Grandma Prayers

I forgot one of the most important things about Renata's grandma getting married. She is a hardcore Catholic who thinks we are part of some sect (much of the country thinks of Protestants as a sect). For as long as I have known her (and likely much longer) she has been praying for us to return to the "true Church" and she has likely been paying the priest to conduct masses for us. So viewing us as apostate, she would never get into anything too spiritual with us. Well a week or so before her wedding, she asked Renata for us to pray that God would give her and Adam at least 5 good years and bless their marriage. Blew us away. We are excited about that. Thought you'd enjoy hearing about that.

Great Weekend

We had a really good time this weekend. On Friday we met with a couple of our good friends for our little guys to play together and for us to talk about the next steps in ministry here in Warsaw. It feels like we are finally making forward progress with our home ministry plans. Our friends are excited about it and together we tend to generate more ideas than on our own. All this while sitting in the beautiful sunny park and eating kielbasa (sausage for the uninitiated) and fries. What more could I ask for?
Saturday morning we were on the road by 9am to drive 100km to the town where Renata was born and where her grandma and some of the rest of the family live. The reason for our trip this time: Her 84 year-old grandma's wedding. Yes, you read that correctly. He's 3 years younger, and they have known each other for 62 years. It was a really fun time. It's hard to explain why that was so fun. But just imagine how wonderful it is for 2 people who don't have a lot of years left to live yet choose to spend it together despite being far less energetic and agile than they once were (when the met). Just a really happy time. It felt so light and free. One of the most amazing things we learned about on Saturday is there was another potential suitor who nearly fainted when he heard that Renata's grandma was getting married. Not bad for an 84 year-old woman, huh? (said suitor, impressively, did attend the wedding)
We had been wanting to have a couple of our neighbours over since we moved back in December, but something always came up and it didn't happen. This is a couple that we have known for 4 years now. So finally, we had them over for breakfast yesterday. I went downstairs to confirm with them on Saturday evening and ended up staying and talking with them for an hour or so. Had a good time talking about life (and tested my Polish pretty good). The very first time we had them over 4 years ago, I cooked bacon and pancakes and had real Canadian maple syrup (you can buy it here, but most people don't. Still a real treat for most Poles. Especially when it's homemade syrup from my mom and dad), so yesterday morning we did it again. We had a great time spending time with them and knowing them more. We started talking about the Euro2008 soccer tournament that started on Saturday and the first game for Poland against Germany last night, so as they don't have the channel that is showing the games, we invited them up to watch the game with us. So once again we got together and spent a good time together. This is building relationship in Poland. We are so excited that we have finally been able to connect with this couple and spend quality time with them. They have been on our hearts for a long time. Unfortunately Poland did not win yesterday. They did not even score a goal (unfortunate depending on whom you talk to--some Poles are glad for the outcome as the two top players on the German team are actually Polish guys that weren't recognized by the Polish Soccer association for their talent and went to play where they could develop. Both German goals came from Lukasz Podolski yesterday).
All the same, a very satisfying weekend for us.