The Holidays...

Its been awhile since I last wrote, so I figured it was time for an update.  For Christmas I was able to spend time with the Kingsleys, and had a great time.  My cousin Mike came back to Dublin from England for 2 weeks and I've had the chance to hang out with him quite a bit, its always fun to see him.  

On Christmas Eve I went over to Phil and Cheryl's house to help with cooking preparations (chopping stuff), and after a morning of that we all went into the city for an early dinner and stroll.  Since I was here last Christmas I had an idea what to expect.  Last year after dinner we went to Starbucks for a cup of joe but this year it was closed early, so we ended up going to Butlers about 10 min before it closed and got their famous hot chocolate.  It was a nice evening.

Christmas morning began for me at 10:30am (when I woke up of course) to Eoin opening my door checking to see if I was awake so he could open his presents.  I looked at him and said hi and looked right back and said "you look stinky", turned and walked down the stairs.  What a nice way to start the morning.  I slowly walked down the stairs to the kitchen for my daily cup of coffee, then to the livingroom so the mayhem could begin.  It was fun to see the excitement of Eoin and Moia's faces as they were handed each present.  The afternoon followed up with another family joining us for yet another early dinner, this time of the traditional ham, turkey, stuffing...the works, it was fabulous.  

The next day, known as St. Stephen's Day, is a day where you eat leftovers and take walks.  Another family joined us for the walks and later we were joined by yet another family and had a great time of just being in each other's company.  

I am so blessed 

Grace Days

We do this thing at UJ called Grace Days and what it is, is the staff going around the community to the all the houses and hand out chocolates or biscuits (aka. cookies) to say happy Christmas to the residents.  Its actually a fun time to talk to people that we wouldn't normally see and develop relationships with those we do know.  I was a little hesitant at first (as I am about most things) because I feel I'm not that great at talking to people, but I put my pride behind me and went off with Belinda.  We've been invited into homes by both people involved with UJ and those who aren't, and offered tea, coffee or what ever they have.  

We've only done Grace Days for two days so far, but I find myself humbled by God's love each time someone answers the door.  They aren't just someone living in a house, they are a creation of the Most High.  They are a grieving grandmother, a lonely father, a happy young man and so much more.  Sometimes people are taken aback by our offering and it takes them a minute to understand that we are doing this out of kindness and not for anything more.  We've been offered money (and refuse to take it), and my favorite was a guy in his early 20s was so surprised and grateful that he gave us hugs.  We have a couple more days of this and I'm looking forward to the unexpected.   

...after the mouse

So after I saw my furry friend roommate, I went down to Blackrock for work (we were doing a movie night for the 5-6class), afterward, I walked down to the dart station.  Emma and Adam stayed at Urban Junction to finish up some things (thank God they stayed).  I bought my ticket and walked to the platform, the time read 17 min until the next train, i figured it wasn't too bad so I waited, and waited and waited.  When the time got to 4min it stuck, and didn't change for about 25 min.  Then it changed to 10 min, then when that had run down to 8 min it changed again to 25.  I then had had enough and decided to walk back to UJ and get the bus with Emma and Adam.  What felt like hours at the dart station was probably around 45 min, but it doesn't end there...

Soon after I arrived at UJ and vented my frustration to my co-workers, we left for the bus stop.  The bus surprisingly arrived promptly 5 min later.  I thought it would be smooth the rest of the way home, oh I was wrong.  We got on the crowded bus and went up to the second story to find a seat.  We sat down amongst some unruley young people (younger than us, probably in their late teens), who had obviously been drinking.  A couple of stops down the girls got off and the boys kept making rude comments even after the girls were gone.  As the bus left the stop we started hearing raised voices behind us toward the back of the bus, all of a sudden we heard scuffling, and turn back to see two guys beating up on eachother.  Quickly everyone who wasn't involved moved to the bottom floor.  Someone told the driver what was going on and possibly called the police, I'm not entirely sure, but the next thing i know is that the driver missed our stop and the next 2 and wouldn't let people off the bus (we were assuming so the Garda could come deal with the situation).  This caused a problem of its own and people started complaining and yelling at the driver, cursing and swearing at him.  Eventually he let off the crowd standing by the door, we left at that time.  I don't know what happened in the end, hopefully everything turned out ok.  It made for quite an interesting evening.

