Reconnecting

As we begin to pick up our lives here in Italy, we have found that much has changed in our absence. Some very exciting things to report. One of the greatest blessings being a baptismal service at church this past Sunday. Six people were baptized! The place was packed out with standing room only which meant there were well over 200 people in attendance. One thing that we find so cool here is that when there is a baptismal service at a church people from surrounding churches (up to an hour away) come to celebrate too. It is a huge time of encouragement for all and always so emotional. We praise God for His working in the lives of these individuals.

Every inch of space was filled!

Danilo, who was saved last year and attends our core group was baptized. He also got married two weeks ago to Ivana, bought a house in Caselle and bought a bar (cafeteria if you prefer) in Torino. He continues to grow in the Lord and we were thrilled to witness his public demonstration of following Christ.

Cesare and Danilo

Marco, the son of Giancarlo and Antoinetta, was also baptized. It was a big day of great emotion for the Farina family as Giancarlo was instrumental in Danilo's journey, his son's life and also for the girlfriend of another son to be baptized as well. Her name is Carina. She is from Equador and lived for a time with our co-worker, Catherine. Carina recently accepted Christ as well. It's at times like these that we can see that the work being done is not through us, but solely through the power of Christ. It's just exciting to bear witness of His saving power and work of transformation in lives.

Marco giving his testimony

Carina

This past weekend we also had the chance to spend some quality time with our neighbors, Germano & Gessica, who live on the other side of our house. They invited us over and showered our kids with gifts. Thankfully they do not speak English because it was rather embarrassing when Emma opened up a box of Barbie dolls and said she didn't want them. Later Gessica made note that Emma wasn't really in to dolls and we told her that she prefers frogs. Her reaction was one of great shock and I thought I said the wrong word for frogs, but then realized that her expression was of great excitement for she too is a frog lover. She then took Emma on a tour of her house showing her the enormous frog collection she has. They are also big game players but don't have a lot of friends to play with since their lives are consumed with work. We will be arranging a game night soon. We are excited about this reconnection with this couple and that even after our absence they are even more open with us than before.

Jonathan spoke last week at our Thursday night Bible study. We continue meeting with this group in addition to exploring other outreaches. He has been asked to teach a group of 7 kids guitar lessons at a sister church in Lanzo. Since we have not begun English classes and don't know when that will come to fruition, he is considering taking up this challenge. The kickboxing school moved and he has yet to hunt down their new location and get back in to that. I will have to take a refresher course in Italian and in an effort to specifically concentrate on the two parts of the language exam that I have yet to pass. So I will hopefully soon be able to reconnect with Alessandra as well.

Okay, that's a lot to report for now. There is more but this is just a small glimpse in to what has been going on in and around our lives as of late.

School

Thanks to everyone who have been praying for Samuel and Emma and their first week back to school. Samuel was excitedly and warmly greeted back by his teachers and fellow classmates. Seriously, they are thrilled to have him back in the classroom! I was talking with Vittoria yesterday and she could not get over how much he had grown, matured and is so much better with class rules like listening and sitting still. His behavior is so much better and so much more affectionate as he gave her a huge hug when he saw her again. We believe his time in Kindergarten was a huge help to him not to mention our little guy just growing up. The language will come back for him quickly enough with his full days of school. Right now he kind of just talks in gibberish or says an English word with an Italian accent. His ear and mouth will soon become attuned to picking up his secondary language.

Emma was assigned to a different class with her teachers being Maurizia and Patrizia. I was disappointed at first that she was not with Samuel but in the long run it may be better for her to not be dependent on Samuel. Emma was more excited about going to school on Monday and definitely more hesitant today. She loves school and all the projects they do, but is very intimidated by the language. Her teacher says she has done well these first few days so that is a blessing. However, this morning she didn't want to get out of the van and said that "Italian is too hard". Oh, I can relate all too well! It's a good thing though so that we can be of better encouragement to her and sympathetic to her situation. In time she will too with understand and speak without much effort. Keep her in your prayers in this regard though and for her stamina as five days of school will be an adjustment for her. She is exhausted when she comes home. She will stay home tomorrow as there is a class trip scheduled for her that she was not registered for in time. So a day's break during her first week will be a good thing for her.

