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| Caleb and my parents |
For a few days last week, I had my parents and younger brother, Caleb, come and visit me at the Herdershof during their short visit from South Africa. They only had about ten days in the Netherlands (with a lot to do and many people to see). The shortness of their trip was down to my brother's short Easter holiday. They spent two days in Paris with Hannah, my sister, and then on Easter Sunday they picked me up from my good friends, Theo and Judith Mos. Before I get carried away with my parents' visit, I'll start with seeing Theo and Judith.
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| Theo, Judith and me |
Easter Weekend
On Good Friday, after a short service at Youth With A Mission YWAM Heidebeek, I traveled to over to Rotterdam to see Theo and Judith for the weekend. Theo and I did our Discipleship Training School DTS together in September 2012. We also went to Brazil on outreach together it was during that outreach that I started calling him one of my best friends and to some degree, my older brother. I flew over from England for his wedding a year and a half ago, having told him that I'd go to his wedding, no matter how far away I was. It's always a lot of fun being with Theo and Judith. They've called me the bringer of holidays, as we always end up taking time off to have fun together doing some crazy stuff (like with the selfie of us all wearing hats). We had a lot of good conversations. Judith is a clarinetist and I got to hear her place on Friday evening, which was incredible. Since my last visit in July 2015 Theo joined a running group and took me with him on Saturday. I happily introduced myself to people, when they asked, as Theo's sort of younger sister. When I was in Rotterdam I also got to see my grandmother. When my father collected me from Theo and Judith's, we made the short journey to the nursing home my grandmother now lives in. She's moved from the assisted living wing to the full care unit and its really hard seeing her the way she is now. After collecting my mum, from some friends, we drove down to Herdershof together. I then spent Sunday evening, Monday and most of Tuesday with my parents, as Caleb didn't arrive until Tuesday evening. He was doing some work experience with some friends of my parents, who they met in Hoedspruit, South Africa.
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| Caleb and me |
My Family At Herdershof!
When my parents were here, we spent a lot of time together talking through a number of different topics and spending quality time together, mostly at Herdershof, but we did go a few walks into the forest and into Epe to do some things together. I haven't seen my parents and brother since they left Holland in July 2015, so about nine months ago. I'm not sure when I'll see them again as I'm still not totally sure what my plans are in September... but more on that later on this year.
Another Move
My parents left on Wednesday morning and on Friday afternoon I moved upstairs. I've spent the last month in one of the guestrooms at Herdershof. However, on Friday one of the staff living upstairs moved out. This young woman is getting married in a few months time and has moved into the apartment ahead of her wedding in June. So on Friday I was given the afternoon off to move all my stuff upstairs into my new room. I'm not totally settled in yet. I keep loosing things, misplacing things or forgetting where I put things. It should take a few days to find my feet upstairs. I'll post a photo or two once my room is looking completely presentable, as its still looking a bit unorganized due to me still finding places for everything. My new room is smaller than the guest room I was in. The guestroom had two bunk beds and a wardrobe, my new room is only wide enough for a single bed and a wardrobe, side by side.
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| The View From My New Room |
In Other News
Things are picking up in the GO Teams office. Applications are still coming in for the different teams that we're sending out in July. Whilst I'm on the topic of base activities I'd like to mention that there's the Open House on 5 May. If you're in the Netherlands you're more than welcome to come for the day. There's more information, details, address, etc, on YWAM Heidebeek's website (http://ywamheidebeek.org/open-huis/). Over the last week we've had two new courses start. The Bible for Life started last week, at the end of March, which is a three month bible course, which the Bible Studies Department is pioneering (the website is http://ywamheidebeek.org/bible-for-life/). The other course that started is the Generations DTS, which began on Saturday. The Generations DTS is mainly for families and married couples, with a few singles joining as well. This DTS is a month shorter than the other DTS's run at Heidebeek, with the outreach being two months rather than three, so that it can fit into the Dutch education system's long summer holiday (website: http://ywamheidebeek.org/generations-dts/). So we've got a sudden flood of new faces and young children. The worship hall was quite empty last week, as the Mercy & Justice DTS were in the middle of their team building and preparations for outreach, but this morning it was packed full with people overflowing into the corridor. It was exciting.