It's All Grace

a journey with the Thomason family

A Language Day

The last couple days have been wet and dreary. Even though the weather had warmed up a bit last week, it was really short lived and is currently just above freezing. Us southern Californians aren’t used to that because usually when it warms up it stays that way for a while. As I walked to Titus’ school this afternoon to pick him up I took the above photo to give a little bit of an idea of how it looked pretty much all day. The rain is like an all-day light mist and everything just kind of stays gray.

As I approached Titus’ preschool today I realized just how funny the entrance is (shown above from the photo I took today). After you walk through the gate and up the path you come to a large door that for an American is something out of a movie. The doors are heavy and loud and if you didn’t know that there were a hundred little kids running around inside you would think maybe I was entering some kind of castle. I like it.

When I got to Titus’ class they had just started the Lego movie (dubbed in the Czech language). Titus was pretty excited and didn’t want to leave so I let him watch for a few minutes. Plus, it’s always a bonus to hear kids movies in Czech because the language is usually simplified and I can try following along. I also liked that Titus had his hand on his friend Denis’ chair. Also funny was that it was basically almost all the boys watching the movie while the girls were in the other room playing.

We had our biggest language study day to date and it was absolutely wonderful. Our language teacher Tamara came to our house today because she had a car available and was already running errands (normally we drive to her place about 15-20 minutes away). For two solid hours we worked through our Czech language textbook, and we also had a little time to review a Czech tourism book that Tamara brought us (below). What I really enjoyed about our time with her today was that Tamara will just speak Czech while we do things. For instance, while we were looking at the beautiful photos and scenery shown in the book she brought, Tamara was just simply telling us about the places all in Czech. She was speaking slowly and helping us in English along the way, but it’s an exercise of just listening and paying attention to the words you can understand while picking up new ones along the way. Oh, and by the way, this is a beautiful country.

Between 2:30-4 we had a little break before our second round of Czech lessons started with Jenny and Landen. We also try to have hot water for tea and some snacks on the table (which you can see below). I took this photo today because I realized this has become the norm now and we’re well prepared to get into the Czech language!

Today was kind of special because Jenny and Landen brought a young girl from our church who speaks both Czech and English (I also think she speaks Polish!). Her name is Miriam, and she became a little bit of our “Czech helper” (it’s like a teacher, only she doesn’t have to prepare) and we had fun listening to her speak and laughing at all of our mistakes. I think this was the first week we have done five straight days of language time with Jenny and Landen in the afternoon so it’s been a really fun and full week. I can already tell that with how much studying we’re doing that things are starting to click in my mind much faster. By no means are we great Czech speakers yet, but we’re definitely making progress! Here’s a photo of all of us (minus me, of course) sprawled out on the table working on our lesson.

Since we had such a focused day of language, and because the kids did pretty well during all of it, we decided to take them out to eat tonight. It’s bit of a drive to find a place we can all enjoy, but it’s just nice to get out. We went to a newer mall about 20 minutes from our place and enjoy an easy dinner and just walked around a toy store together.

Bethany has been talking a lot lately about how much baby #3 has been kicking and hiccuping. I believe she’s officially entered her third trimester and she’s starting to feel a little more uncomfortable. In the next month or so we have to begin to figure out which hospital Bethany will deliver at and put together a “birth plan” with a Czech speaker to try to minimize the surprises when she does go into labor. You can be praying for us as the due date gets closer and closer and as we begin to finalize our plans of having a baby in another country.

March 13, 2015
Cold Water and Czech Spa Wafers

“Daddy, the hot water is gone!” Avery exclaimed to me while I was in the middle of an important phone call this afternoon. I heard her, but I wasn’t listening. It’s one of those classic dad moments where I heard the words but I didn’t take them to heart and continued my phone call. A friend tried calling my phone, but I declined it because the call I was already on. I also heard Bethany’s phone ring and still ignored it (lets just pause here and thank the Lord that nothing dangerous was going on because no amount of warning would’ve alerted me unless I was actually on fire or something). Fifteen or twenty minutes later I hung up from my call and Avery said again, “Daddy, the hot water is gone!” Confused still, I said, “Where’s mommy?!” She pointed to the bathroom and that’s when I heard Bethany’s voice, “I’m in here!…There’s no hot water!” As she was showering the hot water went off and now she had been stranded in the shower for at least twenty minutes with soap in her hair. That explains what Avery meant!

Why was the hot water off? Well, that’s a story in a story. Last week while the plague swept our house we got a notice regarding the gas meter being replaced. Mostly we understood it but were a little confused about the times and day they would come. I guess the gas company people did show up but our doorbell is broken so we didn’t hear them. Yesterday we got a phone call that was completely in Czech and I was so confused and did my best to understand. Could this be the gas company trying to call? I thought I understood the man on the phone asking me when we would be home, but my Czech just isn’t good enough to respond and I was already unsure what was going on or who I was even talking to. Finally, after a few minutes of frustration, the caller said “goodbye” to me in Czech. This morning Bethany got a phone call in Czech. Was it the gas company? Just like me she was confused and the caller hung up when they couldn’t communicate either.

