Baptism By The River!

Carlos made it safely to Seattle. The kids and I missed him but I knew the kids would rather stay here in Portland at the camp. We all met down by the river around 10:00 am for a baptismal service.

Here are Liza and I waiting for the service to begin.

My Sweet Russian Friends!
Here I am surrounded by many of the kids who got along great with Landon and Sierra!

Here are the 8 who were going to be baptizedThis is Alex (Vera's husband) he was talking to the group before they were baptized.
Everyone came down to the river to be part of the baptismal.

Let the baptizing begin!

This is Peter. He moved here from Russia a few years ago with his parents and his 4 siblings. Please keep his mom Lida in your prayers. Soon after moving to America . . .her husband passed away. She was left here to raise her five children . . . two of them being handicapped. She needs our daily prayer for strength! Peter is her youngest and he is so sweet.


This is Thomas, Vera and Alex's son.

After the baptism, we all headed to the lodge for the 11 am morning service!

Pastor Vasily and Elana have 2 daughters who are married . . Natalie is in the yellow tank . . she is expecting her first baby in September.
There other married daughter is Olessia (I hope I am spelling that right) She is in the red tank top.They also have opened there home to 3 wonderful young adults. Elijah . . .the guy in the white t-shirt singing

Ksusha - my crazy Russian friend :-)

and Lena who is in the black shirt in front of Elijah. Their whole family is so special. They are so generous and their hospitality is amazing. We love them so much and we cherish their friendship!

Pastor Vasily dedicated one of the babies in their church to the Lord!
This is Vladimir (not sure on the spelling) He and his family have hosted Carlos and Jordan many times when they have gone to Portland during past visits.

The pastor from Tanzania brought forth a wonderful word.
Pastor Vasily translated it into Russian.
Dad . . .once again this is for you. I thought you would get a kick out of the name of the Lodge!
After the service everyone just relaxed the rest of the afternoon. Around 5:00 pm we needed to start packing and cleaning up. Sierra learned a hard lesson that afternoon. She had asked if she could go over to the swing rope. I had told her no because we needed to go up and shower and pack. Well, she decided to disobey and before I knew it she was over at the swing rope across the river. She had been over there everyday but there was always a big person there to help them get back . . because the current was strong and could pull you down the river. Well, she made it to the other side. I yelled for her to come back . . . she got up on the ledge and used the rope to swing in to the water. Well, she then learned a hard lesson. She didn't have anyone there to help her get back to me . . . the current started taking her down the river. I started screaming for her to get to the shore. She tried but couldn't manage. She did grab on to a branch that was in the water and then held on for dear life. I had someone run down the river to where there were two guys swimming . . . they told them what happened and they immediately started swimming toward her. Thank God she was able to hold on until her got there. Here he is bringing her back to me!
We were both scared to death! When she got back to shore I told her that because she disobeyed and didn't listen to me that she could of drowned. She started crying . . I felt like crying too! I just kept imagining her panicing and letting go and going downstream. I told her that you should always listen to your parents . . .there are times when we are asking her to not do something for her safety!!! I don't think either one of us will ever forget this!

We then headed back to the cabin to pack and shower. We headed back to Vasily and Elaina's house about 7:00.