New Preschool Joy!

A proud Jonathan stands tall to show off his school supply cubby --3rd orange basket from the top.  I think this will be one of my favorite pictures of all time.

Joshua's interest is caught for an instant by the teacher's lesson about parts of the face. 

      After a very prolonged absence from blogging, without further delay, I share these pictures and stories about Jonathan and Joshua's new preschool. 

      While we did have a few positive experiences at our old neighborhood preschool, in the end we decided to leave that school and go to a new one.  Thank God!  We are having such a much more positive experience at the new school -- like a difference between night and day.  In contrast to the other school, our new school is spacious, organized, populated by mostly-obedient and motivated children, staffed by enthusiastic and caring teachers and aids.   

       Our new school is further away, not in our immediate neighborhood.  To get there, we walk about 4 blocks down to the main road, hop on a mini-bus for about 2 minutes, and then walk another 3 blocks to the school.  However, even though it's farther away, I've reconnected with a previous neighbor whose daughter is in the class above Jonathan.  I'm connecting with other mothers in a way I never did at the other school, because there are sometimes up to 20 moms waiting around in the play yard and bench area during school hours!  I rejoice in this!  

Waiting for our city minibus ride on the way to school.

On our walk to school, we now have time to notice the beauty of the natural world, including our local volcano.

      The boys are in different classrooms now.  Jonathan is in the "little kindergarten" and Joshua is in the playgroup.  Jonathan loves his classroom and can't wait to get inside, sit at his desk, and start learning.  He especially loves doing worksheets and crafts.  The teacher is extremely organized, plans her lessons, and keeps her classroom extremely clean.

Jonathan does well in his classroom and eagerly looks forward to writing in his workbooks and doing crafts.

Snacktime

       Unlike the other school, this school has a play yard and a lots of local style playground equipment.  I try to get to school early.  School starts at 7:30 am and they start with a 15 minute recess.  So by the time class starts, the boys have had a walk to school and a full half hour of outdoor play.  After that, they are ready to go inside and learn.

      Jonathan is in a high learning curve trying to figure out how to relate to the other boys.  At first he would approach them and they would run away from them.  He'd chase them.  Often they'd get into a tussle of smacks and punches.  The next phase -- Jonathan spent a week digging in the dirt.  The boys would sometimes come and watch him and then wander off.   This week -- Jonathan joined the boys in their game of pile-up-on-the-slide.  For whatever reason, one of the bigger boys insisted on hitting Jonathan with a stick for about five minutes before I finally took the stick away.  Wonder of wonders, Jonathan, who does have a temper, DID NOT HIT BACK!  This was a major breakthrough!  At home he told me, "Mom I was trying my hardest to duck!"  Then yesterday, the boys had a big long game of chase-Jonathan-and-try-to-take-his-hat.  Jonathan seemed like he was enjoying it, although when we got home he told me the boys were being mean.  Indeed at the end of the game I saw they collectively picked him up in the air and then he was dropped on the ground (and cried.)   It's always a wisdom-seeking experience for me to watch these dynamics and decide when to intervene or not as Jonathan learns how to relate cross-culturally.  I know I can't always jump in and rescue him and many times I prefer the teacher to be the one to notice and intervene.

      Joshua, on the other hand, has a different style on the playground.  He putters.  He'll play on a swing by himself, then examine the water meter, or play on one side of the teeter totter.  The moms and teachers will often engage him and he's receptive and sweet.  Sometimes he'll play on the playground equipment, but mostly he just quietly makes his rounds.

      There are 6 American kids who attend this school and about 50 local kids.  It's a really nice mix because the boys do have some friends with whom they have a lot in common and don't have to try so hard, but they also are still in a language immersion environment to maximize their language learning.

Rhythm band lesson using buckets, bottles and home-made shakers.

A little after school tutoring on how to hold a crayon properly.

"Mom, take a picture of my picture!"

Making our way home on the minibus, the boys tank up on water before we hike 3 blocks up the hill to our house.

      So we got a new pile of school uniforms.  They are not as cute as the uniforms at the other school, but Jonathan just loves the patches on his uniform shirts.   The patches have the school name and logo on them.   Dave says Jonathan will be sad when he finally has to go to American-style Mountainview and will not get to wear his uniforms any more.

Exercise uniforms for Friday PE day -- yep my boys are dressed in pink and purple.

One last shot to show you Jonathan's blue uniform which he wears on Tuesdays.  He's so proud of his badge, his tie, and his vest.  Can you see he's turning into a big boy?

