Quick Overview of our Bosnia Trip so far...

Our trip has gone smoothly, as far as logistics. Bob's head cold has been the biggest hurdle for their performances. Most people can't tell that he's having issues, but for those of us who know what the songs should sound like, we can tell that he's struggling at times.

Please be praying for him especially the next few days. We leave today for Sarajevo and the guys will be performing either at churches or another venue on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights.  He will need a strong voice to make it through those times.

Terry's harmonica and mandolin have been a big hit with everyone.

Funny note! Not that I want to perpetuate this stereotype, but I think it's hilarious that several Bosnians have also recognized the similarity between Bob and Terry and Statler and Waldorf from the Muppets. This seems to reveal itself most often in their dry sense of humor when they're performing. The Bosnians weren't going to tell us, but it kind of slipped out at lunch the other day. Apparently they were laughing about it when the guys were performing at the Coffee Bar the other night. I love it!

Sorry I don't have time to share more, but we're heading out to Sarajevo in a few minutes.

We're Hoping to go to Bosnia!

Terry and I are excited about a chance to travel to Bosnia and Herzegovina for a short-term mission trip – our first ever! God has provided the opportunity and the availability of time off for us to travel and we are so very thankful. 

If we can raise the necessary funds, we'll go as part of a team from our church, led by Bob and Helen Ryan.  Helen leads Open Door to the World (ODW) an outreach arm of our church, Open Door Fellowship, in Phoenix and her husband Bob is an amazing musician and songwriter.  The Ryans have been working for years with the people and churches of this struggling nation since the war that tore Yugoslavia apart in the 1990’s.  

Open Door to the World, has worked to help bring hope and reconciliation to Bosnia since before the war's end. Beginning with a long-term assistance program to Bosnian refugees arriving in Phoenix, and working to impact the country with yearly teams to Bosnia itself, ODW has formed long-term relationships in the struggle for peace there. 

Mission:

This year, the Catfish Hunters musical duo (Terry and Bob Ryan) have been invited to perform at various venues in three towns in Bosnia and Herzegovina. What we’ve been asked to do is present songs that speak about forgiveness, hope and reconciliation to this war-scarred country. It's a badly needed message.

Now here’s the awesome part! 

Terry’s part in the team will be to use the musical gifts God has given him to minister in the cities of Mostar, Sarajevo and perhaps one other.  For those who haven’t heard him, he’s now playing guitar, mandolin, banjo, bass and harmonica.  Through the Coffee-bar performances, our Team’s prayer is to reach out to the communities as a connecting point between the Christians and their non-believing friends in those cities.   They'll be playing both at churches, to encourage believers, and in secular “Coffee-bar” venues to bring the message of forgiveness and reconciliation.

I hope to use my photography to capture glimpses of the stories of the Bosnian churches, people and ministries and bring them home to those who want to know more about the work God is doing there.   We also look forward to opportunities to share Christ and to encourage the hearts of the believers, young churches and our own Open Door Fellowship missionary family there (the Tinlin’s) in practical ways as well.    Along the way I hope to provide written and visual updates, whenever Internet access is available.

We hope to be a blessing to the people of Bosnia. And we believe that doing so in God’s name will be a blessing to us. You can share in that blessing – In prayer as we prepare and while we travel, in financially supporting this work, and by keeping in touch with what we find and experience as it happens, through our regular communications during the trip.

In a nation of several million people and fewer than 2,000 evangelical believers, the churches struggle to meet the needs of their members and to have a significant impact on their cities.

Open Door to the World ministry trips are financed through the fund raising efforts and personal contributions of team members.   Your participation with us is a significant investment in the Bosnian churches and their testimony in the surrounding communities. 

And so…

We would welcome any questions you have and will look forward to keeping you abreast of our plans, preparations and travels if you decide to partner with our team. 

Bosnia is still filled with strife and ethnic and political division. Without Christ, there is no solution that will bring these divided people together. Your prayers and financial support will give us the opportunity to use the gifts and talents that God has given us to encourage and minister to the people of Bosnia, using the universal message of music to reach across language and ethnic barriers to share the Good News of Jesus Christ!

To learn more about the goals of Open Door to the World visit www.ODFchurch.org and click on “Outreach”.

We hope you're as excited about this opportunity as we are! Can't wait to get there and see how God will use us to impact these communities.

Playing Music with Dave Argentati in Tucson

Last Friday, Terry and I drove down to Tucson so he could join his friends, Dave Argentati and Mark Converti to play music at the Glass Onion Cafe.  

They played a mix of 70's covers, James Taylor, Jim Croce and others, as well as a good supply of Dave's original songs.  Terry even sang lead on a couple of old favorites.  One of these days I'll get a video tape of it.

The cafe itself is a quaint little place with about 10 tables or so.  All the seats in the house were full and there were even people standing outside to listen to the music.  The photos behind the guys are called the "Wall of Fame". The owners take pictures of their patrons and hang them up on the wall.

