Sunday, January 24, 2010
Quick tour of our place
I am finally getting around to posting some pics of our flat. We worked on weekends for about 3 months and this is the finished product! It is so cozy and cute now and we really love it. Learned how to renovate and decorate on a budget. And our couch folds out into a bed in case anyone wants to come visit!
Quiz Night for Mexico!
Casas por Cristo is an organization that builds homes along the US / Mexico border for families that do not have homes. In just four days, volunteer teams build a safe and secure home complete with cement foundation, electricity, windows, doors, drywall, and insulation. Casas por Cristo is driven by a desire to provide tangible expressions of God's love and provision. It is a ministry about bringing hope to families in need. GTCCF takes a group of volunteers to Juarez, Mexico to do a Casas build every spring break. This year, Canvas will be taking a group of volunteers to Juarez to build a home for a family in need. As you can imagine, this is a God-sized dream that will take lots of prayer and hard work.
The students of Canvas are planning events for the term to help raise money for the building materials that we will need to build a home in Juarez. The first Mexico event of the term was a charity quiz night at Canvas. On Thursday evenings at Canvas we serve free soup and bread and so last Thursday we served Chicken Tortilla Soup and hosted a quiz night to raise money for the Mexico trip.
"Pub quizzes" in England are very similar to team trivia nights at restaurants in the States. We had five rounds of questions, including one round of questions about Mexico. We even had a few interactive rounds where students built towers with marshmallows and spaghetti noodles. Overall, it was a great evening full of fun and competition. Here are some photos from the event:
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
The New Term
Students are back in Selly Oak and we are back in the swing of things at Canvas. We kicked things off last Tuesday night with a Reunion BBQ at Canvas. We served free coffee, tea, and cookies every morning last week to welcome the students back. It snowed, it rained, and it was cold, but it was fun! We went bowling on Wednesday night with some students and had Soup-Er Thursday like usual. It was a busy week as we said hi to friends we had not seen in a few weeks.
Tonight is our first regular Tuesday night of the term. We are serving quesadillas to promote our trip to Mexico. Quesadillas are a big hit here, everyone loves them. But who doesn't love a quesadilla? We are having a Quiz Nite on Thursday to help raise money for Casas por Cristo. I'll write another post on that later. We will have music, a talk, free food, and prayer for Haiti tonight at Canvas. It is going to be a great night!
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May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
-Romans 15:13
Tonight is our first regular Tuesday night of the term. We are serving quesadillas to promote our trip to Mexico. Quesadillas are a big hit here, everyone loves them. But who doesn't love a quesadilla? We are having a Quiz Nite on Thursday to help raise money for Casas por Cristo. I'll write another post on that later. We will have music, a talk, free food, and prayer for Haiti tonight at Canvas. It is going to be a great night!
---
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
-Romans 15:13
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Ryan's CD
One of our very good friends, Ryan Kiesshauer, just released his first album! We are so excited for him and so proud of his work. It is great and we think that you will like it too. Click here to visit his website to learn more. Well done, Ryan!
Sunday, January 3, 2010
London Visit
Our wonderful parents gave us some travel money for Christmas and so we decided to visit London. Neither of us had been there before, so we decided a four day trip would be great! We boarded a coach on the 27th at 6:30 in the morning and arrived in London at 9:30am. Here is the Cliff Notes version of our trip plus some pictures at the end:
On the first day we rode the tour bus around the city before lunch to see all the sights. I think it is about a two hour tour and there is a live guide who points out the majority of things that there are to see in London. So we bundled up and sat up top next to the tour guide and took lots of photos. We pretty much saw it all; Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, Downing Street, the Globe, Picadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square, and the list goes on. It was awesome! After lunch we spent a few hours in the National Gallery and we did the Top 30 audio tour. There are so many paintings there, you could spend days just in the National Gallery alone. We ended the evening with dinner at London's Hard Rock Cafe and bought some playing cards there as a souvenir. We collect playing cards from all the places we visit.
