Welcome to England!

Hello from England!

Well we've made it! Our flight to London went relatively smooth and quick. After we landed things didn't go as quick. We were told that once we made it through immigration there would be a driver waiting for us carrying a sign with "ZAMROZ" on it.  

We made it through immigration and saw hundreds of drivers carrying signs but none had "ZAMROZ" on it. Here we were in the biggest airport I've seen with no phones and no numbers to contact anyone or English money if we had a phone. After what seemed like forever of walking up and down the terminal --searching for what I imagined in my head, an English man in a suit and funny hat driving an old-fashioned taxi like the movies-- we finally found an internet station where we could get ahold of someone over email. 

An hour and a half later we realized our driver was at Terminal 3 while we were waiting in Terminal 5. So, with our home/life in a cartload of suitcases we raced down the terminal to catch the train to take us to Terminal 3. We roll up the ramp thrilled to see a little man carrying a sign with our name on it...although a bit disappointed for he was nothing like I imagined:)

We arrived at our lovely apartment nearly two hours later. Since then we have settled in very nicely. 

Because we haven't received our car yet our days have consisted mostly of cleaning and getting settled in our home, taking walks down the street to the Birstall shops and taking bus trips into Leicester city. Our neighborhood is quite new and very English:) the roofs are tall and slanted just like in Peter Pan, and the roads are curvy and narrow with tiny little cars. I imagine our car will be similar when we receive it. The club likes to give the players a few days to adjust to driving on the wrong side of the road, especially with stick shift. Although we drove on the left side in Australia it should still be interesting as we haven't tried stick shift. 

Ryan has had several practices with his team and has thoroughly enjoyed jumping right in with the new guys and looks forward to playing full-time this season. I get to meet my team for the first time tomorrow at our practice. I'm looking forward to meeting some new girls and trying to get involved right away as well. We both have tournaments this weekend; Ryan's games are home and I will be traveling to not sure where yet. Hopefully next week I'll get to interview for a job at the hotel; one of the club's sponsors.  

By the way, I just wanted to congratulate my hubby for winning MVP in the SBL in AUSTRALIA! Great Job Babe!

Like I mentioned before, things are settling in very nicely here in Leicester and we look forward to telling you more about our great experiences in the future! We always covet your prayers as it is not always easy being away from home and as we begin a new adventure may we be a shining light to those we come in contact with. We are once again thrilled for what God has planned for us here and we thank Him for His provision and grace in these special opportunities.

Love you and miss you all!!!! 

Cheers

PS. our new address is:

1 Brook Furlong Birstall

Leicester, UK LE4 3LU

Goodbye Australia, Hello England!

It's been a while since we have updated our blog, but it seems that as we wind down with our time in Australia things have become quite busy.

A lot has happened in the last couple weeks. Particularly dealing with what will happen after we leave Australia. There was great interest in Ryan with many clubs in all different countries. In this business you deal with lots of little details and logistics and it seemed at several points in the process we didn't know what to decide. We brought these decisions in prayer daily, knowing that God would lead us to the right place. And He did! We received a text about 1am from Ryan's agent giving us strong advice to take a deal in England because another deal fell through.

Faithfully praying about it the next morning, we felt God gave us a peace about deciding to go to England. After following through with the decision, we could see the abundance of God's provision for our time in England. The club will pay Ryan as a full-time basketball player for the Leicester Riders, they would find me a part-time job with one of the sponsors, and I would have the opportunity to play again with the Women's team.

After not playing for over a year, my emotions were mixed feelings. It's a game I have loved my whole life, but because I hadn't played in so long I never expected to play seriously again. Let alone in another country. Its like coming back after retirement. haha. All that to say, I couldn't be more grateful for the opportunity to once again play the game that I have been so passionate about my whole life.  Although I am a bit nervous and have a some training to do these next couple weeks I am extremely excited to put on a jersey again!

Ryan's basketball season for the Geraldton Buccaneers came to an end this past weekend. The team made it to the semi-finals and played the Willeton Tigers, who their 3 game series 2-1.  The Buccs got off to a great start in the series beating the Tigers by 30 at home, but then had to travel to Willeton for the next two game and unfortunately couldn't get the win they needed to advance to the grand final.  They played really good in the 3rd game of the series but the other team just shot incredibly well.  It was sad to see their season come to an end, but they had a great season.

Our last week in Australia has been filled with seeing lots of friends that we will miss a lot once we leave.  Friends from the team, work and church graciously invited us into their home and I didn't have to cook dinner once this week!  Nice to get some home cooked meals!

We have certainly learned a lot about dependence on God through this experience and the grace he provides each day to help us through trying times without family and friends from America.  We are so grateful that the Lord has given us this experience in Geraldton and we are excited to see what He has for us in England.

We are grateful for all the prayers of everyone throughout this experience, we truely felt the support of our family and friends back home.

To our Geraldton family... we have enjoyed our stay so much and we hope to cross paths with many of you in the future.  You have become a home away from home for us and we will miss you all.

We arrive in California in 2 days..August 23rd.  We are excited to be home for a little while and see many of you who follow this blog!

Here we come USA!

Time Keeps on Tickin'

Hey everyone!

With about a month left until we say goodbye to Australia (for now at least) we figured it would be a good time to keep everyone updated as to what's going on as our time here comes to a close.

The Buccs have one more regular season game this weekend and then we hit the playoffs.  We have finished in 3rd place (regardless of a win or loss this coming weekend) which is a good position to be in.  We had a tough stretch of games to end the season and unfortunately lost our 1st place position, but the team is still confident that we can do some damage in the playoffs.  We probably have the most talented team in the league from top to bottom, but sometimes we just have some trouble putting it together.

Stacy and I are winding down our work schedules and will be done working within the next couple of weeks. We want to spend at least the last two to three weeks just enjoying where we are and making arrangements for our next stop on this journey.

My parents arrive this Friday afternoon so we are both really looking forward to that.  We had a great time with Stacy's parents and we are looking forward to showing mine our Australian home as well.  They will get to see the last game of the regular season, play in our team's annual golf day and see the first round of playoff games while they are here.

We are still uncertain as to where we will end up next.  Our flight home is for August 23rd so we are hoping to be able to see all our friends and family when we get there.  We have been in talks with teams all over the world for this fall, so we will see where the Lord takes us next.  Unfortunately our trip home might be very short due to the European season starting back up in September.

Keep checking our blog as we will definitely let everyone know all that happens in the next few weeks with basketball and our time with my parents and such.

Keep us in prayers as we look forward to where the Lord leads us next.

God Bless,

Ryan & Stacy