Baking with Mommy and Cate

On Sunday morning last week, Cate and I stayed home from church so as not to scare away any visitors with her cough and purple face. Well, I could have chosen any activity like going for a walk, reading books and the ever popular cleaning up the house, but I decided we would have our first baking experience as Mother and Daughter! This may not sound that exciting, but when you have baked banana bread with 3 boys "killing" the bananas and making sounds of anguish only boys can think up and having the ingredients beat eachother up in the stirring process, you would understand! Caitlyn took her job very seriusly! She wanted to add every ingredient and stir each time. I can tell, this is going to be lots of fun!

What does it feel like mom?

She had no problem adopting the rule of "every baker gets a taste". This is the boy's favorite part, and I think hers as well.

After a while she got a bit antsy, and just wanted to eat all the dough, so I decided to get a little crazy and give her the almost empty flour container and a measuring spoon. That kept her busy for a good half hour!

I was kinda proud of myself, can you see the mess? Inside I started to get anxious about all the mess she was making and I wanted to put an end to it immediately. I mean, when the boys come home and I am exhausted from the morning with just the girls, what will Steve think? Well, I held back those reservations and just let her go at it. She was so happy! Putting the flour in the container and taking it back out again, then smearing it all over the floor, repeat steps one and two 25 times.

The true test of a woman came when I told her it was time to clean up. I totally expected a meltdown only a 2yr old could give when in the middle of such fun. But to my delight, she said "OK" in her adorable little voice and promptly got the towel to clean it all up. I gave her the broom and she was content for another 15 minutes while I got everything cleaned up on the counters!

I am blessed by such experiences and can only imagine the fun she and I will have in times to come. Thank God for little girls!

Celebrations around the world

Last week Singapore had another public holiday called Deepavali. Also called Dewali, its an Indian holiday much like our New Year. This is a very important holiday to them, celebrated over 3 days in some parts. Our neighbors are Indian and they invited us over to celebrate with them. The children painted candle holders in preperation for that night. They also had a party for the rest of the complex this weekend. They had fireworks, aka, sparklers, henna painting, and amazing Indian food! We donned our Indian attire and headed our for a night of fun and festivities.

If you look closely on the boys hands, you can see the henna tatoos they got. Made from a paste of henna leaves, green tea and some other stuff I am not sure of, it stays for about 3-5 days.

Julie getting a henna tatoo Cate was so excited about getting her hands painted. She had her first one, a little flower, and then it got smudged after she tried to touch it. So then she got back in the queue to have it fixed. That wasn't good enough, she had to have the other hand done as well. So cute!

Ryan got a scorpion

Ethan got a peacock on one hand, and a heart with his name hidden in it on the other hand

Aaron got a peacock and a scorpion too.

Preperations for the special day

Creating a picture with colored rice

All the children gathered and painted small candle holders for the "festival of lights"

P.S. these picture are all backwards. I am still technologically challenged and can't figure out how to load the pictures when i have several that have a specific order. So, the prep obviously happned first and the pic of me and the children was actually the end of the night.

