Horse riding in Limoux

Micah was not sacred to walk right up to the horse, must
be his Texas roots.

Caleb's turn.

We had a beautiful view looking over Limoux.

I took this picture a few weeks ago, when the snow had recently
started falling.  (this blogger does not suggest or support the use of a
cell phone to take pictures while driving in the snow)

The boys in the huddle with their teammates at their last game.

We had another good week.  The weather was lovely and we have had a lot of good contact with people.  I took the kids on Wednesday and on Saturday to see some horses.  Our friend, Philippe, teaches horseback riding and leads trail rides as well.  He is in the process of expanding.  We enjoyed hanging out with him and several of the kids got to ride.  We had a wonderful visit.  Micah missed out on most of it because he had a birthday party to go to, but he did get to come pet them some before we left.  This will be a little busier at lunch time for us.  Andrew will start a special time with the teacher (and a few other students) helping him work on his French.  He does well fo his age, but confuses the masuline and feminine of some words and mixes up some phrases.  Otherwise the week passed without incident.  On Wednesday I had a repair day for the kids bikes and scooters.  The boys are hard on them and they needed some maitenance.  We were able to ride bikes to the boys basketball practice.  Wednesdays (my "day off") usually end up being my busiest day of the week.  Angie got to visit with the neighbors for a couple of hours on Wednesday, and she took a few walks with the neighbor throughout last week.  Bible study was good on Thursday with four who came.  We are still going through the gospel of John.  I had some good contacts at the market on Friday morning, even with  some English people.  Services went good on Sunday in Carcassonne, we had lunch with the church and I stayed for their yearly business meeting.  We were unable to catch the services at our sending church because of internet connection problems.  Looking forward to this week.  I am finishing up travel plans for this summer and looking forward to spending time with friends and family in the States.    God bless, JASON

Chilly weather

This past week went well.  We have experienced the coldest temperatures in this area since 1985.  It has been over a week since the last time the temperatures were above freezing.  The snow that we got last Sunday is still hanging out in  places.  Tuesday the boys went back to school, Lilia went back on Wendesday.  It has been cold, down to -10, I once saw.  However, life goes on.  We had some good visits with friends and neighbors last week.   I was even able to help our neighbor re-hang her vent hood, and a wall heater that had fallen off.  We did have a little cabin fever Tuesday afternoon, and so we jumped in the car and went to Carcassonne for a little evening out.  We shopped and ate some pizza's at a friends house.  Bible Study went well Thursday.  We had our normal crowd inspite of the snow.  There were only 6 of us at basketball practice on Wednesday and Friday night. I did meet a christian lady living in Limoux through a friend of a friend.  We gave her a ride to church in Sunday and I think that she will come to the Bible Study as well.  We are looking forward to being in Barcelona this weekend.  I will be preaching at a church there that is part of the same association as our churches.  We might stay the night and shop a little on the way home.  Things are cheaper in Spain than in France in general because their taxes are lower.  The kids are on their two week winter vacation from school.  With that in mind I better get ready for all that is going on before the interruptions start.  We have opened up a sack full of board games that someone gave us and the kids have been enjoying them, but a lot of questions concerning rules and procedures will come.  Enjoy the pictures of the kids enjoying some hot chocolate to warm up after playing outside. God bless, JASON

New Camera for the Snow

Took this picture before heading to bed last night.
I like the whole "palm tree in the snow" theme.

We got a new camera for Christmas from my parents.  It is amazing how fast things have changed in the camera world.  Thinking back I realized our former camera was about 5 years old.   This new one can do high definition videos.  We have been focused mainly on staying warm these last few days.  It got down to -8 (c)Thursday night, the windchill was -12. We got a good bit of snow on Friday.  I didn't set up at the market, but I stopped by to check out who was there.  Where I usually set up there are at least thirty stands on a normal Friday, yesterday there were three.  I am not complaining because up until this point we have had a relatively mild winter.  Saturday we stayed warm and enjoyed a few snow flurries.  Angie, Lilia, Arianna, and I had been battling colds, so I took the boys to church on Sunday.  There was supposed to be a meal afterwards, but snow started falling heavily during church, so everyone one went home afterwards.  It snowed all day yesterday, this morning we have 15cm still on the ground (6 inches). I did stay up and watch the superbowl. It has just started snowing some more.  The kids school was canceled today.  The forcast predicts that it won't get above freezing until this next weekend.  Enjoy some snow picks from the new camera, check back soon for some high definition videos.  Blessings, JASON

Winter guests

The kids got a box of Christmas goodies from their grandparents.

