Kenan's 3rd birthday party

Kenan's 3rd birthday was Jan 1. He was lucky because my sister was here and threw him a wonderful party (to which I can never live up to). His friend Hannah came and then some other "aunts and uncles" from Mali as well as the family. He refused to wear a superman suit even though it was a Superman party, but it was his party, he could do what he wanted. :) My sister really did a wonderful job- they had tons of games and the cake was amazing. I seriously wonder if it's worth paying for her ticket to come back and do the parties for the boys each year.

They had a super hero training course.

they searched for kryptonite.

You can tell she is a teacher. :)

Lex Luther, malian style.

Nienke carried the computer around wherever we went so my parents and aunt could watch the party. They watched the whole thing- even though it started at 5 am their time!

There was a game to find the stuffed animals around the yard. Dawson found Kenan's precious doggies.

He was so happy that they were safe.

Not only can my sister throw a great party- she makes AWESOME cakes. Every cake after this will be lacking compared to this one.

Flying with his ice cream.

One of his presents was a medical kit. He's trying out the "telescope" as Dawson calls it.

Silas really liked a car that danced and made music. Here he is dancing with it.

At the end of the party, Kenan gave a hug to everyone- even my parents and aunt on the computer! :)

We love you, sweet Kenan. You bring joy to our lives. Your smile brightens any room. You are so sweet and you love your brothers so well. I love your kisses and hugs. We are so thankful for you!!

I should learn my lesson

Silas has been sick this past week which means he clings to me all the time and whines. Often I say in situations like this, "I don't care what they are doing, as long as they are quiet." Brett finds this statement utterly ridiculous and tells me every single time I say it. I am learning that it isn't a great statement. I of course, mean it within certain boundaries. Like, I don't care if they pull every one of their plates out of the cabinet if it keeps them occupied for 10 minutes. Or I don't care if they pull pages out of a coloring book and then tear it to pieces...or take stickers and put them all over their body...or go outside and cover themselves in mud....or pull all the cushions off the couches and jump on them...things like that. Well, Silas is teaching me he can push these boundaries and this statement just doesn't fly. This morning, I left him for one minute in the kitchen. He had the box of Crispix (which we can only get from the States). He was eating one at a time then all of the sudden I hear it- yep, he pours the entire box on the ground. Ugh. This is annoying sure, but it shouldn't have even happened because I should have learned my lesson last night- quiet is NOT a good thing. So like I said, he's been crying like crazy and always with me (like right now he's at my feet crying). After his bath he was somewhat happy so I put him in a chair with his towel wrapped around him while I went into the kitchen to get food for the boys. Just a minute later I came back. I promise it was just a minute. He had climbed onto the kitchen table and was PEEING! Yuck! Thankfully, we have a plastic cover on it so it was easily cleaned, but still, kind of gross knowing you are eating on someone's toilet. Thankfully, it was just pee and not another treasure.

So I'm starting anew today- I can no longer say it-I don't care what they are doing as long as they are quiet. I do care what they are doing...I still might let them be quiet and suffer the consequences, but I do care what they are doing when they are quiet.

Christmas with the Pinhos...a month late

Between trying to get back to life after my sister left, then many power outages, and then a broken computer, I now today have time to post pictures from Christmas and my sister's visit. Since this is so late, I'm just doing a big post of an overview of their trip.

We so enjoyed having Jen, Patrick, Zachary and Shelby Grace with us. Sure it was sometimes crazy with 5 kids 4 and under in only a 3 bedroom home, but it was worth it and so fun. My sister is a teacher (as is Patrick) and she came with tons of things to do with the kids. I laughed, though, because when she left, I asked Dawson what his favorite thing Jen did with them. I thought he would say Kenan's superman party, the gingerbread house, making ornaments for the tree or something like that. Nope, it was when she drew bad guys on our walls and trees with chalk so they could fight them! :) We had lots of fun with them.

Silas was determined to eat the salt ornaments. He would put it in his mouth and spit it out...but then eat it again.

All the names of the cousins...but when they were drying our nanny gave one to Silas to eat not realizing that they weren't really cookies. So Dawson only had half a W.

