It's All Grace

a journey with the Thomason family

Winter Things and Christmas Time

After yesterday’s 6 hour extravaganza, the thought of the driving back to the JV office was thrown out by the time I got home last night. In fact, we didn’t drive at all today and that’s mainly because the roads are still frozen. Well, the roads and our driveway. I walked outside this afternoon to bring the trashcans in from the street and realized that I didn’t really have to carry them back in, I could just slide them. That’s when inspiration struck! If the trashcans can slide, and I can slide with my shoes on, I bet the kids can slide!

Bethany was hoping for me to bring in the Christmas decorations from the garage. The walk across the driveway was dangerous and the kids really wanted to come outside too. I remembered we had purchased a sled at the store a few months back that has wood with metal on the bottom. It slid wonderfully across the driveway so I loaded the kids on there and we did laps around the yard. The ice was probably a half inch thick and it’s still below freezing outside so it wasn’t breaking at all. After a few minutes I slid the kids into the garage where there’s no ice and dropped them off. Bethany and I loaded Christmas decoration boxes on to the sled and I slid them back to the apartment. We had a lot of laughs and fun and here’s a few photos:

Once we got everything inside, we began to unbox a few things and casually start decorating. We’re hoping to go buy our Christmas tree this week (maybe tomorrow). A few years ago Bethany found a Playmobile nativity scene at Goodwill. We haven’t set it up in year’s past because the kids were smaller and the pieces are too small for really young kids. But this year we got it out and hand fun setting it up with Titus and Avery. Here’s some photos of the scene and the kids playing:

Avery was really excited about the baby Jesus. She was taking care of him throughout the night and making sure he had his “blankie.” Before we put the kids to bed Avery had grabbed Jesus and his blankie and said, “Can baby sleep in my bed?” It was hard to say no to that, but Bethany explained that he was just too little for her big girl bed. So Avery quietly returned him to his place in the manger…with his blankie, of course.

December 2, 2014
Literally Stuck in Frozen Czech

Update (11:35pm): Made it home after 6 hours stuck on the highway. The roads are frozen over and the driveway to our place is basically an ice rink. But it’s nice to be home!

As I write this, I’m sitting in my car in the middle of a freeway with the engine off. I’m about 6.5 miles from home with little hope of when traffic will resume. The hundreds of other motorists in the same predicament are all asking this question: will I get home tonight?

Today in Czech Republic, the weather turned from cold to freezing rain. As I was working out of the Josiah Venture office (about 30 minutes from home), I hadn’t paid much attention to the weather, and no one had informed me about what was going on outside. Then I got a text from my teammate Daniel who had left earlier saying he was stuck on a hill with a bunch of other cars. That was at 3:53pm and I was in a meeting and it really didn’t click for me that maybe something like that couldn’t happen to me too.

An hour later, Rachael came in to the office and said that someone in Cesky Tesin (our mutual town) informed her that the roads were getting bad. Rachael asked me if she could get a head start back to town in her car, and if something went wrong, asked if I could help her. Of course, I said sure and called Bethany to tell her about what was going on.

Not 15 minutes later, Rachael called me. The highway onramp was closed and she wanted to know if she could come back to the office and if I could help her. Of course, I said yes, and that’s basically where the story starts and basically ends. That was three hours ago.

When I got to my car it was literally frozen solid. There was ice covering the entire thing and icicles hanging from the sides. It took about ten minutes to warm it up and scrape off. By this time the onramp had reopened and Rachael didn’t trust herself in this ice so I decided she could ride with me. Off we went going slowly on the highway knowing that there was ice between our tires and the road.

Since I began typing, we still haven’t moved. It took us about an hour and half to go about 16 miles and that’s how long we have been sitting still. We saw people literally sliding on the icy sidewalks and multiple times we have stopped for 10-15 minutes each. Police have snaked their way through the traffic a couple times now, and the second batch had an ambulance following. I don’t know what’s going on ahead of us, but I assume people got hurt.

[long break from writing]

It’s 10:30pm. We’ve been stuck for over five hours and apparently the road is closed in both directions. We got a text from a Czech friend telling us they’ll be closed until at least midnight. I’m going to try and post this blog from the car via my phone and see what happens. I will either update it throughout the night or just try and post more about it tomorrow.

