We have someone who demonstrates some recipe.  Then, we have a Bible study and prayer together.  Oh yeah!  We also sample the food.  In the past, we’ve had women from a few countries, so we’ve had a variety of food.

Tonight, we decided to just hang out together and watch Julie & Julia.  It’s a movie that is about a woman who cooks through Julia Child’s cookbook.  We loved it!  It’s about cooking, eating and relationships.  The woman who cooks through the cookbook writes a blog about it.  When the ladies were leaving, I thought, “This is a perfect time for me to write a blog about this group.”

I guess I have the summer to try out some new recipes before we start back.  Any ideas on what I should make?

Today is Koninginnedag, Queen’s Day.  It’s the day to celebrate the queen.  It’s supposed to be on her birthday, but since her birthday is in the winter and weather is bad, they kept the date as her mother’s birthday.  This is the only day that garage sales are allowed, so everyone goes into the center of the city to set up and sell their things.  Grace has asked for years to do this, and I finally gave in.  We got there at a little before 8:30.  It was rainy and cool.

Here is a timeline of how things went:

8:30 – It is raining.  Grace asks, “Has this thing started yet?”

8:45 – Nothing has sold.  It has at least stopped raining.  Grace asks if we can go home.

9:00 – It is raining again.  Still nothing has sold.  Grace asks again if we can go home.  We lower prices.  Grace says, “I hope we at least sell one thing.”

9:30 – Morning snack time.  The kid next to us asks if we have sold anything after he sells a few things.  I begin to not like that kid.  I try to convince Grace to call out to people and try to sell things.  She absolutely refuses.  It’s no longer cool.  It’s becoming cold.  Grace and I are shivering.

10:00 – We sell our first item.  Grace is more optimistic about the day.  More people are starting to come.  It’s raining off and on.

10:30 – The people by us leave, so we move to their better location.  We sell a few more things.

11:00 – Grace gets her second morning snack.  It has started to rain harder.  Yuck!

11:30 – Grace and I are ready to go.  Grace has started picking up certain items and shouting their price.  She even goes so far as to get a Winnie the Pooh toy and have it wave at people as they go along.  I have to tell her to back up because she doesn’t need to get in their face quite so much.

11:45 – We call for Mike to come pick us up.  It has stopped raining, but we are pretty wet and cold.  Most of the people around us have left.

12:00 – We are home and get to go through our things.  Everything is wet and kind of gross.  Grace has made 8.25 today and is very happy.  We have cleaned out a lot from her room and it looks much better , so I am also happy.  Hot chocolate and hot tea make us both feel much better too.

I asked her if she wants to do this again next year, and I got a definite “NO” from her.  I tried not to be too obviously excited about her answer.  Today, I hope she realized how much I love her!  By the way, as I type this, it’s now 1:30, and the sun is coming out.  It looks like it will be a much better afternoon than morning.

Happy Queen’s Day to all!

We’ve gotten a new puppet stage from BGMC money.  We also were given funds by Dallas Dream Center to buy other equipment we needed such as sound equipment and banners.

Our new puppet stage courtesy of BGMC

Banner provided by the Dallas Dream Center

Besides the service, we break into clubs.  Mike taught puppets to some of the children while others made a sheep cupcake.  (We were talking about The Lost Sheep.)

Puppet club at Zuper Zondag

Cooking club at Zuper Zondag

We had 30 children for our first time, and we’re excited about reaching even more boys and girls in The Netherlands!

We’re able to put our videos on YouTube so our workers can see the videos that we’ll use in church.  If you’d like to see any of our videos, go to http://www.youtube.com/user/MikeAndAnita.

Last week we shot videos for the next set of lessons.  Tomorrow, I’ll start the process all over again.  The fun never ends!

The sickness kept me from editing videos.  I’ve finally started on it again today.  We are working on a curriculum for our church that has video segments.  It should make it much easier for the workers, but it does create much more work for us.  We converted our guest room into a studio of sorts.  We’ve shot the video for the first four weeks.  Now, I’m editing it all.  When I’m done with that, we’ve got to get subtitles on it.  Our church is international and it functions with two main languages: English and Dutch.  Het kost veel tijd om iets in twee talen te doen! (It takes a lot of time to do something in two languages!)

So, while I’m working on video editing today, Mike is at the VPE congress.  The VPE is the church organization we work with here in The Netherlands.  Today is their yearly meeting.  It actually started yesterday.  Mike went yesterday to teach a seminar on children’s ministry  It’s nice that we are a team and can keep working even when we’re apart.

It takes a while to get to Amsterdam, where the school is.  First, I have to ride my bike to the train station.

Anita's bike parked at the train station

I get on the train and go to Leiden Centraal station and change trains there.  I change trains again at Schipol, the airport in Amsterdam.  When I get to my last train station, I walk to get to the school.

Looking out the window of my train

Taking the train gives me plenty of time to listen to music, read or prepare for my class.  Since we have one car, we are so happy to be able to have public transportation and bikes.  It’s like having a second car.

On Sunday morning, we led a family Sunday at ICL, the International Church of Leiden.  It was so great to be able to minister there again.  It’s been over a year, and we were amazed at how many of the children not only remembered the puppets but also things they would say and do.

On Sunday afternoon, we ministered in The Hague at Thousand Hills Church The Hague.  This was the church’s first core group meeting.

Playing a game in kids' church

We had a great time with the kids and are expecting to see great things happen through this church.  The core group meetings will take place every other week until the church officially launches on Easter.  We will continue to help with their children’s ministry and train leaders to work with children.

Kids at Thousand Hills Church The Hage

We love doing this and are doing it more as a family now that Grace is a little older.  She helps us by doing her character, Smiley Iris and by singing with us during the services also.

Now, we’re down to 23 days before leaving.  We still have 6 services in Texas and Arkansas before we leave.  Our crate is being made that will carry some of our things via a ship, and our suitcases are pretty much packed.  We are truly living out of our suitcases now.  Someone asked me recently where I am from.  That’s a long question to answer usually, but now, we don’t really have a home until we’re back in The Netherlands.  I’m ready to go home!

Now we are anticipating going back to The Netherlands.  We are planning on returning on August 6.  This is exciting for us, because we have missed our friends and the work we do there.  We get to return to the International Church of Leiden and the children’s ministry there.  We also get to begin training children’s workers at a new church plant in The Hague.  Then we will begin Kid’s Club Leiden, a club to tell children in Leiden about Jesus.

We still need around $975 in monthly support before we can go.  Please pray for us and the churches we will be in the next 3 months so we can raise the support to return.