Field trip

It was a crisp, sunny morning Thursday when we arrived at the houses. All the children were dressed, all the supplies prepared. We were going sledding. We took off towards the mountains and travelled until the town of Bucin (Boo-cheen), stopping only for the occassional car sick child. There was only one hill, but it was perfect and the snow was up to my knees at the bottom of it. Down the hill and back up again, all day long. We stopped for a lunch break and then they were back at it again. I'm happy to say the only blood inducing injuries were when Bethany sliced her thumb on a sled and when I was snow-balled in the face from only a foot away, which resulted in immediate swelling of my lip, a bit of a bloody nose, and tears from the pain but mostly from the laughing.

Go Catalina, go!

I'm the one in the blue coat and pink hat going down...I have bruises from that ride.

Yep, that's the Tibbetts. She's got grace even on a sled.

Pajama Party

Once upon a time, there were 3 Romanian girls-Kati, Catalina and Claudia- who met their American friends (and one of their after-school educators, Paula) at church and then had a night of fun. They walked to McDonalds and ate happy meals and then to their evening destination-Angela and Bethany's apartment. All involved in the party, changed into their pajamas when they arrived at 8:45 and they began making chocolate chip cookies. After enjoying their creation they watched some cartoons until midnight (and I think they would have kept watching if Angela hadn't turned off the tv). They awoke at 8 and lounged around for a little while before eating and enjoying American pancakes, playing a game of Kerplunk and heading back home.

Christmas fun

Waiting to be called downstairs, the kids sang "O what wonderful news."

Catalina, Claudia and Elis opening stockings.

Claudiu and his guitar.

Our beautiful Christmas morning (photo taken by Bethany and used without permission, which resulted in some yelling and accusations, resolved by giving credit to the photographer).

The best Christmas ever

I don't know if it was the snow, the activities or playing the parent role, but this Christmas was the best ever. Bethany and I spent Christmas Eve getting ready to head to the houses for the evening. We arrived around 5 and hung out with the kids and ate dinner with them until it was time to go carolling. In Romania the young people visit the older people and sing carols. The kids visited with the house director Elena, our driver Traian and our foundation director Bruce. We arrived home about 8:30 and the all the kids went upstairs to put on their pijamas. At Ana we talked about how not all of the presents would be the same and how they are not allowed to sell their presents (crazy, but it happened only a few days before). Then with the help of Septi I shared the Christmas story with the kids. We used a book that shared creation, the fall of man, the need for a Savior and God's ultimate plan, leading to the events surrounding Jesus' birth. We also watched How the Grinch Stole Christmas. By this time it was about 10 and they headed up to bed obediently and quickly fell asleep. Then we started working...until after 3am! We finished stockings, wrapped the last presents, went to get the sleds from the office and much more. We had told the kids that at 6 they could come out of their rooms and they did. They stayed upstairs until everyone was up and then they sang Christmas carols before they raced down the stairs. Everyone got a sled, a Bible, and clothes. The younger girls got a play beauty center. The older girls got makeup and jewelry. Daniel, Cornel and Zorro received remote control cars. Claudiu, who had told his person of reference, (who told me at 11pm Christmas Eve) "If I get a guitar it means that God loves me," did in fact receive a guitar. We put batteries in cars and played around the house until about 9, when I think all of the kids got dressed and went outside to play in the courtyard with their sleds. Bethany and I went home and had our own Christmas and got ready to go to Bruce and Catherine's for lunch...mmmm...turkey, mashed potatoes and all the rest of the yummy carbohydrates. We then met the kids at church for their Christmas program. Phew...what a day!

To the center

Last night we took Casa Ana kids to the center to look at the lights and drink hot chocolate. It was snowing (again, as it is now, as I guess this winter will be) and we bundled up and slipped and slided as we walked around and played.

A+

Meet one of the 1st grade teachers at School #7. Her name is Letitia Sava and she has Claudia, Ibi and Margareta in her class. She is also our contact person right now for the education of Claudiu, Zorro and Laura who are home-schooled at this time. Though I have not had a lot of contact with her, I appreciate her immensely. She has patiently worked with us as Claudia acted out behaviorally and just couldn't stay in her desk. She is giving our girls so much extra attention from what I have heard. She came to the opening of the houses. Pray for us to minister to her as she educationally ministers to our kids. If I understand correctly our girls will be in her class until they finish 4th grade. Bethany was able to take this picture of Doamna Sava and Claudia at their Christmas program.

Real Smiles and Thank Yous

The Wednesday night girls' and boys shindigs went great. It was a perfect time for Emily and Grant (short term friends from the States) to pass out the pijamas and the dolls/purses/remote control cars they had collected for the kids. I'm such a kid and must admit, to this day I still love opening presents, but it was great fun to watch our kids ipen them. They were so excited! I heard sever of them saying, "this is what I wanted, thank you."

