Our Son is Here

Hello Everyone,

We are so thankful to you all for your prayers for us this past week. Our son Luca was born last Tuesday at 4:51pm weighing 8lbs 3 oz. Even though labor was tough for Carli we could not have asked for a better experience. The doctors and midwives who took care of her were by far the most helpful we have ever encountered. We are now looking ahead with this amazing blessing that God has given us and ask that you pray with us to always hold our blessings like Luca with open arms to God knowing that Luca is the Lord's.

During this week we have learned much in finding patience with eachother and especially Luca. These past nights have been difficult for us as he wakes up every 2 hours to eat. We know that sleep deprivation will not last forever and we want to take in every moment that we have with him during this time.

Please pray that the Lord molds us to the type of parents He wants us to be for Luca and that our hearts are always more satisfied in being loved by our heavenly father than with the love of being earthly parents.

We love you all!

Carli, Justin and Luca

Our Apartment

Hello Everyone,

The goal of this post is to give a peek into not only the obvious ways we are sharing God's love, but also how we hope that in the practical day to day things we display the light of Christ. Some of the prayer requests we had before our return in February was for ease in finding a doctor, renewing our visas, and finding an apartment. For this post I am going to focus on how God has provided an apartment for us and the friendships that have already started from living there.

Our new landlord is named Anna Maria. She is a very sweet women in her 70's who lives in the same building as us with her cat.  From what we have learned about her so far we know that she loves to joke, really enjoys life and art.  She along with everyone else in the apartment building are eagerly waiting with us for our son to arrive. It has been over 50 years since this apartment building has had a child in it. So you could say that Luca will have no shortage of people loving him.  Our first week in the apartment we met another one of our neighbors, Fausta. She too is a women in her 70's and also a bit of a spitfire.  One day when we were moving boxes they were both outside the building talking. They invited us to sit and chat for a while.  This quickly turned into pulling out the lawn chairs, a bottle of coca-cola, and talking for two hours.  I mentioned to Fausta that tulips were my favorite flower and that the ones growing near us were beautiful. She quickly went inside to get scissors and cut me four tulips. She said that her grandma planted them and that she loves when they bloom each spring. During this time with them we also got the share our desire to have a positive impact on the youth of our city as well as serve in the local evangelical church. They were both interested to know more about this as the see the need for our youth to have positive influences.

Our prayer is that as our friendship with them continues to develop, that they would see the joy of Christ in us. Please be praying for their hearts to be open to the Gospel and for our lives to display it.  We hope to meet more of our neighbors soon, but in the mean time we are so thankful for the warm welcome we feel with these two ladies.

We also welcome good old fashioned snail mail to our new apartment.
Our address is
Via Antonio Gramsci 34
Budrio, Italia (BO)
40054

Thank you for praying with us,
Carli & Justin