going on a Christmas cruise.
You talk’in to me?
We received a package the other day from my sister with some things we can’t get (or easily get) here in Germany. In the package, she sent Alex this police uniform with a baton, handcuffs and radio. He’s been having a blast with them.
Me? I got several boxes of Kraft Mac & Cheese (should really be Cheese & Mac but I think they’ve had the debate before).
Check out more pictures of Alex in uniform here in the Photo Album.
Back, Recovered, Moving on to the next task
Thank you to all of you that prayed for us while we were in Ukraine. It was an amazing trip. It was awesome to see and hear how God is working in Ukraine – using technology to train leaders and for outreach purposes.
The first part of our time in Ukraine was an eLearning Center (eLC) Directors meeting. We have over 18 (actually more now but that in a moment) eLCs in Ukraine and most of these eLCs are in churches scattered across the country. eDOT invited those church leaders who are involved in using the eLCs to come to Kiev (Ukraine’s capital) for a time of encouragement, more training on how to use the eLCs more effectively and for them to meet each other. Our goal is that they will be each other’s greatest resources and to hear how each of the centers are being used is just amazing. Some are a part of ministries that are focused on outreaches to orphanages, some are focused on adult education, while others are focused on reaching local ethnic communities. How they use the computers is just slightly different in each context but they were able to share these differences with one another sparking new ideas and excitement. It was just great getting to know these church leaders and to share in their passion to reach Ukraine for Christ.
Alex’s First Day of 1st Grade
This week was a big week in our family. ALEX IS IN 1ST GRADE!! He has begun to go to the international school here in town. They have an exciting tradition to start off the year where there is an opening ceremony. In the ceremony, the senior class (the school is 1st thru 12th grade) comes in carrying flags from every country that is represented (either a student holds a passport from there or their parents live there). It was a lot of flags. Later, they read each country and the students stood up if it represented them. It was truly amazing to see where everyone came from.
Another exciting part of the ceremony was the presentation of the Class of 2019 (yes, that’s Alex’s class). Seven little first graders went up on stage and the director of the school interviewed them. Here’s what we found out: Alex is not afraid of crowds and he says whats on his mind. At the end of Alex’s interview, the director made the comment to the crowd: “Future class president”. I don’t know, but something about that comment scares me.
Anyway, Alex is in a great class with some great teachers. His primary teacher, Mrs. Schmidt, is also the elementary school principal so in the afternoon Mrs. Riffe comes in. His class is made up of five boys (including him) plus two girls. Several of the children speak both English and German and one boy is just learning English so our hope is that Alex will still want to learn more German (he still takes official German classes in the school) even though his classes are now in English.
Please pray with us that Alex will make some great friends in his class and that he will be a good student. Please pray for his teachers. They are really good teachers and have a great experience so we are really excited that he will be in their hands.
Check out the photos of his first day in the Photo Album
Photoshop Play
Just taking some time to learn more with Photoshop and brushes. Here is a couple of my afternoon play items:
