Our first few days

On our way over the Atlantic, Donna turned to me and said “Well, everything we have done over the past months has been to get ready to leave for Latvia. Now we are almost there, now what?” Getting on the airplane marked a very significant point in our journey. The support was raised, training was done, good-byes were said. For the past months, all of our energy was directed to preparation. That is done. We were prepared as well (or as poorly) as we were going to be. Our next step in the journey was actually to step onto Latvian soil.

Scott and Lisa Runzo made that next step very easy and comfortable. We were picked up at the airport and welcomed into their home for a delicious family meal. They had prepared our temporary housing with flowers and some supplies. We are warm and comfortable! We are staying in this vacant home of a previous missionary, vacant except for a bed, picnic table, and our suitcases. Pretty sweet, huh?

Then armed with a map and a full tank of diesel (good if you plan on getting lost), we headed out Friday and Saturday to make some exciting purchases. We are now the proud owners of a European coffee pot, toaster, Brita, and even an iron. This may seem mundane to you, but this is really big stuff for us! After all, can you imagine me without a coffee pot? And we did all this in an environment that is so, so different from anything we are accustomed to. We have gotten very bold with the question “do you speak English?”


Our big adventure today was to venture out without a car, using public transportation, into the city to buy groceries. It is always interesting to taste things and see if you purchased anything like you intended. All that seemed so easy and automatic at home takes so much brainpower now!

Yesterday (Sunday), we attended church with the Runzos and saw a few people that we had worked with on our summer trips. Afterwards, we headed out for a genuine Latvian experience celebrating the Autumn season at an open air museum. Beautiful, centuries old buildings, ethnic food, music and dance combined to give us a taste of old Latvia. The lady in the chicken hat was my personal favorite.

Today, we were in our first staff meeting, woohoo! We were welcomed in by all and enjoyed getting to know these people better. We mostly listened and are eager to figure out how we fit into the team. What we have learned, or rather had reinforced, was that our primary responsibility right now is to get settled, learn the language, and learn how to live in Latvia. We set out tomorrow to complete paperwork and procedures for our permanent residency (including a chest x-ray for tuberculosis) and see a few apartments. We will do all this on public transportation, so if we find an apartment, pray that we will be able to find it again. Our love to all of you!

Made it!

Good morning, Friends and Family,

We arrived in Riga last night about 6:00 in the evening safe and sound. It's a long ways here, but we had no problems and even had our luggage make it in the same flight! For that we're extremely thankful :)

We're sitting at our little kitchen table this morning trying to take it all in that we're really here, how good God is and what in the world does He have in store? I'm in awe and amazement. It's quite like Seattle here to me, the gray skies and the tall evergreen trees. Very pretty. We were awake at 7:30 this morning and it was light, but not too.....okay w/me. I'm looking at all those wonderful books dreaming about actually having time to devour them!

Funny story....we landed in Chicago, and were still kind of down, feeling such a loss of everything and everyone in our hearts. We were trying to figure out how to get to the next terminal for our trip to Copenhagen when this couple looked at us and said hello. She looked vaguely familiar, but I wasn't sure who the heck we would know in Chicago! I asked her where I knew her from and she said Faith. It was Nancy and Mark Nelson and they had "missed" their original flight earlier that day on their way to Harrisburg, PA, and had an hour before their next flight. We ended up at Chili's w/them enjoying a meal and hearing how they'd spent several years in Spain as missionaries, and some of their experiences. To me (not to overspiritualize here) it seemed like God just confirming in our hearts that He has many cool experiences planned for us that we won't know about until we step out in faith and follow Him where He leads....at least for us right now. Both Kelly and I were so uplifted and excited for our adventure from that point forward. And now the journey begins.....and we're praising God for the chance to be here and work for Him! We truly want to be His "lights" in this place and to whom He brings into our lives.

We were also reflecting on how we have the privilege of praying over all our special people for the next day while they sleep....just like I did when the boys were small and they were like sleeping angels in their cribs :) So before you wake up, you've had prayers lifted on your behalf by your faraway friends who love you so......

It was great to fire up our computer and see that there were messages from some of you!!! YAY! We treasure hearing from you, so feel free to write and keep us in your thoughts!!
We're off to explore this city and look around, buy some necessities (yes, toilet paper :) and see some apartments. We are staying in a really nice house for now that one of the missionaries had purchased and hasn't sold yet. It's only two doors down from Scott and Lisa, so that's rather nice as well. But we're anxious to find something soon that we can have ready when our stuff and our family arrives before Christmas.

Love to everyone and many hugs....the Lord bless you all and keep you safe!

Donna