Finally...another post!

So, I'm finally finding some time to write again. Thanks to all of you who have kept up with me by email and have been praying for me and for our work here, even when I didn't have much time to respond. July was a hectic and wonderful month for us! It began with a team of students from Harding University arriving to help us with our first English Christian Camp. We then had the camp at a retreat facility about 1 1/2 hours away from Olomouc. We were so thankful for the 23 Czech teenagers who showed up for our camp and seemingly had an awesome time with us over the course of a week. After that camp was over another team of students from Conway, AR arrived to join the Harding team in helping us run our next English Christian Camp. I was glad to have this group here with us, because they are from my home town and I grew up with almost all of them. It was nice to have a bit of home here with me for a while. Again, God greatly blessed our camp time with 27 new Czech students who attended this camp. It was held over one week's time directly in Olomouc. We had a blast doing many new things together with these teens. The month was so full of work and joy and fellowship and new friendships and we are still taking it all in. It's overwhelming and humbling. Now, we're beginning to host follow-up activities with all of these new Czech students. Sadly, this week our 2 American teams left and we are also feeling their absense. It was encouraging to us to have so many people to worship with and work with for a month. However, God has already begun to fill some of the void with some Czech friends who have begun attending worship with us more regularly. We praise Him for that and pray it will continue and even grow with these new Czech teens over time. There is still much work to do, but we are looking foward to it and to knowing all of these new friends better! At some other time I'll post pictures from our camps and tell more stories about our time spent at them. For now, a small pregnancy update and then back to some needed resting:)

I had a doctor's appointment yesterday. I'm on target measuring at 24 weeks- which means I'm in the 6th month now. I can't believe how fast it all goes by. I know many of you warned me about this already:). The baby was fun to watch as he was moving around a lot. We got one fairly decent picture that I'll post later- it looks like the baby is smiling:) So cute. The heartbeat was going strong and everything measured well. The baby's weight measures at 1 lb 6 oz. It's always a relief to hear that he is healthy. Tomorrow morning I'll go to a special clinic here to do the routine blood glucose testing. Please pray I pass this test and that I do it with strength and patience. I have to fast beginning at 7pm tonight and it's been a long time since I've made it past 7pm without a snack before bed:) Hopefully I won't feel too sick in the morning.

Here are some pictures at 24 weeks and then at 18 weeks to compare to.







So far I haven't had any stretch marks, but I do have dry skin that I put lotion on a lot. It helps with some of that itchy feeling. Most days I feel really good, except for always feeling exhausted. My belly button, which you can't see in the picture, is about to pop out:) With the warmer days I'm having more swelling in my face, hands, and feet. My regular medication helps control some of this, thankfully. Though it's not really hot here, compared to what many of you in the US are experiencing, I'm already looking forward to fall and cold weather:) As for names and plans made for the baby/baby room, we still don't have any answers:) We'll be sure to start some of those preparations soon...