Brief post today, as I don’t want to spend too much of my Sabbath on the computer, but I’ve been meaning to upload these pics of Jacob’s first day of school!
Here he is modeling his chosen outfit…
The family waiting for the school bus (he was really excited about the bus)!
Getting on the bus… a little apprehensive…
Once on the bus, he thought it was pretty cool (although he did admit later that he fell off his seat at least twice because the ride was bumpy)!
His school is in an English speaking town that is nearby. He is in kindergarten this year, and in a bilingual program. He has two teachers in two classrooms; one day he has class with Mrs. Guthrie in English, and the next day he has class in French with Sylvie (who goes by her first name).
He seems to be really enjoying school! He’s learning French colors and numbers, and is picking up basic vocab like hello/goodbye, yes/no, etc. We were puzzled for a few days at some of the seemingly random vocab he was coming home with… see if you can guess how he learned these words!
Wolf. Wood. Naughty. Pig. Fall. Brick.
Figure it out yet? They were reading “The Three Little Pigs” in French!
As you are able, please pray with us over the next couple of months as we try to decide if it would be best to keep him in this bilingual kindergarten program in January, or if we should switch him over to a different local school that would teach in all French. There are pros and cons both ways!
Posted October 23rd, 2011. Add a comment
As promised, here are some pics of our language school campus!
First, here’s our apartment building! A retired couple lives on the top floor, and the bottom is split into two apartments – we’re on the left, and another missionary couple is on the right.
Next is Jacob’s favorite part of the campus… the playground! This is right behind our apartment building.
Standing between our building and the playground, if you look to the left you can see the pavilion – a building that’s often used when the school hosts their summer and winter camps.
Turning around and looking down the hill, you can see the basketball court (summer) and hockey rink (winter).
Walking down the hill and to the left is the administration building. The top floor is apartments, the middle floor is offices, and the bottom floor is split between offices and classroom space. To get to our classrooms, you go through the bottom entrance and take a right. 
The next building is primarily used by the students in the Bible school here; the top floor is the girls dorm, the middle floor is the cafeteria, and the bottom floor is a lounge/hangout area for the students.
We feel blessed to live on such a beautiful campus! The leaves are just about at peak now (fall photos will be coming soon!) and it’s truly a sight to behold.
Last but not least is the “family” building, which is more apartments for language school students. Jacob catches the bus in front of this building every day.
The campus also has a boys dorm/Bible school classroom building, several outbuildings, a pool, multiple soccer/volleyball fields, and a few miles of hiking trails in the woods (the organization was given 90 acres of land, with some of these buildings already on it a few decades ago). All in all, not a bad place to spend 10 months!
Posted October 11th, 2011. 3 comments
We’ve finally reached what I would basically consider to be the end of the unpacking and settling in phase in our apartment here in Sherbrooke, and I must say, it feels great! Everything is unpacked and put away in a place where (I think!) I can find it, we have pictures up on the walls, houseplants have been purchased and potted, the cupboards are full of food… we are now “chez nous” (in English:- in “our home”).
Since I shared some of the crazy unpacking pics in my last post, I thought I’d include a few pics of the end result:
This is the view from our front door, of the dining area.
Turning to the left from the front door is our living room/office.
Here is our humble "salle de bains", just past the dining table through the door on the left.
Here's our bedroom - I've had fun putting up some Parisian wall decor, recovering the lampshades, and putting the black stripe on the curtains... making it feel a little more French!
This is the room that the boys share... its a little on the small side, but that's made up for by...
... the toy closet! Its even bigger than it looks, as you can walk in and turn right, too!
Last but not least, the kitchen! It's a little short on counterspace, but has room for all of the essentials (notice the coffee grinder and coffeepot, front and center?!). It came with a cute baby, too.
Next time… a tour of our school campus!
Posted September 22nd, 2011. Add a comment
