Snowshoe Ski Trip

On Wednesday, December 31st, a group of ten of us headed up to Snowshoe for our annual ski trip. Sarah and Janet joined us later that evening. We got our gear that night. Thursday morning it was off to the slopes for us! We had awesome weather!! Very cold and windy but the sun was shining!!! Carson, Kristen, and Angie joined us midday. Friday was another great day of skiing! Cloudy and not as cold! We are on our way back now. We had three new skiers – Brooke Reeves, Jakob Rhea, and Anita Voorhees and they all did a great job!! The Lord definitely blessed us with beautiful weather, wonderful fellowship, safe travels, and safe journies down the slopes! Praise be to God!!!

Chick Fil A

Yah America!!!

Atlanta

We have successfully landed in Atlanta and navigated customs! We are now on the bus back to Knoxville!!!

Come Monday…..

Today we had a performance at an elementary school where we were had mostly kindergarten aged kids. 60 adult and kids were in attendance. We were able to give out our “Jesus Love Me” bracelets. We had lunch at the park again and the off to another kindergarten school. They were so excited to see us!!! We had 50 children and adults in attendance. We did a prayer walk around our house and dinner at the grille.

I do have to apologize that the posts are short and without photos. Not a lot of time to post but know that God is definitely at work doing great things that are not easily relayed through words.

This is the day The Lord has made

Today, we went to Connection which was Steven and Susan’s church here in Bruhl. Steven did the service both in German and in English. It was quite the experience to see all of God’s children worshiping Him no matter their nationality. We quickly grabbed McDonald’s for lunch and we were off to Cologne. We set up and then went to the service at the International Baptist Church. Again, it was incredible. All nationalities coming together to worship Christ. We were then dismissed for children’s church which is where we performed for the children. We performed an all English program and they loved it. They even sang “This Little Light of Mine.” We handed out bracelets. We have the afternoon off and are just relaxing. We will have dinner at the house tonight.

Time is flying by Fast!!!

Thursday, we had a very pleasant meeting with the Jetts at their home here in Bruhl. After telling them about each of us, they told us about them and their ministry here in Bruhl. It was awesome to hear how passionate they are about The Lord and their mission here. We then went to an awesome buffet where there were so many choices for food. During our afternoon, we prayer walked the town. Afterwards we went to the Jett’s church for a Fourth of July celebration. Several German young adults showed up and we interacted with them playing badminton, corn hole, and some other games. The church was decorated red, white, and blue with streamers and balloons. Believe it or not we even sang patriotic songs and had sparklers. We got to celebrate July Fourth in Germany! How cool is that!!!

Happy Birthday Taylor!!! This morning we had back to back performances at an elementary school. We were warned that Germans do not really interact to things like this nor would we get any kind of response. The very first song we did the kids were oohing and awing and clapping. The response was amazing and encouraging! While we could not physically see their faces, we could feel the excitement. In all the years I have spent as a puppeteer, I have never seen a group of kids request an encore. Today was the day!!! The kids wanted us to do another song, and guess what! We did another song on the fly!!! And they loved it. We had roughly 100 kids in the first performance and the second performance had 150 kids. And believe it or not, the adults loved it too!!! We had lunch at an beautiful park. We had great fellowship. We were then off to a second school for another performance. Here we had roughly about 60 kids here and they love it!!! We do have pictures here of the performances and the kids; however, we are not allowed to post the pictures. They have specifically requested that we not post them.

Saturday we will be in the market place for three hours doing six twenty minute programs. Please pray for those that are there and that seeds will be planted for The Lord. So far, everyone is doing great health wise. The weather is awesome as well!!!

Happy Fourth of July!!!!!!

Well we are on the road again this morning from Rothenburg. Once we got on the autobahn, it started raining. After all our sightseeing days of perfect weather, our travel day was filled with rain. Our God is Good!!! What a symbolic rain!!! Just as the ground needs refreshing so do our souls and that comes from Christ above!!! We stopped and ate lunch at a cute little cafeteria place called Marche. Once we finished, we were on the road again. We arrived in Bruhl around threeish and met up with Susan Jett. We took the rest of the afternoon to get settled into our house for the next few days. We had dinner at a little grill which was awesome and of course some grocery shopping!!!

Info regarding our time in Bruhl:
We have recently received our schedule for our time here in Bruhl, so I will give you a brief description of every day so that you know what we are doing!

Thursday, July 4th – Orientation with the Jetts, Prayer walk, July 4th Celebration
Friday, July 5th – two performances back to back at an elementary school, afternoon performance at another elementary school
Saturday, July 6th – Market performances from 11-2 with free time in the afternoon
Sunday, July 7th – Church, afternoon performance for Sunday school
Monday, July 8th – Morning performance at a school, afternoon performance at a school, prayer walk
Tuesday, July 9th – Morning performance, Sightseeing in Koln
Wednesday, July 10th – Morning performance at a school, Augustusburg Tour
Thursday, July 11th – Travel to Munich
Friday, July 12th – Fly to Atlanta, Bus home

Just so you know, we do not have WiFi at the house. I will certainly do my best to post when I can and update you when I can (hopefully every other day).

Prayer Requests – Pray that Satan stay far away from this team and all that God is doing through us being here in Germany. Pray for the schools that we will be in and that all will hear the message that we bring. Pray for continuation of good health and energy.

By the way: HAPPY JULY FOURTH!!!! (Sorry no pictures today.)

