Baking without, youth group and celebrating holidays...

Last night, for the first time, i feel like i was getting prepared for the missions field! I wanted to bake cookies for for youth group (update coming about that after this), so I headed to the boys' apartment because they have an oven and we don't. I took along all of the ingredients for the cookies, along with the recipe and a wisk, which i knew the boys don't have. I get to the boys' flat and ask for a measuring device. Nincs (none). Okay - normally you shouldn't just 'eyeball' things when baking, but we'll make it work. I ask for a teaspoon. Nincs. All they have are tablespoons - okay, we'll make that work too. I ask for a cookie sheet. Nincs. Okay - i'll use this shallow pan that reminds me of a roaster. I ask for some paper towel or a napkin. Nincs. Okay - I'll oil the pan with toilet paper... I look at the oven to see what settings there are... Nincs. Well, that's a lie - there are 2 settings - high and low and space in between where you can set the dial. Awesome. I'm actually surprise that the sugar cookies (which look more like pancakes) turned out as good as they did! The chocolate shortbread cookies turned out amazing!

Anyway, we just had our first youth group 'meeting' - the first two hang outs were just that: hanging out. So, this week, we decided to meet at the church and have coffee and cookies (hence the reason for the baking) and actually HAVE A MEETING! An update since the prayer request: Aaron did come and while there was a little translation, for the most part, it was in English. It was good :) We had two students, refugees from Iraq, that came and we had a blast. We played that game where you tie balloons to your feet and try to stomp out everyone else's. Then we filled out a short survey about maybe what we would like to see in Youth Group and about Bible knowledge. Then we talked about names. What does your name mean? I found out that that "Tracy" means "warlike" and is of Irish/Gaelic origin. great... We then moved on to talk about some different names for God - we went through a bunch of them (God, Adonai, El Shaddai, Jehovah-Rophe, Judge, Shepherd, etc) and looked up some corresponding verses - the verses were then read in English and Arabic (which was really neat). And we concluded with a 'homework assignment': think about what would be a great description or name for our group and come back with some ideas in 2 weeks. Ladies and gentlemen, it was great. Thank you for all your prayers. Please continue to pray for these kids - we have different kids every time we meet, so I can't wait until the day we get all of them in one place at one time! I also can't wait to actually get to know each of them and discover who they really are and what makes them 'tick'.

Also, tomorrow is Mikulás Day in Hungary - Santa Claus comes tomorrow! I'll tell you about that in my next blog. Promise.

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Experience holidays with me in Budapest!

Halloween in Budapest :)



Dia de Los Muertos :)


Thanksgiving Feast in Budapest :)