Time for a holiday!

Hi
This will be a short post for a change. In a few minutes I'm leaving for my first holiday! It definitely does feel a bit soon to be relaxing but anyway! It's with a small group from church to a hut in the middle of nowhere in the Alps- how amazing!! Apparently it is so beautiful. I definitely have my camera with me. We're going to be doing a lot of walking and also doing some Bible study together. It may bring back some memories of Longbarn with the basic facilities :)
I've had a good week. It has gone by so quickly though! Though I do have really odd patches I think I am feeling more confident with speaking generally.
On Monday I went for lunch at a lady from church's house and it was so nice! I made the tram ok :) On Monday also we had the first night of our housegroup which was really great. It's a small, very international group and was just an inspiring evening. I'm looking forward to it again in 2 weeks.
Jesus House, the youth mission, was our main focus this week. It was really great, so praise the Lord. Lots of youth came- on Friday night it was particularly packed out. It was held in a huge, beautiful church which is no longer used usually. A lot of energy was put into it being a nice place to be and it was a really good atmosphere. Every night put a different slant on getting to know God more, eg. 'is there anybody out there?', 'Love is everything'. The talks were really powerful and inspired the youth to live for God; the only way to know true life and joy. It was a good chance for me to hang out more with our youth as well. My official job was prayer/pastoral care team, which was a new challenge for me! I was a bit scared at first but it helped me to rely on God's help and boldness. I was able to have some good conversations and pray with people. Another cool thing is that yesterday there was a Brazilian guy there who can speak no German, so I translated my first German sermon! I have never done translation before so it was no way perfect. I enjoyed it but it was slightly stressing in that I was aware that I felt the responsibility of letting him know what the message was.
Both kids groups went well this week- not so many children which was ok, but pray that lots more come back. We had a lot of fun. Pray that as we have fun and get to know each other more, they will experience something of God's love. Something I've noticed is that there always seem to be lots of able, willing workers- which is amazing! Thank God for all these teams and pray that I can be a help and blessing to them.
Please pray generally that I develop some stamina- the other day I only had 8 hours sleep (yes hardly not much!) and I felt the effects! I have taken to having naps but I won't always be able to.
I love hearing your news so keep in touch. I better go, so hope you have a great week.
Love,
Ruth xx
PS A motivation for you to come and visit me- the ice cream here is AMAZING! SO yummy! David and I went yesterday with Franz, the intern who is just leaving. Thanks Franz :)