Adventure Trip to Bangka

 Here is the "Express Bahari" that the guys took to get from the river in our city, out to the ocean and over to Bangka island.  This took about 3 1/2 hours.

 This cool lighthouse was on Bangka.  From the port there they rode a hired car about 3 hours to another part of the island.

 Here is a big mosque.

 And a big Chinese temple.

 Two of these HUGE guys guarded the temple.

 Then they went to the Tin Factory.  Bangka is famous for it's tin.  They make beautiful things out of it...

 Like these vases with designs etched in the sides.

 Does this picture even need a caption?  Isn't it amazing!

 Kris takes pictures while the boys enjoy climbing on the rocks.  See the rough life TCKs lead? LOL

 Makes me relax just looking at this picture!

 This is a pretty cool picture Aaron got of a shipwreck.

 More beauty!

What a great trip the guys had!  I am so glad.  It looks so pretty and I can't wait to go.  Wanna come along?

The Adventure That Wasn't

Here I sit, for the second day in a row.  I am in Kris' recliner with my computer in my lap.  I don't have the energy to move much.  I am SICK!  My youngest is sick too.  Here we are.  But we are supposed to be on another adventure!  My next post was going to be about our great adventure to the island of Bangka.  I still plan to make it my next post, but it won't be MY adventure.  Kris and the other boys went, but Joel and I had to stay home, much too sick to travel.

I am SO disappointed.  I really struggled with WHY we didn't (ok, why I didn't!) get to go.  I was the one that was the most excited about it in the first place for pete's sake!  I'd done lots of research on the island and was so looking forward to it.  But it was not to be.

I guess I won't know WHY it worked out this way except that it's just life, isn't it?  We get sick, we miss out on things, we get disappointed.  It doesn't matter where you live or who you are, no one is immune to the "bummers" in life!  But I can choose to respond in grace.  I can choose to spend my energy being thankful rather than spending my energy wondering WHY.  I can cheer for Christ in His greatness and watch Him at work around me.  Even if it's while on unwanted bed rest!

*Oh, and by the way, both Joel and I are on the mend :)

Puzzling Pictures: Airport Funnies

I agree with the sentiment, I just probably would have worded it differently.

This one is just cute! 

Whoa, wait, no one told me there were wild cats in the airport! 

 I just love this welcome sign!  It's just so...welcoming!

Ha ha!  This was posted on the baggage X-ray machine!  Those of you who know what durians are will get a kick out of this!  Durians are SUPER STINKY fruits that are very popular in this part of the world.  I am so curious now, do X-ray machines make them explode?  Who cares about guns, knives and explosives, just please don't bring any DURIAN!!!

Adventure Trip to Penang

 This week we went on an adventure!  We flew to Penang, an island in Malaysia.

Penang is famous for it's hawker food (street vendors) and one day we hope to partake.  But for this trip, we were more interested in Chili's (bottomless tortilla chips, who can resist?)...  

And Burger King!

We enjoyed this beautiful guesthouse...

And the boys enjoyed basketball, ping pong and badmitton...

 The guesthouse dog, Bailey, was a great hostess!

  Some day we'll take a real tour of the island, but for this quick trip, we just enjoyed the things we saw as we went from point A to point B (namely things like the airport, the mall, the orthodontist and the school the Aaron will be attending next year).

We were so amazed by this second bridge connecting Penang to the mainland.  It is being built by a Chinese company.  When finished, it will be 24 kilometers long!  You can barely see it in the distance in this picture below...

 Aaron has been accepted to attend high school at Dalat International School in Penang.  In February, he and Kris got to come visit the school.  I got to have a quick look at the campus while we were there this time.  The campus used to be a British R&R base during WW2.  It overlooks the ocean!  Here are a few pictures I took just as the kids were getting ready to begin school...

And this is a sneak peak inside one of the dorms where the boarding students live.

It was a quick (2 night) trip, but we had a great time and it was good for our whole family to see where Aaron will be living when he begins high school NEXT YEAR!!

Finished

Last night it was time for bed.  It was past time for bed really.  I was tired and ready to sleep.  But I was restless too.  I couldn't put my finger on it at first, on why I felt so restless.  But as we flipped off the light and my head hit the pillow, I got it.  I had tried all day to finish.  I had tried to finish printing out two different projects that needed to be printed.  The ink cartridge wouldn't work, the paper fed crooked, the paper size was all wrong.  We've been trying to finish some house repairs which has felt like running in waist-high mud.  The yellow bathroom (see previous post!), the master bathroom is in shambles (literally), the guest room is still not ready for guests who will be arriving soon.  I am behind on my Bible reading goal, I tried hard to catch up yesterday, but fell short.  And those are just to name a few of the projects that just aren't getting finished.  I even considered staying up super late last night to finish the novel I'm reading, just to say I'd finished something!

We like to finish things don't we?  Well, I know I do.  Starting projects can be fun and exciting.  But I really like to finish stuff too!  I like it when a job is well done and I can sit back and be glad that I worked hard and that I have something to show for it.  I love checking things off of "To Do" lists.

I look up the word "finished" and "complete" in the Bible and just reading all those verses is satisfying!  Try it! Do a search and read them over.  Either you'll feel good that so much was "accomplished" or you'll just think I'm a little more quirky than you originally thought!  But anyway, here are just a few:  God finished creating the World and rested (Genesis 2:2.) Solomon finished building the temple for the Lord (1 Kings 9:25) and when Jesus was finished teaching the crowds were amazed (Matt:7:28.)

Yesterday, I just couldn't seem to finish anything at all.  I had to give up the day with not very much accomplished.  I prayed and told God I was handing Him all my unfinished STUFF.  And as I lay with my eyes closed, trying to find sleep, I remembered the words uttered by Jesus Himself, "It is finished."  He said that on the cross.  He finished His work on earth...for you...for me!  Last week we celebrated Easter, Jesus has victory over death!  If I never finish another project, Christ has finished His work of redemption and that is what really matters.  The peace that came with that thought brought rest to my heart and sleep to my body.

