Easter Egg Hunt...WHAT'S THAT!?

Scotty started off our Resurrection Sunday on the right foot by having us sing two hymns about the resurrection (this was especially nice since we attend church in Spanish). I even played along on the piano.

Yes, hunting for eggs is a foreign concept here. Most have heard of the idea but didn't know how it all worked. They had heard rumors of even hunting for colored hard-boiled eggs..."Really," they asked, "you do that?" We enjoyed having church friends over and introducing grown-ups to their first egg hunt. I included Resurrection Eggs in the loot to find and we all circled around after the hunt to see who had found which resurrection egg. The kids opened the resurrection eggs in the correct order and an adult told the history of its place in the resurrection story.

Adeline had a tumble, but kept on going. Darton is always quite clueless to what's right in front of him, but he did pretty good with the hunt ;)Abby found the egg with the cup representing the last supper Christ had with His disciples. Adeline was a champ and didn't whine once that she didn't find any resurrection eggs. She just listened and watched. She also did a great job pointing out candy to the small kids instead of taking it for herself.

Camping in the Dominican

We survived our first camping trip with 3 kids! I had my hesitations, namely being security, but the trip was great! Scotty found an official camping ground (rare and even unheard of in the DR) near the mine. Scotty grew up camping and I am so very thankful to Papa Geer for all the camping trips he provided for his family. Going camping with Scott isn't much work at all. He puts up the tent and cooks the food.

The kids loved playing around the fire. Hotdogs for dinner.

I LOVE watching my kids get dirty when they are having fun at it! I guess that's why camping doesn't bother me so much.

Smores for desert!

The kids COULDN'T WAIT to go "Fish n Caught." Adeline's coined phrase for going fishing to catch fish. She does this a lot actually and flips her words around. The one that comes to mind is "jacket lite" for life jacket.

Sarah's first vacation since we moved into the house almost a year and a half ago. She did great!

Our happy boy

Scotty trying to make the worms come out of the ground.

Adeline & Daddy going hunting for bugs

They found lots of termites! Our 10 man tentDarton chasing butterflies among the baby pine trees. Daddy and his girl. He told her last night that one day boys are going to like her but not to worry because he will help her pick out the best one. I love my husband!

Matthias has been my chubbiest and he's really not all that chubby. The result of on-demand feeding! Didn't know it existed with the first two.

Bobbin'

Daddy & the kids made boats for the pool.

I proudly cooked a dominican lunch the other day. The menu: Rice cooked with salt and a bit of oil (they say they have a headache if they don't have rice for lunch), vegetables cooked in oil & vinegar, and fried salami. I don't know if dominicans eat salami for lunch, but it is a staple in the dominican grocery basket.

This is an example of what I mean by Darton being "all boy." He hits his horses on the ground so hard while he is pretending with them that the back legs break off...of 2 horses!

Last week after about 2 weeks of feeling "off" I finally sank and was willing to label my thorn in my side as depression. Praise God for talking to the perfect person at the right time and after meditating on Psalm 91 and John 2-4 my faithful God answered my prayer to drench me with His everlasting water and to protect me under his wings.

How can a mom living a dream life in the Carribbean get depressed you ask? As mentioned, depression is my thorn in my side (or at least one of them). Day-in, day-out, same-o, same-o gets to me after a while; especially with an infant who's not letting you get full nights of sleep. Back in January I was pumped to get back to life here with my three blessings. Now I just want me time! Or at least I did for the last three weeks. I've come to realize that most expat moms need to get off the island every 3 months or so. But really? Is that all I needed? No, it wasn't. Ultimately I needed sleep and God. Once I received that dose of medicine and a good 4 day holiday weekend with the hubby at home, I am bobbin' now and not sinking!

I'm getting back on track with more "purposeful play" (aka Little Hands to Heaven curriculum) and activities with the kids (painting, reading, puppets, ect).

Adeline's Play-Do creations of Mommy & Adeline. However, she doesn't call me "mommy," instead she calls me the dominican "mama" with an accent on the last "a." It drives me nuts since she says it with a whine. But it's been about a year since she first started using it, so I suppose it has stuck!

Black & White

We recieved an invitation to a work related party last week that said Black & White Attire (optional). What??!! Which is it - black & white or not? I knew that it would have been safer to dress in cocktail attire, but we took the dive and opted for the chance to wear what you never get to wear.

And you guessed it. Scott was the only man in a tux of about 200 people and I was the only one in a long formal. There were a good number with jeans and tennis shoes! It was quite disappointing, but that didn't keep us for busting a move solo on the dance floor ;)

RSA Animate - Changing Education Paradigms

I think this is worth 11 minutes of your time to ponder....

Mi Hijo Tiene 3 Anos!

