Psalm 127:5

This just in...

My girls are cute.

I Corinthians 12:27

Our Family is Growing!

And no, I am not pregnant. What I mean is that our family of friends is growing.

It would seem like friendships could not possibly develop when you travel as much as we do. But God has given us amazing friends, some of whom we have been able to see several times - and it is so special for us and of course, for our girls.

Just to highlight a few of the recent fun moments...God gave us time with the Taylors in NYC recently...so much fun!


...the Makri’s and Tina in NJ...our second family


...and the Hardin’s who we stayed with on our first trip to Missouri. Michael and Jared laughed 90% of the time they were together! I had so much fun bonding with Shelly.


We have made so many fantastic friends during our nine months of traveling. It is so refreshing to fellowship with the body of Christ, be encouraged, have fun, and create new memories.

Matthew 13:44

So many of the churches we visit are a blessing. First Bible Baptist Church in Blue Springs, Missouri is one of those churches!

The conference started Friday night with a missions banquet - Bobby Bonner preached.

Saturday they surprised all the missionaries and took us shopping.

Amongst other things I picked up a backup drive for my computer. A friend of mine failed to back up his computer once and it caused a lot of problems for him. I did not want that to happen to me. Erika picked up some new clothes for herself. Of course the girls were showered with gifts as well.

The following is a video capturing the silliness.

Ecclesiastes 9:10

Calvary Baptist Church in Ashland, Ohio was the latest stop on the Barone tour.

The service we were part of was packed...songs, missionary presentation, baptisms, sermon, building project presentation, music special - and yet the service seemed to fly by. The church is first class, has a great staff, and is really growing - flat out, it's a great church.

On one of their walls...they have each missionary's prayer card and the most recent letter nicely framed. I am always impressed when I see things like this.

Afterward we ate at a restaurant the Associate Pastor was not exactly a fan of. He called it a glorified "concession stand." It was better than that...but the expression made us laugh.

Now off to Missouri...

Acts 17:6

As we pulled into the hotel Saturday night Natalia said, "Home!" I laughed knowing she was half right.

In the morning we were going to be presenting at Freedom Baptist Church.

We met Pastor Calloway and his wife for dinner at a local Mexican restaurant. Great fellowship - we just had to talk over the "Woohoo's" and "Yeeha's" of other diners who had too much to drink.

We presented our ministry to their very sweet church. The pianist jokingly greeted us with her accordion, playing, "When the Moon Hits Your Eye." At the end of the service Mrs. Calloway brought the girls out from the nursery wearing hot pink crowns from the lesson they had learned about Queen Esther. The Pastor, his wife and family are the kind of people we could spend all day with.

This little church is growing and will soon need to be meeting in a bigger building. They were very generous and even helped us pay for a much needed expense. This little church is doing big things. Little is much when God is in it!

In the beautiful countryside town of Red Lion Pennsylvania is a special baptist church that supports over 200 missionaries! As soon as you walk into the church there is a wall packed with missionary letters. One lady told us they would need to put on an addition in order to hang all of the prayer letters from supported missionaries. Red Lion Baptist Church supports around 200 missionaries! On a monthly basis they design a calendar and for each day, there is a different supported missionary family that is prayed for. Many people came up to us to show us these calendars and were excited that we would be added to that prayer calendar.

After Michael presented our ministry and preached, the pastor told us that they will be voting on new missionaries soon. He also encouraged us that he thinks they will want to take us on.

Please take a moment and pray that the church will want to partner with us and for this upcoming church meeting.

1 Corinthains 1:4

Prayer makes all the difference, that's for sure. Today Natalia had tubes put in her ears due to the innumerable ear infections she has had. All morning long many of our friends and family emailed, sent a text message, and called, stating they took time to pray for our two-year-old daughter Natalia.

Although this was a common procedure, we saw prayers answered!

Natalia was so brave and happy as we took her to see the doctor today, with a 2-year-old understanding of having her "ears fixed." We went into the room with her and played "dress-up" with the hospital gowns and fuzzy slippers. Then we practiced receiving the anesthetic on her baby lamb doll.

The Dr. and all the nurses were so impressed that Natalia did not cry once, even when coming out of the anesthetic which is very common to do.

We covet your prayers and are so so thankful to have people praying for us and our family! It is impossible to convey how encouraging it is to know that people are praying for us! Thank you!