One of my favorite times of the year...Christmas! We get most of our Christmas fix inside the walls of our home, but I just love this time of year. We had Christmas music playing and Jonathan even made some eggnog. Don't let the winter attire fool you...it was 70 outside.
Quote of the day came from Regan..."The tree is so SMALL! I remember it being a lot bigger than that!" No baby girl. You have just grown that much :)
The kids had to take turns this year putting the ornaments on. We laid them all out and each kid had a pile. I could just see the tree falling over this year as all five fought for the "perfect" place to put there ornaments, so this was my solution and it was grand.
They easily could get their ornaments up where they wanted them and then go back to chose the next one that they wanted to put on.
I love the expression on her face. She must have found the perfect spot.
Lauren was very careful and put things on very delicately. The first to go on was her ballerina of coarse. It is still her favorite.
Hudson wanted to find the spots inside the tree....he's still learning how to be gentle :)
And the honor this year goes to...HUDSON! He got to put the star on top this year. He was very excited about it (and the other kids, too). So much has happened these past 10 months! He is still experiencing so many "firsts" and has learned so much. It's still hard for me to believe that it still hasn't been a year since he came home with us. He was made for this family :)
So, I was asleep very late at night when Lauren comes into my room and says there is a bug in her the bathroom. I sleepily tell her ok and fall back asleep. Lauren reappears and says, "Mom, wake up. Regan says she is not leaving the bathroom until the bug is dead." I am slightly more awake now and tell her to get a shoe and kill it. I go back to sleep. Lauren reappears (with pony tail all messed up from sleeping and off to the side of her head AND hand on hip) and says, "Mom, if you don't want me to come back in here again, you better wake up. Regan says the bug is as big as my hand and won't get down off the toilet. We need your help to kill it." Now I am awake and crawl out of bed to find this in the bathroom. She indeed is standing on the toilet. Never fear. Dad searched for the bug and killed it....all slept soundly :)
My good friend asked me to go for a walk with her one morning. I got up very early before school started to meet her. I should have learned by now that ANY TIME a local asks you to go for a walk what they really mean is climb a mountain. If it had been a clear morning we could shave seen much more of the city than this...and you could see a bit more in person.
The kids getting a little PE in for the day.
Ayi was gong back to her village for a few days to check on a family member who was sick. I finally got one of these quilts finished to send with her. I which I could send a thousand, but one at a time. It's not perfect but I had fun making it for a reason. The little boy I made it for has 3 siblings plus his parents and they share one blanket. I also sent her with some winter clothes to give to whichever village kids needed it the most.
Our fur babies took over the comfy chairs...hmmmmm.
Lauren has been begging to go to the complex next to us because they have 1 swing there. I wasn't sure if the guard would let us in, but he did. I have never seen these girls happier. I wish we could find swings wherever.
The rest of the playground was completely falling apart. I told them the swing ONLY (if we were in the States I probably would have passed on that as well). I also informed them that if they cut themselves on anything on the falling apart playground that we would be going to the hospital for a tetanus shot :) I was joking and serious at the same time....they understood to be careful and they were VERY careful.
Benjamin and I had to fly to Thailand to see the doctor this weekend. This was the start of our trip on the bus headed to the airport. This was just before I was checking all of our paperwork to leave the country and realized that I had looked at the tickets wrong and that the flight was for 12:40 and NOT 2:40. I told Benjamin that we were probably going to miss our flight, but we were going to try anyways. It had started to rain, we were in traffic, and we were not even scheduled to arrive at the airport until 12:10. We arrived at 12:00 and had to wait for the entire bus to unload before the driver would open up the underneath for us to get our luggage. We grabbed ours first and RAN inside looking for where our airline was checking in. A cleaning person said "Hello! Where are you going?" and then told us that we needed counter F. Where was counter F? It was on the far side of the airport, so we ran again. We can around the corner to where the counter was and saw about 150 people in line to check in. I ran up to the front of the line and asked if we could please go first because we were about to miss our plane. They were so nice and let us go ahead. When the guy at the counter saw our flight time, his eyes got HUGE and his fingers started flying. He was typing and using his walkie talkie to call us an escort. They checked our bags in and the escort said to follow him. We had to take our luggage with us to another place because our flight check-in had already closed. We ran to that place, had our luggage checked, left our luggage there, ran past the first set of security, to the main security check. I thought there was no way because there were 300+ people standing in line at security. Our escort ran us over the the line that said VIP, first class where we waiting behind ONE person! He said that he could not go through security but someone else dressed just like him would be waiting for us on the other side.
Sure enough, she was waiting for us. We ran and I filled out the Departure cards for Immigration (the messiest I have ever made one look) and then we ran to the line for Immigration. You guessed it. A TON OF PEOPLE! They only had five windows open and the line snaked through the entire area. I'm sure there were at least 200 waiting. The new escort talked to the security guard and we got to skip the snaking line and jump right in line at the window that said "Dignitaries and Special Needs" So, I guess I was a special need :) After we got through this section she was waiting for us again. She hustled us onto one of those airport cars and we sped through the airport. (see above picture) You guessed it. Our gate was THE LAST/FURTHEST GATE in the airport! As we pulled up, they were about to shut the doors and one of the workers yelled, "There's 2 more!" They scanned our tickets and we rain onto the plane!
