More pictures... not of St. Kitts, but from Austin's phone download.
(Most of these are from our trip home and the break in August 2015.)
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| Temple trip! Couldn't miss the chance while we were home. |
Sunday, December 13, 2015
Photo Blast! A life on St. Kitts
We just took the pictures off Austin's phone. So.. here's a photo blast of life on St. Kitts
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| On campus with Daddy. He took Eden flying! |
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| Yaba had a birthday so we made him a cake. Everyone needs cake on their birthday. |
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| This is how we roll. I clean. Eden sleeps. In this case, we are cleaning the church. |
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| AMSA Health Fair for the islanders |
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| Views of St. Kitts from school and our neighborhood... the daily sighting of cruise ships |
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| Getting here |
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| Walking to church |
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| Pioneer children sang as they walked, and walked, and walked...and walked |
One year older and wiser too...
It happened. Eden had a birthday. We now have a one year old in our family. Crazy! Thanks to a kind family in our branch, we had a delightful celebration and one that I was not expecting. Austin had his first final to kick off the day. He performed with excellence as usual, and came home in time to party! The Kims invited us over to their place for a big birthday lunch. This is the family who lives at the Marriott. The father is now our branch president, they have a 14 year old son, 12 year old daughter, and soon to be 10 year daughter, and they are Korean. I have talked about them many times before- now you know them better! We are so well taken care of and loved by this family. It's been a great blessing to know and be friends with them. Their daughters absolutely love Eden and the mom, Yahn (aka. Sis Kim) is what I call the "branch grandma." She is not nearly old enough to be a grandma herself, but she LOVES babies and has taken a fondness to us because of having Eden. I can't say enough about how selfless and kind this family is. We just love them!
You also need to know that Sis. Kim is a fabulous cook! She bakes wonderful bread- often with surprises in the dough, like hot dogs or cream cheese- and always has a unique dish of something to share with us. You should see her rice cooker. It's worth 500 US Dollars and is practically a robot. It's a digital touchscreen and talks to you. It's an insane piece of cookware! And it keeps your rice good for a week- hot and ready! For Eden's birthday, she made bacon-wrapped shrimp, Korean flavored Ribs, salad, rice, this noodley-Korean dish with spinach and eggs- (which is apparently the Korean party dish, especially for first birthdays because the long noodles are said to represent a long life), and cream-cheese rolls. Oh, and homemade lemonade and orange/strawberry juice. Talk about a feast, eh? To top it off, she had a cute little cupcake with a candle for Eden to blow out. (Well, I blew out her candle for her, but she thought all the attention was pretty awesome.)
We had a breakthrough at their house: Eden voluntarily left the room and played with the girls without Austin or I being with her. She had to be at least 20 feet away and out of sight. I don't think that has ever happened on the island. Our good friend, Genevieve, and her baby Jack joined us for the festivities. That was fun for Eden too. She's loving other kids right now. It's fun to watch her interact with other kids, smile, talk, and laugh hysterically at them.
After lunch, Yahn had planned for Eden to take part in a Korean tradition. They set out a bunch of items, all corresponding to a different attribute. They set out all these different items and let Eden choose one. Because she chose the ball, it was said that she would grow up to be sporty and athletic. Her other options were to choose money and be rich (sorry dad, I guess she'll have to marry rich instead), string for a long life, a book for smart and well learned, a doctor tag, or a pencil for artistic. We think she can be all these things, but only time will tell!
So... as of Eden's first birthday, she has 3 teeth. Maybe 4 will be showing by the time come home in the next few days. We can't wait to show her off. We made it to the beach another two times this week. We took Yaba with us the first time. The ocean is good therapy for his leg and shoulder (which are debilitated from a car/pedestrian accident). The second time, we went to the Marriott beach, which has harsher water, but better sand. It's fine for us because we only stay on shore. Eden loved it! There is always something to point at, show off, and eat (but not really): sea shells, sea weed, waves, and sand. What a fun life!
This post was all about Eden, but it was her big week, afterall. Austin has three more finals to go before he is done with his second semester of medical school! Time is flying by! I feel like we have adjusted and made it our home here. I never thought the day would come. Life and attitude is all about perspective and being grateful. Oh how we are blessed. We have great neighbors, a wonderful branch, (I love my calling,) a nice place to live, Austin is doing well at school, and we are all healthy.
AND we are coming home soon! How could I forget? Next week, my update will be in person!!
Sunday, December 6, 2015
Achieving Excellence
It's the most wonderful time of the year! That saying is just as true in St. Kitts as it is in America. The weather is cooler, school is out (or almost), people are busily shopping, Christmas music blares in the grocery stores, and it's birthday time. Can you believe it? Eden will be 1 year old on Friday. Boy has time disappeared.
Eden has yet again gone through a sort of transformation where she is a new person again. She has also decided to grow a good 4-6 inches in what seems like a week. This happy little child of ours thinks she is invincible and is happiest on her feet, though she puts up good competition racing on her hands and knees. Her walker is no longer for walking in, but for climbing on, as is everything else with a ledge to hold. I can't even begin to describe what a delight she is. Even she thinks she is funny and will laugh at herself.
We don't often go to the beach because it feels like so much work and is so dirty. I'd rather be in a pool. But, this week, I took Eden for a day and was delighted to find that she loved it. She really is growing up! Now that she is mobile, the sand was a blast. We looked for seashells on the beach for a good hour together, which was just the coolest thing. She had to show me EVERYTHING she found. What fun!
On Thursday, Eden and I got to go to class with Austin. He received an award for having a 96% or higher in Biochemistry at the time (which includes grades from 3 exams and 3 quizzes). There were only three people in his class that were awarded this "Certificate of Excellence." Truly, Austin could get this award in every class if it existed. I can count the number of questions he has missed in all his classes from both semesters combined on my hands and still have left over fingers. Needless to say, he has a near 100% in every class. It was a big deal and hard achievement; the dean was invited along with the professor to present the award. I think we got a good picture or two and were allowed to stay for part of class following. The professor was pleased to see that Eden was smiling and clapping for his teaching.
The only Christmas lights we have seen on the island are right across the street from us. Good ol' Yabba decorated his bush. And it even sings! Austin and I laughed, noting that even the recordings here are off tune, but it may just be that the batteries are dying. We are lucky that we get to experience the festivities first hand. Christmas lessons have begun at church likewise. I was in charge of teaching sharing time in Primary today- we talked about some of the Book of Mormon prophets who prophesied of Jesus Christ's birth. I'm loving Primary and these kids. We have a lot of fun, but I also feel like we are teaching them a lot and letting them feel the spirit some. It has been neat to me to teach because they are not as familiar with the Book of Mormon stories, so anything I say is fascinating and new! We acted out most of the stories today; the kids all got a change to be King Benjamin and stand on a "tower" and say something that he prophesied of Christ. How amazing that he knew our Savior's name would be "Jesus Christ" and that His mother would be "Mary" and that he would do such descriptive mighty miracles, including the Atonement. Next, we got to act out the story of Abinadi preaching to the people and King Noah and talked about how he gave his life as a testimony that Christ would be born on earth. Lastly, we sang about Samuel, the Lamanite. I LOVE that Primary song. It may be my favorite Christmas song. The words tell about the signs that Samuel prophesied would come and then shout Hosanna! It goes like this:
Once again, we were able to talk about how Samuel risked his life for people to know that Jesus Christ would be born. And then the kids got to "cast stones" at Samuel- one of the kids. So we had a good time.
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