United

2007-07-16T14:00:00.000-07:00

Soooo, there I was wondering what everyone was up to. Then I thought, hey I'll check the blog to read everyone's updates. But I couldn't find them. Anyway, here are a couple of questions to get you started.

Al & Brenda: When are you guys heading out on the mission trip? Brenda, how are your holidays going? Al, have you sold your car yet?

Markus & Teresa: Are you guys on holidays now, too? What are your plans? How did school end?

Scott & Patsy: How was your time with your friends from B.C.? Scott how is work going? How are the kids liking being at grandma & Grandpa's?

Mom & Dad: Actually dad gave me a pretty good rundown of what your up to last week. Mom how did your weddings go? How was Sunday with everyone over? By the way we got our licenses today in the mail, thanks.

So, yeah, I look forward to hearing from you all, soon.

By the way, I have my flight booked for August 20 to go back to Canada to raise support and money for Quest. Carol's is booked as well. Mine is already paid for but Carol's is sitting on our credit card. Any donations??

We look forward to sharing with friends and stranger alike about Quest and what God is doing here. And of course spending some time with family, too.

So here are some recent pics of us.

We got a soccer ball for the girls to play with. It is really soft and gets alot of use by everyone in the house. Jasper is actually pretty good with her feet.

She also likes to just hang out in her own little world many times. She is very creative and uses her imagination a lot. Jessi and her are really starting to play together and get introuble together. An example is, today they covered themselves is oil in their room.

These next few picture were taken at the beach. The fire dept. had their stuff set up so the girls had a few pics taken. This is just one.

They had a play ground there that the girls loved.

Jaden and Shannon were enjoying a moment the other day after he got his hair cut.

Here Jaden is doing his impression of Mr. Bean in his new movie, "Bean goes to Hollywood". "I'm sure they would have told us if he was a serial killer or something."

Have a great day, miss you all!

2007-07-10T09:50:00.000-07:00

We are back online!!!
Yup, we now have internet once again. We are sooo behind in many of our communications, but Shannon updated our Blog today and will again in a few days.
So this is just to let you all know we can be connected with again.
Our phone number again is (47)3374-5076.
We look forward to hearing from all of you more.

2007-06-24T19:42:00.000-07:00

Hey family,

We're in Indianopolis tonight and we're on our way to Manitoba. Scott's grad on Wednesday was wonderful and it already feels like it was a lifetime away!

Our visit with the Watkins was great...we all had a refreshing time. Now we're on our next leg. Thought I'd let you know where we're at.

See you soon...

Patsy

2007-06-14T07:02:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone!!

No we don't have internet yet, but I'm over at the lan house with our computer today 'cause I needed to send some information to Patsy. So anyway, we have a phone now, after only 3 weeks instead of the 4 in Gramado. (Things are picking up) Our number is (47)3374-5076.

We are all settleing in quite well. Jaden has started school and Shannon has started getting more of schedule becasue of that. The girls are playing together more, which is great. They can play outside if someone is watch them. Jasper plays out side by herself sometimes, too. I have started working on Quest stuff again after 3 weeks of being away from the computer and internet. I have joined the evagelical pastors of Jaragua at their monthly meetings (1st Friday every month). This has really helped is kicking off some important relationships for Quest. I will be speaking at one church this Sunday (7:30 pm) about Quest. I will use a power point I made up from translated information Carol did for us. This will help alot because the people can read the information while I speak a little.

Our neighbor, Alzira, has been making a lot of contacts for us since we shared the grander scope of the vision for Quest. She said she didn't realize how big this all really was and got on the blower. I am to have a meeting with the mayor of Schroeder some time soon and we went with a real estate agent to look at a property yesturday. It won't work for us, but he seemed to be a realy good guy and showed us around Schroeder a bit.

Alzira, her son Kleiton, possible Pastor Daniel and us will be going to see another property Sunday. This one sounds pretty good, but we'll see. Many of the ones we've looked at sounded good (that's why we went to see them), but turned out not so great. Keiton found this one for us.

Peter R and Paul L ( from JT Swiss) will be coming to our place next Thurdsy. We will finally get to meet and share God's vision for Quest (Christian camping in Brazil) with them. It will only be a one day meeting so it isn't going to be too long of a visit.

We look forward to hearing from you all. Teresa, I'm glad you can get on now. Thanks for the call last night dad. We really missed being able to communitcate and especially talk for 3 weeks.

This was the veiw out our back window the other night. The front is basically the same. It's hard, you must understand, but we live through it.

Have a great day and get in touch with us.

Love and miss you all,

Dwayne

2007-06-11T15:14:00.000-07:00

Hi Family,

Speedos, eh? Where do they come UP with these rules? :)

Well, today we hit 30 degrees! The flowers are starting to bloom and it sure feels like summer. I survived another round of report card writing - let's see now, that's 11 years of it! Yehah! Al is off golfing right now, with Todd, a friend from church. This past weekend we went to Niverville for the Fair. We met dad and Marianne and then headed out for supper together "on the street." Mom joined us after serving cheesecake at the Heritage vendor. I saw high school friends - Laura, Sheila, and Bonnie! It was nice talking to them! Laura was nervous because it was her first time letting her 11 year old go off on his own.

On Saturday we celebrated Al's 44th birthday! Markus, you realize you HAVE lost your "oldest in the family" status. We had Al's family over for a BBQ - Mom Wiebe, Tante Teen, Tante Sus, Tante Annie, and Rob and Brad and the nieces Brittany and Alyssa. It was a great spitziering evening. Alyssa has caused a lot of grief lately, drug use, assaulting a cop, getting a criminal record for that, being "locked up" for that for a few days, and believe it or not, that seems to have helped. She told me she really wants to get out of her bad friends now, because she sees the road they're going down - destruction of their lives. So, I was thrilled to hear that. She really wants to move back to Winkler, so this is being negotiated. It has been hard for Mom W. and Brad. We went to Brittany's dance recital Sunday night at the Concert Hall. She does hip hop. She's really grown into a young lady! We are always praying she makes it alright, in spite of her messed up mom and all she sees there. Right now, Pam is dating a man that is married.

Yesterday we had a bake sale at church to raise money for our Uganda mission trip. There are ten of us going. Later we had a planning meeting the third of about 10. We practiced three skits that we will do this summer. I think we have a nice team of people. We're just beginning to know each other. Because we only have three men going, the nature of the trip is changing from being only construction, to being one week construction and one week children's ministry with orphans. We will get to go the Bethany children's village which is the orphange that Al's "car" money is going to, and any other money raised through our letter.

Marriage ministry class is over now. We hope we made a difference in these 4 couples lives. The one couple was especially close to getting divorced and we may have helped salvage that marriage. Pray for this one couple. I also have one more week of the Daniel - Beth Moore study that mom has also been a part of. It has been incredibly challenging mentally! But it has been great. I hope to have my small group over for a potluck this summer one day.

Graduation is on June 28 at LCS. This is my first batch of kids graduating at Linden so Al and I will attend. It is a milestone for me as a teacher. Kind of sentimental I must say!

We are getting a dog! A "Comfort Retriever." It's a cross between a golden retriever and a cocker spaniel. Looks like a golden retriever, just smaller. He's not born yet, but we will get him in August after we get back from Uganda. He'll be about 8-10 weeks old. We found this dog on the internet, from South Dakota.

Yeah, so those are some of the events happening around here. We are looking forward to going fishing July 13-16 with Al's brother Rob,...who used to be a fishing guide. I'm looking forward to just being out in nature.

Hey Niklaas! My class has been making movies about extreme weather. I thought of you because I know you would like this. I have a suggestion...why don't you film your summer holidays and send us a movie of it? Interview Emily and Matthew and you mom and dad...just a thought. :)

Love you all!

Brenda
Hope you are all well.

2007-05-25T00:28:00.000-07:00

Hi all, we'll see if this works. Brenda thanks for getting this username and password to me.

We are all doing fine. It's the end of the school year so you can imagine things are pretty BUSY around here.

Niklaas is losing another four key kids from his class so he's pretty sad about this.

Emily loses one, and I'm not sure about Matthew - I know atleast one.

Jaden our kids know how you must be feeling saying goodbye to friends. It's not easy! We are praying that you will find new friends. Be wise in your choice of friends - dont rush into things. One thing we notice is it's best to sit back and observe for a while first, then start making friends.

I'm glad all you stuff is there - now's the fun part of putting the house together again.

We are changing our house around too. We put the diningroom table into the livingroom, we are moving our bedroom up to the diningroom, and we'll make our bedroom into a guest room. I wish we had thought of this before last summer. We figure if mom and dada want to come for a while they have a place to stay.

Don't worry we understand that they are more needed in Brazil once the camp gets going and we bless them for that.

I brought my special Tim Hortons coffee to work today because we are celebrating Herr Fields birthday and he's my Australian coffee buddy at work.

Our boys are both loving tennis.

Niklaas is thriving in his writers club and it's becoming a social outlet for him as well. He gotr the English and Choir awards for grade 8. They have a closing time planned for tonight with supper and a movie together after writers club is over.

The rest of us are off to a toga party - the high school spring party is up in the vineyards of Tannenkirch.

Saturday Niklaas' class is having a cookout near Frieberg from 2 - 8.

Sunday is the middle school/high school spring concert.

The pool is open with the new rule of speedos only for guys. Matthew has braved it and feels fine, Niklaas refuses at this point. Markus bought himslef a pair but I'm sure they will not get used very often.

I know this is long, but I haven't written for so long.

Mom, Emily loved talking with you the other day - thanks for taking time for that.

Love you all,
Teresa

2007-05-20T11:46:00.000-07:00

Dear Al and Brenda,

You are definitely in our prayers. That does sound like quite the roller coaster week. I can imagine your emotions have been varied to say the least. Keep us posted. We love you tonnes.

Patsy

2007-05-19T16:21:00.000-07:00

Hey, just an update for everyone. We had a rep from the moving company come today and check out all our stuff, and there is a lot. He gave us the price it will cost us and 1% of what we want to claim for insurance.

The guys can come on Wednesday to pack all our stuff and put it on the truck. Then Thursday they will drive and Friday they'll unload in Schroeder. So we, Shannon, Jaden, Jasper & I, will spend Wednesday night down at Janz Team and leave early Thursday morning to get to Jaragua to pick up the keys. We will then head to Schroeder and do a cleaning of the apartment. I will also need to pick up a couple of items we will need for the kitchen. We will spend the night at a hotel in Jaragua and meet the truck at the apartment in the morning.

Lidi and Jessi will leave Gramado Thursday night on the bus. They will arrive in Guaramirim some time Friday mid morning. Guaramirim's bus station is closer than Jaragua's.

So things are falling into place. I feel much relieved after our consultation this morning. They guy was very nice and helpful and didn't look at us like we were crazy to want to move so much stuff.

We just have a few things left to do here in Gramado before we leave. With two days to do them we should have no problem. Lidi is going to Caxias Monday to change our address with the Federal Police and to extend my protocol so I can go to Canada and return no problem. She called and she is able to do this for us, we don't have to go.

So, will the Sens win the cup???? They do have a good break now to rest and heal up before the series begins.

Mom, is someone recording the games for us? Even if noone can record DVD's we would love to at least have the Stanley Cup series on tape.

Brenda, thanks for the call. It was great to be able to have an actual conversation rather than just writing back and forth. Al did catch the big one? A cold that is, being out on the water with wind and cold weather.

How are you Schalms? Love to hear what your up to.

Buhlers? Well, we keep pretty updated right now. Did you see the www.parcimovies.com.br website? check it out, they have some good options.

Alright, GO! SENS! GO!

Dwayne

2007-05-18T13:20:00.000-07:00

Hi Family,

How exciting Dwayne and Shannon! Looks like a beautiful place! All the best as you transition. Sounds like a nice church out there too. That's great. We'll pray for new friends for Jado.

Patsy and Scott, I'm sure you are detaching and getting ready to move, at least in your minds. What a big change again. Al is looking forward to golfing with Scott. We are excited to have you around this summer!

Markus and Teresa, Haven't heard from you for awhile. How's the school year winding down? Or is it winding UP, like mine!!! Such a busy time for staff. Hope you are all well. It was sure nice having you all here last month! Any special plans for summer?

We have been on a rollercoaster this last week. We confirmed we were pregnant last weekend. Then we had to start processing mentally what that would mean for us. We were just getting used to the idea as it seemed surreal, and then I started bleeding. I spent 4 hours at St. Boniface Emergency Wed. night. Al came with me. I went through my severe cramps, which I had not had in almost three years. They called me back for more blood work Thursday (yesterday). They are trying to determine if I am still pregnant or had a miscarriage, for as my doctor put it, "your pregnancy may be in jeopardy." My gut tells me I miscarried. We are waiting for a call from St. Boniface for the results of my blood test. This is something you could pray about for us. It's a tender time.

Last night we went to Oakridge greenhouse and picked up a few more perennials this time for our front yard, in front of the house. We are excited to plant these this week. Marianne helped us out. Then we went for coffee with her, Jamie, and his girldfriend Bethany. Nice evening! Al is going fishing this weekend with the guys from church - 16 of them! Starting at Caddy Lake and then going on to Sailing Lake.

Love you all!

Brenda

2007-05-15T06:48:00.000-07:00

Okay so here are the photos of the new apartment!! Front of the apartment, balcony, and empty store space. The living room and 3 bedrooms face the fron street.
Living room with a window into our room??????? I think we'll need some curtains! haha
Big bathroom with room for cupboards to store our stuff and Lidi's!
Laundry area and small room with a toilet just off the living room.
Living room with churrasco pit which is very important!

