It has been a long and busy month.  My in-laws (and fellow team members) arrived on April 1st.  We all squeezed into our 68 square meter (6 or 700 Sq Feet) apartment.  They slept in the living room on a pull out couch and stored their suitcases in a corner nook in the same room.  Last Wednesday, on May 6th, they were able to move into their apartment.  During this month, we were busy helping them get their paperwork moving, purchasing a car, finding an apartment, and helping them get acclimated to Spain.  Even though they were missionaries here years ago, Spain has changed much since they have been gone.  Many things that they were use to are now much different.  All of them (even my wife) always talk of the nice spacious apartments that they use to have and live in, however, in this day and time, those apartments are farther and fewer between.  All of the apartments that they looked at during this month don’t have the space that they were use to when they lived here over 15 years ago.  Although the place they found is not as spacious, it is still very nice and has some added features such as a very nice patio and even and little yard.  Deanna and I are already “licking our lips” thinking of the possibilities for grilling out from time to time.  ☺  They also tell me that there are many more round-abouts here now.  They said that when they lived here, there were a few, but not many.  This is the land of round-abouts.   

This past Thursday, the container that they shipped from the states finally arrived.  We were able to contact a few of the other missionaries here in Madrid to come and help.  For the most part, it was easy to unload.  My in-laws apartment is on the ground level floor and we were able to take part of the fence off and pass the furniture through the fence.  It was one of the easier moves that we have made.  The hardest part was getting our couch into our apartment.  Our apartment is a first floor apartment (this would be a second floor apartment in the States.  Here they count the ground level floor as “Zero”) and because they have so many “fire” doors in our apartment building, it was impossible to get the couch through those doors.  So we pulled the rental (U-Haul) truck next to my apartment window.  Myself and Jack Loveday stood on top of the truck, while 4 men lifted the couch up to us.  Then, those men ran into our apartment and we passed the couch through the window to them.  It was a wild scene, but we got the couch in the apartment. 

So all and all, it has been a busy but productive month.  My in-laws are still unpacking their things and should be done by this week sometime.  We have already started discussing things about the future ministry here in Spain and it is exciting to think about. 

For me, the best part of this month was when the container arrived and I received:

 YES! IT IS KRAFT MAC & CHESSE!!!