Northern Travels

We spent the past week travelling north of Manila visiting pastors and congregations of the Integrated Mennonite Church of the Philippines.  I think we were on the road a total of 24 hours with our boys! The whole time we were accompanied by the lovely Reg, who is a wonderful Ate (big sister) to our boys and has become a dear friend to us too. Here's a picture of her and Cody on the 5 hour bus ride from Manila to San Jose City.

In San Jose, we stayed at the church where the bishop and his family (and anyone who needs a temporary home) live. This is the city where we will live for 4-5 months in order to learn Tagalog. We attended a board meeting here and worshiped with them on Sunday morning. It was wonderful to spend time with these lovely people and we're excited to learn their language so we can get to know them more.

Cody made a friend.... the pastor's grandson is the same age as Cody and they enjoyed playing together. Cody brought out his hockey stick and showed everyone his skills:) Of course, everyone enjoys him and he gets a lot of attention!

On Monday we visited Pastor Jojo in Castaneda and he toured us around the area to meet with other congregations. It was great to share our vision with these Mennonite communities.

We also stopped at a church member's beautiful home and enjoyed some amazing dragon fruit from their farm. Cody loved it too:) It was such a refreshing and picturesque setting and Cody ran around with their son chasing ducks!

The next day we headed up north to a small community called Binuangan. It was a long bumpy ride in a van with the boys on our laps. We just kept feeding Cody snacks to keep him occupied and he enjoyed looking out the window... there's always so much to see here! We met Bishop Docuyanan and had a meaningful evening getting to know the church body there. There is also a school and bible college and we met a lot of lovely people. Cody had fun running around in the cooler weather there.  I took some great photos on my camera, but unfortunately can't access them now. But here's one from the church meeting and then of the students (and Darnell- cant miss him!) at the school.

After a busy week we're now enjoying some much-needed R & R at a lovely guesthouse in Manila. We had some great Skype chats this morning and plan on hitting the pool after Cody's nap. This morning was our first time in a week not eating rice for a meal... kind of nice, especially since Cody has become quite the fussy eater and won't eat rice!  ...somewhat of a problem in this country! Tomorrow we get back on the bus and this time we're heading south to visit some more Mennonite churches. And on June 30th we fly to Davao to reconnect with our friends there... can't wait! We're really thankful that the boys are doing well travelling and are healthy and happy. Look how happy this little guy is!!!

This week has been SO different than anything we've ever experienced as a family and we have hauled our two little ones all over the place! So far, it's been a very fun adventure and we're excited for more to come. Thanks for your prayers:)