I’m revising some old posts from our time in France to give you a glimpse of what our lives were like there, as well as to highlight some of the lessons I learned. I still don’t write publicly about how our time went there, but I’m comfortable with this week’s glimpse. I’ve kept the comments [...]

We used to live in wine country (France)–a place where one could buy a great bottle of wine for two euros. I’m not much of a wine drinker, not much at all, so I don’t understand the sacrifice of pouring forth wine. But melted dark chocolate? Maybe. There’s something amazing about taking that which is [...]

I’ve worried whether I’d be a pessimist for the rest of my life. But, oddly, after our time in France, something paradoxical happened. I became strangely positive. But then I read the book Learned Optimism by Martin E. P. Seligman, PhD, and took a little test that bothered my little paradigm. Even though I felt [...]

It seems like a lifetime ago that we flew to France as a family to explore our calling and see if that’s where God would have us serve. This picture was taken at Schipol Airport in Amsterdam. The kids did really well when we traveled, though they were all very tired. They were 10, 7, [...]

It seems like a lifetime ago that we flew to France as a family to explore our calling and see if that’s where God would have us serve. This picture was taken at Schipol Airport in Amsterdam. The kids did really well when we traveled, though they were all very tired. They were 10, 7, [...]

France had a way of beating me down. Not the whole country, but the sum of our experience there. We’d made friends who were leaving the country and decided to throw an enormous, lavish party. I didn’t really want to go. I was in that place where I’d rather stay at home, safe inside the [...]

Crepes a la Mary I’ve been making these crepes nearly twenty years now. Forget the gimmicky crepe makers—all you need to make crepes successfully is a sturdy, non-stick pan and cooking spray. Our favorite way to eat them is Parisian style—rolled up with a smearing of Nutella inside. Raspberry jam and Nutella are also a [...]

These last two years stateside, I’ve been praying for my husband every time I spied a red bird. The whole red bird thing started in France, where, surprise-surprise, they have red birds too. Something about the startling beauty of a red bird flying through the sky or contrasted in front of a thicket or forest [...]

When you have to move in a short period of time, you automatically become a target for scam artists. We are wise in this area (unfortunately), but still are shocked when scams come our way. First, moving. Patrick found what he thought to be a reputatable moving company. When they asked for a credit card [...]

Every day we walk to school and this is what we see. The little church with its own square. The place (pronounced plahhhce) that we walk through every day. The street we pass by. But more than that, more than the beauty of Southern France in Fall, we will miss our friends. Here is Anne [...]