Well the new year has began with a bang..Alan will be preaching a lot more now that our Pastor is in Holland for the month of January, also continuing with the student work..plus he hopes to start visiting some of the church folks during the week..
So I'm still continuing in the Bible book shop, but without Hetty!(Dik's wife) I enjoyed working with her, but now the couple who run it have to come in once again. The fact that there were two volunteers on a Thursday morning meant that they could have the morning off, but now they can't as there are no more new volunteers coming along..need to do a publicity drive.

I love the fact that you say bonjour to folks every time they come in the shop..& bonne journee when they leave..In many shops in the UK you can enter & not say a word! the cashiers always say bonjour & bonne journee here..they don't know me from Adam, & I may never see them again.& in fact may not even mean what they say (of course they do!!).but it seems so rude to go in to a shop & say nothing to anyone!!

I love it too, when you first meet someone, you shake hands, then when you see them again you kiss them on the cheek.. unless of course it's your GP or Dentist, or the electrician who is delivering your washing machine! Although there was a time when I was going to the Dentist so often that I felt surely we would progress to doing the bisous..but no! tant pis!

I remember going back to the UK once, being introduced to folks who just stood & said "hi" It was so weird! no shaking of hands or anything..I mean I didn't expect them to charge over & give me a hug or anything but I felt a bit lost.....

The anglophone ladies meeting has fallen by the wayside for the present, as one of the ladies moved to the Dordogne, & another has gone back to work full time.. there may be another lady for me to meet up with each week, we'll see how it goes.

We have a wonderful beautiful new addition to the family..a hot point washing machine! Our other one gave up the ghost tho we managed to keep it going til just after Christmas..the programmer had a mind of it's own, & would just click click it's way around the different programmes! The half hour quick wash became the half hour very long wash! From time to time puddles appeared on the floor!
Some wonderful friends from the UK have offered to give us the money to buy a new one..it's lovely!! SOOOOO quiet & it's bigger than our old one, I can't wait to see how the "bonne nuit" programme works! There's a wonderful shop called Envie where they sell refurbished electrical goods.. We must have done about 3 or 4 washes just after it arrived yesterday!

So, still no news about Grenoble..David Vaughn is in Burkino Fasso at present, & so I guess things will get moving when he gets back..watch this space.
It's amazing that the Sunday evening services are filling up with new folks each week. Last Sunday we were 20!. If we go it'll be sad to see this work fold, unless the Lord sends someone to take over...