Warm smiles and happy hearts from Italy:
I hope that all is most excellent and awesome and fantastic for everyone back home (and here too); I'm happy to say that I have built somewhat of a life here in Italy, and it has consisted largely of New Naif, and Mensa,(a soup kitchen and homeless shelter). I wish I could have began volunteering at Mensa earlier on, but required my permesso di soggiorno, which I was lacking until recent, Italy takes there sweet,precious time getting things like that to you :-/ Working and serving there has brought me quite a bit of joy, and I can only hope that I carry the attitude and humility of JESUS when I go there and am helping out the best I can, giving glory to our GOD in heaven. Helping out there, I believe, has also helped improve my Italian, a good thing, that with no doubt still needs quite a bit of improving, but I hope it does you, my family, friends, and supporters well that although my language skills not be quite up to par, (at least in my opinion), I still help, and do my best, my best, in serving on Sundays at Church; praying in Italian, for the Lord's supper, or the collection, or helping out in the children's class. With my ability to understand better, I look all the more forward to my following months here and getting closer to both our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ and also to the friends I have made outside of Church, (with great, huge hopes of blessing them and showing them GOD, and the awesomeness of Him who is awesome always towards me, in all that I am and do) because that is why I am here in Italy and in this world, so that I can always be constantly pointing towards our awesome, gracious, merciful, and fun loving GOD, with hopes of bring others into His well being. Because that's what I'm about; and it's what I want to be about in my joy and happiness, and it's what I want to be about in sadder, gloomier days. And I hope the same for you. Always thank you for your love and support and prayers; and please keep on praying for me and my team, and the work that we are working towards out here.

Eph. 6:19
"...and pray on my behalf, that utterance may be given to me in the opening of my mouth, to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel..."

Thank you always...

Hello to all.
I first want to apologize for my lack of continuing this blog, but also for my lack of communication with everyone. You see, not all of this past year has been a cake walk, and by non-cake walk, I mean, there has been many difficulties and struggles and distractions (and Lord knows, I'm easily distracted), since I have arrived here. And I am not trying to excuse my poor communication here, as much as catch you up on my life in order to allow you to be on the same page as me if you desire that at all. For me at least, when things get difficult, the first things to go out are the things you struggle with in the first place; well, writing and long distance communication (actually any distance) are things that have never come naturally to me, and we some of the first things to go out.

This past year, has honestly been much more gray and monotone, with the constant forecast of being overcast with a chance of rain. It has been full of doubt and questions, like, "GOD, did you really ever want to come here?", or, "Brandon, do you even have the ability to live up to what you are suppose to do here?", "Do you have what it takes?". With the shading and weight of it all looking and feeling more "No" than "Yes".And in the midst of that two of my friends and teammates left. Questions leaving me very curious about my purpose, here, and in life.

But HATING to focus on the negative of any situation, which is very depressing for me, I am going to move on. Also because I believe that no matter how glory, awesome, GOD filled a life may be; it will still end up dull and sad as like an ostrich you have your head stuck in a hole on a sunny day. With that, I want to say that I think it is important to reflect and never to neglect what is negative in your life. I had found myself more focused on the "bleh".

You may ask yourself why I didn't come home. I can honestly tell you it is because, I do believe that GOD desires for me to be here. And through all that not-so-happy, full-of-goodness? times, there were always rays of hope; always enough to remind me that GOD is with me in this. That GOD is stretching me molding me into something more. That GOD still has purpose for me here in Italy; and that He believes, Our all mighty, all awesome GOD in heaven, believes that I will still influence people here in Prato, Italy for the better. Something in the past I had become more and more skeptical of, or at least closed or squinted my eyes at when looking in that direction.

It has also been very refreshing, as recently a new team of AIMer's has come out here
this past month and has been a huge blessing to my life already, and I'm sure will be to anyone who may stumble across their path, as they are all quite stellar in many ways. I look forward to helping them adjust to Italy, with the constant and hopes and prayers that they may learn from the lessons I've already learned, and not repeat it all; and that I may be there to help in whatever fresh challenges await them. I kind of what feel like this is what a parent feels like- weird.

