I have how to….. make coffee cake for 60 people.

-how to ice skate on a pond that has not been run over with a Zamboni or that has any railings.

-how to more easily accept change, although I don’t always like it.

-how to learn to love and enjoy people even if they leave tomorrow or in 6 months.

-how to do Tae Kwon Do.

-how to have the confidence to break a board. Kea!

-how to accept the decisions from authority without question.

-how to shovel snow off of our sidewalk.

-how to make croutons and brown sugar.

-how to take care of my rabbit, Lizzy. I’m still learning.

-how to plan ahead for the future. Still learning this as well.

-how to think about others and not just myself. Also, work in progress.

-how to help others while being able to laugh and have fun together.

-how to meet new people and try to get to know them.

-how to obey and listen even when I really don’t want to [I'm talking about Tae Kwon Do but especially with my parents]

-how to think about what I’m doing and saying. WIP (work in progress)

-how to manage my free time.

-how to make apple cider and applesauce.

-how to make a snowboard jump by the pond.

-how to make new friends and trying new activities such as youth group and Teen CBS [Community Bible Study].

-how to survive in New Hampshire. Not kidding.

-how to survive through a bad ice storm.

-how to be grateful for what we have and thankful for what God has given us. WIP

-how to live on a farm in New Hampshire.

-how to be domestic “missionaries” and what it means.

According to the title, April does seem timeless. It seems as if April won’t go by fast enough, same with March. In March, you’re waiting for winter to end, at least in New England, that’s what we’re waiting for. April comes along with spring. You’re itching for school to end. Just a couple more months and then FREEDOM. Ask almost any kid right now, that’s probably what they’ll tell you. Seriously! If you live in a rainy place, like Portland, it just seems like rain, rain and more rain. Nothing is happening, life is going on, school’s still around and I’m waiting for no more school and some sunshine! Yet even though April feels timeless, it’s still going, one day at a time. It’s already past the half way mark. We can start to see the end of the tunnel.

June has been a hectic month for our family and for the Mansion. Our family returned from a 3 week trip to the Pacific Northwest at the end of May. We worked to get school done and Memorial Day rolled around. June started and we had our June HCC course coming up. HCC stands for Healing in the Context of Community. It’s a one week course where people can come in and learn more about our ministry. If you wish to know more about HCC, contact my dad. We had 25+ people enter the hill on June 12-13th and they stayed for a week. It was a busy week for everyone. The hill had no time to pause for as soon as the HCC folks left, we had a work group arrive from Florida. And for the next week, we had 3 different work groups on the hill at once. Someone didn’t schedule that quite right. Team Connecticut, Team Florida and Team Maine. The work groups have since left and we are allowed to take a breath. But not for long as the 4th of July weekend looms ahead of us.

We finished school on June 15th. Yay! Mom has said that we have to do some summer school. About an hour of school a day. Not too bad. We’ve been doing some deep cleaning and organizing over the weekend. The basement looks absolutely amazing. It hasn’t looked that clean in a long time. Our school room is also very neat. Floors have been mopped, the house vacuumed and bathrooms cleaned as normal chores. So the house looks quite presentable at the moment. You should drop by for a visit now! No, just kidding. We have relatives coming for the 4th of July weekend. My dad’s parents and his sister and her family. My birthday is on Saturday and the special 4th of July picnic is a week from today. What else is going on…. We sent out our newsletter this month! Hopefully many people have received by now. If you would like to be on our newsletter list, then contact my dad and he can put your name down.

Summer is going well here. Lots of sun and some rain for the gardens. Children playing outside. Birds chirping. The sound of lawn mowers. A picnic table outside. Bicycles on the grass. Green leaves. A slight breeze. Ah, the joys of summer. That’s all for now. Signing off. -DL

I was so inspired by my daughter’s post.  Months have past since my last post.  After talking to dear brother from Portland, OR today, I was struck that my view of life has changed quite significantly even dramatically in the last three months.  I cannot share it all on the blog, but I am amazed at where God’s taken me in recent months.

Through a process of brokenness and recognition of unhealthy past patterns and finally amazing friends, I am learning a new way to live life with my wife and children. I cannot describe how much I’ve been blind to and now am beginning to see.  The pain of the process has been profound and yet isn’t that what if often takes for us particularly me to embrace a significant change in the way I love and live.

