as this chapter closes

our team's time is coming to a close and everyone begins to get quiet and contemplative not knowing how to handle the very quickly approaching farewell we will all face.

it is a sad thing to be a part of and to watch because in these short few days meaningful relationships have budded and the future is unknown as to whether individuals will ever get to see each other again. it is a very bitter sweet moment and the only counsel i find personally is that God will continue the journey with any of the people i, or our team, has had the chance to touch or plant a seed in!!

tomorrow is our last day and we will give: our presents, hugs, high fives, kisses and pieces of our hearts to the orphan kids of sunshine orphanage. Then we will say goodbye to our partners in crime - the Ukraine team - who helped make us feel at home across the world and translated for us to have meaningful conversations with those we got to get involved with. hopefully there will be enough of them for each of us to have intentional farewells to each child we individually connected with.

many of our team members have posted pics on facebook and so if you search under their names you will find countless captured moments of our adventures...enjoy and we continue to thank you for your prayers!

pics of our wonderful new ukrainian friends - part 2

pics of our wonderful new ukrainian friends

we thought abby had RAIN...NOT LIKE THIS!!

i love when God intervenes in fun ways with nature and all sorts of other ways. last night, it rained heaps which led to puddles, which led to puddle jumping wars, which led to ukraine-canada team bonding and that was a wonderful thing to watch and be a part of.
it is always fun to watch relationships in the beginning, waiting for the connection to start and grow. i smirk as i watch the awkward union of the canada and ukraine team as we go through the formalities of finding out (and trying to properly pronounce) each others names. i smirk because i know that in the next 24 hours there will be new bonds and buds starting. then in a few days laughter and teasing like only friends can do. and by the end of 12 days there will be heartfelt and painful goodbyes of deep meaningful friendships.
all this coming under the common ground of our love for Jesus and more specifically our love for these orphan kids. so with that in mind, as a leader you try to get creative in how to initiate bonding and the team growing process...and then God intervenes and says, "here i will help, heres some rain...HAVE FUN!!" and everyone got involved in the getting wet together activities...well some kinda had to at the mercy of those of us who need to (putting it a nice way) not let anyone feel left out!!! hahaha
thanks to god for his creative involvement and we pray he continues to as we work to be fruitful together.

ps - i also found out my wife has better balance than i do because we jumped into a big puddle together and i was the only one left flat on my butt in the mud!!!

plane, yotel, london, plane, kiev, bus, train, bus, krivoy rog... all in 48 hours!!!

phew!
so we have arrived in krivoy rog to a wonderful greeting from our ukraine team we will be working with. it is still the AM but feels like early evening. everyone is excited to be here and we are having fun getting to know the ukraine team (plus josh and i are excited to see familiar faces from last year). we might end up getting to stop by the orphanage this afternoon which would be cool but other than that we are prepping for the week of programs and such and chilling and such.
for all the parents, we are alive and doing well and no one has lost a limb yet. only 14 more days to keep that track record! shouldnt be a problem...papa luff is on the job and mama luff is keeping papa luff on the straight and narrow (which is probably more relieving anyways)!
more pics later

the kiddies are safe and london is complete

so we have finished the first major leg of the trip and explored bits of london, like the beautiful tower bridge and the london tower. lots of riding in stagnant hot tube trains and a full day of celebrating canada day across the world!
it is always funny to see how different people react to over-tiredness and we definitely had the gidy-goofy, the cranky 'panties in a knot', the i dont want to shop anymore's and the few ready to pop anytime (i will let you guess who was who). always makes for an interesting day.
now it is time to hop back on a train to another airplane, where we will land in kiev to hang out there and then hop on another long train!! oh the places we will go...
everyone is excited for what awaits us next.

here it comes..then there we go!!

so there is now only a few weeks left until we leave and some exciting stuff is taking place already. the team has performed some of their drimes for the first time at clccyouths JRHI program called IMPACT. they did an incredible job and the youth really enjoyed watching them and listening to a couple of the team members share their testimony as well.
it was even better to have the JRHI crew gather around the team afterward and pray for us and our trip...
this is getting exciting. next up, kids shop on june 27th for a presentation as well!