Kent and Jan Reimer

Central Oregon

janmreimer — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 03:52:00 GMT

We have moved again, this time to Sutherlin, Oregon. We are at an RV park and getting some much needed office work done. I am working on our Thanksgiving cards and Kent is catching up on all kinds of office work.

First of all, I went out to find the local Curves and I worked out yesterday We even got a short walk in too, although our weather was mostly rainy all day. There were short periods every few hours when the sun came out, so we tried to get a walk in. We were out about 15 minutes when it started to pour down on us, well a quick run back home.

The beauty of coastal Northwest is a lot of large, lush evergreen trees. But along with over 60 inches of rain a year it has other things too. We saw lots of moss growing on trees as we traveled. I was used to seeing the mold growing on the trees and lots of mushrooms in the grasses etc., but the moss surprised me.

Any of you who have known us for very long, would know that we used to live in South East Alaska. When we lived in Ketchikan we used to get an average 150 inches of rain a year. So this weather is not a surprise to us but, it just reminds us of our time in SE Alaska. The beautiful green forest comes at the price of lots of rain to maintain it. So we get rainy days like we had these past few days.

In this park where we are, we have some beautiful views. When we walk around the park, I usually forget to take my camera, but I should. We saw black tailed deer, a buck and doe, as well as several jack rabbits, that is the ones with the really big ears and about 7 wild turkey. Kent felt those turkey were pretty brave walking around so close to Thanksgiving. But NO, I think these turkey are safe as they are wild ones and no one is hunting around here. All of these animals are so comfortable in this park that there are strict warnings against feeding them, or they would become a nuisance.

Well, I do pray that you have a good day. Ours started out very foggy but is starting to look sunnier. With our temps only in the 40’s overnight I still have some pretty geraniums blooming for me. Yeah! I love flowers!

Love,

Jan for the Roving Reimers

Beautiful Oregon Coast

janmreimer — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 05:42:00 GMT

Any of you who have seen the Oregon Coast know how beautiful it is!! Kent and I had been there only once before and Kent knows that every once in awhile I need a “beach fix.” What I mean by that, is that I want to go to a beach some. and even though Kent doesn’t enjoy the sticky, sandy beaches he will for a limited time take me. No swimming, this time of year in Oregon, but a beach all the same. I love hearing the waves wash up on the shoreline and when the weather is pretty I love walking along the beach. I got all of that today and much more.

As we drove to our next spot we wove our way to the coast coming to the beach at Yakina Point lighthouse. There are lighthouses all along the coast, but it was the beach and scenery I wanted to see this time, as we did tour the lighthouses on another trip. So we stopped for a lunch with the beach and waves crashing just outside our window! I loved it. It was so warm, in the 60’s, so we left our screen door open. How special! After lunch we saw some beaches that were more rocky and even with a wreath of fog around the hillsides. Just really nice.

We are currently parked in an RV park in Coos Bay, Oregon. We are here as Kent will be speaking to a church missions committee on Tuesday. But when we went to church on Sunday, we were warmly welcomed and several families had a potluck after the services for us. Kent was able to coach an adult couple and their family from this church to go with WorldVenture to Ivory Coast this past summer for a month. They helped at the hospital as the man is a radiology technician. There are possibilities of them returning. So it is an especially good meeting for this couple to hear first hand about their experience but also for the church to move toward a deeper relationship with WorldVenture. We are so excited for what God has planned here.

Here is an addition to this blog as this one was written earlier and did not get posted...

Today was another beautiful and unseasonably warm day! so we took off and went to the coast again. We went to several spots along the coast, one called Cape Arago and a little inlet right before it. We actually hiked down to the beach which was strewn with lots of driftwood and found a huge driftwood log that we first sat on and then lay down on and took a little snooze! It was about 70 degrees and in the inlet almost no wind and so warm, sunny and quiet because we were the only ones there. It was just gorgeous and just what my soul needs from time to time. We hiked several more places and took lots of pictures. We even saw and heard Sea Lions and large seals. Fun!

We ended up going to Charleston, a small town nearby for a fish lunch and then wove our way back to Coos Bay. We went down town Coos Bay and looked over the boardwalk where there is an interesting interpretive walk explaining many things about the town. Fun! By about 3:30pm a fog and clouds started rollin in. And it looked like time to head home. so now we are in our cozy little home with the temperatures outside still about 57. Still very nice weather for November 17th. I just praise God for days like this that surprise you!

