October 30th, 2015 by Kim

Fall is always a busy time for us and this year is no exception. In addition to school starting and getting back into the swing of things, I’m organizing after school activities and schedules. Our national organization (TCKompas) is also starting the new school year and doing the very same (as our family).

Some of the highlights of the past 6 weeks include:

Welcoming Hudson and Kari Jones (back) to Slovakia! The morning they arrived to Slovakia from Arkansas, Zac came down with a terrible stomach virus! I was able to make the 3 hr trip to Vienna and be their welcoming committee. We are so excited to have them here. Although they didn’t stay with us that weekend as we planned (because of Zac’s illness), they did return and stay with us the following weekend for the Fall staff meeting.

During the staff meeting I was able to host our growing staff (35+) in our home for a meal. Honestly, when I said “yes” to having them, I didn’t think about the details. Details like, I don’t have enough plates or silverware, or what if it rains, there isn’t enough room for everyone to be inside.

It didn’t rain, and thanks to a loyal friend (Anicka), I (we) prepared a beautiful meal  (-including special diet restrictions), for all 35. It was a lovely garden dinner party, just as I imagined it would be.

I told this story about saying “yes” first and worrying about the details later, when I spoke at the  Slovak Women’s conference this past weekend. This was the 16th year for the conference and had the most attendees so far (around 250). I spoke on “Hospitality- the Jesus model”. I enjoyed studying God’s word preparing for it and it was so great to be together with women from all over Slovakia.

After one session at the conference, a young woman came up to me and thanked me for my talk. She went on to say how she loves reading my (slovak) blog. She lives far away from others and most identifies with the articles by “Lydia”. I grabbed her arm and told her, “Did you know that Lydia is here at this conference?” Later, I was excited to introduce them to each other!

One of the most exciting things about the conference is that I got to meet for the first time, some of my authors/contributors, for my Slovak blog! Although I have never met them in person (only via email), it was like a reunion! I came back from the weekend completely exhausted (isn’t that the same for all of us women) from teaching and conversations, and somehow energized at the same time. I came straight home and started planning  for the 2nd Blog team meeting (the first one was 2 years ago). I plan to host them all in Zilina, here in my home!

I’m giving Zac one of my blog posts (from my Slovak blog) to share with you (the English version of course) I hope you enjoy it. God continues to bless our efforts in this project and weekly we have more than 1000 visitors on our site. I feel a responsibility to serve God in this new medium. He gives me so many ideas. The blog is no longer a hobby, but a platform.

But unfortunately, one that has to function out of my excess. My biggest limits are time and finances. Currently I am running it completely from our personal expenses. If you would like to give specifically to this blog project, to help us add it to our monthly ministry budget, please click here. Budget items would include: translation costs, website design and hosting, communication with contributors (meetings, transportation costs), promotion of the blog, etc. 

Ironically, during this time TCKompas has an extended intern, David (who has been living with us), serving in the area of IT/Web Design. He is here until February and is willing to help me develop the blog.

Life gives me so much to write about, particularly life with one certain red-head 🙂  We are really seeing big changes in Hampton these past 6 weeks. It seems that the change in classes was the right choice for him. Finally, after 2 hard years, he is enjoying school, his  classmates and his new teacher. With this new teacher, school is actually more demanding for him. Not only is she more strict, there is more homework each day, and more demands on him to be responsible and self-sufficient in school. All of this is good for him and I am thankful he is responding so well.

I am still teaching at his school one day a week, so I get to see him “in action”.  I love my English literature classes with the 7th, 8th and 9th grade classes. We are reading together and discussing books from Sonlight curriculum. It is an amazing opportunity to have such an influence on these students.