Photo Friday [121]

This week:

Life has been a little messy this week.  My house?  Very messy.   We're in a phase right now where no one is getting to sleep through the night.  Add to that the stress of adjusting to full-day school for Greg (which isn't as smooth a transition as I originally thought - for any of us!), and it's taken a toll on our attitudes and relationships this week.  But life is still good.  I mean, look at this sweet little face, distracting me from the disaster that is my living room!

Thanks to the encouragement of the women's Bible study group that I attend weekly, I've been focusing on worship, even when conditions aren't perfect.  I can find moments to worship God in the midst of it all, and it lifts my spirit, re-focuses my perspective on things, and reminds me of what's really important.  So, here are a few of the good and important things from this week:

Don't you love how a child's mind works?  The boys were trying really hard to catch butterflies, and were not having much success.  So Greg decided that he needed to make the butterflies come to him... by taping leaves on his arms and pretending to be the tree where the butterflies kept landing.  (It didn't really work though, and in the end I had to use my mad mommy skills to catch some for them.)

 

What's not good about watching a 14-month-old learn something new every day?  I love this age, when their ability to interact with the world grows by leaps and bounds.

 We celebrated eight years of marriage!  This guy is my best friend. 

 We had a fancy anniversary dinner... Ukarumpa style, that is.  We asked the guesthouse manager to do a special dinner for us.  She set up a nice table in a private room, decorated with candles and lights.  She made an impressive effort to make us feel that we were in a nice restaurant, and she practically forced us to make our dinner nice and leisurely.  She said that missionaries forget how to do anything but eat and work, so she had to remind us how to have a nice date!  We spent two hours over dinner, just talking - uninterrupted.  It was great!

Mangoes as big as my face - what's not to like about that?  I only wish mangoes weren't seasonal...

And finally, a mud puddle reflection.  I have this weird habit of watching mud puddles as I walk around our dirt roads, looking for interesting reflections.  I'm sure people walking home from market this morning thought I was really weird, taking pictures of mud in a parking lot.

That's all for this week!  Thanks for stopping by.

Photo Friday [120]

Just a few photos for you this week.  I've been taking pictures, but not of my family!

 Greg is back in school, now going full days instead of just in the morning.  So far he has been fine with it, but his little brother is having a harder time adjusting and has been missing having someone to play with in the afternoons.

 Caleb "reading" a book to Kate.  Kate now likes us to read to her.  The other day I found her very frustrated though, as she kept grabbing at the pictures in a book.  I finally realized that she wanted to lift the flap, but it was not a lift-the-flap book.  No wonder she was frustrated!

And another friendly face from market...

Until next week!

Photo Friday [119]

A few photos of our week:

I'm doing a "Project 52" this year - a photography project where you have to take a photo each week to fit a certain theme.  Last week the theme was a traditional landscape, so here are a few of the photos that didn't make the cut.  These are just outside the perimeter fence that surrounds the center.

It was hard to take a landscape photo this week, as Brian was out of town and I had to drag all three kids along!

Next week's theme is "Red."  I'm still working on that...

 Kate thinks she's very clever pulling up grass at the playground.

 

  

Another fun thing about having chickens is that the eggs aren't all "Grade A" and sometimes you get a weird one, like this tiny egg.  We hard boiled it and everyone made a guess as to whether it was all yolk, all white, or some of both.  Turns out there was a teeny-tiny yolk inside the little bitty-egg.

 

These sticker pages make a good rainy day activity.  See the scuba diver and farmer visiting the dinosaurs?

Woe to the person who tries to separate her from her softball this week.  She slept with it last night.

And finally, a photo of this lovely Tairora lady from the market.  I took the photo on Wednesday, then printed it out and brought her a copy this morning.  She was thrilled, so I was glad I did it.  I just hope I'm not setting a precedent that I'm going to print out photos for everyone...

Until next week!

Photo Friday [118]

This week at our house, super heroes are big, thanks to some Christmas gifts from my brother and his family:

Ant Man prefers to fight crime with his face mask up.

Checking out his super hero credentials.

Kate has not joined in with the super hero crowd, though she thinks it's funny when her brothers wear costumes.

 Serious about the sippy cup.

Sweet smiles and messy, post-nap hair.

That's the Kate attitude we are familiar with!

We're still enjoying fresh eggs from our hens.  This hen, Gina, only lays half the time, as she goes broody every month and tries to hatch some.   Here she is this morning trying to keep me from collecting the eggs her fellow hens have laid.  She is definitely the Alpha hen, and rules the roost, though she is the smallest.

After a trip to market this morning I was thinking about how spoiled we are in Ukarumpa.  Our Papua New Guinean neighbors have learned over the years what kinds of produce the waitskins like, and they grow a lot of things in their gardens specifically to sell to us as cash crops... things that they don't really eat themselves.  The variety of produce has grown a lot even since Brian and I have lived here.  Some of the things you can buy at the Ukarumpa market that you may not find at other markets in PNG include cilantro, jalapeno peppers, red onions, red cabbage, red and yellow bell peppers, and lots and lots of strawberries.  I'm not complaining!

Until next week...

Photo Friday [117]

Happy New Year everyone!  And Photo Friday is back on track.  Here are a few photos of our Christmas and miscellaneous other stuff.

Our Christmas wreath, purchased at the market.

Kate was pretty happy about her fancy Christmas dress and shiny shoes.  Afraid this is the first and last time those shoes will see use though... I felt like I was trying to put the glass slipper on a stepsister squeezing them on Christmas Eve.

 Checkin' out the dress.

 The obligatory photo of kids in front of the tree didn't turn out so well.

 But the family shot was better.

 Very proud of herself for pulling off an ornament.

 "Ooh!  Who is this one for, Greg?"

 

 Stockings.  (Sorry Sharon, I couldn't find the stocking you made for Kate until the day after Christmas....)

 Checking out the gifts with his new magnifying glass.

Thanks Grandma!

 Legos: the gift of hours of quiet play.

 In non-Christmassy news:

 Our garden is looking colorful.

I drove a few other ladies into town to hit the secondhand clothes stores.

And last but not least, a few photos of my golden boy:

 This face is so him. 

I resolve to return next Friday.  Thanks for reading!