Home, Home Sweet Home

Apparently WE did not push the right button and our note to you all that we arrived home did not post. Anyway, we're back in the states, and happy to be here. We went on a cruise for our 35th anniversary before flying home from Nairobi. Not to bore you, but we flew to Barcelona out of Nairobi with a day layover in Istanbul. Sounds exotic doesn't it, well it was. Went to the Blue Mosque and Grand Market in Istanbul, relaxed in the great city of Barcelona, both cities with really nice and helpful people. Our cruise left Barcelona and our first stop was in Monte Carlo. Didn't visit the Casino, but could see it from the ship. Instead we took a trip to Nice seeing a medieval castle along the way and then had a wine and cheese tasting in Nice. We stopped at 3 Italy Ports, saw some Rome sites, and had a stop in Sicily and saw Carthage in Tunisia. A great way to wind down from 9 months in Africa and a great way to celebrate our Anniversary. Back to Nairobi for our flights home. We were expecting to be in Des Moines at about 1pm, but in Amsterdam our plane was accidentally loaded with 1200 pounds of empty pop cans, making the plane overweight. Of course they couldn't just off-load it at the loading terminal, we had to taxi to another place to get the cans off. By the time this was all done, we left about an hour and half late, which was all the time we had to switch planes in Detroit. Missing that connection meant we didn't' get to Des Moines until 8pm or so. But what a great greeting we had. 5 of our grandchildren showed up with home-made signs and balloons and were we ever glad to see them and our son and daughter, along with daughter-in-law and son-in-law. Our oldest and his wife and his two kids met us later at my brother's house, So we got to see my whole family other than Mother and sister-in-law who we hope to see later.

We have a little place near Rathbun Lake in Southern Iowa where we're scrunching all our things we brought home, clothing, and of course my golf clubs I got out of storage. It's small, but we're only expecting to me here this summer/early fall and then find another way to thank God for what he has given us.

We already miss all the kids and 'family' we had in Africa. Spending all the time we did with the kids and the people we met, we grew to love them and we're sure we'll eventually go back and see them again.

Our plans now are to try and set up some time to visit with the Grass Roots people in Ohio and investigate and explore other opportunities to do God's work. Maybe some time we'll actually retire. I'm sure our next mission will not be nearly as interesting to everyone as this one proved to be, but we'll let you all know that are part of this blog where we're going and will start a new blog for our new adventure.

Thank you all so very, very much for your support and prayers. There were some rough times and illnesses that weren't any fun, but knowing we were in Africa for a reason and knowing that we had family and friends supporting us helped us tremendously. God Bless You All, Mark and Pam