"Can you hear me singing?"

Still alive

2007-02-21T22:32:00.000-05:00

We've been a bit busy lately. Sorry for the absence of posts. I'll try to capture the last couple of months briefly.

12/5 Paul was born
12/16 Esther's wedding to Chris Crane in Cleveland, OH. We all went.
12/22-25 Christmas holidays in Bloomington with Larsons and in W. Lafayette with Magills
12/26 We got word that Ben's grandpa's cancer was back in full force.
12/27-30 We directed the high school winter conference. Paul was the youngest conferee on record. My mom stayed with the girls at our house.
1/3 We switched the water piping in our house from the old system to the new, including a new water heater and softener which we needed. Over the next several weeks, we had to keep working out the details of this and finishing the hooking up of our fixtures to the new piping.
1/6 We went to Indy and visited Ben's grandpa with the whole family
1/8 Ben's grandpa passed away.
1/11 Lily's birthday
1/12-13 Calling and family gathering remembering Ben's grandpa
We spent one more weekend in Indy helping with Grandpa's house
2/2 Immanuel Reformed Presbyterian was organized. Ben was elected to be an elder.
2/4 First morning and evening worship of IRPC
2/7 Ben's first session meeting
2/9 Paul weighs in at 13# 6 oz.
2/13 Record snowfalls for Lafayette. 4+ ft. tall drifts.
2/14 Purdue students having a snow day come over and help us nearly complete the last pieces of our piping project. Thank you !!
2/23-24 We are having a little family trip with Ben's family to Chicago to shop and visit the important Czech places from which Deda always purchased Czech food for us. Lily is more excited about staying in a hotel (she remembers this from Esther's wedding) and going swimming.
I am so thankful that the recovery from Paul's birth has gone amazingly well. God's grace, some mental preparation, and Dr. Wickert's skill came together to make his birth as smooth as possible.

Must go, it's late. Hope to get pictures posted eventually.

He's a Big Boy

2006-12-13T09:14:00.000-05:00

Yesterday morning Paul had his first well-baby appointment, and we were somewhat suprised to learn that he now weighs 9lbs, 5 oz! In his first week of life he gained 11 oz (more than 2/3 of a lb.) This doesn't take in to account that he was down to 8 lbs. 5 oz. at one point (baby's always loose some weight in the hospital). This is an increase of almost 8% of his total body weight in one week - if you weigh 125 lbs, 8% of your body weight would be 10 lbs!

All of this weight gain is perhaps explaining why Paul seems to spend most of his time sleeping and eating, and relatively little time awake right now.

Hopefully by next week we'll have some more pics to share. Stay tuned.

Here are some more pics...

2006-12-07T23:58:00.000-05:00

Okay, so this is the first time we've tried anything like this, but here is a link to what should be a Web Album with pics from Paul's birthday. If this works, we'll try to use it more in the future. We hope you enjoy!

Paul Gerhard Larson

It's a boy!

2006-12-06T09:00:00.000-05:00

We were glad to welcome Paul Gerhard Larson into the world at 5:50am this morning. Paul weighed in at 8 lbs, 10 oz. (our biggest yet), measured 21 1/4 inches long, and was born right on his due date (recall that Lily was 13 days early, and Mariah 10 days late). Anna and Paul are both doing well, and you're welcome to come visit us in the afternoon or early evening, or just drop us a line. Stay tuned as we hope to add more pics soon.

Indiana

2006-11-09T22:14:00.000-05:00

Conversation today with Lily:

Lily: "Where does daddy work?"
Mom: "At Eli Lilly."
Lily: "No, at Eli Mariah!"

Indiana has such a great climate. Where else can you experience all 4 seasons, and have an occasional 70 degree day in early November? Though we are on the verge of winter, I finished planting spring bulbs today in a short sleeved shirt!

Finding ourselves

2006-10-23T15:00:00.000-04:00

Ben and I took a counseling course at Faith Baptist Church in Lafayette in 2003. It was a great class and we sure learned alot. We were recently reminded of that when a friend of ours from Washington D.C. mentioned that he saw a picture that looked an awful lot like Ben on a 2007 FBC counseling conference brochure on his boss' desk. We were unaware of his picture being used in their publications, so our friend emailed us and gave us the online link to the brochure...http://www.faithlafayette.org/page233.aspx and scroll down. Nice smile and nice sweatshirt, too!

Home-grown

2006-09-28T21:28:00.000-04:00

The Wagners gave us fruit from their apple and pear trees this year - we got 16 qts. of free (not counting labor) applesauce, and slightly larger muscles from scrubbing the apples. The pears are amazing. I've never eaten pears so juicy in my whole life. Ben, who doesn't usually like pears, even liked them. We're now considering how we can stick a pear tree in our yard, just for fresh eating in a few years.

Mariah is really learning the advantages of speech. She can put 2 words together, she can get help when she's stuck, she can tell on Lily, she can ask for a beverage of choice, she can ask for someone to read to her... Tonight she climbed in my lap and started tickling me (unprompted) and told me that was what she was doing! She also gets lots of milege out of the word "hiding"... Mariah (heading behind the couch), where are you going? 'iding. Mariah, where's duckie? 'iding. Mariah, where's (name anything else)? 'iding. Meaning: I don't know where it is, you go find it!

Tonight, we drove by SIA (Subaru Isuzu Automotive) where they have a huge parking lot with rows and rows of newly manufactured cars. Lily commented as we drove by, "There are cars all over the place."

Oh yes, we bought a van tonight. We've joined the ranks of 2-kid families with mini-vans. It's a Toyota Sienna. 8-passenger. Desert Sand Mica is the color. Theoretically, this is the best mini-van to fit six car seats into, just in case we get to that point. With the IN car-seat laws, we might get there. And then again, we don't really want to dwell on the logistics of 6 kids under 8. Three seems like plenty for now. At least we have room to tote them all around and the myriad of things that seem to go with. I guess the best feature is that there are three spots for car-seat "latches" across the middle seat. The second best feature is that you can be 9 mo. pregnant and get into the back seat without having to do a) gymnastics moves or b) pivot on your big belly. We like Toyotas. But don't tell that to Deda.

2006-09-06T15:31:00.000-04:00

Just added the baby ticker for the new baby. 90 days to go sounds kind of depressing, but the graphic sure is cute!

Anecdotes

2006-09-06T15:07:00.000-04:00

Mariah is milking her speaking abilities for all they're worth. Today she said "counter" (as in, those things in the kitchen). She wanted her chapstick which was on the counter! She is putting two words together, such as Daddy mow or I-yee (Lily) play.

Second only to snuggling with her duck and blanket, she really likes to listen to books being read. If you sit down, she'll bring over a book and say "read". When you get done, she says "one", as in, read another one to me, please.

Lily is trying to sing. She rather likes the little refrain "Cement mixer, putty, putty", and can sing through her ABC's and "Blessed be the Lord" (Psalm 72D) with only a little help. So far, she shows all the abilities (ie, nearly none) of a Magill child in this realm, so you'll just have to imagine the tune and the rhythm!

On other fronts, she's making progress with recognizing her colors and shapes and slowly learning the power of asking sweetly for what she wants instead of crying and screaming. She also would like to completely ditch her booster seat at the table. Mom and dad have different ideas though, and she gets to sit in her chair without the booster as long as she stays in the chair and doesn't stand up! The struggle for self-control begins early!

It continues to be a good garden year, and this last week of cool weather should help to yield a fall crop of lettuce and spinach before the frost, we hope.

Sunday night is going to be the first worship service of IRPC, the new church plant in West Lafayette. Our Bible-overview (evangelistic) study is going quite well.

2006-08-21T15:13:00.000-04:00

I'm not doing so well at this blogging thing since returning from PR. I have way more stuff to do here, I guess, and the kids are napping for shorter periods of time. Maybe I'll pick up again in winter, when the outdoor work is on hold. Maybe after the baby comes, when we'll have lovely pictures to post.... ok. Maybe not after the baby.

Highlights of life in no order, except how quickly they come to me:

We succeeded in getting our raspberries to root in this year after a failed attempt last year. One even decided to set fruit, and we've eaten three red raspberries from our own garden this summer. We planted the variety 'Latham' and they are big and good. Can't wait for more. The blackberries that did root in last year produced this year, but we never got the berries, they were tiny anyway, and they are making a huge mess growing and sending up shoots all over the garden. They are going to be booted this fall (er, gingerly pulled out because they have thorns the size of needles), and more Lathams planted next spring. They were purchased at Menards, along with numerous other gardening duds over the last few years and now we're getting skeptical of their garden plants.

We are doing a Bible study with 5 friends from the book God's Message to You. It is a six week, gospel-oriented overview of the Bible. We prayed this summer for God to send us friends to study with, none of our ideas of how to meet these friends really worked out, but in the space of 4 days at normal-life events we met 4 interested people, and then another friend introduced us to another person who wanted to join.

This has been a really good gardening summer. I've kept the weeds down, spaced stuff correctly so it's not too overgrown, and we've had great harvests. If I remember, I'm going to start a journal to help me next year.

We've been furniture shopping lately, and have finished our research and made some purchases. You can check it out if you come and visit us!

2 Omas = 2x the fun

2006-07-21T16:04:00.000-04:00

Pictures from the farm. The Diesel 2520 is a rare find in the world of tractors and was recently added to the farm collection. The birth of six baby kittens while we were there was a highlight, as were the wagons - for work and fun. And as always, Oma's basement induced many good long sleeps.

Electric Slide

2006-07-21T15:28:00.000-04:00

Pictures from spending the weekend with Nonna and Grandpa (Ben's parents). Great times were had by all (and much tiredness ensued later).

Quotes from the farm

2006-07-01T19:24:00.000-04:00

From Lily:
"Where my two Omas?"
"Want get 'keeker (squeeker) kiss my oyert (other) Oma."
"Where Auntie Yiz (Liz)?"
"I miss my cousins." (after leaving to go to bed at night)

From Mariah:
arm - Oma - Opa - Heidi - kitty - doggie - eat - go potty

Just before we go....

2006-06-24T23:06:00.000-04:00

Just wanting to make a quick post before we head out the door.... we're looking forward to being with our Canadian family soon!

Here's the interesting stuff:

Wish you could hear little conversations with Lily. They are so fun. And so... well, continuous. And always include "why", at both the beginning and end of the question. For example, "Why go sleep? Why?" "Why take bath? Why?" "Why go church? Why?"

Mariah is trying to repeat words that she hears. It's fun. And also continuous.

Ben's Grandpa went through surgery on his pancreatic cancer on Tuesday. He is in the middle of a difficult and complicated recovery. Pray that he will heal, and that he will come to know Jesus. We were with him and Ben's family in Indy today.

We have a silvery/pale purple-y/white rose in our flower bed that smells heavenly. Wish we could post scents on the blog. It's amazing.

2006-05-31T16:11:00.000-04:00

Lily sporting her pink flip flops from Emily (Purdue student who lived with us in spring), and Mariah in Ben's hat.

Spring Fest

2006-05-31T15:42:00.000-04:00

Pictures taken at "Spring Fest" at Purdue in the petting zoo. For several weeks afterwards, if we mentioned this event to Lily, she would reply with " 'Gain!" (as in, do it again!)