Have a great day wherever you are!!!

Jan for Roving Reimers

Check out our pictures as I added some of the coast from our day today.

Two weeks in Portland, Oregon

janmreimer — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 05:36:00 GMT

We moved from Bellingham, Washington two weeks ago. We had parked here in the same place last fall so were glad to be able to park here again. BECAUSE kent had to fly to Phoenix almost as soon as we were settled in here. So I took him to the airport and then was wondering what to do with all the time she had on her hands.

Well, for the past year I have not been able to do almost anything creative. I had kept my scrap book things but had thought that i would just have to give them away. WELL, I pulled out the things and decided to work on a album of our children’s weddings. I had the pictures for I had planned to do one..but things moved so quickly for us when moving into this lifestyle..I had not had time. SO.. I got busy and because I thought the weather might be a little rainy...Well, it was VERY RAINY! So I stayed near home and worked on the album, only going out for supplies. It literally rained 5 days and nights... It could have been very dreary, but I was busy and didn't mind it too much!

I got it done!!! I would rent movies at the library to help me pass the time or listen to the radio and I just kept working. I am so excited that I got it done and I have decided to not give my things away but that at times I could work on projects like this.

Kent did get home and had a wonderful and busy week here renewing friendships and catching up on things at home. He had a very busy week in Phoenix and god is using the contacts there in neat ways. We take off tomorrow for Corvallis, Oregon and then on to the coast.

Now I am working on Thanksgiving cards. I have some already but will make some too. I like to send Thanksgiving cards for several reasons..First of all, because I am very thankful to have people in my life that love, care for and pray and support us! Thanksgiving seems like a time to be giving Thanks to those people as well as to God for having them. I always try to send cards to our supporters at this time of year. They have been trusted, valuable and appreciated friends over these 30 years of ministry. We are very thankful for them! I hope you have many people in your life that you are thankful for! If not, try to make some new friends!

Love and gratitude,
Jan and Kent the Roving Reimers

Family get together in October

janmreimer — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 02:29:00 GMT

I have to tell you that I was sooo excited to see all of our family in one place. It has been since last December that we’ve all been together. It seemed a whole lot longer than that too. I could not wait to see and hold Silas now a big three year old. I was like a kid on Christmas morning, just trying to stay calm until they arrived.

We were able to get together in Bellingham, Washington which is about 80 miles north of Seattle, where Kent’s parents are living. They are still living on their own and still on their small farm, which is remarkable since they are 87 and 83. We are grateful that they have relatively good health and are still able to get to events that they want to go to. And the family wanted to see them and the farm, therefore the reason for going there.

We decided to do an October trip for our family for several reasons. One was because Kara had a fall break and had been thinking of she and her husband Nick going to see grandma and grandpa. We also were coming to visit grandma and grandpa to help with fall chores before heading south for the winter(yes, we are like the birds and look for warmer weather.) So we just needed to get Josh, Teresa and Silas there. Class schedules as well as work schedules looked like we wouldn’t all be there but in the end God worked out those details. So we did get 2 1/2 days together with all of our family. What a special time it was too!

We as a family did get to Vancouver, Canada..so we all got to use our passports, yes even Silas has one. We had a great day exploring and seeing the beautiful area. The weather was just great the entire weekend and I was thrilled. On Sunday we all went to church with grandpa and grandma and also Kent’s sister’s family as well. We had a great time all in all and it went by way too fast.

Kara had off all week and so stayed two extra days with us and that was just lots of fun! She even made us a carrot soup from grandpa’s delicious carrots right from the garden.

I was sad when they were all gone BUT we got busy helping with fall chores. We helped dad along with the help of many others, we took down a big fir tree. It was about 50 feet high and very lush with many branches. But we had so much help that it was taken care of much earlier than I thought it would be. So we all did other things around the farm that would help mom and dad. We left this morning from Bellingham and traveled south past Olympia, WA. we are parked at an Rv park called Mt St. Helen's Park. So yes we are very close to the mountain that blew its top in 1980. We arrived early enough so we took the drive to see it. Wow! It blew about 2000 feet off the top. It must have been something to have seen it. We did see the mountain before it blew its top and have never taken the time to go back and see it now. So we did today.

