New job

As you can probably see, I am not so into blogging any more. Life has taken on some sort of a  routine, and I am not so motivated to write, as the novelty of France turns into normality ... but maybe this is the start of something new!

I started my new teaching job 3 weeks ago and I absolutely love it! after a summer of chilling (or sweating) out in the amazing weather, taking holidays, receiving wonderful visitors, and taking and trips to the beach and the river (see below) and working a few hours per week in a restaurant, I feel like I have finally got a routine in my life. I now work in a language centre giving individual lessons to everyone and anyone. I have a big variety of students, from teenagers needing help with English for their exams, to housewives, to army officers, and people needing English for their work. I really love the variety and meeting so many different people. The biggest challenge of all has been explaining some of our tricky and sometimes completely random grammar rules to students, but I am getting there. . . The TEFL course was definitely a good decision!

More from me soon!

Le Gardon, Collias, Juillet 2012

Life in Nimes

Hi everyone,

Many apologies for those who like to read this, (no idea how many of you there are) but I realise I have not written for weeks and weeks. I have been in Nimes nearly 6 weeks.
What to say?
I am sitting in my room in my apartment looking over red roofs at a flawlessly blue sky (which appears 95% of the time here) contemplating the last 6 weeks and how much life has changed!
Well... yes, life has changed. I am no longer living in wet England, I am not near friends and family. But my life has been changing for the last 6 years on and off. And I am happy to say that although I could have moved 900 miles south, I'm still completely myself, God is still as close as He has ever been, and I am still living...
As of two weeks ago, I am waitressing, yet again. But this time in an Italian restaurant in the south of France where I spend 20 hours a week running around in varying degrees of heat, serving people in French and using a crazy auto-command system. But to be honest, it's still waitressing. (Minus the generous tips I was used to back home - French people just don't seem to tip that much!)

I am starting a 'proper grown-up job' in September in a language school where I will be teaching English to the general public, and doing some private tutoring on the side.

Quite frankly, when I felt God tell me to move to Nimes a few months back, I had to completely trust Him. I had no idea what was going to happen. I had four weeks to find somewhere to live, I had some money to live off for a couple of months, and a wonderful man to finally (after a year of long-distance) be near to. After a couple of weeks (and an unreasonable amount of stress on my part) I found a reasonable flat-share really near to the city centre and sorted it all out with the landlord over the phone, and JB went to collect the keys before I arrived. I continued to search for jobs online, and got an interview for the day after I arrived.

I only just heard back from that interview. The response was positive but I had to turn the job down, because since that time, (after about 2 weeks of being here), God had not only provided me with one job, but several. In a week, I was offered work in a childcare agency, was interviewed for the language school job, and was offered a summer job in the restaurant. I took the summer job, and the English teaching job. I am going to do some extra childcare work when I can, and I have also had several responses to my personal tutoring advert. God has abundantly blessed my job search and made me realise that trusting Him with my life was the right thing to do. Is the right thing to do, for all of us, all our lives. He will never let us down. We just need to have faith. In His love for us, in His provision and in His timing.
This life is a massive journey, right now I'm in Nimes, and I feel completely peaceful here, learning new things, gaining new skills and to be quite honest, enjoying an amazing summer!

So many things have happened since I've been here, but there will be more form me soon :)

Day after I arrived - white English person! I'm much more tanned now, promise ;)

Blessed, blessed, blessed.

The sun is finally here in England. Today was warm and beautiful and the air full of fragrance as it so often is in May.

I just spent a lovely evening with my amazing best friend, her parents and three french people. Life is so interesting sometimes!

2 weeks to go until the big move and England is looking so beautiful to me. I'm almost seeing things in a nostalgic light now, it's bizarre....

Moving back...finally!

On June 4th 2012, I will officially be moving back to France. Not back to Nancy - this time I am moving to the sweltering South, to a town called Nimes where a certain Frenchman currently resides.
After a lot of time spent back in the UK thinking, praying, studying, working, I finally felt like June was the right time to do this. And although I don't actually have a job to go to - yet, and am only just sorting out housing (in a house-share with two randommers), I am pretty sure God has got this one for me. I just have to trust that things will work out - they always do.
This is going to be a new challange. Real life - compared to a year Au pairing, which now seems like a kind of blissful bubble with no worries or concerns. But it's time, it's time to enter the next phase of my life and to be changed more and more through relying ever more on my Maker.

TEFL

Absolutely loving my TEFL course right now - getting a right passion for teaching and so excited!! Hoping and praying I will get a job :D

My Baptism...

So on Sunday, 25th March, I got Baptised!! It really was one of the best days ever!! I was so completely blessed by everyone who was there, through their prayers, words and gifts. It was completely awesome.

I just wanted to share the testimony that I wrote and read out before the baptism. I hope it will show how I came to that point, and how God has touched and transformed my life.