I am so grateful for the faithfulness and perseverance of my wife. She is truly a gem of a woman, a mother, an artist, and child of God.  I couldn’t have made this journey without her listening ear, her strength of character, and commitment to God and to me.

Well, the old saying that ‘March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb’ is more or less true here in New England. It was pretty cold at the beginning of March but now at the end of March, it’s been getting warmer. A good lot of the snow has melted and we don’t have to wear our puffy winter coats very often. So spring feels like it’s coming. We’re just hoping that it won’t snow. Snowstorms have been known to come as late as April. For one week, we had HCC here at His Mansion. HCC is Healing in the Context of Community. It’s a chance for people from the outside world to come and learn about what we’re doing at His Mansion. Then they can take what they have learned and apply to their own churches, communities and neighborhoods. It was a smaller class, about 12 people. Also during that week, we had a group from Messiah College come to work here. The week before HCC, we had a group from Wheaton College come out and stay and work for a week. So for 2 weeks, we had lots of extra people here on the hill. HCC went really well and everyone enjoyed having the college students with us. After those two weeks, things calmed down a bit. But they didn’t stop. Something is always going on around here.

This is personal since I’m the only one in my family who experienced it but I want to write about it. I went on a retreat with my youth group to a place called Camp Berea, which is a little more than an hour north of where I live. There were 9 kids, 5 high schoolers and 4 jr. highers and 3 leaders who went from my youth group. It was the 12 of us and about 300 other kids and leaders there that weekend. We all had a really good time. There was a band called Attaboy which drove all the way from Indiana for the weekend. Our speaker for the weekend was Brian Pruitt. The whole weekend was a blast. Since our group wasn’t very big, everyone mostly stuck together. Occasionally a couple people would go off and do something or half the group would go watch volleyball but everyone hung out at the same place generally. It was a really good chance to bond and be able to connect with each other. That was the best part for me. The best part was spending time with my friends. Getting to know them better, hanging out, cheering them on and just being together. I very much enjoyed the time with my youth group. I know that since I’m an introvert, this sounds a little strange but it’s true. That was a highlight for me this month.

Easter is just around the corner. Time to celebrate Jesus’ resurrection! Wait, isn’t Easter about jellybeans, chocolate bunnies and creme eggs? No, silly Easter Bunny, Easter is about Jesus and his wonderful grace and love. We will be celebrating Easter with our Mansion family. I don’t know if we’ll be doing anything special but we’ll be together and that’s what counts. I hope that you have a good Easter. That’s all for now from the Tso Family. Signing off. -DL

So what am I doing? I am going out to Oregon for 5 weeks this summer. I am going by myself, my family will not be coming with me. One week, I’ll be seeing my friends and family. One week, I will be at High School Camp out at Eagle Fern. The other 3 weeks, I will be serving on TCL (Training Christian Leaders) at Eagle Fern Camp. Now, Eagle Fern Camp is a Christian camp in Estacada, Oregon. Eagle Fern has different weeks in the summer where you can go to camp depending on your age. I will be attending High School Camp. Eagle Fern also has a 3 week session where you can be on TCL. When you’re on TCL, you are volunteer staff. You aren’t paid anything, you just get to serve God and others. I think that it’s like 6-7 girls and 6-7 guys from 10-13th grade along with 2 TCL leaders. I am a 13 year old 9th grader and God willing, I will be serving on TCL this summer. The TCLers do a lot of the background work and the work that keeps Eagle Fern running. Setting the tables, cleaning bathrooms, scrubbing floors etc.

Now that you know what I’m doing, why isn’t my family going? Well, my parents decided that this would be a good way for me to stretch my wings. To be more independent and do more of my own stuff. Since my family isn’t going with me, I am earning the money to pay half of my plane fare, part of my camp fee and some of my personal expenses. I also have to arrange transportation, plane info, housing and other stuff. My parents will help with some of it, like they’ll pay for the other half of the airfare and camp fee but I have to do a good chunk of the work. If I really want to go out to Oregon, I have to earn the money and take the responsibility of calling people and thinking about where I’m going to stay and such. Plus, I have to navigate the airport and catch probably 2 flights to get out to Portland. I’ve been earning money for this trip since September. I’ve got the amount of money that I need for half of my plane ticket. All I need now is part of the camp fee and some for my personal stuff. The dates that I will gone are July 16-August 22. These aren’t set down in stone yet. Dad is going to help me figure out my plane ticket and then we’ll decide exactly when I’m going.

