Good Long Weekend

Our missionary friends, Charles and Debra Reynolds, continue to show us plenty of hospitality. They invited us over for Thursday night through Sunday morning. Since we hadn't gotten internet at home yet, and since Elizabeth is still waiting for orders from her employers, we took them up on the long weekend in the country.

In exchange, we gave them some help on their current renovation project. On Friday we assisted them with installing a staircase to a loft in their barn/office, laying down a subfloor in that second floor and installing a window where a wooden barn door was. Of the 4 buildings that make up their homestead, this was the newest, which we are led to believe was built in 1886, as indicated in the mortar on the wall in the loft. It was a lot of work, but fun at the same time. We definitely burned off all the calories taken in during the good meals. We only suffered a little from the dust.

Today (Saturday), we took a break from the work and went for a bike ride to the nearest town with a bakery. It was about 10 miles round trip, and took us a little less than 2 hours. Along the way we got a good glimpse of the French countryside, complete with fruit orchards, livestock, corn fields, marijuana fields 1, barely fields, etc. We saw a bunch of chateaus, varying in size. It was a good enough workout to give us a nice afternoon nap.

Other than that, we've been entertaining their 3 cats, eating good food, playing board games and reading. It's really amazing being able to send emails from a barn built before your mama's mama was born.

Anyway, we'll catch up with you guys soon.

1 The marijuana mentioned earlier isn't actually the illegal kind. This variation of the sticky-icky, as explained to us, isn't grown for smoking, as it would make you sick, but rather for making twine.