Rothenburg

Good morning!!! Yesterday morning we got up and out. Well kinda. There was a bank next to our hotel where we could exchange money which was really good for all of us. The only other place we have really been able to exchange money was at the airport with an extremely high exchange rate. The teller was very helpful and charged us all just one flat fee to exchange the money. Thankfully, Craig was with us to help figure out how to divide the money back out! Then we got on the road.
We stopped at a church called Wieskirche. It is just a small cathedral in the countryside. If you could imagine the Vatican church except smaller – that is what this church resembled. When we went in, the service had just began. While we did not understand a word that was said, we were able to experience a church service in another language!! Off a beaten path behind the church, you could see the Alps. I have attached some photos. And we were off..

Well we survived another day on the autobahn!! Today we really got to see what it was like as we had to travel on it for a while to get to Rothenburg!! We took a slight detour off the autobahn that landed us through some small towns that were awesome to see. Then we just happened to find a Burger King thanks to some helpful town citizens. And then we were off to Rothenburg again.

Upon arrival, we had to enter a gate to what one could assume was a fortress. Well, it kind of is. Rothenburg is surrounded by a wall. It is almost as if this town is straight out of a mid-evil story or movie. It is quite awesome to take in!! We unloaded our stuff and got it into our rooms. This hotel is so awesome! You should see the dining room that we get to eat breakfast in. It is like we are sitting down to eat with the king. I will try and post a picture of it either tonight or tomorrow. We then did quite a bit of shopping throughout the town. There are all these shops down the main street with one absolutely huge Christmas shop – Kathe Wohlfahrt. This store is what all Christmas stores have been modeled after. There were floors upon floors of Christmas stuff – nativities, ornaments, Santas, etc. It almost got overwhelming, but awesome nonetheless. We then had dinner at an amazing restaurant on the balcony across from a marvelous church. Madison and I split the dinner we had and I have attached a picture – it was steak, grilled vegetables, and fried potatoes. We splurged a little and got coke! 🙂 After this was our Night Watchman’s walk were we got to hear about the history of the town. It was hit by the bubonic plague. The town was saved thanks to the relationship of some German and American soldiers. We finished up the night with amazing ice cream!! 🙂

Today we head to Bruhl to meet the Jetts and get settled there. Will keep you updated as time and WiFi allow!!!

Please continue to pray for those that we may come in contact with for the glory of God’s kingdom!!!

Guten Morgen

Guten Morgen!!!
Will I sit in one of the cutest hotels in Oberammergau this morning writing to you!

Yesterday was another fabulous day! We left Salzburg and had an amazing drive through the countryside. It was quite spectacular. There is so much countryside to see and when you turn to the opposite side, there are these resilient mountains that will absolutely take your breath away. The towns we came across were so quaint and cute. We arrived at Neuschwanstein Castle about midday where we grabbed lunch really quick before our castle tour. Now, we had several different options to get up to the castle after lunch in time for our tour. Some of the group walked up to the castle while others took the horse and carriage up to the castle. This castle was built for King Ludwig II; however he only spent a total of 172 days over a period of three years before he died of mysterious causes. The castle was so detailed and well preserved. As a matter of fact, we could not take any photos or record within the walls. Of the photos I attached, you will see a yellow castle which was his father’s castle and what he modeled his own after.

Then we drove about an hour to Oberammergau. This town is most popular for the Passion Play that is done every ten years. Most of the buildings have fresco on them. I have a few pictures attached. We were able to shop some here just in time before they closed at 6. They have loads and loads of wood carvings. We have also managed to find nutcrackers as well as coo coo clocks! 🙂 We then walked around town looking for our restaurant to eat dinner. WOW! What an experience. Not only was the food amazing, but we were able to sit down and enjoy each other’s company. The weather was awesome all day, but at night it was so pleasant just to sit and enjoy. I am attaching a photo of what some of us had which was a five cheese platter. It was amazing. We closed our night reflecting on the past two days and an awesome devotion from Janet.

Today we head to Rothenburg ob der Tauber. We will be walking around the city and shopping and end the day with the Night Watchman Walk.

Thank you for your comments, and continued prayers and support.
Until next time….

The Hills are Alive with Sound of Music!!!

Guten tag from Salzburg, Austria!!! We have had a packed full two days. Let me start off saying that I don’t believe anything could have gone any smoother with our flight to our luggage to getting the vans any more than it did! Praise The Lord!! We had one of the coolest pilots on our flight that actually came and addressed all of those that were flying! Pretty cool I must say. Best landing I have ever experienced commercially! Customs was an absolute breeze!!! All luggage and trunks were successfully accounted for!! Vans arrived in perfect time and all of our stuff actually fits with some room to spare!!

We had a nice experience on the autobahn here! Ray and Charles are doing an excellent job navigating it! And I must say we have seen some speedy cars! 😉 We arrived in Salzburg at the Crowne Plaza just in time for lunch! We split up into groups to go to several cafes. We walked around Salzburg for the afternoon until our bus tour. Did you know that Mozart was born here? Also did you know that it is called Little Rome because of all the churches in the city? Pretty interesting stuff we learned on the bus tour. I will say I can now come to understand why the “Sound of Music” was filmed here. It touches almost every part of the town. We visited the garden and the steps where the kids sing “Do Rae Me” (sorry about spelling). We also visited the cemetery where the nazis come in looking for them. We ate dinner at a very authentic restaurant which was quite the cultural experience. And we completed our day with a cable car ride up the mountain to a castle overlooking the city while the sun was going down. Will most definitely take your breathe away. God is so very good!

I must say we have packed a good amount of sightseeing in to today. The weather has been amazing. Cool with a slight breeze and NO RAIN!!! Thank you Jesus!! Health wise everyone is doing well. We are all very tired and looking forward to a good night’s rest (including me). Tomorrow we visit the Neuschwanstein Castle and dinner in Oberammergau!!

Enjoy the photos and stay tuned….