Arianna runs to give Lilia a hug.

We have had a good week so far.  The theme so far has been guests.  Frequent guests of ours have been our neighbors across the street and down a couple of houses.  The son is about a year older than Caleb and has some discipline problems.  We have already had to deal with him opening our garage to get our bikes out and playing in our yard without permissions.  We have to keep an eye on them when he is over.  He has a nice streak at times and just needs love. His family has been tight on money because they just moved. We are trying to be loving and wise in our relationship  with them.  We also met with our next door neighbor and he high school age daughter.  We had a real good visit and even let them taste Dr. Pepper and some leftover cheesecake.  Angie visited with her a couple of more times these last couple of days.  We also visited with one of the members of our Bible study, she is having a hard time finding work.  Please pray for her.  The weather has cooled off and looks like winter is finally here.  It is supposed to get down to -8 degrees C tomorrow and the high is -2.  I do not imagine I will go to the market.  It has been snowing off and on all day, but is not sticking yet.  I am ready for the Bible study tonight.  Angie is getting her haircut done this afternoon by the lady I mentioned previously who is looking for work.  Arianna was not interested in watching scooby doo (in French) and decided to push her baby stroller around the couch.  God bless, JASON

Thanksgiving in January

 We had a wonderful week.  It was filled with activities.  The main focus of course is the Bible study and Thanksgiving.  I did find time on Wednesday, my day off, to clean the back yard a bit more.  Our back yard is terraced and once clean has the potential to produce a lot of fruit.  We have been cleaning rows and burning a large pile of brush, which the boys really enjoy.  The weather was nice Wednesday.

I am a little sad that we will not be here this summer to take advantage of the garden, but I hope to plant some automn fruits when we return to be able to profit at least some from our hard work this year.  The boys have been a great help and really love helping out. As long as they can make it fun, which they usually can find a way of doing. 

Micah has been know for sleeping in wierd positions,
this is how we found him in our bed one evening.

 I did have an opportunity to talk with a man about his spiritual needs.  Be in prayer for him because he is dealing with a lot of issues and needs Jesus more than anything else. 

 Our thanksgivign meal was a big success.  It was a lot of work to cook for 28 people, but there were helpers as well.  (pictured above and below)  We had a couple offer to provide the Turkey, someone else made the pumpkin pie, we had babysitters, people loaned us tables and chairs and dishes.  Many thanks to all.

 The evening went well.  I started this year out with a quiz about Thanksgiving, it was a good topic of discussion and everyone seemed to get along real well.  I then went over the questions and in the process gave the history of Thanksgiving.  There were good questions and conversations throughout the evening.  We enjoyed the time, for all who came, it was their first time to have Thanksgiving.  All seemed to enjoy themselves.  There were many compliments on the food and even the Dr. Pepper got positive reviews. 

Sunday Services went well in Carcassonne.  They had several visitors, several people were out because there was snow in certain areas.  They predicted snow for us as well on Sunday night.   We had a church member over for lunch to help us eat the leftovers and enjoyed some fellowship.  We enjoyed hearing the services at our home church in Texas.  My father is bringing a series from the Song of Solomon.  It has been excellent.  It is based on his book that he is writing for his doctorate.  I am looking forward to getting to read it when he is finished.  It would make a good study for young people, young couples, and all christians.  We awoke this morning to find out that we did not get any snow, not even ice.  The kids will have to wait to see if they can have a snowman this year.  God bless, JASON

Daddy Jim



Lilia and Caleb with Daddy Jim

 

Micah in the snow.



This is what we called our Grandfather on my mother's side.  I am not sure where the nickname came from.  Daddy Jim, Jim Taylor, passed away on Friday night.  He was a good grandfather.  He pastored churches in Arkansas, Kansas, and Texas for over 50 years.  He served in the marines in World War II and the Korean War.  We received the news Saturday morning.  Read his obituary here.  He is the third grandfather that has passed away since we have been in France, Clyde Clark was my Dad's father, Harold Davis who I consider as my spiritual grandfather passed away these last couple of years.  If I could mention one thing that I had learned early from watching him, is that preachers and christians can have a good time.  He loved to have fun and he could talk to you about so many things.  Saturday it rained almost all day but in the afternoon it turned to beatiful snow.  It kind of made a good summary of our week, things get tough but God's still there and he can turn the bad into good.  Sunday's service was good as well.  I had a little trouble when we sang the french version of  "How Great thou Art".  The text for the message that morning included 1 John 3:2 "My dear friends, we are already God's children, though what we will be hasn't yet been seen. But we do know that when Christ returns, we will be like him, because we will see him as he truly is." We look forward to seeing Daddy Jim again.  Back to work for now.  God bless, JASON

Weather Predictions



Lilia played with Andrew's hair,
grow up quick Arianna !

