Construction Update

I just wanted to give everyone a construction update. For the past two months I have changed my focus from working on the Tsigmandru church to working here in Sighisoara. This basically began when the teen group came from Pearce. When they were here we started working on the apartment that the Church of the Nazarene owns here in the Baragon area of Sighisoara. No one lives there, but there are various clubs and prayer meetings that meet there five days a week. When the teens were here they scraped a type of calcium coating of the walls in three rooms and the hallway. These walls were then coated with a light coat of plaster. I have been sanding, painting, and laying carpet in theses rooms. Just this week I started to tear apart one of the bathrooms. I am currently pulling tile off the walls, scraping the calcium off, and beginning to change out the bath tub. It is hard, difficult, and time consuming work, but also very rewarding in the end. I am including some before and after photos of the other rooms and will soon do the same for the bathroom. Maurice

Thunder Snow?

Easter sunday was a beautiful warm day and the following day was even more beautiful. The spring flowers were already popping their heads up. It was about 70 degrees that afternoon. That Monday night Mel and I were at Monday night dinner when there was a huge crack of lightning. When I left for home it was just starting to snow and by the time I got up the street the snowflakes were even bigger. I took the boys outside to show them and the snowflakes were about the size of silver dollars.- Karen

Easter Sunday (Number 1)

I say Easter Sunday number 1 because here in Romania the majority of people here have not celebrated Easter yet. Orthodox Easter is April 27th which is when our Church here will celebrate Easter. Hungarians and Germans celebrated Easter on March 23rd. Let me tell you a little bit about how we spent March 23rd. At 7 am I climbed the stairs to the German Church on the hill for the sunrise service. This church is over 700 years old and has a crypt underneath of it. The service was all in German but it didn't matter- it was still beautiful. At first we all stood in a circle around the inside of the church while music was sung and the pipe organ was played. Then we slowly filed down into this small little crpyt where there were candles on the floor. It was so peaceful and really helped to picture what Christ's tomb might have been like. After a small service we each took a candle and walked back up into the church. We stood in a circle again and sang joyful music to celebrate the resurrection. Afterwards everyone was invited to the Lutheran priest's home for Easter breakfast. Breakfast was simple but beautiful. In America everything is pastel colors for Easter but here it is bright colors. At each place at the table was a bright red egg and the whole table was decorated in bright yellow, red, and orange. The red dyed egg is to symbolize the blood of Christ. It was really a blessing to be included in the German celebration of Easter.

Nolan and Liam knew that it was Easter in America and so expected that the Easter Bunny would come and leave some Easter eggs outside in the yard. I found a couple of eggs at the store and hid them in the backyard. The boys really had fun looking for them and were perfectly content to only get two eggs each.

After church we went out to Saes with Emil, Liana, Lian, and Andre for a gratar (grilling). I have really come to appreciate Romanian "gratar"s because they are so much simpler than grilling out in America. When we got to Saes we worked out in garden cleaning up dead branches and raking up all the dead stuff from the previous year. This all gets put in a big pile and burned. Once it is burned down enough the grate is put over the coals and the meat is cooked. Along with the sausage and cremwurst we ate some radishes and apples. The boys had a lot of fun. Nolan helped Emil and his cousin haul wood for over an hour. Emil calls Nolan "harnic" or hardworking. I can't say Liam is the same. He would rather just play.- Karen

Our Romanan Saturday

We have introduced before to our property manager, Emil. Last week he asked us to give him a ride to Deae, to take a few bags of seed (alfalfa I think) to his father's farm, since he does not have a car. We said sure, we would love to. We have learned here, though the language barrier and various other reasons, that when you committ to something such as this, you never really know what it will entail. Melanie had the boys for the day so me, Karen, and Emil were off to Deae. Before we left Emil asked if we could take a few other things, keep in mind our car is not very big. I had some old tires that he asked if his father could have for his caruta, I said sure, so we threw them in the car with the two large sacks of seed. Then we went to Emil's house and he asked if we could take their dog from their house to live permanently out on the farm, so we loaded it in the car. Then Emil asked if we could take the dog house also, we said sure. We also added a shovel and some various other tools. In the end it was good that the boys were not with us, because the car was totally loaded. Then we were off for the 40 minute car ride.