Happy Birthday Dave AND Happy Easter 2014! Christ is Risen!

Happy 48th Birthday to my favorite husband and the best daddy!

     Dave's birthday started off with Joshua waking up with a fever and very clingy.  He was happy enough to help stir some of the dry ingredients of the cake but insisted on being held for the rest of the process.  I wasn't sure how I was going to frost the cake....

.....but it worked out!  Jonathan helped to frost the inner layer of the cake ....he's standing just outside the picture.  Our first birthday cake made by all three of us.  

     Easter Sunday started with a fire in our kitchen!   In a crazy twist of events, a wooden trivet had gotten stuck to the bottom of our tea pot.  Nobody noticed and in the morning I put my teapot on to boil!  Off I went to change a dirty diaper, and a few minutes later Dave noticed smoke and stink and discovered a fire on the range!  Fortunately the fire went out as soon as he turned off the gas, but we were smoked out of the house and into the back yard for over an hour.  

      This Easter season we did our usual Resurrection Eggs and multiple readings of the Easter story with much interest (Joshua) and questions (Jonathan) from  the boys.  My new tradition to try this year was the Resurrection Rolls (recipe linked.)  Our local import store had some marshmallows from the Phillipines, so I was excited to give this a try.  The boys helped to prepare the marshmallows and wrap them in dough.  The baking didn't go quite as expected .....I guess the Phillipino marshmallows weren't quite the same.  They puffed up to the size of a lemon, exploded the rolls open, and then did not melt as predicted.  So, the object lesson didn't work like I had hoped.... but they still tasted delicious!  

     This year was the 4th time we participated in the Easter Egg hunt at our international fellowship.  It Jonathan's 4th time.  He knew what to do and was so fast I didn't even get any pictures of him finding eggs this year!  I did get this picture of proud Joshua!

Starting for home with a basketful of candy!  To be divvied out one piece a day for .....many days!

Our first field trip and it was a big one!

This last Saturday we had our first field trip ever.  We left at 6 am and got home at 10 pm, so it was a doozy!

We had originally signed up the whole family to go for this full day language immersion experience, but Dave was sick with a "cold" last week .  His symptoms were not quite typical of a normal cold, and by Friday, I finally determined that he had pneumonia.  So no fieldtrip for Dave.  I didn't want to try managing both boys on such a long unusual day so Joshua had to stay home with sick Dave. I arranged a few babysitters during the day so Dave could have a break.  They survived the day, but just barely, I would say.  Dave got a nice fat lip from Joshua during his bedtime tantrum.  The fieldtrip was too special of an opportunity to pass up though, and we felt God's leading for Jonathan and I to go ahead an go even though the day would be rough for Dave and Josh.  Jonathan was so excited to have an adventure with his sekolah friends.

Jonathan and I left the house at 6:15 am and hopped on a little blue minibus to get to the rendezvous point where we eventually boarded this nice air-conditioned tour bus, complete with karaoke, TV/DVD player, and tour guide.  If your wondering, the price for this once-every-two-years field trip was $15 per person.  It included one square meal and snacks.  At one point the kids all took turns singing songs in groups and solo numbers. Jonathan was happy to grab the mike and give a rendition of "Star Light, Star Bright."

After a 3 hour drive, we arrived at this ancient temple site.   It's high in the hills (the locals call them mountains) and we had to switch to smaller buses to get up the steep winding roads.   The temple is left over from the days before Islam came to this country.  It's a pyramid actually.  I was surprised that we only stayed at the site for 15 minutes.  The teachers pointed out the 3 giant turtle statues (one of which they stood on for their group photo) and everybody posed for some pictures and off we went when it started drizzling.  Before we left, 2 of the teachers mounted the staircase to the top of the temple and before I could stop him, Jonathan quickly clambered up after them.  It was quite high and the stairs quite steep.  Do you think he was afraid?

Extreme close up ......nope, definitely not looking fearful. 

After leaving the temple, we went back down the hills past fields of rice, carrots, corn, ginger, and many other things.  We had lunch at a local restaurant:  rice, chicken, veggie soup, rice crunchies and and ice cream treat.  Then we were off to our next destination, and old Dutch sugar processing plant that has been transformed into a local amusement park.  Our main purpose/learning experience at this place was to ride a real, antique, functioning steam train!  We also got to go swimming though.  I didn't know there was going to be swimming, but we improvised with an extra shirt and shorts I had brought along.  Jonathan had a lot of fun frolicking in the water with his sekolah friends.