Long awaited update

2006-05-23T22:29:00.000-04:00

Sorry to anyone who has checked this blog for the last 6 weeks with no update. I do intend to keep it up a bit, even though we're home.

We've been working in the yard and enjoying spring. We've been home 7 weeks tomorrow, and in that time we've: pulled 27 bushes out of a hedgerow, planted 6 fruit trees (1 walnut, 3 apples, 2 cherries), planted grass in the hedgerow and other bare spots, planted the garden, put in edging around 2 flower beds in the front, moved and planted flowers including 3 roses, killed weeds, put up a better bunny fence than the one we had last year (did you know rabbits can squeeze through holes that are only 2 or 3 inches square? we didn't until we saw them do it, and eat our lettuce), and generally wished that we didn't live in the city where it's so difficult to get rid of rabbits. Lily, however, likes to chase them (does she actually think she'll catch one?). It's usually easy to spot one munching our new grass.

Mariah is quite the little toddler. She walks (runs?) everywhere, dances to music, including spinning in circles and falling down (after which she says "boom"), always asks for a marshmallow when Lily gets one for going potty, has a sweet tooth, knows where the cabinet with snacks is (even though it's out of reach, she can point and beg), can feed herself with utensils - even yogurt - without making too much mess, and loves her little stuffed duckie. Dearly. We lost him in WalMart one day. Ever wondered what's underneath the shelves in a SuperCenter? (Thankfully, we did find him).

Lily's current interests include not wearing shoes, ever, unless they are 6 sizes (or more) too big, dancing on the pew ("poo", as she says) while holding a psalter and "singing" in church, playing at the park as often as possible, asking why (why go sleep? why take bath?), singing psalms with hand motions in "family worpish" (family worship), "reading" books, playing with coins (we have a small change jar), playing in kitchen sink with water and cups, and listening to nursery rhymes, many of which she has memorized.

Little Larson #3 is currently interested in making mom tired and nauseous. He/she will be here in early December. We are all excited about the "new baby in mommy's tummy"! Lily would really like to see it right now, and is wondering whether or not there is one in her tummy too. We're trying to set her straight.

Is anyone reading our blog now that we're stateside?

Travel home

2006-04-17T22:22:00.000-04:00

We certainly saw God's hand of providence in the last couple days before we left PR. Our final preparations began in very great ernest (they'd been in "great ernest" for several days) on Tuesday morning. We had to do a final cleaning of the house to pass our inspection at 4 p.m. that day. Ben and I did most of it Tuesday (4/4), and then we hired a lady to come and help us finish up with some of the harder stuff on Tuesday afternoon. We were not quite done when the ladies arrived for the inspection, but our cleaning help was still there, so they quickly cleaned as problems were pointed out. I was furiously throwing the last few piles of our things into boxes and suitcases. Thankfully, our landlord was not there for the inspection. About 10 minutes away from home, Ben remembered that he'd left his laptop in the closet, a bad problem since we'd locked ourselves out of the house. Except that we forgot to lock 1 door (completely accidently)!

We spent the night at a hotel on the beach which was great, and very relaxing. We went swimming in the morning, and the rain began as we had to go inside in order to make our flight.

We completely did not leave enough time to get through the airport, and the lines were hours long; we were never going to make our flight. But our flight was delayed an hour and this very nice porter took all our bags and somehow got them on the flight without them being weighed (I'm sure we had some that were overweight) and without us waiting through the ticketing line. In my furious packing at the last minute, I put all my kitchen utensils including 4 knives into a suitcase I was planning to put inside a box and check. At the very last minute the suitcase, which was small, didn't fit in the box, and without considering the contents, I just decided to take it as a carry-on. Security noticed my 4 kitchen knives (including my bread saw...not exactly discreet), and thankfully gave Ben the option of checking the suitcase instead of just confiscating my knives. We, however, had our maximum number of checked pieces already, and would have to pay a fee to check another. Mercifully, and for no reason, the attendant just let us check the extra bag for free. Because of the hour delay leaving San Juan, we were likely going to miss our connecting flight, but somehow we made it. Our luggage didn't make the connection, but it came through later that evening. Ben stayed at the airport and picked it up while I went on home with Ben's parents and the girls. By 1 a.m. or so we were home with all our luggage. Operative word of the day: mercy. God giving us what we didn't deserve. We could have not passed the inspection, it could have rained at the beach, we could have missed our flights, had our knives confiscated, been charged for overweight luggage, been charged for excessive checked bags, lost our luggage.... Mercy.

Sunday's News

2006-04-02T14:58:00.000-04:00

Here's our schedule starting Friday (3/31) until we leave on Weds. (4/5):

Friday - Ben's last day at work
Saturday - pack, pack, pack, & do a little shopping
Sunday - rest; good-bye party at church in the evening
Monday - finish packing; movers come to take our shipment of stuff which should get to our house 10 days - 2 weeks after we do. Start a little cleaning? Finish any little odds and ends.
Tuesday - we clean in the morning; friends come to help us do the heavy cleaning (under furniture, etc) in the afternoon. Tuesday night we will stay at a hotel by the beach for one last time by the ocean.
Wednesday - our flight leaves at 12:45 p.m. We will be in Indy by 8 p.m., Lord willing.

Lots of mixed feelings on leaving: sad to leave friends here, excited to see friends and family at home.

Other news:

Curious to hear what others think about the current proposals concerning illegal immigration. Have read several perspectives and there are a lot of sides to consider: Are we assimilating immigrants well? Will Republicans "polarize" themselves against Hispanic voters? Should we grant "amnesty" to so many illegals? My personal question is: What is happening to the second and third generation of illegal immigrants? Are they staying and working like their parents, or are they (and their parents?) milking their citizenship by birth for government benefits (housing, healthcare, food stamps, etc.)? Additionally, I would like to see the government grant citizenship by birth only to children of citizens; it doesn't seem right that someone of illegal status can birth someone who has legal status. Thoughts? Forward any links to me with articles addressing these issues...

Visits and Travels

2006-03-19T20:35:00.000-05:00

We had a great time with Jeremy and Wendy. They arrived on Thursday afternoon (3/9), and I picked them up from the airport and also found a great bakery en route (got bread for dinner). Ben worked both Thursday and Friday, putting in some of the longest days he has ever done since we got here. Having company during those two evenings was great! Saturday we went to Old San Juan, looked around, had lunch, etc. See our previous posts on this part of the city if you want to see what it looks like (if you click the link, you have to scroll down to find the pictures). Sunday was rest and worship, and Monday and Tuesday we headed to Culebra – a little island off the NE corner of, and governed by, Puerto Rico. Most nights we stayed up a little too late hanging out.

The beaches on Culebra island are like those you see in pictures of or movies set in the Carribean. The sand is white and beautiful, the beaches are flatter than most and so even big waves break gently, and there are few people anywhere. Even a long way from shore the water is crystal clear, and the fish and coral in the snorkeling areas are beautiful (well, mostly. Ben and Jeremy met a barracuda). We felt like we could spend a long time there. We had a great dinner together on Monday and had some tasty eats and good conversation. The fish platter pictured above was Ben’s red snapper (pictures coming later, hopefully).

And lest this seem a little too romantic, here’s the rest of the story: the ferry ride to Culebra – though extremely cheap – made all of us (except Mariah) sea sick; the girls took few naps and were a bit of mess; we had an enormous amount of stuff with us (2 pack’n’plays, a double stroller, suitcase, backpack, diaper bag, cooler, and bucket of sand toys); and though the hotel was clean and we had a fridge, it was lacking in basic hotel supplies (box springs, washcloths, shampoo, bar soap, etc. – but we knew from prior experience to expect this).

A great time and many memories were made by all!

Going Home

2006-03-19T15:57:00.000-05:00

Going Home #1 - we are coming back to Indiana on April 5. Three of us have feelings on the matter and one of us is clueless.

Going Home #2 - Jeremy and Wendy (friends from Bloomington) visited us from 3/9-15. We had an awesome time.... more on that later. It was hard to say good-bye to them as we realized what an incredible blessing good friends are!

Lily has learned about home. She can tell you her name "Esh-er Yi-yan" (Esther Lillian), and with prompting she'll say "Yarson". She knows her address "601 Siempre Viva", and she knows where she lives "Port-a-rico". Many times when we leave our house to run errands, she says "Bye Lily's house". PR has become her home. She also knows now that we're going to a "new house" and that we will "go airplane see Buka Nonna" (go on an airplane and see Grandpa and Nonna). Upon probing, she may say that the new house is in "Ana" (Indiana).

2006-03-06T09:45:00.000-05:00

We're having Butler University "Spirit Day" in honor of Uncle John today!

Do you like Mariah's crazy "smile" in the 2nd picture? This is the face she makes when you tell her to smile!

Ben worked 13 hours on Friday, and then turned around and went back in to work almost a whole day on Saturday. A portion of the project is supposed to finish this week, so they are meeting lots of deadlines and "urgent issues".

We are looking forward to Jeremy and Wendy coming on Thursday!

"Hun"

2006-03-02T20:52:00.000-05:00

You know that tone of voice you use with a family member when you need to ask a little favor that, basically, they have to grant because it's necessary, but it won't really inconvenience them too much? Such as, "I need to run to the bathroom, could you just wait one second before you do x so I can be there too?" or "Can I run and grab x real quick before we leave?"

So in that tone of voice, I heard a little voice from the back seat of the car, just as we were driving by the neighborhood park: "Hun! Play park! Few minutes!"

Hun = abbreviated form of "Honey" by which the parents of that little voice frequently address each other.

Muffled laughter ensued from the driver's seat!

She lives again!

2006-02-22T19:34:00.000-05:00

After consulting with "techies" at work, the problem with our computer is the power supply - and Ben got a new box thing with a lot of cords attached to fix the problem. It worked - a sweet little solution indeed.

Word of the day: em-PEET. As in, there's nothing in my purse. It's em-PEET.

It was a beautiful Carribean day today - sky so blue, big fluffy clouds, warm and sunny, but not an absolute scorcher. We're sure going to miss the weather when we leave.

I was able to take both girls swimming today by myself and it was a success. Mariah has grown up enough that she now knows to pull her face out of the water while sitting in the little baby floatie.

Big C remains dead

2006-02-21T20:54:00.000-05:00

Sorry, no pictures now. The Big computer - the one with all the family stuff on it - is dead. The power button will not turn her on (She is plugged into the wall. We checked.) Any techies who want to offer advice will find a ready audience here. Meantime, B is researching purchasing a new Big C, and my computer time is on his laptop at nights when I can - so don't expect too much on the blog for now.

Mariah is tooting all over the place on her own two feet. She's starting to do more cute and funny things, like hugging/tackling Lily, feeding herself and others with a toy spoon, and saying "all done" with understanding.

I just finished reading Standing on the Promises, so among other things, we are adjusting our discipline and training strategies. Interesting observation: she has done immensely better with potty training since we began our adjustments (a completely unplanned side effect?). We don't know if someone is praying for her, or if there is a correlation. Guesses, anyone?