Day two began with a river cruise on the River Thames and it was a sunny, beautiful morning. We boarded the boat by the Tower of London and cruised up to Big Ben and back. It was fun to see the city from a different view point and we had front row seats in the boat! After lunch we walked the Tower Bridge and accidentally ran into some friends whom we met for dinner that night. So random and fun. Then we checked out Picadilly Circus and went to see Platform 9 and 3/4 at the King's Cross tube station. Then we went on a walking tour about Jack the Ripper. The guide was interesting and we learned a lot about Jack the Ripper and the murders of the late 1800s in London. We had dinner that night with Dina, Louise, and Ashley at Nando's and it was delicious.
On day three the rain began and it did not stop the rest of the trip. But that's London for you. We started the day off at the Tower of London and did the whole audio tour thing again. It was pretty interesting and we got to see the Crown Jewels which were incredible! After lunch we went to the Natural History Museum. We waited in the queue for an hour just to get inside the museum and it was so very crowded. The museum was pretty cool and there was more to see than we had time for, but we hope to go back sometime. We had dinner that night and then met up with our friend Krista at a pub who was visiting a friend in London.
On the last day we headed over to Buckingham Palace to see the changing of the guard and got there about an hour early to get a good spot. After about half and hour we were told that the changing of the guard was cancelled, so we were pretty bummed about that. We definitely want to see that at some point in the future. So instead got lunch and went shopping on Oxford Street. There are more shops and people there than I have ever seen in my life, it was crazy. We got a few things and souvenirs and had a good end to our trip.
We definitely want to go back and see a few more museums and maybe a play or the Globe. There is so much to do in London! We had an awesome trip, but it felt good to get home. :)
On the first day we rode the tour bus around the city before lunch to see all the sights. I think it is about a two hour tour and there is a live guide who points out the majority of things that there are to see in London. So we bundled up and sat up top next to the tour guide and took lots of photos. We pretty much saw it all; Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, Downing Street, the Globe, Picadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square, and the list goes on. It was awesome! After lunch we spent a few hours in the National Gallery and we did the Top 30 audio tour. There are so many paintings there, you could spend days just in the National Gallery alone. We ended the evening with dinner at London's Hard Rock Cafe and bought some playing cards there as a souvenir. We collect playing cards from all the places we visit.
Day two began with a river cruise on the River Thames and it was a sunny, beautiful morning. We boarded the boat by the Tower of London and cruised up to Big Ben and back. It was fun to see the city from a different view point and we had front row seats in the boat! After lunch we walked the Tower Bridge and accidentally ran into some friends whom we met for dinner that night. So random and fun. Then we checked out Picadilly Circus and went to see Platform 9 and 3/4 at the King's Cross tube station. Then we went on a walking tour about Jack the Ripper. The guide was interesting and we learned a lot about Jack the Ripper and the murders of the late 1800s in London. We had dinner that night with Dina, Louise, and Ashley at Nando's and it was delicious.
On day three the rain began and it did not stop the rest of the trip. But that's London for you. We started the day off at the Tower of London and did the whole audio tour thing again. It was pretty interesting and we got to see the Crown Jewels which were incredible! After lunch we went to the Natural History Museum. We waited in the queue for an hour just to get inside the museum and it was so very crowded. The museum was pretty cool and there was more to see than we had time for, but we hope to go back sometime. We had dinner that night and then met up with our friend Krista at a pub who was visiting a friend in London.
On the last day we headed over to Buckingham Palace to see the changing of the guard and got there about an hour early to get a good spot. After about half and hour we were told that the changing of the guard was cancelled, so we were pretty bummed about that. We definitely want to see that at some point in the future. So instead got lunch and went shopping on Oxford Street. There are more shops and people there than I have ever seen in my life, it was crazy. We got a few things and souvenirs and had a good end to our trip.
We definitely want to go back and see a few more museums and maybe a play or the Globe. There is so much to do in London! We had an awesome trip, but it felt good to get home. :)
Trying to stay warm on the tour bus
Hard Rock Cafe
On the cruise boat, Big Ben in the background
Platform 9 and 3/4!!
Natural History Museum
Buckingham Palace
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