Deae is a small village in the middle of no where, accessible only by a very seasonable dirt road. When we arrived we meet Emil's father, who lives alone, is in his mid-sixties, and runs the farm with the help of his neighbor. They were in the process of plowing the potatoe field with a horse drawn plow. Karen immediately asked if she could try, they said sure without hesitation. I have no idea what they must have thought about this crazy American woman. We then got the tour of the barn and various animals. We saw the cows, chickens, sheep, turkeys, pigs, and rabbits. Karen especially loved holding a new little lamb, until Emil informed her that this lamb was the one we would be eating together for Easter, when Orthodox celebrate Easter next month. She thought he was joking with her at first, but he was not. Were then invited into the small farm house for some food. They sat me and Karen down at the only two spots available at the small table and found us some dinnerware. They put a bowl of liver and onions in front of us and insisted that we eat all of it without them. They also pulled out the biggest slab of slanina, raw pig fat, that I had ever seen. We also had bread, and they brought a honey comb, literally straight out of the bee box. We looked at it a little unsure, so they took the knife and scraped the honeycomb back and exposed beautiful honey in the middle for our bread. It was a great day, one that I will remember for a long time. It was a snapshot of how people in the heart of Romania live their daily lives on a small farm in small farming village. It is one of the many moments that I have had here when I can not believe that I would ever in my life being there. It is very surreal in a great way. Here are some pictures. In my next entry I will tell about the next day, Sunday. Maurice

What's Going On?

You may wonder where we have been and what we have been up to for the last month. I have heard from several faithful blog readers to say "What's Going On?". I promised my sister-in-law Amy that I would definitely write a blog this week so here you are Amy. Since our last blog on February 11th much has happened and we have been pretty busy.

Liam turned 5 years old on February 12th. It is really hard to believe that he is already 5. He is getting tall and losing his baby fat. He has quite an active imagination and often contributes anything he does wrong to the little guys who live inside of him. Conveniently- when I want to talk to those little guys- they have locked the door inside Liam and won't let him in. Melanie made him a really cute birthday cake and he got to open a few presents.

On February 15th a group came from Pearce Memorial Church. There were five adults and 15 teenagers. While they were here we worked on a house in forest in real need of some insulating and protection from rats, worked in the Baragan apartment where we hold a lot of our clubs, fixed and painted the main room in Magda B's apartment which had water damage, as well as tear off the walls in the Sighisoara church. Pretty ambitious- but everyone did a great job. The teens were fantastic workers. In addition to all the work we also had a great time of devotions every day with a different teen leading them. It was great for us to see this as these teens have grown up and spiritually matured while we have been away. It also got us excited to go back and work with the teens again. The first Saturday the teens were here we had a soccer game at the Baragan school. We had so many kids we had to have teams rotate out every fifteen minutes but everyone had a great time. At the end we played 6 on 6- America vs Romania. If you can't guess who won- let's put it this way- the America got spanked. Our American teens though were really impressed how great the Romanian kid's footwork was.


Another highlight was our trip to Mama and Tata's house in the village of Saes (shaiesh). The morning before I took four of the guys down to Mama's house to make Salata de Boef and prajitura. Mama made me a chef hat to wear. She said now I had my own kitchen staff. The guys had a great time and Tata really got a chuckle when he came in the kitchen and saw Alex wearing a flowery apron and cutting up potatoes. The next day we took everyone out to Saes and cooked mici (meech) on the grill and ate the Salata de Boef. We had a wonderful time but a couple of the boys got to experience the anger of a romanian mama. Two of the guys came back from the soccer field with questionable foot attire. Sid had no shoes on and Stephen had only shoes- no socks- because it was so muddy. Mama was "superat". When I was leaving to take the first group home she had both boys in the back room with their shoes off soaking their feet in steaming hot water. Quite a sight. Mama said "I told you so" to me a couple of days later when I told her Sid was sick the next day with a cold. It was definitely a real Romanian experience for Sid and Stephen.

The greatest thing about the team being here was the relationships with our friends from America. We got much needed encouragement and realized how much we miss our church family. It also got us so excited to come home and work with the teens again.

To read more about the teen trip from their perspective go to http://www.sighisoara08.blogspot.com/ or look at my attached photo album.

On February 29th Maurice, the boys, and myself took the train to Arad to spend the weekend with our Free Methodist missionary friends in Arad (the Dunn's). The boys had really been wanting to ride on a train but that got old quickly during the5 hour train ride. The boys had a great time while we were there as the Dunn's have a great dog named Madison. Stephen (their son) also has a car video game the boys loved and the Wii. While we were there we went out to dinner a couple of times and drink some really good hot chocolate at Paula's favorite coffee shop in town. We had a wonderful time just being able to talk, share, and relax together.

