Lettre - Bonne Année (english)

Dear Friends and Family,

Here we are at the beginning of 2008!!! As we wish you a Happy New Year, we thought we’d also give you a little recap of 2007…

Again this year we have lived in and experienced the wonderful grace of our God and Saviour, Jesus Christ, for which we are thankful and give Him praise!

Let’s start with Timo (Timothy) who turned 2 in November. The first thing that always comes to mind when we (or anyone else) talks about Timo, is his hair. Unlike Sophie & Dominic… his hair is a mass of curls, for which he can thank his mother. For a good part of the year and even a bit of last year, Timo had fluid in his ears which caused a bit of hearing loss and was likely responsible for a slight delay in his speech development. In October, he had tubes inserted into his ears (a very common procedure for young children) to drain the fluid. Within about 2-3 weeks, there was a remarkable difference in his speech. Now, he’s saying a good many things, but his favourite words are “Fries”, “Hide”, “Mouse”, and “Car” and now that winter is here, he enjoys walking around the house in his boots. I was a bit amazed to watch him over the Christmas break; he enjoyed being outside in the snow for hours, despite not really being able to do a whole lot. Since he was little he’s always really enjoyed being outside.

Since we began with the youngest, we’ll go with Dominic next. Dominic, at 5 years, is our extremely tender hearted and affectionate child. Case in point, yesterday afternoon at my parents’ home in Moncton, it was time to come in out of the snow and he was trying to get Brandy (Mom & Dad’s golden retriever) to come in the house as well… he couldn’t get her to come and so he arrived at the house crying because he was concerned that she’d get lost with no one out there with her. We love that trait about him. Nicu (as we call him) also started homeschool this year. He seems to be a very quick learner. He’s moving through his phonics more quickly than Sophie did and even math is going rather quickly as well. I suppose that he’s spent so much time watching Sophie learn over the past couple years that he’s gotten a bit of a head start through it all. We haven’t started him on piano yet, but that will likely also come soon. Dominic is also going to be Bible Quizzing this year with Sophie. The kids will memorize some 180 verses from Galatians and Ephesians, form a team and compete against other kids in the region. So far they have already gotten the better part of 100 verses behind them. We are SO proud of our kids for that. Our kids aren’t really overly involved in sports, but they do both LOVE swimming lessons at the Aquatic center and Dominic is an avid basket-ball player… just about every time we’re at church, he’ll spend some time in the multipurpose room shooting some hoops. He really does a great job at it.

Now let’s talk about Sophie. As already mentioned she’s in her 3rd year of school, at age 7. She is a great reader and it’s not uncommon for her to pick up a Reader’s Digest and flip through it for the sheer pleasure. When she’s reading outloud for her schoolwork, she also has wonderfully expressive intonation. Her piano lessons are progressing nicely and it looks as though she’ll soon begin the Royal Conservatory Progam – common here in Canada. Her favourite pass-times are playing with horses, barbies, horses, polly pockets and more horses! In terms of clothes… she really likes shoes. Of all the kids, Sophie speaks and understands the most French (although I think we’ve been more consistent about speaking to Timo in French than the other kids at that age). She does quite well and really surprises us by times (no talking in French to “keep a secret” from the kids)… just today, in the car, we were listening to a French CD and she started singing along. She is proud to have learned how to make coffee this year and will frequently slip upstairs early in the morning and get our coffee made before we’re up. What a GREAT way to wake up!!! We just got a new coffee maker for Christmas and her first reaction was one of disappointment because she’d have to relearn how to make coffee. In terms of quizzing, this will be Sophie’s 2nd year – last year she learned some 133 verses from the Old Testament. Although there were fewer verses last year, the material was actually a bit more difficult because the verses were generally much longer. She did very well and her team came in first place in the region.

Now on to Liz, my beautiful proverbs 31 wife... She would likely be very hard on herself, but she really does a lot of things and does them well. At home, she is the one who has been doing most of the homeschooling with the kids as well as the quizzing (which is incorporated into their school work – in the form of reading and writing exercises)… not to mention of course the house, Timo and her work at Air Canada. People are always commenting on her incredible hand at cooking and maintaining an impeccable house… we eat very well and our diet is quite healthy. At church she helps out a bit in the nursery and leads worship in the French service. She really doesn’t have time for much more as she generally works in the evening. Her work with Air Canada has really been a bit of a struggle this past year. Because of scheduling and seniority issues, she was generally working from 5pm until 1:30am but that has recently changed for the worse… 6pm to 2:30am. She has a lot of flexibility in terms of getting rid of those shifts – by taking them off without pay so she’s been doing that quite a bit and only working 1-2 days per week. Really the only reason that she stays on there is because of the flight privileges that we get, which enable a fairly regular contact with Nonno and Nonna (grandma & grampa in Italian) Bennici in Belgium. You can imagine that that’s a significant benefit. Note that she’s even getting a bit more used to the Canadian winters… (she’s neither wearing a scarf nor a coat for this picture!).

As for Mike… “busy” seems to be a word that is never out of fashion for me. This year has been truly wonderful in many ways. In January I was in St. Louis to record the French version of Exploring God’s Word, a 12-week introduction to the major themes & history of the Bible, on DVD. I was back in August to do the English version as well. In June I became a locally licensed Minister with the United Pentecostal Church – I can’t do everything that a fully licensed minister can do, but just about. I’m not on staff at my local church, but by the grace of God I’m involved in leadership and conduct the French services weekly. During the school year I teach French at the Saint John campus of the University of New Brunswick and just recently, I completed the requirements for my Masters in Arts degree, with a specialty in the Science of Language, from the University of Moncton. This was a 5 year process, so you can imagine that I’m immensely relieved to see it come to a close. Completion of the M.A. is intended to increase my chances of a more permanent position at the university, although all that is ultimately in the hands of God and will be determined by His will. Coming up in the New Year, Lord willing, I’ll be helping to organize the “Heart of Worship” conference that out church will be hosting in September ’08 as well as the North American French Evangelism Conference for the United Pentecostal Church – to be held in Moncton New Brunswick, May ’08.

In all of these things, our family is so thankful to and indebted to God for his many many blessings, his faithfulness, his guiding, his word the Bible and the Holy Spirit that guides us & helps us become more like Him. We pray that you too will experience the blessings that come with knowing God, in 2008.

God bless you dear friends!

Mike & Liz
Sophie, Dominic & Timo