Christmas Eve

Billboards

I'm quickly realizing that I have a 'billboard fetish' - not sure if that's a problem or not but I love to read them... today my inspiration came from this one: "We need to talk. God" How true! I feel this new year will bring many more conversations with the One that has brought us to a completely different place in life. We hope that you are all doing well and that the holidays were a wonderful time of food, family and friends...
Soon the pictures will come rolling in - so brace yourselves for Samuel/Olivia overload!

Christmas Time

Well it's almost past for another year and I look back and wonder where it went... Thank you Jesus for giving us a reason to celebrate. He is the reason for this season and all the others as well!

Our kids opened their gifts from each other, Grampa & Gramma 'on the farm', Uncle Les and us on Christmas Eve. They had a blast and if we thought we didn't have that much living space before we really noticed it once they were trying to ride their little hobby horses up and down the trailer! It was a fun time. We tried to go to a church pageant (notice I said TRIED); unfortunately our little princess didn't think that 5pm was an appropriate time to be going to church and sitting! So after about 20 minutes we left and went back home to make supper and open our gifts.

Samuel got to talk to Uncle Willy (one of the greatest gifts for him!). I talked to my family and realized how I really wish we could have been there. We really missed family on Christmas Eve!

Christmas Day came and we got ready to head out to Hammond to spend it with the Raifords. We had an awesome time with them, the kids got to run and play and us adults got to sit and eat - how dreamy is that!! There are a lot of fun pictures of our day together but it'll take a while to get them online (I'm having some space issues on my laptop). Tisha and Kent opened their home to us and we are very thankful that they did. God is good and we treasure their friendship.

So we begin the weekend with renewed faith in a God that will care for us and give us exactly what we need when we need it - all for the purpose of honoring Him.

We pray that you all had a good Christmas with friends and family and that you had time for Christ as well! Let us know what you're doing... we would love to keep in touch. Thank you to all of you that are emailing and calling - we treasure all the communication we get!

Home

"Yes!" is an answer to all of you who have been asking. Yes we miss "Home" but we have quickly realized that Home is where your heart is and this Christmas we have focussed on Christ and our kids and each other. It's changed things a lot for this 'shopaholic'!

We miss our family and friends but we know you'll all do what you do at Christmas... celebrate Christ and enjoy fellowship with those you love. We will do the same here. We will be with The Raifords and we're looking forward to being in their home for Christmas Day.

It is hard to believe that Christmas came so quickly again this year. Yesterday in church we had the pastor say something I hadn't thought of before - "As Christians we celebrate Christ all year - but during Christmas the rest of the world joins us - we need to show them how..." We truly need to celebrate Him coming with our lives all year so that others can know about Him.

We went out to Tony and Donna Duplessis (some of you know them) this past Sunday and had a good time. Their granddaughter was with them so the kids were excited to see her and have some play time. It was a two hour drive (one way) so it was a good Sunday Drive.

Thank you to all of you that have sent us Christmas wishes. Thank you Jobe for calling Samuel - that made his day pretty exciting! Thank you for the special note Les! Made me shed a little tear missing life at home and being at Mom & Dad's with everyone!

Well off to do the laundry... I'll put up some pictures real soon.

Make a Smilebox greeting

Christmas

I read a wonderful church sign today; it read:
"What gift will you give Christ this Christmas"

I've been wondering how we can help our kids to understand that Christmas is about Christ and not just gifts for them and I think He just answered my prayer. This year and every year to come I hope that I can sit with my kids and have a conversation of what we will be giving Christ. I'm really excited to start that this year.

Willies contribution...

If you wanna see some MDS pictures of the work in Newton you can go to the following websites:

http://gallery.me.com/cmarider (or http://public.me.com/cmarider
www.mds.mennonite.net
www.newtonmethodist.com (click on MDS link)

New Mailing Address

Hey everyone - we arrived in foggy Pass Christian last night. We got to meet up with Peter & Margaret Goertzen in New Orleans for supper so that was a great treat (especially for the kids!)

Our new mailing address here is

Willie & Jacquie Friesen
c/o MDS
503 Church Avenue
Pass Christian, Mississippi 39571

Our phone number is still 780.841.1366

We will be here until the first week in March...

Have a great end of December!!!!

December 14th

Haircuts, Guns, Goodbyes and a Bathtub

Sounds like a crazy mixture but that’s been the last few days. I had an amazing experience in a Barber Shop on Friday afternoon. Ms. Teara took me to get Samuel’s hair cut. Too funny! Apparently they like me though because they talked about me (actually they were laughing at me!) I felt quite intimidated - (I’m wondering if I’m the only white woman that has ever walked in)? But we survived. I was very thankful that Teara was there with me. I would have either left or cried if I was on my own. Samuel did very well. He got up in the chair and he was doing fine until she was pulled through his hair with a comb (well it was more like ripping through them) and you all know how dreaded it was already! So he was trying real hard to be brave but all of a sudden the walls broke and he lost it. He really started to cry and I asked him to stop... didn’t work so I got up and was told to sit down and to stop babying him and that he needed to cry... But I went to him anyway... he got off the chair and now I had a devastated child, a barber who was upset with me, a little girl on my leg and a bunch of guys thinking I’m a freak! So I calmed him down and after the next guy was done Samuel was brave and jumped back up and he was fine. He did VERY good considering! And he looks great. He looks like he’s about 10 years old but he’s so handsome!

All the long-termers left on Friday or Saturday morning. We were left at the camp which felt so quiet but it was good to have some extra time to pack up and do some ‘extended’ goodbyes.

The Samuel’s house is so close to completion but it just didn’t quite get there. Willie is a little disappointed but respects MDS’s decision... but we will be coming back through on our way home to visit. We are so looking forward to meeting them again. Teara and Lester Samuel are such a grateful family! We just love them and thank God for allowing us to be a part of their life! We will never forget them.

