Nothing could quite prepare me for this time of year. Once December hit, it was like everything transformed overnight.

Nothing could escape it, no street,

house,

balcony,

window,

door,

pond?

fountain?

....you get what I mean :)

This is also an exciting time of the year for students. Christmas Banquet was a much anticipated event for high school students. Here are some fun pictures from the evening.

On December 6th, we celebrated St. Nikolaus day, which is the day St. Nikolaus comes and fills your shoes with goodies.

Then we had an awesome winter concert. It was so fun to see these talented students in action!

and the last week of school, we had our small group Christmas party

Now that school is out, Kandern seems a bit empty with all the students scattered around the world for Christmas. Now that I have some time to process, I've realized this semester has been incredible! I thank you all so much that I can be here! Have a Merry Christmas!

October Highlights

It's officially fall here in Germany and you know what that means...

Time for fall parties! (space theme)

Fall Festivals in Basel! (aka who can ram their teachers the hardest on bumper cars?)

Time for fall sports!

Time for Operation Christmas Child packing! (we lead the best small group!)

Visiting some incredible friends!

And as always, having fun learning German in Frau Hinton's classroom

Happy Fall!

Spiritual Emphasis Weak/Impact Day

I thought Homecoming and Courtwarming were high-energy weeks, but I was definitely wrong!

Spiritual Emphasis Week definitely blew those out of the water. This a week at BFA that is an incredible time of year for students. Every morning we gathered together in the Chapel with the High School students for worship and speakers. Students are challenged and encouraged in their faith and there was so much energy as they entered into our classrooms and the discussions just spilled over. It was really great to experience!

The Middle Schoolers were interviewed one morning and asked what they enjoy about Spiritual Emphasis week and I was so excited to get a video of them. Some of their answers blew me away, but sorry it's not the best quality





They didn't just say it with words, but I saw it in action as we served the community on "Impact Day" where we were split into groups and given different jobs throughout the community.

My group spent the first half of the morning cleaning classrooms and windows in the High School building.

Here is a picture of my group working really hard! :)

After lunch, we went to a local nursing home and brought some "amerikanisch" snicker doodles and peanut butter cookies.
But what happened next was incredible! As they were giving out cookies, the middle schoolers were talking, smiling, and putting their arms around the people there. They played "Gymnastik" with them and sang to them. Most of them did not know a lot of German, but this did not bother them.

The joy from the students serving and the joy on the people there was amazing. I just kept thinking "We've got to do this again!"

Here is a picture of the students who did "Gymnastik" with 99 almost 100 year old woman

Group picture

Mayor of Kandern thanking everyone for their hard work

At the end of the week we hiked from Sitzenkirch to Kandern

met some llamas

When we arrived in Kandern, we had a BBQ waiting for the students. It was a great time to wind down, worship, and talk about all the things we had learned that week.

It was such an amazing week of just bonding with the students and challenging them in their faith. I am so thankful I was able to be apart it!