I feel like that is a very abridged version of the life of me right there. Hope you appreciate. If you care for more details or whatever, I try to be an open book; not saying I just come out and say everything, but if you ask. . .Thank you all always for your support, prayer and love. I pray that all is well with you and GOD, and that you also may continue to grow.

"Io ringrazio il mio DIO di tutto il ricordo che ho di voi; e sempre, in ogni mia preghiera per tutti voi, prego con gioia a motivo della vostra partecipazione al vangelo, dal primo giorno fino a ora."

Also thought that scripture fitting and wanted to put some Italian in, being I hadn't done that yet. (Phil. 1:3-5) Totally mean it too. You guys rock.

Ciao a tutti miei amici
Io spero che tutto e’ benissimo.
Earlier this week Anna left us, which I must say is quite the bummer. I do not dig. If you by any chance see her tell her Brandon, the one she knows in Italy says, “Come back now!!!” But you don’t have to put the exclamation marks. All that to say, Anna left, but it was wonderful to have her out here as she encouraged us all greatly; and you can tell her I said that as that makes me look like a really, really good person, (Brandon, you pharisee lol). Okay. Okay, you don’t have to tell her I said that. :-) But here’s a cool story, at least I think it’s cool. One of those, I just totally saw GOD guide all of life to get working even more for you good, and His glory sort of things. It’s great. . . . so story. We are trying to take Anna to the train station, right, well we are taking her there, not trying we succeeded; not like our trips to Florence (don’t ask, okay ask. . . I get lost every time.) Either way we get there and the train she intended on taking cost like twice as much as thought but there was another train about an hour and half later for only a little more that is a straight shot, no stops on the way, (oh, by the way we are in Prato, and Anna is trying to get to Milan where she flies out). So she does that, we know have an hour and half to spend on, well, we don’t know. We go to the Duomo, the square, the center of town where everyone chills, at least old men in the middle of the day. That and we were close to there. That made is that much more appealing.  We park the car and don’t even make it to the square before we run into someone Anna had met on the train when coming back from Florence. It was a girl from Australia, actually three girls, but Anna had only met one of them. They were sitting out, leaning against a wall chillin’. We ended up spending the next hour chilling and seeing where these girls go to school and all, swapped info, basically numbers and facebook. But it was just so funny to me how coincidental and yet divine it felt; for us to have things planned (kind of), train and all, that to change only for us to have an ideal amount of time to chill with people we don’t know yet but are only able to meet if we have Anna with us. Crazy I say, Crazy. Agree or disagree, I still think it cool, really cool actually. And actually I change my mind, you should just agree don’t bother with disagreeing- that’s lame. Be cool, give into peer pressure and agree. Lol. Man my humor is lame, but I’m still laughing. Moving on.
We have also began to pass out “Teach English Using the Bible” flyers, and I don’t know why quote that, that is definitely a paraphrase. Eh. We passed out a good chunk, but I wouldn’t say lots today, and am planning on passing out more in the coming weeks, so that we can (come on guess, I’ll give you three tries and if you still can’t get it with it written right after this well. . . . . yeah) Teach the Bible Using English!!!! Woo hoo gold stars for everyone. You’re a winner. (You should feel very encouraged by now but if not, here is one more attempt) Oh, you so pretty ;-) and the gun.
Oh, and final note, we might be moving into another building; changing locations of the congregation. From one place in Prato to another place in Prato; and if that happens, I hear we will be doing some manual labor inside the building to beautify it.
You guys rock, I dig you hard core, everyone of you. Thank you always for your prayer and support, and know you’re always in my thoughts and prayers too. YOU ROCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I LOVE EXCLAMATION MARKS (they’re just soooo happy:-)

