PROGRESS!!!

Slowly but surely progress is being made.  Hurray!  We now have a settled living room, a breakfast area, finished bedroom and pieces for the storage of family dishes, etc.  We even have rugs in some areas.   So things are definitely looking up!

This area has a rug now..nothing on the walls yet.  We're waiting for our stuff that's in France.

The table has a leaf for more guests

The area behind the windowed wall (in the top picture) is a sunroom, which at this moment is housing my two darling striped chairs.  This area doesn't have priority right now...we have ideas for it so it's a work in progress!  The breakfast area finally got a bouquet of fresh flowers but still needs placemats or something (to suit me).  Too, curtains are on the menu here but I'm not sure how to hang the rods on the brick other than putting them directly on the woodwork...hmmmmm.

As much as we liked the church we visited last week, we felt we needed to visit another on our list, First Baptist Church of Kansas City (an American Baptist church).  It's sooo much closer and convenient than Resurrection but is a small church (in congregation, not facility).  It feels more like a country church to me.  However, it was very diverse (which we love) and very warm and friendly (which is very welcoming).  The small group we attended at 9:30 was a mix of people, most I'd say, older than us.  We enjoyed it more than the small group we attended last week,  and they have rotating teachers, which would be a great fit for David.  It was a nice worship service, very casual compared to ACP at least.  Leaving we had a wonderful visit with one of the pastors, Rev. Dezo Schreiner, a young (by my standards!) Haitian woman who is absolutely delightful.  She has a great energy and passion, it seems, which is contagious.   We drove away thinking this may be a very different experience than we've been in before.  We could certainly BE ministered to at Resurrection but we could certainly minister TO at First Baptist.  We usually have visited a church a couple of times then joined.  This may take visiting a church for a while before joining just to see if it's a fit.  I just don't know...

First Baptist Church-Kansas City - to the far right the little "hut" is part of their Living Nativity setting that they do before Christmas

Now, I have to share the shoes I wore to church!  I found a box of shoes I'd stored when we moved to Paris knowing I'd never be able to wear them there with all the walking and my bad hip (that I thought was a recuperating knee!!).  When I found that box, I was like a kid on Christmas Day...I was soooo happy to see those shoes (mostly heels, of course).  However, I still don't think I can wear most of them til I fix my hip BUT I did try this pair of black (they kind of look blue in the picture) booties today.  I only had to walk to the car, from the car to inside church and back (with a little in-church walking).

I was never so happy to put on a pair of shoes!!!

As you can see, it's always been about the shoes!!!  That's me in the heels at my grandmother's house.

Now, and I know many,  if not most of you,  will not believe this,  my back felt so much better wearing this bootie.  I did have some knee pain and I did have to walk more slowly, but I've always said flat shoes made my back and legs hurt and I've always felt great relief when I returned to heels.  I don't understand this, but, for me, it is true.   I couldn't walk a million miles but right now I don't need to walk a million miles...I'm not in Paris anymore, Toto!!!!😉

Saturday night we went to the movies and saw "The Good Liar" with Helen Mirren and Ian McKellen.  Not exactly what we expected but it was a good movie, I thought.  It was strange coming out of the theater and being in a foreign place.  We went to a lot of movies in Plano (and some in Paris) so my mind expects a certain familiarity when coming out of a movie.  This is still new and it just felt peculiar.  We stopped into a Trader Joe's and got flowers for the table.  Fresh flowers on the table is familiar to me.  "Home" doesn't just happen, "home" is created...by tiny touches  of remembrances...like fresh flowers on the table.

Yesterday I went to  a new nail salon for a mani-pedi!  I'll let you know how that went!!!!