s. asia
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sri lanka, here we come!
David just returned from a three-day trip, so we reunited this morning over a family breakfast date and a walk in the park. We are living here on business visas and are required to leave the country once every six months. It’s hard to complain too much about this, since it means we get to travel internationally twice a year! Our last visa run coincided with the conference we attended in Malaysia, so this time we’re head south to Sri Lanka. We leave at 4 a.m. tomorrow, and will spend four days at the beach! This is our first trip that the kids are both old enough to truly understand…
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joshua turns four.
Yesterday was Joshua’s birthday, and his party was in the park. We had a wonderful time celebrating the new four-year-old and hanging out with some of our favorite people. A beautiful day for a party Birthday boy! Michelle and Hadi are best buddies Judah gets a climbing lesson from John-uncle Go Judah go! Worn out from partying We love each other! Could these two be any cuter?? Alison gives out Cars 2 tattoos “Will you take a picture of my tattoos?” All of us are becoming fast friends with our language teacher, Neetu. She came with her husband and sons. “Watch me jump, Julie-aunty!” Friends from church Three sweet girls Elsie…
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swimming pool!
Just about every day I think, “What did we ever do without Priya???” She is one of the hardest workers I’ve ever met, constantly thinking up news ways to serve our family, help me with my diet, and keep our home in tip-top shape. Her latest plan: to garden our terrace. I worried that I’d feel awkward having another person in our house all day, but that hasn’t happened at all. Since Priya speaks English, I feel like we’re becoming friends, but at the same time, she is so good about giving us space to just be a family when we’re at home together. I love that she’s used to…
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afternoon out with michelle.
Our teammates, Richey and Keli, have a nanny with them from the U.S. for two months. After they began making plans for her to come, I found out that I know her! Michelle’s parents are in the church in Florida my dad pastored when I was in middle school. So my brothers and I grew up for a few years with Michelle and her siblings. Who would have thought, years later, Michelle and I would meet up again here on the other side of the world! We spent a fun afternoon out in the city last week, getting pedicures, sipping iced coffee/fruit drinks, and exploring a book shop. First auto…
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amie and lina.
Our creative girl discovered a way to play cars with her cousin.
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things that make me happy right now: living here.
A week of my favorite things . . . When I was little I lived for three years in Barbados, and my nine-year-old heart broke into a thousand pieces when we had to leave. That place and the people there were apart of me, and leaving them was a loss I felt for a long, long time. When I graduated high school I was given the gift of moving back for a semester, and I felt like a part of me came alive again. For four short months, I soaked up the hot, humid weather, the sticky mosquito-filled nights and the island accents all around me. I learned to navigate…
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things that make me happy right now: gluten-free care packages.
A week of my favorite things . . . I am overjoyed by the number of people who learned about my new, gluten-free predicament, and have sent me care packages. Fun care packages! Yummy care packages! Full of things I can’t find here: like rice cakes and xanthum gum and GF all-purpose flour. With a cookie mix or chocolate cake mix thrown in for good measure. Priya is simply astounded by the influx. She said, “You have some very good friends!” Do I ever! It’s humbling, to be sure. 2012 has been a year of lows in the food department . . . until these last couple weeks when we…
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things that make me happy right now: city church.
A week of my favorite things . . . In November, we moved to the center of our city, because we wanted to be apart of starting a church here. You know, the fact that I’m saying “we” is a big deal. David has talked, dreamed and prayed for as long as I’ve known him about planting churches. It’s in his blood. And in college, as we were friends, then fell in love, dreamed about the future, got married, and dreamed some more, I always thought, subconsciously, This is David’s dream, and I’m going to support him in his dream. But I wasn’t very happy about it. He knew that,…
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things that make me happy right now: family day off.
A week of my favorite things . . .
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things that make me happy right now: homeschooling.
A week of my favorite things . . . Hmmm. Okay, let’s be honest, maybe a better title for this post is: “Things that make me happy right now: the idea of homeschooling.” I am growing, more and more, to love the idea of homeschooling, and to feel certain that it’s the right thing for our family in this season. So . . . I’m having a little trouble managing all the priorities in my life just now. But I’m enjoying the effort—in some ways, being more busy, not less, is a great motivator for me. And at least they’re fun priorities. Homeschooling typically seems to be first to go. …