I haven't updated much on our move and house search, I know. Part of it has been due to the illnesses and craziness that comes with that. But a bigger part is due to the uncertainty of it all. I started composing a post about our nbew house, but never finished it. Now I am glad I didn't. We had a house we loved, and through a series of events and much prayer, we put a purchase on what I have called My Dream House for the past 5 yrs! What's not to be excited about right!??? Well, I did talk about it and dream about the spaces, ect, but I always felt inwardly that I needed to gaurd my heart until all the paperwork was finished and we closed on the set date of Dec 1st. I couldn't imagine that anything would go worng. I mean, it seemed that God was lining everything up and this was the house He has set apart for us. So, what's to worry about? This past Tues we had the inspection and decided to do a Radon test, much to our realtors dismay (which we thought was weird). We recieved the results, which at first seemed great. But, then, that's when we got the worst news we could have ever recieved. The radon test. The radon levels are 20 times the legal limit!!! This is big, I mean, HUGE!! This is not like a leaky pipe or an electrical outlet that needs to be fixed or even a crack in the tile flooring. We are talking about the long term health of our children and our family! Come-on, I don't even let the children drink milk due to the hormones and antibiotics, you think I will allow them to be in a house that needs 4 (yes, you read that right, 4) mitigation systems!? Right, NO!!! I mean, this is cancer causing stuff! Being radioactive is not one of those things that you want to brag about these days. So, as you can imagine, we decided not to go through with the purchase of the house. Three weeks before we are due to fly out, we have no house. I am okay with it, really. At first I was really upset, not about losing my house, but about the uncertainty of it all. Where will we go, do we buy or build, having to rent and move again in 6-9 mo. etc. But, I talked it out with Steve and my dad extensively and prayed alot and am doing much better now. Steve left for the states this morning. He will see a few building sites and a house that's in the final stages of building. Hopefully we will have a better idea of what God has for us. The best news is God is still in control!!

Transitions

As most of you know, we are moving back to the U.S.! The news came quite gradually, over the month of August, now confirmed, with a departure date around the first week of December. I am beyond thrilled to be going home, to my family, my friends, my native climate, to be there for Christmas. I feel as if my body has been in a dormant state living here, in this hot, humid climate, for 4 yrs without a break. Yes, there are things I will miss, but for now I am focusing on the things to come. This will get me through a transition period, which everyone knows is always difficult. Whenever I hear the word "transition" I automatically think of labor (mom, are you proud or what?!) Having had 4 children completely natural with no drug intervention, transition was a word both glorious and terrifying to hear! This meant that it was almsot over, but, the worst is yet to come. It is still an uphill battle, but the end is in sight. So many details to be decided, things to be sorted, friends to spend time with, children to reassure that this will be great despite the sadness of saying goodbye. We still don't know where we will live, and I think this is the single hardest thing at the moment. Ask me in a few weeks when we are living in the midst of boxes and not sleeping due to our minds racing and the insecurities of Caitlyn because of all the change, and saying goodbye to the friends I have also called family for the past 4 years. But, for now, I am really struggling with not knowing where "home" will be next. I want to invision the spaces and how I will set them up. What things I can give away here and what I must keep. Where I will homeschool the boys and how the room will look, and how I will set things up for Caitlyn during school hours. How I will decorate the spaces I was blessed with, the colors and decor, the furniture in which places. I am a Home Maker, and right now, I dont have a home to make. The decision will come soon enough, but it doesn't feel that way right now. Each day that passes Steve and I talk over the same spaces of the same 4 houses I chose 2 weeks ago, trying to decide which one is right for our family. May God guide us to the place He has for us in this next season! I need to choose to dwell in His peace and grace that His timing is perfect, and not my own. I guess I ended up focusing more on the difficult things rather than the things to come this time. My next post will be filled with anticipation of our new home and what life will look like back in our home town! The sights, the smells, the seasons, I can't wait!

Change

I decided, as I have exactly twice in my life, to change my hair. I still cannot figure out what possess me to do this, I love long hair! It seems as if when change is imminent, I need to control this change and do something drastic. ??? I did this when Ethan was born and again now. ??? I don't know either.

The cool thing is I actually like it this time! Yeah! Here's me and Cate this morning modeling my new haircut.

My Nature Lovers

Julie has taken to showing Catilyn and Aaron, my nature lovers, any bug or insect she can find. Yesterday, she found this HUGE caterpiller! Does anyone know what kind this is? I have never seen one so huge before.

Ryan has also been deiscovering frogs in the most piculiar of places, his sneakers! Twice now he has tried to put his shoes on before school only to find it previously occupied by a frog! He is not quite so excited by this as Aaron is. Needless to say, he keeps his shoes inside now.

Ethan and Megan, best buds

Happy Birthday Aaron!!!