Good Free Stuff

2006-02-13T21:15:00.000-05:00

If you're into rebates and free stuff, this is a really good month to check out the WalGreens Easy Saver - you can get a free child's toothbrush (pass it my way if you don't have any little sprouts), a free tube of lipstick, a free bottle of shampoo or conditioner, and a free stick of deodorant. That's enough to keep a body clean and pretty for a little while at least! If you haven' t seen it before, the Easy Saver is a little booklet on the same rack with the weekly circular just inside the door in any WalGreens. One booklet lasts for a month, and every month they offer several free items (via rebate) as well as in-store coupons and various rebates. And if you get into the "Easy Saver" habit, you can get your rebate back in the form of a WalGreens gift card, and they'll give you an extra 10% back for free just for choosing the gift card. That'll usually cover the cost of your stamp on the rebate, if you even care! Happy shopping.

PS - this WalGreens tip came from Tara VanderW. - a true bargain hunter.

PPS - no pictures yet. The big computer has decided to go on vacation and not turn on.

Caribbean National Forest

2006-02-11T20:37:00.000-05:00

We just got home from hiking in the Caribbean National Forest, El Yunque. El Yunque is a real rainforest. It was so fun to visit and actually see all the stuff that I've heard about the rain forest. In relation to the US, it's most similar to the Smokey Mountains, in that everything is green and mossy, but the similarities end there. The vegetation is so different: palm trees, other trees that look like deciduous trees but never really shed their leaves, lots of vines and plants that grow on the trees, etc. There are four visible layers to the rainforest, which we could clearly see. We hiked two different trails, one to a waterfall (pictured in the "El Yunque" link above), and one to a lookout point (on top of a mountain) from which we could see a good portion of the eastern corner of the island. The view was great. I was surprised at how cool the wind got when we were up that high. The clouds are low here, and at the top of the mountain we were on the same level as the clouds and could see them floating by.

We put the kids in their packs and they did ok. We let Lily walk some (until she was so tired she couldn't walk anymore), and we collected some rainforest "toys" (leaves, bark, etc) for her to play with in the carrier. She never really slept until we got into the car to go home at dinner time and we have never seen her more tired than she was today! Mariah did well in her "pack" and had her own little conversation with nature complete with many hand gestures as we walked up the mountain.

Pictures to come later.

Snail mail

2006-02-07T20:21:00.000-05:00

This time our mail really did come on the back of snail. In fact, I think the snail - packages in tow - floated across the ocean on a leaf. Today we received 2 packages via "Priority Mail", one postmarked Oct. 3 and the other Nov. 17 (Today is Feb. 7). We think that the pony express was faster than this!

In other interesting news, strawberries were on sale at Amigo (the local grocery store owned by Wal-Mart) for the very low price of $3.97 per pound (US dollars) - cheapest I've seen since we've been here. Regular price: $5.97 per pound. I bought some and we are having strawberry shortcake for an early Valentine's Day treat sometime soon! Red and yellow peppers also came down to a mere $2.97 pound, as compared to the regular $5.97/lb. The cost of food (though these are extra high prices) is one of the down-sides of living on an island; most of our groceries are shipped in. Milk, which is locally processed, must be regulated by the government or something, because it is always $4/gal, and the price has varied by nothing more than $0.25 (even with "sales") since we've been here.

Mariah is taking lots of steps now - 5, 6, or 7 or more together. She does still crawl or cruise along the furniture most of the time, but she is getting more confident in her walking.

Quote

2006-02-05T20:46:00.000-05:00

Lily in the car on the way home from church: 'Cito. Miss. Hand. Holding.
Translation: I miss Davicito. I hold his hand (and run around the church with all the other kids)! Davicito (center) and family moved to MI on Wednesday.

News & Views

2006-02-01T21:00:00.000-05:00

Mariah seems to be producing a mate for her lone top tooth (she's got three on the bottom, which makes things a bit lop-sided!) and this new tooth is sure giving her the blues.

Lily has really taken to Madeline, a recent book from the library. A childhood favorite of mine, she is especially intrigued by the bed that is "em-peet" in the row of 12. She knows of course, that it's empty because Madeline is in the "ha-pit-al", and likes to find the pictures of Madeline in the hospital. She's also decided to add the suffix "-ing" to most of her verbs (would that be the present participle???), so most of her actions (the ones she reports, anyway!) are in the present continuous. I guess that is actually somewhat fitting, since she rarely thinks about anything other than the immediate present, and most of her actions are repeated over and over!

I am starting to sew a new batch of diapers. I've finished the pattern design, done a trial run, made pattern adjustments, and finally cut into my good fabric (lime green french terry! - sweet stuff!) for the first one today. I need to assemble this one and try it out a bit before I do a mass cut-and-sew of a dozen or so. Maybe I'll get them finished before we come home; we'll see.

I feel kind of badly leaving a mention of Ben out of this update, but I feel equally badly say, Ben is working, working, working. But that's how it is, and last week and this week (and maybe next week too) he will work Saturdays as well. They are in the heat of finishing up stuff on this phase of the project.

Word of the Day

2006-01-25T21:12:00.000-05:00

Ok, 2 words.

"Fip-pops": as in, Mommy's wearing fip-pops outside while we wash the van.
"eh-freaking": as in, we have to clean up eh-freaking before we take our naps.

Lily is saying 7-10 new words every day right now, and putting 2 and 3 words together. It's so fun; and then funny at times to hear words like fip-pops repeated 30 times through the course of the day!

Recent funny & interesting pictures

2006-01-24T14:39:00.000-05:00

1: Lily sitting on the stairs "nursing" her baby (that baby can get completely fed in about 15 sec! Amazing!); 2: a sweet shot of a lizard that I was on the outside of the kitchen window at night. 3: the colors of the sea, as we saw last Sat. Thus ends the pictures.

Pictures from the Mangrove Forest expedition

2006-01-24T14:30:00.000-05:00

First pic: Fiddler crab beneath 3 neumataphores in the center of the picture. The crabs dig the holes that you can see elsewhere in the picture. 2nd: the "road" to the forest. 3rd: the hike, 4th: some of what we saw. Gotta love those carriers; we can take our whole family on foot - Lily in the KeltyKids, and Mariah in the Baby Bjorn (though she barely fits, and Lily wants to walk most of the time!)

More pictures to come...

2006-01-23T21:21:00.000-05:00

There are too many people online right now, and the cable company allows too many people to access their lines at once, so our internet slows to a crawl after 10 p.m. I'll upload more pictures in the morning.

Pictures from Casa Cautano

2006-01-23T20:49:00.000-05:00

In order from the top: bedroom; bathroom (lower left corner = picture of an old fashioned bidet); front of house; picture on wall (look at this picture closely - can you tell what it is?!); courtyard fountain. The courtyard fountain is marble, and was ordered from Italy by the founder of Guayama for the town square. But when it came he thought it was too small for the town square so he just kept it and put it in his personal courtyard. He ordered a different, larger one for the town square!

Puerto Rican houses

2006-01-23T20:42:00.000-05:00

The first picture is of a very nice, but typical PR house. The second is of a house by the sugar mill. Notice the large yard, the verada, the sloped tin roof. Hidden behind the tree in the top center part of the roof is a small raised area of roof for ventilation.

Recent news and travels

2006-01-23T15:21:00.000-05:00

We are back into our routine here. Ben’s work is going ok. Not great, not bad. He is still working long hours and probably will be for the rest of the time that we are here. Two interesting things from work: it became apparent that until we have our return tickets purchased (which hasn’t happened yet) we don’t know exactly when we’ll be coming home, and that it’s a definite possibility that he will be doing some travel to PR after our stay here is finished.

I have a couple of big projects I’d really like to get some time to work on (in addition to wishing for time to study and learn Spanish), but I usually end up spending my time doing housework (of which we have quite a bit more here – bigger house, house gets dirtier, house is harder to clean than at home) or trying to get other stuff done that we just need to do to live here. As for phone calls and arrangements (say, to get our air conditioning units cleaned, which really needs to be done), I always get the run-around, in part because I can’t speak Spanish, and in part because everything here just takes longer – no one knows, no one can give me a definite answer, and then when someone does know I have to ask a lot of questions to make sure they aren’t trying to take advantage of me!

Lily has a lot of energy all week long and training her is a non-stop job when she is awake. Her language is developing more, and that is fun. She talks all the time, and tells us in one or two word snippets some of what she is thinking. This weekend she has been reading and singing The Little Drummer Boy (a picture book with the words from the well known Christmas carol) with Ben. Something about the little boy, the drum, and the rum-pa-pum-pum really appeals to her!

Mariah has 4 teeth now – one on top and three on the bottom! She has not been sleeping well this week (until last night), maybe because of ear infections (which she had this past week) or teeth (1 just came through, 1 will come soon). She really likes to play with Lily. She’s always crawling along behind her and trying to play where Lily plays. She also seems to have a special need for “mommy time”.

Saturday we went to Guayama and near-by Aguirre on the southern part of the island. Guayama is the town where Ben works. Casa Cautano is in Guayama, an old house (just over 1oo years) preserved in amazing condition with the original furnishings. It was the home of the founder of Guayama, and his family lived there for 3 or 4 generations and then the house was given to the municipality. We'll post some pictures from the house later. There is an old sugar cane mill in Aguirre, and although it’s not in operation (I would have liked to see the processing operation), there were some interesting houses in Aguirre which used to be (and some still are) owned by mill employees. The style of architecture is different from a lot of what we see here. We’ll post a couple of pictures.

Near Aguirre is an estuary, and we took a short hike through a mangrove forest on the edge of the estuary. The road to the forest was a dirt path - literally - not often traveled and we were the only ones there at the time. Unlike the Florida mangrove forests where I think you need a boat, we could hike through this one. Maybe that was because this is the "dry" season? Two interesting sitings: fiddler crabs (which I used while I worked at Purdue, but had never seen in a natural environment) and neumatophores – special roots that mangroves poke out of the soil for gas exchange. This is necessary because the salinity of the soil doesn’t allow an adequate oxygen supply. We took the long way home and saw some great views of the ocean from the roadside (minus the decomposing skull – dog? – that was also on the roadside next to the great view of the ocean).

Sunday did not bring us much good news from local friends: an older lady is in a grave health situation, another friend had discouraging news from her recent surgery, another girl was missing because of side effects from chemo, and our best friends David and Karen (David has done some - really most - of the translating for us at church) are moving to MI in a couple of weeks (all this in a church of about 50 people). We are really going to miss David and Karen and their boys; our last couple months here will be more lonely without them. We are excited that they are going to MI, and we hope to be able to visit them when we get back to IN. Their kids are also Lily’s favorite playmates at church.

That's it for now - check out the recent pictures (above post) from our trip this weekend.

Happy Birthday Lily!

2006-01-11T23:35:00.000-05:00

We had a little party today for Lily's second birthday. After singing "Happy Birthday" to her more times than we can count, we think she figured out that today was a special day! A highlight was Nonna's phone call this morning. She had gnocchi (potato puff pasta) with spaghetti sauce, peas, and bread for dinner, and chocolate pie for a birthday cake. She saw me bake the crust earlier in the day, and couldn't wait to eat the pie! I think we've read too many Richard Scarry books about people eating pie... In actuality, she only ate a couple of bites and was more enamored with putting the candles into her slice of pie. Thanks to everyone for the cards (paper and electronic) you sent. I can't believe she's two; but overall, she sure becomes more fun the older she gets!

