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Old Cowtown Museum has an Old Fashioned Christmas each year where they show what Christmas would have looked like in Wichita in the 1870’s.

Our friends Ben & Kelly invited us to go and we had a fantastic (but COLD!) time. We enjoyed homemade hot chocolate, Christmas caroling, some Irish step dancers in the Saloon, and even a retelling of “‘Twas the Night Before Christmas” in the old one-room schoolhouse. We rounded out the evening in the old farmhouse where they were roasting a Christmas turkey in the kitchen lit by oil lamps.

We had so much fun with Ben & Kelly; it was a really great way to get in the Christmas spirit. So much fun, in fact, that we completely failed to get any pictures of our own, so here’s one we found on Flickr.

(So where are we going next, guys?)

I was really craving a #47 Roly Poly last night after my workout – not just craving, but rather a nagging feeling that I couldn’t shake. I knew that we should probably eat at home, but I convinced Ryan and we went to Roly Poly. We had to hurry since it was close to closing time!

Let me give some back story before going too much farther. We’ve been going to Roly Poly for several years. While the food is very fresh and healthy, we really enjoy seeing the owners. An older Asian couple owns the shop, and the wife is extremely good with names. Every time we walk in she says “Hey, Sam and Ryan!” She is so joyful and kind to everyone. She even knows the exact sandwiches we like and at the end of each meal she brings a candy dish over to us. You might say we go there too much, but really we don’t – she is just that good! Her husband is more quiet, but one day as I was by myself waiting for my order during lunchtime he asked me where I worked. I told him where and what I did and he told me that he used to be a mechanical engineer for Coca Cola! And one evening when Ryan and I went together he happened to be there and he came over and asked Ryan about his job and we all talked together for a long time. I said all that to say that they have done a great job getting to know their customers, but we on the other hand have not done a good job getting to know them.

Back to the story. When we arrived there were new people working and a new woman took our order. As we sat down the Asian woman came over and said how happy she was that we were there that night because it was her last night as owner! Their 5-year lease had run out and they sold the business to these new owners. She thanked us over and over for being such good customers and made us promise that we would give the new people a try. She even gave us a coupon for a free sandwich to make sure we’d come back at least once! We told her how much we would miss her smile and she started to tear up. It was so sad! She disappeared into the back and Ryan and I just sat there, stunned. Even then we still did not know her name (or her husband’s), and now we would never see them again. We were really ashamed of ourselves for missing this opportunity.

But then it struck us that we should get her address so that we could send a thank you card. When we got up to leave she came out to say goodbye, so we asked for her address. As she was writing it down, we noticed that it was the next street over from our house – they lived in our neighborhood! Just a few doors down from us! They’d lived next to us for all these years and we didn’t even know it.

Just think, we could have gone to any other food place or eaten at home and we would have missed this experience. Because of the way all these things happened we know the Holy Spirit led us there for that purpose – this was no coincidence. So now we will definitely have them over for dinner and get to know them!

To read about their successful mission work in Scotland visit their website The Block Letters.

Make sure to check out their website, The Block Letters.

“After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go. He told them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves.” Luke 10:1-3

Enjoy!

We also spent some time touring Tulsa. We ate at the obligatory Casa Viva (formerly Casa Bonita), the famous Spaghetti Warehouse, and experienced the Center of the Universe. The Center of the Universe is on a pedestrian bridge over the railroad tracks in downtown. When you stand in the center of the brick circle and speak your voice is amplified and echoes! But the moment you step outside the circle the echo is gone. Since the echo made it sound like we were miked, Tim & Sharon and Ryan & I sang a verse and chorus from Our God, He is Alive (we call this song our church of Christ theme song!).

So, I’ve enabled comments to be posted on our blog, so please take a moment and click on the “comments” link below and leave us a short little note about who you are, where you’re from, and any other information you’d like to share with us. I’d love to know who from Sunnyvale, CA, Lee’s Summit, MO, or Detroit, MI has been viewing our blog, among many others. Also, if you’ve visited my Bible Blog, let me know if you’ve enjoyed it or have gotten any useful insight from it.

Think of it as our own little “Guest Book.” In fact, I’ll add a link to this post in our “Links” section on the right so you can return here and see who else has posted.

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