Pictures of the New Car

Dacia Logan MCV

I justed picked up our car, 2009 Dacia Logan MCV 85ci 1.5 liters. It had 12 km on the odomoter when I got it. We were able to get it insured in Carcasonne for a real reasonable amount. Only 49 euros a month, full coverage. Lilia and I traveled to Massy yesterday to pick it up and get the last few things out of our appartment here. The car is great. It has more room than the Opel Zafira we had rented. I'm looking forward to the drive home to see how well it does on the highways. It is supposed to get 4.8 liters per 100 km in gas mileage. Which is real good for a 7 passenger car. I am sure that I am in France because after we settled all the paperwork, they gave me a bottle of champange. When we get it back home, I will take pictures and post them here. Sunday went real well, we ate lunch with the Pastor's son and daughter-in-law and had an excellent time. Hopefully we will now be able to put all our time and efforts into the search for a house. Picture is Lilia in front of some vineyards near our house.

Houses and Cars

Tuesday – We went and saw a house in Magrie, about 1.5 miles south of Limoux, It was nice inside and had a good yard, three bedrooms, but it was a little difficult to get to, the view was real nice. Angie and I also saw the house in La Digne D'amont. We both decided that it would not be good for the work. The dining area was small and also two bedrooms were had a slanted roof, that made parts hard to reach. We mentioned that we would be interested in three bedroom homes around 100 meters squared with yards in Limoux and we'll see if they what they can find. If nothing, then we will pursue another the one in Magrie. I called the car salesmen today and left a message, he called back and said that the car will arrive the 23rd and that they will have it ready by the 28th. Tomorrow, I will go to Carcassonne and see about getting car insurance. I will also stop by the hertz rental place and see about extending our car rental by a couple of days. Attched are some pictures of the kids at the cross on top of the hill near our house. God bless, JASON

Confirmation

Friday - The beach trip did not go so well. It was a little cool and real windy. We saw 2 large jellyfish and caught a small one, but the worst part was that the wind would kick up the sand and sand blast us. The kids really did not like that. I think it all lasted maybe 20 minutes before we left. The wind has continued to blow all day and it cooled off to about 60 degrees by days end. This afternoon we went to Limoux. On the way I got a call from the Car salesmen who sold us our Dacia. He had the wrong address on a paper, so we stopped by a McDonald's and faxed him the right paper. He said everything was going well. I showed Angie the home that I toured Thursday. The only negative aspects are that is has no parking, no yard, and the front door opens to the street, but it is roomy, around the corner from a school and in good condition, and only about 2.5 miles from Limoux. I mentioned to Angie that maybe God wants us to start out living in a smaller town because we are going to make a lot of mistakes. It's possible. We have another house that I found online that we are waiting to hear back about. It was in Limoux and had a yard, I called and emailed and have not heard back yet. Tomorrow we are getting a visit from the pastor of the church in Carcassonne.
Saturday – We had a good visit with the pastor this evening. He offered to give us a loan for the car. We took him up on it. It is amazing how the love for Christ unites us. Can you imagine loaning someone that you have only met twice $20,000 interest free.
Sunday – Services went real well this morning. We had some good visiting afterwards. There were several visitors. One family from Ireland was spending there vacation in the south. We had a good visit, they come to this church each time they take their vacation here. There were also fist time visitors from Limoux! It was a French lady who had recently married a man from England and they had just settled in Limoux. How amazing is that. I had planned for the work in Limoux to start slowly. I had in mind to spend a year building relationships and having Bible studies before I even brought up the idea to plant a church. If things continue as they have been we could already have a core group. This couple makes four that we know from Limoux who travel to the church in Carcassonne. As soon as this couple introduced themselves and where they were from the Pastor leaned over to us and said, “interesante”.
Monday - Just got a call that said the house viewing for tomorrow was cancelled because the couple decided to stay in the home. So, I scheduled us to see the home in La Digne D'amont, so Angie can see it, and then we will probably try for it. We are currently at McDonalds, just finished some grocery shopping. God bless, JASON

The search is on (again).