More Birthday Pictures...

2006-01-11T19:52:00.000-05:00

Lily sure enjoyed the candle fire on her pie; that was a definite highlight of the birthday bash. She also really enjoyed the FP cash register (1974 version) that we gave her. How much fun can a toddler have with 5 buttons, a crank with bell, an opening drawer, and a change slide? Alot, when you have a few of the right coins. We found it in amazing shape at a yard sale (hey, the new ones just aren't near as cool!), but after looking at what cash registers like this go for on E-bay, wondered if we should let her play with it!

Botanical Gardens

2006-01-06T21:35:00.000-05:00

Here are the promised pictures from the Botanical Gardens that we visited in December. The 2nd picture is of starfruit on the tree, which grow abundantly around here. We also saw a beautiful brazil nut tree (not pictured). It was huge, with an excellent shape. There is also a USDA research station for tropical agriculture located on the grounds, but since we visited on Saturday, no one was there to give us any information about current activities.

3 Kings Day

2006-01-06T21:20:00.000-05:00

Today is Epiphany, the day on the church calendar when it is thought that the wise men came to visit Christ. In PR, this is a large traditional holiday, and until recently, was Puerto Rican Christmas. Recently, Christmas, with all it's American materialism, has overshadowed this holiday, though from what we hear, most families will celebrate both holidays. Local tradition is that the children collect grass and put it in small shoeboxes beside their beds on the night before Epiphany. They're told that when the kings come to visit, their camels need something to eat, so they eat the grass in the shoebox and the kings leave behind presents for the children.

Welcome Home

2006-01-06T20:51:00.000-05:00

We had an uneventful (PTL!) trip home. The flight timing was perfect. The girls were pretty tired, but aside from a little crying, we arrived home to PR (84 deg. F when we landed!) in one piece.

The is the second time I've arrived in PR. Ben and I commented to each other how much easier it is this time than when we came together in September. We understand the culture (or at least we understand that there are lots of things we don't understand, culturally speaking!). We can expect the unexpected and not go crazy. And when we got home, Lily knew we were home and was generally obedient to the ground rules we'd established previously. Potty training is so much easier on tile floors! She also seems to be catching on that we live in 'Rico (as she says), and that we have different friends here than we have in IN. One of her favorite conversations is to name someone (a friend or family member), and then say "soon" (as in will we see them soon?), and then often follow up with another comment. For example: Nonna? Soon? Christmas? or Davicito (a friend at church in PR)? Soon? 'Rico?

It was interesting to watch Mariah. She slept through the night the first night we arrived home (which she hadn't done the whole time we were in the US). She was happy, she wasn't nearly as clingy, and she ate well. Did she know she was home?

We had a wonderful time in IN. Thanks to everyone who hosted us! Lily especially had a blast, and is enjoying her new Christmas toys very much. She seemed kind of surprised to see them here, as though she assumed we left them behind after Christmas! We are enjoying all the Christmas cards that came forwarded from IN; they greeted us when we arrived home.

Good news in the mail

2005-12-21T20:06:00.000-05:00

Good news came in the mail today. We received our 3rd electric bill to date, and while bills are not normally considered good news, we were pleased to see that this bill is half as much as our first bill. Finally, our PR electric bill is now less than our house payment in West Lafayette. No joke.

The cost of living here, and especially electricity, is high. And yes, dad, from talking with others, we're pretty sure the electric company isn't just scalping us because Ben works for Lilly!

We had a great time at a botanical garden near here on Saturday. I hope to post pictures soon.

Lily, who loves to look at our photo albums here, has now discovered that she can see pictures of Anabelle Humphreys (her friend from Lafayette RPC) on the computer. Now she has a regular request whenever the computer gets turned on!

We will be home so soon. I can't wait.

2005-12-11T20:49:00.000-05:00

We were at the beach on Saturday and took these pictures. When we got home, we had pictures in our email inbox from my dad showing pictures of 11" of snow. Sorry, Pops.

The beach is nice right now because it's the off-season: for the locals it's "winter", and the holiday tourists haven't arrived yet.

Sabbath ramblings

2005-12-11T20:05:00.000-05:00

Here are a few interesting things from this week:

Monday we went to the San Patricio Mall, where they had a living nativity, with the "living" part being the animals. The set up was complete with a gumball machine filled with animal food - $.25 for a handful. We had a whole lot of fun for $.50! They had a small cow, 4 sheep, chickens, 2 rabbits, and 3 big goats with horns, who could scare little children by jumping up and putting their front feet on their fence pen. Lily added "Baby - Jesus" to her vocabulary. Nothing like a little zoo in the midst of a nice mall with A/C, florescent lights, and Christmas decorations!

Good news from home: there is going to be a West Lafayette RPC, Lord willing!

For $.25, I recently picked up a copy of Super Baby Food by Ruth Yaron at our local library's perpetual booksale (one of the ways they make money as a private institution). I'd seen this book recommended on some of my cloth diapering groups, and it has been no disappointment. While the author is a bit of a health food nut, she does have numerous good ideas for feeding little babies solid food that will build their health. I was especially interested in the charts that she includes explaining suggested feeding schedules (ie, how many nursings per day, how many different types of food at each solid food meal, etc.) for each month starting at 6 mo. Also interesting were the recommendations on which foods were most nutritious and when they could be introduced safely to babies. Mariah's diet now includes lots of sweet potatoes, avocado, and some ricotta cheese. And I've got a long list of new things to keep adding...

Lily, who refers to herself as "Yi Yee", has added the reflexive pronoun "self" to her vocabulary. This word shows up when she goes to the bathroom, eats, or walks with us - for example, when we're walking together she sometimes pulls her hand out of mine and says, "self", meaning I want to walk by myself. Don't hold my hand.

Our Spanish teacher informed us Wednesday that we have 2 more lessons to go and we will have enough foundation to start forming sentences properly. I'm ready.

Friday morning our play group met at Angel's house (Angel goes to the Thursday Bible at Calvary). The kids did a little Christmas craft (made ornaments) and also decorated birthday cakes - Happy Birthday Jesus! This play group is somewhat of an outreach (not exactly organized, it just flows out of life): Moms that are part of the play group meet other moms in the community and we invite them to come and hang out with their kids and play with us and our kids. We get to build friendships in a comfortable environment and share about the Lord as we have opportunity in the context of life.

Friday night we went to the park and met a couple with a 2 year old son from Cuba. He is a Dr. here doing his residency. I've never met anyone from Cuba and we had a fascinating conversation with adults who have come out of Fidel's regime. His basic summary: I like the US. You have freedom. You have money. In Cuba, we have no freedom and no money. Interesting to hear it from someone who has lived under that.

I also had a nice conversation with Idania, wife of the Dr. from Cuba. She hasn't met many stay at home moms here, so I'm hoping to introduce her to some of the ladies and kids in our play group. Lord willing, she'll also get a chance to hear about Jesus.

Our Pastor Vater just returned from a short preaching trip to Haiti. There is a growing group of believers in Haiti with whom leaders from the Reformed Baptist churches have been visiting, usually hosting a short teaching conference on the Confession of Faith (the Baptist Confession of 1689, which is basically the Westminster Confession of Faith with a few revisions for Baptists.) Pastor reported on his trip during the Sunday School hour (an impromtu SS lesson; the teacher's wife gave birth to a baby this morning) and had some amazing stories about Haiti and the opportunities and challenges there. Evidently these fraternal relations have been developing over 6 years and at this most recent conference there were around 200 people there who were seriously interested in studying reformed theology.

Our neighborhood hosted a Christmas party at the clubhouse (which is across the street from us) today. We didn't make an appearance, but we got to "enjoy" the music nonetheless. The party started at 1 p.m., and we felt the rock beat in our house for a few hours, then the live music started and we got to hear the sax and other instruments and feel the drums almost as though they were playing in our own living room. We went to evening worship, came back, and still the live music was playing. We put the girls in bed, heard 2 or 3 more songs, and finally the music stopped nearly 8 hours after it started. I breathed a sigh of relief, and then heard a little voice from the upstairs bedroom say, "mo-wa", as in, more music, please!

I guess we're kind of on a count-down now. We leave for Christmas 1 week from this coming Thursday!

Mariah stands alone

2005-12-11T20:00:00.000-05:00

Here's what Mariah did this morning in the nursery of her own volition, according to my friends who witnessed it. We helped her up at home (for the picture), but she can stand for a second on her own, and has enough control to lower herself to a squat without immediately crashing. She is strong. Look out everyone, here I come!

Antics

2005-12-06T15:12:00.000-05:00

Here's some of our latest (though maybe not greatest) pictures:

We have a 2-dimensional Christmas tree this year - Ben conceived the idea and and I put it together. Since it hangs on the wall, it's quite child-proof.

A small invasion of ants in our kitchen. A couple months ago, we contracted with an exterminator to come on a regular basis. He applies this sticky ant bait which the ants eat, take back to their nests, and all die. It works really well and I never have to worry about smashing ants or spraying Raid (traps are almost useless here). I think it's kind of interesting how they all line up like eyelashes to munch on their suicidal feast.

Mariah has learned to clap her hands and thinks it's a pretty fun trick.

Concerning interesting things in life: I visited with some other wives of Lilly employees this morning and discovered that Ben's long hours are actually shorter than what some guys work. Two of them mentioned that their husbands don't get home until 9 pm at the earliest, and it can be as late as 11 pm. at times. Often their kids go 3 days without seeing their dad. The working hours in the corporate world here in PR are really frustrating to us since they conflict so directly with our personal value of family time.

We were excited to learn that the E. Blackwoods would like us to store their spinet-style piano in our house while they're Down Under. I'm not sure yet where we'll put it, but I am so excited that we will have a real piano to use when we get home!

Christmas Return

2005-11-29T21:00:00.000-05:00

We have purchased plane tickets and will be in Indiana from Dec. 22-Jan. 3. Here's the order of visits: Boswell (Christmas Eve), Elkhart (Christmas Day), Bloomington, and West Lafayette (New Year's Eve & New Year's Day); with an initial very brief stop in W. Lafayette to change from t-shirts into sweaters. The pessimistic side of me says we need to be ready to get a round colds when we get back due to the abrupt weather change we'll experience. Dr. Larson, do you concur?

Better now

2005-11-29T20:43:00.000-05:00

I have a terrible time coming up with titles for these posts. I'm thinking about dropping the title feature, except that I really like the way the titles look so nice and concise in the "Previous Posts" section on the side column. I intially thought about giving this post the title "Running again", meaning that the girls are running around and playing again, but suddenly realized that such a title could have all sorts of other unintended and unpleasant connotations, especially in the context of recent illnesses. All this to say, we are much improved in terms of health. We hope to stay this way.

We don't have much else interesting to say (but here it is anyway): we have had three major invasions of ants three days in a row (but they eat the ant bait, and in a few hours, they disappear without us even smashing one of them); Mariah let go of the box she was standing up near and stood with no hands for a few seconds on Monday; tomorrow we're having a family picture taken, and with any providence, we'll get it back in time for Christmas; we had a little game shin-dig with some friends from church on Saturday night (the ants timed invasion #1 for when they were here); Ben managed to blow coffee and grounds all over the kitchen while our company was here on Saturday and he got it all cleaned up before I even saw it (I was upstairs putting the girls to bed). Doesn't that take the cake? I was impressed.