The Kitchen with Daniel's back!! Lots of space!

Dining room below which we may use a T.V. slash playroom!

Front doors off the living room!

Stairs to carry our food, kids etc!! Yeah, we lost the hill up to Janz Team and got stairs to our place. I think the stairs will be a lot easier!Below is Daniel and Grace Port. They are the pastor couple at the Lutheran church who have been a huge help and are super excited about us being there. They know Scott and Patsy from Janz Team here.

This is Itimar and his wife. They are a christian couple who goes to the same church and have and imobiliaria. Dwayne go to spend mother's day with them and their family.

So that's the place and some connections we've made already. It's going to be a lot of fun! Well it's cold today but we do have some sunshine so i will get some laundry done and i'm making soup to keep us warm and skinny!! haha

2007-05-14T07:19:00.000-07:00

Hey guys,

So we got the apartment!!!!!!!!!!!! I just received an email saying that we are approved and Dwayne is signing the contract! Yepeeeeeee!

We are pretty excited, i know Scott and Patsy you are too. We have waited patiently and God has provided. So now the move begins and off we go. Thanks for all your prayers!!! Once we get our for sure date we'll let you all know.

Pray for Jaden, as he is leaving a very good friend. It's not easy as you all know but we have been praying for new friends for him there. Also pray that even though he knows some of the language that he will really open himself up to want to learn more, and that God will make it a bit easier to learn. 13 isn't the easiest age but he has come a long ways since we came here, ovecoming many things in his life. We see so much potential, and we know God will use him mightily.

Brenda thank your class and give them super big hugs from us. They are mighty prayer warriors and we have been so blessed by their emails.
So Al, we think Nestle should send you down sometime to check things out here in Brazil!!!
Let us know, now that you've met the big boss! haha

Teresa and Markus, we hope you have a great summer. I'm sure you are super busy with school end approaching. Say a big hello to the kids for us and you can tell them the next visit to Brazil will be in a new place!! Yeah, and close to the beach!

Mom and Dad, well what can we say, Thanks for everything!!!!!!!!!!! Thanks for all the calls, support, love, and prayers. We are blessed!

Alright, enough chatter, i need to do some organzing today. We have lots to do this week and Dwayne will get home early tomorrow. Yeah!

Love you all,
Shannon

2007-05-11T13:18:00.000-07:00

Hey guys,

So as we speak Dwayne is in Santa Catarina looking for a place for us. There is one we like with 4 bedrooms for R$450 so it is a good price for that many rooms. It is in a smaller city called Schroeder so that helps with the pricing. There isn't much else with 3 or 4 bedrooms that we could afford so are praying this one works out. We have signers for the guarantee that we will pay them but they need some specific documents that we have to come up with so we don't know if it will happen on Saturday or until Monday or Tuesday depending on the process down here. So it is just a matter of waiting and then once we sign a contract we can move whenever we want to. So we hope to be gone within the next two weeks. We'll keep you posted on what's up. Just pray for a smooth process now and that all will work out.

Love you all,
Shannon

2007-04-30T13:51:00.001-07:00

Hey Family,

It was great to hear your voice today Tres, it's been a while. We're glad to hear that you had a good trip, but it is always so nice to get home and into routine.

Routine??? What's that? Someday, I dream of having a normal life!

Dwayne and Shannon, we've prayed a lot for you today, keep us posted. We're glad to hear you're feeling better Dwayne, make sure you rest.

Brenda and Al, it thrills my heart to see God guiding you both so specifically. We're praying for you.

Mom and Dad, how was the sibling supper?

We're doing ok without Scott. I told him the other day that if there was anything positive at all about him being away, it's the fact that our schedule is much more relaxed. We're not having to constantly be flexible for his schedule, which is how this past year has worked. Yes, it was good to see him go through this past week of kayaking and hearing the excitement in his voice over his personal victories. He was sooooo stressed about this trip, but it has turned out to be one of his personal best, so I'm glad for that. My prayer was that God would help him overcome his fears and teach him through whatever outcome was in store for him. It sounds like that happened.

The kids and I are thoroughly enjoying the Stanley Cup play-offs. It gives us something to do in the evenings. The boys and I love it and Hannah sits around playing with dolls or coloring. It makes for peaceful evenings. We've been plugging away at school and will be finishing up beginning to middle of June. Perfect timing for summer.

I've been studying the book of Hebrews in my quiet times and been really challanged in the area of faith. If any of you have comments on the topic, I'd love to hear them. One question I have is if everyone is granted a certain amount of faith by God or do we all have the potential to live completely by faith??? If so, why do we see so little of it? Why do people who live by faith look like the fools? Anyway, just some thoughts to chew on. Scott and I are leading a book study this last semester on Charles Sheldon's book "In His Steps". It's all about stepping out in faith. What's God trying to show me???

Anyway, Scott should be home on Friday night and after that he has a very busy schedule until mid-June when they have their last 3 night trip here in Ontario. June 21st the course ends and we will pack up and head to Manitoba to be there by the 1st of July.

Love you all tonnes,

Patsy

2007-04-24T05:56:00.000-07:00

Okay before you look at all the pics, make sure you have gone to the bathroom before hand because for me everytime i look at these i can't help but laugh. This was actually her trying to be very serious about her latest facial, dental accident, but man is it funny! She was just playing around with Jaden and when she jumped she come down on his knee and ate it, literally!! I'm not sure how many more accidents these teeth can take but so far they have stayed in. This time though, as you can see, the one is bent back a little so now she has one chipped tooth, one bent tooth and two bruised teeth. She is entertainment at its best sometimes, and that is one of the reasons we love her so much!!

2007-04-21T11:47:00.000-07:00

Hi Family,

Well, as you all know by now, Al won the car at Nestle! We are humbled and excited because this car represents something bigger that God is doing, which is still unfolding. I just wanted to share briefly what God has been speaking to Al in particular. This is some of what Al has told me.

In July Al felt that God wanted him to "go for it!" in terms of this contest, knowing that in order for him to qualify in the Western Canada division, it would take a miracle, since there are 2 guys in the West who normally win. He worked really hard!..Wondering if this was a God thing.

Then, of course, in February, at the annual meetings, he was named the finalist for Western Canada! Wow! He was one of 8! It was shortly after that God confirmed he was going to win the car and he was also given a word about "multiplication."

We went to Cancun and it was on our way home, driving from Minneapolis to Winnipeg, that Al was praying and God asked Al if he would be willing to contribute the full amount of this car to Uganda, if he won. The pledge to Quest was still to be made, but out of our pocket. The word "multiplication" became clear - he was to multiply this money from the car, through Church of the Rock and Nestle, who would show him favor.

The following week he got the invitation for the 8 finalists to fly to Toronto for dinner and prizes on April 12. Having said that, Al went to Toronto, won the car, had a chance to speak to the President of Nestle and share his vision, and now has also talked to Pastor Keith.

We are planning to go on a two week mission trip to Uganda with our church this summer, the first two weeks of August. The purpose of the trip is to build a school/training centre. We are thinking the money could go for supplies, books/curriculum, and possibly an orphanage in the area. Who knows...

We are praying now that the Nestle President would show favour here. We are watching to see what God will do through this!

The whole concept of donating this prize to charity has caused a buzz in the Nestle company. Al has received e-mails from across Canada, congratulating him, but more so respecting him for the choice he/we have made to donate this to charity. This story is an aroma of Jesus throughout the corporate world this week! It is SO COUNTER-CULTURE! Our world is self-indulgent! Pray that these employees might get on board too, to donate to this project.

Church of the Rock is willing to set up a donation website link, so that Nestle employees can contribute. We pray that Nestle match's the donations of the car plus other employee donations. That is the plan...and we'll see what happens.

So, it appears again, we are living by faith, not by sight. We are merely vessels. I know you all know the feeling! Stay encouraged. God always has our best in mind.

Love, Brenda

2007-04-21T11:35:00.000-07:00

Hi Family,

I'll see if this works. Then I'll write again. Who can you explain why this Blog is not working like it used to? Did someone do something to change our status? I had to use Dwayne's email and password to get in, but there must be something I don't know. Please inform me.

Thanks!

Brenda

2007-03-21T04:26:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone,

I finally got around to putting some pictures up here for you to see. This is a mixture of us and others but all from the wedding. I don't remember if you got some of these already, but here they are anyway. Enjoy!

Here is Carol and Jasper before the whole thing started during the almost 1 hour wait.

This is the Curitiba group (Flora is missing). It was really fun to see Renan, Carol and Tiago.

As always, Mogui and Marquinos look great. They seemed very happy always having a smile and encouraging words for whoever.

Though Jessi wasn't in the wedding, she did grab the attention of everyone who saw her. She got to sit with 'grandma' during the wedding.

Here Jasper is heading down the aisle for the first time. She did it a second time with the pillow holding the rings, but we didn't get a good picture of her. She was a beautiful princess!

Carol and Renan spent a while talking about Quest and where Renan is at making his choice of coming on board or not. He is at the point that needs to be decided and to live out the consiquence of that decission.

This is the only picture anyone has of the bride and her flower girl. It was late and nothing was going to keep Jasper awake, not even the band. She fell asleep at the table while eating, literally!
These two could almost share clothes. Jessi's growing fast and Jordana stopped a long time ago.

Scott & Patsy, just to make you feel more part of what was all going on and because we knew you really wanted to be here, we took this picture of you with us. Patsy you are sitting with Shannon and Carol and Scott you are standing between Flora and Tiago.

...and here are your plates. Don't worry we ate them for you and they were good.

Oh yeah, this is why we were all partying.

Pipa is finally showing a little passion for something!

This is to show you Jordana's dress. She got it made special.

It was very beautiful!

Jaden is growing soooo much. He is now wearing a size 10 shoe and is only 1 inch shorter than Shannon. He has grown 5.5 inches since coming here. He is also starting to show a growth is maturity. It's funny,c ause he'll do something and Shannon and I will look at each other as to say, "Where did that come from."

Believe it or not, Lidi caught the boquet. Yikes!

Pipa & Jordana Pieper

Don't they look beautiful?

They all sang Happy Birhday for the 3 of us. It was speacial.

Doesn't Shannon look great!

So that's it for now. I hope you all enjoyed the brief summary of the wedding. It was very nice and informal as we have come to expect form Pipa. There was no big program during the meal, only a band made up of students that go to school with Jordana. The time was spent raoming around and talking with people.

Al & Brenda, mom told us about the results of your surgery or exam. Sounds good!

Markus & Teresa, You will be almost ready to leave by now. Have a safe trip and a great time in Canada.

Scott & Patsy, I listened to the game last night. It was a good one for you to go to.

Dad & mom thanks for the call and the update on life back home.

Have a great day and we look forward to hearing from you all.

Love you all,

Dwayne & Shannon

2007-03-15T14:21:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone,

I'm writing this so I guess your invitation to co-author worked, Patsy. We are home from Pelotas and just got our internet fixed here at home half an hour ago. Well, we'll write more later, I just want to see how this worked. Have a great evening.

Dwayne

p.s. mom and dad we are only 2 hours different now and Scott & Patsy, 1 hour.

2007-03-06T12:57:00.000-08:00

Hey family,
I think I've figured out now how you can all access the blog. I invited you all to be authors. We haven't figured out yet how to get our Quest blog and Frances blog off of our google account, but if it could work like this for now, that would be great. Sorry about the inconvenience. we love you all.

Patsy

2007-03-01T13:04:00.000-08:00

So we started to pack a few things for the big move!

And so to save space in the car, Jasper fits perfectly into this box!!

We'll make some air holes, and put some food and water inside!!! That will make it more humane!!!!

You know your small when????????????

2007-03-01T07:32:00.001-08:00

Hey family,

It's been a while since i wrote so here's a brief update!
While we wait on the finances for Quest we are going to head down to Pelotas for about 9 days. Lidi has a graduation to go to this Saturday and we will spend the week with her family and then the following Saturday is Pipa's wedding. Jasper is the flower girl and is very excited about twirling around in her poofy dress and new sandals. She is a drama girl!! We will take our school stuff with us this time because we have alot to catch up on and if Jaden and Dwayne go to Canada in August we will need to make up for that time. Jasper is keen on doing some school work so that is nice instead of the why do we have to do school, or why do i have to learn about that?????? hmmm, i seem to remember using a few of those phrases myself.

Anyway we are excited watching and hearing the feed back about Quest and because it is so out of our control as to the finances we are pretty calm and at peace. So far things have stayed pretty low key here as we wait, and haven't had many problems as of late with JTB. They are just waiting for us to leave and that's okay. We don't have much contact with them, besides paying the monthly bills and a few hellos here and there. We are just looking ahead to how this will all workout to God's glory and i think that is the best place to be.

How are you all doing in Germany?
How's school going for the kids?
How's work and groups?
We sure miss you guys and hope you really have a good time in Canada with family for Easter break.

Lotsa love,
Shannon

2007-02-18T11:21:00.000-08:00

Hey family...it's been awhile since anyone wrote, so I thought I would just say Hello. Please pray for Scott and I as we are both feeling overwhelmed with life in general. We are trying to rest in God in all areas of our lives. Here is a picture of the land that we are praying about.

Scott was supposed to go on a snow camping trip tomorrow, but because everyone is literally sick and tired, they have given the LDP Monday OFF and they will leave Tuesday morning. That was the best news we've had in a while.

