Tuesday, April 28, 2015

USA visit!

We are crossing off days on the calendar until we are back in the USA for a visit! We've added a calendar (look to the right) here on the blog to update you all of our comings & goings over the next few months.

In addition to our church visits, we would love to have some 'small group nights' in different peoples homes. Our hope is to have a more intimate time with smaller groups of friends/supporters and enjoy the personal interaction in someones home as well. While we would love to spend time with all our friends and supporters individually, we realize it might not be realistic. We hope to have one in Chicago, one in Muskegon and several in the Grand Rapids area.

Would YOU be willing to host a small group of friends at your home?

You would pick at date/time and help provide some food. We would get the word out and jointly we could invite people who might naturally fall into your 'sphere' of our community. We would share about life & ministry for however long people are interested, including pictures, sharing stories, maybe a video and answering questions while enjoying snacks, etc. To be upfront, this would include a brief update on our current financial needs and asking people to consider partnering with us. We would NOT make that the bulk of the presentation and it would certainly not feel like a sales pitch, but raising support is essential to us continuing here. We would also have a table of items from Tanzania that people could purchase to help our fundraising. Finally, we would want time to just hang out and catch up with people and share life!
 
What do you think? Would you be willing to host a brunch/tea/dinner/dessert night in your home?  We would love to start setting up some dates and talking through it a bit more. Feel free to email us at thedriesengafamily@gmail.com if you'd like to chat more about it!

 

Monday, April 6, 2015

What do carpet, street lights & garage sales have in common?

Besides the obvious joy of seeing family and friends this summer in the USA, here are some things I'm looking forward to, in no particular order:

* carpet
* camping
* meijer
* paved roads
* street lights
* orderly traffic
* not living behind a wall
* cooler temps
* as many chocolate chips, black beans and parmesan cheese as I want!
* salads
* fast internet
* garage sales
* parks
* places to take the kids: meijer gardens, zoo, children's museum, skyzone, etc
* farmers market
* going for walks
* ice cream shops
* drinking water out of the tap
* consistent electricity and water
* being light out past 6:30pm
* Wolfgangs (and a whole list of other restaurants...)

Marc agrees with my list, but wanted to add:
* Brewery vivant

Isaac's additions:
* McDonalds
* going to football (soccer) camp
* spending time with family
* having playdates at other people's houses
* going to Legoland (date with auntie Ker)

Hope's additions:
* going ice skating (a date with Auntie Ker)
* going to get ice cream

Geneva's additions:
* children's museum (date with Auntie Ker)
* playing