As we were searching for our seats, we quickly realized that they had UPGRADED us to business class!!! Free blankets, Free bottles of water, and...
...check out the enormous amount of leg room!!!! We were in the air at 12:40!!! That is unheard of record time! I told Benjamin that that was a lot of fun, but I NEVER want to do it again.
We arrived in Thailand and on the following day my child wants to take a tuk tuk to the mall to get a hot dog and ice cream. It is a hassle that we have to travel so far away to see this particular doctor, but I am so thankful that He has place this guy close enough for us to fly to for the weekend and for the special weekends that I get to have with JUST this guy. :)
The food court had lots of Thai food available, but Benjamin's choice was western...
Dairy Queen Blizzard with a chili hot dog.
He also got to see this very nice Lamborghini. He was asking me all kinds of car questions that I had no clue (that was my big brother's department growing up) There was another foreigner there who happened to be BUYING the car!!! He was so nice to Benjamin and talked to him about the car. He said that if Benjamin wanted one that he would have to save up his money for 40 years like he did and then he could get it. As we were leaving, he also added that Benjamin should never get married or he will NEVER have enough money for the car ;) haha! I think married is ok, but definitely no room for a family in this car :)
The mall had an aquarium. I told him that we should take a picture out front with sad faces and send it to Daddy because it looked like lots of fun (just expensive). He thought fishy faces was much more fun...I have to agree.
So, how did we spend our spare time that was not at the hospital? Window shopping of coarse! We saw all kinds of toys and food and books!
We spent 2 hours just looking at ENGLISH books!! I was so excited to see so many books in English! This was the one place that we did NOT window shop. I could not pass up the opportunity to get some good books for school. He read two while he was waiting for me to choose which ones to get.
This part of the city I will not miss....oh the traffic and the noise and the exhaust fumes. :( But I do like other parts of the city and defiantly other cities in Thailand!
But THIS! I loved seeing this in Thailand....Christmas trees and Christmas things :) I really loved this hands on Nativity countdown to Christmas, but it was not for sale. They had a newer one for sale and I didn't like it as much. I'll keep my eyes open.
While I was in Thailand I got a Facebook friend request. At first I thought it was one of those strangers that is trying to get into your page, but when I saw this request, I clicked on thinking maybe it was someone I knew? Sure enough. As soon as I opened his page, I knew who it was. This was the little boy that Jonathan and I sponsored so long ago through Compassion International!! He found us on Facebook! It was so much fun seeing how he has grown up (no longer a little boy, but 19 years old now) and catching up on his schooling, family, and life in Tanzania!
He sent me this picture and said, "I have been praying for you every day." WOW! I'm am beyond words to express how happy and thankful I am that God has brought our lives back together.
So, what did the rest of my family do while I was in Thailand? Well, they rode bikes in their pajamas! Not just because, Katherine and Hudson were already ready for bed and Jonathan needed to pick up Lauren and Regan from Taekwondo class....so they all went to pick them up together :)
Hudson tried on Lauren's old outfit and wanted to know if he's big enough yet. SO CUTE!!
And what would a weekend with Daddy be if they did not make an enormous tent! This is apparently where they slept while I was gone :) So, life has been adventurous, full of Christmas, and full of grace and blessings. Glad we are all back in the same place again! Love this family!
OH, and on a side note. Since we had such a fiasco getting to Thailand, I didn't want to be late coming home. So Benjamin and I people-watched at the airport Dinozzo style. We had quite the time laughing at all the people....so here is a glimpse of some of the craziness we noticed...
1. The girl wearing the toboggan and ski jacket when it's 95 outside
2. The mom with the toddler, a baby, backpack, stroller, diaper bag, carry-on suitcase (This one made me laugh because it was not that long ago that all of my kiddos were that little and I a carried on all that stuff! now I know how ridiculous I look) :)
3. The lady that thinks 3 inch heels are appropriate attire for running to catch a plane
4. The lady in the Halloween dress
5. The lady wearing a badge on her jacket that resembles a police badge but in fact is a Lions club badge
6. The grumpy old, very old, couple who pushes everyone to make sure they get to the front of the line first
7. The golfer with his golf clubs and wearing a sweater vest
8. The tour group who is absolutely clueless...I kid you not..CLUELESS...I cannot tell you how many times I heard the guide say in English " no. no water on plane. (translation: you can't take drinks on the plane) you drink. drink. pee pee. drink drink." and "no, you cannot take that (50 pound huge suitcase) as a carry-on. You must check the bag" really?
9. The "I'm going to try really hard to make sure every item of clothing and every accessory is a different pattern and that the colors don't match one bit" girl
10. The young couple wearing their neck pillows on their neck already (Benjamin thought this couple was hilarious and what started the whole people watching thing)
11. The infamous "my pj's are the most comfy thing in the world so why not wear them on the plane" people
12. And finally, the tourist(s) wearing his rice hat through the airport...just in case you didn't already know that he was a tourist :)
Our list goes on, but you get the point :)
