A Bit of Holland in Woodburn

This weekend was a great weekend to be outside. Michael and I were fortunate to be invited with some friends to go to the Woodburn Tulip Festival just an hour and a half north of us. I'd never been and it was as colorful as advertised. I never realized how many kinds of different tulips there are! Here's a few of my new favorites.

GSM Heart-to-Heart

 In February, we attended the Good Samaritan Ministries first annual Heart-to-Heart Celebration and Auction. See our previous post about the event here. We produced an overview of the event for GSM and you can see it right here! Enjoy.

Wendolyn

Meet my new feline friend, Wendolyn (Wendy for Short), the cat featured in our new blog header. I met her this past January while visiting friends. She was a recent addition to their home and was constantly in play - or insisting on being in someone's lap. Wendolyn loves string, the stair banister and getting her photo taken. She seemed to enjoy batting at the camera as much as she like attacking string. The above photo is one of my favorite images. It makes this spunky, half-crazed teenage kitten look like a regal duchess... or maybe a queen kitty? What do you think?

Heart-to-Heart

Greetings from the green and blossoming Eugene, Oregon! This post is our first from our new location, but it kicks back to a project I got to be involved in last month.

Shortly before our move, I was blessed to be a part of Good Samaritan Ministries' first "Heart-to-Heart Celebration and Silent Auction." GSM is a non-profit counseling organization that helps a lot of people work through tough times and healing from past and present life wounds. There are many offices around Washington, Oregon, Idaho (and beyond) that offer free counseling to those who want it. They also support many GSM counseling offices abroad. GSM Tri-Cities supports work at GSM centers in Rwanda, where counseling and reconciliation has been an important part of rebuilding a country nearly destroyed by the 1994 genocides. Heart-to-Heart was done to raise funds used to go to Rwanda. It was a great success.

It was also a night of desserts, wonderful auction items, and especially wonderful testimony from some who have found great help and healing because of how the Lord worked through GSM. I was especially touched and encouraged.

Here's my favorite photo (an auction item) from the evening: