Water Balloons

I wanted to share a picture of Josh being hit by a water balloon. Sadly, his tantrum is not caught on camera. It seems Devin was consoling him (his scenes are legendary) so there is no sad face like Claire's on camera. But his unhappiness seemed to exceed that of Claire. He loves to throw the water balloons and gets a kick out of every kid he hits, but he sure can't take it!!! This picture is cool, because if you look really closely, you can see the water flying in the air above Josh's head--good shot, Dev!!



His tantrums are embarrassing. I hope he grows out of them someday!

Our shipment should be here tomorrow or the day after, so we're off to do some major organizing today!!

Devin just took a picture of the kids enjoying themselves downstairs...



That's hilarious!! They're so creative!! I think I'll leave that cupboard empty so they can play in there! :P Notice the stick in Josh's hand? He saw Harry Potter at a friend's house for the first time last week, and now he runs around everywhere he goes pretending he's Harry Potter with his wand and trying to cast spells on Claire. (Mostly he just tries to make her fly) Oh dear.

Did You Know?

Did you know:

When Claire needs to go 'potty', she either does this fantastic spastic dance, or she pretends she's on a trampoline (jumping up and down), and she whimpers a lot until someone finally asks her if she needs to go...then she'll say yes and run to the bathroom!

Andrew still doesn't talk very much, but he'll point and cry until you finally find what he wants, then he'll grin and make a funny grunting noise, and you know you've found it.

Despite the 90 degree temperatures, Josh still prefers his 'Dash Boots' (Long Live Napoleon Dynamite!!), because, as he puts it, it takes too long to put on his other shoes on (which are slip-on loafers and sandals)!!

The other day, Josh was talking to a friend of mine(who speaks fluent French due to the fact that her mother was French) and he said, "I know French. 'Gracias'! See?" And she said, "Well, Josh, I think that's Spanish." "No," says Josh, "I'm pretty sure it's French." They argued about that for a minute until Josh says, "I also know 'Merci'!" And my friend says, "Yes, that's French!" And Josh says, "Yah, just like 'Gracias'!" My poor kids are so mixed up... But at least he can be polite in three languages!! :)

At the Yaounde International Airport, most flights come in at night. When they know a plane is coming, they turn on the lights for the runway, etc. After the plane takes off to leave, they turn the lights off, and everyone goes home. (Devin says he once saw three planes there at once! Busy night!)

A Hard Question

Claire asked me a difficult question the other day. She asked, "Mom, how did Heavenly Father make you?" Josh knew, though. He piped right up and said, "He just got some play dough and squished it, and then here we are!" He he he!

We all went to an outdoor boutique, and Josh got this sweet hat! It's worn by the chiefs of the villages!



Josh and Claire went to a birthday party the other day. Josh got his face painted and got some candy:



Claire got hit by a water balloon!

It's Coming!!!

It's official: Our big shipments are on a flight as we speak!! They are coming!! By sometime next week, we'll have food, clothing, kitchen appliances, toys, etc.! Oh, I'm so excited!! And, in honor of that, I'll try uploading some things...

We found a lizard on the living room curtains this afternoon.

Evacuation

Well, our adventures for the past little while all began on an unsuspicious Saturday morning. We were just minding our business, getting ready for a shopping trip with a few friends to the local markets for some bargain shopping and haggling en Francais, when all of a sudden, about 10 minutes before we were scheduled to be picked up, Devin gets a call, and he has to go in to work for a radio check. Oh well. That shoots that activity. But, it was usually a short thing, so we thought maybe I could just either wait for him, or just go because there were some other girls coming with us who are fantastic with kids (and Josh and Claire LOVE them!), so it wouldn’t be so bad. So, we piled into the van to go, and Devin told them he had to go into work, and one of our friends said she wasn’t going to be able to go because she had to get some welcome kits ready because they were evacuating the US embassy in Chad…and everyone was scheduled to be there around 11am!!! I decided that helping make welcome kits for families would be a lot more fun and worth my time than doing more shopping, so I offered to stay behind and help, too. So, the kids and I, and another family, helped get some things ready for our ‘refugee’ friends! J We were actually pretty excited, because some friends of ours (whom Devin trained with) are in Chad, and so we would probably see them! And they were looking for someone who spoke SPANISH of all things, to help welcome a lady who spoke almost no English! Yea!!! I’m useful!!! So, after the flurry of excitement getting things ready to welcome them, I dropped the kids off at home with a great babysitter, and we went over to the local hotel to welcome all these poor people. They evacuated the families of the employees of the embassy, so we welcomed a lot of women and confused children. It was crazy. I’ve heard two different versions of what happened in Chad—one: The uncle/cousin of the president of Chad came up to the president and said, “Hey, let’s share power!” And when the president said that he thought that was not such a fun idea, the uncle/cousin raised up rebels and attacked the palace and let out all the prisoners from the prisons and looted all the houses and bombed things and killed a lot of people. The other version I heard (which I think is actually the true one…but still not sure) was that a rebel from the last uprising became the minister of defense of the current president of Chad…and for some reason, the president started to suspect the defense guy of being rebellious again, so he (the president) tried to poison the defense guy! Well, the defense guy didn’t really appreciate that very much, so he ran away back to the rebels, only this time he was well armed—because being the defense minister, he now knew all the presidents top secret info, and knew how to get through all the chinks and loopholes!! Yikes!! So, the rebels raised themselves up and attacked the palace and let out all the prisoners from the prisons and looted all the houses and bombed things and killed a lot of people. Either way, they did a LOT of damage. So, when this all started, they began evacuating people and sending them here. No one knows exactly why they sent them here—probably because this is one of the safest countries in Africa, and it just happens to be next door to them. By the time they decided to evacuate everyone else that they’d left behind, they had to be a bit more sneaky about it (covert would be the word) and they had a time of getting them out!!! Whew!! But, they are all here…I think even the ambassador is here finally (which will make his wife and baby happy, I’m sure!!)—but most if not all of them have lost pretty much everything they own. Their homes have been looted—and here in Africa, if there is an open house, there will be nothing, and I mean NOTHING left in it!!—some of the homes have been smashed in, even! The embassy has holes in it…who knows what will happen now. No one is quite sure as to what they’ll be doing now. There are rumors that they’ll be sent back to reclaim and rebuild, but we don’t think they’ll send everyone back. Where will they live? So, everyone is waiting with baited breath to see what they’ll do! :/ Incidentally, the friends that I mentioned earlier are staying here with us! It’s so nice to have the extra room all furnished and ready at a moments’ notice. So, they have a nice cozy house, with a housekeeper to wash the only two pairs of pants and shirts they have left in the world, and someone to make food for them—and I have a purpose! J it’s always nice to be needed. We’re having a playgroup tomorrow here at our house, and we’ll probably have all the kids that were evacuated over here, so we might have quite the group here in the morning…and since I’m the hostess of the playgroup event, I’m in charge of providing snacks!! Oh boy. So, I think we’re going to have popcorn, blueberry muffins, and homemade ice cream! Ha! (This was mostly Josh’s idea…) Thankfully, it’s pretty much ALWAYS a nice beautiful day outside, so they’ll all eat outside. We were going to have watermelon, too, but when I went to the store, they were all out. That happens. You never really know what you’ll find when you go to the store. They didn’t have any carrots, either. BUT, across the street from the grocery ‘store’ I looked up in the sky and thought I saw flocks and flocks of these huge black birds…but, no, they weren’t birds at all—they were HUGE African BATS!!!!!! These things were monstrous!!! I remember seeing bats in St. George, and even in Idaho sometimes…but those things were these little teeny tiny scrawny things…like a mouse! So, an Idaho/Utah bat is to a mouse, as an African bat is to a CAT!!!! I couldn’t believe it! I just stood there gaping like an idiot!

Anyway, things are starting to calm down a bit more here. We are really starting to enjoy it. I’ve gotten over many of my initial fears of being here, and am feeling much less paralyzed! Ha!! I actually walked to the embassy the other day!! It’s a really nice walk. I think I should do it more often. I think that the evacuation of Chad, and hearing all the stories of what it’s like up there, has made me feel much more comfortable here. And maybe, just maybe, someday we’ll get our shipment and have our things again! :P

Here are a few pictures...one of a happy Andrew...and I'll try to post a video of us after a funny shopping trip last friday when we went to a 'museum' (which was really really tiny and the kids kept trying to shove over the wooden statues!)

This is AMAZING!!!

Well, I've had quite the week this week... From weird rashes kids, to sick me, backed up septic tanks, broken kitchen sink pipes, no drinking water, no internet, no dial tone on the local phone, no minutes left on the cell phone, no water pressure for the garden, and still no word on the car or the shipment of our stuff...and this was ALL YESTERDAY!!!! Yah, I had a good cry last night and this morning, feeling a bit overwhelmed...BUT--Andrew's rash is going down, a plumber came first thing this morning and fixed the pipes under the kitchen sink and our water distiller :) (so we have drinking water for the first time in 3 days!!! Yea!!!!), someone else came and found that our phones were broken, so they replaced them and now I have communication again, AND--get this--one of the internet guys came and FIXED OUR INTERNET!!!!!!!!!! I AM LOGGED INTO MY BLOG AS WE SPEAK!!!! I can't even tell you how exciting this is!!! Now I don't have to overload my poor sister in law! I can check my email and it doesn't take an hour to read 2 messages...I can actually log into my blog in a matter of minutes! I can go to pretty much any internet site that I want and actually see it in less than an hour!! Oh, it's just such a breath of fresh air for me! C'est MERVEILLEUX!!!!! C'est FANTASTIQUE!!! JE SUIS HEUREUX!!
I haven't seen Devin since this morning. It's almost 8pm. *sigh* Well, that's not exactly true. I did see him during French class today. But, a problem came up at work, and he had to stay late to fix it. Then, he had to leave to pick up some stuff at the airport. So, I won't see him until around 11pm. C'est la vie. Oh well. The kiddies are all in bed--I did it all by myself! I'm so proud of myself! Ha!
Well, I'm off to try out some experiments on my new-found freedom with the internet!! :) I haven't been able to surf the net for over a month! Weird!! I'm happy to be back!! :) Maybe my next experiment will be to post a few movies....

Out in the Town

This morning, I was playing a random variation of Go Fish with Josh and Claire, and Josh made a discard pile, and said, “Mom, this is my disco pile!” Ha!

I’ve had the opportunity to go to the huge outdoor market a couple of times now. I went the first time with my fantastic housekeeper, and found a nice large oriental rug for our den. The second time I went was on Friday morning with a few friends. I must admit that the first time I went to the market, I had been here only a very short time, and I was scared out of my wits! I didn’t like that people were throwing things at me and grabbing my arms…all so that I would come and buy something from them. This time when I went, I found it was rather enjoyable!! I found cool (cool meaning light and summery) clothing for all the kiddies, and some sandals for all of them as well. I knew more French, and while I still didn’t understand everything they said to me, I was at least able to hold my own. I learned lots of interesting and useful phrases! C'est la meilleur façon à apprendre une langue. (Thanks Jen! Good phrase!)

After a few hours in the market, I went home for an hour and played with the kids (which was when Josh mentioned his ‘disco’ pile) and then I was off again with Devin to go to the brasserie (brewery). Funny thing to do, I know. Our friends were doing a tour of it as part of the French class, etc., so we went along. It was really interesting. We learned about how they make biere (beer) in French. A few of those rooms we went into…can you get drunk just by breathing in the fumes? Man, my eyes were burning!!! It was interesting to see the different machines working and all the work that goes into making bottled drinks (they also make soft drinks there). At the end of the factory tour, they gave us free drinks (Dev and I got Fanta and Schwepp’s Ginger Ale) and they gave us a hat and some cool cups that say ‘Castel Beer’ on them! Ha!!

We then got to go home and finally see our kids and play with them before we put them to bed! I felt sad that I hadn’t seen them all day long! They don’t do much when I’m not home…mostly just watch movies. So, in some ways I suppose they were glad to not have me there since I don’t let them watch movies when I am home! Ha! They’re good kids.

We’ve had a hard time at church lately. I’m in the primary now with the kids, and it seems to be harder than it was. Josh is mean to all the other kids around him. He keeps telling us that he doesn’t like them. How could he not? They’re sweet kids in the primary, and he doesn’t even talk to them. At all. He just sits in a corner and glares at everyone. What’s up with that??? Or he beats up whomever is sitting next to him. What have I done wrong??? During Sunday School, he wanders about the room, talks over the top of everyone else, or makes a lot of disturbing noises. Then comes Sacrament Meeting, where all 3 kids converge to make it fun for everyone. Today, Claire SCREAMED all the way through the whole meeting. Dev and I took turns holding her outside—we were far away from the room of the meeting, and you could still hear her loud and clear. Andrew was walking all over the benches and trying to eat crayons and paper, and Josh kept wanting to get up and leave, then come back, then leave, then come back and start screaming about something or other. I feel like the worst parent in the world. This is pretty normal for our Sundays here in Africa. It’s been very difficult to pay a lot of attention. Anyone have any advice or ideas how to make it better?? We bring snacks, crayons and paper, small toys…I’m just not sure what to do.

Anyway, on a lighter note, we get to go to the beach for Spring Break in March!!! ϑ It’s a beach resort type place called Kribi. I’m super excited! Beach, sand, waterfalls, boat rides…it will be fun! We’re going with a few other families that we know, and I think it will be nice. We’ll be there for 4 days!! Wow! We’ve never been on a family vacation…we’ve gone places, like to visit family, etc., but we’ve never been on a vacation as a family just for the sake of going on a vacation! So, this will be our first one! Yea!! I hope it’s fun! (I’m also hoping that we get our big shipment before then so that we’ll have all our back up swimsuits, beach towels and beach toys!!!!!!)

I wanted to mention one other thing: Thank you SO MUCH to my fantastic Sister in law who is ‘moderating’ this blog for me! If it weren’t for her, I’d have no blog anymore!! Thanks, Robyn!! The internet connection here is still not great, and while I can email, and buy things on ebay (sometimes), I still can’t log into my blog. *Sigh* And I’ve really enjoyed reading everyone’s comments! It’s nice to hear from so many friends and family!! Leah, if you read this, I need your new email address!!!!! I’ve been wanting to write to you for forever!!!!

Kisses to you all!! ϑ