January Ends

January ends

With lots of cold days

Fantastically wild beauty

New every morning

Ice, snow and rising sun

                                                                                    The tools of His Majesty's artistry

January ends

With exclamations of how tired we are being cold

You know it is cold in the house 

when the dog tries to sleep this close to the fire

Dispite discomfort half on-half off the hearth

To be fair, it was early morning when

The winter chill of the night

Had yet to be banished from the room

 January ends

With odd collections of humor found everywhere

Socks for feet - as opposed to socks for hands, maybe?

Humor a tool to keep us warm inside

To onward go

Ready to shovel the pond to skate

Or forge a path to the beauty of our lake

Or enter the cold kitichen to prepare a meal

January ends

With the beginnings of

Established rhythms for the year

Of prayer with the church

Of family Bible discussion at a meal

Of build in exercise for everyone

And February begins

With dreams of community

Establishing a monthly board game night

Planning a Chinese New Year celebration to share

Ways to chase away the struggling gloom of deep winter

Year of Travels begun

 2026 barely begun, Mom left on the 2nd for Family Education Conference in Thailand. After fighting her way across Canada and beyond with patience and persistence (for the three flights of her journey there was one cancellation, 3 delays, and 2 rebookings), and living the day twice (crossing the International Date line), she landed in another life.

Leaving behind Christmas celebrations and winter sicknesses, snow and frozen landscapes, she entered the world where seasons are only dry and wet, where a dangerously cold morning is 15 degrees, and yet hotels still play music crooning of white Christmases and sleigh rides vainly trying to appeal to their international guests.

One too short day later, she's plunging into consulting families living in Asia, back end conference duties, and reconnecting with the team. Jet lag growls along in the background aided by beds Asian hard and populated with entirely too stuffed pillows but is quickly conquered by the all-day every-day engagement needed by a gathering of friends and workmates usually far-flung around the world.

The kids asked for food pictures - food is what they seem to miss the most and it can't be brought home to be shared - but Mom didn't often have it in mind at the right time to take photos... Still, coveted sticky rice and mango with coconut sauce!

A breather and a move into town over the weekend, and then a few days of team debriefing, planning for next year, and enjoying getting to know each other more. Since this time we stayed in 2 AirB&B's all together, we did get to know eachother much more than usual. And there was so much to say of God's outdoing us!

It was SAFE's first year attempting the conference away from our main office town, planning and running the conference ourselves instead of using a professional company, and partnering with MSG (we held our conference at the same time and place as them so families could join their teens). A bold move considering our attendee numbers have been precariously low since Covid.

And yet, our numbers were doubled this year, we actually made money instead of operating at a deficit, the week ran smoothly despite it being our first time going it alone, the team reports were all positive and full of furthering ideas for next year, and even the early attendee survey results had next to no complaints or negative reviews! When does that ever happen at a conference?!

And then Mom had to fight her way home again. Same story: flights delayed, cancelled, rebooked turning a usually 20-27 hour journey into nearly 72 with extra layovers and new routes. But, it did mean Mom got to try her hand at painting a hagoita paddle in Japan and snatch a few hours sleep enroute so she arrived more awake than expected.

Somehow, the shock of moving from beachside hotel in Thailand to winter wonderland in Nova Scotia was harder than going the other way. And jet lag also hit harder as there was less that had to be done (sweet family had done all the household jobs for the weekend!) and stronger reasoning to "just rest a bit."

Mom's synopis: Being there was fantastic. That team really is "my tribe;" I'm able to really be myself and love the work I get to do. Even though getting there and back was arduous and unpleasant, it was more than worth it.

And the story at home: Mom left them all sick when she left (and arrived in Thailand sick herself) and arrived home to them still recovering because they's recovered and promptly fell sick again! Still, they'd managed to look after one anther well enough with Grace free of school to cook meals and Dad present to manage Aiden's schooling. Everyone is very happy to have Mom back to run the household again!

So, one of 4 potential trips in 2026 done. Safely. Successfully. Way more than Satisfactorily. God certainly outgave us on this one!

Post-Christmas December

But first, Christmas Day

Morning church - harder to find this side of the world but gladly joined

An extra love-gift of a pond skate for the kids

Turkey dinner that mixed in some Asian flavors and stlyes

Christmas slipper sock gifts (and others too!)

The 27th was supposed to be our big day of extended family christmas and Messiah From Scratch. But, people woke up sick - in 4 of the 5 households expecting to come! So we postponed to the 29th, when we had planned to play board games together. Instead of a marathon day out, we left our sick one (Jasmin) on the couch for the afternoon and joined messiah From Scratch. Poor Aiden really was thrown in the deep end! Sure, he likes to sing and even experiments with harmony, but suddenly here he was in a tenor section holding a score of The Messiah (of which he is not at all familiar) and expected to know how to follow along as this giant motley choir rushed through a 2 hour practice of select pieces and then performed them with the orchestra... by the end he was enjoying himself and says he'd do it again, so all is well. Grace thoroughly enjoyed all of it of course :)

On the 28th, we went to church and lunch with Imma, and then in the evening Grace and Mom went back out to walk through the Public Garden lights and then join a hymn sing evening. We sure have missed gathering to sing like that, so it was a lovely boost.

Then, on the 29th, along came an ice storm (the morning heralding sky was amazing!), creeping sickness (now all three kids were sick-ish), and a host of little irritants so that the Christmas party was rather muted and not well attended. But we are glad it still happened despite delays and sickness, and there were no travelling adventures even though the car was encased in freezing rain upon arrival.

Since then, all we've done is rest! Reading aloud to finish the book before Mom leaves, watching together the one time of the year we do so, and doing our own projects that have been languishing in busyer times. Mom is almost finished Grace's coat hem...