Here are some photos from the adventure (captions below each):

This was my frozen windshield as I got into my car around 5pm.

Here’s an ambulance squeezing through traffic.

This is the salt truck. It got so close to our car we could high five the driver.

More police clearing a space through the already tight traffic.

This is how all the trucks looked…icicles!

Not sure how this truck got snow on it? It was the only car we saw like this.

December 1, 2014
I’m Sorry, I Don’t Speak Headlight

We spent this morning at church in Titus and Avery’s class. We weren’t exactly sure why there wasn’t a class for Avery’s age today, but a lot of her class were combined with Titus’ class so we all ended up just staying together. They did a little activity (photo above) where they had to put gifts on their colored fabric. Tamara, today’s teacher, told us in English that they were supposed to give their gifts to another person in the class the same way God gave his gift to us, Jesus Christ. She followed that by saying, “But none of the kids want to do it.” I guess they’re all still learning how to give gifts.

Here’s a couple more photos from class today. The little gifts they chose from were wooden ornaments, plastic gold stars, and metal bells.

This afternoon I spent a good two hours trying to replace the driver’s side headlight on our car. Outside it was around 28 degrees, but my phone said “feels like 20” because there was a wind chill. I had purchased what I thought was the correct light bulb a few days ago and figured I would be able to quickly replace it. Our owner’s manual is all written in German, so it was no help, and I tried searching online and that didn’t help much either. After removing the entire headlight because I really couldn’t find another way to do it, I replaced the light, turned the lights on and…I had fixed the wrong one. Back to the store for another bulb and to try again.

Since I had already taken it apart once, getting to the light again was a cinch, but the lowbeam bulb was more challenging to replace. On our cars in the States, this process was always very simple and usually didn’t take a lot of time (and often I didn’t even need tools!). Today I had to remove about five different screws and the entire headlight. The cold was hurting my hands outside, so I brought everything inside where could let my fingers thaw out and try to see how to get the bulb replaced. It proved much more difficult than I thought and thankfully my dad head given me a metric star shaped screw driver which was a life saver today since I don’t have any of those kinds of tools. Finally, I got the lowbeam replaced and in, took it outside, and put it all back in place. Amazingly, it came right on and we have two working headlights again!

I really only share that story because it’s another example of what usually is simple is just harder here. Learning the stuff of life here is on the same level of difficulty as learning the language and apparently I don’t speak headlight. But with a little more work and some extra time I was able to get it fixed and get everything working again. Now maybe with a little more work and a little more time the lightbulb of the Czech language will turn on too!

November 30, 2014
Ice Skating in Poland on Avery’s Birthday

Never in my life would I have imagined spending Avery’s birthday ice skating in Poland, but that’s exactly what happened today. Our friends, the Millers, have a daughter with the same birthday (she’s a few years older) and they planned a big ice skating trip with a few other missionary families today. They invited us while we were at the JV Thanksgiving event and we were pumped to join them. The ice rink they chose is about a stone’s throw from our apartment, but it’s across the river in Poland. I think it actually takes longer to drive there than walk, but since it was in the 20’s outside we decided to take the car.

There were five families, including us, and we had a really fun time on our first ice skating adventure. The rink was very nice and really reasonably priced for skate rentals and time on the ice. I have done a lot of rollerblading, but I don’t believe I have ever actually been ice skating before. Bethany has gone, but it has been a really long time. Titus was excited, but Avery just wasn’t having it today and didn’t even want us to put skates on her. Later she warmed up to the idea (ha! “warmed up”…to ice) and let me carry her around the rink for a lap or two. Titus wanted to try a few times so I would hold his arms while his little legs and feet scrambled for stability beneath him.

Here’s a few photos with captions beneath each one to give more of the story.

We arrived a few minutes earlier than the other families so Titus and I were walking around the building just checking it out and found a big pile of snow. This is not snow that had fallen from the sky, but I guess they made it for some event or practice they were doing. Behind this pile was a large ramp thing where I assume they were skiing or snowboarding. But that didn’t matter to Titus; he was just excited about all this crazy white stuff.

Here’s Bethany and Avery as we were waiting to buy tickets and get our skates on. Avery had just gotten up from a nap so she wasn’t quite camera ready.

