It's All Grace

a journey with the Thomason family

Sunday (Literally) or What We Miss Sometimes

I think Tuesday was the last time we saw the sun shine. It was on our drive home from Vienna and it wasn’t for very long, but I do remember the sun coming out. That was five days ago.

Bethany and I talked today about the sun, or the lack of it. We never really thought we would miss it, but when you don’t see it for five days you really appreciate it and notice it when it does. Things are really gray here when the sun isn’t shining. Mostly, I think it’s because it gets really foggy and the clouds hang low. In California, even if it got foggy, it burned off by noon and you had clear skies. Not so much here. But today the sun poked through a few times during church this morning and then finally stayed out around 3:00 or 4:00 for the rest of the afternoon/evening.

I’m pretty sure I’ve written this before, but someone told us once that “when the sun’s out, the Czechs are out.” That was us today. We spent as much time outside as we could. We walked through town (as you see in the top photo) and we played in the backyard (shown directly above and some below). Bethany said, “I didn’t realize how much I love blue skies.” I totally agree. We had so many blue sky days in California you have the opposite problem–you want cloudy days! So we’ve flipped now and I would say we’re still adjusting.

We’ve been thinking and talking a lot about language learning the past week or so. We’re still looking for a new tutor and we’re going to start having a young girl from church come do some mini-lessons with us this week. Today at church was yet another reminder for me how bad I want to learn Czech. I know it’s hard. I know it will take time, but I’m feeling the pinch right now. Our prayer is for God to provide someone soon who can focus with us and be flexible with our family. We’ll see what the Lord does.

Like the sun, we’ve been missing other things lately too. Skyping with our friends yesterday reminded us how much we miss them. Oh, we pray and trust that the Lord will bring new friends and close relationships here, but we left so many behind. I found myself missing the pumpkin patch today. I saw a photo on Instagram of another friend at our favorite place in California with their kid, and that was one of our traditions. Traditions here are unknown right now. I don’t even know at this moment if they have a pumpkin patch for us to take our kids to. Maybe that’s something we left behind as well? Yet the one thing we haven’t left behind, or rather, He hasn’t left us behind, is God. He is constant and unchanging and that is a wonderful reminder.

Last night as we were video chatting with friends in the States they said, “From reading your blog, it doesn’t seem like you miss anything here.” Well, if I’ve communicated that then I’ve probably missed something on the blog! Those big picture things are hard to communicate on a daily basis, but today as the sun came shining through it was a real and physical reminder of what we have been missing. We’re thankful God has brought us to this needy place and by His grace we will continue to do whatever we can to show His love to others. But it doesn’t mean we don’t have moments where we remember what we left, or better said, who we left.

October 5, 2014
A Sleepy Saturday

Why is Avery walking around with an American flag in her mouth? Honestly, I have no idea, but I took the photo below today and was just laughing at her. She was running around with a little flag she has and kept wanting us to do the pledge of allegiance. I’m realizing now that there was a moment today where Bethany and I had our hands on our hearts and we were reciting the pledge of allegiance while both of our kids were holding little American flags. That’s funny to me, but it’s probably because I’m so tired.

I’m feeling the effects of a 3am night last night. No, nothing bad happened. No, I’m not sick or suffering from insomnia. I’ve just become that guy. You know the one. The guy who has to watch his baseball team no matter the cost. The Dodgers were playing their first postseason game and I just got hooked and couldn’t stop. Looking back, it was a terrible decision. The game started at 12:30am (our time) and I was able to watch it through our AppleTV. By 3:00am the Dodgers were leading the game 6-2 and I felt confident I could go to bed around the end of the sixth inning with that lead. But like clockwork the kids were in our room early this morning and I tried to stay in bed. Bethany let me sleep in a bit, and when I did get up to check the score all was not well with the Dodgers. The game was close, but they lost the lead shortly after I went to bed. I told Bethany I won’t do it again. No sports team is worth that kind of lack of sleep…well, unless we go all the way to the World Series. If that happens I’m pulling an all-nighter.