Sick again

2005-11-25T14:39:00.000-05:00

Mariah has been sick since Sunday, running a low-grade fever for 4 days, as well as having typical cold symptoms. I've had a cold the last couple of days, and today Lily is running a low-grade fever. Ben survives unscathed. I took Mariah to the Dr. on Wednesday, and she has ear infections again. Our Dr. here thinks it's quite likely that the infection she had a few weeks ago did not completely heal. Please pray for health and strength for all and the complete removal of Mariah's infection.

Thanksgiving

2005-11-25T14:07:00.000-05:00

What's it like to celebrate a holiday that commemorates American Protestants in a Spanish Catholic country? Everyone takes time off work, cooks turkey, drinks alcohol, and enjoys the holiday. And that's about it. We had a pot-luck Thanksgiving dinner at church, enjoying and trying the various Latino sides that traditionally go with holiday meals. No alcohol at church, in case you were wondering.

The whole dinner from arrival at church to departure took about 2 hours. We came prepared to spend a number of hours at church (after all, this is a holiday in a country where people love to hang out, right?) We didn't experience the depth, the feasting, the gratefulness, the welcoming of the season of Advent that this holiday embodies at home. We didn't use tablecloths, there were no decorations, and everything was served on paper and plastic. We just prayed, went through the line, ate and talked, and got up when we were done. There was a brief mention (in Spanish) of the history/meaning of Thanksgiving via a handout. But it's just a bit unusual here: a few hundred years ago, some English speaking guys landed in the US, and established a free, Protestant country. And they were thankful they survived the winter. In Puerto Rico, we were conquered by the US about 100 years ago, we aren't sure how much we even like them, we spoke Spanish and we still speak it, we are Catholic and it's hurricane season that we worry about surviving. Not surprisingly, the meaning of the holiday is mostly lost.

So, it's a bit of a let-down, but we're enjoying the time together; I'm going to cook a turkey sometime soon and we'll have a good feast, perhaps on the Lord's Day. We're thankful for each other, for modern, Western health care, for life and strength, and most of all for the Lord Jesus, who redeemed us from the curse of the law and set us free in Christ. And we're thankful for our heavenly citizenship, which binds us to our brothers and sisters in Christ wherever we reside.

It's always interesting...

2005-11-25T13:58:00.000-05:00

...to see who you find in cyberspace. I clicked the link to Jared's blog, read a comment, which led me to Joe Bibby's blog, where I found a link to Zach Peachy's page, and a picture of Daniel and Natalie Faris presumably at their Geneva graduation. Kind of fun. I organized my web "favorites" today and created a new folder for "People we know online". If you read here and have a website, post a comment with a link to your site, will you?

Lilypie baby days

2005-11-18T16:05:00.000-05:00

Thanks to the Humphreys for the cool idea (which we shamelessly stole.... imitation is the greatest form of admiration, right?) to stick these little counters on our blog that tell our children's ages. You too can get one for your blog or website!

Happy Birthday, John!

2005-11-18T15:45:00.000-05:00

JRM: November 18, 1986 - November 18, 2005. Congratulations on 19 years!

An Island Tour

2005-11-18T15:40:00.000-05:00

We have just finished a wonderful 6 day visit with Ben's parents. They came last Thursday and stayed until Tuesday. On Friday and Saturday we planned a little "island tour" and drove a complete circuit around the island (the link shows a map), heading south from San Juan and returning to SJ along the north coast.

2005-11-18T15:39:00.000-05:00

We left Friday morning, and drove south to Guyama, which is on the south coast east of Ponce. Guyama is home to Lilly del Caribe, and we drove by the plant site. They have the big Lilly emblem painted very prominently in several places. Then we went west towards Ponce, and stopped at Hacienda Buena Vista, an historic coffee plantation. HBV is a demonstration coffee plantation, and has a long agricultural history. Most recently, it was abandoned in 1949 after being struck by economic and natural disaster. In the early 1980's, it was restored, and today you can see a demonstration of the whole coffee making process, and learn about the history of coffee production. Oh yes, and you can taste some, too.

In the pictures above from HBV, you can see the raw (green) coffee beans first, then the roasted ones (brown), and the roaster. The beans are put into the drum and the drum is turned by hand via a pole while the beans roast over the fire.

2005-11-18T15:38:00.001-05:00

In the morning, we visited a lighthouse and a beach at Rincon. The lighthouse had beautifully manicured grounds, and some spectacular views of the ocean. We enjoyed the ocean breeze and view. At Rincon, we were able to find a portion of beach with a large shade tree and no other bathers. We took turns sitting and playing in the waves with Lily and looking through the crystal clear water at the coral reef below the water. The beach was sandy, but the ocean floor was hard, prickly and uneven from the coral reef. Red and black sea urchins were living in the reef's crevices. We promised ourselves that next time we go to the beach, we'll take a snorkel and goggles!We returned home along the north coast.

We'd planned to stop at the Arecibo Radio Telescope but ran out of time. It is amazing to realize the incredible natural diversity within the small confines of this island, and makes us marvel at the Lord's handiwork and design in creation.

2005-11-18T15:38:00.000-05:00

Later in the day we saw the Guanica Dry Forest, and as the website I linked points out, it is a neat counterpart to the more tropical rain forests near us in San Juan. There are cacti growing (can you see them in the picture above? They are the green, stick-like things), and other flora that require less water. In the middle of PR are some large mountains, and most of the rain gets dropped on the north side of the mountains, making them wet and jungle-like. The south side of the mountains are more dry. This is noticeable even from the road, because the open land goes from what looks like jungle near San Juan to prairie-like grass as we approach Guayama.

At night, we saw the phosphorescent bay at La Parguera. In the water of this bay, there are bioluminescent bacteria that are excited by motion. We went on a large, glass-bottomed boat (this was not what we thought it would be - is was actually a solid-bottomed boat with about 6 windows cut into the bottom of the boat near the perimeter) and took a short trip out to the bay. At the bay, the boat company had several guys (from their company, not passengers) jump out and swim in the water, and they brought a bucket of water up as well. The swimmers glowed in the water, and when we swished our hands in the bucket the water twinkled, like tiny fireflys were swimming all around. The Lord must have had a mighty good time creating these twinkly little bateria!

We spent the night in Mayaguez in a hotel and experienced many things that have been completely typical of our time in PR. Summary: things were not quite what we thought they'd be. The good parts: it was clean, and the A/C worked.

Nursery rhymes

2005-11-16T15:37:00.000-05:00

Lily has really taken to nursery rhymes lately. Although we've read them to her occasionally for some time, we recently had a couple of books from the library that caught her interest this time. Today we were jumping around the bench in the pool to the rhythm of various ones including "Wee Willie Winkie" (to which, as we discovered a couple of weeks ago, she can fill in the word "Winkie" as well as the last word of every line but one. It's pretty funny to hear her say "eight o'clock").

Scooter no more

2005-11-08T20:21:00.000-05:00

Mariah has completely left her serpentine scooting movements (which were very effective on our nice slippery tile floors) for the more progressive motion of crawling. We noticed recently that she was crawling sometimes and scooting sometimes, so on Sunday we took a little video of her scooting across the floor since it has been so fun to watch. It was a good thing we did it then, because today I never even saw her scoot once. She's the kind of kid that's going to be a really fast crawler once she gets it all coordinated perfectly, so watch out.

Update on Grandma

2005-11-08T20:18:00.000-05:00

Dad sent an email today to say that Grandma Magill started her chemo treatments (for breast cancer) last Thursday, and is moving in with them in Elkhart tomorrow (she just can not be alone during this time as she needs extra care). Pray that they can find good doctors who can care for her skillfully and relate well to her. This move is a major change for her; she loves her independence and many friends in New York.

A Theological Interlude

2005-11-06T21:35:00.000-05:00

[Editor's Note: Ben is writing this post in the midst of preparation to take his final exam in Soteriology]

As I've been reading several classics of American theology (Redemption Accomplished & Applied by John Murray and AA Hodge's treatise on the Confession of Faith), I've been struck by two observations these men make regarding Christ's Work and it's relationship to us, His people.

First, there is the discussion of how the coming of Jesus Christ changes our worship. As an introduction and in order to understand how Jesus changes our worship, let's review quickly what worship was like before Christ:
In the Old Testament the saints participated in the sacrificial system. This system consisted of ornate buildings (first the tabernacle, then the temple), intricate decor (a golden lampstand, tables, lavers, basins, and altars), attractive smells (fresh bread and incense), grand music (remember the priests ordained to play & sing), and of course the vivid imagery of the sacrifice - large animals (bulls, rams) being sacrificed by the white-robed priest. All of this was one elaborate, yet singular foreshadowing of Jesus Christ. It was intended to help the OT believer understand the beauty, the perfection, and the glory of Jesus Each of these elements of OT worship was a dim, shadowy picture of Christ, which when seen together helped to build the faith & understanding of the OT saint.
Now, with that foundation, we come to the New Testament, and especially to the book of Hebrews - the book that best expounds the transition from the Old Testament dispensation to the New Covenant in Jesus Christ. The author introduces this book by showing us the glory of Jesus Christ:

God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things through whom also He made the world. And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had make purifications of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high. Heb. 1:1-3 (NAS)

In this passage the writer to the Hebrews introduces Jesus as "the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature." Remember that the OT saints were limited from seeing the full glory - it was veiled (both literally and figuratively): they were seeing dimly as through a mirror (II Cor. 3:14ff). Now in the New Covenant, we have Jesus Christ - we have the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature. This is why we worship in simple buildings with a podium for the preaching of the word: not because we are less concerned with art and beauty, but because we have more in Jesus Christ. The forms and symbols and grandeur of the OT worship was pointing ahead to Jesus Christ - it foreshadowed His coming glory. But we have Jesus Christ in all His radiant glory with us in worship. We keep our buildings simple so that we aren't distracted from the true glory, so that we can't settle for enjoying the surroundings, but we must rely on finding our joy and satisfaction in meeting with our Lord.

I was challenged by this passage, especially as I prepared for the Lord's Supper this evening, which we celebrated in a small concrete building with lumber (2x4 and plywood) pews, a small podium, and no artwork to be found. Yet this is a congregation in which the Spirit of Jesus Christ is present and active. We enjoy this worship because we enjoy being in the presence of our Savior, and usually we don't even notice the simple surroundings.

So may we all find more joy in meeting with the Lord of Glory, than in the audible and visible glory of our surroundings - and may this be the case not only in our church buildings, but in our homes as well. Amen.

PS: I'll try to post about the other interesting thought later this week, for now though, I'm out of time.

Sabbath ramblings...

2005-11-06T16:02:00.000-05:00

We approached one of the ladies at church this morning about informally helping us to learn Spanish. She was an English teacher for 21 years, but has never formally taught Spanish before. She is our current "best candidate" for someone to help us, and we hope she'll accept.