I will put on some new photos and include one of the mountain for you. But of course the most important ones are of the family.

Love to you all,

Jan for the Roving Reimers

Old slides and many good memories

janmreimer — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 05:23:00 GMT

I have been working all week long on a project that I have been wanting to do since before we moved into our RV over a year ago. I have ben digitizing our old slides. When we were married over 33 years ago..many of us took slides cause it was cheaper. I know this generation with all the digital photography probably can not understand what I mean by that, but trust me that is what many of us in our age group did.

So the big project has been to try to scan all of these old slides into our friends (our hosts) computer and then eventually to make a DVD of them. Then we can actually show them to our family and others who might like to see these old pictures. Well, our hosts, Denny and Brenda Lippert have all the great computer equipment and a great scanner and a software program (Photoshop) which even helps you to restore the picture in many ways. I had been doing so much restoring that I wasn’t going to get all the slides scanned. so today I only scanned and that part is almost done. I ask Kent for my birthday to get me the software to fix minor things anyway, and that will help a lot to actually seeing these pictures.

So what are all these pictures that I have been working on?? Well mot of them were taken before we had children. Some of them even before we were married while dating and college days. We were married 5 years before our kids came along. Kent went to aviation school in Tennessee, all of the people and then traveling we did as we joined the mission and then traveled west together for the first time for me. It was interesting to see all of these over 30 year old pictures. We sure looked young in them. Once they are digitized and on a DVD I will post some of them for you to have a laugh. Also we had over 100 of us living in Brazil and lots of interesting things there.

Wow! Doing this project has been another one of those God moments for me. Just seeing all the places god has taken us and the many good friends along the way, has been truly a blessing. So even though it has taken a long time to get it done, I am very grateful in many ways, both to God for our life in Him and for Brenda and Denny Lippert for allowing me to do it on their equipment. Praise God! I got finished with scanning in the slides today!! Yeah!

I hope you are preserving your history in some way. It sure is a fun testimony to the next generation.

May God give you many good memories that you want to preserve!

Love in Christ,

Jan for the Roving Reimers

30 Years in Missions Ministry

janmreimer — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 03:12:00 GMT

Kent and I celebrated another anniversary in September.

No, not a wedding anniversary but one just as significant. 30 years in missions ministry. I can hardly believe it. We were able to put together a very special Newsletter in celebration of this significant event in our lives and ministry years. If you have not received a copy take a look at it by going to the WorldVenture web site at:

http://worldventure.com/Missionaries/Missionary-Directory/Missionary/Reimer_Kent_Jan/Links.html

I just now tried this and it worked fine. If it doesn't for you let me know. Thanks!

It was a fun and hard adventure..I was trying to sort through over a hundred pictures when I finally asked our hostess, Brenda to give me some help, BUT I never knew that she was a graphic artist and had all kinds of equipment to get this job done. Nor did I fathom the hours that she would put in to helping me make this special letter a reality much quicker than I ever could have. So I do hope you can enjoy it.

While sorting through those pictures I was reminded of how very faithful God has been to us. Through thick and thin He has helped us, sustained us, carried us at times and also His people have been there for us so many times. I am so grateful to God for giving us the opportunities to minister in His name all these years. And what a life we have had; living in Alaska, the Amazon and all over the US as well visiting over 30 foreign countries. All this travel was before we moved into a RV fulltime. God has sure been keeping our life interesting!

Thanks for listening. I would love to hear from you as well.

Love and gratitude,

Jan for the Roving Reimers

Visits and Reflections

janmreimer — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 04:23:00 GMT

We just had a few days of helping out at Kent’s parents small farm in Bellingham, WA. That is about 2 hours north of Seattle. We have loved visiting them a little more this summer. No, we aren’t particularly close even though we are living in Spokane, WA. We are about 6-8 hours drive away and it depends on the route that you take. We have taken the beautiful scenic route through the Cascade Mountains two times now. It is a really gorgeous drive and I do enjoy seeing the mountains covered with the pretty NW evergreens and other vegetation in this area of the country.