March brought a lot of new things. Mel is living out on her own now in a little apartment above Mama and Tata's. This means Liam and Nolan now have their own room (Mel's old room). It works out great because we don't have to retreat to our bedroom as soon as we put the boys to bed. It also means that Liam quits getting me up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night. He is now right across from it. Starting March 1st the boys are no longer going to school here. We had been talking about taking them out for financial reasons as well as making sure Nolan is where he needs to be for school in September. The week before we took them out of school pretty much solidified the decision. I have never really liked the way they discipline the boys (black dot on the had when they are bad, red when good). For Liam who rarely had a red dot it was difficult. Every day he would get the message reinforced that he was a bad kid. Then they were coming home saying they had to wear these Christmas tree shaped hats when they were bad (dunce caps). Then they said that their teacher pulls their ears so hard when they are bad that Nolan can hear the inside of his ear crack. Needless to say- it's just not what I am used to although that is pretty mild for here. Home schooling seems to be going well now that I am getting some kind of routine. I try to take the boys one day a week to elderly club so they can sit and color with them or play Rummicube. Mel comes on Wednesday afternoons and does geography or history as well as music class with the boys. They seem to love all the silly songs they learn.

Since the group left Maurice has pretty much doing construction everyday in the Baragan apartment or church. Last Saturday there was a whole church construction day at the church and the whole thing got painted as well as the outside getting washed. It was great to see so many people work together. This Saturday will be another work day for the church but this time the plan is finish the apartment.

We have picked a tentative coming home date - June 10th. This will allow us time to get reacclimated to America before I hopefully go back to work June 30th. We still have much we want to accomplish here but we are not sure what God wants to accomplish through us. Please be in prayer for meetings we have coming up concerning small business in Tsigmandru. We will be working with Magda and Nelutu to develop a small business plan for the sewing workshop in conjunction with a Peace Corps volunteer that is here. Soon after we hope to have similar meetings in Sighisoara with the church here.

February had it's really great moments for us but was also filled with some real discouragements. I want to especially thank the Pearce team, the Dunn's, and Tracy for keeping us looking towards God even in the difficult times. God really blessed us though you. Thank you for all your love, support, and prayers. -Karen

For You Mom

I am writing this as a tribute to my mother. I received a special blessing this week that I never saw coming. I discovered a new kind of respect for my mom. I think my mom has really not quite known her purpose in life since my brother and I left home 14 years ago. This year my parents sold the dairy cows and mom was faced with finding and alternate means of income but also finding her place in the world. My mom came to Romania to see us in October and while she was here she had a chance to work with the elderly in several of the programs and found a real love for them. A week and a half after she went home she saw an ad in the paper regarding a Certified Nurses Aid in a local nursing home. For the last several months she has been doing the grueling training but has been so blessed by the interactions with the elderly she works with. The work is physically demanding but she goes everyday- even though the pain stays with her the rest of the day. The other night I talked to her on the phone and she told me how she does it. Every morning she gets up and prays. She tells God that only he can get her through the day- on her own she could never do it. Then she opens her journal and prays for each of the elderly from the nursing home. She also told me that she remember when I was little she would find cups under my bed with mold growing on them (thanks for remembering that). She realized that we are like that-we have mold growing on us, dirt in our hearts, uncleanness in our spirit and that each day we need to ask God to cleanse us. Only then can the Holy Spirit fill us anew and work through us. I realized how blessed I was to have a mother who loves God, who raised me to serve and think of others first, and to realize that each and everything is life we do- we are doing for God- no matter how hard or how difficult. Mom said she doesn't do it for the money (minimum wage is pathetic). She does it for God. Thanks Mom.- Love Karen

Praise- for a cold?

I wanted to share this praise with everyone back at home because for us it is a big one. Many of you know that one of our major fears about moving to Romania was Liam's respiratory problems. In fact it was the last thing really holding us back from the mission field until I heard something a much wiser missionary women from Cambodia (Yuko Williams) had said. She said "If you don't do missions work because of your children, then you limit your children to only experience a little bit of God". That finally sealed our decision to move to Romania with the boys. That didn't mean we were going unprepared though. We took enough medication and two nebulizer machines just to be proactive. For those of you who don't know- when Liam was one he ended up in the hospital with a severe respiratory problem. Over the next two years, every cold he got turned into asthma like symptoms and he need steroids and albuterol. Last year our pediatrician took an agressive approach and he was on inhaled steroids from the first cold of winter until the end of April. He did much better and only occasionally needed the albuterol. We were going to start him on the steroids this year in September but decided not to. He got his first major cold last week and we kept him home from school for several days. On Monday he was back to normal- no medications, no breathing treatments, no respiratory problems at all. What an answer to prayer. This is the first cold since he was one that has been just a "normal" cold. A little hot water with honey and lemon every day and he made it through. I just wanted to share this with you as so many of you have been praying about this and we thank you. - Karen & Maurice