Yesterday, the boys and I tried ice climbing and I had the most unusual experience, because 2 chunks of ice fell and hit my nose, which is now cut and bruised! Not sure if I'll try it again. Pretty scary stuff, but challenging.

I'll try to download some ice climbing pictures from Becky's computer soon so I can send them. Next week they head off to New York to ice climb in the Adirondacks for 6 days. THEN, they'll have some great pictures. One of the climbs they are going to do still has the waterfall running behind the ice...cool, eh?!?

I would love to sit around Mom and Dad's kitchen table and chat with all of you throwing out and ideas and receiving insight. Thank God I have a family like you.

Patsy

2007-02-09T08:49:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

We are sooooooo thrilled to let you know that we received a call from the Dalmeny Bible Church this morning telling us that we have become one of their missionary families. They will be suppporting us with $575/month. I almost fell over, but realized that this affirmation came on the day that Dwayne and team are out in Santa Catarina negotiating land, etc. God is MARVELOUS!!! He has great things in store for all of us. I feel his hand of blessing on the Klassen clan...by the way, CONGRATS Al, all your job benefits!

Let us praise His name forever! He owns the cattle on a thousand hills, the wealth in every mine. Let us proclaim from the moutaintops the works of the Lord!

We'll be in touch as soon as Dwayne contacts us. Love you all.

Patsy

2007-02-07T19:37:00.000-08:00

Dogs have owners.
Cats have staff.

This tickled my funny bone today when I saw it on a billboard.

Thanks for all the news! Teresa, my Spring break is the week before you come. But, we will be around the week you're here. Jae-Won is really working out well. He is funny! He loves school and his class enjoys him too. He wanted to stay 8 weeks longer but we said no. We did say he could come again next year if it works out. I took him to boys club tonight with Michael Seidu. They love it. Al is in Calgary for work meetings. He left this morning. Back Friday 7:30 p.m. I will miss him. Well, time to go to bed. We are keeping our ear to the ground about the Brazil story, to see what God is doing there. We were blessed to hear Steve Saint at Missionfest (son of Nate Saint) with mom and dad. I thoroughly enjoyed it. So did Jae-Won. He has been really touched by this story. He saw the movie, "End of the Spear." He bought the book, and the documentary and got Steve's autograph AND we had our picture taken with Steve Saint! He was really touched to meet Steve. I feel it was a God encounter. Well, time for bed.

Love, Brenda

2007-02-05T04:23:00.000-08:00

WE'RE BOOKED!!!

We actually leave Toronto at like 8:10 am on Monday and arrive in Winnipeg at 9:45 am.

This is such a relief off my shoulders.

I've been doing alot of grade 5 grading this year. I'm sure learning grammar - but not really putting it into practise.

Teresa

2007-02-02T01:40:00.000-08:00

Thanks Dwayne for the update, God is in this busy time too.

Our flights are booked!! They look a little different then they originally did.

Thursday, March 29 leave Germany @ 8:00 from Zurich
Thursday, March 29 arrive in Toronto @ noon

Monday, April 2 leave Toronto @ noon
Monday, April 2 arrive in Winnipeg mid afternoon

Tuesday, April 10 drive to Calgary (leave early)
Tuesday, April 10 arrive in Calgary

Friday, April 20 leave Calgary @ noon via Toronto, arriving home on Saturday morning.

I think we will stay at the guest room while in Calgary. The main reason for this is so that when the kids are completely bored at Oma and Opas, they can go to our suite and play games there. Otherwise they have to sit very quiet all evening in Schalms livingroom. We will get out every day so they can run and be louder for a while. We will also be eating only one meal a day with the Schalms - either breakfast or lunch. Just pray for this time together that Mrs Schalm will feel cared for and loved but not over worked and stressed.

Mom, dad, Al and Brenda I hope the little change in our itinerary doesn't through you for a loop. We booked late and everything on Sunday was already booked. We'll stay the extra day because they accidently booked us on the 20th instead of the 19th. (Maybe it wasn't an accident!)

Oh, we can hardly wait!!!

Teresa

2007-02-01T08:50:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone,

Yeah, Patsy said it well when she said we are trying to hold on to the coattails of God. WOW, we (including Lidi)were in Pelotas for a week and came back to a whole new reality. Through talking with Patsy, Lidi's parents, friends, and finally Jack, we have come to the descision that the best thing for us at this point is leaving Janz Team Brazil's territory and relocating to the area Quest will be located. This means we could be out of here by March, which is only a month away. There have been a number of factors considered in making this descision and we all feel it is the best for everyone involved.

Lidi's parents were very supportive of this decision not only with us in public but with Lidi in private as well. God is sure working in their hearts and they are really opening up to what he is doing. They have said they will be at Quest every summer to cook for camp.

Anyways, we are going to do some final face to face negotiation on this property and actually see another one on Feb 8. We will be back home the night of the 10. We then need to have a final proposal or offer in to them by the end of the month. We also need to find a place to live by the end of the month. It would be best if we could move right to the property but it all is happening sooooooo fast. I checked out rentals in the area and they are pretty expensive (R$1500-R$7500/month). We definitly don't have that kind of money for a house.

We also need to transfer our registration for our car this week and register it. We are not exactly sure where the money for this is going to come from either. Thank you mom and dad for helping to cover our trip to SC next week. It is something we need to do but weren't sure how it would come to pass.

Pipa, Samuka (a lawyer friend), and Renan (a businessman friend) will be coming to see the property with us (Shannon, Lidi and I). We will see what the best the real estate cane do for us is, using the other property as some leveage, and go from there.

Please pray for us. This is all VERY real to us. We are living it everyday and some of these changes are HUGE for us and somewhat sooner than we expected. We know God provides for his people, but at this monment we are not sure where we will be moving or where the money will come from for the move and the rent. Please pray that the property God has chosen will be claimed for him and that the details will fall into place. Lidi's dad use to be a truck driver and said when we move he will call up some buddies to help out.

We had the chance to talk to quite afew people while in Pelotas and a number of them offered their services in what every the can do for us. It is so neat to see how the Brazilians are taking ownership of seeing God's vision come to life. I was telling Jack that it is hard for us to describe to him or other the passion and drive the people here have for Quest. At times we don't have enough things to get done for everybody to be involved.

Well I think that's enough for now. I have so much going through my mind from this past week that I'm not sure what's been said or hasn't been said or what to say or not to say. But to say that our world was given a very big spin this past week would be an understatement. But we are ready to go and face the future and what God has for us in SC.

Dwayne

2007-01-31T02:14:00.000-08:00

Hi all, Scott and Pats it all sounds very exciting regarding QUEST. Please do keep us posted even if it requires extra effort. We care very much.

We plan to be in Ontario until Sunday morning. I don't know the exact time here at work.

Brenda when is your spring break? We hope to see alot of you guys too.

Mom and dad I know this is out of your comfort zone, but please reconsider being cooks at BFA for a year. They are getting desperate and considering paying a German company to cator for one year. Maybe BFA would consider rather paying your room and board so you wouldn't have to raise any support. JUSY PRAY!! Our kids would love it!!!!!!!!

Our phone is finally working again.

I was home sick yesterday. Today Markus had a accident on his scooter and landed on his nose. PTL it's not broken, just very bruised. I'm sure his face will go through some colouring in the next days. On Friday I spent about 5 hours in the hospital with a grade 5 girl who had a sledding accident. Shes okay - just an internal bruise.

With my small group girls I'm reading a Francine Rivers book on Bathsheba - they seem to be enjoying this. I only had 6 last week so it was a nice breather. One girl was actually pulled out at Christmas - I'm very glad her parents made that decision, she was enjoying her "freedom" from parents too much for a grade 9 girl.

We are definately not looking into the job at Prairie for now. Our kids are very happy here and Markus just said he doesn't feel it's the right time. I'm glad God speaks to our godly husbands and they are obedient to Him. Emily cried for about 3 days straight because she misses Gramma and Grampa very much. I finally got it through to her that Three Hills is still far away from Niverville. She will bask in her time with her grandparents.

Mom could you help me with our birthday present for Matthew. Please hand write out some favorite recipes of our family. Cinnamon buns, vereniki, rhueier, how to prepare farmer sausage, buns, easter buns, icing, etc... We are giving him an apron, a family cookbook and another tool kit.

Dad, Matthew wants to bring his tool kit to Canada to show you and maybe work with you in the shop in your garage.

Are you ready to read Niklaas' book? It's very Fantasyish, but he's proud of it. I'm not sure if he's planning to bring it along.

The boys are both in the middle drama PATCHWORK. They are getting busy with practices.
Matthew is playing basketball in intramurals - Niklaas chose not to sign up for basketball.

Guess I'm just rambling now so I better sign off,

Love to you all,
Teresa

2007-01-30T13:19:00.000-08:00

Here's some fun pictures of our winter so far. Our ice rink from our road, the kids and Scott playing hockey and our family attempting skiing this past weekend. We had a lot of fun this past weekend. Scott took the whole weekend off and we snowshoed, skiied, tubed, and played hockey. It was wonderful. Well, I talked to Dwayne last night and we tried to fill each other in on everything that has been happening. God is definitely moving ahead with Quest. We literally feel like we are merely hanging onto His coattails. It is all very exciting and scary altogether. The piece of land that we would really like to buy (the one most of you have seen on pictures) is going up in price in March. The agent has told us that he will still give it to us for the $250,000 (Cdn) up until the end of February. So, we are about to take a huge step of faith. Pipa is talking to a pastor in the area to see if we could raise funds for the land in Brasil. Please pray for God's provisions. Jack is fully supporting our decisions and is happy to see it moving ahead. A huge part of us would love to be in Brazil right now, but we're NOT, so we are needing to balance Medeba, family and Quest right now. God obviously has us here in Canada for a reason right now, and we are grateful for that.

Anyway, there are so many details we are hammering out, but right now we are working on putting together a package for our supporters. We are planning on including a letter from Jack, a letter from us and a copy of our business plan. If God is going to bring this to happen, we will need a strong support team behind us. Interestingly enough, we have had several new supporters come on board in recent months. God is amazing!

Anyway, we'll try to keep you all posted. It feels hard enough to keep Dwayne and Shannon posted, but we will try to do our best. We have people looking into setting up non-profit organizations in Brazil, but we have the possibility of joining together with Daniel's camp in Curitiba. There is another trip planned in Feb for Dwayne and Shannon and Pipa to check out land negotiations, etc. Yes, lots to think about and even more to pray about. Thanks for listening to us and supporting us. it really is a very exciting time in our lives.

Tres, we've been trying to call you all weekend regarding airline tickets. Have you purchased yours? If so, when do you leave for Manitoba, because we will try to buy one for Caleb around the same time.

Love you all...

2007-01-29T02:14:00.000-08:00

Hi all,

Our phone and internet were down this weekend, hopefully it will get sorted out soon.

Today Kenny Reed is having surjury because he still had cancer in his body. He just turned 20 on Friday. Please pray them today.

Love to you all,
Teresa

2007-01-25T07:30:00.000-08:00

Hi all,

Well we are almost ready to book our flights. We will leave Germany on March 29th arriving in Toronto around 4:00 March 29th. We will leave Toronto Sunday, April 1st. Rent a car and drive to Calgary Monday, April 8th. We will fly out of Calgary on April 19th. Matthew gets to turn 12 in the air!!

We are looking forward to seeing all of you (except the Klassens in Brazil - boohoo). Caleb we are very glad you are coming to Winnipeg either with us or meeting us there. You are a brave kid.

Pats - what kind of prices are you finding on WestJet? We will ask our travel agent at Menno Travel (Rikki) what the price for a child is TO to WPG.

Really looking forward to seeing you!!
Teresa

Please pray that we will know what to do about housing while in Calgary. Christina said Mrs Schalm is not strong enought to have us eat three meals a day with them. She suggested only one meal and maybe not supper. Should we stay in the guest room so the kids can go their when they are bored at Oma and Opas or should we try to find another home? I think stay there if there is a fridge in the room it would be great.

2007-01-24T14:37:00.000-08:00

Brenda, our new email is spbuhler@yahoo.ca

Love you all. I really do want to update this blog, but I don't seem to find the time.

2007-01-22T19:54:00.000-08:00

Patsy and Scott,
I hear you have a new e-mail. What is it? Brenda

2007-01-17T16:48:00.000-08:00

Dwayne,

Good to hear from you! Yes, I read the dreams Zech has written to you. He came to me one day and said, "May I talk to you at recess Mrs. Wiebe?" I said yes. Then he said, "It's about three dreams I had this weekend." Cool. So at recess I listened to his dreams. The one was for you, the other was for Jae-Won and the third we weren't sure what it meant at this time. I told him that sometimes God reveals it's purpose later, so he should keep his spiritual eyes and ears open. Yeah, so the dream he had for Jae-Won and us was: He saw a rotten apple on the ground. Someone picked it up and took out the seeds. The person planted the seeds and a tall tree grew out of it. Wow! We feel we are to plant the seed about Jesus in Jae-Won while he's here. Al bought him a Korean Bible and we watched the JESUS video in Korean, with English subtitles, last Sunday. This was totally new to him! It was exciting for us.

So, I believe Zech (Zechariah is his full name) is gifted with dreams. He is the boy in my class who I said would be our next Franklin Graham. He is a good public speaker and he is an evangelist at heart. He is sensitive to the Spirit. He is a really neat kid!