I have always known that God loves me, I have always known that Jesus died for me and I have been greatly blessed being brought up going to church, learning about Jesus and learning how to pray. Knowing God’s amazing love and knowing that He is always there for me has been a great hope and comfort all my life. But I haven’t always completely lived in that knowledge and truth.
 As baby, I was christened into the Anglican Church and Confirmed at 12. I made the personal decision to follow Jesus at that age because I felt it was the right thing to do and because I saw no other way than that. Jesus said “I am the way, the truth and the life” And from then on, I began to embark upon a journey of faith that was personal to me, growing in personal relationship with God and working out what it means to be a Christian. I learned how to worship God and to pray to Him in my own way, how to communicate with him in a relationship that is unique to every one of us. I had some great friends during my teenage years who encouraged me in my faith, and who are still good friends to this day.
 As a got a bit older however, I guess I wasn’t really living for God. Sure I knew He was there for me, that he would forgive me when I messed up, but I decided that I wanted to make my own decisions without Him.  And of course I made many mistakes. But God is so faithful. In all things He works all things out for the good of those who love Him. (Romans 8v28) He has turned every wrong decision and bad thing in my life into something good that has made me wiser and stronger. I have never felt like He wasn’t there. I guess I just sometimes acted like He wasn’t.  But He’s never left my side. Whenever I have called out to God, He has always been there.
During university I was part of a great church and I started to really love reading God’s word, finding strength in Him and being involved in Christian Union outreach on campus. However, it was after finishing university nearly 2 years ago that I started to really understand what it is to trust God with my whole life. Not really knowing what to do with my life, and finding the courage to leave behind me a relationship that wasn’t right. I felt really called to France. In fact, my whole life, France has been a passion for me. Trusting in God, I allowed Him to find me the perfect place to live and for a year I had a great church, and English Bible study and some wonderful friends. God blessed my life beyond belief at a time when I really just had to completely rely on him. I learnt how to embrace life in his care and to be more thankful for all the blessings he has given me.
 “Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus” (Thess. 5,v16-17)
 I have learnt to trust God and live my life in Him, praying about everything, praising God in good times and in bad, and putting my life into His hands, knowing that his ways are the best ways.
 In Isaiah 55 it says: “ ‘For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,’ declares the Lord. ‘As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.’ ” (Isaiah 55 v8-9)
 Through trusting in God, he has shown me that He really does know best. When I have chosen to completely follow His plans for me, He has completely blessed me. He has brought so many wonderful people into my life on my travels and back at home, He has been changing my heart and continually giving me wisdom, making me less scared and more courageous.
 3 months ago, I came back home to England, and as soon as Christmas was over, I wanted to go running off back to France. But God had other plans – reasons for which I can now see – to keep me here for a bit longer and He has blessed these last 3 – difficult – months of my life more than any other. I now appreciate the verse in Philippians 4, which says:
 “I can do all things through Him who gives me strength”. (Phil, 4v13)
 I have felt Him here with me in everything, even the tiniest decisions.  The last words of Jesus in Matthew have come back to me again and again during my life and especially at this time; words that profoundly touch me.
 “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Mt. 28v20)
 To really truly know that Jesus, the saviour of the whole world is with us, loving each and every one of us is really staggering. I want to follow in His footsteps, coming to Baptism, leaving past hurts and every worry and trouble I have at the foot of the cross to continue my life in Him for the rest of my life. His works in my life have given me faith that He really wants the best for us and that I can look forward to eternal life in Him. Looking forward, I want to be transformed to be more like Jesus every day,
 In Colossians, 3 it says “And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.” (Col.3v17)
 I want God to use my gifts and to allow me and to stand with others, encouraging them in their faith, and being to them, what so many people have been to me, to be a living testimony, living in love and allowing God’s light to shine from my life.
 

So that's it! I hope this has encouraged you.

Lucy :)

  

Spring?

March the 1st - birds singing, sun shining, daffodils poking their sunny faces out all over the garden, the sounds of lawnmowers and children playing, and my 12 and a half yeah old Black Labrador going loopy (when we all thought she was getting past it) again in the sunshine!

...and enter my 3rd month away from France: next weekend's trip to Nimes cannot come fast enough! But although plans have changed and my brief stay back with the parents has turned into something a bit longer, God has been blessing my life so completely every single day.

blessings...
My desire to go back to France hasn't ebbed, but my patience and joy in life here back home has increased in a huge way! I still miss all the wonderful friends I had back in Nancy, and the beautiful city I used to live in. But I have been blessed with some great friends back here, a loving church, jobs, beautiful countryside and the change to spend time with my family.

I have also had more time for hobbies such as cooking and... knitting! And most importantly, time to spend more time with God.

Long-distance relationships - though tricky - are a real test of how strong the relationship is, and absence really does make the heart grow fonder. The frenchman and I have managed to spend some really good little breaks together and skype is a HUGE blessing!


future plans...
So in case you're wondering, I am  still super-keen to get back to France. But I am also very keen to become and English teacher there. After much job searching and negative responses to applications, I have resigned myself to the fact that I need a TEFL qualification. So I'm taking a 100 hour online TEFL course... and when that's complete, back to the job hunt!

more from me soon!

Lucy x

I miss Nancy

It's crazy to think that I've now been back home in England for 7 weeks! ...and I still haven't updated my blog! I am hoping to do this soon... but for now, here is a picture from the Nancy webcam this morning. I don't miss the cold weather in Nancy, but I miss it's beauty... 

This is the day...

I gave my first haircut!!

My sister was a good model!

Ok, so it's slightly wonkey, but she likes the home-done retro look!

...and other things I like about being at home!!

Full update on life soon!

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!