Incredible Debrief - Leaving Bacharach, Deutschland in 4 hours...

Hey everyone - just a quick note to let you know we will begin our journey to Madison in a few short hours.  It is currently 12:38am in Germany (5:38pm in Madison) and leave our quaint debrief village on the Rhine around 5am, drive 40 min back to Frankfurt, and depart our connecting flights (after a 1-day layover here) to Dusseldorf and O'hare at 8:55am.  After a two hour layover in Dusseldorf, we should be back to O'hare by 2pm and in Madison by 6pm.

I can't enough about how amazing our last few days in Craiova were with our beloved Romanian brothers and sisters.  We found Bacharach to be the ideal the setting for a debrief experience.  In addition to being in a beautiful little village (oldest houses dating back to the 1300's and a church that was first built in 1100), we found so many great places (castles, mountaintops, vineyards, and cobblestone villages) to process, share, pray, and prepare ourselves for our return to the States.  Even though we've only been here just over 24 hours, we feel God has blessed us with a significant opportunity here.

We'll do our very best to have someone write up a better account in Frankfurt tomorrow AM. We're sorry we didn't post more while here, but we were without wifi and didn't have much time either.  We are SO THANKFUL for your prayers, support, and love for us.  It is clearly felt though we are thousands of miles away.  See you soon!

-Lief for the team (now finally to hit the hay! - Noapte Buna, Schalfen Sie Gut!)

Even More Retreat Photos

 All the Women on the Retreat with our Colorful Scarves

Brendusa (a brand new believer!) and Karen 

 The Brady Ladies and the Oae Sisters

 Fabulous Leaders from Romania - Martha & Mimi

 Ema Mihut - dressed in Traditional Romanian Costume

 Emily and our Youngest Retreat Participant

The Team and the Town Namesake - Hercules 

 Our Beautiful Retreat Speakers - Barb & Jacquie

Sassy Saiza and Bar-bah-rah 

 The Finished Products of the Crafting

 Rodica and her beautiful daughter, Breana

April, Romanian Youth Leader Claudia, Emily



Retreat Photos

Romanian's planting their fields

Diane with her host Anca

Francine Speaking

Jacquie's Amazing Greeting Card Craft Table

One of the many gypsy houses

More retreat deatails

Hi everyone! Finally we have some time to fill you in on some more details of the retreat.  First, here is a bit of history and Romanian culture.  The woman in Romania are not used to anyone serving them.  Their roles as wife, mother, daughter are full of work along with taking care of the house and family.  Communism only ended 22 years ago and woman's roles here are still very oppressed for American standards. These women have never been to a retreat and the majority of the women have never ever been away from their family.  Their husbands count on them for everything, so it was good that some gave permission for their wives to come. We left Friday am at 10:30 on a coach bus, drove through the countryside about 3 hours until we got to Herculane (home of Hercules).  We passed by many fields of families working and planting their fields. It looked like farming 100 years ago with no machinery, horse and plow and many people bent over planting.  We also passed by gypsy villages full of elaborate houses with tall spiraled towers. We got to the retreat and waiting for the women in their rooms were the "joy" bags we made for them filled with gifts, a scarf, soaps, journals, colorful folders and candy. They were all so surprised and felt so special to receive this. We started out with a group meeting with singing, introductions and Barb introducing our retreat topic of "garden friendships," who are the people who walk beside you in life when you can't walk anymore.  Diane shared and then free time to relax, get to know each other.  Saturday a.m. during the meeting Jacquie continued our teaching on friendship and how God uses people in our lives to display His comfort.  Free time in the late morning and afternoon were filled with card making, stamping, exercise room, sauna, or walking outside in the beautiful mountain air. The day continued with another session from Jacquie which included the plan of salvation, and how these women could have a personal relationship with Jesus.  Francine and April also shared their journeys through life with Christ. The women were very touched by their authenticity. This followed by free time of hand massages, manicures, more card making and a photo booth for them to take pictures with their favorite friend.  We had a talent show and ended off the evening with the movie, "The Blindside" with Romania subtitles.  Many deep spiritual conversations and questions were answered.  Sunday morning we ended the time with Barb speaking and Pat sharing her journey, along with a sharing time for the Romanian women. They were all so thankful for the time away and felt refreshed and energized.  One of the desires of the leadership team here in Romania was to have all the ages of women together worshiping, sharing wisdom and learning from each other.  The women all felt united and it didn't matter what age they were.  Some of the written comments from them were, " I savored the time like a coffee", " I felt loved and it was real", " My heart and mind are full of thoughts and wonderful things because I had the privilege to know what evangelicals are in my soul and I discovered that my soul has room for much love.", "Happiness of sisters from America and their openness of talking about everything.", " I felt spoiled by the Lord, felt closer to the Lord".

