Notice the first wire on the left and the melted white box. This is the main power to our house. PTL no burned down house just no power for 24hours which is amazing for here. Our land lord has city connections and was able to call a city electrician and he came out on Sunday to repair it. Most the time we would be looking at about 3 days to a week for city repairs.

We got a generator thinking there was going to be no electricity for a week and we really didn't want to loose the turkey in our freezer nor the kids vaccines. Now we have power for our daily blackouts and other unexpected power outages.

That same night it started snowing!

Today is the kids first snow day. Mikayla was not sure she enjoyed it at all but Josiah was jumping and running through it.

Mommy came out to help the kids build a snow man as daddy dealt with the electricity. Notice Ruthy has the carrot nose all ready for the snow man Mrs Trica wants.

Mikayla was broken when she was trying to help and she patted the snow mans head and it rolled off and fell apart.

She was clapping when he was put back together and she refused to touch him.

My snow angel!

So, I had the great idea to let the kids help paint our front gate. They had lots of fun and it looks much better after a couple a coats of paint.

This is usually how the kids want to travel to the near by little stores. Ruthy is now saying her sister is getting to big for her.


This and the following pictures are of the international day at school. There was food and a presentation at each table from each country represented at our school. Here the kids are having fun trying out some Japanese games.

This is Roberts pumpkin pie here. Since Thanksgiving is coming up we have been experimenting with making these squash pies since there is no pumpkin here. The challenge was finding a Gluten free pie crust, but leave it to Robert he did it. He even found all spice at the market when people who have lived here over 10 year were saying he never would. Let me tell you this was a wonderful pie that didn't last long. The crust was made from corn flour and was like a graham cracker crust...so good!

Well these are our beautiful kids posing on the new backdrops for school pictures. Since I do not have my Studio Photo lights here I am getting really creative. We got some cheap fabric from Medina Bazaar for back drops. Then I had Robert stand right behind me with his white t-shirt on and I bounced the flash off of him onto the kids as my reflector creating a more soft white light on the kids with very few shadows.

Mikayla has found a new hobby...Flushing the toilet!

These are our kids watching the girls last soccer game today. Guess how cold it is here?

38 degrees F or 5 degrees C

We are expecting snow tonight!!!!

Oct 8-12

Rhesa and her soccer team went to a neighboring country to play in a soccer tournament. There was 5 different teams from our school. 2 varsity boys teams, 1 JV boys team, 1 JV girls team and Rhesa's Varsity girl's team.

Wed we left the school by bus in the morning arriving at 6pm in the evening. All day Thur, Fri and Sat were the games and we traveled back Sunday so the kids could be in school bright and early Monday morning.

The hardest thing for me was leaving Robert and the kids back home.

This is Mega Mall. This is the first North American looking mall I have seen since leaving the US. It was nice I was able to buy Skittles and Marshmallows and hotdogs to take back to the kids. We ate here in the food court every evening after our big soccer day.

We played from 9am to 6:30 or 7pm in the evening. Several nights we got to see the sunset during the last game.

JV ready to play with coach Jennifer.

Prayer before each game.

Coach being hard on the girls.

Before each game each team introduced themselves.

Awards presentation at the end of the weekend. The Varsity girls placed third!

This is 6 teams from our school and another local international school headed out on a bus to a soccer tournament in a nieghboring country.

This is crossing through the border. The trip is only 4 hours in travel time with another 3 hours at the border.

This is Junior and Senior Varsity with coach Jennifer and coach Rhesa

This was as we were leaving to go on our soccer trip. I left Robert and the kids at home. Robert said that Josiah kept asking him to go back to school and pick me up since that is where they dropped me off at to get on the bus. This is a picture through the bus window.