Well I am totally stumped on how to start talking/ writing this here blog. but total blanks on how that is going to happen but Salute!!! to you anyways. And it at least makes me happy that you are reading my blog right now. Thanks. You Rock.
This past week we have been working on the Women's Retreat, making bookmarks and other snazzy things that are cute and cuddly-ish, (bookmarks are not something I usually cuddle with, but you get the picture). We have been putting together little trinkets for memory, not forget this convention and what you learned type things. Hopefully people enjoy these things and don't through them away right after leaving, my feelings would be crushed. Well, maybe not crushed, but I would definitely be bummed, as all of us here, (Anto, Evan, Tracie, Anna, and I) had put time into this. So next time you go to a women's convention; don't through your pretty little bookmark, or kool glazed rock, with something encouraging on it away. (Oh, and the cool glazed look comes from a thin layer of watered down glue, awesome, you should do it to everything: homework, your fingernails, computer screens that you own, painting of you weird neighbor; everything.) Sorry, that was definitely a tangent. Either way that has been what has taken up a chunk of our time.
Oh, and I think I mentioned this last time, but we are now doing Italian two hours a day five-ish days a week (depends on schedule). But its quite helpful. I'm a learnin' man.
This coming Saturday is our friend Emmanuella's (I think I spelt that right??) birthday, which is awesome and will be going to her party and also seeing Giocomo and Paride then also; as they got back from visiting the states the 9th. I'm looking forward to it.
And, I think the other big news is that Anna Callen, my sisters friend who decided to stay here an additional month and help us out and encourage us through life, will be leaving this coming Wednesday, which is kind of a bummer, but she is going to be considering coming back and working us after a lot more prayer, and thinking. So drop a little prayer on GOD's will being done in everything, including Anna coming back or staying; because that would be awesome.
Once again, thank you for everything you are to me, and for all you've done too. Peace.

Ciao miei amici!!!!!!exciting thoughts!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Spero che tutto e' bene per voi.
I hope all is well (or good) for you guys.

This past week on September 1st, our coordinators got back from furlough, (if that's how it is spelled, that missionary vacation thing), and they are going to be helping us learn the language even better, (which I can say that I've got a lot of bettering to be doing :-) and help us get even more things going which will be good. And August is over so I am looking forward to trying to hang out with Sandro again; as it has been about a month since we have seen and hung out with him because he had to do some traveling for his job. Oh, exciting news that I had no part in at all is: Antonella, a lady that has been going to the congregation up in Pistoia, got baptized this past week too. Which is awesome happiness. I think I remember referring to her in another blog as the lady I thought/seemed totally awesome but didn't know what it was about her. Well she is Antonella, and baptized and part of the Church- AWESOME. And another one of our friends, Patrizio, he is back in town this week and we are going to hang out with him. But all in all, I don't feel like this has been the busiest week. It's been a week setting up for everything productive that will being happening here after. Oh yeah, we will be resuming Italian like I said, but instead of two hours a day, three times a week; it is two hours a day, five days a week. Which I must say I'm looking forward too/need; even though I have been learning, I've got a lot more learning to do. Which reminds me, yesterday we set one of the rooms up in the villa as a study, which is awesome, and so needed because I can't concentrate without silence, or a complete focus by all in the area. Makes me happy because, well, I'm easily distracted. Pray for the work here, and that things continue to pick up, so much so that we can't handle all of the work. It'll be amazing. Io apprezzo che tutto fai. Grazie.

Ciao miei amici
Questa settimana passata era molto buona.

