Welcome to Volga, Iowa!

Calvary Bible Church: Volga, IA
Wow! It's hard to believe we've been here for a month already - and yet, in many respects it feels like so much longer! (That's a good thing, by the way - meaning it already feels like home and it's hard to imagine NOT being here!)

Volga: View down the main road

In front of Calvary Bible Church

Walking to church!

View from inside: Beautiful!

Welcome to Our New Home!
This past month has been SO busy, so wonderfully full! Besides moving in and trying to unpack/organize the house (a feat in itself with young children underfoot!) and the expected responsibilities of getting to know the congregation in our new church and community, so many other things have filled our schedule.

Our house!

Dining room - not completely organized still (as evidenced by the messy bookshelf), but getting there!

Big, beautiful kitchen! - And our first-ever functioning dishwasher!!!

Still the kitchen - I told you, it's big!

Guest bedroom/Playroom

Guest bedroom/Playroom

Chris working on sermon prep in our living room

Kids' room (obviously I didn't clean up before taking pictures; this is real life!) - If you look closely you'll see Charis sleeping soundly in her crib <3

Kids' room - Josiah's side

Busy, Busy!
Our second week here, Josiah turned our refrigerator temperature off, and we didn't realize it until two days later... meaning we were eating bad food for two days before we realized why we were feeling sick. The kids didn't really get sick from it, but Chris and I ended up being sick off and on for nine days. NINE DAYS. That, my friends, was awful. BUT - we are thankful that the sickness was relatively mild (we didn't end up in the hospital), that it happened when it did, and that it didn't cause us to miss any major events in church or in the community.

Meet & Greet
Our third week here, our church hosted a "Meet and Greet" dinner for us to meet more of the community. It has been such a blessing to be so warmly welcomed!

Daddy's Girl

Meet & Greet at the town park

Josiah making new friends!

Vacation Bible School
That week our church hosted a community-wide VBS, in which I was a group leader for the 3rd-6th graders, and Chris taught the Bible lessons all week long (that's 3 age groups and one lesson per group per day - 15 in all), plus the Gospel message during the presentation on Friday night. That was a wonderful week - and exhausting too! The VBS is actually the reason that the church requested for us to be here earlier than our previously estimated move - if you remember, we had planned to be moving mid-July, but ended up moving a month and a half earlier specifically so that we could be in town and participate in the VBS. I am so glad we were able to be here for that - it really helped us to get to know a lot of the families and kids in our new community in ways that we wouldn't have been able to otherwise.

"Mount Kilimanjaro" was the theme - got our campsite set up at the base of the mountain!

Hiker-Pastor Chris and Josiah

The first day, there were bad storms around our area and our power went out before VBS even started! It didn't surprise our God, though - He had provided just the right people present who had access to a generator and big lights that we were able to use to plug right along!

This was the damage done at our house by the storm: A huge branch (covering almost half our garden) had fallen down right outside our house. Glad I wasn't home to witness that!

Probably the cutest camper you'll ever see.

Bet you never thought you'd see me wearing a baseball cap!

The climax for the older kids: Climbing "Mount Kilimanjaro" - er, a rock wall brought in by one of our church's deacons 

Time to Travel!: Hospital Visits and Grocery Shopping
Chris has already had a few hospital visits: One for a lady in our church who went to a hospital nearby to get some concerning symptoms checked out; and one for a middle school boy in our community who ruptured his spleen in a bike accident (who had to be taken to a hospital two hours away in Wisconsin).

At least it's a beautiful drive...

All the hillssssssss!!!

Volga: That Way ------>

Major occupation: Dairy farming

Gotta cross the Mississippi to get into Wisconsin. I guess it's kind of a big deal...

Preaching
Our first week here Calvary Bible Church already had someone scheduled to preach, but Chris has been preaching every week since then. (Speaking of which, if anyone has an idea of an economical and convenient way to record sermon audio, we're in the market for recommendations!)

Front row seats!

I'm sure there's a joke somewhere that could be made about our preacher putting people to sleep, but being his wife, I won't be the one to make that joke ;) 

Well, it's late, my computer is going to die soon, and I need sleep!

We will be leaving around 6:00 in the morning to head to Nappanee, IN, to stay the night with Chris' grandparents who live there. Chris was asked a couple of months ago to preach there July 5th while their pastor is on Sabbatical; at that point in time, we had been planning to finish our internship and make our move mid-July; but that was before VM decided to place us in Volga, so we didn't realize at that time we would be leaving sooner. They understood that he needed to keep that obligation, so we are headed up tomorrow just for that short visit. I don't know when we'll be in IN next, so if you want to drive to Nappanee on Sunday, we'd love to see you at Living Gospel Church!