We hope you have all been having a good summer.
We know we have, although we have definitely missed Lake Michigan and its beaches!
Here are the things we've been up to this summer:
We sat on some steps at the Colosseum! But now I'm getting ahead of myself... |
Our children finished up with their French school year at the beginning of July as well (French school goes from September to July, with longer breaks in the middle of the school year than in the U.S.). However, we were still in classes until the end of July, so our language school provided a summer program for them and some of the other missionary kids who were here, which they seem to have enjoyed quite a lot!
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They made a "mummy" while learning about Egypt. |
See that weird face I'm making? That's the only way you can pronounce French correctly... or so our teacher tells us! |
After our exams we were finally given some much-needed vacation time! We have the whole month of August "off" from classes (although we plan to spend the next week and a half studying in preparation for the beginning of our next and final trimester).
As soon as our vacation time started in the last week of July, we took off on the train to visit Paris for a few days as a family. It seemed strange that we had been in France almost 7 months and had still never been there! We are glad we finally got to go. It was a very fun trip.
We had all just had ice-cream cones in front of the Eiffel Tower... hence the chocolate all over the two younger girls! |
Finally, on August 7th my sister Cynthia and her husband Michael arrived for a 10-day visit. We rented a van and traveled Italy and the south of France with them for about a week. It was a blast! (Though we realized in Italy how much we had come to rely on knowing the local language in France! It was frustrating to not be able to communicate all over again.) We got to see the Colosseum, the Vatican, several amazing monuments and galleries in Florence, and we spent a lovely day swimming in the Mediterranean Sea near Nice. We finished our trip by driving through the "Grand Canyon of Europe," the Verdon Gorge. That was a breathtaking view! Earlier this week, Michael and Cynthia left to spend some time in Paris before heading back to the U.S. We were very sad to see them go, but we are so glad we got to have that fun trip with them.
Enjoying some amazing pizza and pasta with Michael and Cynthia in Rome. |
So, to sum up our summer:
Praises:
~ We passed our exams!
~ Everyone is relatively healthy (we had lots of nasty viruses in the winter, but we are all doing a lot better now, praise the Lord!).
~ We have been able to relax and spend time with family.
Prayer requests:
~ That we would be able to get some good review time during the next couple of weeks.
~ That we would be a blessing to the new missionary families that come this month.
~ That my parents, who are planning to come visit us in October, would have a safe trip.
Finally, we want to thank those of you who have consistently written to us, prayed for us, encouraged us, and financially supported us. Right now our monthly financial support is at about 30-40% of our monthly goal. Thanks to some very generous one-time donations, we have been able to pay for language school, living expenses, and day-care for our youngest child, but as we get to the end of the year and look to our move to Togo, we will need to rely more and more on monthly donations. We would like to ask you to pray that God will provide, and if you or anyone you know would be interested in supporting us on a monthly basis, please contact us. We can tell you how to sign up to make a tax-deductible monthly donation through Samaritan's Purse online, or you can download this donation form, fill it out, and mail it to Samaritan's Purse: Donation Form
Thank you again to those of you who have been faithfully supporting and praying for us! We thank God daily for you, and are are so honored to have you on our team as we prepare to serve the Lord in Togo.
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