Moving Help

Thanks to Nancy's niece Sara and her husband Dewayne for loaning us their pickup to move out of our apartment. We spent two days, Friday and Saturday, distributing our "stuff" to family members, friends and charity. We are now out of our apartment, staying with Nancy's sister Neola until we leave on January 8.

GOOD NEWS! We just received our passports back from the Hungarian Consulate, so we are able to leave the country. Please keep praying that we will have no trouble receiving our residence visas when we apply in Hungary.

MORE GOOD NEWS! We sold our car to a young Christian lady who is beginning college in the fall. Thank you for praying for us. We board the plane in 8 days!

Happy Birthday, Jesus!

Here are our Christmas presents to each other. We bought "wedding bands" for our right hands. In Europe, the wedding ring is worn on the right hand, so we decided to wear our original rings on our left hands and buy new rings for our right hands. So now we are doubly married!

We want to wish a Happy Birthday to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. How blessed we are that he left his home in heaven to come live with us and die for us and rise again from the dead to bring us life.

We wish you and yours a very Merry Christmas and a blessed and happy 2008!

Welcome to Grandma and Grandpa J's house, Nathan! Nate arrived this morning with his mom Nadine to stay through Christmas. Grandma and Grandpa are hard at work spoiling the little angel.

Mike talked with the Hungarian Consulate that was handling our resident visa request this week. They told him our request has been rejected but that we could apply after we arrive in Hungary. This was very different from what we had been told before. Trying not to panic, we prayed and asked several others to pray for us, too. Michael Gulyas, the Hungarian Field Director, went to the immigration office in Hungary and asked them about it. They said the law is changing December 22 and yes, we will need to apply for our visas after we arrive. Please continue to pray that we will receive our visas without any trouble.

We wish you and yours a very Merry Christmas, or Boldog Karacsonyt!

Weathering Out The Storm

Here are some pictures taken Wednesday morning at the apartment complex where we live in Des Moines. We received around 1/2 to 1 inch of ice followed by snow Monday night. The temperature was 24 degrees and it is not supposed to get much higher than that the rest of the week. Most of the city was shut down, but we didn't receive the worst of it. According to news reports this was a major storm that stretched from Texas to Chicago. The worst damage was in Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri. We were on the north end of the storm system.

The pictures really don't do it justice. Even though it was treacherous to travel in outside, it was a beautiful sight.

Our Car in the parking lot

The building we live in

Our apartment complex

Ice-covered trees

Still waiting for visas

Our grandson Nate was a ring bearer at our son Paul and Kate's wedding. Thought you might want to see another picture of him and a couple other pictures from the wedding.

Please keep praying for our resident visas to come through. Mike talked with the Hungarian Consulate Friday and they said they are waiting to hear back from Hungary before they can send them to us. Mike let them know our plane leaves for Hungary January 8.

Also please pray for a good place for us to live in Hungary, language tutors, and all the details to be worked out in our transition.

We are getting ready for Christmas, planning to have all the kids (except Mark who is in Iraq) here in Des Moines Christmas Day.

More Grand Pictures

Everyone keeps asking for more pictures of grandkids. Here we have a picture of our grandcats, Ruby and General. Matt and his wife Mandy are the proud "parents." We visited Matt, Mandy, Ruby and General over Thanksgiving.

We are busy handling many details concerning our departure January 8. Please pray that our resident visa comes through soon and that we will be able to find a good place to live in Debrecen. We were able to obtain our international drivers licenses this week. Next on our agenda is deciding for sure what to ship to Hungary and getting it into boxes.