We also had some good times with Kent’s only sister LeAnn and her husband Ken. We always enjoy being with them.

While with Mom and Dad Reimer, Kent and I had the chance to get to the beach on the Pacific Ocean. You see I need a “beach fix” every once in a while. That is because Kent doesn’t really like the beach so he does this for me to not miss it too much. I really like to go and enjoy the warm beaches where you can swim, but if all I get once in awhile is to see and hear the ocean and hear it, well that is pretty good too.

We drove home on Tuesday and have been trying to get a lot done before Saturday when we both fly to Denver for about a week. We have meetings at our headquarters and then a quick flight to Portland, Oregon for an all day conference that Kent is speaking at as well. So a busy next 10 days.

I did some reflecting today as well as probably most of the nation. September 11, 2001. I do remember being so glad that Kara, our daughter who was at a college only a hour by train to NYC, I was so glad to hear from her and know she was ok. Our son, Josh was in the US for another two weeks but headed back to N. Ireland not long afterwards as a missionary. I was grateful to know they were both in the states on that day. But I am so proud of our nation and how they responded. I do think the people who did this figured that this attack would knock us for a loop, and they were surprised at how we pulled together and helped each other. What a legacy to remember and to continue! May God help us all to remember that much of that day.

May God help you to bless someone today!

Love the Roving Reimers

We got Rain and some other blessings

janmreimer — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 20:04:00 GMT

After 8 weeks of no rain that is NEWS! The grass has gotten greener and flowers and all are trying to perk up after all the sunshine and no rain.

Kent flew to Phoenix, AZ on Monday to kick off the mission trips that he has been working on for the students of SouthWestern College. He had lunch with the president and has met with several others. So he has felt that the kick off went well. We are expected to stay on campus again and that is a nice idea. So the trip has been a success.

He flies back on Saturday and we hope to go and see his parents again in Bellingham. That is at least 7 hours away so we haven’t the the trip as often as we had thought we might. But we would like to go and help around the farm again. We are still ironing out the details.

I got to go to a beautiful local park here in Spokane. I love flowers and they had several areas with different types of flowers and bushes. The one main part reminded me of a park called Mozart Park that we saw in Austria. Very beautiful and full of color. Nice day out with our hostess and her daughter and children. Afterwards we had a Turkish meal at her daughter’s house. Very delicious too.

Today on my way to the local library, I stopped to buy some local peaches from a man who advertised along the road. The peaches look wonderful but the conversation with the man was even better. I first was admiring his flowers and lawn, after that we got to talking about our RV lifestyle a little because he and his wife would like to downsize. When I said that Kent still worked full time the conversation went from that to what we do and to spiritual things. He was a believer and we talked about world missions until another customer came. Sometimes in this lifestyle I become discouraged about not having any friends and then God blesses me with people like this. So two ways that God has blessed me just lately, a visit to a beautiful garden and a believer that was willing to talk and share a bit.

May God use you also to encourage someone.

Love Jan for the Roving Reimers

1 year living in an Recreational Vehicle Full time

janmreimer — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 18:50:00 GMT

August 8, 2008 was a memorable date for Kent and I .

That date marked the 1 year anniversary for us to live full time in our new “house” our Recreational Vehicle. So it is time to reflect.

What have we LEARNED in one year?

1. Kent and I enjoy living a little more simply with less stuff.

2. We can live in 300 square feet after having a much larger house for years. We haven’t had to many squabbles because of this small space. We do try to give room for each other to get their jobs done.

3. Hooking up our Truck to the RV can be as tricky or scary as almost anything in this lifestyle. This is my(Jan’s) hardest thing to do.

4. Glasses and dishes can travel safely in an RV, even crystal goblets.

5. We still get to see and feel close to our grown children and Silas our only grandson. VERY Important! I, Jan wondered about this and God has given some great times with our children.

6. We can Work full time and live in our house on wheels. We say we own “wheel estate.” This we heard from someone else but it certainly fits us.

7. Meeting new people is a constant but pleasurable experience. In an RV your neighbors are generally pretty close. We were surprised to find some close relationships have formed. We are so grateful for Mike and Ruth, Denny and Brenda, and also for Lisa. We find that most people are friendly but especially RVers and most especially full timers..that is what people that live in their RVs all the time are called.

