Malt-o-Meal

This is the recipe for our favorite muffins.  Here in Kazakhstan we use something called манная and the muffins are almost the same! So yummy hot with butter spread on them!

Tuti Fruti, Almaty Kazakhstan

We love Tuti Fruiti and were shocked to find one here in Almaty! So fun! The kids had Coco Puffs on their yogurt. Yum!

Shopping

Andrew and Katie love this little cart in our local grocery store. We love shopping in Kazakhstan, it’s always a fun adventure. The kid’s favorite thing to buy are Kinder Eggs. They are little chocolate eggs with a toy 

inside. 

My First Text from The Sara Bear

Hiking in the Tien Shan Mountains

Kazakhstan

It was a long road to get to the point of moving our family overseas. We are thrilled at the faithfulness of the Lord through so many wonderful saints to help us, support us, encourage us, pray with us, and partner with us. It feels unreal that we are now here and getting settled in Almaty Kazakhstan.

During the preparation, so many neat and wonderful things happened, sings from the Lord of comfirmation of our desire to live in Kazakhstan. We met a woman we had known and worked with in Kazakhstan more than 10 years ago in Walnut Creek, just a few days after we had made the final decision to persue moving to Kazakhstan. She is Kazakh and her husband is from the P. People group in a country below Kazakhstan. This is a completely unreached people group. We got together for breakfast and I will never forget her words. As we are sitting at the NorthCreek Cafe, she is telling me about how much a training center is needed and how tired and weary the believers are in this part of the world. She said she had just gotten an email that morning from a pastor who is exausted and needs a break. He needs to be trained. She urged us, encouraged us, and implored us to go, train and refresh the people of Central Asia. It was a bit surreal siting across from her, hearing about the desperate need and getting encouragement my own hesitant soul needed so badly. It was as if God had sent her to Walnut Creek just for that specific day, and that specific breakfast to spur us on and give us the confirmation of the decision we had just stepped out in faith to make. Until listening to this dear sister, I was scared, tenitive, and very sad that God would uproot all the good things in our life. I was worried about the kids. After this sister's encouragement my soul was at rest. I would follow my husband. I would leave the life I loved with all my heart, so that some in this world might have a heart that can come alive in Christ. How can I truly be happy and content in this life, how can I settle down and rest in comfort, when I know there are so many in the world who are spiritually lost, without anyone to go to them? There is a God who is calling "Who will go for Me?" Could he use me to reach the lost in Walnut Creek? Yes, he could, but he could also use hundreds of thousands of other believers. Does he want some of those thousands of believers to re-locate to where there are just handfuls of believers... scattered random pockets of very few believers.... who's light is small against the darkness of false religion? Yes, with all my heart I believe He does. It makes sense scripturally and logically.

Preparation was not easy, and the transition has not been easy. We have had our share of discouragements and hard times. Is it worth it? Absolutely. As long as our family can thrive among a spiritually dark nation, then we will do it. We will be here where the harvest is plentiful and the workers are so very few. We so desire to be used by the Lord, and raise our hand and beg him to "Pick me! Pick me!", when it come to spreading His word and truth of scripture. 

Thank you Lord for Your word and your encouragement to our family to relocate and become migrant workers for the kindgom. May our kids see the goodness in your plan, and may they understand why we wouldn't stay. May they never resent or be confused about who they are or why we are here. May they never linger in loss, grief or pain or feelings of rootlessness. May we all have a deep sense of our citizenship which is in heaven. Help our family be strong, grow closer to one another, and a mighty tool in your hand to be used in whatever way you would choose.

Tuti Fruiti Walnut Creek

Turi Fruti! This is one of our favorite places to go on a Pajama Ride!

The Scott Cuties

We love living with the Scott family. Since rent is out of control in the area we live in, we decided to move into a house with another family. The Scotts have three little girls who are so sweet and cute. We love them.  

Sammy!

 We sure love our little cousin Sammy! He is such a sweet little boy and we love it when he comes to play!

Fall 2015

I think these are my favorite ages of my children of all time. Each child is so amazing. I love our conversations we have all day long and how each one of them is learning and growing in so many amazing ways everyday. Justin and I think we have the best children that have ever lived on the planet. We love each of them so deeply and wake up every morning so excited to have another day with each of them. We thank God for entrusting each of these little lives to us. 

Easter 2016

Easter 2016 was the best Easter ever! We went camping on Mt. Diablo and had an Easter morning egg hunt in our campground. The weather was beautiful. We had an amazing campsite with really great climbing trees. We took a hike around the summit and it even started to snow on us as we hiked. It was a hike we will never forget. The green hills and beautiful flowers were declaring the beauty and creativity of our Lord. We are so thankful for nature and how it shows us glimpses of God.