Bella Sicilia

 

A Night Out

We had to deliver a stove to a country house for some friends of the church.  After we finished we took a night off and went to a small coastal town for a walk and some dinner.   The town was having a festival so there were lights up in the square.  We found a small seafood restaurant that overlooked the harbor and boardwalk area.   There was also an “unofficial” street market set up on the boardwalk.   The wares ranged from jewelry to furniture.  We enjoyed our dinner and the fellowship.  It was a nice break and a beautiful night.

Picnic at Piana

We had a picnic with the youth as one of our final outings.  A family in the Palermo church has land out in the country near a lake so we grilled out.  It was a beautiful day and we saw all across the valley on the drive up.  We took a bbq spice mix sent to us by our pastor and fixed chicken for everyone.   We enjoyed food, fellowship, and a nap in the warm sun.  We had a time of sharing and prayer and looked back on a wonderful year.   It was hard knowing that this was the last time in a long time we would see some of these friends.   The photos include: BBQ chicken, chowing down, a WWII era bunker, with friends, and the mountains overlooking the lake.

  

Pirati Fanuloni (Settimana Felice #2)

Two weeks before we left Italy we went to Bari to help with VBS there.   We did a Veggietales theme using the Pirates Who Don’t Do Anything.  We left Sicily and had to take the traghetto (ferry) to the mainland.   After 7 hours and some very frustrating traffic delays we finally arrived in Bari and stayed at a missionary’s house that was on furlough.   We had to be at the church early the next morning to welcome the kids.  We only had 8 kids, but at times it felt like 18.  We had a great time.  Shawn taught the middle school class, I helped him and also with the English lessons and craft time.  The kids had a great time, especially with game time.  They were fascinated by the frisbee.  It was close to 100 degrees several of the days so we had water games planned for most of the week.  Unfortunately, one day they would not listen and we had to cut the game times short.  The next day went much better.  We spent each day on  a different Bible story that reflected our theme.  Thursday, the kids got to watch the Veggitales movie, and then had to answer questions about the theme and characters.  The final program culminated with the kids explaining what they learned over the course of the week and singing songs, including one in English.  There was also a short gospel presentation given by one of the local church members.  After the program a local specialty, foccacia and gelato were served as snacks.  It was a very busy week, but we enjoyed the time with local believers and the kids.   We also had the opportunity to work with some friends from the US.  He was a former missionary kid in Sicily, and this was the first time his wife had been to Italy.  We were tired at the end, but glad to be able to assist the church in Bari in this outreach.

 

         

Construction

There was one thing I said I would never do again, work on a construction project and pack for a big move.  Well……you should never say “never”.    We recently moved into a new location for our church  and needed to partition off some walls to make a Sunday school room and kitchen area.   This was about a month before we were to return to the US.  We had some help from the men at church, but since most of them worked during the morning hours, I became the help in hanging some of the drywall and mudding the seams and holes made by the screws. It was hot, dirty work, but it was very satisfying to see the job finished so that all the men of the church had to do was paint.   The pictures show the framing that all the way up to the end prior to painting.   We even had some help from the youth group in Palermo also. 

We spent the 4th of July in old town Palermo with some friends. We had crepes, stighioli, and sausages. As we sat at the table there was a hungry stray dog that was very interested in our feast. The owner of the snack stand tossed him a piece of chicken, to keep him away from the eating area. After that we saw a church that some friends had gotten married in, that the roof had been bombed out in WWII. We finally decided to stop for gelato and granita, since it was a rather warm night.