August fun workshops

During the month of August we try to have some fun days with the children in our sponsorship project and at the Children's Home. One of my favourite days is always with the sponsored children from the next town over, Čelinac. They are all super sweet and we love getting to hang out with them. 

This time we were in the Elementary School main hall, and we started off by making butterflies (which will be sent to their sponsors). Here we all are about to make the butterflies: 

And two of the cutest kids with their butterflies: 

(they did get to make more if they wanted to take some home as well!!) 

Then it was time for the real fun to begin - I try to organise fun activities/crafts/games etc that they can toggle between. We really had something for everyone: 

The lego station: 

The playdough station:

The making cups that turn into rockets station! Elastic bands and a second cup needed... so simple and so fun! 

The football station: playing football with straws? 

There were two stations that were delibrately more "educational" - the health game: 

And the brushing your teeth station - essentially brushing off the whiteboard marker with a toothbrush. It is actually much quicker to get rid of the marker by brushing in circles - which is also the dentist-recommended way of brushing your teeth! 

Somehow we didn't get a picture of the most popular station - which was the throw bean bags at cups station. My colleague Graham was in charge of it, and after a while he asked if it would be ok to add some spice to the action by getting the kids to go upstairs and throw from up there... Luckily I said yes as it was so.much.fun for the kids... We did lose one of the bean bags by a mis-throw into a ceiling area  above the door (wish I could be there when the person who finds it there tries to figure out what the heck it is doing there!). After a while, I did have to pull the plug as we had most of the kids upstairs and none downstairs at the other stations! But there was definitely enough for them to do without it...  

Afterwards we had to wait for some of the kids to come be picked up by their parents and already had to be outside because the man with the key needed to leave... and that is when I realised that sometimes the best moments come from things you don't plan meticulously. Besides the upstairs bean bag game improvisation, I also brought along our hula-hoops - and we ended up having the best time outside while waiting, playing the pass the hula-hoop along your team while holding hands game... 

As you can see we had a really fun day with our friends in Čelinac, and the same can be said of the kids in Banja Luka and at the Children's Home! 

US Team and YWAM Team

We got back from our short triplet to Croatia, and our next US team arrived. This time it was just 12 of them, and as they were with us under 2 weeks, we did a shortened version of our orientation with them, before they got into the swing of things with fun game nights, pub quiz, etc. 

They were all studying in North Carolina, and so I could tell them about my visits there to see my friend Greg (who visited me last year!). They were a sweet team and it was fun to have them come and join in with our students and volunteers. 

After they left, we had just 2 days before our final team (from YWAM Trentino) before the summer break arrived. There were 6 nationalities amongst the 7 of them: USA, The Netherlands, Chile, UK, Brazil and New Zealand. 

They were heading down to the camps at Boracko Lake, and the idea was to have an orientation to the country and then help out where they could with us. Some of my colleagues had already left on their summer break, so it was just Kate and I doing the orientation for them.

After that, they helped a lot around the building - helping me with getting my supplies ready for our children's ministries (read: sharpening of pencil crayons!) and also helping me get rid of a lot of stuff from our office. And we also managed to find the right person for the job... of fixing how the books were organised: 

It is so fun when you give someone a job that they absolutely love, and do a great job with it!! 

It wasn't all work and no play, they did go up to Banj brdo lookout with our volunteers: 

And we had a fun last night with them, playing pictionary and other games: 

And then it was time to say goodbye to the last team of the spring/summer and head out on my own summer break! 

Triplet to Croatia

 After the InterVarsity team left and before the next team arrived, we had a 4 day break. On our team calendar, it was written "R.E.S.T" into those four days. Ljilja and I decided to have an actual getaway including her mom and sister as well. We went to a Split (and they came up on the bus from Trebinje) and had a lovely time at the beach, relaxing and enjoying time at the sea. We mostly just stayed in our area of Split: 

But on the last day when we took them in to the bus station, we had a short excursion to the city centre: 

We managed to find MY shop: 

And also the tower which goes back to Roman times... 

And was also a place Mom and I stopped on our trip in 2015 to listen to the local singers: 

It was fun spending time with me "other" family and enjoying the lovely city of Split together... but then it was time to go back to reality!

Rocky Mountain Region Team 2026 part 2

After I got back from the conference in Hungary, it was time to engage once again with the team. (If you haven't read part 1 about the team, check it out here)

Twice a week the team ran fun events, ranging from fun game nights, to trivia evening and a great cultural dance night - with dances from locals, Americans and Indian students. It is such a great way for the team to learn about the local culture and for locals and International students to learn about American culture! It is also a lot of fun! Below they are learning the "kolo" or Serbian circle dance:

Michael Ots who is the Field Director of FEUER (The Fellowship of Evangelists in the Universities of Europe) and an author of numerous books came and spent a weekend in Banja Luka, where he was able to speak on two events: 

The first night was about some of his travels to 75 countries around the world, ranging from meeting the Crown Prince of Liechtenstein to sharing how he sees God in the wonders of New Zealand. It was fun and engaging and encouraged even more people to attend the next night where he shared on the topic "What makes us human? Faith and hope in the age of AI". 

At this event he not only shared more deeply about faith and the meaning of life, but he was also able to share a copy his new book "Making sense of life" to every one who wanted one. Many stood in line to chat with him afterwards and get their booked signed! Here is one of our amazing volunteers, Vlad, with his signed copy: 

Then all of a sudden, it was time to say goodbye, and we had the traditional pizza/karaoke goodbye party. And the turnout was testimony to the relationships formed over their month with us: 

So, to end off, I do have to share one of the hard parts about hosting teams - and that is when something goes wrong or someone is sick...