  Our friends, Doug and Liz Johnson (Liz is in red on the left -Doug is sitting in front of her on the other side of the table) from Santa Clarita, CA moved to Tucson a few years ago. Liz and I have connected on Facebook and they were so sweet to come and hear Terry and the guys play. They also brought their son, Zach (in brown) who is in high school now. The last time we saw him, he was about 10 years old, so he's changed A LOT and is quite a handsome, well mannered, young man. He was so polite to sit thru 2 hours of oldies and songs that he'd never heard before. Thanks Zach.

In this photo you can see a glimpse of Mark, the cellist sitting behind and between the guys. He adds such a beautiful sound to the trio. 

After the concert we had a chance to hang out with Dave, Kathrin and some of their friends.  What a great group of people they are. It was such a fun night but we didn't leave their house until midnight! We had a wedding to go to the next day (more on that later) so we decided to do the 2 hour drive home. Or should I say, Terry did the 2 hour drive home while I slept most of it. I think we're getting too old to stay out until after 2 am. The next night we ended up coming home early after the wedding and I slept like a rock trying to catch up after a short night before. It was well worth it though, and we would do it again in a second!  Maybe next time we'll stay overnight in Tucson.

If you want to see a few more pictures you can go here.

Fort Myers, FL (Part 4) - Beautiful Music

When we went downtown for the First Fridays Art Walk in Fort Myers we had a chance to meet some of Alice's friends, enjoy some delicious food, browse a few galleries and hear some great music!

These are a few of the friends that Alice meets up with to enjoy First Fridays and other night life around town.  They are a sweet bunch of folks.

While we were there we heard the legendary John Mooney play blues (slide) guitar for free at the Indigo Room! He's a pretty amazing musician. (There's a photo of him playing with Bonnie Rait among other things). Apparently he has family in Fort Myers, so he comes to see them and drops in at some of the local places to play.  Sorry that the photo is blurry. I was using our table as a tripod and it kept getting bumped, but you get the idea.

After that we wandered down to have dinner at the French Connection Cafe.  The food was excellent and very reasonably priced.  Even though we had a pretty big storm earlier in the evening, the weather was perfect for eating outside.

Check out Alice's Steak Salad.  Mmmm!

Later we stopped in at this Arts for ACT Gallery and Boutique set up to raise funds for (Abuse Counseling and Treatment) in the Fort Myers area. See the beautiful blue scarf hanging over the partition? That's where I found MY beautiful GREEN hand-dyed silk scarf by Sara Long that I promptly purchased to bring home.  It was VERY reasonably priced too. I loved all the quilted art and textiles here. 

 

Alice has a friend, Kat Epple that was playing music at another gallery - Space 39 (also free to listen) so we headed over there to hear her music and meet more of Alice's friends.  We learned that Kat's music has won 8 Emmys for film scores and has been nominated for Grammys!  Pretty awesome, huh?  Unfortunately, I don't know the names of the other 2 musicians, but they all played beautifully!  The guy on the right is playing a theramin.  You can go here if you want to hear what one sounds like.  It has something to do with radio waves...

 

Well we're headed out to Naples today, so that's all I have time for. We had a really fun time at the Art Walk, thanks to our host and tour guide, Alice.

Fort Myers, Florida (Part 1) We're Here!

For those of you who don't already know, I'm in Fort Myers with my mom and my sister, Diane on a short vacation to visit my mom's sister, Alice. Unfortunately, it's after midnight here and we have a busy day planned tomorrow (and most every day that we're here), so this has to be short and sweet.

I just couldn't wait to post a couple of pictures of some of the things that we saw tonight when we went downtown to their First Friday Art Walk. Yes, they have one too. We'll talk more about that later.

Right now you can admire this awesome art installation with words shining all over the sidewalk, building, pedestrians and ...

...even on the trees!

I just LOVE it!  Alice didn't really know the story behind the choice of the various words.  Some of them are definitely real words, but others look to be either made up or another language.  I haven't had time to research it.  Let me know if you know anything about it.

Anyway, this is at the Sidney and Berne Davis Art Center in downtown Fort Myers.

Here's a close up of the words below as well.

Later we went into this gallery that had some gorgeous textiles!

I found this beautiful hand-dyed silk green scarf for only $15!  What a fun souvenir to bring home as a reminder of the wonderful time that we've already had...and it's only the first day here!







We also enjoyed some amazing music tonight, but that will have to be a post for another time.  In the meantime, do any of you know what a theremin is?  I can give you a hint.  It's a musical instrument and we got to hear one tonight!  More on that to come so stay tuned...

Andrew's Place of Employment, Magic and Fun!

On Saturday morning after our big Dbacks night we left town for Los Angeles. You see, we had decided just a couple of days before that we were going to meet our kids there. Amy and Andrew already live there (well, in the San Fernando Valley) and Kevin had just a week or two before he was going to leave Omaha, Nebraska and move to Meridian, Mississippi for his first job since leaving the Air Force. And because it had been over a year since we'd seen him, we talked him into flying to L.A. to spend the weekend with us. He also agreed to take us all to Disneyland as a sort of late birthday/Christmas present. (Isn't that sweet of him?). More on that in another post.