August 30th, 2000, God blesses us with another son, Aaron Michael Wilson . I can't believe my little man is getting so big! He really wanted a party this year, so we decided he could have 8 friends. Well, it ended up being more like 13 children not including our boys! Ohmigoodness! But, it's okay, we planned an outdoor party. Well, it had been raining all week, and we just kept praying that Saturday would be nice and sunny, cause God knows I would not make it with that many children in our house. Awesome, Saturday morning greeted us with beautiful sunshine and hot weather, perfect for a soccer and swim party. Wel, around 3pm, the clouds rolled in, to stay. I was getting a bit nervous, but Steve assured me, repeatedly, that it would be ok, he had it under control. My husband is awesome! It rained for the whole party, and he occupied them with games galore! At 5:30, even though it was still sprinkling, we sent them all out to eat Aaron's choice of KFC for dinner followed by cake. They finally got to swim after that. The party was suppossed to end at 6:30, but most of them stayed until 7:30!

All in all, Aaron has a great time, and that's what is most important.

Happy Birthday my son!

Camelot Olympics 08

We all know how Steve loves to come up with games, he is so great at it! Well, what started out as family fitness night, turned into a full Olymic event. Each evening we have anywhere from 2-6 boys knocking on our door wondering if the Olymopics is on!

They start out warming up, and then move to sprints and swimming, and they all beg to do shotput. On the days they are not doing individual sports, they are having soccer matches.

I am so blessed that the boys have so much fun with thier dad!

Bobby and Tyler are some other friends from Camelot the boys often hang out with, they are 4 1/2 and 6. Mark, thier father went to school with Steve for the MBA.

Two Peas in a Pod

This is Aaron, and Erin. Erin's family just moved into Camelot last week, and these 2 have hit it off incredibly. Unfortunately, they are of the same personality, so you never know what they will get into, or come up with! Erin loves nature and bugs and animals, just like Aaron does, he is so excited to share this with someone. They are inseperable most days.

Erin has 2 brothers, Elliot, who is Ethan's age and Ilan, who is Ryans age. All 6 of them play quite well together.

First day of school

School is here once again. They donned thier uniforms, got thier backpacks ready with thier list of school supplies, packed thier lunches and off they went. It was so easy this yr to get everyone inot routine, what a blessing.

The banner they have hanging on the school is based on 2 John 1:1-6. This is there school theme! What a blessing we have in the ability to teach our children God's Word, at school, in S.E. Asia! God is so good.

Cate and I have missed them throughout the day, but we are relishing the quiet time we have together, for they are now numbered!

I didn't even get teary at seeing the little ones (mostly Ethan) going off to school. That is, until I took him to the bus when Steve had to go in to work early one morning. Seeing Ethan board the bus, blow kisses out the window and waving feverishly at me for fear I might miss him, it broke my heart! It was so precious to see, these days are gone in an instant, may it serve as a reminder that I need to cherish each moment I have with my precious children and never to take advantage of the time we have.

Underwater World

While John and Jake were here we took them to Sentosa Island and visited the aquarium. It's pretty cool there's a "touch tank" where you can litterally touch the stingrays and other fish. Aaron, as you can inagine, is loving this! After the aquarium, we headed to the Dolphin Lagoon for a dolphin show.

P.S. John, I am working on getting your pics on the cd and out to you, really I am! Sorry, I have been a bit distracted lately, can you blame me?

Daddy's little girl

He came, He saw, He conquered

SINGAPORE 360

Jacob was super excited to see a knee boearding place to try on his visit to S.E. Asia, so each morning we assessed the days possible activities along with the weather, trying to determine the best day to go. Alas, the day finally came and he was so excited, although Jake is somewhat reserved in nature so it's kindof hard to tell what eh's thinking. ;-)

He watched pensively for a while and decided to take the plunge. Literally. The boys were so proud of thier cousin being able to do such a cool thing, and all wanted to try. You only have to be 7, so the bargaining began, on how and when we should come back so they could give it a try. Ethan was fine with not being old enough, he's a bit more cautious than the older two.

After many attempts and observing others, Jake made it the whole 360 degrees!

Way To Go Jake!