Lyon festival of lights

Not a whole lot going on at the Château right now - we're working on putting up Christmas decorations in preparation for the Christmas open house on the 21st - should be lots of fun (most events with lots of cookies are fun for me). Patty Morris is coming up to the Château tomorrow, to spend a few days and will be working on finishing up the setup for our new accounting software - and I'll be learning how to use it. Debbie, Pam, and Maribeth have been continuing to work on room 1 - they've scraped all the peeling paint off the ceiling (which is quite a bit of work on those tall ceilings) and are working on patching and repainting it. All the walls are pretty much done though, just a few spots that need re-fixed, where the stucco texture isn't quite to Debbie's liking :) I'll post pictures when it's finished.

This weekend, we went down to Lyon (about an hour drive south of us) to check out the festival of lights. So I do have a few of those photos to post.



This guy was making the biggest dish of Tartiflette I've ever seen (not that I go out looking for it that often). Potatoes, bacon, onions, and cream - smelled delicious! There were a ton of food vendors out on the streets - next year, we're going to save our eating-out budget - this looks like a good place to spend it!






Several buildings were all "painted" with huge light projectors. This church is completely white/gray stone in the daytime - all the color (and some of the statues) are just images projected on the façade, and it was constantly changing. Quite cool.














Another building, all painted with light - again, by day this one is just white/gray stone.

...and one more of the light-painted buildings - this one had a whole story that took place on it (and the one above, they're in the same square) - Huge loudspeakers played the story and background music in sync with the images. Quite interesting (and a little sureal)

Drawing of Châteauneuf-en-Auxois

Here's a drawing that Debbie just finished of a castle we visited last month. She's been trying to get back into her artwork, which is sometimes hard with all the stuff going on at the Château here - but I thought this one turned out pretty cool :)

2 videos

Just had two great videos I wanted to share with everything. The first one is just a cool video of guy (I think it's in Bangladesh) piling 20 bricks on his head, and carrying them off a boat. Really incredible. The second one has a bit more meaning to it - it's by an organization called the "Advent Conspiracy" - they're partners with LWI (Living Water International) who are also ICDI's main partners for drilling wells in C.A.R. - great video.

Parole de vie session

Parole De Vie

Today the Parole de Vie (Word of Life) group arrived. We're doing a combined camp with them and our own association, the AAC. About 40 youth signed up for the camp, between 12-18 years old, so this should be a good camp. It's kinda a test for future combined camps, so we really hope it goes well - Word of Life has a good reputation from the camps they do, so this is a great chance to get more people from this area involved in their camps (which are usually up around Paris).

Nadia's favorite spot

Our cat loves to sleep in our clothes basket. Usually, it's not so full, and she's all curled up inside, but even when it's overflowing with clothes, she insists on sleeping on her own little mountain of clothes. I really wanted to post of picture of the dead mice she brings us, but I figured that wouldn't be appreciated as much as this cute picture. My rough estimate is that she leaves 3-4 mice per week in our house or on our front porch for us... some days two or three are there to greet us when we step outside in the morning. We've been here 26 weeks, so probably just shy of 100 mice. Nice huh?

Cooking for the AEE group

Thought I'd post some pics of the food that Pam has been cooking for the groups this fall. For the AEE (Child Evangelism Fellowship) group, here are a couple of the menu items.

Apples baking in the oven - served with carmel sauce

Home-made mashed potatoes with baked-apple-pork roast

This is the AEE conference group that got to enjoy all the good meals!

Debbie & Maribeth working on salads for one of the meals

The cheese tray - we serve a cheese course before dessert at lunch

Pumpkin Carving!

Pam, Maribeth, Debbie and I had a fall party, carved pumpkins, had good fall food, and enjoyed spending some down time together. I think our starry-eyed pumpkin turned out pretty sweet!

Big Blue - gone for good :(

We sold Big Blue this week! After years of service, it's finally been replaced by the ford which I've already posted on the blog. Amazingly, with over 300,000km on it, we still got 950€ for it (Marlin paid 1,000€ for it, which I believe was back in 2003 or 2004) - of course, the Château has put money into repairs for it, but still, it's held it's value pretty well! Here are the last pictures taken of it - just a few hours before it sold. I decided to post it online, so took some pics, posted it on "leboncoin.com" and a few hours later had it sold, which was pretty surprising to me. Leboncoin is kinda like craigslist in the States - and seems to work pretty well.

