The day that just got better and better

Last night Boaz woke up numerous times complaining that his ear hurt. We gave him Tylenol and kept a hot compress on the side of his face for a while. He still woke up every half hour whining that it hurt, until about 2am. This morning, I let him sleep in while I sent Nandry off to school. He wasn't feeling too bad when he did wake up, so we did another hot compress and got ready for school. He was there by 9am. Well, throughout the day I kept praying that he would feel better and have a great day. He came home with a ribbon pinned on him and a special prize from his teacher for being "Boy of the Day". How cool! Then, when Nathan sat down with him to do his homework, it went really well for the first time this year. He didn't struggle with concentrating, he just got right to it and finished it quickly and easily. THEN, to top it all off, Boaz finally got the hang of riding a bike by himself. That was the thing he was most proud of today and most excited to show me. We are so proud of him for all his great accomplishments and successes, and so thankful for a great day!

More Amusement Parks

This was our last big adventure before school started. Boaz in the front with Abby, Asher not keeping his head inside the car while it's moving with Emma, and Jacob, Nandry and Katherine in the red ladybug car. I think Nandry's a bit too old for this, though she did enjoy making sure 2 year old Katherine was ok.

Boaz is the responsible driver, keeping his eyes on where he's going. Our kids are really enjoying their cousins on both sides of the family. We are so thankful that our kids have these instant friends (cousins) who we'll be able to keep in touch with even though we are gone for years at a time...because it's kind of required somewhere that you visit your family more than once on your furlough, right (Christmas and Easter - kind of like church)? And besides, it's SO MUCH fun.

Asher, ready for take-off

We are officially renaming Asher, "Tigger". Nathan and I've realized that Asher never walks anymore. He always leaps, bounds, hops and boings wherever he is going. We've noticed also how many picture we have of him without both feet on the ground. In these two shots, he's airborne. Sometimes, I'll have to get a picture of this, he even flaps his arms like he's going to take off and fly away!

Northern PA

This weekend we visited our 2nd cousins in Troy, PA and Nathan spoke at the churches they belong to while we were there. One of the churches was the Olde Covert Church for the mountain folk (like the parking sign?)...we kind of felt at home driving on the dirt road (though they needed a few million more potholes to be like our Cameroonian roads) and following the cloud of dust the car in front of us left.

It was so awesome to see the little kids I played with when we visited them 12 years ago all grown up now. It's difficult for me to as we travel so much to offer myself and get involved with new people in new places, so I really enjoy the times we get to visit and catch up with family and friends we know, but just haven't seen for years.

More Hershey Park

Ever had a "Nathan's Famo Frankfu"?

Experiencing Life in the USA

Here is Asher, totally content to be on the "Granny Bug" ride at Hershey Park. Forget about keeping all hands and feet inside the car while the ride is in motion!

I did this!!!

I found this on YouTube and this is the exact zipline we did in West Virginia on our 1 day fun trip to ACE Adventures. Here's another video of the river we went rafting on and at 25 sec and 51 seconds in the video it shows people jumping off the same rock that we. not including Diego, did. I think I impressed Nathan with my fearlessness (I even fell out of the raft going over the first of MANY rapids and was still up for the rest of the trip...but leaned farther INTO the raft from then on). However, my kids weren't impressed when I told them about what we did and showed them the videos.

All About Nandry

Check out Nandry's blog, she's having fun taking pictures and posting them (even if I'm the one making her come up with things to write next to her pictures to explain them).

Blessings from West Virginia

This past week, Nathan and I left the kids with my parents and joined the BBC youth and their leaders on their mission trip to the old coal mining town of Gary, West Virginia. We worked on a house in the run down neighborhood (one of the poorest in the US), painting, roofing, yard cleaning and making porch repairs. Our hosts at the School For Life program told us in their beautiful southern accent that we were going to hear some real good country music from a friend of theirs, Jimmy Whitaker. Well, Jimmy got in late on Wednesday night, after a day of driving from his last concert and still mustered up enough energy to play the 19 of us a few of his songs. This guy is amazing, has a heart of gold and deeply loves the Lord. After a lot of admiration of his ability to play and some joking about trading guitars (Bill Cliff's guitar for Jimmy's "Taylor"), Jimmy cleared out his guitar case and said to Nathan, "The Lord told me when I bought this guitar 2 years ago that it wasn't mine, I was just keeping it until He showed me who to give it to, and I knew as soon as we started talking that you were the one it belonged to." WOW! After we all finally convinced Nathan he had no choice but to take the guitar, Jimmy promised to teach him some things to improve his sound and technique, which they stayed up 'till 2Am the next night going over. I think all the youth and leaders on the trip could tell you that the next worship session Nathan led on the guitar for us all was the best of the week! Praise God for his blessings when we are least expecting it!

Adjusting

The kids are adjusting well to life here. Some may disagree, but their quirkiness from living in another culture is starting to wear off. They understand now that the answer "monkey" to the question "what's your favorite pet?" is going to get strange looks unless they explain that they've lived in Africa. They are gaining more vocabulary (TRX, Shady Maple, Amish, VBS, speed limit, McDonald's, play land, Teletubbies, microwave, crushed ice, Walmart and soft serve ice cream...) and becoming accustomed to the things they are seeing. Asher, a few weeks ago, was curious why there were so many spaceships in Lancaster County, PA. It took us a while to figure out what he was talking about. Who knew those Amish folks were ahead of us with technology?