Ms. Teara and her girls came to watch the kids while Willie and I packed up our stuff on Saturday. I had a lot of laundry to do so this was a great thing!

We got to ‘shoot’ on Saturday as well with Jason. (we still think it’s interesting that there’s a Rifle Range on a Bible Camp!) It was rather deafening so I left the men to shoot and went back to the house. We had supper together before going into Newton for a Christmas Train Ride in the park. It was such a beautiful evening. God is bringing His glory to us everyday in such different ways when we just look at the surroundings. We are quick to say that we could make East Texas our home simply because of the people that live here. We have met incredible people of faith and hope and love! The local people are friendly and so inviting. And we met a lot of short term volunteers in the last 6 weeks. Many will remain on our hearts and in our contact lists forever! We are thankful for people that give of their time and Willie has enjoyed working with so many different people. He always wished the work week was longer because after 5 days you’ve only just begun to get to know people but we’re learning to ‘get to know’ people faster!

So anyway... we finished our time in Texas with God guiding us through the day of blessings. We went out to the Call Junction Baptist Church where Jason preaches and God spoke to us through him. God is good! He spoke about contentment and encouraged us to want more of God and being good with what God’s given us. And another sweet little smile from God, I heard my favorite Christmas song in church!!! Thank you Jesus!

We packed our stuff on the back of our truck, cleaned our room and then we went to say goodbye to our good friends the Glenn family. I was doing the ‘strong’ thing and thinking I was so used to goodbyes that I wouldn’t cry... Wrong! It was really hard. We hugged, prayed and cried a bit and off we were.

We stopped by Lester and Teara Samuel’s home one more time before we left Texas. Lester showed Willie his gun collection... there were just more and more and more ... and they were all in the bedroom! Yikes. It was so great to see them and they were actually having a family get together so we got to see everyone before we left. The kids just love our kids and we will miss them.

We will miss our family and friends in Texas but we know we will see them again - if not now we’ll meet them when God calls us home!

So we’re now in Lake Charles in a hotel room and the kids were super excited about the full size bathtub (as were Willie and I!)

One funny... I told my son today that I just loved him to pieces.. “Mommy I love you together”. :-)

Goodnight.

December 10th

Thanks be to God for His provision. He is the Great Physician and He proved it once again. We are so sure that Olivia had pneumonia or some kind of Bronchitis but she’s doing well now... no more coughing until she puked, no choking on mucus she couldn’t get out, she’s breathing normally, no more blood coming out of her nose, and the best indication that she’s back... she’s eating again and fighting with her big brother! So even though we felt a little like neglectful parents for not taking her to see a doctor we did have peace knowing that God would take care of her and restore her. That being said I’m sure I would have taken her in if I was at home but... circumstances are so different here.

This is our last week in Newton Texas and we’re going to be leaving with mixed emotions. We have enjoyed being here and have fallen in love with a lot of people and it’ll be hard to say goodbye. Leeanne is pregnant and is due in February so we do hope we can ‘swing’ by on our way home after we’re through in Mississippi but after that we don’t know when we’ll see them again. They were the perfect gift to our family through these last 6 weeks. (Man I feel like I’ve said that about a million times on this this blog... sorry)

They are laying the lino today and tomorrow. It’s looking really good. The power was turned on today as well so they have air/heat and all that other good stuff. Cabinets are getting installed. Teara said she would like to put her Christmas tree up as soon as the floor is in so I might go help her with that. They won’t get everything done in the house by Friday but Willie is happy with the progress. God has been sending the exact tradespeople when they were needed - how awesome!

Yesterday we saw Santa and Samuel listed off everything he would like... Santa was patient and said, “Well, we’ll see if we can get you at least one of those things.” It was really cute, I thought he would be too shy to go up in front of all the other kids but he wasn’t at all. Olivia of course just went for the candy cane, forget Santa! Santa also did the coolest thing... he told the Christmas Story. I’ve never had a Santa talk about the real reason of Christmas (in public) and then they prayed!! How wild is that. I told Leeanne that would never happen in Canada! It was great.

It’s been raining like crazy... and today is the coldest day we’ve had. Feels like winter that’s forsure. I know there isn’t snow but we’re bundled up. I think it would be warmer if there was snow! The door to our room is not exactly weather proof so we have the outdoors coming in all the time :-) By Sunday we’ll be in our new ‘home’ in Pass Christian, MS.

Talk to you later. Thanks for being patient with the updates. Gotta run... the kids are waking up. Later.

Our Faithful God

Wow. We had the toughest week physically and mentally but we're so encouraged and excited - Kinda like the phrase...
"It's Friday but Sunday's comin' " Well Sunday came and the kids feel great, we've had a relaxed weekend that included a Christmas Tree and fireworks and family. Thank you Jesus... thank you for all the people that have been praying for us so faithfully.

Just wanted to quickly update you and now I need to run... it's our last week here and so that means a lot of prep to leave. Take care and thanks again. (and thank you Pete & Martha - you know what for!!)

Tough Weekend

It's been a really tough weekend for us. Samuel is down and out. Besides the adult teeth coming through he's been at about 103/102 fever every night for the last 5 nights and he's coughing painfully. He also started doing the limping where he actually can't walk sometimes. We couldn't figure out what to do and the Chiropractor offices were closed on the weekend. He's walking now (Monday) but we know it hurts still. Not sure what's up with that. We think it's his knees and we're praying really hard. So of course to follow in his steps Olivia had to get sick too. It's feeling like she might be getting pneumonia but we're again praying really hard that this doesn't happen.

The forman left this morning so Willie has some added responsibilities which he is both excited for and a little stressed about. The house is ready for painting so that's awesome!

I'll send pictures soon.