I painted this last year.

Monday through Wednesday was spent preparing for the sermon that I will preach in Carcassonne the day after Christmas.  I prepared it well in advance so that I would have plenty of time to look over it.  Wednesday at Lilia and Micah's swimming class, Santa Claus showed up, wearing snorkelling equipment.  All the little kids were really excited.  As always, I have been having trouble getting an accurate weather report.  I usually check two or three to get a idea of what the weather will be and even at that they can be wrong.  The forecast was for rain yesterday, and freezing temperatures and snow today.  What we ended up with was snow all morning Thursday, though thankfully it didn't stick.  I was able to get some Christmas items mailed to the states.  This morning it was 50 degrees when I woke up.  We did have the rain however, which meant that  I didn't go to the market.  That gave Angie and I our first chance to do some Christmas shopping together.  This afternoon I am doing some paperwork, and soon I am going to make some pumpkin soup from some pumpkins that were given to us.   The temperature has been dropping all day, so we may end up with snow this evening.  I pray that the weather clears tommorrow afternoon for the Christmas meal and program in Carcassonne that everyone has been looking forward to.  We had only one at the Bible Study, but it was still an excellent time.  Sunday afternoon there is a Carol Service in English at the church in Carcassonne that we will be attending.  Today is the last day of the kids school and so it is the official start of the holiday break for them.  It is also Caleb's birthday today, he is 8 years old.  Attached song, may not be to your style of music and it may reveal my age, but when I was a teenager, it was my Christmas theme, I would play it every Christmas. God bless, JASON  

On fire.

The seminar has been going very well. I think the expression "on fire" could be used here in regards to myself (i.e. to be very excited). I would recommend it to all missionaries and pastors, and church members. There is a wealth of information that is presented. Missionary finances, deputation, church planting, missionary kids, cooking on the foreign field, culture shock . . . the list goes on and on, as well as good preaching. We also love the opportunity to meet with other missionaries. After the classes on Friday, Andrew blackened his eye on the table. It looks real colorful now, if you want a picture email me or comment and I will send you one, because Angie will not let me post it here. He seems to kind of enjoy showing it to everyone. A man we were eating lunch with asked him today, what happened to his eye. Andrew replied, "table." We had a great weekend, visited in two churches. Lilia was sick Saturday night and our hosts, the Raburns, who are also putting on the seminar, volunteered to stay and watch her so that we could all go to church. I visited a revival service tonight with another missionary. Attached is missionary kids playing together (you can see our display in the background) and Bro. Raburn ( lynnraburn.com) speaking during the seminar. We heard that Limoux got another bit of snow. We hope that all our friends are staying safe and warm. God bless, JASON

More details

As mentioned we left an evening early from our home because of all the snow, and we spent the night in Barcelona. We arrived at the airport at time and unloaded at our terminal, and said goodbye to Rebecca who had came along and was returning our car. When we entered we discovered that our airline was not at terminal 2 as I had found on the internet, but on terminal 1. We jumped on the shuttle and made it over to terminal one. Come to find out that because we were not as early as usual and because we had booked the flights a little later we had to split up a little on the plane. Lilia and Caleb sat in front of me and Micah, and Angie and Andrew sat two rows behind us. The plane ride went well, we were afraid that the plane would be packed because it was headed to Newark, which was closed the two previous days because of snow. It was not however, and Angie even had an empty seat on her row that allowed her to lay Andrew down comfortable. The other kids really enjoyed selecting and watching their own movies. Micah took at nap on my shoulder. The steward dropped a drink in Micah's lap, but it didn't seem to bother Micah too bad. There was strong wind when we arrived at Newark and Andrew got sick. Just after we landed Micah told me that he didn't want to go to the US and that he wanted to go home. That was a surprise, right after thought he got sick on my shoe, and that explained it. All was well after that. From Newark to Dallas, Angie sat with Micah and Andrew on row 5, Lilia on row 8, Caleb row 18, and me on row 19. I was right behind Caleb and as soon as he sat down he started talking to the lady next to him. He talked for about twenty minutes straight and then fell asleep. I think everyone had a good nap on that flight. We arrived at Dallas and were met by my parents and my little sister and her husband. We had a good drive back, the roads were clear, but there was heavy fog. The kids have been waking up early thinking it was time to get up. Saturday we enjoyed the fellowship at the church. Sunday I enjoyed sharing about our progress and preaching in the morning and evening service. After the evening service we shared some cookies and gifts from France with our church.

