On the Ohrid : An Egg for Shiloh

This is my new friend Irida who I got my nails done with. Her hair is normally in a VERY fluffy, curly fro of ringlets. It's beautiful. But yesterday she asked if she could come over so I could STRETCH it...

...it is now stretched. One day she wants to get a STRANGER of her own so she can STRETCH her hair. I love her.

The fruit from the day camp in Pogradec the week before last is incredible. We were able to meet and build relationships with SO many kids that live right in our neighborhood. That is how I met Irida.

Many of these kids only came to a few days of the day camp and some of them are now going to the CAMP camps happening in Cangoni the next two weeks.

Cangoni is about an hour away so many of the parents are tentative about letting their kids go. They don't know us, they don't know where Cangoni is, they don't know why we want to take their kids camping in the middle of nowhere for a week.

I mean, I get it.

So, I have made some visits to parents this last week. I explain where the camp is, what we will be doing, why it is safe and that they can have their kids come home whenever they want. None of the parents speak English so all of this is done with their kids translating for them.

One girl wanted to come so badly and she does not know Jesus. I have shared the gospel with her completely and she says "I want to believe, but it's so hard."

Her story is a very sad and one that I cannot share in total here. I first heard it one night when I was feeling particularly sorry for myself that I could not be at dinner with the team because I had a sleeping baby. She came to my house that night around 10 and sat down at my kitchen table. She shared her story, she cried, we prayed.

I knew it would benefit her incredibly to be away from her home for a few days.To be with people that will love her, to hear the gospel over and over again, to have fun and laugh.

I was praying that her parents would let her come. I went and visited and talked with them twice. Her Father was very closed to the idea. He finally told her she could go adding a few conditions. Her joy was diluted by the pain of his unkind words (sorry to be vague).

She is on her way to camp right now. Pray for her although you don't know her name. Jesus does and I keep telling her that. She is known by God the Father who is perfect, loving and unchanging.

On another one of these visits Shiloh was given an egg by a girl's mom. Yes an egg. An uncooked egg. Apparently it is tradition that on a baby's first visit to a home, they are given an egg. I was directed to cook it for Shiloh and give it to her with garlic.

The longer you look at this pic, the funnier it gets

So even though last week was a bit of a down week because there was no camp, it was still full in many ways. We also had some great friends of ours here for the week so there was a lot of Washington in Albania!

It rained all week.

BUT, we are (still) so thankful to have so many of our friends be a part of our ministry here!

An awful morning breakfast picture

Camp 4 begins today and we are so excited and burdened! We know many of these kids already. We know where their hearts are at before the Lord. We love them. We want them to know Him. This creates both excitement and burden.

The team this week is special to us because some of them were a part of the very first trip we took.

2 years ago.

We had no idea what we were doing. We had never been to Albania. We had never been a part of JV camp, but we asked 10 people to join us.

And this is our third year here together (minus Shiloh of course)! We feel so blessed to have some of dearest and closest friends be such a vital part of our ministry. They have walked through this with us from the very beginning.

They have eaten A LOT of bread and Nutella.

They have played A TON of Kijabe.

They have shared the gospel MANY TIMES.

This team is from Alderwood, our sending church in Washington. We were a part of this youth group when we lived there and Cory was a leader and on Staff there for almost 10 years. We know many of these kids and have had some of them in our small groups. So fun to catch up with them and share stories of our new life!