Kenan loved red

the boys going to save the day...all they need is underwear and sunglasses.

Riding on the motorcycle.

Silas learning from Bocar how to sweep the yard.

He LOVES this if you can't tell. He sweeps each morning and night with him.

Making the gingerbread house.

I told Jen we'd have no problem remembering where we spent this Christmas since all three boys are only in underwear. :)

Showing off their work.

Kenan ate a ridiculous amount of icing. He kept licking and licking, would ask for more and then lick some more.

Jen and I had an icing fight after the fact. Shelby Grace was not amused.

The little two after a bath

We went to the pig farm and had a great time.

When I see this picture of Jen, it reminds me of a famous person in a magazine. It's like one of those pictures you see when they catch them in their daily life, going shopping or whatever.

Zachary is so good for the camera. Sweet picture of Patrick and him.

always trying to get a picture with kids who never want to take them.

they were encouraging Brett to jump over the water. It was quite a jump.

He didn't make it.

Swimming at the pool. Dawson swam around and picked up every ball in the pool

Batman and Robin, showing off their muscles.

These will be blackmail pictures one day.

This one reminds me of one of the first pictures of the two of them together. see below

When they were babies. Ha! It was so funny to me, I kept it.

Going for their nightly ride from Bocar.

Getting ready to fight someone.

Playing at the construction site at the hospital. There are a ton more pictures that were taken this day but somehow they didn't make it onto my computer. ): Regardless, SG looks cute.

We love you guys! Thanks for coming! Hope you come back sometime!

Two different kind of dreams

Dawson came out of his room this morning telling us about his dream, clarifying many times throughout that he wasn't sure if it was real or not. He said, "we were in our house, but it wasn't our house...it had stairs....we were in our bathroom, but it wasn't our bathroom..I was Batman and Kenan was Robin...I don't know if this was real or not....but we were in the bathroom and the bad guys were getting us....Then I did a flip and got around them...and Kenan did a flip too. I was yelling Kenan!...and we got away from the bad guys....I don't know if this was real or not...but I was doing a flip!

Kenan chimes in "Yeah, me there too! Me do flip!" "Me there!" He was just as convinced that this dream was real.

So that's my boys- dreaming of fighting bad guys and prevailing. Not just winning, but also doing flips in the process.

The same night, my dream: Our house guy got tuberculosis and was really weak and close to death. Worse than that, he gave it to Silas because Silas was around him too much. We were hoping Silas could be treated and saved but it didn't look good for Jeremie. But I'm sure if this was real or not.

I think I'd rather be fighting bad guys.

A first in Mali

Yesterday I had a first here. My first accident. Everyone always says it isn't if you have an accident but when. Yesterday was my when. I was trying to get through the market which is always crowded. There was a van parked on the side of the road which croweded the space even more. The first thing I saw was a man yelling at a boy on a water cart (it's like a wagon with a barrel of water on it). Next thing I know I hear a terrible sound. I get out thinking that it is just a bad scratch. Nope, the kid had pulled off the entire piece above the wheel as well as the mud flap. It also broke the bumper. The kid started leaving but I yelled out to him to stop. I was kind of in shock when I saw parts of the car on the road. Thankfully, a man I knew who works at the cotton factory was passing through so he stopped and talked with me. Near the end another man from the hospital stopped. I called Brett and seeing that it was impossible for an 8 year old kid to pay for the car, we just let him go. The best I can figure is that as he was passing me he lost control of his donkey and it just went too close to my car.