We have a good week planned ahead of us. We will be visiting Angie's parents this evening or tomorrow evening. Wednesday, Angie and I have dentists appointments. Friday we will be at the consulate in Houston. Attached pictures are of the family at the airport in Barcelona and myself preaching at our home church. God bless, JASON

Thawed out.

The snow finally stopped falling late Saturday night. We ended up with over 7 inches. It was nice while it lasted. Sunday, Angie and the kids stayed home, while I walked to the car and braved the icy roads to go to the church in Carcassonne. I really enjoyed the servcies. Their current pastor will be retiring soon and his replacement was visiting Sunday. I enjoyed hearing him speak. He will be moving here in June and we have offered him to stay in our house if needed while he is trying to locate one for him and his family. Tuesday he came and visited in the morning with us. I am really impressed with him and looking forward to getting to know him and his family better. We are trying to decide our plans for returning to the states. We do not know if we will leave mid-june and stay to the end of August, or if we will May and stay to July. We received a Christmas package from Angie's parents today. Loaded with fudge and other goodies. Angie has gone shopping with Lilia, January is a month of sales on almost everything. I am hoping that we will have the Bible study this Friday. I am giving an introduction to the Bible. I also pray that we will have a good number come. I heard this morning of the large Earthquake in Haïti, our prayers go out to all who are affected by this tragedy. Tomorrow I am giving the prayer meeting at the church in Carcassonne since the pastor has taken a short trip to England. Sunday I will lead the services and Angie will teach the younger kids Sunday school. Attached picture is the kids playing a board game. Enjoy the day that God has given you. God bless, JASON

"It rarely snows here"

How many time have you heard that before. For the third time this winter we have snow on the ground. As you can see from the pictures it is quite a bit, 5 inches or 13 1/2 cm. It snowed Thursday evening, Friday afternoon, all night Friday, and has snowed all morning today. The kids have had fun playing in it. It is a little hard for Andrew to walk since some of the drifts are up to his waist. We still have power thankfully, yesterday we had some brown outs. We are still planning on getting to church tomorrow. We did cancel the Bible study last night. Enjoy the pictures. God bless, JASON

Snow again.

Our internet was down Tuesday through Thursday. We talked to the help desk on Tuesday but could not get the problem resolved. The repairman came Thursday and pushed the reset button to fix it. I wonder why myself or the help line people did not think of that. That was a $150 just for him to push the reset button. The prayer meeting in Carcassonne went well yesterday. All the ones who showed up spoke English so they gave the option for speak in English, but I stuck with the French. Also, it started snowing yesterday afternoon and we currently have about 3 inches of snow on the ground. The kids really enjoyed playing in it last night (pictured). They still had school this morning. We left early so we could walk a third of a mile to where we had parked at the bottom of the hill. We are about to go pick them up for lunch. We will probably eat in town somewhere to avoid the drive and walk back. I imagine that the bible study will be canceled tonight because of the snowy weather. God bless, JASON

The weather outside is frightful.

The great news is Angie is continuing to improve. Yesterday she was able to smell the food that I cooked. Her voice is still a little raspy and she coughs occasionally. Today she is getting out to do some Christmas shopping. I just spent some time painting with the kids. All the kids seem to be better today as well. I hope all the sickness is behind us for a while. Angie was sick for three weeks. Yesterday we had another snowy morning. What I would call a blizzard came through after I dropped the kids off for school and covered the grounds and the roads in snow. I did not want to try to make it up our road, which is steep, so I parked at the bottom and walked up. I could tell by the footprints in the snow that three others had done the same thing. The snow didn't fall for long and I was able to drive all the way home after lunch. It has been cold. The temperature has not gone over freezing in the last few days. We celebrated Caleb's birthday, which was Thursday. He turned 7 years old. He was feeling a little better thankfully by the time we had the party. I am looking forward to the time off now more since Angie is better. Tuesday evening I will be speaking at the English Carol service in Carcassonne. It has been a while since I have spoken publicly in English. Hope that you weekend is blessed and that you find time to worship God. God bless, JASON

Snowy Day

Pictures from around our house on Monday. There is also a chance of snow today. It is currently 27 degrees so I think it is possible.

