I was thinking it would be interesting to chronicle a normal day here in Ukarumpa. But then as I went through my day, I thought, wow... that would be so uninteresting! My life here is just pretty normal. Just in a somewhat different setting than friends and family back in the U.S.

So maybe instead, I'll just write (ramble?) about a few things that have been going on.

Justin and I are still trying to get used to the long school days with K and N gone. When they don't get home till almost 3:30, wow, it makes the days very different. I try to do some activities/school with Justin every morning for a short while. Painting, alphabet or number games, worksheets, reading.


But he still gets to missing his siblings. Yesterday we set up a playdate and Joshua was able to come over for the morning. I need to be intentional about doing that on a regular basis so that Justin can have some good time interacting with kids his age.


Yesterday was a typical laundry day here. I always wash my clothes the night before so that they can have the maximum drying time the following day. But, like many days (most?) recently, we woke to grey rain. It comes and goes, so I watched the sky for hours, debating whether to risk hanging the clothes outside where the rain might not come, or just go ahead and hang them on the few lines in my laundry room. I finally hung them inside, and it was a good thing as it POURED later in the morning. However, the sun did come out again after lunch, and it looked like it might stay around for a while, so the clothes got to go outside for a few hours. They got about 80% dry before I had to bring them back in.

Drying in the laundry room

Later in the day when the sun came out!

Every Friday at the Primary school we can go eat lunch with our kids. This was the first Friday of the school year, and I had planned for us to go eat with K and N. However, it was pouring right before lunch and the roads were just running with streams of water, and the thought of walking across Ukarumpa (like 5 mins) in the mud and rain with Julianne and Justin just wasn't appealing. So we'll try hard to make next Friday's lunch with the kids.

I had to run to the store to pick up something for a friend. I had already done all my weekend shopping on Thursday (here the store is only open M-F, till 4pm... so you have to plan ahead and get stuff for the weekend), so I wasn't planning on buying anything for me. However, I got in there to discover that there were finally tomato products in the store!!!! (for the 2 weeks we've been back there have been none). They had tomato paste, sauce, canned tomatoes, spagetti sauce, etc on the shelves. So I had to get some of those, since so many of my recipes call for stuff like that! So now my pantry is very well stocked!

I love the rare opportunities when I don't have to cook! (I mean, I LOVE cooking, but occasionally, it's nice to NOT need to!) Friday nights during the school year we have "Teen Center". The high schoolers run a "burger night" at the Teen Center (gym/multi-purpose building) where you can get hamburgers, salads, chips (fries for you Americans) and shakes. You don't go for the great food. But it's fun to hang out with friends and not have to cook or wash dishes later.

notice J's wearing K's slippers! She LOVES two things in life: shoes and dolls!