I've been reading this book "Calm My Anxious Heart" (yes, I've actually read a second book in the last few months! I'm trying to better myself and am reading things on areas that I am lacking). Anyway, so the chapter I had just read the day before was "what ifs" and "If only" and how these are not beneficial. Often we worry about many what ifs and they never even happen. The If only's just cause pointless frustration. Rather, we should trust this was God's will and His plan for our good. As soon as I got in the car, I immediately thought, "If only I had left a minute later" then I realized this was what the book was about. I needed to trust it was for my benefit, for my teaching. To be honest, the things that bothered me the most was the money it would cost to fix it and my pride of having to drive around with a messed up car (I know this is absolutely ridiculous, like anyone here would care my car was messed up- it would just blend in more!). So I tried to be thankful. Thankful no one was hurt. Just the car. Every single Malian who heard about it, asked me if there was anyone hurt. It really hit me how significant this is. People have accidents every single day and people get hurt and die. So I should have never cared about the silly car. I found out that our mechanic in town could fix our car so he actually did it today! So it's all fixed aside from the scratches and need for paint. I thought all the parts would have to be replaced, which would have been a ton of money, but praise the Lord it could be fixed. I'm glad to have my first accident behind me. It was very minor, no injuries, easily correctable (only $40 bucks!) and the best part- it wasn't MY fault! :)

Deep thoughts from Dawson

I enjoy taking Dawson to school each day because it gives us time to talk. I'm often amazed at what comes out of his mouth. I know that most don't really care about all the things the boys say but I want to remember them, thus you must bear with me (or just skip to another post). :) So here are some car conversations:

Last week Dawson asked me how God got to heaven. I told him that He had always been there. Having just studied in my Beth Moore study about "I AM" and how that displays a sense of being "I am being as I am being," I tried to use this explanation for how God had always been in heaven. He was there before the creation of the world. Dawson seemed to take my answer.

I realized he didn't when a week later he said "I think God used glue." "What?" I asked.

"I think God put glue on his hands and then he could grab the clouds and get to heaven. Then he washed his hands." Well, ok then.

Shortly after he said this he proceeded to ask if God was longer than the sky, I said yes. Is he taller than the sky? Yes, I said, he is bigger than everything.

A little later, "I want Jesus to be on the plane with me when we go see Grandma." So then we talked about how God is with us everywhere all the time.

I enjoy these conversations but I've already told Brett he'll be taking him to school when he is older and his questions get deeper and harder! :)

Two cute things

Dawson and I have been listening to a new cd on the way to school. One song has "I've got peace like a river" at the end of it. Today Dawson started singing it himself. "I've got peas from the river , I've got peas from the river!"

They have been sick with diarrhea, throwing up, and a cough. One day their breath wasn't smelling so hot. I mentioned that to them but said I loved them even when their breath smelled. Well, they started switching it around and now Kenan says often, "If you smell like carrots, me no love you." Good to know. I'll make sure I never smell like carrots, if I can help it.

The new prayer card

Since I posted asking for people's opinion, I thought I would share the final decision on our prayer card. Everyone, yes everyone, said the blog picture, so we went with that! :)

Here it is....

I bet you can't wait to get your hands on one of these babies, huh? :) Seriously, thanks for all who commented and gave ideas.

Dawson's school

When my sister was here, she and Zachary went to school with Dawson. It was nice because she actually got to take pictures of his day and fill me in on what really goes on.

In the mornings they start out singing. Dawson's favorite songs are "fanga b'a la" and "Yesu est mon ami" which are "Power is in Him" power in his blood and "Jesus is my friend." It's cute to hear him sing these. His teacher has told me before that his favorite is really fanga b'a la and that he goes around school singing the song.

Not a great pic of him, but here he is working on his drawing. Each day they spend time writing, often it is just lines or dots. They are moving up to shapes!

Here's a picture of his class. The white lady on the left is Erin. She is an American here working in Dawson's class. It is such a blessing that she is there. Dawson told me today that she is his favorite person in the world. Kind of hurt his favorite person isn't in the family, but glad he enjoys her at school! :)

After bathroom time, they wash their hands in these buckets...since bathroom time really is just going in a hole, which has no plumbing or anything and no sinks.

Dawson gets 25 CFA (5 cents) each day to buy juice. It is da, which is a leaf that they boil and get a liquid, then they add water and sugar and freeze it. This gave him diarrhea his whole first year in school but he got used to it and is fine with it now. He enjoys it a lot.

So though the school isn't like anything in the States, he enjoys his days overall and is picking up more and more french. He can count to 5 in french, say his colors and then randomly comes out with several phrases. We are really thankful for all that he has learned and more importantly that it has improved his relations with Malians and now he is more willing to talk with them.