8. All the stuff we left behind, we didn’t really need.

9. Getting service done at a dealership isn’t so bad. In fact, we have some great experiences especially in Spokane, Washington.

10. We would still buy the RV we bought with all of our modifications, our big Truck and our little car. I love my “house” on wheels. We did about 10 years of research and we weren’t sure it was enough, but after living with those decisions for a year now, we are still very happy campers, literally!

What would we do differently? Not much..we are pretty content, but...

1. We would slow down and “smell the roses or cactus” more often. We do plan to do that more in this next year.

2. I would not bring along my scrapbooking stuff. I haven’t had a chance to open it at all in a year!

3. We did hear of something we want to adopt while traveling. Some other Full timers have a 2-2-2 rule. They drive for 200 miles, stay two days and get there by two in the afternoon. We like that too because it will slow us down more.

We have had some learning experiences along the way..

1. Our first day leaving Denver..and I feel out of our big truck. OUCH! But thankfully no broken bones. Just wounded pride and arm...

2. The hookup and unhooking process is a little different in various circumstances, ie: different levels of RV and truck, like when the truck is on a hill..and the RV isn’t.

3. Our truck’s brakes really do stop us when needed. Praise God only one close call, but noone hurt. The brakes do a great job going down a mountain too. We have done that several times. Yeah!

4. We are a long “train” when we are all hitched up. We don’t turn on dime, nor do we go where it won’t hold our RV’s weight. We look before we drive off the road!

Well that is about enough reflecting..

Have a great day.

Love, the Roving Reimers

Back Home in Spokane, Washington

janmreimer — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 20:32:00 GMT

We flew back to Washington on Thursday, Aug 14th from our visit to Pennsylvania. It seemed like a very long day for us, since we had the 3 hours time difference but also had a 3 hour layover in Seattle. So our bodies felt like it was 4 am by the time we got to bed. We have taken it easy for several days. We have been catching some of the Olympics. Fun!

On Sunday we had about 20 degrees higher than normal temperature...over 103 degrees here. And that is hot by any one’s standards! We stayed close to our house where thankfully the air conditioning was working well. But we are grateful now as the temperatures are even below normal at 74 degrees and we are all enjoying the cooler day.

We had to pack up our house again last evening to go back to the RV dealership to continue to get the work done on our hydraulics. There are some needed tests to diagnosis the problem. So then we hope they will have the parts to properly fix it too.

We did know when we moved into our house, that these kinds of things will happen from time to time. We do have good facilities at the RV dealership and they are very nice and are really trying to get this fixed for us too. so We do not fault anyone, but we are hoping that this time it will be fixed before we move back to the horse farm.

We pray that you are all well and enjoying your summer.

Jan for the Roving Reimers

Continued visit in Pennsylvania

janmreimer — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 21:03:00 GMT

We are continuing our visit in PA with family, friends and supporters. We have had such a great time and enjoying being among some very beloved friends again! Our supporting churches here are always so encouraging too.

We seem to keep running into people we know at unlikely places, such as at the local Curves for Women, the local farmer’s market or at a Starbucks coffee shop. That does happen when we come to visit, but this time we have run into some people that we actually haven’t seen in many years. God blessed us with many great visits and good interactions with family as well. Our time is fast coming to a close and we usually run in high gear then. One more day until we fly back to Spokane and our house.

Kent has continued with counseling people interested in serving in missions while we are here. He has had several long telephone interviews of candidates or pastors. We recently heard from a family that went to Africa this summer for a two week trip. They want to apply for full time service. How exciting! these are the days that bless us and all those that support us are a part of these successes.

I still have a long visit with my mom, a neice and nephew. So we are looking forward to them. God surely has given the strength to keep going. We do look forward to being in our house again soon.

Thanks for your interest!

Jan for the Roving Reimers

A trip and family visits

janmreimer — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 20:28:00 GMT

Today we are in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania which is Jan’s hometown. We flew here(it was way too far to drive just now) last Wednesday to go to a missions conference at a supporting church and to see family, friends and supporters in the area. We are here for two weeks.