Cornel receiving a gift. I love this smile!

Most of the younger girls with their babies. I'm so exicted about opportunities for pretend play.

WOW! A classic Christmas face.

Zorro and his new PJs.

A sweet thank you to Grant from Ibi.

Not even one bad word

In making plans for this week, Bethany and I planned a girls and boys evening. Originally it was intended to be something earned, but we decided to just let all the kids come because we wanted them all to be able to participate. When I was thinking/praying about a particular thing my Ana kids need to work on, their mouths was what came to mind. I sat down to spend some time with Jesus and prepare for our meeting discussing this issue. Ephesians 4:29 was the verse that summed up what I wanted to share with them, "Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths but only what is useful in building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen." We talked about what unwholesome talk is: gossipping, cursing, swearing, talking back, making fun of someone, taking the Lord's name in vain, and just plain ugly talk. And I also tried to give them an example of a tower and what happens when you pull out one of the blocks in the middle...it gets destroyed. We then played a game (if that's what you want to call it) where everyone drew out a slip of paper telling them to say something nice about another child in the room or giving an example of unwholesome talk. We hung up the verse in the kitchen and I was suprised at how many times they referred each other to, "Niciun cuvant sticat (not even one bad word)!" And a few of them asked if we were going to play the game again, or have another discussion. Please pray for these great teachable moments. Pray that I would be disciplined enough to prepare for them and that the Holy Spirit would give me wisdom as to what needs to be discussed.

home sweet home

This morning I joined Simona, Maria, Cornel, Daniel and Claudia Kalanyos on a visit to their family (I had been there twice before, once on a visit this summer and once to pick them up when they moved into Casa Ana). To be expected they were very excited, and with every landmark they called out, "We're getting close!" They really didn't seem to talk much once we arrived, but enjoyed seeing their parents, siblings, cousins, nieces, nephews and grandmother and riding the homemade sled down the hill by their house. I didn't anticipate it being so cold, but the higher altitude proved me wrong and there were several inches of snow and it flurried a bit while we were there. I just cannot imagine how hard it must be for these children and their family. At one point Maria said, "We have 2 families." What a blessing to have 2 very different sets of people to love you so much, yet how awkward. I inwardly cringed as Mama Gabi was introduced as "our mom," to Mrs. Kalanyos. It was a sweet time of reunions though, with promises to try for visits around Easter.

Click on this picture to enlarge it and check out the joy on Cornel's face. Claudia is throwing a snowball at me and their little brother Zoli is hanging out at the top of the hill.

Simona with Zoli.

The kids with their oldest sister Mihaiela and her two children. She lives up the hill in the next village and didn't know that we were coming for a visit. When she came to the van to say hello her eyes were full of tears and immediately asked, "When are you coming back again?"

The Kalanyos family: Mihai, Daniel, Dad with Zoli, Cornel with nephew in lap, Maria with niece Bianca in lap, Claudia sitting in Mom's lap, Simona, Ramona and a nephew.

little tidbits

it snowed yesterday and left a lovely blanket of white across everything (except the now muddy and slushy roads).

snowball fights are incredibly fun. i enjoyed one with some of the nadia and ana kids last night. in Romania people tell each other "i'm going to wash you," meaning they are going to pelt you with snow and make sure you are covered.

our staff Christmas party is tomorrow night and the Americans are cookin' for the Romanians! Bethany and i are in charge of the cookies and brownies. estimated party attendance: 100 adults. that's a lot of food.

who knew peanut butter cookies were so difficult/weird to make?! after thinking, "this can't be right! what is going on? did i miss an ingredient? should i call my mom?" i realized that when you roll the dough into balls, all the miniscule crumbs stick together. we shall see if they hold after i do the little criss-cross with the fork.

bethany and i are turning into romanians...last time we went shopping we bought salami. and to top that off we've been eating it as romanians do...on a piece of buttered bread. yes, open-face.

please pray for the 6 boxes of Christmas presents mailed in early November (or maybe even October) to get here this week, preferably Monday so we can pick them up on Tuesday and wrap during the week.