A mouse in the house

So there I was in my room, sitting at my desk studying for the GRE (that's right I was studying), when I saw some movement out of the corner of my eye. I was hoping it was my imagination, but knew it probably wasn't. I turned my head to see what it was and sure enough there was a little mouse standing under my radiator. I think my heart stopped for a half a second. We have been having a little mice trouble in our house, Emma can attest to that, but I hadn't seen any evidence of one in my room, although i had my suspicions. So yes, i have a mouse in my room and to be honest it kind of weirds me out. I'm not completely freaked out just slightly, but i'm sure i'll have some dreams tonight about mice crawling all over me. It looks like its time for a deep clean of my room. Mom and Dad, don't start laughing at that line...ok, you can laugh a little.

The good, the bad and being cold...

So again I know its been awhile since my last post.  I apologize.  These past few weeks have been kind of busy because of Christmas coming up.  For the Christmas season we have been putting on a lot of events for the youth and community.  This past weekend is a prime example, on Saturday we took about 30 youth to go ice skating (thankfully some parents came as well).  I being the "sporty" one was asked to be on the ice with the kids, gladly I accepted.  Although I didn't fall I soon figured out the skates given to us by the place we were at were absolute crap, and have the bruises on my ankles to show for it.  Thankfully, there were no major injuries to the kids.  One of the mothers that came got here foot stepped on by a man wearing skates, she ended up with a nasty bruise and sprained ligaments, but nothing too serious.  Overall it was a fun evening.

The next night, on Sunday, we had a community Christmas dinner, where we invited families from the community to Urban Junction to enjoy a meal together.  We ended up having around 80 people show up, it was a great time to get to know people and learn more about them.

Last week I also had the chance to go with my housemate Emma to here hometown of Kilkenny and stay with her family.  She was having a fundraiser dinner for a mission trip she is taking to India at the end of this month.  I got to meet some of her extended family (she has more cousins than I do, which is pretty impressive) and help with the preparations.  Its always nice to get a free hot meal (or two).

One thing that is not so enjoyable has been how cold its gotten in the past few weeks.  Grant it, its always been cold, but the temperature has decreased quite a bit since I first arrived.  What doesn't help matters is that the heating in my house is broken, so while we have space heaters for our rooms, we can't keep them on all day (they use a lot of electricity) or night.  I knew it was bad when i could see my breath while sitting in the living room the other day.  Ah well, it should be fixed today, but who knows.  Thank you for all you love and support.  I really appreciate it.

Its getting dark...

by 4:30 pm, which sucks, so it always feels later than it really is.  

Last night we had a social for the primary school aged kids (9-12), it was quite messy, slightly stressful, but it was fun as well.  We started off with with free time, giving the kids time to play pool, and the playstation, or xbox, I don't remember, but they played a football (meaning soccer)  game, once all of the kids arrived we started in on our program, which was lead by Brian our work experience student.  It involved a lot of different games, some on the play station/xbox and some as a group.  But the part of the evening that the children enjoyed the most was when Adam and I (we are both new staff members)  we interviewed, and while being questioned, had ketchup, flour and water smeared on us.  It took a few washes for the smell to come out.  I'm glad the kids enjoyed it. 

Its been too long...

since I last wrote that is.  I'm sorry for the delay, I'll work on it.  The past couple weeks have been pretty good.  The weather hasn't been too bad, meaning not much rain and not unbearably cold.  I did have a interesting task this week, I had to construct a snowman from chicken wire and paper mache, it brought out my creative side.  We then had the kids spray paint it, under strict supervision, and create the face.  It went pretty smoothly except for one mishap of a kid spray painting the wall, he had to then scrub it off.  All in all it went well.

As you all know I'm coaching a basketball team for a local secondary school.  We've had a few games and so far won all of the important ones (we did lose one game, but it wasn't a league game and we only lost by 1 point).  The last two we won 33-4 then 41-22.  I have to say I'm very proud of them, they have worked really hard.  