For the most part we stayed inside today. We had some cleaning to do and I just felt like we were catching up on life. It was colder out today (high around 55), but Titus and I did play a little tennis in the yard while Avery napped. When she woke up we did some puzzles inside and played with their toys. Avery has gotten really good at puzzles. I love it when she says, “Hhmm…where this one go?” Above is her putting together the big Curious George puzzle we have.

Tonight I went to youth group at church and Titus came with me. Bethany, Titus, and Avery have all had yet another round of sickness. It’s kind of unbelievable to be honest. Even though Titus had a runny nose and was coughing, he really wanted to come with me so I let him. Youth group was great and the youth pastor introduced me to everyone (it was only my second time being there). The pastor and his wife shared about relationships tonight and were just trying to have some open discussion about dating and marriage. Our friend Misa translated for me so I felt like I got the gist of the content. Titus and I had to leave around 7:20pm (it starts at 5pm) so we could get back for a few Skype sessions with friends and family. I was a little bummed we had to leave because they were about to start so open questions from the students and I would’ve loved to get to know them better.

When we got home we Skyped with some good friends of ours in California. It never gets old seeing familiar faces, especially those of close friends. It was a sweet time together even if it’s over video. Right after hanging up with them we spent some time Skyping with Bethany’s parents. Our kids were just full of energy during both video chats so that wasn’t always fun, but we still had a great time with them too.

It’s getting late and church is tomorrow. You know what they say, “Sunday morning starts on Saturday night” so it’s off to bed for me. Goodnight.

October 4, 2014
Haircuts Again

Titus and I had another trip to the hairdresser today. Each time we go I have to ask our friend Mel to make the appointment for us since we don’t speak Czech, and our appointment today was at 9:30am. We got there on time and I told Titus I would go first. I kind of feel that when he watches me get a haircut before him it gives me a little more confidence. Earlier this week when I told Titus we would be going, he said to me, “Will you hold my hand?” There’s still a little fear there for sure.

But Titus did great! He stayed pretty still throughout his hair cut and I kept telling him he was getting his cut like daddy’s. Zuska kept talking to him in Czech and it was to watch Titus just smile. Below are two photos Bethany took of him today. He’s getting so big. The photo on the right is actually really accurate to how Titus was feeling today. He’s been kind of stuffed up for the last few days, but he definitely had a cough and was really stuffy today. Of course Avery is right behind him with lots of sneezes so I think we’re going to have a bit of a sick family for a few days here.

As I often do on Fridays, I worked from home today. Right now I’m working on getting our team in the States some materials for their upcoming recruiting tour. We have a few of our staff people who will be visiting various Christian colleges around the U.S. recruiting interns for next summer. I’m helping get them materials to pass out and hopefully aid them in getting more students to spend their summer over here serving the Lord.

We watched a little moving tonight as a family since aren’t feeling well. I made popcorn on the stove but had to run to the store for some canola oil. Never in my life have I see so many bottles of oil at a grocery store (regrettably, I didn’t get a photo). I don’t know exactly what they’re using it all for but you get that stuff basically by the drums! The popcorn turned out alright, but it wasn’t my best batch. The kids really enjoyed it and that usually makes it worth the effort.

The Dodgers are playing their first postseason game tonight and I really do wish I was in the States to watch it with friends. I’m not sure if we’ll be able to watch it over here or not, but we’re root, root, rooting for the Dodgers all the way from Czech!

October 3, 2014
Heaters and Envelopes

Our radiators (heaters) are working again! The funny part about it is when I’m trying to communicate with our landlord I usually just send an email that I use Google Translate to put in Czech for me. I have no clue how it sounds when she receives it, but apparently it worked because she brought Bethany a space heater today and said something about calling a repair man. When I got home this evening our landlord took me down to the basement and showed me all of the equipment. Here are the words I understood: “light,” “bad,” and “reset.” I think what she was trying to tell me was that when the red light is on, it’s bad, so you have to hit the reset button. Or maybe it’s “hit the red reset button and the light will come on?” Ahhh! Either way, the heaters are working right now. And as our landlord was leaving me tonight she pointed to the space heater in our house and said, “provizorní.” Immediately I thought, “She must mean temporary.” After checking online I was right! Whew… Let’s just hope this communication barrier is provizorní.

