we bought a car!

when lance and i moved to taiwan we got rid of our cars. we'd each had our own cars since we were 16 years old. so it was really weird to move to taiwan and not have a car. when we arrived here we got scooters. boy, was that an adventure! traffic here is not quite like american traffic. there are lots of cars and even more scooters on the road. fact: there are more than 10 million scooters on the roads of taiwan. this tiny island has the record for the largest per capita scooter ownership in the world! that's a lot of scooters!

it took me about 4 months before i was ready to brave the hectic streets, but lance quickly jumped in with both feet! for the past 2+ years we have managed to travel the streets safely on our scooter. but with a baby on the way, we felt it was time to make a change in our mode of transportation. (altho you can see many taiwanese families all piled onto one scooter. it's quite a sight to see mom, dad, and 2 kids on a scooter!)

we started raising support in mid july by sending out letters to our individual supporters and churches. at our last report from our forwarding agent, we had $2,300! we are so blessed with such generous friends and family. at the beginning of september, we realized the birth of our baby was only a short few months away and we really needed to start car shopping.

first we talked about what we were looking for in a car: no more than 10 years old, no more than 70,000 miles, mid-sized (not too small, but not too big to fit easily into taiwan's small parking spaces) not pink (you wouldn't believe all the little pink cars here!), and around $3,000. we had planned that we would take whatever extra money we needed to purchase a car from our general team expansion fund.

it wasn't easy finding the right car for our family. we started our search with our friends Teacher Jang and her husband Peter. they gave us some websites that used car dealers use to advertise their cars. but we quickly learned the cars on the website were never at the dealerships. so Teacher Jang and Peter took us around to look at several places. in the end, the car we thought best suited our needs was the very first car they took us to look at. after a few trips to look at it, test drive it, talk about our budget, we finally purchased it!

it ended up costing us $3,400, but we just couldn't give up such a great car. it's a 2000 silver ford tierra with only around 40,000 miles. the previous owners didn't drive it very much because they often took their scooters to work. plus, it had been very well maintained so it was in great condition. we really believe this will be a great car for our family to safely travel the streets of taiwan! we can't wait to pick it up on tuesday!

thank you so much to everyone who helped us buy this car. without our wonderful churches and individual supporters, it wouldn't have been possible! (by the way, if you had been planning to give towards this need but hadn't yet, you can still send a check to our forwarding agent with "car fund" in the memo line.) praise God from whom ALL blessings flow!

typhoon fanapi

this has been a strange typhoon season here in taiwan. the season usually runs from april-october, and on average we see around 3-4 typhoons during that time. but we have yet to really have one hit this year. a couple of weeks ago there were a couple typhoons out in nearby waters, but we didn't get hit too hard. maybe we're getting a break from the terrible typhoon that hit last aug on chinese fathers day (8/8), typhoon morakot. this was the deadliest typhoon to ever hit taiwan, wiping out total villages and killing over 450 people.

but it seems like typhoon fanapi will be making a direct hit on the island this weekend. here's a clip from a local paper:

Typhoon Fanapi is picking up strength as it approaches Taiwan. The Central Weather Bureau said it could issue a sea warning as early as Friday night. Right now the typhoon has a radius of 180km. It was upgraded from a tropical storm into a typhoon on Thursday night.

At the time of broadcast, Fanapi was approaching eastern Taiwan on Friday night. The outer circle of the storm could affect northern, northeastern and eastern Taiwan starting on Saturday.

The bureau said it may issue a land warning as early as Saturday afternoon. Meteorologists say Taiwan may feel the brunt of the typhoon on Sunday and Monday.

Meanwhile, President Ma Ying-jeou said on Friday that he has asked all related government departments to be on call as the typhoon approaches. Some 600 soldiers have also been put on 24-hour alert as of Friday in preparation for typhoon.

we are really thankful to be here in taichung (the west central part of taiwan). most every typhoon makes landfall on the east coast and we have some mountain ranges in the middle of the island that work to protect us. typically in taichung we see lots of rainfall and some wind, but not usually enough to do significant damage. but we do have friends and co-workers on the east coast, so please be lifting them up in prayer.

we'll be sure to keep you posted!

anxiously waiting and preparing...

i remember when we first found out we were pregnant. time seemed to crawl by so slowly! especially those first few weeks/months. we couldn't wait until our next appointment (every four weeks). we couldn't wait to see our baby's picture on the sonogram screen. we couldn't wait to find out the gender. there were just so many things we were excited about, and patience wasn't coming very easily to us.

then last week, i looked at this blog and noticed my last post was several months ago. and the baby "ticker" at the top of the page read 29 weeks. and i could not believe it. 29 weeks. where had the time gone? we still had so much to do to prepare for the baby. i'll confess, i had a melt down. we aren't ready for this baby to arrive! we don't have a nursery set-up, we still lack some necessary items, we haven't settled on a name, we haven't thoroughly researched labor and delivery, we don't have a birth plan, and so on and so on. fortunately, i have a wonderfully, patient, encouraging husband who provided a shoulder to cry on and some encouraging words.

so last week we got down to business. we completed the home projects in the baby's room (tore down wall paper, repaired a wall, painted...) and put together all the baby furniture. it still needs some work (decorating, organizing, etc.) but at least it's looking like a nursery and not a storage room.

in fact, it's feeling so cozy, we started having our quiet time in there. the chair we got (from our b'town baby shower) is so comfortable. and there's just something special about knowing that for the next couple of months, we'll be praying, reading, thinking in that special space. it's a different kind of preparation for the baby, but definitely preparation of the most important kind.

even through all this preparation work we accomplished in the last week, i was still feeling quite anxious. i think that's probably pretty normal for the 3rd trimester, but i think i was letting it get the best of me. right now i'm reading in the book of philippians. i stopped and meditated on 4:4-7 for quite awhile this morning.

"Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."

i know that there will still be some anxiety about the major changes that are happening in our lives right now. having your first child is a scary, exciting adventure. but i take such great comfort in knowing that the lord is near.