Working on my Italian, "This past week was very good." And I practice because it turns out that I'm not that good at it :-). I only say this because this morning when I went to pray in front of the congregation in Florence a line in Italian came out, which they were happy about, (I think), maybe even a little impressed, (now I'm just flattering myself) and then. . . English, line after line. All from the heart, but an English speaking heart. An English speaking heart that knows a little Italian, wants to know more, but man, oh man the "non-Italian" flows; ma sto imparando, ("but I'm learning."
This past week, from Tuesday through Sunday, there has been Church of Christ convention, in which many of the missionaries from around Italy came down, (or up to, really whatever direction, they came), to Firenze/Florence for. It was awesome; although I was surrounded by Italian, a language a still don't quite have an ear for, I would say that I was surrounded by even more love. It was a beautiful thing, and gave everybody on my little teamie squad here in Prato some of the encouragement that we need from time to time. So much fun. We just did lots of singing (for the most part in Italian), and had some classes, which side note: It was so, soooo awesome because this lady Toina, (I think that's how her name is spelt), took detailed notes as the teacher would talk and pass them to me along the way to keep me updated (not the word I'm looking for but eh) on what was being said and so I wasn't bored out of my mind; so considerate. And I also know that I wanted to be in the class because, although I definitely don't comprehend all that is said, I do know that a persons presence can mean a lot and go a long way. It's the small things in life that make a difference I suppose. . . . Well, that and the big ones. Whatever. :-) Lifes good. Oh, right , so singing, classes, um?, food. Food. Food. Yum. Before going to the convention I was told that the food was the best part, not because of the awesomeness of the grub but the chilling with people, the fellowship, I dug it. During this week, which was compared to camp. . . . multiple times. . . . by other people. . . . like people that aren't me.. . . . . .so other not me people, said those things. . . . . . things of it being like camp. . . that's all. Weird. Strano. It really doesn't matter that other people said it. Eh, moving on, we made some awesome connections and already having some traveling ahead of us being planned so that we may have an excuse to come together and love on GOD and each other agian together. There is going to be an mens convention in October, another thing that I don't remember (must not be important, right?? haha, funny ha. . .) and this thing called C.I.E. (pronounced chia)which means something. Vague and to the point that's me. Well feel like I'm talking too much, so I'm going to end here, but know good things are in the works, good things that are in groove with His purpose. Continue to pray always, and thank you for everything.

Ciao mi amici,
Io sono dispiace che non ho scritto miei blog su volta.
"I'm sorry that I haven't written my blogs on time."

Hello, the few, the proud, my followers, :-) At least I would like to think you proud, if not the work being done, or worked at, that fact that I have successfully managed to manage a blog about four times a month. I'm kind of impressed with that; next step: writting post cards to my ever so awesome and very, very much loved, (not too mention thank you very, very, super much for everything,) supporters. That is my next mountain to triumph over, for you see it is a struggle of mine. Oh, and I say few, well because their is just eight of you followers I can tell. I dig it. Thank you for reading this little blog of mine.
Moving on, Tuesday we went out with out friends again, (a regular occurance, I'd say), just to hang out but also to see Paride and Giocomo before their trip to the states. They left Friday morning and will be back September 10?? I think?? They really wanted to see us before they left for the States and had mentioned how they have lots of plans for things for us all to do together once they get back, once we all have time again. :-) It makes me happy. I look forward to it all. Beautiful (don't know if that actually fits there, but there it is. . . ). Wednesday we went swimming with some a Aventi Italia people, and met this kid Ben (who is not part of the Aventi Italia program, just someone they wanted us to meet because he lives near us), and who trully isn't a kid, and well he is one of the most "jacked", or muscular men I've seen in my life. He is studing to be a bodyguard, and if you looked for him in a crowd just look for the guy who looks like he is flexing, while just standing there. . . huge; nice guy. But he is one of our new found friends here, look forward to chilling with him. All of that is so you have a clue about who we are chilling with and so you know we are out there, working at, slowing filling our time.
After swimming, we went back to the Harding HUF villa and they cooked us some steaks, let me say pretty much wonderful in all ways, and we enjoyed each others company together. It was good.
Thursday, Anna Callen and I walked from Ventimiglia, Italy to Nice, France, and I did not get back till yesterday evening, It was great, very, very beautiful, one of the more beautiful places I've seen in my life, but way too expensive. It was a good thing we had packed all the food really needed for the trip. Beautiful. Beautiful and full of boats, I think I salvated.
This coming week is a convention of many of the Church of Christs in the area and we are going to be helping in any way possible with it. So back to work, I'm loving it. And as always, continue your prayers please. Because I love those a lot too! :-)