My first Christmas... In Riga

As many of you have possibly heard, airports all over Europe were closed due to an abundance of snow. My supervisor and his family were in Ireland, working with the Latvian Lutheran Church in Dublin in the midst of all of this, and ended up stuck there for 5 days longer than expected. This wouldn't have been as big of a deal, but this period of time included Christmas! Saddened by missing half of the team here, we kept one another in our prayers and rearranged our plans.

In Riga, Kathleen and I spend the weekend together. On Christmas Eve we had our English speaking service, and I gave a children's message. There were about 25 people worshiping with us, and celebrating the birth of the Savior. Later than evening we went to a Latvian Christmas music concert at the Dome, where we were able to participate and sing along with eight different christmas hymns. It was quite a nice evening. The rest of the evening was filled with watching the Grinch, snacking on appetizers, listening to Christmas music and playing scrabble. On christmas day I roasted a chicken, and scurried over to Kathleen's apartment and we had a nice lunch together. (as a Lutheran from Minnesota- this reminded me of potlucks, as I covered the chicken and wrapped it in a towel for transport, I know many of you understand this well ☺)In the evening we went to a Christmas play at the Jesus Church and then took a tram out to spend the rest of the evening with another friend. Yesterday we were blessed to be invited to a nice gathering at the home of a family that regularly attend our English Worship on Sundays. Later on in the evening we went to a Christmas ball that was movie themed. Everyone was dressed as different characters from all sorts of movies. Some of them I recognized, but some were from Russian films that I am not familiar with. All in all the weekend was quite nice. It was certainly not what I am used to, but I feel so blessed to have been able to spend the holiday with wonderful people, and I am thankful that God has already put so many wonderful people in my life here in Latvia.

Mark, Rose and their son Philip just got back from Dublin this morning, and I am so happy that they are home. We are planning on celebrating together soon. What a blessed Christmas! I pray that you have had a good Christmas as well!

Me cutting up the Chicken for our Christmas day dinner.

Christmas fellowship! It may have just been the two of us, but we had a nice time and I am so thankful for our celebration together.

In costume at the Christmas Ball.

Can you guess our Characters?

Post your guesses with comments on this blog entry!