In the Village

After what seems like solid weeks of thinking about nothing besides plans
for the village (what meals I would make, what food I needed to bring out
and how much, setting out kids clothes and packing them, etc) we finally
made it out to Hamelengan. I know I will quickly get really tired of the
extremely slow pace of life out here (where one day often feels like it
easily could have been two or even three!), but for now, I'm really enjoying
having a little extra down-time.

Our last day in Ukaurumpa was just crazy busy. We had sent out most of our
cargo to Aviation on Tuesday afternoon, but there were still lots of little
last-minute things to take care of. I was up at 5:30am getting my last 24
cups of granola made. Then it was a quick run to the market to get
(possibly) the last fresh produce we'll have for the next 8 weeks. The kids
all had their last day at the school, I had my ladies Bible study.

By the end of the day, I know I was completely exhausted. Then, just to
complicate things, I caught Julianne, after dinner, getting into the malaria
meds. She has always been great at swallowing pills (something she didn't
inhierit from her Mom!) and thinks it great fun. So I caught her with the
bag that contains Matt and Kaitlyn's meds (our family takes a variety of
different things) and one missing. She denied drinking it down, or even
touching it, but the guilty look on her face and the missing pill told me
otherwise. And, she had just taken her own dosage of her med already!
Needless to say, we called the clinic, very worried. But the nurse assured
us that the two kinds of pills she had taken weren't dangerous together, so
while she got more than she needed, it wasn't harmful. Thank you God!

Then, right before bed, Elijah got really cranky and then threw up all over
me. Great! Then I was envisioning a night of a throwing-up baby, and
soaked bedding and a sleepless night to start out our trip to the village.
Thankfully, it ended up being a 1 time thing.

Our trip out to the village went smoothly. We were thankful for a
relatively late 6:30am pickup. Then we sat out at aviation for an hour or
so before the helicopter was loaded and ready to go. We had a smooth trip,
with no kids throwing up, which is a major accomplishment! We landed and
stood around for a while talking to people. Eventually, E started getting
fussy, so I headed to our house to feed him and start the immense cleaning
job.

It seems like whether we're gone for 2 months or almost 9, this house gets
extremely dirty! The dust accumulates in a thick layer over everything.
And the cockroaches! I don't know what they eat in this house when we're
gone, but they have a massive, months-long party. So in addition to the
massive layers of dirt/dust on everything, in every drawer, on every table
or countertop, all over the bathroom, etc is a layer of cockroach turds.
Fun stuff. =( So I get to sweep and mop and disinfect counters and drawers,
just so I can start putting things away. Usually, I do this while almost
incapacitated by horrendous allergies. This time, however, I got a dust
mask and tried that. Miraculously, I didn't sneeze once the entire day,
despite all the dust, dead bugs and cockroach poos everywhere! I know my
Bible study friends were praying, and I was so very thankful for them!

We got the first couple layers of dirt cleaned, and most things unpacked and
put away that first day. But we were exhausted. We had an early dinner and
went to bed early. Yesterday (day 2) we continued with the cleaning and
unpacking, helped along by all 4 mobile kids playing in the mud all day long
(it rained from about 10am on our first day, and all the second day) so they
each had 2 separate baths during the course of the day.

Now we're here, and trying to get settled back into a routine. It will help
when school starts up again on Monday and we have a more set schedule for
each day. But overall, things are going well.