Salud!

A peak into the Retreat Talent Show

Enjoy this video of Karen & Irina with their entry into the Women's Retreat Sat night talent show. More pictures and stories to come!

Retreat a huge success!!!

Praise the Lord! What an amazing experience with 50 beautiful Romanian women!  The Lord blessed us with a safe bus ride,  great hotel,  tasty food and lots of laughter and fun between the  US and Romanian women.  But most importantly the retreat allowed all of us to grow in understanding of God's plan for our relationships with Him and each other.  The women are already looking forward to the next retreat.  Photos and more details will be coming tomorrow, Tues.   We were treated to a Romanian barbeque with our host families at the church this evening.  What fun!  Thanks for the prayers!

Blog Settings Changed - COMMENT away! :)

Hey everyone! Lief here - just off the phone with Emily and the other women from the retreat.  It sounds like they are off to a great start!  The men had a night of bowling, Romania's Got Talent, Catch Phrase, and homemade traditional "Mamaliga!" (see pic below)

We just realized that our blog settings have not allowed you to post comments to our blog without "signing-in."  Since many of you do not have accounts, and we have heard this was keeping some family, friends, and supporters from commenting on the blog posts, we've changed the settings to allow anybody to post comments easily. So, if you have a chance, please let us know you're reading the blog by dropping a quick comment on the blog for us! We read these posts every day at our meetings and they are a huge encouragement to us and remind us that we are connected to a vast network of people who love us and are praying for this trip and weekend retreat!  Thank you so much for your partnership in this.  We serve a great God.

The picture from the men at home for the weekend:

Pictures

Getting on the bus! 

 A tributary to the blue (green) Danube

Working in the fields 

Arrival 

Decorating with paper flowers 

 Our paper flowers with Mimi talking and Stella translating

 A small group

Our team

The Retreat is Underway

We loaded the buses at 10:30 am took the 3.5 hour drive along the blue Danube. We saw Serbia on the other side of the river. We got to see a good amount of the country side, including lots of houses and farms. It was a nice day today, so there were lots of people out working in the fields. We arrived at our retreat spot, a very nice hotel called the Golden Spirit Hotel in Herculane, the home of Hercules. It is in an area with lots of mineral baths and beautiful countryside in the mountains. About 50 Romanian women are here at the retreat, of all different ages, some believers and others who have not heard the Gospel. Barb gave tonight's first message on relationships with a theme of garden friends (a true friend cultivated by love and time who walks beside us through all that life brings). Diane shared her testimony about a good friend Brenda, who is her garden friend. We broke up into small groups which resulted in lots of discussion and laughter. Translation is going well, thanks to many Romanians who speak very good English, unlike the rest of us who cannot speak a lick of Romanian.

More pics from teen pizza party

                                                ping pong champs

                                                       Orthodox Church in Craiova

Pizza Party with the Youth

Last night was a blast, we had an extra treat to be able to join in on the church's youth pizza party.  There were about 30 youth ranging in age from 16-30. We had Romanian pizza with eggs and corn and no tomatoe sauce.  We had to add ketchup, spicy or mild on after if we wanted.  Actually it was really good.  Watch out Dominoes!!  It was fun meeting all the youth that are involved with the summer camp ministry with Blackhawk.  They all send a big ,"Buna Ziua" to all the youth back home, especially Nate since they have now met his mom. We spent today finishing preparations for leaving for our retreat tomorrow morning. We are so excited to minister and serve these women.  More to come!! We are all doing great and staying healthy. Love you all  and miss you!!!!