Luca wishes he could go to school as well. He came in the first day to drop the kids off and he was as big as some of the kids in there and immediately was brought in to an hugging/pushing match with one of the kids. Maurizia told me today that I should sign Luca up for next year. She has no idea what she is asking and believe me another year and a half is needed for him to work off some rough edges that would be most disturbing to a classroom setting. He definitely hates it when we drop the kids off as he cries and gets upset. He is most excited to see Emma for lunch and Samuel after waking up from his afternoon nap.

The house is so very quiet in the mornings and even worse during nap time. We miss the kids so much and it has been a week of stark reality that our kids are growing up and that life as it was with all three around during the day is gone.

Re-entry: Top 10

10. Everything seems so small. It was my first thought after admiring how clean our house was. I thought our house was huge before we left, but our adjustment to the large and spacious America now leaves us with the impression of how small things are here.
9. Meal planning and grocery shopping. I have been spoiled by living with family for 10 months. The process of meal planning, cooking, clean-up and grocery shopping now take up a huge part of my day and much longer with just one set of hands.
8. Laundry. The two hour wash-cycle followed by line drying everything does not allow for getting through a mound of laundry quickly, not to mention the softness lost with the convenience of a dryer. It does make for a good humidifier in the bedroom by going to bed with damp laundry hanging in your room.
7. Circuit overload. We are readjusting to what large appliances can be run at the same time without blowing the power. Washing machine + oven/vacuum/microwave/dishwasher = blowout!
6. Serandas. The kids have not been getting up in the morning because they say it is not daytime yet. The closing of the serandas make the house pitch black even in the light of day. It's awesome!
5. Language. Need I say more?
4. Bluntness. Getting used to people to just telling you straight up what they think. For example, a neighbor saying how we should not have any more kids because 3 is enough or someone telling Jonathan how much weight he put on while in the states.
3. Cooking. Gone are the helpful conveniences for cooking (shredded cheese, canned soup, pancake mix etc.) and back to preparing everything from scratch. One Italian friend who now lives in the states said that for them to find food NOT in a box was a huge adjustment for them. I prefer a mix of both.
2. Legal matters. We immediately began the process of getting our papers in order. We are still trying to change over our residency papers from Perugia to Leini' that began almost two years ago. Somewhere along the line the ball was dropped and we have to sort that out this week. Health insurance issues as Jonathan's gallbladder surgery is still having billing issues over one year later. It was wrongly submitted and is being reprocessed after making several phone calls between the hospital and insurance company.
1. Driving. This will always remain number 1 on our list! The roads are SO narrow and the driver's drive so fast. It's with a breath and sigh that we squeak past a passing building, pedestrian or oncoming car. Today we were waiting at a red light and after 3 cars whipped past us on the red, we began to wonder if they were seeing something we weren't. Getting used to people ignoring the rules of the road will take some time. Driving still remains my biggest fear that I must overcome.

Home Again

"It's MY house!" "Home sweet home" "I love my house, my bed...I'm so happy to be home in Italy!" These have been the words of our children repeated over and over this week. What a blessing for us to see, hear and experience their excitement for returning to Italy. Their adjustment seems to be coming more quickly than ours, but in time this too will all seem normal to us again.

We arrived safely with a small delay in getting in on Wednesday. The kids did well despite only sleeping for a few hours during our travels. For the first time, we left precious items on the plane that we were unable to retrieve. Thankfully the loss of Emma's "Hushie" frog and Samuel's new Leapster and games did not turn in to a major loss of self and hysteria in the Frankfurt airport. We had so much stuff it's amazing we didn't leave more things behind. Apart from that everything went super smooth. We were warmly greeted by Brad, Pino & Adrianna who were amazingly able to get all of our luggage in the two cars.

