Team Dinner

We had a fun dinner over at Chris and Laura's place last night. The kids ran around and had a tickle-fest. So did Lucy, Clark, and Owen - the other kids.Check out Lucy's cool new Czech hat.

More body paint

The Prague Christian Library had a big story hour on Saturday, complete with clowns (visiting from America). They had balloons, candy, and most exciting - face painting. Lucy chose to go with hand-painting instead and chose a strawberry. Both kids had fun.

Aqua Girl and Boy

Who wants to take a boring bath with color-less water? Not these guys. Body art is optional.

Happy Name Day to Me

In the Czech Republic, as in other Eastern European countries, each day celebrates someone's name. So there are 365 Name Days, and on your Name Day it is customary to receive small gifts or flowers. It's like a mini-Birthday.

Well, today is the name day for Filip! I want to thank all of you for your cards and notes of well-wishes. Actually, Shanna was the only one who said "Happy Name Day" to me, and that was because I told her to. Oh well, mark it down for next year.

So, this chicken walks up to this dog...

Actually, I'm not kidding. But it wasn't THAT strange, because we were at a children's festival at one of the nearby parks yesterday. They had all sorts of games and activities, including a trampoline to jump on and giant blue pencils that you could put on.
Still not sure what the pencil activity was about, but it sure was fun. It was reminiscent of Most Extreme Elimination Challenge on Spike TV (also known as Takeshi's Castle here in Prague)!

What are YOU looking at?

I'd like to say that this was the turnout for my first-ever street preaching event in Prague. However, I'd be lying, which is a bad thing for a pastor to do.

Travel season is definitely picking up, and with that comes the throngs of people who gather to watch the Astronomical Clock chime on the hour in Old Town Square. Honestly, it's not a very exciting clock, especially if you're coming from Munich and watching the amazing Glockenspiel there. But it looks impressive and does have a couple of moving characters.
I just liked standing in front of everybody and feeling like a rock star for a few minutes.

Special Guests

Right after our Greece trip, we had two special visitors - Bob, the director of World Harvest Mission, and Terry, a WHM board member and pastor in Philadelphia. They were also in Greece with us for the week, and they made Prague part of their return trip to the States. We enjoyed showing them a little bit more of the city, and they spent a lot of time just asking good questions and praying for us and the Syvertsens. We love these guys and the fact that we're part of the same mission organization.

Czech Marketing

"When my kids get that rumble in their belly that's not going to be satisfied by any little frozen pizza, I reach in the freezer for BIG AMERICANS pizza. It's the biggest one there is, because, let's face it, my kids deserve to be just as big as any American kid. BIG AMERICANS - We never take our children's weight 'lightly.'"

The World Harvest family, big and small

Here's the entire group of overseas missionaries and US staff from our Greece trip:
And here we are the last night before we left:

Alpha, Beta, Feta?

So besides swinging and swimming (see below), what did we do in Greece? The 10 days were jam-packed with great speakers, prayer, forums, and silliness. Our Prague team arrived a few days early to have a mini-vacation before the actual conference week started. It was a great time to relax and settle into our room - for Clark, that meant sleeping in the bathroom in the Pack-and-Play for 10 days!

We were at the small town of Eretria, about a 90-minute taxi ride north of Athens. It's not the most popular Greek destination, but our hotel complex was really pretty and extremely kid-friendly.

Once the other missionaries arrived, we enjoyed mornings of hearing from our guest speaker, Steve Childers (standing on the right, next to WHM's director Bob Osborne). Steve is a RTS professor in Orlando and leads a ministry called Global Church Advancement. He spoke to us about movements of church planting, which is right up our team's alley.

We had small group meetings each day, and the afternoons were devoted to praying for each of the dozen or so teams that were represented. It was very special for the 4 of us to be prayed for, especially because it was on the one-year anniversary that Chris and Laura arrived to Prague - yes, it's hard to believe we've been here for one year now! The prayer time was definitely a highlight for us all.

Lucy and Clark had great times in their respective kids' classes. Volunteers from a church in Winston-Salem, NC, came over to help with children's ministry and worship. Lucy loved her teachers and her friends - especially Wilson Briggs from Spain (see picture). We got some wonderful time with the whole Briggs family on this trip, which was so special for us - our lives have paralleled each other's through the years.

There were over 200 adults and kids there, so we couldn't meet everyone and hear all the stories, but we loved meeting other WHM missionaries in London, Ireland, Uganda, Kenya, India, and Rome - just to name a few. It was the closest thing to a family reunion that I've been to!

Once we get a picture of the whole WHM group, we'll post it. I took some of these from Chris and Laura's blog. Thanks for praying for our trip!

It's Greek

A few of the first pictures from Greece... hanging on the swings, the complex where we stayed, and Lucy at her finest.

Back in Prague

Just a quick note - we're back safe and sound from Greece. It was an awesome time with all the other World Harvest Missionaries. We got to re-connect with friends from all over the world and pray for each other.

Pictures to come soon!

Make that 3 bags to check

Every two years, all of the missionaries with World Harvest Mission get together for a mission-wide retreat. It's a time to re-connect with all the missionaries, fellowship, and pray for each other. You may remember that I went to Kenya in January for all the team leaders - this one is for everyone on all the teams.

So all 4 Davis family members and all 3 Syvertsens are heading out tomorrow for Greece. Before you get too jealous, we checked the weather and it's looking like it'll be in the mid-60s - not the hot Greek sunny conditions we were hoping for, but we're still bringing our shorts and bathing suits.

We're excited to see many of our friends there, including our pastor at Uptown Church, Tom, who is now the newly appointed chairman of the board of World Harvest Mission too. He'll be preaching on Sunday.

In an effort to save some money, we found a perfect bag for Clark. We're just going to pad him with crackers and cheese puffs. Anything to cut costs!

Meanwhile, two floors up...

Our neighbors upstairs, Ben and Rita, invited us up to hang out this afternoon. Ben is from France and Rita is from Hungary. They have two boys, Adam and Bruno. Adam goes to a British preschool, so that makes three languages that he's working with - and he's two years old. I'm feeling pretty dumb. All of us had fun, playing and eating. We even got some billiards going on Ben's table - Lucy gave it a shot, and Clark liked to crawl on top of the table.
Ben works for Dannone yogurt, which is a good place to work for in this yogurt-crazed city. I'm not kidding, they love it.

Get out of my dreams, get onto my scooter

Lucy is starting a new gang - The Prague Pinkies. They ride through the park and run through puddles and into dogs. Watch your back.

Friends, Old and New

We've been blessed to have a friend from Uptown Church in Charlotte visit us for a few days. Brooke was on his way home from leading a week-long training seminar in Lithuania, and extended his trip a few days to layover in Prague. He joined us for bagels at one of our favorite places to eat, Bohemia Bagel.
While we were there, a couple sat down next to us and we started talking. Lisabeth and Ben were from Alabama and taking their one-year anniversary trip through Europe. We invited them to dinner, along with Brooke, that evening at our place. It was great to hang out and share stories. Turns out they go to a PCA church in Alabama, and we even have some mutual friends. You never know who you'll meet in Prague, eating bagels.