The first week

We have now been in the US for 9 days. We received a warm welcome, from both family and church. We are currently staying in a camper. The temperature is beginning to drop below freezing at night, but with the heating and a pile of blankets we will survive for a while.

In the meantime we have bought a truck. Quite a challenge to buy a truck in this country if your money is on a Dutch bank account and you do not posess the standard American documents which a customer usually brings. We have been tremendously blessed with a beautiful Ford F150 pick-up truck. In this area, there are hardly any other cars than trucks and SUV's, because of the extreme winters.

All administrative issues in The Netherlands with bank and insurances etc. should be finished now. We already bought 1 American sim card, because depending solely on a Dutch sim was limiting us too much.

After having gone grocery shopping for the first time and taking care of the things mentioned above, we are now beginning to find our way in the daily life. In addition to the daily things, we have started home schooling the kids. As tourists we can of course not perform any paid work, but we are spending our days helping Johanna's brother building their own house and providing technical support with sound, livestreaming and the computer in church, because we are taking over from a couple which is moving.

All documents for the first phase of our visa application have been sent. We are now waiting for approval, so we can continue with the next phase, which includes an interview at the embassy in Amsterdam.