One practice that IBB (our church) maintains is that of an Old Testament and New Testament Scripture reading each Lord's Day (OT in the evening, NT in the morning). I enjoy this practice because eventually the congregation hears the whole Word of God read from the pulpit. We are currently reading the last few chapters of Ezekiel in the evening service...when was the last time you heard those chapters read in worship?

This past Tuesday we had a little baby shower for Karen Lebron (her family came to our house for lunch 2 weeks ago) hosted by some of the women from the Thursday Bible study at Calvary.

Potty training is going ok. There is more parent-training in this process than I anticipated, and I occasionally have to resist the temptation to put her back in diapers because diapers are more convenient for me (I can't believe I'm actually admitting this).

Should a parent be concerned when his/her under-2-year-old knows what coffee is and pretends to drink it?

I learned how to use the hem rolling foot on my sewing machine this week. The work this foot can do looks very professional and could not possibly be replicated by hand. It is also immensely easier to use the foot than to try to roll a narrow hem by hand.

Speaking of sewing machine feet, did you know that a foot exists that will fold and put on binding perfectly for you? I'm thinking this may go on my Christmas list. I can think of lots of cool ways and handy times to use such a device, and doing binding by hand is very tedious.

Ben's parents are coming on Thursday and we are really looking forward to their visit. We've identified a few places on the island that we'd like to check out while they are here. Hopefully we'll get some good pictures to post.

What we've been UP to...

2005-11-03T20:47:00.000-05:00

Mariah is moving "up" in the world, literally. She has pulled up to standing several times with the laundry basket being a prop of choice. Though she has actually gotten both feet under her, this is the closest I've gotten to a picture of her standing efforts.

Lily and Daddy went swimming on Saturday. It was Ben's first time in the pool with her since we've been here. He is working alot, it gets dark early (by the way, Lily has just realized what "dark" is and notices it now), and we've been doing other stuff on Saturdays.

Lily is standing next to an orchid. When we moved in, I noticed that there was a pot shoved into the flower bed outside with an orchid planted in it that had finished blooming. I just left it there and did nothing, and a few weeks later, I saw this pretty yellow flower in that bed! So it's pulled out of the bed now and on a table outside where we can see it from the family room. Lily really likes the rocks that compose the "soil" in the pot.

For the biology nuts: Ok, getting orchids to bloom a second time in Indiana is something on par with a miracle from what I hear, so I was pumped to see that it happened here without any care. I guess the tropics are just the right environment, and maybe that explains why it's so hard to care for them in IN! If you look closely at the picture, you can see where the spent stem (blooms round 1) were. Below that are the original leaves, above that is the new growth. I've never seen an orchid with so many leaves. If you look closely as well, you can see the incredible root structure, much of which is above the "soil" line. I think that some of the root growth is from the old leaves section and some from the new leaves. In fact, when I pulled the pot out of the flower bed, some of the new root growth had started to root into the mulch of the flower bed outside of the pot. These are the healthiest, whitest, fat roots. This has been so fun to watch. I think if I had a orchid in IN, I would just put it outside during the hottest month or 2 of summer, water it a ton, and see if I couldn't get it to bloom again. There is just no physical way to create this kind of hot, wet, humid enviro. indoors. It's not the most beautiful orchid I've ever seen, but this has been a really cool "experiment" to observe.

Friday comments

2005-10-28T20:17:00.000-05:00

Yesterday we went back to the library, and to Bible study, otherwise we've stayed in this week so that the girls could rest well (or at least be given the opportunity to!) and kick these colds. Mariah seems to be responding well to the antibiotics, her nose isn't running, and she is happier overall. Lily also seems to be doing better. We've only made a small dent in that stash of PediaCare (this is not a complaint!).

We have learned how to say "My name is" in Spanish. Thanks to everyone who filled us in. If we have any more language questions we'll just post them here...

I just finished reading Honey for a Child's Heart. Thanks mom, for the copy. This is an excellent book to encourage parents to read to their children and as a family. It also includes a large annotated bibleography to help choose good children's books.

Reading board books in Spanish is an interesting way to get in a little Spanish vocab. practice. Our library has several of those, but many titles are in English. My 2 favorite finds in the children's section this week: Each Peach Pear Plum by Janet and Allen Ahlberg (I can quote this one from when I was little), and Under the Window by Kate Greenaway (stories and rhymes for children with KG's adorable illustrations. First published in 1879).

We have had a very hard time finding a source for whole wheat flour. Evidently no one bakes with it here as no Super K, WalMart, or other grocery store carries it. I paid $5 for 5# bag at a health food store yesterday, and the price just about killed me (but it's still cheaper than buying WW bread). Tonight on the phone our pastor told us that he and his wife know where to buy it in 50# bags, and that we can go in on part of a bag with them. Isn't God good?

We are attempting to potty train Lily. We will not keep a running tally on this blog of accidents vs. successes. Check back in a few years to verify that we succeeded. We will comment that she is rather taken with the concept of a "treat" or "tee-free" (as she says) for going potty (1 plain M&M. Generous, aren't we? But hey, when your child has hardly ever tasted M&Ms, just 1 tastes wonderful!). She's figuring out how to work the system and get as many treats as possible, and I've spent more time in the bathroom (and wiping the tile floor) than I'd care to recount. And yes, mom, we're using the M&Ms to teach her her colors (a tried and true Magill tradition).

Dr. Visit

2005-10-24T22:00:00.000-05:00

Mary, from IBB (our church - Iglesia Bereana Bautista), went with the girls and I to the Dr. this morning. It's extremely helpful when people show us places as San Juan is rather large and Dr. offices can be in hard-to-find strip malls. There is a pediatrician who goes to our church (at church people know her as Cuca) , and so we went to her office. She was kind and friendly, and though the office was tiny and different from the Dr's office at home, things worked out ok. The line of patients in front of us wasn't long and we were in and out in about an hour. I was glad we went, as both of Mariah's ears have ear infections. We got an antibiotic prescription for her, and Cuca gave us numerous over the counter drug samples as well (PediaCare anyone? We have 12 boxes now. She said she had to get rid of the stuff as no one here in PR wants to take it and she keeps getting more samples in the mail. Evidently it's not the drug of choice here, but Dr. Lipp at home recommended it to me and Cuca also endorsed it. I was glad for the samples). The excellent news was that Lily's ears were clear - this is the first time a doctor has looked at her ears in the past 12 months and said there wasn't an infection or some possible indication of one. PTL! And pray that it stays this way. She hasn't really responded to any of the antibiotics we've tried in the past.

Sabbath comments

2005-10-23T22:00:00.000-05:00

I don't really have time to ramble since I'm typing this a few days after Sunday....

David Vater, and his wife Karen (who has a different last name. Most women here don't take their husband's last name. It's a cultural thing, we hear. And when you ask them why they don't take their husband's last name, they say, how would I go about changing my name? with a kind of clueless expression. With the bureaucratic hassles we've been through here already, I don't blame them and wouldn't want to try to change my name either if I lived here) and their 3 sons (2 visible, 1 soon-to-be-born) came for lunch. We had interesting conversations about various problems in PR, about life here, life in the countryside (where Karen's mom is from. We hope to get to visit out her direction before we leave), what kinds of fruits grow around the island, etc.

Karen asked what the biggest culture "shock" has been for us. My initial answer was the trash everywhere, but in thinking it through, I think we have a short list of 3 things that continue to shock us and are hard to get over:
1. The bureaucracy

2. The cost of living

3. The trash (which reminds us that at some level, people aren't thinking about the future consequences of present actions)

Possibly a fourth item would be things related to living in a huge city - the crazy traffic jams, the crowded feeling, the sky-rise apartment buildings, etc. But honestly, these are easier for us to accept than the first three.

BOMB

2005-10-22T22:00:00.000-05:00

Ben went for a ride this morning with BOMB - Believers on Mountain Bikes. Haven't heard of them before? Neither had we, until we met Angel and Carlos. Angel goes to the Thursday morning Bible study, and Carlos is her husband and an elder at Calvery Chapel, and also the president of the local BOMB chapter. Carlos, Ben, and several others rode around Old San Juan for a couple of hours and the non-riding spouses and kids played at a nearby park. They had devotions before they left, and this was a "prayer ride" (not all rides are prayer rides) so they stopped at a couple of points and prayed as a group. Carlos is a pretty serious rider, but most of the other guys in the group weren't; Ben wasn't sweating much when they got back. Ben informed me that the fellowship was good. Maybe there will be a chance for "serious riding" later.

More Lizards

2005-10-21T22:00:00.000-05:00

We went to a park today with a few friends from the Thursday Bible study for our once-a-month play group. It was a small-ish neighborhood park with lots of playground equipment, but in PR-style, some of the equipment had parts that were missing or broken. It's always handy to have a bench with a back and no seat.

However, it had a pond in the middle of it with large iguanas and large geese all around it, just walking around free. (There was a fence between the pond and the park). So Lily saw the iguanas and fed the geese and a good time was had by all. It's kind of cool to go the park and see the iguanas.

BTW, Happy Birthday, Elizabeth Magill!

Bookin' around...

2005-10-20T22:00:00.000-05:00

We found how to get inside the library today when we visited there with friends (I had attempted a few weeks ago, but went down the wrong drive, only to encounter a guarded gate - very common here - with an only Spanish speaking guard). It is very small; very, very small. In fact, the whole thing would easily fit inside the children's section in our Lafayette library.

However, it's a very interesting place... it's completely community run, operating on a skelton budget funded by the cost of library cards ($20/year) and volunteer staff (with the exception of one, part time guy who pays the bills and does other essentials. A number of the volunteers did not speak Spanish as their first language). The books are received almost entirely from donations. Donated books are either sold at reasonable prices to generate more revenue for the library (these are usually the less pristine volumes), or shelved for circulation. There are over 700 community families involved in this library, and they can have whatever kind of books they'd like in their library (read: no government regulations!). The sad thing is that there is no library system here (my card doesn't work at any other libraries) and there are very few libraries around. The next nearest library (so we've heard) is about 20-25 min. away, and is another community-run venture.

The lingering thoughts in the back of mind: What does it say when you have a city of 4 million people and there are only 700 families involved in the library? Is that a fair indication of the number of folks around who read books for fun and education? If so, would that shed some light on the social poverty we see everywhere?

Lizards

2005-10-17T14:30:00.000-05:00

We've mentioned to some of you that Lily likes to look for lizards in our yard. We see the little ones (like seen at pet stores or ECHO) frequently. However there is a larger variety that we've only spotted a few times. This guy (at left) came wandering out while we were swimming this morning (I got the picture later in the morning when I spotted him/her again). He is about 12 inches long, including the tail. At first glance I wondered if it was a rat! I was relieved to realize it was just a big lizard.

Incidentally, we also have frogs the size of small kittens (we're not kidding) that come out in the evening in our front yard. We don't have a picture yet, but when we do, we'll post. They are really cool. Lily and Ben went frog hunting on Sat. night after dinner for about 1/2 an hour. Great playtime.

Unfortunately, pictures of wild life don't come with little rulers at the side to "compare for size".

Recovering

2005-10-17T14:24:00.000-05:00

To those who prayed for the girls recovery, thank you, they appear to be on the mend. No Dr. visit necessary. I am hoping to avoid that part of PR life while we're here!

