E's V-day Gift

School Days & Misc other fun :)

Lij's 1st pix - our friends Matt & Abbie who work in the Philippines :)

Even though our national friends have never experienced it, we studied "S" for snow - closest snowman we could get was a tropical ones out of bananas :)

Fun magnet activity...

So fun that a turtle came visiting right around the time we did "T" for turtle!

Lacing fun with "U"

Making a "U" from seashells - now that's using our local resources well!

Boys learning about the calming of the storm - complete with paper boat & figurines sitting inside, Alden's Mom is so smart!

Homemade geoboards thanks to Alden's Dad!

These are the teachers that were a part of the teacher training...

Here's Lij playing at their school:

Helping the teachers search online for teaching/classroom decor ideas...

A couple old discarded boards make for awesome bike ramps for Lij & friends!

Of course sometimes they needed straightening...

Go Lij go!

One of Lij's closest friends, Nefa

Sai's bike riding fun included a stroll around the block with Alden's Dad :)

Nefa's Dad drives a motorbike/sidecar vehicle called a "becek" which the kids love to ride on from time to time as well :)

Here's J trying to get Lij's kite to fly while Lij & Sai enjoy a "becek" ride. Boys enjoying themselves on the sofa cushion...

Nefa pulling them around! On a different note, after a couple months of training, E finally got to the 100K mark!

Fun pier-ish thing she saw on the ride...folks like to fish from here:

Lots of drying fish hanging up as she rode by...

Here's a before & after video of the amazing road put in by USAID... Lij was playing King David with his slingshot - or maybe scepter?

Here Lij's trying to decide if he wants to be bad King Saul or good King David... Nail cutting woes...

The day before fasting month begins folks here usually go picnic at the beach and play together - here we are enjoying the fun together!

J was invited to see the ceremony of the local leader being put back into office - it required him buying a suit...1st one he's ever owned ;)

Catching up on the latest...

Believe it or not, I actually started this post about a month ago, finally getting around to finishing it now. Happy July folks :) We were over @ our teammates' house & realized too late we'd forgotten an extra diaper for Sai. Also didn't realize exactly how big their cloth diaper would look on our little "tweedle dee" (thx Bs for the pinjam btw!)

A few Sai moments...

Enjoyed celebrating Sai's 1/2 bday, Dad J's bday & Mother's Day all on one morning with a rare coffee cake treat!

Building a tower that fell down on it's own at the end of the story, perfect timing!

So Elissa was bike riding one morning & came across a traveling salesman with this sweet oven...the salesman put on his little show & we were sold!

This is a great little local-style grill - trial run: s'mores with neighbor kids!

Sai caught in the act of climbing up on the table...

& quickly trying to get down the way he got up!

"N" for Nest fun @ school! Here we are gathering grass, feathers, etc. to make 'em:)

E & e even found a bird's nest at home which we tried to see via climbing up a ladder but little e got a little nervous with the climb...

Making a bird's nest out of noodles & dinosaur egg gum...

Enjoyed making a chain to count down the weeks 'til we get to see our family & friends stateside - down to 8 links as of today!

Lots to Celebrate!

As if Mom's Day wasn't enough to get excited about, it's also Dad J's birthday as well as Sai's 1/2 bday (yep, we celebrate those too 'round here!) So here's a special post for Mom D & J (Happy Mother's Day!) & Dad J (Happy Birthday!) WE LOVE YOU 3 SOOOO MUCH :)

So before the Bs left for the good 'ole USA, we had 1 final beach afternoon together. They'd found a sweet beach with huge sand dunes that the boys could jump in & around...of course we had to "help" them jump by joining in the fun :) Here's our 5 boys enjoying some homemade ice cream & cookies (thanks to Mama J!) before we head out...

This pix has "Got Milk?" written all over it - what a cute model ;)

Our older 3 guys & Mama J

Jumping off some dunes with our oldest 2...

Lij brave enough to jump off solo: Here's some pix around town with some of our guys - this one's at our local fruit stand:

Outside the big store in town (& yep it's about like a 7-11) - our bike parked in front

Inside our local mart:

Only public slide in town but has a sweet view of the ocean- perfect octopus shape with 3 slides so our oldest ones can all slide simultaneously :)

Our little beach bums!

So J & E fit all 3 guys on our bikes by carrying 2 on 1 bike...go J go!

Stop by to see Lij's good friend Alden:

Using little mosaic pieces to make the letter "H for Hippo" at our little school :)

Shortly thereafter we all flew to Java together (just as the huge earthquake was happening actually) & met up with friends & colleagues for about a week...Lij's 1st jungle gym experience

Got family physicals in the capital - thankfully there were several aquariums in the hospital to help keep the guys occupied between getting poked & prodded!

A haircut was in order for Sai although this is probably the only 5 secs he was completely still...probably because he just grabbed the hairdresser's water bottle.

Hanging out at our friends' place in Bandung: Here's a video showing a bit of Sai' personality on a halfway stop of a fam bike ride...notice how it ends up with him trying to eat the camera! Also on that stop there were some fishermen fishing off the bridge so Sai wanted to hold their catch:

A week ago (yes, we're somewhat up-to-date with these pix!) we went to the capital & the boys had a blast on the new indoor playground in town...

Making "beep beep" sounds, whatta cutie!