Things with Jae-Won are going really well. Tomorrow it is two weeks since he came. We have not seen any signs of homesickness yet. He seems to love it here! We talk to him a lot and play games with him, plus we take him to kids club on Wednesday nights so he is very happy! We take Michael too (Grace and Joseph's), so he has bonded with Michael a lot. Last Saturday we met with a family from near Teulon, where Jae-Won's cousin is being hosted! We all went toboganning and then went to their house for hot dogs and birthday cake. It was Jae-Won's birthday on Thursday, Jan. 11 (11 years old) and it was this family's youngest sons birthday, 8. It was a really neat visit! Ukranian people, not Christians but very high values. JAe-Won was happy to be with his cousin.

Well, I have to go do some marking now! Al and Jae-Won are at club.

Brenda

2007-01-16T05:19:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone,

Just to let you all know our internet has been down since a major electrical storm last week. It is being worked on so hopefully we'll be back on in the next few days, from home.

Camp has started here and it is very wierd watching it happen from our house. It is like watching a big screen TV. Kind of like the a reality show. But it isn't as hard as it was during winter camps. I talked with Mougie yesterday and she seemed a little discuraged about how things were going. The staff is VERY young. The oldest person is 20 but most are around the 16-18 age. We also showed Mougie the Quest stuff and she is very interested in helping where she can. She loved the who focus of the camp and how it was going to be run. 1 more for the team.

We did some work on our car the last couple of days which cost us about $500, but we had received a gift for $500 for Christmas. God knew what we needed.

Tres, Shannon hasn't read what you wrote about this teacher yet, but I gave her a brief overview. It sounds pretty cool, we'll have to talk it over with S&P, too. It's great that you get to go to Canada for Easter! It sounds like you have quite a break at that time. Is it longer than usual? By the way, we received one of your emails the other week, so I guess you can email us.

Al & Brenda, hows the parenting going? Thanks for the picture of you with Jaewon (???). We have introduced him to our kids as their Korean cousin. Brenda, we got another dream from Zach in your class. Do you read them before they send them? This kid is deep. We really appreciate hearing from him and the rest of the kids, too.

Well I should sign off and leave the office before I "interfere" too much. I have Jasper with me, too. She always find her way into the group.

Dad, thanks for the talk the other day. I've been going through a bit of a feeling alone time this past week. It is hard not having another man around who cares about us or what's going on in our lives, especially for me.

Alright, talk again soon. Don't be afraid to call, we have LOTS of time on our hands.

Dwayne

2007-01-15T02:23:00.000-08:00

Brenda, I was thinking about you today because I'm wearing my fishnet nylons that I wore at your wedding. Thanks for calling me Tres - I love that.

I assumed mom would have told you we were thinking about all coming. We are very excited!!!!!!

Tres!

2007-01-14T18:51:00.000-08:00

Tres!

What do you mean NOTHING BIG TO SAY! Of course there is, ... you are coming to Canada?!!! Wow! That would be great! That is the tail end of my Spring Break. Talk to you more later...have to put my "son" to bed. Good night!

Brenda

2007-01-14T09:41:00.000-08:00

Hi All,

Nothing big to say just HI.

Mom tell Sue Poss that we "scalped" the train tickets. Markus went to the train station and sold them to people for a discount. He made 64 Euro.

This was a weekend of birthday party's and sleepovers. I'm glad that's over. The kids have fun of course, but then they fall apart when they get home because they need more home time. Today matthew and Emily played Monoploy while Niklaas did homework, Markus worked, adn I am emailing. Nice just to be home together.

We heard Prairie is looking for someone in finance. Is this the time for us to move back? Who knows!!

It looks like we will all come back for Easter. Markus may even be able to come on March 29th with the rest of us. Pray this would be possible. We would drive to Calgary on Easter Monday. Fly home on the 19th or 20th.

On Monday the boys are both auditioning for the middle school drama. In intramural sports right now it's basketball. Niklaas did not sign up.

Patsy and Shannon this is for you. We have a student teacher - Miss Jeanie Imbody - here in grade 5 right now. She was homeschooled for her schooling. She also moved around tonnes - not a missionary kid per say. Her father worked with some Christian doctors association I think and they would go do medical relief for missionaries and other places. Anyway, she went into teaching for the exact purpose of teaching missionary kids - but not in a school. She wants to go front lines and home school missionary kids so they don't have to go to boarding school and allowing both parents to work to thier full potential. She has no problem with learning another language. Our principal says this young lady is one of the best student teachers she's seen come through. She just spent a semester at a Christian ranch in Colorado. I think she's done her schooling this spring. Think about how this could benefit you. I mentioned your two families to her and she seemed interested. she's praying about it but wouldn't mind getting in contact with you. Are you interested in emailing her?

Can the Buhlers be in Manitoba for Easter? I know this wasn't in the plans. Our palsn are to be there March 29th to April (Easter Monday).

well, the final darts game is on tv so I'll sign off to go cheer them on.

Teresa

2007-01-09T05:48:00.000-08:00

Well the house is a lot quieter now that everyone has left and camp has begun as of this afternoon. We aren't quite sure what to do to keep ourselves busy but we have lots of time to spend together as a family. The kids are good and keep on going. I am doing laundry today because it is nice outside, and Dwayne is lounging! We will go to Pelotas at the end of the month to visit friends and pick up Lidi and also get Jasper's dress sized for Pipa and Jordana's wedding in March (Dwayne's birthday). That will be a good trip and we can talk with Pipa more about Quest etc.

Some of the staff here have asked Ivan(staffer who is a friend of ours and S&P's) why we are just up here and not down there(JT) with them. Do we not want to work, help or participate with them???? He told them they don't know the whole story and that we would like to be there but aren't able to. One other said she thought we would be there, why aren't you and you should interfere more!!! Another says the staff is young, different and i could tell it wasn't so easy for her. These comments are hard at times because we can't be there to defend why we aren't there and we don't know if Roger or De have said anything or just won't acknowledge who we are and why we came. We would love to encourage and visit more with the staff but we don't want to start problems with Roger. Not easy but we will do what we can when the opportunites arise and God says go for it.

On a good note, we saw Jackson!! He is home from Seminary and doing some presentations at churches etc. He has a date to play basketball with Jado today and we invited him for churrasco tomorrow or before he leaves Thursday. He sounds great, positive and it is good to see a friendly face. Maybe if he is here tomorrow we can call you S&P or vice versa and you can say a hello to him.

Well should get more laundry going and get ready for lunch.

Shannon

2007-01-07T14:17:00.000-08:00

Hi family! Here we are! This is our little boy Jae-Won Choi, age 10. He is an active and humerous little guy. He loves the snow! We went out and bought him boots yesterday and then went toboganning with Michael (Grace and Joseph's little guy). That was new to him, but he loves being outside. He is learning how to play. He stayed at Michael's while we went curling last night. He had a lot of fun! In Korea we were told he goes to school six days a week from 8 am to 8pm, including tutors after school. He is ADHD, and on medication for it. He is also on med's for seizures (epilepsy). He's great though. I think the time change and the "thinking" in English is tiring him out.

As I speak, he and Al are building a snow fort outside. Al is cutting boards and nailing it and they have formed a "shell out of wood." Jae-Won is shovelling snow on top of it, to make it into a fort.

We have enjoyed our first few days with him. Only, we are both feeling a little short on sleep. The first night he arrived 11:40 p.m. and we got to bed only around 1:30 a.m. as he called his mom, and then we unpacked a few things. For him it was 3 p.m.! They are 15 hours ahead of us. He left and arrived at the same time - 15 hour flight! 2nd night he woke up around 2:30 a.m., went to the washroom, but then we heard him again a few minutes later. Al checked on him and he said "finish sleeping". He felt frustrated and agitated. He said, "Hungry" - I guess it was supper time in Korea. I ended up sitting beside his bed for one hour and he eventually did fall asleep again. It's really hard when you can't talk to each other!

Al and I both go back to work tomorrow. Jae-Won will go to school with me as he will be in a gr. 4 class. He just completed Grade 4 in Korea. This is a first for Linden, to accept a young, short-term exchange student. Rob Charach did me a favour, but who knows, maybe it will be the start of something. I think it's a great mission field. Jae-Won comes from a buddhist home.

I will also be driving Paul and Lisa's (neighbor who lent P & S a car last summer) girl to school in the morning, Jordan. She' in my class. Pray for me because I am not going to have much "quiet space" (which we both need.) But this is good, we have both agreed already this is our "stepping out of the boat" experience in FAITH. Gotta go take pictures of my man and son!

Love, Brenda

2007-01-04T05:46:00.000-08:00

Happy Birthday, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, etc...

To all you December birthdays - happy belated. We definately remember Jessies birthday as we were the first to see her that day - what a great surprise that was for us) Shanon how did you manage that whole thing with us all there!! Then we got to celebrate with Jasper, Jadpo and hannie as well - great memories for our family. All you birthday kids are very special to us. God made some amazing miracles when He was creating each of you inside your mom's wombs.

It was good to read about your Christmas's and other events in your lives. Al and Brenda I con't believe you - you're nuts! I really hope you love this time with the young Korean boy. We all welcome him already. The Koreans are second largest group of kids at BFA, next to the Americans.

Scott and Patsy I'd love to hear about your SK Christmas - mom said it was very hard. Call me sometime when you have time to talk and I'll call you back. Hope you had a safe trip back to ON - we arrived home about the same time you did.

Dwayne and Shannon I'm sure this is a very quite time for you - the lonely time after company leaves. Mom said Kathy loved it - I'm so glad!!

So any news on what the 10 of you Brazilians are going to do now? Please keep us posted on the camping plans and events. God is at this very moment leading you!!

Mom it was great to catch up on the phone yesterday - I hope you still had some time to make supper for Al and Brenda.

We love you all very much,

Teresa

2007-01-04T05:16:00.000-08:00

I just lost the whole write up of our trip - urg!!!

Well - you'll just have to be satisfied with a shorter review since I don't have the patience to rewrite all that. It was a great processing time though.

December 21 - left Kandern drove to Calais France. stayed in a hotel right across the street from the English Channel. found a star fish on the beach.

December 22 - took a speed ferry across channel (took about 1 hour). drove on the left side of teh rode through fog to Retford, England where we stayed in the home of Nigel and Helen Spencer (they stayed at our house). got the key from a very friendly neighbor, settled in and found a grocery store. this store was owned by walmart and was very reasonably priced.

December 23 - markus and i went back to do a realy grocery shop while the kids stayed home and watched english cartoons!! We bought all our food for the next few days and found some real canadian treats. later we drove to another town to see their castle.

December 24 - sunday - we went to an assemblies of god church in the morning and our kids loved it. it was very informal, a lor of families, adn interactive learning. niklaas said that was the kind of church he would like to be part of. we went for a walk. in the evening we went to an anglican church for a litergic candle lit service. it was very good.

December 25 - missed all of you very much - talked alot about our christmas together last year! we opened gifts in the morning - the kids really wanted to go back to the aog church, but we didn't get reay in time. watched a movie, played games, went for a walk, ate turkey and cranberry sauce (i forgot to make the dressing) - everything that always happens at christmas, but without other people.

December 26 - drove out to the sea and walked along the shore. ate fish and chips.

December 27 - went to sherwood forest and saw an 800 year old oak tree like the one robin hood worked out of. matthew and emily shot some archery there. matthew popped a balloon.

December 28 - left Retford. stopped at Nottingham. went to the robin hood center - did not get to see the museum, but there was enough other stuff there to keep us all happy. went to the movie eragon (a book niklaas got for christmas). emily and i went to happy feet instead. very exciting to be at a real movie theater. got to delanies very late.

December 30 - oxford/stonehenge/windsor castle day. i loved oxford and could have spent all day there. the tolkien and lewis history is huge. we stopped at the eagle and child pub where they met every tuesday for 21 years for their tuesday lunch hour reading club. went to the alice in wonderland store. stonehenge is amazing. there is soem astrology type story that goes with this huge rock formation. everyone else said this was their favorite part of teh day. windsor catle was a dissapointment. it was very hard to foind and then it wasn't even lit up. the flag was up so teh queen was home. we ate at pizza hut across the ctreet from it and hoped for a view of it while we ate, but a mcdonalds truck stopped right in front of us to unload it wares next door.

December 31 - bought tickets for a 48 hour bus tour. a tour where you can get on and off tehbus whereever and for however long you want. we first stopped at speakers corner to hear an evangelist preach. then on to the sherlocks holmes museum and store. the museum costs extra so we just looked in the window and went to the store (a personal favorite). stopped at hamel's toy store (8 floors high). then went to harrods. in the evening we played games, watched a movie and went to bed around 11:30. markus and i didn't got o bed until 4:30 when the party upstairs finally stopped. we are definately small town people.

December 1 - continued our 48 hour bus tour. stopped at hamley's again so emily could buy herself a sticker making kit. matthew and i went to starbucks down the street. saw the london eye - the worlds largest ferris wheel, saw big ben and the beautiful parlimane tbuildings its attached to, drove over london bridge and saw the tower bridge. drove past the london dungeon and london tower. got on a ferry (part of the bus tour) and saw many interesting sights with funny commentary from the guide. got of the next bus at buckingham palace - a disappointment to us all. decided it was to complicated to see the changing of the guards (which we had seen in Monaco) so didn't do that. back to harrods where niklaas bough himself a make your own monoploy game. then home.

December 2 - left England via the chunnel. got home at 4:00 am.

I'm going to send this one and then do another one so i don't loose anything.

teresa

2007-01-02T11:12:00.000-08:00

Did you know that if you click on the pictures, they will enlarge for you? Try it!

