Hi everyone, Audrey here! Well, it is safe to say that the parent’s retreat was a fantastic success! Going in to these 3 days of retreat and teaching with our house parents, we wanted to focus on equipping them, strengthening our FHF community and giving them a fun, relaxing time.

These sweet people are the heartbeat of Faithful Heart Foundation. Over the past 10 years, God has brought each couple to Faithful Heart’s doorstep…for one purpose. They wanted to bring orphans into their families. Now, each couple (6 couples at this point) has a houseful of children—they care for them daily…and yearly. Matt & I feel like it’s such a privilege to work with these couples and get to have a part in the Kingdom work God is bringing about here—transforming the lives of these sweet children through the obedience of people like this…people with open hearts, willing to be the hands and feet of Jesus to the hurting children in Thailand.

^^^(Left) That’s the whole group! The staff are in the blue shirts (ehm, shirts designed by me! So fun!) and we had a little (big) competition going over the 3 days, so the parents were divided into teams—orange, purple, magenta. (Right) Gawley led us several times throughout each day in worship—our theme song was Oh Happy Day, but in Thai—so great. :) Listen (in English) here!

^^^(Left) Us! Hot and tired, but happy :) (Right) A little break time for our hard workers…Dave, Pring, Shirley, Tiida and Puan. That’s a good bunch of people right there. We had the help of our college students and a few friends from church!

^^^Remember that little (big) competition I was telling you about? Here’s some of the action! Team building, strategy, and camaraderie—not only was it a blast to watch, but we just continued to see the community of our little FHF get stronger and deeper. These guys only see each other at Foundation meetings and monthly worship times. It is so good for them to get to know each other, share in this community and share in life! Matt mentioned it during the retreat and I totally agree—this retreat is an invaluable time for our foundation parents and community. We need the unity, encouragement, excitement and love that it brought about!

^^^(Left) Day 3…the final hours—we announced the 1st place winners of the combination of team points from all three days. The orange team was jumping for joy at their victory :) Not a bad prize either! $30 each to the shopping center (similar to Walmart). Needless to say, they loved it.

(Right) This week in Thailand is also the Thai New Year. At the end of the last day, the house parents planned this traditional Thai ceremony to honor and bless their leaders (Dave & Shirley). Oh man, it was such a moving time—they offer a blessing to their leaders and ask for forgiveness of any offense from the last year, then the leaders return a blessing to them.

^^^An ending prayer for our leaders and Faithful Heart Foundation. Invaluable times.

Thank you for you prayers & love!

Miss you & sending love,

Audrey & Matt