And today, the sun showed, the coffee perked, the birds sang, and I had the energy to get up and try again!  And today, I noticed yellow showing through the cream paint in the bathroom, the printer still doesn't work, the repairman didn't show up and I didn't finish my novel.  But I worshiped with my family and other believers, I spent time in the Word, and got a little farther on several projects, and I am just a little closer.

And then I remembered Colossians 2:10 "We are complete in Him."  Thank you Lord.  In You, I am complete!

Smile!

Whatcha think of my awesome bathroom design skills?  This picture does not  evendo justice to the bright shiny-ness of the walls, the true intensity of the color.  There is a story to my color choice, I promise!  Here's what happened...


We've been having some work done on our house.  Kris asked the workman to also repaint our guest bathroom.  When it came time to paint, I had a discussion with the painter. 


"Would you like pink?" he asked, hopefully.  


"No!  Not pink!" I replied.  Honestly, I don't even like the pink tile to begin with, and I like the blue tile in the "bak" (water reservoir you can see in the picture) even less.  But anyway, "I want white," I continued, "But not very white.  More like cream," I said, pointing to the cream colored walls in the hallway.


"Ok," he replied, and headed out to buy paint.  He returned and painted the bathroom.  But he finished late and I had to leave quickly as soon as he was done.  So I just left the house quickly and did not check the bathroom until the next day.  When I looked in the bathroom the next day, I found SMILEY FACE YELLOW colored walls!  I couldn't believe it!  Surely he didn't misunderstand me.  I was very clear.


Later, Kris talked to the worker about the paint.  It went someting like this:


"You painted the bathroom yellow."


"Yes!"


"But Jana wanted CREAM."


"Yes, but that is just too much cream.  So I painted it yellow."


Pause.


"But Jana wants CREAM."


LOL  I will eventually get my cream colored bathroom walls, but for the time being, this is what the bathroom looks like.  It is SMILEY FACE YELLOW and therefore reminds me to SMILE!

Easter

Easter celebrating began earlier this week with egg decorating! I had to buy "kampung eggs" because they are whiter than the other choices.  Kampung eggs are from "ayam kampung" which is apparently a smaller chicken (that lay smaller eggs) that are raised in the kampung (village) rather than some chicken
farm.  My other choices were:  regular chicken eggs (brown and hard to dye, although we did try a few), duck eggs (large and greenish blue, why bother to dye eggs that are already an Easter color, right?) and pigeon eggs (tiny and white with black spots, again, why bother decorating eggs that were layed decorated!)  Anyway, we had a good time decorating with Aunt K and then we ate boiled eggs for breakfast throughout the week! 















On Sunday morning we enjoyed fellowship and worship with our 
Indonesian brothers and sisters.  What a blessing! Yesus bangkit!


And then we enjoyed more fellowship and yummy Mexican food 
with friends!  YUM!




 We have been reading the events leading up to the first Easter as a family in the evenings, so on Easter evening we wrapped up our Easter celebration by reading the beautiful happy story of Jesus resurrection!

Because HE LIVES I can face tomorrow!

Because HE LIVES all fear is gone!

Because I know HE holds the future,

and life is worth the living just because HE LIVES!

A Day in the Life...

Last week my sister had the very clever idea of blogging a typical day in her life. I think she's planning to do it once a month, I hope so, because I thought it was great fun to read!  So here is a day in my life.  But I'm not sure if it's typical or not.  Do I have a typical day?  But here's how yesterday went anyway...

We had a LATE NIGHT the night before so we didn't get to bed until midnight.  That is NOT typical as I usually turn into a pumpkin at 10pm.  So I didn't set the alarm and we all slept in.  Upon waking up, and this IS typical, my first thing to do is get my large Starbucks mug of coffee...Aaaaaah!  And then it's time in prayer and the Word.  This month I am reading the whole New Testament, so it's a LOT of reading each morning.  I enjoy getting to see the BIG picture as I read many chapters each day.

 We are having to redo our master bathroom b/c of foundation trouble.  The day before some men came in and hammered out the tub and cement cabinets.  It made the whole master bedroom smell like fumes and ashes.  Weird.  And no way I could sleep in there, so I slept on the roll-away bed in Aaron's room!  At least there was an extra bed :)

Once the boys woke up, somewhere around 8, breakfast was chocolate cereal.  Nothing very healthy, but it's easy.  Then we set up school on the dining room table.  No way we could have school in our designated room because it is next to the master bedroom:  too many fumes or dust or something.  It was hard to breathe.  Our dining room table looked like a command center of some sort with all our computers!










Lunch is at noon and is usually simple, sandwiches or leftovers.  After lunch there was a big storm.  Lots of rain. Nice and refreshing!

 Then it's time to bake cookies.  Today it was oatmeal cookies.  They taste different than American ones because I used Palm Sugar in place of brown sugar.  They taste like granola bars.  Yummy.

 Here's our empty school room.  Too hard to breathe in there...

 In the early afternoon, Kris returns from a trip.  Yea!  Nice to have our family back together again!

 Out to eat for dinner.  One of our favorite restaurants is Solaria.  It sells a little of everything.  Our family usually orders a variety: chicken cordon bleu, chicken teriyaki, fried rice, soup, noodles...

Then back home to relax in the evening.  We decided to try sleeping in our bedroom since the dust has settled. This is the view of our bathroom that I woke up to this morning.  Don't think I'll be taking a shower in there anytime soon!  So there you go, a day in our lives.  Not super exciting or anything, but it is what it is.  And now you know! :)