This & That and Our last day in Slovenia

This & That and our last day in Slovenia!!!! I wanted to share with you a few random things from the week. I always seem to have a problem with the electricity here in Bovec. Not with everything just those things that make us ladies look a little more beautiful. Last year I blew out my chi and this year I blew out the power and yes I have a converter. On Monday I was trying to use my blow dryer and blew out the power in our room so I just let my hair dry naturally. Natural is the way here in Slovenia. On Thursday I blew out the power to the whole building. I was heading to the owners apartment to share with them and the owner met me outside. He wanted to know what I was doing because they had never had this happen before. Really!!!!! Leave it to me to be the first. I showed him by holding my hand close to my head and making a blowing sound. I promised I wouldn’t do it again. He was really nice. OK here’s the real punch line. After we returned home that night they brought Becky not only one but two European hair dryers for me to use the rest of the time we were here. Oh and by the way I left all of my curling apparatuses in the states. We were having a little trouble with the drain in our bathroom. Nothing really big or so I thought. I was taking a shower and Lynn said are you finished and I said not yet he said I think you are I said no not quite yet and he said you are the water is running into the living area. So I had to get out of the shower and wash my hair in the sink. Yes I had flooded the place. Not really flooded but it was getting pretty wet. They came that afternoon and fixed the drain. I hope you can see the humor in all of this and not the inconvenience. Because it’s not what happens to us in life it’s how we view it and handle it that counts. I continue to learn that daily.

One thing I have especially enjoyed is when one of us would say a sentence that had a word we related to a song we would bust out singing and most of the time everyone else singing along with us while laughing all the time (Bro. Ken Stosgdill and I use to do this when we both worked at the church)

Friday: Today was the first day that Lynn and I got to spend some time together in the country. We had a wonderful time with the Trull’s and J.P.. Here are a few pictures of the places we went.

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Sharing some videos.

Take a look at these videos. I think you will love them. http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=452490246951&ref=notif&notif_t=video_tag http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=fl_1626602388266#!/video/video.php?v=452620946951

Walking our legs & feet off!

I can't imagine living in bible times with all the walking they did. We spent all day sharing literature in Bovec & Plusna. Hills, Hills, more Hills. It was an unbelievable day. We went to an area of Bovec that none of our team had ever seen and never knew was there. It was a huge community with appartments and houses. Right now there are flowers everywhere and they are beautiful. I so wish I could grow flowers like these in Magnolia.

We saw lots of cats everyday. This was a sweet little kitty that was really shy.

The Sheep Herder We were heading back to Bovec and we saw the funniest thing. These sheep were heading down the road with a red van behind them. We found out that the van was the sheep herder. It was really funny.

A cheerful look brings joy to the heart, and good news gives health to the bones. Proverbs 15:30

A cheerful look brings joy to the heart, and good news gives health to the bones. Proverbs 15:30 Today was a wonderful day. We shared literature with two villages. Is where we placed two benches last October while we were in Bovec. One had the Romans 1:20 and the other has John 3:16. There is a special story that I just have to share with you about these benches. Before we placed them last year we had permission to put them at the public bus stop. They are beautiful and in a great place on the main road. After we left the person over the area, kind of like a County Judge called Joe and told him they would have to be removed. So Joe went and took them away. The people there circulated a petition throughout the village. Everyone wanted them returned. They delivered the petition to the person responsible and told them to return the benches. Can you see God working here? We also went to Cezsoca today. We delivered literature there last year as well. The people there were so kind and J.P. had several discussions. We had a wonderful lunch and the waiter was so kind and helpful to us. Before we left J.P. shared the book of John with the question card and a pen with the question website on it. They discussed the book of John briefly and the young man seemed interested. After finishing the literature distribution we headed to the Boca which is a HUGE waterfall and it is just beautiful. We shared a wonderful laugh about the sign containing Most Boca. This in Slovene is Boca Bridge. There was no water in the riverbed under the bridge and we just thought it funny that there was no water in the Most Boca. Guess it was a location thing. Hee Hee !!!! We decided to hike a just a little closer to the waterfall so that we could get better pictures. Well we hiked and hiked up, up and up. We didn’t get to the top which is a 3 hour hike because there wasn’t enough daylight and because most of us would be dead. I say most of us because that Becky is a hiking machine. J.P. does a great job hiking as well. We decided we would go back to the same restaurant for our evening meal. Becky kept the girls so that Kim could go with us. She doesn’t get to go out often because they don’t have babysitters or family help. OK ladies can you imagine not having any help with your children. I’m talking NO HELP. It was a special evening for all of us. We headed home and here I am sharing with you. I wanted to share a little about what the guys are doing. They finished all 6 benches today and all of them are placed. WOW that is a HUGE deal. They also have one additional bench that we didn’t plan on building but have the supplies to complete it. The special thing about this is there is a new golf course (just opened) here in Bovec and the owner would like to have it there. J.P. and Joe are working on a ministry project with golf that they will be sharing in the coming days. They are going to need golfers from the states. Gods timing is perfect. Sometime I get tickled when I see it. Do you ever do that? Lynn loves golf and had an opportunity to talk with the owner, J.P. and Joe to discuss this project. Had he come here at any other time! Also one of the benches was placed in town and a lady that can see the bench came by Joe’s house and told him she was upset because she was atheist. The bench is on some other persons land but she is mad because she has to look at it. There are many ways to look at this but as I set here typing at 11:04 PM our time and 4:04 PM your time God has impressed upon me this. How often are we mad at someone or something in our church because of what we want or what we think, which really has nothing to do with Jesus or sharing the Good News? How many time do we have the screaming ME ME’s? I know I have them way too much. Just some food for thought and I am way too full of myself. Please continue to pray for the people of Slovenia, the missionaries and their families and for all of us. Pray that we all will be changed. Thank you for taking your time to share with us on this special trip. I hope you can get a glimpse of the glory of God. Because He First Loved Us, Lori