We put the kids to bed last night before opening our monthly envelope from our Bible study in the States so we waited until today. If you’ve been following along with us then you know these envelopes were sent with us when we moved and we get to open a new one each month. This month’s had an autumn theme and came packed with magazines, gum, a Hello Kitty blow up beach ball, coloring books, instant oatmeal, and some Airheads candy. Oh, and a $15 iTunes gift card…woohoo! The kids always love doing it and it’s been a fun monthly tradition since we’ve arrived. Here’s some photos:

In the photo at the top of this post you’ll see a second envelope (the brown one). I found it on our doorstep today and brought it inside. It was addressed to Bethany from our home church in California! We decided to open it tonight after we opened the other envelope. Inside was an update on the women’s ministry at our church along with the book they are currently reading. What a blessing to have our church care for us in that way by sending us the latest information along with a good, Biblical resource. Here’s Bethany opening the envelope:

Tonight we had a special treat. Bethany made BBQ chicken and mashed potatoes. But…she used Stubbs Spicy BBQ sauce. The other day I was doing some shopping at the local grocery store and on the end cap where they have the sale items I saw the Stubbs bottles. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I had heard about Stubbs in the States because it’s made in Austin, Texas. The bottles were marked down over 50% so I bought them both for just a few bucks. I’m pretty sure they were way too spicy for the Czechs so that’s probably why they were on sale. Even though it was definitely spicy, I was so excited to eat something more familiar over here. It was a fun treat.

I had the joy of video chatting tonight with a good friend. It was encouraging and a blessing to chat with him and just share about what we’ve been doing and how God has been working in our lives over here. I’m reminded tonight that we need friends in our lives to challenge and encourage us in Christ. As we continue to lay down roots in Czech I’m hopeful for more friends here who can do the same. And while I’m on the topic of friendship, I picked up a highly recommended book tonight called Relationships: A Mess Worth Making that is FREE today on Amazon.com (for Kindle). The title alone makes me want to read it…and apply it.

October 2, 2014
C is for Caterpillar, K is for King

We were back in full swing today after taking a few days away as a family. I returned to the Josiah Venture office to begin working on new projects. With conference over, we’ve got a few projects that have backed up. But during conference we showed clips of young people from this year’s summer ministries. Since the conference was so focused on higher level leadership training, we wanted a way to bring people back to the “why” of ministry. One of those videos that was shown before one of the sessions is probably my personal favorite. It’s short, to the point, and I love how this young man talks about his faith in simple and plain English. This particular student is from Czech Republic, not far from where we live. Watch and enjoy this short, but clear testimony of a changed life.

Back at home Bethany treated today like Monday because we were on vacation so the kids did “school” in the house. They painted the the letter “C” and made little caterpillars. Bethany tries to have some organized time with them and do a craft which is great or days like today when it was pretty gray and rainy. Here are the kids working on their craft.

Here’s the final result. They are looking great!

Tonight, after dinner, we played a little flashlight tag in the house. Titus and I were a little better at hiding than the girls because every time we would get remotely close Avery would start to giggle, thus revealing her and mommy’s location. Still we had a lot of fun and I got this photo of Titus heading down the hall to find the girls.

We’ve had quite the battle today with getting our radiators working in the house. As the temperatures begin to drop outside, and we begin to prepare for colder days, I wanted to make sure we can get the heat working. I’ve never had to use radiators, and they are a lot different than central heating (like what most people have in the States). Today our landlord came over really early and it was kind of frustrating to communicate the problem. Eventually she got it working and it was great. However, tonight as I was writing about it, the radiators stopped working again and then one of the handles popped off the radiator in the living room. I’m pretty bummed at the moment because this is not an easy process with the language barrier. Please pray for us that the heat would work and we would get this issue resolved. I am trying to have patience, but being cold is not my thing!

One last thing that’s much better than being cold is that another spot opened up for Titus in the local preschool. We’re not holding our breath because of what happened last time, but Lord willing he’ll be starting on Oct. 13th and will go a few days a week. We’ll be sure and keep everyone posted on that as we get more info. Thank you for praying for this! Goodnight.

October 1, 2014