2007-01-01T12:57:00.000-08:00

This is our partzikle making time- Maom and Patsy fried, I did the icing sugar! Mmmmm! delicious! And over here Al getting the meat ready for tacos later. Hey, on a totally different note, we have news to share. We are going to have a boy! (Not our own!!!) We are expecting a 10 year old Korean boy on Jan. 4 to live with us for 2 months. He is an exchange student. We learned of this organization, Hanwood, from a couple in our church. We got information off the internet and registered for more. Then about 5 days ago they called us! This is a bit out of our comfort zone, but we feel God wants us to try this right now. Sooo, we have agreed, IF they can find a school for him. Maybe LCS! or maybe the public school down the street. So, we'll keep you posted! Brenda

2006-12-31T15:43:00.000-08:00

Hi guys! Today is New Year's Eve and we just survived a toboganning adventure! Now we are making partzilke. We are hanging out and enjoying the day. We'll go to Grace and Joseph's a bit, then see some Christmas lights, then eat a late supper - tacos and refried beans! We love you all. - Brenda for all of us

2006-12-26T12:37:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas Family! (Dwayne how did you get the letters RED?)

Well, it is a beautiful Dec. 26 today! Al and I went for a long walk in our neighborhood. The sun is shining brilliantly and the temps must be close to zero. We went to check out the outdoor rink at the end of our street, on Ness Ave. On New Year's Eve, we are all going to go skating and maybe play some hockey with our newly equipped hockey goalie, Muki! Mom and dad and Patsy and Scott and kids are coming over. We'll make "partzilke" and skate and then have a mexican supper and who knows what, to welcome in the New Year.

Teresa and Markus, mom tried your phone number and it didn't work. How is your holiday going? I'm sure it's nice to get away and see new things.

Dwayne & Shannon, we're so glad your mom and Kathy finally arrived, bags and all! Poor Kathy! Enjoy the beautiful Gramado and the warm weather! How's Jasper's black eye? All better?

We went to Al's mom's Dec. 24, visited with his 92 year old uncle Diedrich Dyck and his cousin John. Then later also his Aunt Anne, and we went to see his "Tante Zus and Tante Nite." They were appreciative that we stopped in. Dec. 25 we had our own little Christmas here and then went to mom and dad's for lunch with Joseph and Grace. Poor Grace was really sick with a cold and flu which Al and I are just getting over. Then we went to Danny and Irene's for supper (who needs to eat any more!!!!) and a movie. They are enjoying their sweet new little baby girl, Brandy.

Now we are both on holidays for two weeks. I plan to do some scrapbooking and reading. I am still working on the album of our dating year. Then I'd like to make a wedding album with maybe 20 of our favourite pics enlarged? Not quite sure yet...It's just nice to have some time to ourselves.

We wish you the hope and joy that Christ brings. He is good all the time. He is the Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father and Prince of Peace.

Love, Brenda

2006-12-24T15:30:00.000-08:00

MERRY CHRISTMAS, EVERYONE!!!

We hope you are all having a great Christmas, wherever you are. Every one has made it here, after some delays and as of this afternoon, all of our bags got here, too. We are walking down town tonight to look at the lights then returning to open one of our presents. The rest we'll open tomorrow morning.

Thanks for the treats mom, they were great!

Again, Merry Christmas to you all,

D&S

2006-12-21T05:21:00.000-08:00

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JADEN! I hope you have a great day! I guess your grandma is coming soon! You will have a lot of fun I'm sure. Don't eat too much birthday cake! I heard you're eating more and more. You're probably getting quite tall. We love you Jado!

Brenda

2006-12-20T09:54:00.000-08:00

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JESSI! Wow! It is exactly one year ago since we were all in Brazil and so much has changed since then. But I remember so well the anticipation of the baby and it is a happy memory thinking back to hearing the good news, and hearing how Scott surprised Teresa and Markus by taking them to the hospital to see the baby! Then when we came we got to see this precious little baby. And Shannon, you were such a trooper going out to the sitio with us after delivering a baby only days earlier. I'll never forget that. Give Jessi a big hug for me.

We are praying for you Dwayne and Shannon and Scott and Patsy as this crossroad time for you guys. God has a plan and we trust He will show it to you clearly. It may be different than you had thought it would look. He loves you and has the best in mind for you.

I'm at school right now, so I've gotta go have lunch now. It'll keep me going this afternoon! The kids are very hyper, afterall, only 5 days till Christmas!

Love,

Brenda

2006-12-13T01:37:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone,

Just a very quick note, I need to get on my way to the bus station to go to my P class. But...

Tres, I checked out the website and had a few good laughs. I didn't get through it all, but I will go back another time.

Patsy, I guess if you talked to Scott he must have made it through, so that's good. We look forward to hearing his adventure stories. Give us a call when he gets back and before you go meet Jack.

Brenda, Thanks again for the work your class did to help us out and also for the gifts.

We had a wonderful time at the sitio this passt weekend. Got some flowers planted and leaves raked up. I will go back today to finish planting and bring a couple of supplies out for when we go at Christmas.

Tomorrow we are going to Caxias to do the, what we believe, is the last step in te process of getting our permenant visas. We got a letter that said we just need to bring in the proof that Jessi was born in Brazil and they would be happy to give us aour visas.

Only 8 more days till Gwen and Cathy get here. We are really looking forward to having them. This year feels abit more like Christmas. Decorations in our house, no pregnancy and birth in the middle of it make a world of difference.

Well gotta go,

Dwayne

2006-12-12T15:37:00.000-08:00

I forgot to mention that Niklaas is doing exams this week. Wednesday morning it's a grade nine algebra exam, in the afternoon its science. thursday and friday are history and english (i'm not sure which is on which day).

Teresa

2006-12-12T14:58:00.000-08:00

Hey, Tres, thanks for the website, we'll check it out. Just want the family to know that Scott is out of the water and on his way back to Ontario. He will be arriving on Friday here in Winnipeg. We were so glad to hear his voice again. I'll let him write(which he never has done!) to you and tell you all of his wacky experiences.

Patsy

2006-12-12T02:54:00.000-08:00

Scott, why are hemorrhoids called "hemorrhoids" instead of "asteroids"?

I was checking Christian comedians for Emily for Christmas and found www.rickandmick.com/funnies , if you need a gut splitting laugh, check them out.

Delanie called last night so things are falling into place for us to stay at her flat Dec 28 - Jan 2. She lives a 2 minute walk from Hyde Park and walking distance to Buckingham Palace. Enily is doing a book report on Princess Di so she's excited about seeing things in London.

Teresa

2006-12-06T03:24:00.000-08:00

Hey family,

Jasper wants to say a big thank you for all the blogs, e-cards and birthday blessings. She had a lot of fun at her party and so did everyone else.

We got the girls' ears pierced for their birthdays. There was a few tears shed but after all was done they are quite proud of their new jewelery. Jessi's ears were so thick and dense that the earing bent in her ear and the lady had to take it out and straighten it with some sort of pliers. She had pain but quickly recovered. Jasper was more ticked off and said to the lady after the first one"You don't do that!" with a very disgusted look on her face. Funny but understandable!
Will try to get a better picture of Jasper for you to see her's as well. Lidi is happy that people are now calling Jessi a pretty little girl and not a cute little boy!

Kathy got her visa on Monday so she is relieved and excited. She was one of my bridesmaids and has been a great support for me for many years even though she isn't a christian. She has been searching for a long time and is wanting more for her life. Her biggest block has been the hook to New Age which is so out there in society, T.V. etc and is quite luring. Just pray that we can continue to be a witness to her and that she will see clearly that Jesus is the true saviour.

Have a great day!
Shannon

2006-12-05T12:52:00.000-08:00

Hi all,

Tomorrow sammy moves to New Zealand. he has lived here for 9 years and has been one of Niklaas' friends since we first arrived. They started out being they only two boys in the class. His dad is taking over AIA in New Zealand (which is where he's from). Niklaas has been near tears all day - please pray for him.

I got an email form Sam Kraines - remember her? She is pregnant and making some great choices. She has felt God tugging at her heart for the past year, has moved home to learn about parenting, has kept her job and done great for a year, has been drug/smoke/alcohol free for over a year. She's due in May adn desires for her child to be raised in the church. I'm thrilled!!

Teresa

2006-12-01T15:06:00.000-08:00

Happy Birthday Jasper! I sure wish I could give you a big HUG! You are very special! I hope you have a fun day with your family and friends!

As for our family, Al is at the gym as I speak. I finished parent-teacher interviews today and it went well, but I am exhausted. I took a little rest. I felt incredible anxiety before these interviews. Some anxiety is normal, but this was irrational. It's still a remnant of fear or anxiety attack as I've experienced in the past. This was minor compared to those, but I want to get to the bottom of it. I have been going through "attachment" growth with Al, meaning that it takes me longer to attach - emotionally expecially. I don't know if this makes sense, but pray for me in these areas.

Tonight the Chrsitmas events begin. We have a dinner theatre at church tonight, Charles Dickens "The Christmas Carol." It is being performed by the same group that our cousin Don was acting in - in the passion play. So, I wonder if he will be part of it tonight. I am very excited as our neighbors Gwen and Roger are coming with us! They live across from Paul and Lisa. They have three kids. He is a cop and works with Conrad Lescheid!

Then tomorrow we are prepping all day for our Christmas party at our house. We are making a turkey dinner, meatballs and rice for 17 people! It will be pretty full at our place. Married and single friends, hoping to introduce some of our single friends to new singles! Wink! Wink! Audrey Loewen is coming (Lori's sister!) and Syl and her husband Jonathon, to name a few. Should be fun!

Nice talking to you!

Love, Brenda

2006-12-01T13:35:00.001-08:00

Happy Birthday to Ja(s)per!! Or is it Jasper already? We hope you are having a happy day celebrating your birthday. We will miss seeing you this Christmas, but I know you will have a great time with your grandma and "auntie".

My child phsycologist friend helped me see that this thing with Emily started while Dd was here. Like me, Emily needs to be having fun and laugh, and of course we didn't have much of that while Dd was here. I felt emotionally torn apart, but as an adult I can figure how to ut myself back together again. Emily probably felt the same way but doesn't know yet how to put herself together again. We are now in the process of helping her do this. It doesn't help that her teacher is very like Dd - negative and bitter. Please keep praying for her. We are seeing her happy more than not these days. Please keep praying for us - I'm completely exhausted of this being on gaurd every minute I'm with her. But if it helps, I'm willing to do it.

We got our first Christmas card today - December 01. Tomorrow we get our tree and then on first advent we decorate it.

Teresa

2006-12-01T13:35:00.000-08:00

2006-11-27T02:14:00.000-08:00

I'm not promising snow at Christmas - more like rain. We've been having spring here already (+16). The crocuses and some tress are blooming - this can't actaully be a good thing. However, I'll enjoy the warmer weather.

Teresa

2006-11-24T08:00:00.000-08:00

Travel Europe for Christmas!! very tempting if my mom and friend weren't coming for Christmas. We would love to see some snow, real snow but the Santa float with the snow machine will have to do i guess. Make sure you take some pics and maybe put on a disc so sometime we can see! we need a new photo of your family too, our fridge pic is looking way outdated!

Good to hear some positive news at work for Markus! we'll keep praying for the situation there with Gary. Not easy to work under those types of conditions when you are always the one who is wrong, no matter what! Grace and mercy!!!!!

Patsy, the more we hear about Lisa the more we love her. She is a solid chick!!
We feel super blessed by you guys and Carissa and Bob, more confirmation for us!
By the way Brenda's class raised $238 at the bake sale for us and the car! Awesome! She said the baking sold in 15 minutes!!!!! We are feeling great, and at peace with where God wants us! This is an answer to prayers and questions. Thanks Brenda for your heart and class!

have a super day guys,
Shannon

2006-11-24T03:28:00.000-08:00

Hey all, Well, Markus worked till 5:00AM. I just talked with him and he said Frank is not letting Gary rule, he's willing to question things and tell them why things were alittle late - new guy, learning new things, computer break down, etc... it's not all Markus' fault. Finally someone who will stand up for the guy.

See ya,
Teresa

Any takers on that Christmas thing?

2006-11-23T14:17:00.000-08:00

Hey all, wow a lot has happened since I last read the blog.

What does JTM think its doing? I guess it's focus is really on Christian schools right now with this thing Harold is getting started. What does this mean? Pats what did you mean when you said JTM was "letting you go". Are you not sure about going back to Brazil now? I really need things written out in plain simple English for me to grasp it.

Markus is working late tonight because Gary emailed the school to check up on him and of course didn't meet with his expectations. I've spent the past two hours on line looking at job opportunities in Canada. I know Markus isn't ready to throw inthe towel yet, but he did say "we'll never be rid of Gary". We would all miss it terribly if we were to leave here now. Then I checked the blog and found out about this Brazil thing. I agree lets all move home again!!

Emily is requiring all the emotions that I can muster up. My friend, the child physocologist, said just love her all the time. Make sure she feels loved and secure at home. I have a wonderful group of women around me who are praying and speaking into Emily right now. i can't change her heart - that's the tough part of parenting. Her heart is between her and God, I can only PRAY.

Dwayne I'll look into those sandal things - please be patient though it could take a while to figure that one out.