Catching Up

Dober Dan(don), Good Morning from Bovec, Slovenia Please accept my apology for not getting posting sooner. There is no wifi in our room and when there has been time it was bed time and I can promise you that I needed my rest. You may not have the time to read it all but I hope you will. I wish I could tell you every little detail and every place that it was evident that God was with us and had gone before us. But I would never get it all written down. For those of you that know me know that I would much rather tell you about it than write it down because you won’t get all the animation. Hee Hee Us while waiting on the Trull's to pick us up from the Wood's in Little Rock. I will start with the beginning of our journey. We left Little Rock about 12:45 on Saturday and headed to Atlanta. We had a short connection time and were very happy that our gate was only about 15 minutes away. Lynn & I left our luggage with the group and ran to get some water. We returned to find they had already called our group to load the plane so we gathered up our stuff and hurried to get find our place only to realize that most of the overhead bins were full. Lynn was able to get his loaded however they were telling me that I would have to check my bag. I went in to pantic mode. I didn’t want to be the ONLY one in our group that had to check a bag. So I begged them to find a place for my bag. Finally they found me a place in the first class section. Whew I was so thankful. When we got to our seats Wayne was receiving his luggage tag. Yep, he had to check his bag. So glad it wasn’t me. Nancy & Wayne eating a snack at the Little Rock Airport. Up, up and away, we were and it seemed like forever until we landed. Our flight was 8:59minutes. It was on an older 767 that didn’t have the amenities of the new planes. Lynn was such a trooper. We were able to get a little sleep. We landed in Munich, Germany we were through customs and clammed Wayne’s bag in less than 15 minutes. How crazy is that!!! We caught a 45 minute train ride to the train station. If you’ve never ridden a train in Europe you won’t really appreciate this. We arrive at the stop and everyone got off except for Lynn. He was at the door trying to get off when the door closed and away he went. You better be in a BIG hurry getting on and off trains in Europe. I had a huge sinking in my stomach as he was whisk away. Gene got on the next train got off at the next stop and there he was. They were back with us on the next train coming our way. The layover was about 2 hours and while we waited we drank Bela Kava (strong coffee with milk I mean really strong coffee), walked around and bought lunch for our next 4 ½ hour train ride through Austria to Villach, Austria where J.P. and Joe would be to pick us up. We boarded the train where there was a huge traffic jam of people trying to find their seat.Finally made it to ours where we had lunch, took a small nap and enjoyed the beautiful scenery. When we got there they were waiting for us. Yea It was so good to see old friends. We loaded up and headed 1 ½ hours to our home away from home. We stopped several time to see the beauty of God and take some pictures. We finally made it to Bovec, checked into our room, headed to eat, then to our briefing then finally to bed. Did I need a bed or what!!! I think Lynn was asleep before his head hit the pillow. Monday we started off by having coffee and sharing from Gods word. I truly love the fact that we are spending time each day to have a word from God. One of the highlights from today is that we drove up this HUGE Mountain. From what we can figure we were about 1400 feet high. The roads were narrow with very sharp curves. I was really scared at times and want to stop but didn’t really want to stop. I am so glad that we kept going. When we stopped I could hardly speak. OK I know that is hard for you to believe but it’s the truth. It was just so beautiful for words to express. At that moment I thought this is as close to God as I will ever be but knowing that I have the ultimate closeness with God. He is with me every minute of every day. WOW what an awesome God I serve. We did encounter a man that must have been having a REAL bad who was really ugly to us. I will have to get Becky to help me give you more of an update on Monday. My brain can only hold so much. Today was an awesome day and I mean really AWESOME!!!! This morning Lynn and I went to have Belacava in town. After that we went into a little bakery where they make fresh bread and pastries every day. We begin to talk with the owner. His name is Remzi . We had a wonderful