Here was the scene inside the locker room where everyone was getting their skates on. I was really impressed that the same electric key that got you into the room also unlocked your personal locker. Not bad for $11 which got all four of us an hour of rink time, a locker, and skate rentals.

I know ice skating rinks are cold, but I’m pretty sure it was colder inside than outside (and it as cold outside!). For a while we skated clockwise and then an announcer came on in Polish to tell us to turn around and go the other direction. Since we don’t speak Polish you just kind of follow the crowd. You’ll also notice the big sign that reads “Welcome to Cieszyn.” Cieszyn is the Polish name for the same town in Czech which is Český Těšín (where we live).

This a little video I took going around the rink one time.

I held Titus and Avery while skating around the rink a few times. I only fell one time and sadly I had Titus in my arms. Both our kids were well padded today, but when you’re dad is 6’4″ it’s a long way down. I saved Titus’ head from hitting the ice, but his bum hit hard and he cried. He settled down after a few minutes and we went around again. I tried hard to make sure he wasn’t completely freaked out about the ice after that considering that it was his first time. When we got home he said, “Ice skating was fun!” so I don’t think I did too much emotional damage.

After ice skating, the other families had plans to go back to where they were staying and invited us to have sundaes with them. It was just a little too far for us to go tonight and would’ve been another hour of driving, so we left and went to a local hamburger place in the Polish square.

While at dinner we were waiting for our food (at the table above) and Titus was drinking his apple juice we had gotten him. I was sitting across from him asking him to sit down when he reached for his juice and it slipped and began spilling on the his seat (the bench seat). In a moment, I got up from chair, hit my head on a hanging light and all I heard was a big crash and glass breaking. It hurt and I was a little confused in the moment about what exactly had happened.

You’ll notice in the photo above that the glass lamp shade is sitting on the bench. Basically, my head knocked the huge lamp cover off the wire it was hanging from, it broke the light bulb, and everything fell on to our table. Amazingly, the lamp cover didn’t break, but we had broken glass from the light bulb, juice, and drinks all over the table and floor. Here’s a few more photos after we cleaned it all up with the help of the employees at the burger joint.

Finally, we did have time this morning to give Avery a little something from us which she opened in our living room. Here’s a few more photos of Avery opening that. It was a really fun day and we’re glad we got to spend it with friends and enjoying another new adventure here.

November 29, 2014
On a So-Called “Black Friday”

It’s amazing what a day will do. You go from happy, fun Thanksgiving to this intense, maddening holiday rush where sleepless people wait all night to save $20 on a big screen. I was a little sad to be out the States yesterday, but I’m not missing “Black Friday” at all on this side of the Atlantic. As I watch the news stream in from the States of big lines and huge sales, I’m struck with the fact that it’s become such a part of the American culture. From what I can tell, that doesn’t seem to be the case over here, but only time will tell just how strong that American influence is to the rest of the world.

We packed and left the hotel this morning and were back home around 11am. My voice is slowly returning, but I woke up with a pretty bad sore throat today. My energy hasn’t returned much either. We had a little meeting around 3pm with our landlord to get a new copy of our rental agreement which is needed for our long term visas. She has an office above our flat and while we were signing papers the kids ended up bringing her drawings they made which she was really excited about. Through her computer she translated, “I am going to bring them something for Christmas.” I’m glad our landlord likes our kids enough to want to bring them gifts!

Speaking of gifts, tomorrow is Avery’s actual birthday. Above is a photo of her last present, which is from us, so she’ll have something to open. There’s also a chance we’ll be joining some friends for ice skating tomorrow. They too have a daughters whose birthday falls on the 29th and they invited us to join them. We have never taken the kids ice skating, so this should definitely be an adventure.

Shortly after our meeting with our landlord, we decided to lounge around and watch a Christmas movie together. With me not feeling well and all of us a little worn out from Thanksgiving, it was nice to just “veg” as my dad would call it. Bethany prepared some food and I made popcorn. Avery loves to make popcorn from scratch and watch the popcorn pop on the stove top. She giggles and says, “That’s silly!” which I think is just hilarious. We had a lot of fun just hanging around today and being together. Hopefully I can feel good for ice skating tomorrow and Avery’s birthday. Being sick just isn’t fun, especially when you’re trying to celebrate holidays and birthdays!

November 28, 2014