This weekend we have our Christmas banquet. I again am in a lip synk group doing Point of Grace's Jingle Bell Rock song. It's the closest I'll ever get to singing in front of a group of people!! It'll be fun again. I do wonder though if one ever gets to old for this kind of fun!! Maybe once the kids start getting embarrassed by it. On Friday night I will help Gail Palsky (worked as a florist in Red Deer for 8 years) make 30 boutineers and corsages for two of the dorms. Then on Saturday I will be at Palmgarten dorm helping do the girls nails. It's all very exciting.

We're still homesick - doesn't anyone want to meet us in England for Christmas? Come on - Sherwood Forest/Nottingham, Yorkshire (James Harriot Country), Oxford (CSLewis), Buckingham Palace, Stoenhenge, etc... The housing is FREE!!

Okay - lets keep each other posted.

Love you all,
Teresa

2006-11-22T02:49:00.003-08:00

Teresa,

Just a quick note, or question really, for you. Do you remember the sandles you brought for me. I am wondering if you could see if it is possible to buy insole replacements for them. The insoles come out so it should be possible. Mine are beyond worn out and I love these sandles.

The name of the style of sandle is TATAMI and the sizes on them are 45-101/2, 29, M12. Impressed on the bottom of the insoles is the number 535. I'm not sure what that number is for.

Check it out and see if it is possible. I love these sandles and if I can get replacements, I will be able to continue to use them for a while.

Thanx,

Dwayne

2006-11-22T02:49:00.001-08:00

2006-11-22T02:49:00.000-08:00

2006-11-22T02:08:00.000-08:00

Hi family,

Well we too agree with Patsy that it's nice to have security in a family when things aren't going as planned, well at least not our plans. The thing is that God knew all these things were going to happen like Brenda and Al's house, the issues with Emily, and the rejection by JTM for Quest. However what is greater is that he knows the future and has big plans for all of us and he is forever with us and just asking us to trust him with it all.
He has and will protect us and our belongings, he has and will continue to keep helping us parent even when we want to give up, and he will fulfill the visions he has given us if we trust him and give it all to him.
We are frustrated and confused by JTM's response to Quest and really felt Monday night that they ripped out our hearts and threw them against the wall like they were garbage or just something to play with. However after much prayer and talking together and with parents and Scott and Patsy we truly believe Quest will come to past the way God wants it too, bigger than we could possibly imagine and in a way that no man could ever make happen. We are at peace now and know that our future is in God's hands and really that is the best place to be. We will stand on the promises, the dreams, and visions he gave and allow him to take this burden off of us. We will continue to trust and pray that he will bring it to pass. The fulfilment of this vision will truely bring glory to God not man.
We are grateful for all your prayers and support and we continue to trust him to take your burdens too.

Teresa and Markus, your kids are blessed to have amazing parents who keep on believing in them even when they stumble. You were chosen to be their parents because God gave you what it takes to do the job. There are days when we would like to trade in ours but we hang on to the fact that God really believes we can do it, and we gave our parents as much or more grief and they didn't give us back!

Patsy and Scott, we know you are meant to be here in Brazil! Your love for this country and these people is God given and he wants you here. He has big plans for you and your kids here! The past 8 years was just preparation for things to come, hang on to the vision!!

Brenda and Al, your hearts for your neighbors, kids at school, people at work and your friends is awesome and God wants to use you to pour out his love to them. You, together are a strong united force that when God is center the enemy cannot break through. I look forward to seeing how God will use you more and more in the years to come.

Mom and dad, you are pillars in our family and we are so thankful we have your years of experience and your faith in God to come to when we need ears to listen, and your words of wisdom. Our family is strong because of your faith and trust in the Most High!

My heart aches for the people here to be saved, they just need the opportunity, and i believe God is preparing a strong wave or movement for this to come to pass. How and when i don't know but i want to be ready, and willing to be a part of it.

Dwayne's heart is aching for Christian leaders here to be restored and encouraged in their God given gifts and responsibilites. He is disappointed with the choice JTM has made but is excited at the wide range of opportunities this opens up for us. God knows exactly who he needs and can use to fulfill his visions.

We need to be willing to do our part and trust God to bring together his people and his plans for his purposes.

Love and blessings,
Shannon and Dwayne

2006-11-21T12:43:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

It is sooooo good to be able to come to this blog and be real. Thanks, Tres, for your update and your openness. We will definitely be praying for much wisdom as you continue being the great parents you are. We love you guys and miss you so much...maybe it's just time for all of us to move HOME!!!

Anyway, on that note, we officially received the notice from JTM board today that they will not be supporting QUEST in Brazil and that we are to talk to them about "redemployment", which I'm assuming means we are being "let go" from Janz Team Ministries. There is a part of our hearts that are feeling rejected, hurt, frustrated, betrayed and many other feelings, BUT there is also a sense of freedom to get away from a mission that is definitely unhealthy in it's set up and that has been wearing on us for a LONG time.

So, the question is...what next? Who truly does believe in us? God or man? Is the vision God has put on so many hearts in Brazil not going to come to be because JTM didn't want to support it? Lots of confusion, but at the same time God's PEACE is starting to take over our anxious hearts. PLEASE PRAY FOR US, OUR KIDS, OUR FUTURE. A part of me wants to give up fighting, but another part of me believes in the vision. Where God closes a door, he opens a window???

Brenda, I would love to come to your party. Thanks for the invitation.

Thanks for praying...we'll keep you posted.

Patsy

2006-11-15T15:27:00.000-08:00

Hi family,

Scott, I was sorry to hear of your grandma passing on. She was so cute!... and she lived a good long life. I'm glad you got to celebrate her birthday with her this summer.

Wow! for the grocery gift Patsy and Scott! And the baby in Brazil - Katchy and Zenella (phonetically spelled):)

Teresa thanks for the update. Stealing is tough. We will keep praying as you parent this. I appreciate the update - low emotionally. I understand, as I have been there many a time.

For us this is a season of joy, overall. Sure we have our blue days, due to lack of sunshine, winter, etc. but God is blessing us in so many ways.

I'll write more next time, off to curling tonight.

Love, Brenda

2006-11-15T14:03:00.000-08:00

Hi family, Scott we are sorry to hear about your grandma, but also know that she lived a great life, loving Jesus andothers. Glad to hear about the shopping spree - God keeps taking care of His family.

We would appreciate prayer for Emily and her heart. In October we "lost" 50 Euro. One night she asked if we had looke on our pillows yet when we put her to bed. There on our pillows was the money, she said she found it under her bed. No confession or repentence. Last week at school the girl sitting beside was missing two oreo cookies. Emily confessed when I discovered oreo cookie crumbs under her pillow. She apologized tot eh girl and bought her a box of oreos. Today Matthew had 5 Euro lying around an it went missing after Emily was in the room with it. She wont fess up as of yet. Pleas pray that the temptation to steal would be less appealling to her and that she would have a soft heart of confession and repentence. Pray for wisdon for us - we are totally lost as parents as to how to deal with this. This is difficult to not be anxious about.

Otherwise we are doing fine. My small group is now 10 grade 9 girls and myself. They totally ticked me off with their selfishness today. Oh well!!

Niklaas is having a hard time finding time when 11 cast members can get together to video his 13 page script. He already decided that his next script will have less characters. The kids are all very excited about doing this, but they can't all get together on the same days. I really hope for his sake that he can get it videoed.

Matthew is developing a rather odd looking tick in his eyes. he says they are very dry and so he does this funny thing. Markus is concerned that it is becoming a bad habit - I'm not to concerned yet.

I guess I'll start posting scripture verses aboput honesty up in our house now.

I have been very low emotionally. Partly (maybe greatly) due to Emily's issues. Partly - no sunshine (until today). Partly - just very busy with everyone's schedules. Partly - missing family (we're really feeling the four year seperation thing right now - glad for last Christmas!!!!!).

We're okay - but low. How do you explain this?

Hope you are all well.

Glad to hear about the car finally doing okay for you.

Wiebes hope you're all okay.

Teresa

2006-11-14T18:54:00.000-08:00

Dear family,

Just a few things to update you all in our lives. First, Scott's grandma Buhler went to be with the Lord on Monday night at the ripe age of 90. Second, Scott's parents have allowed Ricki and the boys(half of the week)to move in with them and Scott is not at all pleased with that decision. It is "supposed" to be temporary, but she is only making $8.50/hr, so we'll see. Third, we had the biggest surprise tonight. I was standing at our table mixing a cake, when the door opened beside me and several of the LDP rushed in and grabbed me and blindfolded me. They took me to Superstore and told me that the LDP food budget had a huge surplus and that they had asked Medeba if they could take us for a HUGE shopping spree!!! Well, they did. I don't even want to know how much it cost, but they totally spoiled us. They are soooo good to us! Fourth, for those of you that remember Cati and Zanella, they had a baby boy named Timothy.

We love you all and really appreciate hearing from all of you.

Patsy

2006-11-11T16:28:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone, We finally have our car!!! Yes we went to Porto to pick it up on Tuesday and it has been good so far. The guy we bought it from paid for all the repairs and the price stayed the same. He has been very good about making sure we get what we want. So now, we believe we have a great car. We will get you pictures some time soon.

We had a wonderful time at the beach last weekend. The weather wasn't the greatest, but we did all burn and are pealing now. This coming Wednesday we are going to MCT a huge interactive museum. (S&P can tell you more about it) Anyway, it's a holiday here and my school is going on a field trip there. They got a great deal (R$7/person) so we are all going. Taiesa is going with us and we will continue on to Pelotas for the weekend. It is Ivan's B-day on Monday the 20th. We promised them that Pelotas would be the first trip in our new car, so this is it.

Tiago stopped by here the other day. He is back from Canada and loved it. He is planning to go back in March. Cindy had sent a little package for us. PEANUTBUTTER!!!!!!!!! Man we missed that stuff. We also got some real Twizzlers, Good Host Iced Tea and a few other things. It was great to hear about his time and to hear about Canada.

Well I should head off. Look forward to hearing from you all soon.

Dwayne

2006-11-08T12:30:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone...we are keeping busy with the course, Mom and Dad's visit, and now we are doing the final preparations for our Quest business plan for the November Janz Team Canada board meetings. Please pray for decision soon, so we can use this year to fundraise, plan ,etc.

I knew that Frances is funky, but did you know that she is a whiz with a digital camera??? Yeah, she managed to get our family standing up straight, but the entire parliment building is leaning!!! She's amazing. We had a great time in Ottawa and Toronto with Mom and Dad. We all managed to survive the CLOSE living quarters and actually enjoy ourselves!!!

We love you all and look forward to more updates from you all.

Love, Patsy

2006-11-02T13:25:00.000-08:00

Hey, Tres, our other blog is only to inform our supporters and mostly our Brazilian friends about what is happening in our lives. Don't worry...Frances Funky Family is still our family's blog!!! Love you all.

Have fun at the beach Klassens!

Love you,

Patsy

2006-11-01T18:49:00.000-08:00

Just to let you know, our car must not be done because it didn't show up today. Soooo, we are taking this other car to the beach this weekend and the guy will probibly come to drop it off tomorrow, but well we won't be here. We are leaving at 5am and will get back Sunday sometime.

Have a great weekend,
Dwayne

2006-11-01T11:57:00.000-08:00

Wow, Brenda and Al...I just read the blog today after missing a few days. We are so glad that you are both safe and that your belongings were protected. Praise God! We will continue to pray for peace and a calming of your spirits.

We are doing well with Mom and Dad here. We spent one day in Toronto...did the CN Tower, which was definitely worth it and also the Hockey Hall of Fame. On Saturday we are heading off to Ottawa for 2 days...should be good.

Our house is small and "cozy", as Muki said, but it has been a good visit. The kids had a hoot getting their Halloween costumes ready. Muki was Sponge Bob, Hannah was Curious George's little sister, Georgina and Caleb was a lumberjack. We took them trick-or-treating and we all had a lot of fun. They have never had so much candy in their lives.

We love you all and enjoy hearing from you all. Hey where are the kids and teens??? We need to hear from you guys as well!!!

Love, Patsy

2006-11-01T03:21:00.000-08:00

Hi Everyone,

Well first we are glad to hear that Al and Brenda are safe and nothing was taken. It definitely shows us God's hand of protection. And like i told Brenda last night, whoever it was that broke in it is someone else to pray for. Maybe too they will realize that it isn't worth the risk again to break in to someone's place.

We went to Porto yesterday to get the car repairs done, the guy that sold it to us will bring it today. He gave us another car to bring home so that was nice. He has been good to us and we trust everything is on the up and up. He even gave us a ride to the shopping mall while we waited, picked us up after and tried to give us directions to the bus station. So today we will have our car back and running properly.

It was quite the adventure yesterday at times. We found the right gas station to meet him at after a few turns we weren't sure of. When he took us to the mall we stopped to pickup his mom, which we chuckled about. At the mall we went shopping a bit and then went to McDonalds. Of course that was also a bit of a hoot because the armed guards were there with hand on gun collecting the money. That was a first at McD's for us! After we got the other car we had to find the bus station which everyone said it easy or you can't miss it. RIGHT!! But after a few interesting conversations and one while driving, asking a guy who we believe was drunk, we found it. We were waiting to pick up Lidi so we drove around a bit and found DC shopping. It wasn't quite what we were looking for but the most entertaining because the arrows on the road told you where to go. We followed and at one point you could go straight or turn according to the arrows. We opted to turn because the straight arrows directed you into a brick wall. (we had a good laugh)
Anyway we made it home last night in one piece with some good stories and today have many things to do to prep for our trip to the beach with Taisa's family and Lidi.