Fast forward back to the cold shower. I ended up boiling hot water for Bethany so she could rinse off and no longer be stranded. I checked the hot water boiler we have and I could see the pilot wasn’t lit. It’s not a hot water heater, and doesn’t store hot water in a tank like most places in the States; it kind of heats water when you need it. That’s when I called back our friend who tried calling me while I was on the phone. Basically, she told me the gas company talked to our landlord and replaced the meter this morning thus turning off our gas while Bethany was showering, and she added they weren’t happy about all the miscommunication. She also told me that the water heater would be off and need to be relit which of course we already knew at that point. I was thankful for the clarity. I did finally get the boiler pilot light lit again. A little Googling and a lighter got us back in business.

We continued working on language stuff with Jenny and Landen this afternoon and they brought us a special Czech treat that we had never had before. It’s called “Kolonada” (shown above) and they said it’s a pretty traditional treat that Czechs give as gifts when visiting your home. It’s like a thin wafer with sugar and hazelnuts inside and it was delicious! Here’s another picture of it.

As for language, it’s coming along albeit very slow. We are putting together sentences and doing a ton of listening but it’s not fast and it’s not easy. Every day I’m amazed at our progress and continually am asking the Lord for His grace as we learn Czech!

March 12, 2015
Czech Makes You Do Funny Things

“You put the green book under the yellow head.” I think that’s the sentence that Landen was putting together in this picture. To the left you see his wife, Jenny, laughing because it’s hilarious how silly we look sometimes but how focused we are while we’re doing these things. You may not think that putting a green book under your chin with a color card would mean much, but for us it’s helping us understand adjectives and how those words change. In the Czech language the endings of words change often and that’s true of adjectives, like when you’re using a color to describe an object (e.g. “the green book”). So we’re building sentences from simple objects and trying to listen as Jenny tells us what we’re doing in Czech. Fun times!

Another funny (maybe strange?) thing about Czech is an Easter tradition where boys use sticks to hit girls on Easter Monday (that’s not a typo, it’s the day after Sunday). Above is a photo Bethany got of those sticks today at the grocery and instead of trying to describe the tradition myself, here’s how one Web site explains it:

Young, live pussywillow twigs are thought to bring health and youth to anyone who is whipped with them. An Easter pomlázka (from pomladit or “make younger”) is a braided whip made from pussywillow twigs. It has been used for centuries by boys who go caroling on Easter Monday and symbolically whip girls on the legs. In the past, pomlázka was also used by the farmer’s wife to whip the livestock and everyone in the household, including men and children. There would be no Czech Easter without the pomlázka.

I guess I’ll make sure to keep Bethany indoors on Easter Monday!

March 11, 2015
Our First Hole in the Wall

Thanks to our friend Greg who lives and serves in Poland, we now have our nice big clock hanging up in our living room. You would think that I, as the man of the house, would be able to hang a clock on my own. I would say I probably could’ve done it, but we have never actually tried drilling in to the concrete walls before and because I was unsure I enlisted Greg’s assistances (and tools!) to help me. He came over at 8am because he was going to be in our part of town anyway and in about 10 minutes we had this new clock hung and looking good! So there you have it–our first hole in the wall.

After hanging the clock I headed into the Josiah Venture office for our big international team meeting. It’s been a few weeks since I’ve been able to be there because of sickness, but I was so encouraged by the verses we looked at this morning.

Philippians 4:6-7

…do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Dave, who was teaching, talked about having a “zero tolerance” for anxiousness. I really like that thought. The Apostle Paul is not saying you can be anxious sometimes, but “do not be anxious about anything.” Anything! I started to think how often I am anxious in my heart. Whether I’m driving the car, thinking about my family, thinking about ministry, or whatever I’m probably anxious a thousand times more than I realize. But God’s Word provides the solution to our sinful anxiety. “…but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.” Pray! Cast all our worries on the Lord! Be thankful! And what happens? “The peace of God…will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Amazing. It’s a simple truth, but it’s impact is far reaching. I love the simplicity and I love that when we follow God’s plan in His Word that He brings peace to our worried hearts.

That’s our Tuesday. Goodnight for now.

March 10, 2015
Back At It

It really feels like it’s been a while since we’ve had a normal start to a week, but today we were back into the swing of things. Titus went to school this morning and Bethany took him while I got ready to head in to the Josiah Venture offices for meetings. It’s great to see a normal routine come back in to our lives. As our health continues to improve I feel like we’re catching up on things in our house and Bethany was hard at work today getting the kids’ room ready for baby #3. When we were at IKEA on Sunday Bethany really wanted to buy a little frame tray and she had a vision of what the kids dresser could look like. Today she made it a reality and texted me this photo of what she was working on. I thought it looked great!

It also has felt like it’s been a while since we did our last Czech lesson which was about a week and a half ago (we cancelled our lessons due to sickness). So it really nice to meet up again today with Jenny and Landen to work on our Czech language drills. We spent most of today just reviewing and getting our minds back around the last few drills which was really helpful. We’re learning prepositional phrases like “the book is next to the table” or “the paper is inside the book.” It’s amazing when you start to think about all those little things that we do naturally in language that you now need to train yourself on. Words like “on, beside, in, under…” are often used and we don’t think about it. There are so many ways you can say things! It was a good time today and we’ll be back at it tomorrow afternoon.

I took the above photo tonight around sunset from our kitchen window. It was fun to see the sun reflecting off the huge Catholic church. The sky was beautiful today and it was another “warm” day (mid 50s) and I’m thankful for the break from the cold. It might cool off later this week, but we’ll take all the warm, sunny days we can get!

March 9, 2015