Family Reunion to Departure Day

At the time of this writing, we are just a couple of hours away from our departure for Ukraine. We will leave for the airport in a couple of hours, and we just wanted to give you a quick report on what has happened since we last wrote.

The past week + we have enjoyed great family reunion at Katherine's parent's house in San Clemente, CA. With visits to the beach, Disneyland, special celebrations honoring the Bechtle's forty years of marriage, and just being together, we enjoyed a week "full" in many ways. A highlight was certainly the family devotional times each day, when each family unit shared some thoughts from scripture, updated everyone what was going on in their lives, asked for prayer in specific areas, and then ended in prayer time. It really helped to draw us all closer to one another, and helped to keep us focused (which proved somewhat of a challenge at times, having had 4 children age six, and under to keep us entertained throughout the week). Abbie particularly enjoyed getting to know "my cousins."

With the reunion ending on Wednesday, we had a full day and a half to prepare for our trip to Ukraine. Although we tried to plan ahead, we managed to spend all day yesterday (into the wee hours of this morning), making last minute purchases, tying up loose ends, and packing. Please pray that amidst all the hustle and bustle, we will be able to keep our focus and composure - that why we are going will remain constantly in the forefront of our thoughts (II Corinthians 5:20).

Our flight departs L.A. at 6:40 p.m. this evening, flying to Frankfurt, Germany, where we will have a stopover. We will head on to Kyiv on Sunday morning, after having a short visit with some of Scott's dear friends who moved from Ukraine to Germany a number of years ago. Please keep our travels in your prayers this weekend.

God willing our next posting will come from Ukraine! Thanks for checking in on this site ... and we hope that it will help to keep us "connected" while we are abroad.