So that’s the whole story. That’s my summer endeavor. I don’t think that I’ve left anything out. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask. Just comment and I’ll try to get back to you as soon as I can. I would appreciate your prayers as I prepare for the trip. I know that it’s quite a while away but I’m a person who likes to plan things out. I will post more updates on what’s going on as the months go by. I’ll write more later. Signing off. -DL

• The different seasons, the regular 4 seasons and 2 extra. Mud season and black fly season.
• A New Hampshire winter. Bitterly cold at times but we had fun. We got to learn how to cross-country ski, sort of at least. Go sledding, make snowmen, have snowball fights and just play in the snow.
• Seeing people come and go. Saying hello and goodbye to staff and residents alike. Short term staff as they finish their year of service here. Residents as they either choose to leave the program or they graduate from the program. Long term staff as they finish their time of service here and move on.
• Residents graduating from the program and some have come onto staff. Currently, we have seen 5 men and 2 women graduate and come onto short term staff. We have seen 4 graduations throughout our year here. And we have a graduation coming up soon in October.
• The cycles and changes of just being here at His Mansion. The residents going through the program, the work that goes on here and the fun parts too. Our family got to help in the canning room, kitchen and wood lot.
• Celebrating the holidays such as Labor Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas. On Labor Day and Memorial Day, we have outdoor picnics for everyone on the hill who wishes to come. We get to celebrate Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve and Christmas together as one big family. It’s a lot of fun!
• Making new friends, getting involved in activities outside of the Mansion and taking time to explore the wilds of New Hampshire. We hiked up Mt. Monadnock last fall. Just a couple weeks ago, we visited Franconia Notch for the second time and we hiked the Flume Gorge. A few weeks ago, we met some new friends and went down to Portsmouth, NH and saw little fairy houses. [Fairy houses are little houses built for fairies made out of natural things i.e. moss, bark, shells etc. Very pretty and some were super creative]

We experienced lots of new things during this year here. The ups and downs of life. Hopefully our next year here at His Mansion will prove to be just as wonderful, fruitful and full of growth for our family and for the ministry. One frequent FAQ now that we have come to Sept-Oct.

-How is school going? School is going well. We started school the last week of August. All 4 of us kids are homeschooled. I’m a 13 year old 9th grader, Mei is in 5th grade, Di is in 3rd and G is in 1st. This year I have church history, physical science and algebra 2. It’s going okay. School is school. Mei and Di are taught together in one class, they’re doing history on the Eastern Hemisphere such as China, Japan, Australia, Russia, Mongolia etc. They’re also learning about how their body works, bones, digestion system etc. G is doing a world history, so a brief history of the whole world and his current science is learning about flowers, who visits the flowers, seeds etc. I teach G his science and history and Mom teaches him the rest. I do most of my school work on my own. Mom checks in with me a couple times a day, checking my math, reading poetry, going over my assignments for the day etc. So school is going okay for all of us.

That’s all for now. Hope you’re having a pretty fall! -Dog Lover

Mom and us 4 kids left early on July 10th. Dad stayed behind for graduation (residents complete the 1 year program, it’s a big celebration) and to work for another week. Mei went off to camp for a week, starting July 12th-July 18th. Mom, me and the 2 boys just hung out mostly during the first week. Seeing friends here and there, arranging play dates and sleepovers, going out for coffee dates (that was Mom) and hanging out. Fairly low-key. Dad arrived on July 17th, picked him up from the airport. Mom picked Mei up from camp on July 18th and our 10 days together as a family began.

We went to our home church, Spring Mountain Bible Church during the 3 weeks we were there. We spent time with another missionary family who were also in Portland at the time. We went to Sunriver which is a very sunny resort in Bend, Central Oregon. We went with another family who we’re really close to, we rented a house from a family who goes to our church. It was a lot of fun, going to Sunriver was our “vacation” on our vacation. We went to Sunriver from July 21-24th. On July 24th, that evening, I got to go to a sleepover at a friend’s house who kindly let me invite a couple more friends over so that was a lot of fun. On July 25th, some friends threw us a pool party and gave an open invitation to people in our church. Dad preached at Spring Mountain on July 26th. I went to camp from July 26th-August 1st. During that week, my family did a lot of stuff. Saw friends, having play dates, going to the beach and all sorts of stuff. I’m not exactly sure about everything b/c I wasn’t there!