                                 Karen teaching finances with a Biblical perspective and translated by Rich

                                                             Karen excited to share

Financial Seminar

Last night was the first of two financial seminars. We had a full, diverse crowd of Romanians, who took a lot of notes and asked a lot of questions. Karen led the night with Rich translating. The average monthly income of a Romanian is between $300-$500 per month. Stand alone home ownership is not common. Most people live in small apartments that they own. An average apartment costs $60,000. They are all looking forward to the next seminar on Tuesday, when they will come back with worksheets completed and have a chance to ask questions.

Random photos from Romania

Arc of Triumph in Bucharest

                                             Norika host of Barb and Francine

                                                               Vali Emi Liefi and Lavi

                                                           Pat and Irina

                                                    Pastor Rich and the Romania women's team

meeting in the church with the Romania leaders

Rainy day in Craiova

Even though it has been a rainy day here it hasn't put a damper on our preparations.  We have split up and gone our separate ways to get things done.  Pat and Diane were able to visit the orphanage for disabled children.  It was an amazing experience.  They toured the facility, met the Dr. in charge, the staff and of course the children.  The children were all moderately to severely disabled but well taken care of. Diane was able to meet with two of the physical therapists and was pleasantly surprised when they asked her to help them with their therapy times with a few of the children to share therapy ideas and techniques.  They also want her to come back next week. Lief, Emily, Larry and some of the Romania leadership went up to the mountains to check out a potential summer camp for the Blackhawk youth mission trip. Barb and Francine's host took them on a tour of one of Europe's largest natural parks, and then came back to the church to pray and work on retreat materials.  Jacquie and Karen held down the fort at the church and prepared for the retreat.  Tonight as  I write Karen and Francine are presenting the first of two financial seminars.  A good sized, diverse group came.  We are all really enjoying staying in Romania homes and getting a real taste of the culture, language and life here. Will post more photos soon.  Take care, love you all!

Pictures!

Getting ready to pack in the sardines for our 8 hour flight!

At the Romania Airport with all of our luggage and part of the Romanian team.

Toni and Sorin came to Madison last year at this time and stayed at Diane's home. Now, Sorin and Toni are hosting Diane!

We Are Here!

After 24 hours of travel by plane, bus, taxi, and train we arrived in Craiova, Romania for dinner. We were greeted at the train station with flowers and banners along with lots of hugs :) After a most delicious meal of fresh chicken and potatoes (so, so good), we were off to our host families for a full night's rest. We are staying with Romanian families in groups of two. Many of them have sacrificed their own beds for us to sleep on.

Today we are continuing to get acclimated and beginning to plan for our financial training class tomorrow night and the woman's retreat this weekend.

We will try to post pictures later today!

The excitement is building!

Dear Family and Friends,

Over the past six months we have planned and prepared for something that was only a dream before that. Our small team of ten people has spent many hours, many hours, working to prepare for this venture. We realize that we can dream, make our plans, and set our course of action but only God knows what He wants accomplished, what is needed, and what lies ahead for us. Hopefully we have been sensitive to His leading so that we are bringing with us what is needed to accomplish His will. Personally, I know that I will be bringing a heart overflowing with love for the Romanian people. And, a heart eager to share this experience with some of the best teammates ever!! We have prayed and prepared... we are ready and eager to see His plan revealed. Thank you for your love and support. We truly feel that you are journeying along with us. We will try to be faithful in keeping this blog up to date. Please check in frequently. And, of course, we would enjoying hearing comments from you.

Pat

Packing Party

We have packed the bags, (almost all of them) and are excited to be on our way. We will try to post daily once we leave so keep your computers ready! Thank you all for your prayers and financial support, without you this trip would not be possible.  We love you all!

Team Preparations Underway!

The Romania Women's Retreat Team from Blackhawk Church is busy with preparations for their upcoming trip! The team leaves Saturday, March 26, 2011 for Craiova, Romania.

Be sure to check back often for updates from the team!