October 31

Winter's here! We had our first snow... sorta. It was really more of a snow/sleet mix, but still, cold and miserable.

We just finished up with 5 days of cooking for AEE - the French version of Child Evangelism Fellowship. Had a great time with them, and Pam, Debbie, and Maribeth did a great job keeping up with meals for the 40-some people who were here for the conference.

We had a day off yesterday, today we cleaned all the bedrooms & meeting rooms, and tomorrow the next group arrives. We're hosting a youth event which is a combined effort between the AAC (which is the Château association that organizes youth events) and Word of Life. This is a first, and hopefully there will be more of these camps/events.

Yesterday Debbie and I drove up to Montceau to spent some time with the Hoberts, which we try to do every so often. Dave Hobert is the president of the CEP - which is the other Château association, the one that is more in charge of the Château ministry overall, and planning events that cover all ages. Debbie and I love the drive up there, it must be one of the most beautiful hour long sections of road around, we're really lucky to live here. On the downside, the gatehouse roof leaks like a sieve, despite my efforts to re-arrange the tile to stop the leaking. The forecast is calling for 6 straight days of rain (this is day one, and we've already got 5 leaks, and a couple gallons of water).

3 presidential debates synchronised

Get the latest news satire and funny videos at 236.com.

interesting time lapse video

Nothing to do with anything in France, but ran across this cool time-lapse video composition, and thought I'd share it. Nature is so interesting.



Nature [Time-Lapse] - Numaga - HD from Van Thieu on Vimeo.

October pics

"Ahhhhh.... I hate pigeons!"

Hello all - thought I'd post some more pics from the past month or so for you to enjoy. There's a whole album of them available by clicking here (20 some pics)

Also thought I'd throw in some old pictures of the Château, from before GBIM bought it, just 'cause they're kinda cool.

Enjoy!



Things are going well here, we've got a group of about 50 coming this weekend, AEE (Child Evengelism) - and we'll be doing the cooking for them. We've been enjoying getting to know people in the neighborhood - we spent all afternoon & evening with an older couple down the street, Marcel & Yvonne - had a great time, they were really friendly. Debbie made cookies today with one of our neighbors, Aurore - who is the older sister of Correntin, who comes over quite often to help with chores around the Château and play video games in the cave with me :)

Pear tart

Pam made tarts for the group today too. This is what interns get to
eat when they come, so if you know anyone interested, show them pics
of the food here - we'll need an intern to replace Maribeth when she
leaves in January :)

Blanquette de Veau

Mmmm.... blanquette de veau. We've got a group here from Villeurbanne this weekend, about 45 people, which is a good number for the Château, not too crowded, and pretty easy to take care of.

We had a great day yesterday with the "Operation coup de main" - which is the work day where people from the various churches come to help out (mostly the Mâcon church). We got a ton of yard work done, and a few other misc projects - but the weather was great, and everyone enjoyed being outside.

Today my parents arrive for about 10 days, so Debbie and I are driving down to Lyon to pick them up this afternoon.

Gatehouse work

Nadia decided to help debbie with some of the work on the gatehouse.
Since we took out a wall, we're now re-plastering the walls to make
them match.

Fondue

After a hard day of work cleaning up after the Lyon church group (130
people, and it went great!) our team enjoyed cheese fondue over the
fire for dinner.

Alarm System Ditch

We just filled in the ditch we've been working on for the past few weeks. It's for the cables for the new fire alarm system, to hook up the new building to the central system. A lot of work, mostly by Pam, Owen, and Maribeth, although Debbie and I pitched in too when we could (and our neighbor Corantin helped out a few times too). We ran into 11 pipes, and only broke two of them (both of them septic luckily, so no gas or water to shut off - one of them had actually been broken before, and we actually broke through the previous patch). Lots of old tile, old bottles, and bits of bone, it's quite exciting to dig around here :)

