Easter Playgroup

Isaac and I (Steph) recently started attending a play group of between 5 and 10 women and their children on Tuesday mornings.  Isaac has loved this despite the fact that most of the children are younger than him, and I have really enjoyed getting to know other mom's in the area.  

One of my friends that also attends the play group decided she was going to host the week of Easter.  After we talked about it, we decided that we would do an Easter party for all the kids.  We thought this would be a great and non-threatening way to share the true meaning behind Easter with a few of the women that are not believers.  

We put together a project (hand print lamb cards), we dyed Easter eggs (always challenging when the eggs your dying are brown :)), an egg hunt, along with a time to read an Easter story and present the true meaning. 

We got to send a little goodie bag home with each of the children and we attached the Easter story and Gospel to a bag of jelly beans.  
We had such a wonderful time and had a fabulous turn out with 15 kids and all the mommy's that accompanied them!!  

Below are a few pictures from our party along with the attachments we got to send home with jelly beans!

LITTLE JELLY BEAN

Little jelly beans, tell a story true
A tale of our Father’s love –

Just for you and me.

Green is for the waving palms
Red is for His precious blood
Black is for the sin He washed from your soul and mine
White is for our hearts now clean from sin
Purple’s for the sadness of His family and friends
And Yellow is for the glory of the day He rose again.

Now you’ve heard the story,
you know what each color means.
The story of our Father’s love told by some jelly beans.
So every morning take a bean,
they’re really very yummy.
Something for the soul, you see,
and something for the tummy.

The Jelly Bean Gospel

In the beginning was God (white jelly bean).  God created everything, including Adam & Eve.  Adam & Eve disobeyed God, & brought sin into the world (black jelly bean).  Sin separates & keeps us away from God.  But God loves us so much that He wanted us back.  He sent Jesus to live & die for us (red jelly bean).  Jesus was crucified, buried in a tomb, & everyone thought that was the end of the story.  But on Easter Sunday morning (yellow jelly bean), Jesus rose from the dead.  He was alive again (green jelly bean)!  Jesus died for us so that we could have our sins forgiven & be a part of God's family (purple jelly bean).   We can be happy (pink jelly bean) because of what Jesus did for us.   "Orange" you glad that Jesus loves you! 

Our Big News!

Roses are red

Violets are blue

We have one kid

But soon we'll have TWO

(This is the fun poem we posted on Facebook!)  

We are expecting!!!  Our due date is September 18th.  

We are so excited and are looking forward to keeping everyone updated on our baby's progress!!  

Mae Sot

In January we had the privilege of joining Karla Tillapaugh and her LightBridge team on a trip to an orphanage they support in Mae Sot.  Mae Sot is about a 5-6 hour drive from Chiang Mai near the Burma/Myanmar border.  This particular orphanage is located in a Karen (A Burmese People Group) Refugee camp just outside of Mae Sot.  There are roughly 7-10 refugee camps on the border there and about 50,000 people in this one camp alone.  

We spent 2 days at the orphanage, playing with the kids, helping to rebuild/repair a wall to their home, and eating amazing food that they cooked for us both days!  Isaac loved playing with the other kids.  They played soccer, marbles, chase, made crafts together, and Isaac even went for a swim in the river behind the orphanage. 

We had a wonderful time visiting Mae Sot.  We felt such a draw to the Karen people, they are so warm and welcoming!

New Year's in Bangkok

After Christmas we drove down to Bangkok to celebrate the New Year.  It was an eight hour drive from Chiang Mai.  We stayed at one of our company guest houses which was close to all the malls and restaurants.  Since traffic can be horrible in Bangkok, we took the skytrain and public buses.  Isaac loves trains and he rode plenty of them while we were in Bangkok.

Hanging out the window of the Bus to give a traffic report

Our first day in Bangkok we visited the Grand Palace which has been the official residence of the Kings of Siam since 1782.

Where is Jake the Pirate?

We spent a lot of our time at the malls in Bangkok.  They are a destination in themselves.  We even went to our first Ikea.

They had our favorite...cake batter with strawberries!
We really need Cold Stone in Chiang Mai!

New Year's eve we went to Hard Rock for dinner and then to Central World Mall for the countdown.  This is compared to Times Square being one of the largest celebrations in Southeast Asia.  There were a few hundred thousand other people at this location for the countdown and fireworks.  Luckily we were within walking distance of the guesthouse or I don't know how we would have made it back.

Chiang Mai Christmas

We prepared ourselves for a difficult Christmas away from home and family.  We had never spent Christmas away from home.  Every year we had the same traditions that we loved doing.  

We thank God that He provided new friends, gifts, delicious food, a home, and family to celebrate the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ.  

We had never hosted Christmas Eve when we were at home.  This year we had our friends over for dinner and a gift exchange.  During dinner some of our other friends came by caroling as they made their way through the neighborhood.  

Christmas morning included the tradition of opening gifts in our stockings.  

We spent the morning and afternoon at home enjoying food and family.  When we lived in Colorado, Nate's mom had the tradition of making a baby Jesus birthday cake.  We continued that tradition for breakfast.  Steph is an incredible cook but she had never cooked a turkey before.  We splurged and bought the cheapest turkey in Chiang Mai ($40) and Steph cooked it to perfection.  She made a wonderful Christmas dinner!!

Christmas morning is Christmas Eve evening in the states.  Our family had sent us gifts and we had sent them gifts.  Through Skype we were able to watch each other open presents.

Skyping Nate's family

Steph's sister lives in Australia so we were skyping 
from 3 different continents

Christmas evening we went to our neighbors house where many of our friends gathered.  We had a wonderful Christmas, much better than we had expected.  

Christmas at the office

Our office is located on the same property as a tribal children's home.  Children from the hill tribes around Chiang Mai live there away from their families so they can go to school.  Every year our office has a Christmas party for them and gives them gifts.  Isaac loved handing out the gifts and watching the children open them. 

Isaac getting ready to hand out a gift

Handing out a gift

Enjoying all the toys