One last Thanksgiving photo

I forgot to post this picture earlier. Becky Bronson found this adorable bib for Calvin. It's a turkey and says "baby's 1st Thanksgiving." It is so cute. The turkey's legs hang off of it and Calvin loves sucking on them! Calvin really enjoyed all the Thanksgiving goodies too...especially the pumpkin pie! 

more pictures

Calvin has discovered the steps but has yet to figure out how to get up them. It won't be long! You can see how chunky his legs are.















As mentioned below, we celebrated Paul's 29th birthday. I made him a chocolate cake with peanut butter icing. PJ had fun helping Daddy blow out his Happy Birthday candles.










This picture was taken during our Thanksgiving Feast. It is from left to right, Tori (intern from Canada), Becky Bronson (short term teammate who arrived with her husband, Andrew, in September) and Yu, one of our Thai staff. They are standing in line anticipating the feast.









And this is another Thanksgiving photo. It was a joy to share this day with our Thai friends. The four women in the front of this photo were in my English class when we went on the English retreat back in June. 

Up and Running!

That's right folks, we now have a phone line in our new house and we are now waiting to get dsl connected but dial up is better than nothing! I thought I would post some pics of recent events. Pictured to the left is Calvin enjoying a piece of Paul's birthday cake (Nov 16). Paul turned 29 years old! We had a nice night together as a family. I made lasagna and a cake to celebrate.





This is a picture of Paul and Andrew Bronson with some Thai friends. Most of those seated are from the campus (the guys he plays basketball with 4 or 5 times a week). The guy on the front left is "Me" and his girlfriend, Bow, is beside him.








And this is a homemade bread cornucopia that Jan Veldhorst (teammate) and I made last Monday for Thanksgiving. I must admit that Jan did most of the creative work on the project...I only helped roll out the dough! 

Frustrated, but thankful!

Well, I came to the office this morning all excited to post Thanksgiving pictures BUT for some reason my pictures from my camera won't download onto our computer. So, sorry. I tried! I will say Thanksgiving turned out to be a tremendous blessing. We had about 27 people total at our home for turkey, mashed pototoes, sweet potatoes, stuffing, green bean casserole, grits (yes, grits!), squash corn casserole, cranberry sauce, homemade applesauce, salad, pumpkin pie, pecan pie and even a few Thai dishes, pineapple and pomelo fruit. The Thais enjoyed the meal. They enjoyed the sweet potatoe casserole the most...so yippee for southerners who have shared their recipe with me! It was the first time I had ever made a turkey of this size (over 23 lbs!) and it turned out well too! The meal itself was a lot of fun. We shared why we celebrate Thanksgiving, the history of it for Americans and why we, Christians, celebrate. We told our Thai friends that in America people eat and eat and eat and eat and then they sleep, then they wake up and eat some more. They were amazed that a person could eat that much in one day! After eating we did a little karoake and then everyone started leaving because they had class or work to get to the next morning. We want to thank you for your prayers for us. We feel that God had exactly the people He wanted there. (We were not sure how many people would show). It was the perfect amount of people and everyone really seemed to enjoy themselves. Please continue to pray for those relationships to deepen and for God to work in hearts.
I also want to say that Paul and I didn't do it alone. It was a joint venture with Andrew and Becky Bronson, along with our Canadian intern, Tori, and most of our Thai staff. It was amazing how manageable the whole day was because we each had taken a part in preparing and cleaning up afterwards. It was wonderful...words can't explain all the service I saw emulated over Thanksgiving. So, thank you to each of you who helped in such tremendous ways and made being part of a team a joy and a blessing!
Please continue to pray for us as we enter the Christmas season. Pray for many, many oppurtunities to share Christ and the TRUE reason for Christmas...and I want to encourage you out there to reach out during this season...don't just be focused on your family but look outwards too and see if there are hurting hearts around you and really try to minister to them. Christmas is a perfect time of year to tell others of God's grace, love and mercy.
Well, I should be going. HOpefully I can figure out what is going on with my camera!

Just a Quick Note

Hi all! We're still alive and kicking and I am sure you all have stopped checking the blog due to the lack of updates. We still do not have a phone line but hopefully soon! I am at the office trying to get caught up on emails and blogs.
So, here are some recent pictures for all of you. Pictured to the left is cousin Claire with the boys on the Duolos (the ship she sails around on.) We went one night and had dinner on the ship with her...PJ LOVED it! He was so impressed. Claire gave us a tour of the ship. On the tour we got to see the lifeboats that are hoisted way up. Claire was explaining to PJ what they were and how it works in case of an emergency. She said something along the lines of, "and if there's an emergency we get in the boats (which seat about 70 people!) and then crank them down to the water." When we returned home PJ kept talking about "cranker boats" and we were stumped as to what he was talking about but then figured it out...he meant the lifeboats!

On Thursday we went to a local mall where they have an entire kids section with rides. We went with Emmy and Rhianna Mills. Here you see PJ and Emmy very seriously driving PJ's favorite ride...the racecars! (Thanks to the movie, CARS). They had a blast. By the way, it's called Yo Yo Land.







And I can't leave out my dear little Calvin. He is growing so fast. He is very mobile now, getting into everything and having a blast doing it! He especially likes electrical cords and outlets...I think I see a career as an electrician in his future! His second tooth has come in and I think he might be working on a third.







After our trip to Yo Yo Land, PJ, Calvin and I went to Baskin Robbins for some ice cream. This was a special treat. PJ was a real tropper walking all over the mall and so I told him I would reward him with ice cream. We both enjoyed our snack!

As for Paul and I, well, life has been busy. Paul is seeing some interest in Christianity from a few of his Thai friends. Please be praying for him as he starts studying the Bible with one guy who is interested. Paul can now share the Gospel in Thai using a Thai tract! I am excited for him (I think he is excited too but he just isn't as verbal as I am!) Please continue praying for our Thai language ability to increase.
We are now gearing up for Thanksgiving and Christmas outreaches in our home and as a team we will be doing several outreach events. Please be praying for us in this busy season that we would keep our eyes on Christ and also that He would bring a harvest from this time. Well, I can't stay and chat long. Thanks for dropping in and I will try to update sooner than next month!!!