Sunday – Services went well at church. They had a good number there are several people who drive in from villages further out during the summer. People remembered us and had been praying for us. Monday - We had planned to go to the beach. We had put it off all last week and the kids had been begging to go. The weather end up being perfect for it. It was cloudy and cooler, it had rained a little in the morning so the beaches were not crowded at all. I thought being before the French holiday that it would be packed but that was not the case. The kids had such a good time. They are a lot of fun just to watch. Andrew would just get so excited he would start running down the beach. After we got back home and cleaned up, Angie and Lilia went grocery shopping and to check out the clothing sales one more time. They hit a lot of traffic and so were slow going. They did not make it back in time for supper so the boys and I had hotdogs (yeah!). Tomorrow we are trying to decide if we need to go to the fireworks in Carcassonne or not. It is the French independence day, the fireworks in Carcassonne are popular and famous, but about 10,000 people drive in for them and from what they were saying at church Sunday, it could take up to three hours to find you way out.

Thursday - We decided not to go to the fireworks. We enjoyed the Bastille day activities in our little village, they had some kid games and activities. Wednesday and Thursday was spent by me traveling to Limoux and visiting real estate agencies (immobiliers). We have two prospects in mind for a house, I saw the first today. It was a good size, nice location about 2 miles from Limoux, real nice interior, everything practically new, but no yard. I will see the other one Tuesday. We might take the kids to the beach again tomorrow. With me being gone during the day they get kind of restless at home. We did go for a walk Tuesday and saw a large cross on top of a hill near our house. It was dedicated to J. F. Bousquet who died "for the faith" in the 1700's. He was from the town of Ginestas where we are staying. Can anyone find out anything else about him? Enjoy the pictures from the past few days. God bless, JASON

The last few days.

Monday – The move went well. Angie left with Lilia, Micah, and Andrew about 10:30 to say goodbye to some friends and head on south while I finished packing. We finished packing and headed out ourselves. The trip went well. I had a friend drive with me and Caleb to bring the moving van back. We made it in a little over 9 hours of driving. The last part of the drive was real pretty. We crossed the viaduct at Millan which is the highest bridge in the world. We made it here to find Angie having arrived just a half hour before us. She had to make more stops and had some kids get car sick. She was just finished walking through the house with the man. The house is a good size, nice outdoors, nice furnishings, but it is dirty. Even though he has been living here, there was a layer of dust on everything, the dishes all looked liked they had been sitting for months, and the toilet had not even been cleaned. We got everyone settled and called it a night.
Tuesday – I called the owner of the storage unit that we were going to use in Carcassonne. He said that we needed to have a paper of direct withdrawal from our bank. So I went to the next town where our nearest bank branch was and they told me we must order from the branch where we set up the account, by person or by mail. Back at the house we called the back and they confirmed that we had to be there in person or via Internet. So we left for Carcassonne to meet and planned to stop by McDonald's and use their WiFi for the Internet access. We found out that we had left the cell phone at home so we could not call the owner and let him know that we would be late. Angie went with the Moving van to meet the man and I stayed at McDonald's to get the Internet stuff done. With the online banking you have to have a code before you can add another direct withdrawal, they send you the code by text message on you cell phone. Oops. So I left with the kids to meet Angie again at the storage place, when I arrived she was not there, so I went back to McDonald's and she wasn't there. I figured out that we were dodging each other so I was heading back to the storage building to wait for here, trying to follow the GPS and taking wrong turns, Micah getting car sick, etc. It was the low point of the day.
We met and decided just to get some lunch. We ate at McDonald's and decided just to unload the truck at our house so that our friend, Bo, could head back to Paris. Bo and I headed back to the house to unload the truck while Angie picked up some groceries. Ended up that the house held all of our stuff well. It has a lot of closets. So we decided it worked out best to have everything here, it is more handy if we need something. Bo headed back. Caleb and I took a walk. Angie returned. We had supper and went to bed, end of a long day.
Wednesday – This morning we wanted to go to the nearest town with a grocery store and we also wanted to see the Tour de France which was also heading through that same town. We stopped by the store, picked up some groceries and walked over to the route for the Tour de France. We have a good time, it is kind of like a Parade, but the floats come every 2 to 5 minutes. The sponsors would come through and throw out all kinds of stuff to the people on the street. Finally after two hours of waiting the cyclists came through. There were a group of about 10, then 3 minutes later a group of the rest, I would guess maybe 60 bicycles. I could not make out anyone. It was neat. Unfortunately we left our camera in the car, but we ended up with three hats, a bag pack, several bags of candy, even sausage. I am glad that we went.
Thursday – We went to Narbonne today. That is the nearest big size town, about 10 miles from here. We were searching for a better cell phone plan that could call the states and we could check our e-mail. After a lot of talking and discussing we finally found one to our liking. We took the kids to play at a local fast food place to burn some energy before our ride home. We went for a walk after we got home up the hill near our house. We enjoyed the scenery.
Friday – Today Angie and Lilia went back to Narbonne to do some shopping and get some questions answered about the phone. July is also the big sale time of year and she found some really good deals on clothes. She bought me a pair of pants for 7 euros, about $10. Me and the boys stayed home and put together the soccer goal that Andrew got for his birthday a month back. They had a good time with it and played for almost the rest of the day. That allowed me to get a lot of good Bible reading in. Also we got a call from the pastor of the church in Carcassonne checking on how we are doing. He ended up having a couple that he has been visiting with recently who lived in this same village that we are living in. We have been seeking for confirmation that God really wanted us in Limoux. The cell phone salesman ended up mentioning that he drove there all the time. Even more amazing was the e-mail I just read from former language school classmates of ours, Tim and Liz. They have returned to Australia to have a baby. Her sister is a nurse at the hospital where they plan to have a baby. Another nurse there is a man from France who she has been talking about salvation with. She thought it would be good language practice for Tim to speak with him. He ended up mentioning that he was from a small town in France that no one knows about. It was Limoux, so Tim impressed home by knowing where it was. Tim said he hopes he will be saved before he returns to France, and then he will turn him over to us. God is truly amazing in the way He works. Currently (Sat) we are at McDonalds using the wireless internet and letting the kids play. We will be headed to church here in Carcassonne tomorrow. God bless, JASON

