Chicago with Aniela

Aniela was in town before school ended and we went downtown to see Dirty Dancing (which, to those who do not know is NOT a bad/dirty show...I just want to make that clear. It's a musical based off the 80s chick flick movie).

We also went out to dinner beforehand at the Berghoff and walked around the city and looked at the Christmas window displays.

December Grad Dinner

Colson graduated in December and they had a dinner for all the grads...

Christmas Eve at the Andersen's

Wonderful pics of a Christmas Eve well spent...it is starting to sound like a lumberyard in here, though.

Hope you're all enjoying your Christmas! I think I'm going to go find another couch for myself.

Heather's Pottery

I know that a few of you have been interested in Heather's pottery stuff (like the mugs that I have and Bonnie has). I asked her about people ordering specific things and she said she would love to custom make some things for people. It's a little too late for Christmas this year, obviously, but if you want to order something for her next round of items, let me know (or I can give you her email address). Above are a few sample pics from her latest sale (I also bought a couple things so I can show you at Christmas when I come home).

If you want to order custom items, let me or her know specifics by January or February. This way through the course of the semester, she can make sure to fulfill the orders. She can do mugs, bowls, pitchers, vases, tea cups, etc. Depending on the size, mugs can be around $10-$15 and vases and pitchers are around $30 (cost could be more or less depending on any other specifics that you want, too.)

Chicago Parade

A couple weeks ago, Colson and I went downtown to watch a Christmas parade in Chicago. While everyone was freezing their butts off on the street, we got to watch from the 18th floor of a building on Michigan Ave.

One of Colson's friends, Rachel, nannys for a woman who is an executive for AMC theaters so she let us hang out in her office. The other sweet thing was that they had all the movie candy we could want in the office and we were allowed to eat as much as we wanted. I asked Colson before we got to the office what we were going to do for dinner, and he said, "Dinner? Why do we need dinner? We get all the candy we could want!"

Both of us had a bad stomachache reminiscent of the post-Halloween stomachaches you get when you're a kid. And we didn't need dinner either.

More Conference Pictures

Candace who lives in Canada but has done backpacking stuff in Australia and Austin who is from Colorado Christian and is leading a ministry team to Europe this summer


L-R Me with Tracy and Jamie Scott, and their son Ethan. They are from the UK, work in Australia, and are definitely people we want to partner with in the future.



L-R: Sarah who works in Spain, Scott who is coleading a trip with Austin, and Christa and Casey who live in Canada and work in Australia


Miriam-a woman from Germany who has worked in India for a while with travelers, nomads, and hippies.


Christa and Casey and me


Faith and Nate--Wheaton grads and YHM alum who are working to start a Christian youth hostel in Spain


Hanging out on a canal tour

Amsterdam Conference Pictures

Here are a few pictures from the Amsterdam conference that I just attended. I had the first few days by myself to sight-see and hang out, and then the conference was the next 3 days. It was a great time to network with other Christian backpacking/hostel ministries around the world, share ideas and strategies, and work together to be more effective in this ministry in the future.

In the near future, we're hoping to put together a training manual for teams like the ones we send out from Wheaton. We've been in contact with a student from Westmont College who wants to start YHM there, as well as two guys from Colorado Christian who attended the conference and are sending teams out for the first time this summer. Hopefully we'll be able to help them in their ministries, and a training manual is one way that we want to do that. We're also hoping to build up a partnership with several ministries in Australia, since there is a great need for Christian workers and great Christian hostels where we can send students.


Brian, the director of the Office of Christian outreach eating fries by some shoe thing (maybe some memorial representing war orphans we think), chilling by Darth Vader, and enjoying fries again.



The "hiding place" at Corrie ten Boom's house--the hole in the wall on the first picture shows the actual hiding place. On the second picture, notice the guy crawling underneath the shelf--that's how they had to get into the hiding place--and they had to get 6 people in there in about 70 seconds. The last picture shows the front of the house, which is located in Haarlem, a 10-15 minute train ride from Amsterdam.



Around Amsterdam


Anne Frank House, Amsterdam

Amsterdam Conference

Just a quick update about the Amsterdam conference. Things went well and I arrived safely, and the conference has been great. It has been really cool to meet people from all over the world that are interested in the same type of ministry. We've gotten some great ideas for how to improve Wheaton's YHM and we've definitely made a lot of new connections around the world...In other words, I now have free or cheap places to stay in Germany, France, India, Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Israel, Spain, Greece, and some other countries. :) So much traveling to do, so little time.

Anyway, I fly home tomorrow and arrive in Chicago around 5:30pm, so I look forward to catching up with people then!

Much Love,
Sarah

YHM 2009

Just a little update for YHM this coming summer---applications have come in, and we have 29 applicants! Last year we had 10, so this is awesome! Please pray that we find another hostel to work at this summer since we have so many students (it's a nice problem to have!)

Bergen, Norway-Part 2

Impromptu dance party


An awesome Italian dinner in our apartment with Marcello


Grace and Tom, from the UK


Marcello


The view of Bergen from one of my favorite hikes

More fall fun

Enjoying fall...

Beth is in town, so her, Colson, and I went to a nearby park for the afternoon to just hang out, climb a tree, and drink hot apple cider. It was really fun!











What a stud. :)


I was not very graceful while climbing.