New van for the Château

We got a new van! We were finally able to replace "Big Blue", our old 1989 Mazda van with over 194,000 miles on it. This is a 2003 Ford Transit, 74,000 miles, and it even has AC! It will be great for hauling supplies, and picking up visitors at the train station or airport. Almost 1/3 of it was paid for from the Château 100 Club gifts, which was exciting for us - we have 38 people signed up for the 100 club, and hope to have a lot more, so if you're interested in being a part of it, it's a very easy way to be a part of the Château ministry - check it out at www.chateau100club.com

Macro pictures

Just figured out that I can hold the lens of my 50mm lens up to my zoom lens, set the focus to infinity on both of them, and take cool macro pictures (the lens are front-glass to front-glass). Here are a couple of sample pics, of my watch and then the auto/manual focus switch on another lens. All sorts of new fun stuff to try out now!

Ditch

Everyone working on the new ditch for the fire alarm system.

Burgess family at bridge park.

Jay and debbie at bridge park.

Maribeth climbs the obstacle course

Blowtorch

Last night as we walked back to the place we were staying and ran
across 3 men burning the lane markings off the street. Kinda sureal at
1am to see men blowtorching the street in downtown Paris.

Picnic on bridge in Paris

We're up on Paris helping the Plasters set their new apartment -
building a closet, putting together new furniture, doing some
electrical work and helping carry stuff down 8 stories, and back up to
the second story of their new building. We're taking a break for lunch
right now, on the "ponts des arts" for a picnic.

Chateau Kitchen

Kitchen art: Garrett the Carrot

More wallpapering pics

Dave & Sue Griffith found a house to rent, in Plottes - just 15km from the Château - so we took the day to help them get it setup - it's a new house, so all the walls need wallpaper & paint - which is the responsibility of the renter. We got 2.5 rooms done today, and people from the Chalon church are coming tomorrow to help them. It's a really great house, with a great view over the valley from the back - I should have taken some pictures from there for the blog.

The Griffith's have relocated from Le Creusot, where they've lived for over 25 years (I actually don't know how many exactly, but I think 25yrs is a safe estimate). They'll be continuing to work with churches in the region - especially some of the new church plants that are just getting started, and Plottes is a nice central location.

Wallpapering the Griffith's new place

Today we are spending the day helping Dave and Sue wallpaper their new
rental house!

Debbie's artwork

After 10 days of long hours at the chateau, debbie takes a much needed
break to relax and do some drawing.

Cambodian group dinner

60 people in the dining room is a tight fit, but they seemed to manage just fine.

Pam lighting candles for a birthday party on the last day - they had a whole pan of tiramisu left over for us :)

We had a great time with a large group of French Cambodians - about 60 of them were here for a whole week, and we did the cooking for them, so a lot of work, but a lot of fun too. We enjoyed getting to know them a little, and they enjoyed a great conference together! This week, our group cancelled, so we have a little time off from groups to catch up on paperwork, other projects, and rest. The next group coming is Rob & Nichole Plaster's film club, who will be at the Château for a weekend mini-film festival.

pics of our house

i'm in the states for my brother Joel's wedding. Last summer, i posted pics of John & I working on our house - taking off the old stucco. well, the house is finally all done - new roof, new stucco, and new paint, so i thought I'd post some pics.

work projects july

another quick video - of a few of the projects during July (we start cooking this month, so work projects are probably going to slow down a bit as we get back to just keeping the Château going)

video of gatehouse work

just a short video, with debbie and austen working on removing wallpaper, and a view of the ceiling, before we get it painted.

Pictures from July

I've posted some pictures from this last month, along with captions on my Picasa web albums - check 'em out - a few are posted here to give you a sample :)

yo-yo video

found this, thought it was pretty cool. enjoy!

Peugeot 305

thought I'd include some pictures of our sweet Peugeot 305 wagon. Cute huh? The weaver's sold it to us for a mere 300€ - a steal for this piece of French history (although when I found out it takes leaded gasoline, meaning I have to ADD lead to the unleaded fuel I buy, the Peugeot lost a little of its charm... but not too much). Debbie's considering painting designs on it... we'll see if we actually get around to it. If you're considering coming to the Château as an intern, you will be allowed to drive this car! I'm sure that will help many of you who are on the fence as to whether to come or not.