Camp was a lot of fun for me. I went to Jr. High Girls Camp at Eagle Fern Camp. If you want to know more about Eagle Fern, contact us. I loved it! I had fun with friends, camp activities, playing in the creek during the 100+ degree weather and just talking with people. Eagle Fern is really cool, this was my 7th year going to Eagle Fern. It’s an awesome place! My dad picked me up early on August 1st from camp and we picked everybody else up and the luggage and headed to the airport. For a trip back home. And we are back home now in New Hampshire. It’s our 4th or 5th day back and we’re pretty much adjusted to the time change. Dad has been going to work and the rest of us are settling back into routine. Thank you to those who we saw in Oregon, we had fun spending time with you. That’s all for now. Over and out. -DL (Dog Lover)

We brought the berries back and Mom picked up some stuff to make jam. A couple of us kids helped Mom make jam. I hulled the strawberries, Mom washed them and Di squished them into a mushy pulp. Then Mom did the rest. I have no idea how to make strawberry jam or any jam for that matter so if you want to know, ask Mom not me. Mom did 2 batches of jam and from both batches, she got 18 jars of jam!
We ate some strawberries but they didn’t taste super great. Dad says we’ve been spoiled from having Hood strawberries from Oregon. I guess that the strawberries from Oregon taste better than the ones grown in New Hampshire. I helped my mom sort strawberries, wash strawberries and hull strawberries. And after I was done hulling strawberries and sorting them. I was sick and tired of strawberries! I was humming a tune to myself, “strawberries here, strawberries there, strawberries everywhere” over and over again. I’m not really sure why, maybe b/c I had gone strawberry crazy! Just kidding. My mom said that she would close her eyes tonight and see strawberries. I don’t know if that happened or not but there definitely a lot of strawberries. We also froze 2 gallon-sized bags worth of strawberries. Mostly the frozen berries are for smoothies! Which are absolutely delicious and make a fabulous summer treat. I hulled a lot of berries for that as well. Berries and berry stems. Oh no, they’re floating before my very eyes!! Just kidding. I’m being too dramatic.

Dad and Mom are planning to give most of the jam away. It’s very good jam by the way, I had some on toast for breakfast this morning. Mom said that maybe she would give it away to people for Christmas presents. An easy gift, not expensive, they’ll most certainly enjoy it and it’s edible. What’s better than that? I know! Chocolate! I’m getting off subject again and being silly. Sorry! I don’t know how you save jam until Christmas. It’s a good 6 months away, but then again, I don’t know much about jam or canning either so go figure. I don’t want to see strawberries though for a while. For the next couple of weeks, I’m going to be strawberried out! I know strawberried isn’t a real word but I made it up and thought it was fun. Well, hope you enjoy this post about strawberries! I also hope that you get to eat some delicious strawberries yourself this summer. Just don’t send any to us! Signing off. -DL (Dog Lover)

What does it mean to abide? To me it means to rest in, trust in, wait upon, and entrust myself to, in this case, someone. That someone is the Triune God. A dear brother and friend challenged me to abide in Christ and clear out as much of my schedule as possible to wait upon God for my next step. His challenge was made in face of his knowledge of me as a doer, an initiator, a person who struggles to wait. I also believe that this friend walks very much in step with the movement of the Holy Spirit.

Given all that I do in my work here at His Mansion, I am asking myself constantly this past week, what does it mean to abide, to remain, to wait upon the Lord. In the past I have seen the Lord’s movement produce in a way that I as a human could never match. Often when I trust God, giving space to Him in my life and my spheres of influence, I see Him work, and I get the incredible pleasure of being swept along in His wake.

Why then is it so hard for me to abide? My flesh, my natural bent cry out to plan, to talk, to work, to act and yet I know in my head that if I can remain in Him, it will be very clear when I need to move myself. Timing is most everything, and I want to control it, even though it is NOT for me to control.

I know there is a freedom and rest that is found in abiding in God. Freedom and rest are things I long for, but it doesn’t seem that I want to trust Him enough to receive them from Him. Alas, that is my prayer, to abide, to remain, and to wait until He moves first that I might follow in His wake. - Dad writing