We wish you a merry Christmas

Carolers at our Door

Every year, Hope of Life Church sends out nearly 3 dozen carolers to tour the city and sing sing sing!

This year, Emma led the way as one of our greatest turnouts yet sang to the families in our church as well as a few new families.

The tradition is: You let families know that you are coming and you ask if they would like you to stop by their place. If they say yes, you create a game plan and basically walk the entire city.

It's quite a bit of walking, so each house traditionally prepares something to eat and drink for all of the carolers. So, you sing at the door, one or two carols and then they invite you in for snacks. One lady this year served an entire meal. Our young people said that it was well worth it!

They were truly a blessing to each family, just as each family was a blessing to them.

Living Room

We just wanted to show you our living room, cause we really like our tree :)
Those drinks and snacks on the table were for the carolers that came later that night.

Philip's First Birthday

Emma and I are aunt and uncle for the first time. Her brother Ionut (which is Romanian for "Little John"; cool huh!) and his wife Oana (Joanna) had little Philip last year at this time.
We threw him a party at their house and he had a great time. He's a cutie!

Children's Christmas Outreach

For the first, but not the last, time in our Church's history, we
put on a large Christmas program and giveaway for the poor children of Targoviste, Moreni and Doicesti.

With the help of Mission Connection as well as a few local businesses we were able to
give nearly 500 gifts away.

Here are some of the guys from the church carrying gifts into the auditorium that Santa would later hand out to the kids.


In each of the 3 cities, local elementary schools and other local groups joined our effort and participated with songs, dances and dramas. Here is one children's class from Moreni singing their hearts out.




Above we see the Targoviste drama team putting on a skit involving Santa Claus, Superman and Jesus; the skit was about the 3 of them explaining their view on the true meaning of Christmas.

Below, Pastor Mihai and Adina Popescu hosted the event.

One local girl performed a traditional song and dance routine. It was quite an experience for me (Chad) since we don't have these type of traditions in the U.S.

Above is Estera (Emma's sister) and Chad. Estera was one of the 4 clowns in Targoviste. In each of the 3 cities there were different young people who volunteered to be clowns.

2 pictures up is Nikki hard at work. She organized the entire event and did a wonderful job, especially since she just found out she was pregnant.

3 pictures up: One of the 6 bicycles that was given away through a drawing. It was aweseome. One girl who won the bike has 5 brothers and sisters and none of them have a bike; they were so blessed.

We have snow!!

This is the view from right outside our apartment from our balcony.
The first picture is to the left and the second to the right. We live on the second floor.
We have a nice neighborhood with tons of kids who run around all day and who play on the playground in front of our block.
There is a general store right beneath our apartment, so when we need basic things like food, drinks or toiletries we just hang a bucket down the balcony with a list and some money. True story...

...Well, partly true; we don't have a bucket yet so we haven't tried lowering one down, but we only need to take 3 steps and we're in the store. Pretty convenient!

EMMA IS PREGNANT!!!

Most of you probably have heard, but for those who haven’t, we are having a baby!! Emma’s due date is June 13th and she is already starting to show. We will have the baby here in Romania at a clinic in Bucharest. Please pray with us for a healthy baby.

On the Spot Baby Shower

Since we waited until we arrived in the states to tell everybody that Emma is pregnant, nobody had any time to plan a baby shower for her. But our wonderful Aunt Nancy and Grammy didn’t let that stop them as they quickly rallied their troops together and threw us an on the spot shower. Emma is holding an outfit that says “I love mommy”

10 Year High School Reunion

This year, Emma and I not only returned home for Thanksgiving, but for my 10 year reunion as well. Thanks be to God that my best friends from high school are still my best friends today and all Christians. we all met and attended the reunion together and had a great time

New Hope Group

This is Marius Lunguleasa, one of our church’s newest Hope Group leaders. He is doing a great job with his guys; last month we spent the day in the mountains with the guys and had a great time.

Our Nephew “Filip”

My very first nephew just celebrated his 1st birthday before Emma and I left for the states. He is healthy and almost walking; we had a great time with the entire family at Ionut and Oana’s house just outside of Targoviste.

Sunday School

I, (Chad) have started teaching this year in Romanian and am really enjoying it. Emma and I teach each Sunday morning.