Grandparent Fun

For the past two weeks my parents have been here visiting us. It has been such a huge blessing to have them here for this time; they flew out early this morning. Once again, saying goodbye always stinks. We knew when we began this line of work over 10 years ago that being away from our family would be difficult. The difficulty level was increased greatly when we had kids and brought them into a life of having to regularly say goodbye to people they love. We always knew this would be part of the cost, and we have weighed the cost and counted Jesus as worthy of it all. He is worthy of our lives and anything He asks us to do. Goodbyes are still hard. And it's not just that we have to say goodbye, it's that our kids go for years sometimes without seeing their grandparents and other family members. So all that to say that these past two weeks were not taken for granted. It was a sweet time with Grandma and Grandpa and I'm eternally grateful for the time spent and memories made. We did our best to make the most of the time with them. That included seeing some of the cool touristy sights in our city, but it also included just letting them in on our lives here in this foreign country. Eating the food, interacting with some of our friends, worshiping with us, experiencing how we shop, watching us do home school, riding the subway, playing on our playground with the kids, walking LOTS more than they're used to, staying with the kids for a night to let my hubby and me have a night away, and just hanging out playing games late at night and talking - this is the wonderful time we've had for 2 precious weeks. Every moment we get to do things like this with our loved ones, we count as a gift from God. He was been so faithful to work in my parents' lives and they have such powerful testimonies. I'm so proud of them, and proud to be their daughter. And I'm ever so grateful for time together. Thank you, Lord, for this priceless gift. We don't deserve it, and we're thankful.

Thank you, Grandma and Grandpa for all the special times we had together. Thank you for the financial and physical burdens that you carried to be able to bless our family with your time and energy. We're so glad you came, and we love you!

Amazing Water Park

In early September we got really cheap tickets to a huge water park here in our city. It was really very impressive, though the time we went was a little chilly. That's why the tickets were so cheap. :o) But it was well worth the experience for our family. And it wasn't crowded at all, which made it that much more enjoyable. Joshua was pretty bummed that he wasn't big enough yet to ride many of the rides. He kept asking if we could go back when he's 130 cm; we told him we would see. :o) He was so brave! I ended up not ever taking Mercy into the water because the breeze just made it too cool and she would have been miserable. Micah just kept immersing his body under the water so he could not be cold. Thankfully the water itself wasn't cold, just the breeze. At any rate, we're glad we got to do it! I'll post some pictures from our fun day.