Our friends from church did more than give our house a quick clean. Everything was thoroughly cleaned from the drapes to the floors and looked awesome. Not to mention the dinner left for us and a stocked refrigerator. They literally saved my back and a week's worth of cleaning. It was nice to just be able to dig in to our bags and begin to put things away. The house has a lingering smell from the flooding and mildew that followed. We thought our heat was turned on a month ago but there was a block in the gas line and so there was no heat to dry out the basement. It was fixed and turned on the day before we arrived. There were a few books that were sustained water damage, we lost our printer, but the carpet seems like it can be salvaged once it dries out thoroughly and gets a good scrubbing. And the guitars do not seem to be damaged although there is evidence of the cases being wet. All of our cardboard storage boxes in the garage are ruined but thankfully most everything inside them was in plastic bags so only 2 large bags of clothes are needing a good wash before they will be repacked this time in plastic storage bins.

Upon arrival our first task was to clear the driveway of icy snow so we could get our van out of the garage. It took Jonathan 8 hours to do so! It was a great way for him to reconnect with our neighbors as he had to borrow a pick ax and shovels since the stores were out of stock in the shovel department. He was able to have great conversations with all of our surrounding neighbors and everyone seems happy to see us back. So although it was an all day back breaking task there was no better thing than for him to be exposed outside all day to people coming and going. Our neighbor, Angela, even gave him a hand for a while.

On Friday, our van was in the shop all day getting tuned up to pass it's overdue inspection. Therefore, Samuel and Emma could not go to school. They will start on Monday instead. The kids have been sleeping in until 9am each day and would sleep longer if it weren't for us stirring them up. Saturday we did the most insane but necessary thing by going grocery shopping. It will be my last time shopping on a Saturday! One could hardly manuever a cart through the aisles and the lines were horrendously long even with every one of the 50 registers open!

It was a blessing to be back in church today and warmly greeted by everyone. There were new births, deaths, marriages and so much more than took place in our absense. We are anxious to reconnect with so many people. Continue to pray for us in the language as we are most definitely rusty. We are filled with joy to be back and thank you for your continued thoughts and prayers for us as we reaclimate to life in Italy.

Travel Day

It is amazing to think that it has been nearly 10 months that we have been stateside. Our time has been full of encouragement and refreshment. We want to thank our families for their amazing hospitality, sacrifice, love, giving, encouragement, food etc. during our invasion of house and home. We have been so blessed to be in your care and presence and for the influence you have given to your grandchildren during this time. We love you so very much and will treasure these wonderful memories from our first furlough....So before I bring myself to total tears, I thought we would give you our flight schedule so you can be praying for us over the next couple of days.

A winter snow storm is moving it's way across Michigan so we will be leaving the house around 12 noon today to drive to Detroit. Samuel woke up his siblings at 4:30am and had trouble getting back to sleep until around 6am. Thankfully he was able to eventually get back to sleep and didn't get up until 7:30am. This ought to make the day very interesting.

Lufthansa Airlines
Depart Detroit at 6:10pm
Arrive in Frankfurt at 7:55am
Depart Frankfurt at 1:20pm
Arrive in Caselle/Torino at 2:35pm

We are so thankful for dear friends, Pino and Adrianna, who have thoroughly cleaned our house out of love and with servants' hearts in preparation for our arrival back home. I can't imagine what 10 months did to our house! They cleaned our house in freezing temps as our heaters were not working. Brad has helped to get our gas problem fixed so that we now have heat, hot water and a stove to cook with when we get home. Thank the Lord! He's also working on trying to get our van running again even with his damaged shoulder that is awaiting surgery very soon. What a servant he is! Brad and Pino will be picking us up from the airport including our 14 bags plus carry-ons. Be praying that all our luggage makes it safely along with us.

Samuel and Emma will start school on Friday so pray also for their quick adjustment to the time change of 6 hours and that everything will go smoothly for them as they transition back into the adventures of Italian school. The next time you hear from us will be from the other side of the "pond." We thank you in advance for you prayers and thoughts for us on our journey home.

A presto...