Alyssa Laubach and Kate Elmore

Hello Fellow Bloggers!!!! For our last day in Estonia, we spent the day in Tallinn, the capital of this wonderful country. We dropped our luggage off at the hotel and then proceeded to tour the city. We ate the finest food money could buy (McDonalds) and shopped for souvenirs for ourselves and loved ones. Don't worry Mom, I bought my brother a gift! :) We made sure to take plenty of pictures so you could see all the sights; the historic city was absolutely beautiful! Can't wait to see everyone at the airport: Delta Flight 173, lands at 5:15 PM, we are guessing that it will take us 1-2 hours to get through customs. P.S. Mom, I would love outback for dinner if you're wondering :) ha ha ha jkjkjk

Love you!!

Alyssa and Kate :)

The Amazing Race!

Our trip is sadly coming to a close and although many of us are excited to be heading home soon, our hearts are heavy with the thought of leaving Estonia. Last night we returned to our fabulous hotel in Rakvere and finally got a good night's sleep in a bed! This morning we headed to the church for a morning debrief with the Estonia leaders to talk about what went good and what could be improved for next years camp. After that we headed out to a yummy lunch and a little visit to the piercing salong (salon). A few of the girls with be returning home with some extra holes, 13 in total to be exact, including Angie's new nose ring! Then we headed back to the church to meet up with the youths and play a huge game of The Amazing Race all through the city! We divided up into 5 groups and raced through the city to complete tasks as a team. Sadly it decided to rain, but that didn't stop any of the teams. The tasks included playing the human knot game, racing up stairs and dressing up in a second hand shop. We all enjoyed a fierce fashion show from Kyle back at the church. After the winner was announced(the group with the ginger!) everyone enjoyed pizza, snacks, cake and unfortunately out last time with our new Estonian friends :( Now we are resting for the night and heading to Tallinn tomorrow for our last day!

Bye Bye English Camp

Today was the last day of English camp or fairwell to our new found friends. It means nights with more than 4 hours of sleep on something other than the floor. Also it means goodbye to horse flies that can carry off a horse. Despite the fact that we know are back in the guest house with comfort, I think all of us regret coming back because we are missing our small groups and our lil buddies. We had an oh-so wonderful picture session in the hallway of the school...and all the Estonian's wanted pictures with us even that ginger in our group Michael. I KID!! We said goodbye at the church and there were a few tears, but everyone seems excited for tomorrow when we can hangout. At dinner we saw Kaspar the friendly ghost, except he's not a ghost, and Sandar my lil fireball of a buddy. The cripple is hanging out with us and he got crutches actually made after WWI so we don't have to worry about him slipping everywhere. Well I want to play rooks and I'm can't think of anything cute or funny to say so I say GOOD DAY!

Josh Partridge aka ASIAN!!

Update to day seven!

This afternoon during free time we had a KILLER..(almost literally) Dodgeball game in the gym. There were a few scratches, floor burns, bruises and tears shed. Everyone is doing fine...except...Blake. During the game, he and Michael collided into each other causing Blake to twist his ankle and all the ladies went running :) To make sure he was alright.. a couple of Estonian leaders took him to the hospital to check everything out. Turns out that his foot was too swollen to find out what was wrong with it but doctors put a cast on it and he's back walking on it with crutches...with a very purple foot which is...NOT normal but he will be A.OK.
As for now.. its the boys turn in the SAUNA until 11 and then girls have it unitl 1.
Tomorrow is out last day at English camp:( We have made many new relationships with the Estonians and will be sad to leave. The leaders actually get to sleep in a little bit longer tomorrow morning which is good:) and then we will have breakfast, session, lunch, clean up and then we leave camp!
That's all for now:)

Day Seven. :)

T2na oli hea p2ev!! ( That's Estonian for..Today was a great day! )
All the leaders attended an early meeting at 8:15 this morning and we were all struggling to stay awake. It was a little cloudy outside but nothing to be worried about. We ate up a great breakfast and attended a session. All the Estonians were starting to really connected and open up within their small groups about their faith and their walks with god so that was really incredible to see! The English environment games like comics and the amazing race really allowed the kids and their leaders to grow a stronger relationships. free time was awesome too! half the camp played an game of dodge ball.......chris style (MUHAHAHAHA). but it was really fun! oh btw, in the previous bog we mentioned some illnesses....heres some details

Michael: has blood coming out of his nipples
Allie: fell over a rock and broke her wrist.....wow
Taylor: ran in to a pole and cracked his skull open and lost 3/4 of his blood supply
Alyssa: face us turning purple from a football to the head.
Kyle: has turned grren....so we call him the jolly green giant
Blake: broke his leg..

.....................NOT.

We are all having a great time!

Sick Bay Update

hey moms and dads - this is angie and i wanted to reassure you that all is well here in estonia. we've had a few students who've been sick but right now, 100% of the team are healthy and happy.

chris brock is our estonian leader and his wife lena is a doctor so we've had excellent care! most of the illness has been being over-tired, not drinking enough water and getting used to a new culture, new timezone and some new foods.

since i'm sure some of you want more specifics, there's been some nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and angry bellies. we've been "mandating" that they all drink 64 oz of water each day and also enforcing a decent bedtime. it seems like the worst of it is over and we are all LOVING our time in estonia!!

ps: i guess most of you will want to know if it was your son or daughter so here's who's been sick along the way: victoria, taylor, allie, josh p, michael. we would LOVE your prayers that we all stay healthy and strong.

stay tuned for more FUN updates from the students. for now, i'm off to be SILLY in the talent show!!!

Day 6

Today was the first full day at camp! This morning all the Americans woke up so they could attend a meeting where we learned all about what we were gonna do today. we started off with breakfast, which was porridge with jam! then we had our 2nd meeting and talked about how Adam and Eve brought sin in to the world. After that we had what we call English environments, its where Estonian's could play a lot of games while sharpening up their english. when everybody was hungry we headed to lunch! then out again to another english enviroment. sadly some american students have gotten really sick the past few days, so some of them had to sit out during the english enviroments. and so right now it is free time where everybody is enjoying football (both american and estonian), vollyball, nail painting, and just chillaxin'.