Thanks for all of your prayer and support, I really appreciate it.

Update

Its been awhile since my last post and I apologize for the delay.  Last weekend I had a chance to travel up to Bangor, Northern Ireland with 5 youth and about 12 leaders from Urban Junction.  We attended a camp/conference called Autumn Soul, which is similar to youth church camps in the States.  There we four speakers and loads of activities for the kids (anywhere from dance workshops, to creative worship, to a disco at night).  It was great to see the youth so excited about getting involved.  The two older girls that went are strong Christians so it was a good time of encouragement for them, while the three younger girls wouldn't necessarily consider themselves Christians, but left the camp open to the Word and excited about it.  It was a great encouraging time away for all of the girls (considering they don't necessarily have the best home lives).  If you could keep them in your prayers, I would appreciate it.  

So that trip lasted from Friday night to Sunday afternoon, on Monday I started to cough, I didn't think much of it, until the next day when it got progressively worse.  Yes, I have a cold and it has lasted since Tuesday.  Hopefully it will go away soon, its gone from my chest to my head, so I don't think it has anywhere else to go except away.  So if you all could pray for that as well, i would appreciate it.    Thanks for all of your support, I miss you all.

We Won!...and lost

Along with working at Urban Junction I am also coaching two girls basketball teams at Newpark, the local secondary school in Blackrock, the cadettes and the senior girls teams.  Both teams had their first game today, I was excited and nervous.  A bit of background, I've played basketball from when I was ten through college, I'm use to intense daily workouts and practices and regularly scheduled games.  None of that exists here, or at least not at this school.  I think we have had three practices, and none of the league games are scheduled, we have to work them in on the calender for when the gyms are not being used by others.  We only practice once a week, for an hour, and at our last practice we had a total of nine players show up (there are ten girls on each team).  So let's just say I wasn't expecting much with these first games.  But the girls played hard and didn't give up. 

The cadette girls lost, but I was proud of how they played, and considering we didn't have any structure, I was surprised that we only lost by about ten (it looked more like jungleball).  They put their hearts into that match, it was fun to coach.

The senior girls won, by around 20, but that was more expected.  Most of these girls have played on the team in years past and play well together.  They also played hard and I am very proud of them.

I'm curious to see how the rest of the season is going to turn out, keep us in your prayers.

Circus, Girls Night, and Immigration

So part of my job is hanging out with kids and doing activities with them.  One activity that we did with them recently was taking about 10 kids to the circus that was in town.  It was great, the performers were incredible, Simon (the manager of Urban Junction) got called infront of everyone to perform a stunt, and a man in a gorilla outfit sat next to me and put his arm around me.  The kids thought it was amazing and were cracking up at both events.  

We also had a girls night for the younger girls.  We ended up with only two girls, but we had a lot of fun.  We watched "Hairspray" ate take out chinese food, and made cake in the microwave.  

I went into the immigration office last week to get my visa.  I got to the office around 10 in the morning, and waited in line for about 45 min to get my number.  Once I got my number, the guy at the window told me I would be called until after 5pm that evening.  I wandered around Dublin till about 5pm, then was tire of walking so I went back into the office only to be called at around 7:30pm and told that I couldn't get my visa because, the letter that I had didn't have exactly how long I was going to be there.  It was very frustrating to say the least.  I will go back again soon, and this time actually get my visa.

I miss all of you.  

Tea and Toast

I have never had so much tea and toast in my entire life.  I am always being asked if I want any tea and/or toast.  Emma tells me this is quite common, and that I better get use to it.  I'm trying, but I don't know how much more toast i can eat...

Birthday and allergy

So Saturday was my birthday.  Yep I'm now 26 years old.  Sometimes I feel like I haven't really done much since I graduated from college, but then I realize, I've done loads and wouldn't take any of it back, well most of it.  I was talking to Simon (my boss) not too long ago and he made a comment about my resume, how many prior jobs I have had, I had to tell him I didn't put all of them on there, he started laughing.  