Running an errand.

I ran several errands. First thing this morning I faxed some paperwork for our storage building in the south. I had some interesting conversations with the owner, because I did not know the French term for a storage building (box de location - if your curious). But I got all the paperwork finished and faxed. Then Lilia and I went at 9:30 to pick up the rental car that will get us by until our car arrives. We got back at the house at 11:00, we literally had to park a half mile from the house. As soon as I got home I went headed out to go to the dealership in Versaille to see about a loan. I left and found out the next bus to the train station didn't run for 20 minutes and so it would faster to walk. I walked the mile down there and just missed the train, so I had to wait 30 minutes to the next. By the time I arrived at the dealership I had missed the finance guy and had to wait 30 minutes for him to get back from lunch. Got home at 2:00 and helped Angie pack a little. We took the kids to see l'age de glace 3 (Ice Age 3) at 4:00. We made it in about 8 people before the cut off. It was packed but the kids seem to enjoy. It was interesting watching it in French. But some things were actually funnier. In the movie the dialogue goes, "Qu'est-ce que c'est (what was that)?", "C'est le vent qui parle(is the wind talking)", "Qu'est-ce qu'il a dit(what did he say)?", "Je ne sais pas, je ne parle pas le vent.(I don't know I don't speak wind)" Lilia laughed out loud for that. Tomorrow will be spent packing. We are getting close to being almost nearly starting to be finished. God bless, JASON

Packing Up

This week the kids still have school, so Angie and I (and Andrew) have spent the time cleaning and packing. Today I have an appointment with the bank for a car loan. I am not really looking forward to going, not because of the paperwork or speaking in French, but because it is supposed to get up to 90 today and the bank has no A/C and only a few small windows on one side. I think that I will bring Lilia with me so that I have someone to suffer with.

We found out Monday from the real estate agency that the house we were looking into renting was not going to work out. So, Angie went to Paris yesterday with a friend and dropped off the deposit for the rental house that we are moving into next week. Interesting arrangement. The owner lives full time in the house, but works at a camp site. So in summer he rents out the house when he can, lives at work, and brings in extra money that way. Angie dropped the payment off with his mother who lives in Paris. Angie said she was very nice and had a good conversation with her.

We do not know what kind of access we will have to the internet over the next month and a half, I will try to blog at least once a week. The kids are really excited about the move. Today they helped us pack up all their toys. What they are really looking forward too is traveling to the beach. I must insert another Micah quote here. One day at school he got in trouble for playing roughly like the other boys were doing. Angie had a talk with him at home about making the right choices concerning his behavior. The next morning Micah walked in and Angie said, "Micah, I want you to make good choices today". Micah sighed and said, "Okay Mom, go ahead and tell me what they are."

We pick up the rental car Friday and the moving van monday. We will keep the rental car for three weeks because our car we purchased does not arrive until between July 20th - 28th. I took some pictures of the kids sleeping the other day (attached). Somehow Micah and Caleb ended up in the same bed, and Lilia always sleeps so crazy. God bless, JASON