Sabbath Ramblings

2005-10-16T15:45:00.000-05:00

This has been a pretty quiet week, just the normal shopping and daily life. Lily got sick on Thursday, and Mariah on Friday, Lily with a bad cold and Mariah with croup. They are slowly recovering, but I plan to stay in with them until they get a little better. Ben went to church this morning, and I’ll go this evening. We don’t have our health insurance cards yet, so though we can get medical care, it will be more complicated. We also hear that going to the doctor here is an all day event since you can’t make an appointment but rather just show up and wait until your name is called. My PR friend recently waited 6.5 hours to see the Dr. with her kids. She informs me that this is an unusually long wait, but if we have to go, we should pack a lunch and plan to be there awhile. I’d rather not experience this.

On being here a month: We are finally completely unpacked. That is a nice feeling. We feel more settled, have little routines, and know where the essential things are in town. I’m realizing that some of my personality and tastes are not very culturally Spanish.

We’re learning to adjust our expectations to reality. Ben is gone about 60 hours a week, which creates a bit of a time crunch for us. His work project also looks like it will take longer than expected.

On friendships: It’s interesting forming relationships when we know at the start they will only be for a few months. People are kind and welcoming, we’re forming good friendships, but there’s a general underlying understanding that it’s only for a short time. It makes us appreciate those that really do welcome us so warmly, and I wonder how it will all work out in the long run.

On learning Spanish: Our generally useful “Household Spanish” book does not have the translation for “My name is”. This is rather problematic, as that is a foundational phrase for relating in any language. Otherwise, it has much good information when we have the time to study it. I (Anna) am picking up a fair number of nouns and a few adjectives, but no grammar and almost no verbs. This makes it very difficult to form a real sentence. We are still looking for someone who might help us a bit with our Spanish.

On Covenant theology: Studying the Scripture with friends who don’t see the Bible through this “lense” makes me realize how integral it is to my thinking and understanding of Scripture. Covenant theology reveals such a rich “layer” of the Scriptures. It ties both testaments together, and shows so clearly how each event fits into God’s covenant plan of redemption. Like Jay Adams points out in his counseling materials, one’s systematic theology (or lack thereof) affects how one sees Scripture and draws applications.

On Anna: Read Luke 2:36-38. I am currently challenged by a woman who shares my name and is a dynamic example of godliness, thankfulness and faithful service to the Lord. I’ve spent quite a bit of time meditating on the little we have recorded of her life and the example of her life is a challenge to me.

On your calls & email: we really appreciate it. Thanks!

Old San Juan - III

2005-10-11T16:18:00.000-05:00

The narrow streets of Old San Juan, many of which are paved with blue-gray bricks. When trading ships used to come from Spain and Europe, they came with hulls full of these bricks, dropped off the bricks and picked up their cargo of sugar or other island products. The ships couldn't sail if they were empty, so they used these bricks for weight. Eventually San Juan accumulated so many bricks that they started using them to pave their streets!

Old San Juan - II

2005-10-11T16:02:00.000-05:00

These are the "cool pics" we took in Old San Juan. Read the following post for details of the trip.

Old San Juan

2005-10-11T15:18:00.000-05:00

We went up to Old San Juan on Saturday. It is the historic section of the city, with a few little parks (like one above where Lily is with all the pigeons; there is a lady in that park who sells food to feed the pigeons), very narrow streets which they still allow people to drive on!, and an old fort built in the 1530s. It has some history and apparently lots of night life; we noticed the lingering effects of the later during our morning visit. We had lunch at a "Puerto Rican diner" - in the US, a place like this would serve hamburgers and fries at lunch or meatloaf at dinner, but here they serve things like "amarillo pie" and beans and rice and roasted pork. We like Puerto Rican food quite well so far. Mariah slept a large part of the time in the stroller, and Lily preferred to walk up all the stairs she could find, poke in every hole we passed, and pick up rocks of all sizes.

Recent pics of Lily

2005-10-11T15:03:00.000-05:00

Playing "driver" is a favorite activity and a request every time we get in the van. She knows how to operate most of the buttons and we don't give her the keys!

Can you tell nap time is approaching? Lily has put the duck, her doll, and herself down for naps on the family room floor... everyone goes face down and with his/her/its own diaper. Very important.

Frog-child

2005-10-07T13:01:00.000-05:00

Where'd we get a kid with a tongue like that?! Maybe we're related to frogs after all... She can lick her chest (seriously) to get those last tasty drops of rice cereal.

Playing, playing

2005-10-07T12:54:00.000-05:00

No real news to post, just pictures of the grand-babies.

Highlights and Lowlights

2005-10-06T09:20:00.000-05:00

Highlight of yesterday: Our grocery store is near a ravine that is really over-grown, kind of jungle-like. When I pulled into the parking lot facing the ravine, up in the tree was the most enormous reptile I have ever seen, something like a several foot long iguana. One of the onlookers was joking that he was going to lasso it. It was absolutely huge, on the scale of something you see in the zoo, not the pet store. Very cool.

Lowlight: A recent biopsy confirmed that my Grandma Magill has breast cancer. She is 83. We don't know how extensive the cancer is yet, but intially, things don't sound real great considering her already delicate health situation. Pray for wisdom for the Drs. and our family.

Attention avid readers of this blog

2005-10-04T16:12:00.000-05:00

If you are someone who wants to read absolutely every post on this blog, you will need to start your reading today from the posts dated Sept. 27. I actually wrote all the posts from 9/27 until 10/4 today, and just dated them according to the day on which they happened. This means that you need to open the Sept. archieves (see link on this page) first, then the Oct. archieves, then whatever shows up on the main page. Hopefully after today things will be more current.

One great thing about the tropics...

2005-10-04T15:44:00.000-05:00

is that science lessons come to you. Lily is inspecting the multi-footed insect that crawled across our kitchen floor just before we went out to swim this morning. It wasn't a millipede, maybe a centipede? Though we may have some crawling insects, we have few flying insects... we left our windows open last evening because it was cool outside, and only 1 moth flew in. It was dark outside, and we don't have any screens, either.

This is a nice shot of the expanse of white tile that "carpets" our house.

Nonna, these are for you...

2005-10-04T15:38:00.000-05:00

Mariah is trying very hard to crawl. She's getting very close to success.

Mariah looks at life through rose-colored glasses

2005-10-04T15:00:00.000-05:00

Hello from PR, everyone!

2005-10-04T14:53:00.000-05:00

Mariah sits alone!

Earrings, toddler style

2005-10-04T14:45:00.000-05:00

Every wonder what it would look like if you wanted a sippy cup or Q-tips for earrings? Wonder no more.

For all our safety-conscious friends: No, we don't usually let Lily play with Q-tips. She found my last 2 that I'd carefully saved until the shipment arrived. The shipment came on Saturday, and now we have a new full box, which is carefully put away.

Pictures of our house

2005-10-04T14:35:00.000-05:00

These are pictures of our house (the car is not ours). The pool is in the backyard and Lily and I go swimming most mornings that we are home. If you come and visit us, you can swim with us too! BTW, the pool is part of our back-up water supply in case of a hurricane (we have a separate drinking water supply). Not pictured: a very small backyard, and the ceramic tile through the house (think: like what's in McDonalds, only white, to show every speck of dirt). Otherwise, it's a pretty typical 2 story, 4 BR, 2.5 bath. Except for the concrete walls (to withstand a hurricane and resist all the bugs that munch on wood, of course).

Update on our return date

2005-10-04T14:33:00.000-05:00

I talked with Ben on the phone this morning, and he mentioned that there is an all day planning meeting tomorrow to re-work the timeline for the entire project, as it is evident that they will not be able to meet previously projected time targets (you may recall that 12-15-05 was the originally scheduled end date). So perhaps it will yield a new target return date?? Personally, I'll know we're coming home when I get on the airplane. That's kind of how things go around here.

Lily - prayer request

2005-10-03T22:00:00.000-05:00

Please pray for us as we raise Lily. She is currently “researching” our behavioral boundaries for her and the consequences of crossing them. We need God’s grace and wisdom, and so does she!

Sabbath refreshment

2005-10-02T22:00:00.000-05:00

A wonderful day of worship and fellowship. I (Anna) was in the nursery in the morning, as we’ve decided to leave Mariah in there during services and SS. Our church has no place where we can get English translation for the service other than in the sanctuary. There is no narthex at all, and she is just too loud to stay in right now, so I’m going to be taking my turn periodically in the nursery.

We had lunch with Omar and Griselda (Lily really likes to run around with Griselda’s purse, like she does with Christy Nelson’s in Lafayette). Several others were there as well, and we had a nice time of fellowship, exchanging stories of life experiences. It was also nice to discover that their “after church hospitality” is pretty similar to ours at home, so we can have people over and do things like we would at home and know that they will be comfortable, DV.

The evening service was communion. Pastor Vater preached from Genesis 3, on the fall and its consequences and redemption (interestingly enough, his communion mediation was styled very similarly to how Dave styles his). He made an interesting comment that the Biblical description of heaven includes elements from 3 places: Eden, the Holy of Holies, and Jerusalem.

After the evening service, there was an informal dinner and Bible study/discussion at the home of one of the members (somewhat similar to a Fireside Chat for people of all ages). Since we were there, and everyone else was bilingual (!), they decided to do it in English for us, for which we were very grateful. We discussed methods of Biblical interpretation, and the practical applications that flow from this. As an aside, we were pleased to discover through conversation that many in this church take the keeping of the 4th commandment seriously! Ben and I left encouraged and challenged, and with some very tired children, who did remarkably well given the late hour.

All in a Day's Work (a post from Ben)

2005-10-01T22:45:00.000-05:00

This Saturday has been a rather full day here. For starters the girls got up early: Mariah at 6:45, Lilly about 7:30. I (Dad) got up with them, and had a good time getting them both ready for the day: diaper changes, getting dress, and breakfast for Lily, Anna and myself. We were doing pretty well finishing breakfast by 9:00. Then it was time to begin the day’s projects.

First I worked on installing a child-proof gate at the bottom of our tiled staircase (with tools borrowed from our pastor). I realized that the installation kit didn’t come with the necessary hardware for installation in an all concrete (exterior walls) house. So this meant a trip to Home Depot, which thankfully is only ¼ mile away. But since I was going out later in the day, I spent the rest of the morning playing with the girls while Anna unpacked our kitchen. [For those who didn’t know we shipped most of our belongings via air freight. This means it flies here in about 8 hours, and then waits at the tax office for about 8 days, and then they deliver it to your house the next day…]

About 12:00 as we were beginning to start preparation for lunch the technician for our cable company arrived. He came to install our cable modem – yes all he did was unpack the box, run a short piece of coax (TV cable), and plug it into our computer. He also installed a bunch of “junk” software on my computer, which I now get to clean up this week. I tried three times to get the cable company to let me pick up the hardware and do the installation myself, but this is against their policy. But all complaining aside, it is a great blessing to have our computer back with internet access. Hopefully this will mean we are more in touch with you, and we hope to have pictures up on the blog soon as well.

After the internet installation and lunch I went to Plaza Las Americas (see the previous post) to find some new short sleeved shirts for work. The dress code here is a little higher than back home, so I’m filling out my wardrobe for work. Thankfully most of the summer clothes are now on clearance so I was able to find some great deals.