Will blog on our return next week.
Lots a love,
Shannon

2006-10-30T19:38:00.000-08:00

Hi Family,

I'm a little shook up this evening. We experienced a home invasion today! Al got home around 4:00 and worked in his office till I came home around 5:00. I was just about to go upstairs to change and I noticed the drops of wet on the steps. I asked Al if he had gone upstairs with fresh snow on his pant legs - it snowed a few cm here today. He said he hadn't been upstairs yet. So, he went up to see if the ceiling was dripping. Well, as soon as he went a few steps up, he turned around and noticed the linen closet in the upstairs hallway was open - wide open. Weird!!! Then we noticed both bedroom doors were wide open - we usually have them closed to conserve heat. Then from the steps we could see the closet door in our bedroom was also open. By this time, we were freaked inside. But stayed calm on the outside, because we weren't sure if the intruder was still in the house - perhaps in the spare room or in our closet. We checked the spare room first - Al kicked the door a little further open. No one - except the closet had been rifled through and clothes were lying on the floor as well as hangers. The closet door had been slid open. We had already noticed that Al's white dress shirts were on the bed. I asked him if he had taken them down. He looked at me with this "somebody could be in our closet look." Then we stepped bravely into our room and realized not only was the closet door open but so was the "secret door" (the Buhler kids saw it this summer) was wide open. That's when I freaked and whispered, pointing, "Someone may be in the attic. Let's get out of here!" We went downstairs and Al grabbed the cell phone and stepped outside on the deck to call the police, of a possible intruder in the house. The police arrived 5 minutes later. They had told us to get out of the house, leave the door unlocked, and get into our vehicle and meet the police at the front of the house. So we had just enough time to pull out of the garage and drive down the backlane to the front of our house, Al al the while still on the cell phone with the police. Then they were already there. They walked into our house (back door) while we sat in the van. We had got Ben out of the basement too. So we all three sat there. The cops came out and said the intruders were NOT in the attic. We breatherd a sigh of relief. They went upstairs with us again and we checked if anything had been stolen. Then there was a knock on our front door and it was our neighbor Melanie, she had seen these two teenage boys at around noon, come to our front door, then go around, open our gate, and a few mintues later come rushing out again, forgetting to close the gate. She had a description of them. Ben said he got home between 12 and 1. So we pieced it together that these boys had entered our home just before Ben came home and were upstairs when they heard the basement door rattle. They were scared off quickly. They went through our bedroom only. My jewellery drawer and other drawers. But I haven't noticed anything taken. I am so glad they did not go into our office. We figure our back door was not locked. They tried prying into the back "red" door (Ben's door) then moved to the patio door and pried it, but then realized it wasn't locked. Sometimes if you don't push the door as you lock it, it doesn't bolt tight. We won't be doing that again! But what are the chances! It was scarey! We are O.K. now. Paul and Lisa came over for Alpha and we talked to them about it. It helped just talking about it.

Well, on a different note, that young couple is not coming to our Alpha. Monday does not suit them.

Good to hear from you Tres!

Love, Brenda

2006-10-30T04:42:00.000-08:00

Brenda, the Celebration sounds great. I really hope that couple comes to you Alpha group. I'm curious to see how this will affect the city - very exciting.

One of the guys on Markus' German vball team shared with us that he is taking a year off studies because the doctor has put him on depression meds and wants to have less stress in his life. We are asking God what we are to do with this info and how we can encourage Jochin.

I hope S&P and D&S still update this blog even though they have their other ones going, because who has time to read that mnany blogs!! Our minutes are very precious to us - so are you, but that was the purpose of this blog.

D&S, I hope things with your car will soon straighten out. We understand frustrating moments with vehicles. We found 3,000.00 Euros worth of repairs needed to be doen toour van within months of buying it. There is a law however, that repairs are the responsibility of the dealer who sold you the car within the first 6 months. That was very good news.

How are things in Ontario going with mom and dad there? I have to say I've been struggling with jealousy over how much time you all get to spend together this year. Maybe we'll see mom and dad sometime in the next year?? I understand it's different where we work so don't feel like I'm upset at anyone!!

I got a new computer at work today so I'm using it to write this short update.

We're all good. Emily and I are still having our moments, but God is giving us wisdoma and patience there too. Isn't He great!! The boys start floor hockey in there intrramurals next week - they are hoing to make an all Canadian team - there are 5 Canadians in middles school and 2 half breeds (Cdn/US). Niklaas will be the captian. he and his partner did great in Bocce ball he has fantastic form.

Report cards came out and again there is nothing to worry about. We met with Emily's teacher last Friday and will meet with the middle school teachers on Monday. No concerns though.

Emily enjoyed her birthday. We had a little family party on the actual day and then on the weekend she had a friend over for 5 Euro shopping and a sleepover.

Okay, my time is up, love you all and hope things ar going well in your part of the world.

Teresa

2006-10-23T17:41:00.000-07:00

Hi all!

I just wanted to tell you about our exciting weekend! Al & I were part of the Franklin Graham Festival at the MTS centre. It was huge! The overflow flooded into Calvary Temple (1700 people) and last night they turned hundreds away from there as well. The largest gathering of Christians I've seen outside of Urbana! We volunteered as counsellors. We took the five week class called "Christian Life and Witness." It was about how to lead someone to the Lord and contained a lot of Bible verses.

The music was amazing - worship music, bands like Paul Brandt, Rebecca St.James, Tree 63, Newsboys, Casting Crowns, and Michael W. Smith. What I liked the most was just feeling the awesomeness of so many Christians singing praises to God, IN MY CITY! Al said one thing that touched him was the chinese community reaching out - there was a mandarin and cantonese interpreter each night (headsets available). Also counsellors in their languages.

There were hundreds of people who came forward each night. I haven't heard any numbers, but we both got to counsel 4-5 people, including a young couple last night. The wife was already a christian, but her husband made a commitment last night and she came to stand with him. I talked to her while Al prayed with him. We prayed with them together and invited them to our neighbor Alpha study! We'll see what happens.

We both felt this was not only for people to come to know the Lord, but for the church of southern Manitoba to be united and inspired to reach out to their neighbors. It really brought a spirit of cooperation to the churches, which we thought was excellent.

Brenda

2006-10-18T11:12:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone,

We have opened our own family's blogspot to keep in touch with our friends worldwide, so here's the address if you are interested. It is scottandpatsy.blogspot.com We have already had many comments on it and that is fantastic.

Teresa, it was really good to hear from your family. Caleb doesn't care when Markus and Matthew come to Canada...all he cares about is that he sees Matthew, so even if we need to meet in the airport in Toronto, we'll do that, ok?!?

We are doing a lot better. Our time in Vancouver was very special. This past week, Scott's schedule got more "normal", which means he was home most evenings. This morning the LDPs left for a solo retreat. They are all dropped off in canoes around a lake and do solo camping for 3 days. They were given assignments to work on, but mostly encouraged just to have some God-time. Scott was excited and nervous all at the same time. It is the first time in his life he will spend 48 hours without seeing another human being. I've never done that either.

The kids were sure glad to have us back and they are doing very well. Boys ball hockey starts on Friday nights at the High school this week and they both want to participate, so I'm sure they will have lots of fun.

My women's Bible study was wonderful this morning. God is teaching me a lot about contenment and perspective...always lots to learn.

Some of the LDPs are reading Wild at Heart and Captivating and Scott suggested that maybe we could lead them in an informal book discussion afterward...wouldn't that be great? We are starting to recognize specifics reasons why we are here this year, which are more than camp programming, but impacts on individual lives.

Anyway, the boys are having soccer training in P.E. today and I am going to work out in the camp gym, so here I go...love you all. Patsy

2006-10-12T14:03:00.000-07:00

hey family,

to see the latest of Jasper check down the blog a few messages. we tried to get it on last week but had problems with the blog.

Shannon

2006-10-10T14:09:00.000-07:00

Hi all,
Happy Thanksgiving to you. I made a Saskatoon berry pie and we were thankful. How was the serving in Winnipeg? What a great idea!

How was the wedding and your kids thanksgiving without you there? I hope you had a great week - I'm sure you did.

We have been offered a house exchange in England over Christmas so Markus and Matthew will come to Calgary in April(that's when the 50th celebration is anyways!). We will spend one week 2 hours north of London while this family stays at our house. Then we can stay at Delanie Sunderwalds flat on Hyde Park over New Years because she won't be there. About the cheapest way to travel isn't it!!

Matthew got a hat trick in soccer today to bring his team to a 4-0 win against one of the better teams in intramurals. The finals are on Thursday and they will play for second or third depending on one other game. Niklaas on the other hand was put into net (not his strength) and let in three goals. he was pretty discouraged but Markus said the goals were all almost unstoppable. Next week Bocce starts. Matthew will play with Jonathon and Niklaas is teammates with Caleb. These are also the guys they are partnering up witht o dress up for the middle school fall party on Friday. Nik and Caleb will be 70's nerds, Matt and Jonny will be the Wright brothers. We build an airplane yesterday. Emilyis going on a retreat with her Awana class. They are staying over night at a Youth hostel and going horse riding hte next day. There will be a small worship band coming to join them around a campfire. Then we have her birthday to plan.

Speaking of birthdays, happy belated to Caleb and Patsy. We really don't forget, but the time difference is crazy with my work schedule. (Only an excuse I know).

I just tried the picture thing again and again it didn't work.

Dwayne and Scott what are your email addresses? It seems the Br. JT one don't really work. they conme back to us.

Hope all is well in whatever part of the world you are.

teresa

2006-10-08T06:32:00.000-07:00

Hi Family,

Happy Thanksgiving to you all! Just want you all to know we love you and pray for you regularly. I am truly thankful for my family.

Brenda

P.S. Good pics Pats!

2006-10-05T09:53:00.000-07:00

okay family,

this is why i believe i am finding more and more grey hair all the time! Lidi stumbled upon our little "princess" taking care of her "owies" with Jessi's diaper cream! We were happy the majority was on her person and not all over the whole room or the living room furniture. This came after already having spilled chimarrao on the chair in the living room because she was "climbing". We still have a half a day to go so we'll see what is next!! We watched the movie last night 'Yours, Mine and Ours' a family with 18 kids. We thought after watching that having 3 wasn't so bad until today, realizing Jasper makes up the other 15 in our family!!
I hope the pics work because to see is to believe!'

By the way Hannah, after Jasper saw your pic she said "i want my Hannah" She sure misses her big cousin!

This actually happened last week but we have been having problems with the blog.

Shannon

2006-10-04T11:19:00.000-07:00

Hey family...I finally got our pictures downloading onto our computer, so I am going to attempt to send a couple on here for you. Some are from Caleb's 70's party and maybe Scott at work...don't know exactly which pictures I'll put on yet.

Anyway, things are starting to feel more and more like home. Our cottage is so cozy, we honestly feel like we are living at the sitio...with a few neighbours. It is sooooo beautiful around here right now. The colors are spectacular.

We are heading off to Vancouver tomorrow for Carissa and Bob's wedding. We heard today that Carissa is sick with a bad cold, so pray for her, please. We have set up this amazing network of people to look after our kids, so they should be just fine. We are going to be back on Wednesday morning, after long layovers!!!

Thanks for your prayers, we miss you all.

Hope the pictures work.

Love, Patsy

2006-09-21T18:55:00.000-07:00

Hey...we got a phone number. It is 705-754-9398.

2006-09-21T02:02:00.000-07:00

Hi all, I skipped BS this morning to get our newsletter worked on and rest abit. Soundfs like you are all doing great. Teh Portugese seems to be coming along since I at least couldn't read any of it!

This weekend Markus goes on the middle School camping trip with the boys and Emily and I will watch the second two Anne of Green Gables videos.

Kenny Reed has started his chemo. He needs four rounds with each round taking 3 weeks. It all doesn't sound very good, but God has a plan here too.

Even though Markus isn't coaching this year, he still gets to help with setting up vball games. He has a tournament planned with a bunch of his German friends putting together teams for September 30th.

The boys played soccer against each other on Tuesday - Matthews team won.

Emily is giving a run for our money this year emotionally. PRAY for us.

I just tried the picture thing again - sorry I can't get it to work.

Hope Caleb had a great birthday - was there a party? I guess you must be making friends already hey!!

Pats - it sound like you are getting involved in things too, good for you.

Niklaas' writers club starts up again in Oct so he's been busy writing for it. he won't let us read the story until he's done with it. Mathhew just got an A on his history test that we didn't have any time to study for. I don't know how these kids do it!!

Take care all of you, I love you all even though I don't take or have much time to write or phone you.

Teresa

2006-09-20T09:24:00.000-07:00

A couple new picks of the kids,
Shannon

2006-09-20T09:02:00.000-07:00

Oi Muki!!!

E ai como tu ta? espero q estejas bem, estou te escrevendo pra te dar parabens pelo dia de hoje.
Tu sabe q dia e ne? 20 de setembro ( Revolucao Farroupilha ) dia do gaucho!!!!

Eu e a Jessi ja estamos comemorando desde hoje de manha!!!!
Beijos pra ti, Patsy, Caleb, Scott, eu bem especial pra Hanna!!!! q tbm e gaucha!!!

Lidi

Hey Muki,

Jessi sure wishes her gaucho cousin was here to celebrate with her but Lidi is helping with that!
Next year we'll have a big party together. Hope you have a great day and we'll talk to ya soon!

Patsy,
Miss hearing your laugh and voice around here. The girls in the kitchen say they miss you. We were helping with dishes during the Drime workshop after our meals. It was fun to visit with them and understand more of what they were saying. I heard you were running 3kms/day. Awesome! I'm not, but I should be. You and Scott are going to be ripped when you get back if you keep this up!! Cudos to you both!