Just before we left Spokane, Kent’s sister and her husband drove over the mountains from Seattle. They had some grand children to visit in Moses Lake about 2 hours west of us and then they came for a two day stay with us. We soo enjoyed seeing them and having them come to visit us as we often visit them in Bellinhgam, WA. We had a great time together including them staying in our RV on our hide abed. They were troopers.

We had a good conference over the weekend complete with a PA afternoon shower. Everything is so green here and coming from a near desert climate we do appreciate that.

Have any of you been or heard of to Lancaster County, PA? Well it has tons of farms and a great Farmer’s Market with lots of things beyond farmer’s produce. But it is fun to go to and Kent and I have it on our calendar for Tuesday as that is the day it is open.

We were at a farewell last night for some old friends from this area that are moving to Ohio. We got to see lots of people there too.

We are also here to visit my aging mother. She is now 87 and having some difficulties. Sometimes it is better to actually see them besides the phone calls. She still is driving although very limited, but many things to consider with older adults. We pray that we will have God’s wisdom to know how to “honor” our parents in these years.

Well, enjoy the summer wherever you are. I am loving being in PA for a few weeks. In case any of you are wondering where we have our “house”..it is still parked at the horse farm in Spokane. Our hosts allowed us to leave it there for this trip. Our hostess in Spokane, Brenda is recovering from an emergency gall bladder surgery which happened the weekend before we left Spokane.

May God bless you all really well today! Jan for the Roving Reimers

Visit and repairs

janmreimer — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 05:00:00 GMT

We are still in Spokane, Washington. We have had several times of visiting a RV dealership in town to fix a hydraulic issue. On Monday night we drove and parked overnight to miss the morning traffic. This dealership has a very nice place to park if you need to. So Tuesday morning early we had them look at our problems. After several hours it looked like they had it fixed, but since it was something that slowly leaked...they suggested we stay for several days and check it out over time. So that is where I write from tonight. It is very comfortable and quiet here in the evenings and at night. So it hasn’t been hard at all. We have been treated so well at this dealership which is R n R RV in Liberty lake, WA(it is just east of Spokane). I would suggest to anyone who needed and RV or something fixed to come here. It is probably the best service we’ve had.

We leave here tomorrow and go back to the horse farm. We look forward to the Settler’s Days of the closest town,this weekend. That should be fun.

We did get to have a new experience on this past weekend. We went to a Cherry Festival. What it really was, was a festival to pick cherries in several fairly close by orchards. What sweet cherries! How fun!

We did take a trip two weekends ago over the mountains to visit Kent”s parents on their little farm. We wanted to help out as they are in their 80’s now. We felt a little weeding and other chores might be helpful. We greatly enjoyed our short visit and the work did get done. Dad’s garden is just starting to produce too. Yummy spring peas.

I do hope you all are having a good summer and enjoying some quiet times with family and just by yourself. May God grant you peace!

From the Roving Reimers

Fires.... and God's blessings

janmreimer — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 16:57:00 GMT

We are still in Spokane, Washington and have had a very different experience yesterday. We have been parked at a small farm about 10 miles out of Spokane in the country. Most of the country side around there was pastureland or fallow fields with some of the beautiful tall Ponderosa Pines with some Blue Spruce. We love this spot and I have just totally enjoyed having countryside to look at out my windows.

On Wednesday of this week we had an appointment at a local RV dealer to get some needed warranty work done. So we left the farm and went into Spokane about a 18 mile drive. We have been parked for these past two night on the grounds of the RV dealer which even had electric hookup for us. so we could use our air conditioner when necessary. We were getting the work done that they could do, although they are referring us to a hydraulic dealer for the troubles with our hydraulics. The hydraulics are what power our slides and also the jacks under the unit. So it is a pretty important system to be worked on properly.

We will be moving to this other company this afternoon and see if they can help us with it.

Our weather has been pretty nice , although everyone form here was saying that is was hotter than usual at high 90’s. We were comfortable and at night the temps drop to a cool 60’s normally and so sleeping is very comfortable. Well on Thursday we awoke to some wind and in the low 70’s. But we noticed that the wind was getting stronger as the day wore on. 12 noon was pretty windy but not so bad but by 4 pm we were being buffeted so bad I was wondering if we needed to move to be safe. At 6 pm as I was trying to get supper ready I really wondered if we might be in trouble. We had turned on the TV as we had been smelling a smoke smell. Well there were several wildfires burning throughout the city already and the high winds(gusts of up to 58 mph) were pushing them and they were moving pretty fast. By 8 pm they had evacuated part of the city where the houses were in danger. We kept the TV on and kept listening although the winds had died down and by 11 pm the winds were back to about 11 mph. So we felt safe to go to bed since we were a long way from the evacuation area and the winds had almost stopped.