Darton turned 3 yesterday. My boy has a sweet nature, but man is he bull-headed! He's full-on boy and I'm looking forward to putting him into karate. I think it will be perfect for him! He wants me to sing Jesus Loves Me and Joshua Fought the Battle of Jericho to him every night. This time last year he loved to sit and watch Chitty-chitty Bang Bang, but it's really hard for him to sit through a movie now. We gave him Old Yeller for his birthday and he's quite sure he wants a gun that goes "bang" now. His favorite bday present was a set of mishaped keys Scotty got from a key maker. The dominican key maker was quite concerned a child was receiving the keys because he could cut himself. Maybe he can.... Darton is also enjoying the gear set we got him (in the pic below) and the Woody outfit Nonnie and Papa bought him. He refuses to look at the camera these days!

For the past two weeks he has been asking for a pink cake. The night before his birthday we asked him one more time - chocolate, yellow, or pink. He said blue! He NEVER asks for anything blue! We had two friends over and they enjoyed playing with water guns. This picture is so cute!

Modesty

We have officially entered the world of "little girl" and all that goes with it, most recently a possessiveness of her items. Scott has been on the lookout for a couple of years now with Adeline's clothes, toys, movies, etc. He never saw Ariel as a mermaid with a beautiful voice. No, he saw Ariel as a scandously dressed princess. I had to finally agree. The same goes for Jasmine. She wasn't as hard for me to say "good-bye." Scott threw out The Little Mermaid and Aladdin while we were away in Texas. Adeline hasn't asked for them once. However, over the weekend Scott noticed the princesses had snuck back into our house on game cards. I'm called to raise my daughter in the admonition of the Lord pointing her to Christ and how to glorify Him. Modesty glorifies God and in the end will protect my daughter. Today I sat down with her to discuss the differences in the following six princesses' clothing. Adeline immediately noticed Jasmine and Ariel were showing their belly buttons. She then pointed out that Jasmine's shoulders are showing. It took her a bit to decide how she wanted to describe what Ariel was wearing (or the lack thereof). These two fine princesses are choosing to be modest even though Cinderella's dress is lowcut. In 1950 Disney chose to be modest by not sketching in cleavage. Adeline surprised me with her comment on these two princesses, whom I thought were being modest.

"Mom, I wish I could go inside the movie to show these princesses how to cover their shoulders."

My 4 1/2 year old challenged my modesty scale today! By the time Belle came along in 1991 Disney decided cleavage was okay. Adeline whined a bit when she realized that the Ariel and Jasmine cards needed to be thrown away. She was over it in 5 minutes. Thank you Lord God for getting me through that conversation. Daddy's next challenge - trying to get rid of the suductive looking princess PJs! It's going to be a long road, but choosing Christ isn't always the easy way, now is it? IT'S THE MOST REWARDING!

Adeline spanish prayer

Adeline goes to a Spanish speaking school two days a week. She rarely wants to talk to me in Spanish, but she came home this week spitting out the prayer the students say each day. Whoohoo! Tio Denny y Tia Cintia - Pueden traducir? :)

Breaking All the Rules

On Thursday I decided to have a "veg-out" day with the kids. IT WAS WONDERFUL! I needed a break from the humdrum of the daily routine and this is how our day went - Before 8a.m. I had started a movie and shortly after I brought up popcorn and juice for breakfast. After watching the Prince of Egypt I had them play outside for a bit before starting movie number 2 at 10:30a! Recording breaking I'm telling you. Shortly after the second movie we had lunch in the tv room and then we headed outside to play. Adeline and Darton have rediscovered their Fisher Price farm set and have enjoyed multiple days of taking it outside to play "farm" and race their horses. Later that afternoon we played our new game The Grouchy Ladybug and then headed upstairs for movie #3 while we drank homemade caffienated frappocinos! Breaking the rules also meant no shower for me. I know for some moms that is really hard to do... not the case for me. By Thursday evening I was ready to be productive and did a few dishes at the sink and we then cleaned up all the odds and ends around the house before eating dinner in the tv room :). Darton took a late nap on Thursday and therefore couldn't fall asleep until 10p that night. He did a great job playing by himself with a LEGO helicopter after his sister went to bed. This picture captures the good time he is having plus Matthias' favorite position - feet in the air! He is either holding them or has them together like if you were playing pat-a-cake with his feet. He's my little monkey. When Friday mornig rolled around I was pumped to get back in the groove of our normal routine. Most Fridays we have a play date at our house. This past Friday a good friend's son turned 13 and we enjoyed 5 hours of pool and terrace time. On Saturday we had more friends over and the kids enjoyed another 4 hours in the pool. With two straight days of no naps Darton just couldn't stay awake during the church service.Last night Adeline wanted to sleep in her tent she made.