wild weekend

Once upon a time on Friday, when all the American gals were enjoying hanging out together at a restaurant, Becky's phone rang (mine was with Bethany and she had left a little early to tuck kids into bed at Nadia). It's the mom from Casa Ana and she's calling in for reinforcements. It's 10pm when we arrive and it's calmer that we thought it would be, but there's a broken mirror in the girl's bathroom and Claudiu and Zorro still look pretty wound up. To make a long story short 6 out of the 10 kids were involved in the drama. Becky and I listened to all the stories and then had the kids wait in their rooms as we collaborated about the disciplinary action to be taken. We decided on 3 days of no snack, no movies, no special priviledges, extra homework and cleaning the house (which involved my idea of scrubbing all the marks off the walls where they had written, touched with dirty hands, kicked or thrown food). We had a range of responses to this decision when we arrived to dish it out on Saturday morning (while the 4 children not involved watched a movie in the mom's room). Some children ended up getting double because of their actions and attitudes and 2 ended up with 4x as much because they ran away and chose some unwise behaviors. We hung out at the house until after 4 and left a list with the moms about Sunday's work. Today after church Bethany and I went with the 4 kids to McDonald's (ok, I know we were rubbing it in, but we had to make a huge deal out of this). From what I've heard the house has been pretty peaceful this weekend. We'll see about tomorrow, when restriction will be lifted on a individual basis. (What have I gotten myself into...I don't have kids...what am I doing???)

In the middle of all of this (actually we were out looking for one of our runaways but when we were told she was back at the house), we made an appearance at the "siblings' day" party. We have 7 children from Nadia and 1 from Ana that have siblings that are not in our care, and they spent a few hours together on Saturday afternoon. I have attached a picture of Catalina and her brothers, Gerian, Corado and Trandafir Galben (Yellow Rose...what were they thinking). It was sweet to watch some of the reunions and others were just awkward. I pray that these relationships will be able to continue and thus families will be blessed because one child or a group is in our care and hearing about and experiencing the love of Jesus.

We had to immobilize Claudiu on Saturday. He talks back and ugly and then when asked to seperate himself from the situation does not listen. He hit David as he tried to help him to his room. Thankfully it was an incredibly short ordeal and he followed through on asking forgiveness from everyone involved and staying in his room. When talking it all out we shared with him what a great leader he had been that morning when he was cleaning the walls and whistling, and then asking for more work to do. I told him one of his assignments for this week is to study with me what the Bible tells us about being a leader. Please pray with me on this one, as Claudiu has a heart for God and His word! Pray that God would direct this study and bring light to both of our eyes. Pray that He would work through the language barrier.

Today I took an amazing nap (I know it was amazing because I was dreaming when the phone rang) and then we walked the 30 minutes to Kelly's for taco soup, fudge pie and "White Christmas." Good times. I'm working on translating some pen pal letters for the kids and have taken Nyquil as I'm getting a cold and wanting to sleep. I finally downloaded my ipod stuff and it only took 7 hours to download the cd that I bought. Tomorrow involves paying bills, maybe calling the landlord (which takes a lot of courage because it's all in Romanian), maybe sled shopping, grocery shopping and I'm sure much more. Don't you wish you could have this life?

Rugati-va! (Pray)

I will start out with a God story about Claudiu from Casa Ana. Yesterday he was giving his pretty common 13 year old boy commentary and attitude when we were having a scheduling meeting with all the educators about Christmas vacation. He was pounding on the walls and the floor and yelling, just looking for some attention. Someone when up to ask him to be quiet, but he didn't listen. A bit later our newest staff member from Nadia, Attila, went up to talk with him...he's a big guy, and doesn't put up with any junk. Claudiu was very disrespectful, hid under the bed and spoke very rudely to Attila...not a good choice. Attila pulled him out from under the bed and brought him down the stairs, where they proceeded to have a raised voice conversation in the hallway (Ok it was a yelling match). I told the rest of the people who were downstairs to head to the mom's room because we didn't want to give attention where it wasn't needed. However, Attila was needed in the meeting so he could choose when he could work, so I handed my responsibilies over to Elena and headed towards the warzone. They "talked" a few more minutes and then Zorro (C's younger bro) came down yelling at Attila for yelling at his brother. Attila went into the meeting some time after that point and I was there with the boys as well as the mom. Zorro calmed down and went upstairs, but Claudiu didn't want to. He told me to leave him alone and that he was going to run away. At some point he went up and got his coat (this tells me he was thinking at least somewhat logically) and I went to stand in front of the front door. He kept telling me to get out of his way (I'm so glad he respects me enough not to hit me) and finally I said, "Ok, if you want to run away then you have to write a declaration about why you are leaving." He didn't want to. "I'll write it for you, you just have to tell me what to write." I looked at the mom and our oldest Simona and told them I needed paper and a pen and they provided. So I put the pen to the paper and started saying and writing, "I, Claudiu, want to run away because..." and I looked at him to finish the sentence. And he did. We wrote for about 5 minutes with me asking questions. He was still intent on going so I asked, "Don't you think it would be a good idea to say how all of this started, why Attila yelled at you in the first place?" So we started writing that, but the pen stopped because I was writing sideways, so I asked, "Can we please move to the kitched table because the pen doesn't work like this any more?" He agreed and we kept writing until Attila came out and sat down near us. All this time that we'd been writing, Zorro was holding his apple from snack, planning to throw it at Attila, so A said "Come on, let's talk like normal people. I am really sorry about the way I acted and how I spoke with you all. Let's talk it out." Well it progressed from there with Claudiu tearing up his declaration, turning to face Attila, listening and accepting his apology and then apologizing. They shook hands and A told him it would be cool if they could be friends and not enemies and then they hugged...I was almost in tears. I didn't think Claudiu would run away, but it was sweet to watch the reconcilation. Praise the Lord that He was a part of that, that Claudiu's heart has softened as much as it has and that He led me through that situation.

