St. Patrick's Day

Our St. Patrick's Day (or St. Paddy's day as advertised here in Enniscorthy, Ireland) was a blast! We didn't make it up to Dublin which in Ireland is the mecca of all things St. Patrick's Day but we did manage to fit in two town's celebrations, Wexford Town and Enniscorthy. Both towns held their own St. Patrick's Day parade which included...

Concrete trucks and construction equipment from local businesses,

Classic tiny European cars waving their Irish flags,

And interesting floats like this one from one of our favorite cafe's in Enniscorthy.

There were bag pipes, boy scouts, and the local sports clubs in between but both towns ended with a bang when they brought out the tractors. It was fitting since we live in the midst of farming country here in south east Ireland.

We also ate green things! James tried to get a green crepe but they were out of the hearty crepe fillings he loves so he ate a burger with me.

We did manage to snag some green whipped ice cream (whipped ice cream is what they call soft-serve). After James ate the chocolate stick and raspberry sauce off his he handed it to me stating "it's not sweet enough." That statement describes my husband's love of sugar and dessert perfectly, for him there's such a thing as not sweet enough ice cream.

Also, not to break anyone's heart or expectations but green beer is not a thing here in the non-touristy part of Ireland where we live. We did have green water at one of the restaurants we visited though. It wasn't half bad just disturbing to look at.

In Other Life News

My husband the ninja with the green noodle you see here taught an awesome word on worship this past Friday. Man, it was good!!! At the beginning he told our youth to take notes explaining the benefits of having them to look back on after you've heard something. I was taking notes on his sermon it was so good, and one of our youth beside me literally transcribed his every word on her phone.

Saturday James went busking for the first time. A busker is what the Irish call street performers. We have a new friend who is a busker and James wanted to try it out to see what it was all about. His plan was to just watch and kind of play along with him but after an hour or two he was doing it all by himself. It was awesome to watch! I absolutely love getting to see my husband step outside of his comfort zone and playing on the streets in front of perfect strangers is a big step.

It is finally Springtime here in Ireland! You can tell it's Spring in Ireland a few ways... first of all, out of nowhere, flowers start blooming like crazy especially daffodils. Then the temperature starts getting up into the low 50's and you can actually change from your heavy winter coat into your lighter rain jacket. It's amazing and all so new to born and bred Texans.

This Irish life is a beautiful thing. We see the Lord continually changing our hearts into missionaries who like farmers are willing to sow the seed here, water it faithfully, and wait patiently for the harvest. We get to call the church here our Irish family, because that's what they are to us!

Best of all we get to see the word that was prophetically given to James a year ago come to life here in Ireland in front of our very eyes,

"For as the earth brings forth its sprouts and as a garden causes what is sown in it to sprout up so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise to sprout up before all the nations." Isaiah 62:11