Anyway, Terry and I drove about 6 hours from Phoenix straight to LAX to pick up Kevin from the airport. Unfortunately, Terry missed an exit for I-10, which is so easy to do in L.A. so we ended up taking surface streets through part of the city. It was fine. We still got to Kevin within just a few minutes of when he landed. If you've never been to L.A. you can see by this photo of the freeway at midday Saturday, that it's a bit intimidating, especially for a newcomer.

Did you know that they have massive billboards on the sides of buildings for TV shows there? I don't think I've noticed that anywhere else in the country (or am I just missing it?).

After picking Kevin up we found out that Andrew had gone into work and would be able to give us a tour of the recording/mixing studio that he works at. Now I'm not allowed to say the name of the studio or the name of his boss in this post and you're not allowed to guess who it is online. Because if you guess it correctly then I'd have to kill you. If you want to know the next time I see you or via email, I can do that. Just not online. It's kept very hush hush.

I will tell you that we drove to a very nondescript smallish light industrial type building in a very average looking part of the San Fernando Valley and that's where Andrew's workplace is. (Hope that doesn't give anything away.)

Once we started touring the place, to our surprise, the building was actually quite roomy and very eclectic inside. It still had kind of an 80's feel with the wood paneling and dark colors, but also had some fun surprises and so much to look at and enjoy.

This yellow lucite chair was one of the first things I noticed.

Then we rounded a corner and I saw this huge aqua banquette. I took the picture just so Linda could see it's magnificence.

The restroom that I visited was filled with Rolling Stones paraphernalia and this amazing mirrored dresser. I saw some similar pieces this weekend at Pier 1 Imports. I love that look!

It was really like a mini museum with all sorts of autographed memorabilia from the bands that had come thru the doors to work on their records, as well as dozens of other items that Andrew's boss had probably just picked up here or there. Do you remember the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man from Ghost Busters?

The walls were filled with framed albums, cds, awards and more tokens of appreciation and accomplishments for the work that had been done there.

The actual working rooms were pretty impressive too, even for someone like me who has no idea what any of it is. Look at these control boards below. They were probably 10 feet across! Wow! What does someone do with all those buttons and knobs.

The coolest thing is that Andrew is working with the team of this well known engineer and learning the ins and outs of the record business...and he LOVES it! From what I hear, his team is extremely happy with his work as well. Go Andrew! His name is even on the latest Green Day album. Did I say too much? You can see him here working his magic.

Oh, by the way, those boring looking amplifiers in the picture at the bottom... Those are Marshall stacks! From what I remember, those are pretty awesome for an electric guitar player. Just thought I'd impress you with my musical knowledge. Ha Ha! I have a feeling they may be a little outdated, but I'm not sure.

And here's our daughter (his wife) Amy, looking all proud of her husband for the awesome job that he has. We're proud of him too!

Thanks for the tour, Andrew! We loved it!

Let's Rewind...
Life has been so busy for us over the last few weeks that I've missed posting about several wonderful outings that we've had, so I'm going to rewind a bit and see if we can catch up on some of the fun.

Back in mid-September we had one jam-packed night!

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We had the chance to ride the Phoenix Light Rail (aka Valley Metro) for the first time. After work, we drove down to central Phoenix with Marshall and Cathy and met some other friends, John and Suzi at the Metro station at Central Avenue and Camelback Road. Coincidentally, that's around the same place where I had taken pictures (above) a few weeks before when we drove down Central to Terry's musical "gig" at St. George's.

I like the new look of the area. It looks a lot different than when I went to Central High School back in the 70's. The Baskin Robbins and Lunt Avenue Marble Club are missing from the north corners of the intersection and of course the light rail fills the southwest corner.

Within minutes, the clean and quiet train delivered us just steps from Chase Field, so we could watch a Diamondbacks game with a great group of friends and folks from Open Door. The Dbacks played the Colorado Rockies and won 7 - 5. That was a nice bonus.

After the game, we were treated to fireworks above the stadium.

Then we heard two Diamondback players share about their faith. Stephen Drew and Blaine Boyer.

And to end the evening, we got a free concert by the band, Mercy Me also at the stadium. You could tell by watching him, that the leader of the band, Bart Millard has a sweet and gentle spirit and a great voice, of course. (Amy you need to look at his favorite artist/band and movie in his bio.)

They closed with one of my favorite songs. Actually I want it to be played at my funeral, o.k.? It's called "I can only Imagine" and it's about going to heaven.

After a long full evening we headed back to the Metro station to catch a ride back to our cars. The ride back was much more crowded, but still very smooth and fairly easy. A few other friends were on the same car on the train ride back...Don, Carol, Bruce & Ellen.

Soon we arrived at our Central and Camelback stop. It was after midnight, but well worth the long evening. We said goodbye to John and Suzi, then headed home.

What a fun adventure with a precious group of friends...and the next morning Terry and I had to get up and drive to Los Angeles to see Amy, Andrew and Kevin. Crazy weekend, but what a blast!

More on that to come...