This morning we heard that NO ONE was hurt in this fire that has destroyed only 8 houses but about 1200 acres of grassland and woods. It is amazing to us to see how something can be so destructive but praising God for how everyone was protected or got out of the way of the fire. Of course we could have moved to a safer location if we had been in danger...but with those high gusts I wonder how we would have gone down the road. I am grateful that God allowed us to be where we could stay put and still be safe.

Some of you may know that as a child of 5 years old my family lost our home and all the furnishings. Our family always talked of what we wished we could have gotten out..we always missed the pictures. But no one was hurt and that was more important. It does bring this kind of thing a little closer to me though.

Sometimes God brings these kinds of things to happen to allow us to realize how blessed we are and that things are only things. The real treasure is the relationships that we have and are making for the kingdom...this includes our families and friends too. May you be blessed today in a new way realizing your blessings.

From the Roving Reimers Kent and Jan

Settled In Spokane, Washington

janmreimer — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 23:22:00 GMT

We have been “off the road” now for almost two weeks. It time has gone by fast. We have tried to get some much needed chores done that did not get finished before we started traveling this spring. We are settled in Denny & Brenda Lippert’s back yard. We have a wonderful view of the countryside and enjoy the long evenings. We have taken several walks down the quiet country roads around us. We have seen deer, pheasants, grouse and heard about a raccoon that got into a neighbor’s chicken house a few nights ago. We have enjoyed the horses too. No, we haven’t ridden them yet but when there is time, we will. We met the Lippert’s daughter Kia and husband Mark and their two children, as well as Brenda’s mother who also lives with them. We have also been to their church, Trinity Baptist in Spokane. This church has been very supportive of many of our long time WorldVenture missionaries. One retired missionary goes there and we got to meet her too. We will soon be visiting the other pastors in the area and other churches as well. Kent will be trying to get to know them and their needs as well as ways that he can serve them better. Kent is busy almost every day though with new candidates as well. So there is never a boring day. We did get another newsletter done and off to the mission for printing. They will be arriving soon for those that get the paper copies. We will be e-mailing the electronic copy once it is proofread. So our days are full but we do take the time on weekends to look around the area. We went to downtown Spokane and found the beautiful and powerful falls there. They do use it for electricity. We had a nice long walk there and also found a beautifully restored old hotel in downtown Spokane, called the Davenport Hotel. It was very well restored and we walked around looking in all of the main rooms. It cost us nothing but the next time I’d like to stop for a coffee and dessert. It had a nice atrium that looked very nice for this. We also found the Spokane Farmer’s market. One thing I did learn from living in Denver, is that the Farmer’s markets in the desert region of the country are a little behind in what they can produce so the markets are a little behind too. In Pennsylvania where I am from the farmer’s markets are in full swing long before this. So I had to learn. This was a smaller sized market but had some great food and even a good bargain. I found some excellent local honey for only $5 for 12 oz. I love having local honey when I can get it. Kent was on the phone with a candidate for most of an hour while I browsed around. I even found a local baker that was willing to give me here recipe for Scones. We had made some on Saturday morning and found so many recipes on the web I wanted an expert opinion. She was so kind and friendly too. In fact I found all the vendors friendly. I have found my own way to the local Curves, several grocery stores and even know how to find WalMart. but as we are 3-10 miles from most stores I don’t just go to look around. We are very near the town of Deer Park actually. I had to go to the Post office there one day and so had a look around the city for myself. Our daughter, Kara and husband Nick are now in Italy. They left on Friday for a three week delayed honeymoon. Last summer Kara had gotten her teaching job and started to teach in July. They went to visit Nick’s missionary sister and family and also to go off exploring on their own. They will be having a great time I know. I better go and get the potatoes to boil as we are having mashed potatoes and steaks tonight. I wish you could just stop by. Love, Roving Reimers