Skate Night

Every once in a great while, a Skate Night is held here.  (By 'great while' I mean once a year or so.)

Since all the roads around our Centre are dirt and rock, and there isn't a paved driveway to be found, and sidewalks are almost unheard of, there isn't much opportunity for my kids to practice their skating abilities (or lack thereof!).  So when a skate night was announced, my kids were thrilled.

For several days ahead of time, they used the small paved area across the street from our house to practice.  It is flat, and paved, but also covered with dried grass, sticks, rocks and bumps.  So while it was an upgrade from the dirt roads, it's not the most ideal place.

 Skating the night away:

I know it's a bit blurry, but it sort of gives you a feel for the night

Julianne and her buddies

So, there's something wrong when your daughter puts on skates and suddenly TOWERS over her Dad!

The aftermath!  Julianne sporting some crazy bruises, and Nathan with his sprained (but thankfully not broken) wrist

Christmas Day 2015

We love a relaxed Christmas morning in our home.  This year, it was especially so!  After a late Christmas evening with friends, Elijah was worn out and slept until almost 8:30am!  The rest of the kids were very patient and let him sleep, even though I knew they were anxious to open presents.  It was nice too, because the extra time in the morning gave me a chance to get our Christmas brunch into the oven.

The first child to come out and see the tree!

Tiger hanging out in her favorite spot-- I don't know what she's going to do once the tree is down!

My favorite present:  a Brown bear book Elijah made at school

In the afternoon, two families joined us for a very non-traditional hamburger dinner!  We had burgers, fries, potato and jello salad, with tons of Christmas goodies for dessert.  Considering that December is summer in the southern hemisphere, a grilled dinner sort of fits!  We enjoyed the afternoon of hanging out with friends, chatting and game-playing, while our combined 9 kids ran around, playing both indoors and out.

Guest Post by Kaitlyn - Middle School Field Trip

Last Thursday, I got to go with my class to Lae on the Middle School Field trip.

We drove about 3 hours to get there.

 When we got there, we got to go see the Crocodile Farm where they raise crocodiles for their skins.  They have about 35,000 crocodiles there and we got to see their eggs.  We also got to hold a baby crocodile.  When I held it, I thought it felt like a bag of jello covered in scales.

 The next factory we got to see was the Gala factory.  They made ice cream, popsicles, ice cream cones, a type of koolaid and baking powder.  They had a huge freezer where they had huge cylinders of ice cream, and there was one machine that made ice cream bars.  When we were there, they were making tubs of mint chip, and chocolate covered coffee ice cream bars.  At the end of the tour, they gave ice cream bars out to everyone.  When we were leaving, they handed out two more entire boxes of ice cream bars to take with us.

Sporting some awesome (?) head coverings

Baking Powder???  Seems like that doesn't quite fit with the frozen/dessert theme!

Somehow, "Pure Sugar" is considered a selling point!

 

We stayed at the SIL Guesthouse in Lae, were we were able to go swimming at least twice every day.  I stayed in a room with all of my friends.  All 5 of us 8th grade girls got to stay together. 

 

The next day we got to the Rainforest Habitat where I got to hold a snake.  We saw lots of birds and animals that are native to PNG.

 

Checking out some wildlife.  Notice one of the snakes the kids got to carry around with them...

Fascinated by a crocodile or cassowary or something!

A wood carving for sale....Gotta love the crocodile eating someone part!

After that, we took tours of the Lae Biscuit Factory and also the Coca Cola factory, where they make all different kinds of sodas.  They were very interesting.  At the Coke factory they gave out tons of free sodas! I drank 3 different ones!

Middle school girls with their chaparones/parents/teachers

The whole gang (minus Matt, who was taking the picture)

On Saturday, we drove back to Ukarumpa and got home a little after 1pm.

It was an awesome trip and I'm so glad I got to go!

**side note from Mom:  Just 2 days after the 40-ish 7th and 8th graders and chaperones got back, the whole town of Lae was closed down due to civil unrest!  We're so thankful that the kids had a great time and got back safely before all the craziness erupted! :)

It's the Little Things

Sometimes, all it takes is something small!

This last week, Matt was able to install some light fixtures around the house.  After living with blaring flourescents and bare bulbs, it's fun to see how pretty things are with just a simple, inexpensive light fixture installed to cover up the bare bulb!

He put a new fixture in our hallway

Both bathrooms

Before

After

 
And we FINALLY fixed the hanging lamp over our dining room table.  When we first bought our house, 10 years ago, there was a hanging lamp.  But it eventually died, and being a scandanavian IKEA or some such purchase, we had no way of getting ahold of replacement parts.  So for years, it has been a hideously ugly plastic and wire mess hanging from our ceiling.  But it is ugly no longer! :)

Granted, it did take hours for Matt to crawl around in our filthy attic space and try to figure out the rather.... unique... wiring that was put in to this house some 50ish years ago.  But he did it, and everything works! ;)

Back To School 2015

Yesterday was a glorious day!  The first day of the 2015-16 school year!  And this is the first school year ever (in the history of our family) that all of my children will be in school.  While Elijah is at his preschool class, I will have two entirely kid-free mornings a week!  Whatever will I do with myself?

All ready for the 1st day of school!

Everyone in my house was excited for school to begin.  Everyone was up and ready to go with time to spare.  I have a feeling that as the school year continues, that may get more and more rare.  But for now, I'll enjoy their excitement and having them be ready to be out the door in the morning!

Walking to school

A partial view of the Secondary Campus

This is our first time ever with a child at the Secondary Campus (7th-12th grades).  So we've got lots of new things to learn.  Kaitlyn has had to figure out lockers and where her classrooms are and what each different teacher expects from her.

Kaitlyn at the Middle School lockers.  They are all painted with the flag colors of various countries.

Outside the 6th grade classroom-- notice the bare feet:  kids remove their shoes before entering the classroom here

 Nathan is in 6th grade this year.  Due to staffing shortages, he actually has 3 different teachers teaching him this year.  As a 6th grader, he has the priviledge of getting to use the 6th grade hauswin (umm, English...gazebo, maybe?  Sort of, but not quite the right word)  Anyway, no kids except for 6th graders are allowed to use it.  He'll be starting to play trumpet in the beginning band, and singing in the choir.

Justin is starting grade 3.  2nd grade was easy peasy for him, so we'll see how 3rd grade goes!  Thankfully he won't have too much homework yet, so he'll have plenty of time to play with Legos and play Minecraft on the computer. :)

Julianne is kind of starting primary school for the first time.  She attended Preschool here in Ukarumpa, but since we were on furlough her Kindergarten year, she didn't really have a 'big kid school experience' yet.  So she'll get to have music and library and art and the sorts of things she didn't experience as a preschooler.  Her class is a 1st and 2nd grade combined class this year (again, due to teacher shortages).  But of all my kids, she is probably the most suited for a class like that... even MORE kids to befriend!

Elijah, with some of the playground in the background

Elijah will be in the Pukpuk class (Pukpuk is Tok Pisin for 'crocodile').  He'll be going 2 mornings a week.  Yesterday wasn't an official class day for him, but there was an open house where we were able to go hang out in the class and check it out.

Checking out some new toys in the preschool room

All the kids came home happy and excited about their first day back!  What a great way to start the school year.

Of course, there is always the random 'only in PNG' aspect to the first week of school:  Today (Thursday) was declared a national holiday, so, after starting new routines and getting all psyched up to start school yesterday, today is a public holiday, so, NO School!  Friday they'll have classes again and then the weekend.  I guess, for a kid, that's not a bad first week of school. :)