Something Familiar

After living overseas for a little over a year I have become accustomed to life here. I am used to the sound of drums whenever there is a wedding close by, or the honking when there is either a wedding or a big soccer game. I am familiar with the grocery store and it no longer takes me 3 hours to get in and out. I am accustomed to having access to a fresh produce stand within minutes from my apartment. I am used to hearing English rap music when I walk into the store - though I may be the only one there who understands it. For as much as I have become accustomed to life here there are, honestly, things that I miss. I miss having a variety of cereal to choose from and easy lunch options for the boys. I miss the ease of being able to go the grocery store at any hour that was convenient for me - very early or pretty late. Oh how I miss one-stop-shopping and finding a bargain! I miss driving and knowing that the lines in the road mean something. Honestly, in the summer time, I miss the common practice of wearing deodorant! I realize these things are not that important in the grand scheme of things. I can laugh about them most of the time. What I really miss, of course, are friends and family. I miss being apart of their 'day to day' lives and them being a part of mine. A few weeks ago my mother sent me a coffee mug that she said reminded her of me. The funny thing is that when I opened it I thought 'this cup is so me'. Soon after I received the mug I also discovered a new coffee drink that reminds me of my mother because it tastes like coffee ice cream. About every other day I mix this drink into my mug - it reminds me of my mother. Sometimes I need that.

Things Change

I knew that living in a new country would change the boys - they will grow up with a different worldview, different ideas of how things 'should be', and even different ideas of what they will be when they grow up. Caleb now talks of playing on a national soccer team rather than for the NFL. The other day I found Lucas putting an empty water jug on the back of his bike. Whenever we get water it is brought to us on the back of a moped. Twice a day our 'doorman' comes to our apartment selling bread. Josiah thinks its funny to ring our bell and say 'bread'. Some of the things they say and play out are pretty funny (and honestly some are not! Every culture has those). Recently Ted was telling Caleb a story and he told Caleb that the main character was very famous. Caleb responded "yeah Daddy, but is he as famous as "maglas or narya" - my made up names for popular drinks here - drinks that we never heard of before we moved!

At Three Months

I have taken a picture of each of the boys when they were three months old. I took these pictures of Micah at 3 1/2 months - its a little harder to get the extra things done these days. =) These were taken as our home studio - aka my bedroom.
Micah has been a pretty good baby. He usually only cries when he is tired or hungry - that works for me. He loves to "talk". He is at his best when someone is talking to him. He usually smiles up a storm and gets his two cents in. It's a good thing that he likes to hear people talk because there is a lot of talking going on around here (especially since Lucas joined in). I have nicknamed him "fidget" since he is always moving around (we also have our fair share of that going on here). He is always kicking and squirming, trying to grab his brothers or move to the other side of his bed. Our family has been blessed by him and , of course, now we can't imagine life without him. Hard to believe three months have passed already.

Beat the Heat

It is HOT here - there is no escaping that. Two rooms in our apartment have air conditioning units in them but we are trying not to use them too much. That means that almost anything you do can cause you to break into a sweat. Poor Josiah sweats a lot and sometimes just watching a movie cause beads of sweat to appear. Well, lately we have been finding Lucas sleeping on the floor. He does have a bed but when we go to check on him we sometimes find him on the floor. Normally Lucas gets up early (6:30) but on the morning I took this picture he didn't get up until 8:30. I guess that he has found a way to keep cool at night - sleep on the tile floor (ouch!)

Like Family

The Lord has really blessed our family with Mrs. Y. Our boys love Mrs. Y and I think that it is because she is like a grandmother to them. Yesterday she had to sneak past Lucas to leave our house (making him upset is incomprehensible to her) but Lucas went to the balcony and spotted her leaving. He lost it! He began to scream and cry "Mrs. Y, Mrs Y". Mrs. Y then ducked behind a bush hoping that he would stop crying. No go - he waited for her to reappear and then continued to cry. She tried to keep walking but turned around blew him kisses and waved - he cried all the more. I know that it took great strength for her to keep walking.
Last week Caleb was very excited to be able to have a sleep over at Mrs. Y's house. The other boys cried and cried - they wanted to go too. She couldn't bring herself to leave but she didn't want to take more than one kid on the bus with her. She finally said "Please drop us all off at my house and you can pick them up at 10pm tonight". This was after she had taken care of them most of the day. We made sure that she really wanted to do that. Needless to say all the boys went to her house. When Josiah returned that night he was in tears (and not just because Caleb got to spend the night). "I miss Mrs. Y" he repeated over and over. He was beside himself.
So what I am basically trying to say is that our boys LOVE her. Before making our trip to this side of the world I prayed that the Lord would provide foster grandparents for our boys. He has provided abundantly in Mrs. Y. I love to watch the boys relate to her (even when they are just trying to get her to keep me from disciplining them) and I love that she tries to teach Lucas her language. I love the way she laughs at them when they say and do silly things and even though it is not always helpful I love the way she defends them and thinks that they can do nothing wrong. I love that she finds it difficult to stop playing with them and talking to them the entire time that she is here. Mrs. Y speaks no English but as a mommy her love for my boys speaks volumes to me.

To the Sea

This 4th of July we took a small vacation with our teammates. We drove about an hour from our house to the sea and swam with an ancient castle as our backdrop. Not bad! Though Micah and I spent most of our time under the umbrella we were thankful to be able to make the trip. Caleb started swimming lessons last week and was excited about practicing his "dead man's float" in the hotel pool. The older boys had a great time and by the second day Lucas was content to swim in the kiddie pool but wasn't as fond of swimming in the sea.

Practice makes perfect!

He feels in control at the kiddie pool, but the sea is too much.

The boys were able to take a
paddle boat out to the castle.

Evidence that he was there.

Nice backdrop, huh?