Once back from the mall I helped clean a little (Anna did 90% of the cleaning herself), then we made our traditional homemade pizza, which is a favorite and longstanding Saturday night tradition. I was given some yeast by our pastor last night, which was a story in itself. We went to the mall just outside our neighborhood to eat at a Puerto Rican restaurant (oddly named “Country Pit”). While in the food court we ran into the pastor’s son and his family, who were just finishing their meal – we had a very nice visit with them, and learned that David was gong to the airport that night to pick up his father who was returning from a short visit to the US. I also had to travel to the airport that night to return our second rental car (which was a great blessing for the past 2 weeks). So, we decided to meet and carpool so that Anna didn’t have to drive with the girls late at night. So after dropping off my car, we picked up Paster Vater (pronounced like Darth V, only with a “t”). We then dropped off Pastor Vater, who loaned me not only his drill, but also gave me some yeast!! The church here is a true blessing.

So anyway, back to Saturday. After dinner I helped get the girls in bed and then resumed the gate installation project, and finally finished about 9:45. I am wishing that I could have shipped my tools over here now – but I suppose that I’d only get into more projects then, so it’s probably better not to have them.

So after a long day of laboring, cleaning, cooking, shopping, and playing with the girls, I slept well last night, and I’m looking forward to great Lord’s day tomorrow. Good night, and God Bless.

The saga of cable TV

2005-10-01T22:00:00.000-05:00

The cable TV man came to install our cable modem and take away the cable TV service so that we could get our bill reduced a bit. This saga of interactions with the cable company has been one of those “Welcome-to-PR-you-are-not-in-America-anymore!” experiences. Enough said. At least we have internet at home at a working (high) speed now.

Today's PR experiences

2005-09-30T22:00:00.000-05:00

Today the girls and I went to a play group with a friend from yesterday’s Bible study. We went to the park, and since it was just “the park” it didn’t occur to me to take the camera…. Was I kicking myself later! It was a gorgeous park, like you might find on the grounds of historic manions or buildings in the US! We could see the ocean and watch the waves come in, there were arbors with vines and unique little benches underneath, beautiful trees and manicured walkways, and nice, solid, unique play ground equipment for the kids in one section. This playground equipment was some of the most tastefully built playground equipment I’ve ever seen; if you can imagine playground equipment being “tastefully built”, this would be it! With the breeze off the ocean the heat was more bearable and we had a wonderful time. I want to take Ben back there sometime.

In the evening, we ran into friends from church at the mall food court where we were trying out some inexpensive Puerto Rican food. Through a random sequence of events, they gave us some yeast, and we also now know where to buy it. Thanks to all who offered to ship us some :). Oh, and we liked the PR food that we tried :).

Guaynabo

2005-09-29T22:00:00.000-05:00

Bible study at Calvary Chapel in Guaynabo. Guaynabo is a section of San Juan near us. It’s a fun name to say in Spanish: Why-na-bow, with the stress on the “na”. There are some great sisters in Christ here, and this study (in English) with women at all stages of life is enjoyable and encouraging. We are going through the book of Luke.

Play group

2005-09-28T22:00:00.000-05:00

The girls and I went to a play group that Alba helped me find yesterday. It was at one of the Union Churches (a non-denominational church, that is a union of people from many denominations). Interesting time, kind of nice people, no real mention of the Lord, except by one lady in a private conversation afterwards. Not sure if I will go again or not, but this could be an opportunity for interaction with some non-Christians.

Our not-so-imminent return

2005-09-27T22:00:00.000-05:00

Ben informed me today that “the project” (ie, the reason we are here) is not currently meeting it’s targeted timeline. Ben told me last week that it would likely be the end of January or early February, given the way things are going (very disorganized - not Ben's fault – My paraphrase of the situation: He's trying to collect documents from various different people detailing how they performed/built certain things, the documentation is difficult to locate, and sometimes just isn't there because people have been trying to hurry through stuff).

We are talking seriously about coming home for a couple of weeks at Christmas, since it appears we will be here into the new year.

The girls and I went to visit with Alba, wife of Ben’s co-worker, who was born in PR and now is re-located back here through Lilly (they have lived in the US for some time). She helped answer many of my questions and made some phone calls for me to establish a few useful contacts.

Plaza Los Americas

2005-09-26T20:05:00.000-05:00

Translation: Mall of America. Yes, we have one about 20 minutes from us - as long as it takes me to get to the Tippecanoe Co. Mall from home. The shopping options are extensive at this Mall of America: 4 stories, Baby Gap, Gap Kids, Gap, a large Children's Place, a JCP that is the size of the entire Tipp. Co. Mall, a huge Sears that doesn't look anything like Sears at home, Macy's, etc. We also have a good mall, comparable to TCM just outside our neighborhood. The discounts at MoA aren't that great (no surprise there), but there are some better options at the mall closer to us. Ben is there now buying clothes for work, because he has to wear dress clothes to work here.

Attempted to go swimming with both girls by myself this afternoon. I won't try that again. Lily won't stay in the little baby floatee, and Mariah is too small for it, and everything fell apart from there!

Mariah is sitting very nicely on her own now. She also decided this evening that peaches were worth eating after all.

Sabbath Ramblings

2005-09-25T22:44:00.000-05:00

Another good worship service today. Our pastor is away in the US for a couple of weeks so a couple of the other men preached. The morning message was on James 1 and how sin takes root in our lives.

We are slowly figuring out “who goes with whom” at church – mothers, fathers, kids, singles. It’s interesting to see people who remind us of folks back home in their personalities, interests, age, etc. Thankfully, this is not too hard since there are only about 50 people in the church. Esther will be interested to know that there are at least 5 people from the DR in our church. One family is from Mexico. They have a new baby with the most amazing swatch of soft black hair.

We were invited for dinner next Lord’s Day, which I’m looking forward to!

The nursery worker told me today that Lily was hiding behind the curtains and periodically poking her head out saying “Hola”! She is not afraid to be in the nursery, likes church, and is improving overall at sitting through worship, for which we are very thankful.

Mariah, who quickly recovered from her fever a few days ago, is trying very hard to crawl. She is so strong she can straighten her back legs as if she was trying to do the bear walk (but she always takes a nose dive first)! She also tried peaches this week and is not sure if she likes them or would rather stick with rice cereal.

We cannot find yeast in any of the grocery stores (no, we weren’t shopping today. This has just been a week-long quest). In one store, I was able to make myself understood, only to notice that the stock-boy had a display box for yeast packets in the cart of things he was removing from the shelves. He produced for me one little and very beaten up packet of yeast that had been buried and abused at the back of shelf. Yes, that was exactly what I wanted. No, sorry, they didn’t have any more and wouldn’t be getting any. We’ve been advised to try Sam’s Club, Costco, or a local bakery (haven’t been to any of these yet). They do eat yeast breads here, so we aren’t quite sure what the story is.

Ben talked with the shipping company this past week, and it looks like our shipment (the stuff that the packers took before we left) may come by the end of this week. I am really ready for my own pots and pans!

Special thanks to those who have emailed us or otherwise kept in touch, especially with personal, family, and church news. Your emails are hugely encouraging.

Expectations...

2005-09-22T22:13:00.000-05:00

Lily was feeling much better and back to her normal happy self when she woke up the next morning. PTL.

Mariah seems sluggish and maybe warm tonight. Unfortunately, the thermometer is coming in our shipment of stuff which hasn’t arrived yet. Ben’s going out to buy one. Please pray that she will not be really sick. She has seemed kind of “under the weather” and fussy the last few days. On a positive note, she just got her first 2 teeth J (the bottom ones).

I think that mom must have prayed that I could get some cleaning done on Wednesday, because the girls slept for almost three hours, at exactly the same time! I got the hall scrubbed down, the last of the suitcases unpacked, and the master bathroom cleaned and “Odo-baned” (this is a strong cleaning chemical) from the doggie poop that was on the floor when we arrived (more on this later).

We’ve made it a whole week. Reflecting back on our expectations and the conflict between them and reality sheds quite a bit of insight into the struggles of the week. I had expected (who knows why?) that our house here would be fixed up something like you might find at a simple cabin at Brown County, IN – something that looked like kind of like a home, had approximately everything that a home would have, and we’d basically just unpack our suitcases and resume life. Instead we arrived to house with plain white ceramic tile on every floor; a kitchen whose entire contents (except for the physical structures of cabinets, stove, oven, etc.) were in one medium sized box – an 80 piece “complete kitchen” set, made in China; dirty walls; doors with gray finger prints around every handle; doggie poop in the master bathroom; and pictures on the walls of modern art, that; when we deciphered the spots and splashes, we suddenly realized that we were staring at what Scripture refers to as “unseemly parts” in I. Cor. 12 (our landlord took these back to his house). However, there is a beautiful pool and bubbling tub (which can be heated, but who wants that when it’s so hot outside?!) in our backyard, leather couches in two rooms, a guard at the gate to our neighborhood, a freshly painted exterior, and clean floors and bathrooms (except the master bath floor) when we arrived. I sense a strange dissonance, and it’s hard to make any sense of these very conflicting experiences.

Life is far more “American” (ie, what you’d find in the continental 48) than I expected, so that has been a pleasant surprise. However, it makes the un-American parts of life seem all the more strange and frustrating.

I went to a women’s Bible study (they even have free, quality child care!) at Calvary Chapel this morning – heard about it from a lady at our church. Though we may not agree totally with their theology, it was a blessing to be with other English speaking believers, and I left encouraged by the fervency of their prayers and desire to walk with God.

So, I guess we’re going to stick it out here for a while.... Stay tuned as the story unfolds.

More on Life in PR

2005-09-19T22:38:00.000-05:00

Sept. 19 – Still no phone hooked up yet, but the cable company came today with a bill for $170 – I didn’t pay them and we plan to contact the company and revise our service request! Other handymen were here (at the landlord’s request), finishing projects on the house which didn’t quite get done before we arrived. None of the handymen spoke English, but everything got figured out anyway. Tony (our landlord) and his wife, Ely (pronounced Ellie), both speak English very well, but weren’t here until the handymen were basically done with their work. I need a crash course in Spanish really badly!

Lily is sick today. She’s got a fever. She’s been on antibiotics for 5 days already for an ear infection, but evidently it’s just not working. It’s so sad to see her all lethargic. Hopefully it will break overnight.

The flora here is so incredibly different than home. All the tropical plants that I so carefully grow indoors at home grow outdoors here and are about as common as petunias are at home! Several of our neighbors have orchids growing in baskets along the trunks of palm trees in their front yards.

We saw a toad the size of a baby rabbit in our driveway on Saturday evening. So cool! There are lizards around, too.

The weather is like the weather at ECHO, only hotter and more humid, if you can even imagine!

The tropics grow bugs very nicely. It’s hard to keep the kitchen free of ants and fruit flies, even when all the food is put away. Bring on the Tupperware! There was a large (1.5”?) cockroach, belly-up, in the bathroom at church. I was advised to contract with the exterminators to come monthly to our home (I don’t plan to follow through with that unless it’s absolutely necessary).

Ben went to get milk tonight… it’s $4/gallon here!

We know that we need to post pictures desperately… we’ll try and do that after we get on-line at home.