Kevin.

It's been quite a week around these parts. Few things rock our Belgian boat more than when a teammate leaves, and Kevin's 2 years were up this week. On Wednesday we waved so-long to our dear friend.

He had his rounds to make saying his good-byes, but we made sure to snag him for some last-minute team time. We spent a lot of the afternoon talking to airlines and checking flights wondering if he was going to be able to get out at all with the ash cloud hype. Such stress. We had a good time just being together though.



A few months ago I found some really pretty white beans at the grocery store that I used as little place cards for one of our weekly team lunches. I since planted Kevin's bean which sprouted into the cutest little beanstalk which then became a most appropriate centerpiece for our going-away lunch. The rest of us, you will notice, are left as beans. We have a little while longer to call Belgium home.



The church youth group had a going away party for Kevin as well. Here he is with our friends Katrine and Pascal.



Parties here become costume parties more often than not which explains Kevin's monk robe and shaved head. Clay and I decided to attend dressed as "Americans."



One last barbeque together.



Early on Wednesday morning, our little team shivered all the way to Kevin and Josh's house to say our last goodbyes. The boys had stayed up all night packing Kevin's bags, so Kevin shared a little quick-energy secret with us: 2 raw eggs, honey, and a little milk will apparently have you ready to rock n roll in no time.



And with that, he was gone. There is a void now and we miss him. 2 years well spent. He reached into the church and the community like no one I have ever seen. He taught us a lot and went through a lot with us. We love you Kevin. Eat some American food for us. Punk.



I must note that amidst all the sadness, several things made this week pretty fun in other ways too.

One, we figured out how to make pretty darned good breakfast sausage. A seemingly small thing, but trust us, little patties of gold they were.



Also, there were fun animals to brighten my days:

Sam and Nathalie's goats.



And a curious milk-cow at the farm. (The farm where Amy took me to buy raw milk that tastes so close to American milk that I want to do nothing else but drink glasses and glasses of it all day long.)




So, quite the week. A tough one but a good one.