Anyway, I had a really good birthday weekend.  Friday night my housemates took me out, but we were all tired so called it an early night.  When we got back to the house we managed to stay up another hour and a half or so and talk about dating criteria.  It was one of the funniest conversations I have had in a long time.  Saturday we all were doing some maintainance work at Urban Junction, I was doing a lot of gardening, pulling weeds, cutting ivy, that sort of stuff.  I left early and went to Phil and Cheryl's house for dinner with Matt and Hailey and the kids as well.  After dinner Matt and Hailey left the kids with the grandparents and took me out to the Sugar Club where we saw the band Half Set play.  All in all it was a fun night.  

The next morning I woke up to discover rashes all over my forearms, and soon realized I'm allergic to ivy.  So my arms a healing fine, a little itchy at times, but not bad.  So far everything is going really well.  God is good. 

Sunshine!

So pretty much since I arrived the weather has been really good.  It hasn't been technically "hot" but its been sunny.  I heard that the weather most of the summer was terrible (pouring rain and pretty cold).  I know this weather isn't going to last forever, so I'll enjoy it while I can.  

Its been a week since I last wrote and so far things are going pretty well.  I've done a lot of meeting people, and learning to use the public transportation (its great not to have to drive!).  I live in Dun Laoghaire in a house called Graceville.  I have 3 other housemates, Emma, Adam and Michael who are all from Ireland.  I also work with them at Urban Junction.  There's no one thing that has really happened that I would consider exciting or extraordinary, but the novelty of living in a different country hasn't worn off yet.  

I'll take some pictures and post them up soon.

Arrived

I've finally arrived.  I feel like I've been talking about this trip for so long and now its a reality.  I landed in Dublin yesterday (Tuesday the 16th) at around 10am, after a long night of flying.  My uncle collected me from the airport along with another couple that works for GEM in Ireland.  I did ok for a while, but by 1pm I was exhausted and managed to sleep most of the afternoon.  I woke up around 4pm and made myself stay awake til 8:30, when finally I went to bed...it was glorious.  

Today I moved into the house owned by the church that runs Urban Junction in Dun Laoghaire and met my 3 housemates.  Tonight I'll probably settle in and such, I can't wait to see what the Lord is going to do this year.  I'm going to miss the sunshine though.

Going, Going,...Gone

Hey everyone, 

Thanks so much for all of the encouragement and support that you have given me.  I know its been a while since I wrote last, I have been so busy getting everything ready to leave.  Last time I wrote I was still in Ireland, well, I'm back in the states (I came back on Aug 20th) and will be leaving again in about 9 days.  God has been so amazing in providing for my needs.  Here's whats going on...

I will be leaving on Sept. 15th to go work in Blackrock, a suburb of Dublin, with Urban Junction (www.urban-junction.com) where I will be working with the local youth.  I will still be working with Matt and Hailey Kingsley, Just not as indepth as originally planned.  Matt has been a  huge encouragement and was the one who initially introduced me to Urban Junction.  All that being said I'm still about 1,000 dollars total, short of my goal financial support.  If you would like to partner with me in this adventure you can do so by logging on to gemission.org and click on the "donate" link, then click on the "giving online" link, then click on the "donate now" link, followed by the "give now" link.  Once you are on the "giving" page just follow the steps (under the "Missionaries and Projects" section choose " Missionaries", find my name Liz Matthews on the list).  Thank you again for all of your encouragement and support.

The Last Night...

So, tonight is the last night.  People start leaving as early as 3:30 am.  It has been a great time to hang out with these kids and get to know them on a deeper level.  I lead a small group of 5 girls who were the older ones in the conference (16-17 years old), they are awesome.  I will miss them terribly.     

Yesterday we went into Vienna and went to an amusement park called the Prater.  Its free to walk in but each ride costs a certain amount of euro.  I ended up going on two rides, one with Matt and Hailey which was like a huge swing but flipped you around as well (Hailey was screaming the entire time and was hoarse this morning because of it).  The other I went on with a few of the girls and it was a rocker/spinny type ride, which was fun as well.  After a few hours in the park we went into the downtown area for dinner and wandering.  Most of the group got pizza then a few kids wanted to go to Starbucks, so I went with them and it reminded me of two years ago when I went with Alyssa, good times.  

I'm sad that this conference is coming to an end, but excited and scared to see what God has ahead for me.  Thanks for all the prayers and encouragement.

He's OK

Yes, Mike is back from the hospital and is okay.  We're still not sure what caused his illness but he's pretty much recovered.  

The kids start filing in tomorrow throughout the day and we will officially kick things off at 6pm (Hungary time, 9 hours ahead).

Hungary at last

Yes I've arrived in Hungary (actually I made it here yesterday)!  It was exciting because this is the reason I came over to Europe for these few weeks.  The GEM-K conference hasn't started yet, it officially begins on Wednesday, right now only the staff are here.  We use these few days before the conference to become accustomed to the the town (how to use the bus system, know what is where and such), get to know each other, and prepare for the kids arrival.  I've done this once before as most of the other staff has as well, but its always good to have a refresher.  

My roommate for the week is Michaela Andrews (from Ojai Valley Community Church) and I'm looking forward to getting to know her better.  

On a down note, my cousin Michael Kingsley (Matt's brother) arrived yesterday from England, after he spent 6 weeks in Cambodia working with nonprofit organizations and visiting his family (the people that he stayed with while he lived there in college).  I talked to him around 5pm yesterday evening and he looked okay but mildly complained that he wasn't feeling very well so I left him alone to get some rest.  Soon after that Matt told me that Mike was rapidly getting worse, he couldn't keep anything down and we were afraid he would get dehydrated.  After a few hours and some homemade gatorade Mike stated that he needed to go to the hospital to stay hydrated, Matt agreed and before I knew it Mike was transported by ambulance to the hospital where he stayed last night and probably tonight as well.  If you could keep him in your prayers it would be much appreciated. 

Thank you all for your support, encouragement and prayers. 

Ireland...then Hungary

Well, I made it to Ireland late yesterday morning and managed to sleep, after a quick lunch and visit with Matt and Hailey, pretty much all afternoon and all night, it was glorious.  The flight wasn't bad and I sat next to a nice guy who wasn't weird or creepy.  (I did manage to make a fool out of myself when I assumed he was from Ireland and was really from England, I do a good job of putting my foot in my mouth)

I can't settle in too much because I leave on Sunday to go to Hungary for the GEM-K Conference.  I'm so excited, it will be nice to work with youth again, something I've missed for the past couple of months.  God has been so good.

When are you leaving?

That seems to be the question of the hour.  I get asked regularly when I'm leaving, here's the answer:  I'm not sure yet, Lord willing in the next few months.  I'm leaving for Ireland on July 30th for a short term basis, I will be helping Matt Kingsley out with the Gem-K conference in Sopron, Hungary then coming back to the States on August 20th.  I still need to raise more support.  God has been awesome though and put people around me who have been a great encouragement and spiritual support and brought about situations that have helped me grow and prepare to go overseas. 

God has brought several short term opportunities to serve overseas in places such as India, Bosnia and Hungary as well as trips to Ireland to visit Matt (who is also my cousin) and his family.  I had the chance to be a staff member of the GEM-K conference in 2006 and came to an awareness that God might want me to be in full time missions.  

I have been accepted for a nine month internship and appointed by Greater Europe Mission (GEM) to the Europe wide ministry of the GEM-K Ministry under Matt and Hailey Kinsley.

What I'll be doing in Ireland is helping out Matt Kingsley (you can read about him, his family and ministry on kingsleyclan.blogspot.com) with his ministry to missionary kids all over Europe and the local Irish students for nine months.  We will be running camps, trips, and conferences, being a support system for the MKs (missionary kids),discipling and keeping in contact with them through facebook, skype and the like.  

If you would like to help contribute you can do so online through gemission.org and click on the "donate" link, then click on the "giving online" link, then click on the "donate now" link, then the "give now" link.  Once you are on the "giving page just follow the steps (under the "Missionaries and Projects" section choose "Missionaries"  then find my name Liz Matthews on the list).  Thank you for your encouragement and support.