On the other hand, it was a disaster at Casa Nadia today. I didn't even make it over to Ana once. We have decided to move Madalin and Daniel into a room together and for the other 4 boys to be in a room for the time being. I don't know that a single boy didn't put up a fight. I won't go into the reasoning now, or all that took place, but I definitely called Elena more than once just not knowing what to do (almost in tears the last time) and we finally got ahold of Bruce about 10 minutes after she came back to the house, and he quickly came and helped settle things down. Madalin and Daniel were still not all that happy, but we all left the mom by 9:45 and everyone was calm, if not asleep. Please pray for all the boys of Casa Nadia to accept this transition. Madalin and Daniel specifically are needing to make connections with adults and needing to learn about respect and how to behave appropriately...a lot of things really. Please pray for these boys to adjust. I just don't even know how to ask you to pray other than that. Praise the Lord that the girls were so well behaved during all of this. Laura and Ibi cleaned up in the common room upstairs and their room as soon as I asked them. Then all of the girls went down and sat on the couch and looked at a stack of books I gave them.

I also ask you to pray for Bethany as she transitions into Romania, into Casa Nadia, into big changes. Pray for her to find a language teacher as mine is booked (she even cancelled on me this week because of her high school teaching schedule). Pray for B to connect with the kids and the moms and the educators at Nadia.

Getting worse before it gets better

I'm talking about the disaster of unpacking and a few other things. My bags arrived last night and praise Jesus everyone I worked with from Tarom airlines was wonderfully polite and spoke English. Sadly I was disobedient when my mom told me to put the containers of cocoa into ziplocs and one of them exploded over half of a very large bag. DISASTRU! (=disaster) However things are washing up nicely so far. I still have so much organizing to do and we need to redo the pantry now that we have gone shopping and the first round of American food has arrived in my bags. As I was unpacking I realized that I have 3 bags of things that are not mine, which makes me feel so much better about the 7 I brought over.

It's official that I'm working with Casa Ana and Bethany with Casa Nadia, but we plan to spend time at both houses. I just can't imagine and Bethany encouraged me with, "It just wouldn't be right," not continuing those relationships I've already built with the Nadia kids. It's so odd because most of those kids I wanted on the list to be in our care and I felt like I fought for them in our "pick the kids" meetings. Oh well, God knows what He is doing as He guides our hearts.

Kids are others that are included in getting worse before better. Please pray for Casa Nadia as things have not settled down as much as I thought they would in the 3 weeks I was gone. Pray especially for the Simon brothers, Madalin, Daniel and Sergiu. Pray for them to make attachments that are meaningful for their emotional and spiritual development. I ask that you continue to pray for Zorro from Casa Ana, as his behavior has changed since I left, but it is odd in my personal opinion. And of course pray for this Christmas season to be about Christ. What a blessing that we have so many gifts coming over but Christmas needs to be about The Gift.

Oh Christmas Tree...and cupcakes...

Allright, Bethany is going to make me look like a slacker-blogger because I think she's going to be good at writing on her's more often than me. I'm up for the challenge though.

It was soooo great to be back and see the kids today. I walked into Casa Nadia this morning and the kids jumped me...I almost fell over. Casa Ana was bitter all day until we arrived in the afternoon because they wanted us (Bethany, Becky and I) to be there. They knew I was coming back and were waiting impatiently. And of course I suppose decorating Christmas trees and having cupcakes and hot chocolate would make some people jealous and ready for it to be their turn. Here's some pictures from today's good times.

The first ornament of the day being placed on the tree by none other than Sergiu and Bethany.

Except for the fact that Becky's and my knees are in it, this is the best picture ever of the Casa Nadia kids!

Daniel, Zorro, Kati and Maria (I know this is bad, but I definitely put this pic in because it was a great one for my hair...and this was after the Nadia kids had played with it).

" Mmmmm...did I get all the icing off my fingers," wonders Daniela.

"Pick me up!" was the most common phrase after only a few minutes of putting ornaments on the tree.

We made it home in Romania without too many issues. Sadly my luggage is somewhere unknown, but I will be calling about that "sometime after 3 in the afternoon," and hopefully it will be resolved.