Tis the season.

Friday night, we let the kids watch a new movie. Saturday was spent getting the Christmas tree up and decorated. Of course the kids loved it. We take time to remeber where each ornament came from and what some of them mean. We also had our friend Yelena over to visit with us. Saturday night, Andrew had fever, so I went with the three older kids to church in Carcassonne. Services were well and enjoyed the visiting and fellowship afterwards. A church member gave us some fig preserves and some apple prune jelly. What we have tried so far has been very good. Monday morning there was a layer of snow on the ground when we woke up. It continued to snow all morning and into the afternoon. We ended up with several inches of snow on the ground. The kids enjoyed it, and we even let Andrew get out and play in it a little. I will attach pictures of it later. Today Caleb has a fever. Andrew is doing fine but we are keeping him home from school just to make sure he is fully recovered. Angie still has been coughing a lot. She did venture out yesterday with the rest of us to buy Caleb some shoes for his birthday. This sickness going through the family seems to have slowed everything down. I am getting a lot of good reading done in between running the kids to school or shopping. I do hope that everyone is healed by Christmas break. Attached are the picture of our tree and the lights on the outside of our house. God bless, JASON

Hotdogs

We have had a good weekend so far. Friday we picked Lilia and Caleb up from school and let them play on a playground close by while we waited to go get Micah. Micah still stays 45 minutes after school on Thursday and Friday to work with his teacher and several other classmates on French. It has helped just the other day he thought of a word in french and could not come up with the English. That was a first. When he did arrive after school we continued to let them play because it was a little warmer than normal and we thought that some exercise would be good. Suddenly Micah claimed to need to go to the bathroom, one that could not be handled outdoors. Another family had stayed with us to let their kids play while I helped one of them prepare for his scripture reading that he had coming up at the language school. They offered to let Micah come over and use their restroom since they lived closer than we did. They ended up inviting us over for supper (hotdogs (my favorite) and hamburgers). Micah never did use the restroom. But now he has in his mind to conveniently need to use the restroom next Friday. We had a wonderful visit. We always ask about how the couple meet and ended up together. It is always a interesting story, and of course we share ours with them. We made it home late but it was a fun evening. It worked out well that the kids got a little exercises because today it snowed and sleeted almost all for most of the day. Thankfully it was not cold enough to let it stick. I am planning to go visit another church in the morning, a church of a French pastor I met through facebook. He visited in our home a few months ago and I would like to see him again and the weather is supposed to be better tomorrow. God bless, JASON

Awesome!

The first great news is that Caleb accepted Christ as his savior Thursday night. The evening devotional that we had was when Abraham was asked to offer his only son Isaac. He asked several good questions afterwards and was obviously feeling convicted. When I went passed his room later that night he was praying in his bed. He told us in the morning that he had asked Jesus to save him. Awesome!

The cold weather is still hanging out. Wednesday was the coldest day in Paris since 1987. Caleb asked on the way home from school if there would be snow tomorrow, when I told him there would be it was sad because he was tired of being cold, he said.

At the kids school they showed a video in Lilia's class about a boy who wanted to dance ballet and fell in love with his best (boy) friend. Afterwards that had discussion where they told the class that that was okay. Lilia said she didn't like it because of the language too. A little idea of what they will face in public school in France. At our school we learned a new verb tense this week, conditional passe. I hope we are close to running out of verb tenses. Friday I went with another language school student to Leroy Merlin (like Home Depot or Lowes), we had a good time just wondering around. Saturday Angie took several of the new language school ladies shopping. January and July are the big sale months in France. Almost everything in the stores at 50-60% off. Angie is good at helping the new ladies at the school get settled. She helps with paperwork, comforts them about cultural things, listens, offers advice when asked, and . . . she just helps in many ways. God has truly blessed me with a wonderful helpmate. Attached are picture of Lilia with a snowball she brought home and Andrew's hair that everyone had fun playing with Friday night. God bless, JASON