When you haven’t blogged in a long time, sometimes it is so overwhelming everything you want to share from the last, say, 4-5 weeks? It has been, in the words of our fearless team leader Dave Veldhorst, “a busy stretch” to say the least. Somehow, it always seems our team is going through a busy stretch.
This month (Feb), visitors seemed to come out of the woodwork and into our lives here in Ram 2. The Burches, a couple from MTW, visited for pastoral support and to encourage us. Kendra, another MTW gal, who also had great insight into the Gao Wao bird’s call (“Is that a monkey, or what?”) came to stay before heading off to Chiang Mai to host a conference of missionaries in East Asia. (thanks for the BBW body wash & lotion!) The Henry’s had their family here visiting, and also announced a new arrival due in September…a new Henry is on the way (this is #3 for them, wow)! Paul Taylor, Director of MTW Missions in Asia, also visited for many days. My mom’s cousin, Dana, and her husband Tim, passed through Bangkok several times on an anniversary trip touring Thailand. And now, as I speak, Andrew is picking up our friends Lee & Helen at the airport to come and stay in Thailand for 3 weeks…and then in 5 hours from now Father-in-law Billy Bronson is arriving and we will make another airport trek to welcome him and other Kirk of the Hills visitors from St. Louis, passing through on their way to Bangladesh for a vision trip… Yippee for visitors! And…Andrew’s birthday (#29!) came and went, along with another visit to Nong Khai and back again. Here he is blowing out his “cake” of gelatin. Thais love gelatin and custard-ey desserts…their baked goods are not so popular (or tasty, if you ask me). 
We celebrated in Nong Khai after a midweek Bible study and a huge spread of food for dinner. Sometimes we can’t even fit our plates on the table because the serving dishes take up so much room! 
In other ministry news, I have continued to have a morning breakfast get-together every week with some women I have gotten to know – they are either free in the mornings b/c they are stay-at-home moms or work in the afternoon & evenings as vendors. Please pray for this get-together, because as of now, that is all it is…I pray someday it could become a Bible study or small group prayer meeting of women, if the Lord should bless this group and our leadership. Paul says in 1 Timothy “that requests , prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everone – for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.” I so desire to share with some of these non-believers the hope we have in Christ that they can also have.
I am continuing to pray about the group that in the past met to study the Narnia books – all non-believers. I am not sure what this group will become, perhaps a group that meets to socialize and cook thai/foriegn food every couple of weeks, or maybe it will dissolve completely…I am still in prayer with some of the Thai staff about how this will work itself into something, maybe nothing, or maybe a thing that looks completely different. It is hard to have wisdom and be in prayer constantly about this, b/c most of the time I want to just make a quick decision and not ask or listen to the Lord first, in everything. It seems like such a hard thing to do! Here is a pic from the last time we met to cook – we are in our house at the kitchen table. 
In the midst of this, Andrew and I have (sigh) tried to start studying Thai again, after a 2-month hiatus b/c of busyness and other reasons. We continue to find it hard to fit it into our and our tutor’s busy schedule, and find time to do follow-up study and review on our own. Pray we would come to a level of understanding of reading and writing so we can move on to our next topics of study which will include Thai culture and then Christian Communication.
I have also been to the hospital and back this month for an unexpected 2 day-stay, which was unpleasant to say the least (but aren’t all hospital visits)…I had an appendicitis scare but apparently was okay, just had some other intestinal problems and a thyroid imbalance. I learned the word for “full bladder” (which, FYI, you need to have before getting a sonogram), “observation room”, “appendix”, “ovary”, “fluid”, “iodine”, and “my throat hurts so bad I’m going to die” (which my hospital room neighbor said, not me). The wheels turn slowly in a hospital, so it took a few days to get test results back and understand my problem fully. In the end, I had one ER visit, 2 nights in the hospital, a sonogram, an X-ray, two CT scans, countless injections and bouts of fainting and nausea. But overall I was happy to be discharged pain-free and sans operation on my lower right abdomen. Pray for my health as these next couple of weeks go by and I try to feel more like my normal self again. We are really blessed to have amazing international hospitals here in Bangkok and fluent English-speaking doctors.
Recent pics: Me with Yu (Thai staff) and one of my students, Ning. Pray for her as well as all our English students, that we could spend time and get to know all of them better (hard when we have 100 students already!) and for their salvation. 
And…no, this is not our blue-eyed, blond-haired child atop Andrew’s shoulders, but it is the Henry’s (soon-to-be middle) child, Calvin. 
Pacman is apparently not only mesmerizing to adults who grew up playing this in pizza places and arcades, but to 3 1/2-yr-old PJ and 1-yr-old Calvin.
Thanks Bethany for the Arcade-in-a-Box!
And thanks for reading my month of February brain dump;)
