Read the Feb. 10 Chicago Sun-Times !!!

Hey everyone,

Make sure you pick up a copy of the Feb. 10 Chicago Sun-Times (if you live in Chicago). You can find it at Jewel, Dominick's, the gas station and other newstand-type places, and you'll even be able to get it on Saturday.

The main travel story (in the travel section) is by me, about me! It might even have a photo of me, though I won't know about that until I see it. I wrote about the experience of "cashing in" and moving to another country.

Sunday is also the day my Sun-Times travel blog "Across the Pond" goes live. I won't provide the url until then, but then I'll put it up on here so you can visit me at the Sun-Times page. Be sure to make comments, too, to get people interested in it.

In other news, I've had a few quiet days of writing and relaxing, something I desperately needed after 11 straight days of serving at church and at the National Leaders Conference (so exciting!). On Monday night I did go back to church once more to help with our next round of More, a course that Ade (one of our pastors, the guy who leads the discipleship year, and husband of my friend Emma) pioneered to help newbies learn more about the Christian life. Many of our 30 or so attenders just finished the Alpha course. I'm a table leader and help facilitate discussion, and I also will be presenting two of the evening's programs: one next week on Daily/Devotional Prayer; and one in three weeks on the Holy Spirit. I did this last fall and it was really fun and went extremely well, so I'm looking forward to the chance to present again. I love telling stories and using PowerPoint and getting folks really excited about the stuff that I'm excited about. I then send them home with the little booklet on daily prayer ("Meeting with God", linked to this blog) that I wrote for the Evanston Vineyard. I wish I could update the booklet because I've learned so much more in the 2.5 years since I wrote it, but at least it's a starting point to give people some ideas and inspiration for embarking upon the amazing, fantastic, mysterious journey of intimacy with Christ.

Yesterday I met a friend for coffee, did some required reading, memorized a psalm for my spiritual disciplines course, and then met up with my friend Alex for my first guitar lesson. Alex is a very good guitar player, but I wasn't sure what to expect in the way of teaching. Let me just say that I was blown away--Alex prepared very thorough introductory material, lent me a guitar and gave me an amazing lesson. We had to quit when my poor fingers were about to bleed. (Come on, calluses!) I left knowing how to alternate pick a chromatic scale, having learned three chords, a strumming pattern, and the chorus of a Sheryl Crow song. I mean, it's not like it sounds like a Sheryl Crow song yet, but I'll get there. And Alex gave me very specific homework before we meet up again next week. He is doing all of this out of the kindness of his heart, and I am so grateful.

Alex is one of my fellow disciples, so we share the Discipleship Year bond. On the last night of the conference down on England's South Coast, we disciples worked hard to help break down the conference venue and stack chairs at about 11 p.m. Then, in thanks, church bought us each a drink from the bar (I love my church!) and we all gathered around a table to chat. Granted, most of us on Discipleship Year had been meeting for drinks, cards and conversation each night of the conference, but this night we were ALL there, all 15 of us. We took a group photo and played the party game Empire (very fun) and it felt so good to have all of us together. It's amazing how if one person is missing, something just doesn't feel right. Being part of this little community is such a wonderful experience and I'm really trying to savor it, especially since the year is half-over. We're all so silly when we're together. After we finished stacking chairs, loading up the van and returning tables to the conference venue, the conference folks taped off the entrance to the venue and asked us to exit the area. The tape was stretched at about my chest level, and so we decided to have an impromptu limbo contest. I, of course, got under it just fine, but most of the others fell (especially the ones who are taller than 6 ft). We all stood around cheering for one another as we limboed our way under the tape line.

Yesterday was Shrove Tuesday, or Pancake Day, or Fat Tuesday. Since England is a technically Christian country, it's been the custom here for centuries to eat pancakes (really more like crepes) on Shrove Tuesday, so as to use up rich ingredients like sugar, butter and eggs before Lent. So my friend Ruth invited me round for tea (dinner) and we made pancakes. I usually like them with sugar, butter and lemon juice, but Ruthie had some golden syrup that was absolutely delicious on them. I'll get more pancakes tonight when my small group meets at my place for a pancake social. Yes, I know it's the first day of Lent, but none of us seem to care that much. I've only found three people who are giving anything up (sweets and telly). I'm not giving anything up. As Ruthie's housemate Josie said last night, "Anything I would give up I like too much to give up." And we all sort of agreed with her. I know that's the point of Lent, but none of us feel very convicted about it and our church doesn't put any emphasis on the season. In fact, I've never gone to a church that has. Maybe some day in the future I'll decide to sacrifice for Lent. I'm sure it'll be very meaningful, it's just not really on my radar at the moment.

Today I've got two articles to write and my Sun-Times blog to prepare. I also need to polish the silver, as I haven't done anything around the house for the marvelous Grange family in ages. Then there are a few really, really, really ripe bananas I thought I'd make into banana bread (i'm sure they don't have that in England) and I ought to go to the shop and buy some more tea since I used the last tea bag today. Finally, I may cycle up to the beautiful flat of my friends Andy & Lui so I can do some creative writing in a peaceful place. Oh, and I have a long meditation exercise for my spiritual disciplines class. Tomorrow the church serving cycle starts again. I love this life!