visit about our families and our business. We exchanged emails and he asked us to come back and make a picture with him. Wow what a beginning to a beautiful day. Later in the day we were in the village of Trenta. Becky and I were distributing literature we rounded the corner and there stood a lady. Becky began to share that we want to give her the words of life and the bible book of John. She was really nice and seemed interested but the language barrier can be hard. After a few minutes she invited us in for coffee, which is almost unheard of in Slovenia. We enjoyed coffee and Becky worked really hard to talk with her. Becky shared with her that she knew Stanka, a lady from the same village of which Alma said she knew. We were able to pray with her and Becky sang In This Very Room in Slovene. The lady was so moved and I began to tear up. I would have cried like a baby but I didn’t want to scare Alma. We said our goodbyes and she gave us some candy. Who loves chocolate???? ME ME ME!!!!!We truly knew that God was with us in that place and he had gone before us preparing Alma for our visit. I hope I never forget this visit and the feeling of the power of God as it was at that moment. The reality is that God is always with me and his power is there at his appointed time. All we have to do is be faithful. We headed back to the car and off to Stanka and Marco’s house to deliver a car seat for the new baby that will be born in about a month, a girl. They have 3 boys, 14, 10, & 8. I had the opportunity to meet them last year while I was here. There a precious family which have apartments for rent to tourist. Gene & Becky came here in 2007 and stayed at their place. That is a whole other story for another day. When we got there we didn’t really think anyone was home but again God did provide. Stanka and the two youngest boys were there. While there Becky shared with her that we met Alma. She let us know that Alma was like a second mother to her. Who would ever believe that? Again we can see the hand of God at work. We had a wonder visit and it was really good to see her. We headed back to Joe & Kim’s to find the guys gone placing another bench on the side of a mountain. That makes 3 benches placed in two days. Lynn was so moved that he said as they prayed over each bench he couldn’t help by tear up. I am so thankful that God allowed him to make this trip. He will tell you that you can’t really grasp what it is like and the darkness in the people here until you experience it firsthand. We have all been changed!!! After supper J.P. and Joe met us and wanted to do our daily debriefing. Our discussion today was to describe our day as a candy bar and why. I want share what everyone choose but I will tell you it is amazing how God is working so differently in each of us yet bringing us all together. That catches us up. I will do my very best to post tomorrow and share the work that the Lord is doing. I don’t want you to miss a thing. Please continue to pray for us, that God will use each of us and that we will be an encouragement to the missionaries and their families. I hope to have an opportunity to load some additional pictures from the previous day. Please be in prayer for our team that God will do a good work in this country as well as continue to do a good work in us. Because He first loved us, Lori

Logoly State Park

Spent the afternoon with one of my BFF's Linda, my other kids & my grandboy Connor. It was a blast!!!!! We had a picnic and then headed to the information center. There we looked at snakes, spiders, bugs, an alligator, all of which I hate. We bought fish food then to feed the fish. Kyle, Jessica, Madison & Connor There were so many fish and some of them were huge. Connor is taking the rest of his fish food across the pond and being a silly boy. Used the remaining fish food to feed the ducks. We quacked like ducks and shook the food in bags to bring them to us. This is one of my favorites. Kyle was so sweet to help with Connor and Connor loves Kyle. How precious is this! We walked for what seemed like forever. I carried Connor, Linda carried Connor and we both grabbed an arm and ran with him. At one point Kyle said "I think we just went in a circle." I was beginning to get worried and all Linda could do was laugh at me. I was really relieved when we finally saw the road. We made it!!!!!!!!!!!!! It looks like we walked about 2.75 miles of trails. Then we headed to the playground for a little fun for Connor. What a beautiful day it was. We are so lucky to have a state park so close to us. I plan to use it more in the future. Blessings, Lori