Lorraine writes- Not been an easy two weeks, settling in; the lack of power and even the snow this week has caused me no end of stress!!! I have to keep remembering that we are on Gods path and here is where He wants us! I have enjoyed being with the staff and kids in the Kindergarten. In some ways they are streets ahead of those kids I left behind in Bournemouth, with manners and the way they play, but yet they are behind in so many other areas. Life is so simple here; I'm learning to take it slow and to chill more.

Chris writes: this weekend the snow came! Waking on Saturday morning it was quite a beautiful sight - of course it is not without its problems - but over here they just seem to shrug it off. It is unlike anything i have seen for a long time. In UK we just brush it off the path or it turns to sludge. Over here by today it was hard work to remove it from the path - guess that is another lesson i just learned! The power has been erratic as usual as well - usually three hours on and three off - on Saturday night we had no power at all so had to put one of the generators on for a bit just to keep the food frozen on Sunday morning before church just as i was clearing the drive of ice! Some of the young guys helped me. Welcome to Kosova! All that aside things are going pretty well apart from still hanging onto a cold. Dave and Cindy have been great and we are getting to know the local staff that we will manage. Getting to know where everything is and how it works and what switch must be where and when! How to get to this place or that - driving in a strange way (so says Lorraine as well!) Coping with the lack of TV and just watching Dvds which of course we get to control! The weekend was good went to church on Saturday and Sunday!! On Sunday after we went out for lunch with a friend and his wife and then visited some families we know - they were bowled over to see us - what a welcome! So all in all a good two weeks - Someone out there must be praying! They are being heard - thankyou!!

Chris writes: it is hard to imagine but we have actually been here over a week now and are starting to settle in and find our feet. I have managed to cope with the design fault on thier cars and am managing to stay on the wrong side of the road - most of the time! Dave and Cindy have been great at not putting any presssure on us and letting us find our feet. The weekend was good - took Raine for a brunch on Saturday for a sumona at a bakery in Gjkova - after almost two years the guy remembered my name! I felt qiute guilty at forgetting his! This life is soooo relaxed!! After a relaxed shopping trip we went to see the new managers at the Smile centre in Gjk. They started earlier this year and have similar testimonies to us. On Sunday we went to one of our home churches here in Kosova - as we start finding a regular place to worship and fellowship. This week has been hard as i have had a cold (touch of man-flu!). Must admit as i was wallowing in my self pity i felt it is never easy being ill away from home - then i remembered we don't have a home back in UK - this is our home! Home is where the heart is here in Kosova with Raine - maybe it sounds strange but that is giving me a strength - Krushe Vogel is our new home!! Had an awful night last night not much sleep at all - after praying eventually got some sleep and woke up and have felt loads better! Why is that a surprise! Day could end well as Raine has been cooking!!

Chris writes: has been a fantastic day - Praise God!! really felt some sort of a connection with the children and doing some useful (i think!) work. Playing with and dancing to some Albanian music with the children this morning - drove one of the autos (cannot say 'car' in Albanian! Look it up!) this morning - sadly as we all know, they have a design fault and they put the drivers seat on the left side so you have to use the stick with your right hand which takes some getting used to; then doing some gardening which everyone said looks good and had a kick around with some of the older children who also helped and encouraged with the gardening - this was a great opportunity to build relationships with them. After supper came down to earth with a bump while chatting with Cindy telling about how the people just don't respect the place or the work that has been done and how they have recently actually trashed the place while everyone was away - she said this really is about longhaul and we should not expect to see any quick results! Oh well - never mind.......keep trusting!!

Chris writes: Well our adventure continues and we are actually living in Kosova now! We had a good flight which was odd after we had just been stung for £70 by BA for what they called excess luggage!! We measured our carry-on bags beforehand and they fitted the measurements on their website ....and so on......anyhow to be fair we did have two holdalls and i was carrying/wearing the other half of my suitcase so i guess it was a fair cop! We arrived at the airport to beautiful sunshine - it was pouring when we left UK - ha ha God has a sense of humour and knew we needed a gentle introduction! We where met by Dave and Cindy - our bosses who are also giving us a gentle introduction! It really is a case of information overload at the mo. trying to learn the peoples/childrens names/what our roles are/besides the language is just too much - i really would benefit from an extra hard drive to plug into - so if anyone has any ideas!! I must admit i am not sure that any amount of cross cultural training would have prepared us for this - the CC is currently the easy bit! Please pray that both us and the people we serve will have enough grace until things start to kick in!!

Chris writes: it is hard to imagine but almost three months to the day we now stand just hours away from the next part of our Kosovan Adventure and actually starting a new life in the country we feel God has called us to. Emotions are a mixture of excitement, tiredness over the lack of sleep and just a desire to just get on with the next stage in our adventure! We end our UK tour in Kent and over the last week or so our final distance travelled was just about 900 miles. We are seeking a good home for our faithful car and have several interested! Our only outstanding issues are with our two mobile phone contracts which unfortunately run until the end of July - the call charges in Kosova prevent us taking them with us - so they shall remain behind in the UK waiting for new users! We have now just about completed the packing for the upteenth time and have even managed to offload a few more of our clothes! We even spent part of last night with my computer genius brother-in-law setting up new accounts on our computer: Skype, MSM and so on are all forms of communication now available to us!

Chris writes: 800 miles and two tired and weary travellers later we arrrive back on the south Coast of England! Over the weekend we visited some of our family/friends in the north of England/Wales. As imagined this was an emotional time saying goodbye to these people and the uncertianty of when we will be seeing them again remains - but thanks to the medium of the internet and Skype.....The weekend was particularly encouraging as we visited one church in Skipton - where they were actually talking and praying about Kosova!! This was great to be able to recieve further support and encouragement from some people we had never met before - the priveledge and opportunity to serve in Kosova made me feel honoured that we were able to go in this way. We are now in Worthing making the final preparations and visiting Family and friends before we leave next week - the time feels like it is racing by and the jobs that we still need to do seem to be mounting up! lol xx