A week of Celebrations!

It's been a full week of celebrations this week. It all started last weekend with Obi's 6th birthday (which is actually the 13th). He had one friend stay overnight on Friday. The kids all had a great time. They built airplanes, watched The Shaggy Dog, and built a gingerbread house in the morning with Daddy. I was exhausted after all that :)

The gang getting ready to decorate the house

The finished product...great job Daddy ;)

Then Saturday night we had our first "Kingsfield Common". This is the name given to the gathering that will occur every 3 months or so between our new church (Kingsfield Clinton) and our 'mother' church (Zurich Mennonite). We gather to share stories of what God is doing in our churches, to reconnect with the larger group and to celebrate. It was really great. I am so thrilled at how God is growing us all so much (not in physical numbers, but in our relationships with eachother and with Him). Now we are turning our focus outwards as we research different local missions that we can partner with so we can really start to help our community in practical ways...to be the servants God has called us to be. I can't wait!

We have also decided to sponsor Rachel Sticklee, who runs the art co-op called "La Tienda" in the Dominican that I've mentioned on here before. Check out her site at: www.latienda.moonfruit.com to find out how you can support this amazing ministry which gives women a means of supporting themselves and their children through creating beautiful jewellery and selling it here in North America. You can even host your own home parties and sell these beautiful products and help these incredible women.

Sunday at Kingsfield Clinton we celebrated Obi's birthday. It was neat to be able to celebrate his birthday with our larger church 'family'. I am so thrilled by how God has developed so much intimacy & closeness between the families that come here...we truly all feel like 'family'. It's beautiful!! Here are some pics of the celebration:

Obi blowing out the candles...I love Lyric in the backround with her tongue out 'helping him' :)

Obi had the joy of licking the feet of the dino that had been buried in the icing. Wow, that's way better than just licking candles!

Wednesday Joel and I celebrated our anniversary (as I posted about before) and we had a wonderful dinner at a local restaurant.

Today (Saturday) we celebrated sweet Simon's birthday (which was actually on Wednesday... the same day as our anniversary). I had the honour of being a part of his birth story and I'm so thrilled to be a part of his life in such an awesome way now, as he and his family are a part of our church family now, and I'm his honorary "Auntie Mel".

Simon's first taste of his gorgeous cake: Simon Before

Simon after: wow, that took a lot out of him :) He was such a delight to watch diving into that cake with both fists

And of course Katie the dog was more than willing to help clean him up afterwards :)

Wow, what a wonderful & full week.

Mel