Team directors, Hannah and Micah (above with our team) had been staff on 2 previous teams. And both those times, someone had needed to go to the hospital... When they arrived, Hannah jokingly said that they had gotten a "name" for being on the teams that always had someone get really sick and hopefully this time would be better...

Well, this team kind of said, "Hold my beer" to the previous two teams!! This time we had 3 people need to go to the hospital, 2 of them in the middle of the night (poor Ljilja!) and one of those two was really sick and needed help multiple days. Thankfully in the end they all got better (one was a broken toe, so that is still healing...). But the good news is that Hannah who was sick most of the previous two times, didn't get sick herself this time, so we are taking it as a win!!! 

It might not always be easy to host teams (especially big ones like this one), but I can truly say that it is always worth it!

Central European Staff Gathering

After settling in the team, it was time to head to Vajta, Hungary for our YWAM Central Europe Staff Gathering. I was on the planning team and so arrived a day early to help, and my main role was to help with the organising of the workshops in the afternoons. Here we all are: See if you can spot me! 

The main speaker in the morning, Dave Ginn, had previously worked in Romania and Hungary and he was so good. It was good to have good solid Bible teaching. In the rest of the sessions we had a variety of interesting topics and speakers, and I loved the conference overall. 

The workshops were many and varied, and everyone's main complaint was that there was too much choice! So I think I fulfilled my role well! I also ran a workshop on "Selfless Self Care" which I think everyone who came enjoyed. 

After helping to run the conferences for so many years, it was really great just to have limited responsibility, and enjoy the main fun at the gathering, which is catching up with friends from around the region - below I am with Ema from Romania and Andreja from Slovenia. I didn't get many other photos as I was too busy enjoying good conversations!! 

It is always a blast to spend time with friends and enjoy good times away from Banja Luka. And since we started going to Vajta in 2012, the distance has stayed the same, but the time travelled has changed considerably! Before, I would need to go on public transport and via Budapest where I would need to stay over on the way there and back... Now with all the newly built highways, it took me under 4 hours in the car! 

Rocky Mountain Region Team 2026 part 1

I arrived back from South Africa into Zagreb on the 18th in the morning, and waited 6 hours at the airport until this wonderful team of 31 Americans arrived. They are all students in colleges in the Rocky Mountain Region of InterVarsity - from Colorado to Utah and Arizona. We send a chartered bus for them, and so I helped with communication with the driver and got us all on the bus for the trip to Banja Luka. 

We then spent 3 full days doing orientation with them - from history and culture, to do's and don'ts in this culture... it also allows them to get to know us better and we have a fun time. I also managed to get all 31 names (it helps that there were returners and staff that I already knew). 

We end that week off with a fun sports day with our teenagers. Always a highlight: 

After that week, they go to different faculties to get to know the students and also get to understand more about the culture. Here we are at the English department. Because of illness, the  promised lecture on cross-cultural communication was cancelled, but I think the exercise they were given instead was equally valuable. The local students were given the task to translate some of Ivo Andric's "Signs by the roadside" which was a difficult exercise, but actually the Americans appreciated the difficulty of translating by the end and learnt a lot about the language and the culture along the way. 

Here they are trying to figure out what Ivo Andric is trying to say in different groups: 

And then each group was able to share their translation of the different texts to the class: 

Here we all are afterwards: 

More on the rest of their stay with us in another blog post!! 

Mom's 80th Birthday in South Africa

I don't usually travel twice in one year to South Africa, but this year was special. It was my wonderful Mother's 80th birthday. My brother and sister also came and even though May is a tricky time for me with our biggest team coming and reports due, I managed to make it work. 

We had a wonderful time as a family the week before her birthday - celebrating Mom's birthday every day in some way. It was really fun. Then it was time for the BIG happening - Mom's actually birthday party. She managed to keep the guest list to just under 40, but it was hard! We had decided to do it at home, and not in a restaurant, as it would be more relaxed. With both Astrid and I helping to organise it (and both of us love organising), it was super fun for everyone! 

And the weather played along... it was a stunningly beautiful Cape Town autumn day (especially as earlier in the week there was a huge storm which caused extensive flooding and electrical outages). We started by mingling outside: 

Enjoying catching up, or meeting new people - we had a fun "Find someone who" knows Sue from different places - like church or aqua... and there was a prize draw at the end for those who filled it out! And the prizes were the 4 spekboom centrepieces which Mom planted specially for the party: 

 

The highlight of our mingling time was having Jack the coffee man - he was making real coffees, lattes, cappuchinos, etc which everyone enjoyed... 

And all this while, the lamb was being cooked on a spit in our driveway! 

And then it was time to enjoy the lamb, and the potatoes and vegetables cooked in the juices being dropped down from the lamb - sooooooooo good! 

We decided to have the 4 of us each have a table and be the host of that table, and it worked really well. Here are all the wonderful tables: my brother, Kevin's:

My sister, Astrid's:

Mom's:

And mine: 

During the party, we had slideshows going in different places - I chose the photos and made sure everyone at the party was on the slideshow:

And it even became a fun talking point with some people: 

Another fun activity was the photo booth: Where you could get into it: 

Or just take a normal photo: 

And two very tall people making it really fun - probably my favourite photobooth photo! 

My brother and I both made a speech, and my sister MC'd the whole event. It really was a fun and honouring party for my wonderful Mom. 

Before everyone went home it was time for cake - made by the daughter of Mom's Maid of Honour who works in a bakery. It was a surprise for Mom (and a gift!) so that made it even more special. The succulents are real (and Mom was able to plant them later). Here are my brother, sister and I with Mom and the cake: 

I don't think we could have hoped for a more honouring celebration, or a more fun time for everyone who came. I believe that celebrations are a small glimpse of what it will one day be like in heaven, and if this party is what it will be like all the time, then I can't wait to get there!!