Scott,
Hope the course is going well still. It sounds busy but a lot of fun too. Dwayne will be happy when you get back now that Pipa is back in Pelotas. He misses the guy talks. He is however doing very well with his classes and having fun with his teacher.

Caleb,
Hope the big 11 treats you well and you enjoy your new home for the year. Jaden found a broken knife blade by the kitchen so he is planning on making something with it. Maybe a spear or something. thought you would be handy to have here in this situation with your creativity in making these sorts of things.

Hannah,
How is kindergarten? I'm sure you are making friends and learning a lot already. Lidi sure misses you and Jasper too. She learned some Drime moves on the weekend and received big applause. It reminded us of you and how good you are at Drime as well. I think when you get back you and Jasper will practice together lots. I know Jesus was sure smiling too!

Miss you lots Buhlers!
Love,
Shannon

2006-09-15T17:41:00.000-07:00

This is a message for Caleb!

Hi Calebe, I wanted to wish you a HAPPY BIRTHDAY! I hope you have a great day. I am glad you are getting settled into your new home. It's neat that you get to do a Gym class with others. I hope you enjoy your new place. I will pray that you can make some new friends quickly.

Love, Brenda

2006-09-12T17:12:00.000-07:00

hey Dwayne,

either one of the cars is Ok..you would have better mileage with the Corsa, but it being a wagon does not mean that you would have more luggage space than the Vectra. The Vectra is more chique and comfortable, but will probably cost you more all over. Insurance and IPVA and also parts and service could cost you more with the Vectra. Either one is a good car. I think that I would probably go with the Corsa, but you need to check out these other factors.

scott

2006-09-12T15:21:00.000-07:00

Just a note to let you know I lost another Kilo this past month. I am down to 198 lbs. Pretty exciting.

Jack emaile dus and told us that someone inquired about how much more we will need for a vehicle and that we should give him the details to pass on to them. We're not exactly sure what this is about, but it sounds like something that happens to other people. So today Lidi's dad, Pipa and I went looking at vehicles and narrowed it down to a 98 Corsa wagon with a 1.6 motor and a 98 Vectra with a 2.2. Scott, what do you suggest? We couldn't find any Parati wagons in our price range.

Well have a great week. It was good to hear from the Buhlers and Wiebes. Schalms how are you?

Dwayne

2006-09-12T10:44:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone, we finally have our laptop and that means I am soon going to have access to the outside, once we get our phone line, which they tell me I may have by this weekend!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Things are going alright here with the Buhler family. The kids are slowly getting into their schedules, which means that Hannah is at school every second day for full days and the boys have Phys.Ed with the private school students on mondays and Wednesdays from 2-2:45. They are enjoying that. The church also hosts a weekly ball hockey night on Fridays for the boys. Muki is praying for friends, we'll see how God answers that one.

As far as the course goes, Scott is enjoying it a lot. He is being challenged in every area of his life, which is good, but hard. He is busy most of his days with Medeba, so you can imagine the change that is for us as a couple, as well as a family. We are used to being together a lot, and we are already feeling the strains of it in our relationships. Pray for us. This is a challenging journey to be on. As far as the camp goes, we are learning very much. They have been really good at embracing our family as well. The LDPers are young, except for 2 that are 26 years old. Nate is fast becoming a good friend to Scott, which is nice.

Carissa and Bob's wedding is coming up now at Thanksgiving and we had erased the possibility of going out of our heads because of $$$, but this week the girls bought and sent us e-tickets, so it looks like we are going. Cindy is thinking of coming out to look after the kids...if not, one of the LDPers(Naomi) has offered to help with the kids...we'll see.

I need to get going. The boys are at home(a 5 minute bike ride)and waiting for their teacher to get home so they can study. I'll be able to write much more often just as soon as I can get a phone line in.

We love you all...it's always good to hear from you all.

Patsy

2006-09-09T04:42:00.000-07:00

VERENIKI AND SHMONT FAT ALL THE WAY!!!!!

2006-09-08T20:43:00.000-07:00

Hello to all you folks out in cyberspace!

It has been a whirlwind here at 234 Conway St. in the last week. I started school Wednesday. Yes, I made it through the first three days. So glad it's the weekend! No, really, it wasn't that bad. It looks like I have a nice bunch of rambunctious (sp?) kids. 25 to be exact. I was making apple juice last week, in the midst of preparing for class. But, overall, it has been a very positive start to the year. Rob Charach is our principal now, and we have a new vice principal for middle years! I am so excited about this, because that's my department and we really feel the support now that Jeff Thiessen is there (VP). He is the husband to Lynelle Friesen who was the pianist at our wedding. He taught at Linden for a number of years with me (he did gr.6) then he went to MBCI, now he's back. He's a servant leader, kind of quiet, but a great heart for the school. He and Rob make a great team. Today, Rob told me, one of our gr. 9 girls got stung by a wasp and went into anaphylactic shock! She would have died if they had not had the epi-pen ready on time. She was not wearing it, and Rob had to bring it to her - she was off campus about a block away, at a tennis club when it happened. Phew! The mood at school seems to be peaceful, some of the BAD highschool kids are not back this year, due to bad attitudes. I can sense the difference in the hallways. I used to pass them and could feel the negative vibes. Lorraine DeMonye is now VP for k-4 only. Rob looks after the Gr. 9-12. We have a new secretary for middle years too, Jan, and she went to highschool with Al in Winkler! Small world. She's really nice! And efficient!

Tonight we went to a potluck with people from our former Home Group. Rob and Toni (Antonette) hosted it. It was a nice evening. We are anticipating starting our little neighborhood Bible Study in October. So far, Paul and Lisa have committed to coming. We will keep praying for our neighbors and see what happens.

We are starting this "Making the Most of Your Marriage" course in October. It is a 7 week video course. We will help by facilitating discussion after the videos.

SNOW in Gramado? How long did it stay? Dwayne, I loved your detailed questions for each of us in your blog. Way to go! I took only the one course, Math curriculum, this summer. It introduced the new curriculum for 2007 Fall. Syl's wedding was really nice, worshipful. It started with worship singing! Very simple. Casual. Bar-B-Q reception, stand-up - kind of like yours. They served Coke in a can! And Pepsi too, and various other flavours. There was no program later. The reception was right after the ceremony. The whole wedding was over in 3 and one half hours.
It was so "Sylvia!" She would have liked to play ultimate frisbee, but wouldn't have been able to run in her wedding dress! Jonathon seems like a really nice guy. She had a bunch of her students there. Now she is Mrs. Epp. No longer Miss Fehr. It was cute to see her kids. They were thrilled!

Tomorrow we want to go to the MCC auction in Morris. We're going for lunch - maybe vereniki with schmont fat? Mmmmmm! Or maybe borscht? What do you think?

Dad, we hope you're feeling good today. I guess it was a long day yesterday. We'll see you soon. Maybe this weekend.

O.K. I will sign off. We love you all. We are praying for each one of you. May you sense God's direction and peace. God is good, all the time. He never forsakes His children. His mercies are new every morning.

Brenda

2006-09-08T10:39:00.000-07:00

Hello? Anyone there?

2006-09-04T09:46:00.000-07:00

Hey family,

Just a quick note for all you people experiencing warm weather. It is SNOWING here!!!! That's right snow, our first year here and we get snow. Lidi was out getting clothes off the line and came running in to tell us. Very cool and very cold at the same time. Jasper was excited to see the snow almost as much as Lidi.
Anyway the fire is going and it is much warmer in here.

Have a super day!
Shannon

2006-08-31T04:03:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

It is good to see some action on the blog again. For a while, there, I thought it wasn't working.

S&P it is good to finally hear from you. We heard a little through mom and dad. I'm glad you all like your cottage and think it will be good for you. Ca and Muki, are you excited about joining the other kids for phys. ed. and Canadian geography? I loved geography when it was in school. And Hannah, how excited are you that you get to go to kindergarten with other kids! You will have so much fun and make new friends to play with. Have you kids explored the whole camp yet? I bet you won't be able to explore it all in the 10 months your there. There must be so many new things to see and do. FUN!

So, Scott, Patsy made it sound as if you were already dragging after only a few days! It sounded pretty intense from what she wrote. How has your first week been? How many students are there? When is your first trip planned for? Do you spend time in a class setting? How are your muscules doing? It is a good thing you and Pipa were running and trying to get in shape, hey? What kind of computer did you find or buy? A Dell? How was your trip out to Medeba? The van worked well? Did you get everything in? I hope you like yours as much as we liked ours.

Patsy, thanks for the update. People are wondering how you are doing in Canada. I think a letter for your Brazilian friends is a good idea. So what are you planning to do with all your free time this year? It sounds like your kids will have great opportunities to meet new friends this year. That will be cool. It will be good to talk once you get settled and get the cheap phone rate. Speaking of rates, I read on the internet yesterday that the gas prices in and around Toronto are the cheapest in Canada. That must be nice. They are aslo the cheapest they have been since March 28. That is great for you!

Tres, your holidays sound as if they were all but holidays. WOW, you were busy! But it is always good to see people, especially the ones from home. Even though you were very busy I hope you enjoyed having your guests. Now school is on and rutine is the name of the game.

Markus, how is your new boss? It is good to hear that he really takes interest in people. Do you see yourselves being friends away from work? I hope this year goes smoother for you than last. I read that you changed offices, right? Was that just a switch of rooms or was that a change in position as well? What are you working with now, still enrollments and such? Are you all healed up from you v-ball injuries? Do you start that again soon? Howard showed us your house and really the whole BFA setup on Google Earth while he was here. It was neat to see your place.

Brenda, is the countdown on for the arrival of students? When do they officially start? Do you need to take a lot of courses like you did the other day? I guess today you leave for your little holiday, right? Say a big "HI" and "CONGRATULATIONS" to Sylvia from us. We were very excited to hear she was getting married. What a great girl! Shannon really connected with her at Madge.

Al, how were your meetings in Sask? How is your new position going? Do you like it more than being on the road selling? What differences are there in what you do now compared to what you did before? Are you glad you made the switch? Brenda wrote a little about the new home group you a planning. It realy sounds good. It will be nice to meet and get to know your neighbors more and to invest in their lives. I hope that goes well for you. It will be nice working with the other couple as well.

Last Friday, Shannon and I went out for Fondue for our 4 year anniversary. It was a beautiful night so we went for a walk after supper as well. It is nice to have Lidi here to watch the kids which allows us to go out. I hope we will do more of that now that Jessi is eating other foods and she doesn't need Shannon all the time.

This past Tuesday I got my third wisdom tooth pulled. The bottom right side. It didn't go as smoothly as the last one which just popped straight out. The roots on this one were curved and so he took it out in three peices. Again, it was a huge tooth. I have to take a few different pills and use some sort of alchohol to swish over the holes to keep them clean. Last night when we were playing UNO, Jaden and I stacked the deck against Shannon because she was winning every round. So we were joking that the past while has brought me to taking drugs and alchohol and that I was even cheating on my wife. Next week Monday I get the last one pulled, then they are done. I am sure glad I don't puff up like some people do. Really it is pretty painless for me, thank God.

I have started my Portuguese classes this past week. So far I have had 4 and they are great. It is a lot more conversation based with homework for each class. I do 2 classes each day I go. Each class is 1 hour. It has been good for busting my confidence to speak, even if I make a mistake.

Well this is pretty long so I will get off and let someone else write. We love to read about what is going on in your lives, so keep writing.

Dwayne

2006-08-30T17:25:00.000-07:00

Hey family....finally we have the oportunity to let you know that we are alive!!! It has been a great experience thus far. Scott is going to be learning A LOT, because he is already feeling an overkill on his brain cells(never mind his muscles and syatic nerve)! It will definitely be a challenging year for him(he has already done high rope jumps and used his new climbing shoes, which really hurt his feet Mom), but he is really enjoying every aspect of it. I'll let him fill you in sometime on the course. The family on the other hand hasn't had the greatest of weeks because the cabin we are living in this week at the camp is full of MICE!!!! Mommy is the worst of course. She hasn't been sleeping very well hearing the mice scurrying around the room! But this too shall pass. We did go to see our "cottage" and we all loved it. It is small, but the space is well used. We should be OK> We decided to enroll Hannah in public school for kindergarten. She starts on Sept.11. She goes for full days every other day. Then today the principle of the private Christian school at Medeba told me that for no cost our boys are invited to participate in their afternoon phys.ed and Canadian social studies programs...so we'll see. I might even get a few afternoons to myself this year!!! I have been enjoying the kids a lot and the family time has been precious.

We miss you all...it's another culture change altogether. The staff here has been so very kind and good to us all. They are doing their best to make us all comfortable. Anyway, I could write a lot more, but I have no idea where my boys are, so I should go and round them up. Scott is sitting at the next computer at this minute and is ordering our laptop which will allow me better access to the internet...I'm feeling disconnected with my world.

Dwayne, I'm glad you are enjoying your classes...write in portuguese as soon as you are able. We want to write an update soon to our Brazilian friends. Shannon, thanks for the email regarding Lidi's money situation...sounds good. Your girls are so cute!!!

Tres and Markus, I'm so glad to hear you are finally getting some routine back into your lives. All the best with the new school Matthew, with the new boss Markus and with the new work hours Tres.

The rest of you...when exactly are you coming to visit??????

We love you all.....Patsy

2006-08-30T15:30:00.000-07:00