Frolicking in the water

A mini water slide made of tile

After swimming, we were supposed to immediately get on the steam train, but we ended up having a 2 hour wait.  Apparently they were expecting another group of "important visitors", who got priority on the train.  The important of adult visitors did not even arrive at the park until our large group of small children had already been waiting for an hour after swimming.  We had scheduled this long in advance and we were the only group in the park that day.  This delay was frustrating for the sekolah teachers, but fortunately there was much to explore including a small playground, a sandpit, cages with various animals including a flock of geese, an inguana, a family of monkeys with young, pigeons, and a large display yard of antique gears and pistons from the old sugar processing plant.

Jonathan enjoyed the antique sugar processing plant parts and ran around pretending they were all grinding up sugar cane.

Jenn's favorite part was watching this family of monkeys -- 2 sets of parents with 2 babies.  

Finally, we got to have our  30 minutes steam train ride!

Another view of the train ....upon arrival at the station with the group of "important visitors."

For our interested friends, here are a few close-up pictures of some parts of the train that we thought were especially cool....

The fire box and cab

The coupling

The derailment

When we finally were all loaded on the train, we went about 10 meters and then went bump, bump, bump!  One of the carriage wheels had nudged off the track.  The teachers were practically crying at this point after such a long wait.  They thought it was all over, but the workers did a trick with some blocks of wood out of the tender and got the wheels back on the track.  The steam train inched along the track very loudly around the dilapidated sugar plantation and our ride ended just as it was getting dark.

Riding in the carriage with a classmate ....

The rest of our field trip consisted of a stop at the souvenir shop, dinner at another restaurant, and the 3 hour drive home in the bus, during which all the kids went to sleep.  We were dropped off at the rendesvous site in a torrential rainfall!  We shared a taxi home with some of the teachers and Jonathan was tucked into bed around 10 pm.

The best thing about the day is that Jonathan had such a fun time with his sekolah friends even though he couldn't talk to them much.  It's the kind of experience I've dream of for him.  All of the kids were really kind and understanding with him.  I hope that this day will be the turning point for some better days at sekolah for all of us.  Thanks for praying!

Sekolah 3

Taking a few morning whacks on our sturdy tree.  It does not complain when hit.  

     On Fridays the boys wear their red uniforms.  My friend saw the pictures and said "They look like kilts!"  Uniforms come in all colors here and each school has their own "motif."  I've seen one school whose uniforms are all white -- perhaps appropriate for a nursing school but this was a preschool!  I've also seen some little boys running around in all pink plaid uniforms.

     I noticed that when we got to school, Jonathan had a lot of nervous energy and struggled to keep his hands to himself.  So my new strategy is to get the boys out into our yard 15 minutes earlier than usual to get out some little boy aggression and wiggles.  We start out by taking turns banging on one of our giant trees and then have races around the house.  The boys love the races and it does help us to get out the gate with smiles on our faces.  The morning exercises do help the boys to settle down for circle time at the beginning of the school day.

Morning races around the house help get the blood flowing and the wiggles out before school.

This day we worked on motor skills with lacing cards.  

Jonathan adores this school friend, but they haven't figured out how to BE friends without hurting each other.

     As the Lord leads you, please pray for Jonathan's interactions with his school friends.  He especially loves one little boy in the class, pictured above.  They always find each other at the beginning of the day and greet each other with a hug.  It's sweet to see, but sad when said friend comes up to Jonathan later and pinches him hard on the leg or punches him, literally, in the face.  Since they can't communicate with each other in the same language, they struggle to find other ways -- pinching, punching, bumping.  Sometimes they do play peacefully together -- looking at books or playing "mirror" but more often than not they have to be separated by the teachers.   It starts out innocent, but then it escalates when one will actually hurt the other, who hits back hard in revenge. Jonathan is confused about what friendship is all about and I am working hard with him at sekolah to help him navigate these hard waters of cross-cultural friendship.   He does have some ex-pat friends he plays with well at the Mountainview playground so I'm thankful he is having some positive play experiences.  Whether or not this improves is one big factor in whether we will decide to continue at this sekolah next school year.

Locked out....

     At every national school in this country on Monday mornings, all of the students participate in a very formal patriotic flag ceremony.  It last about 15 minutes and includes standing at attention like soldiers, saluting the flag at multiple, specific times, reciting in unison the 5 national virtues and singing the national anthem and other patriotic songs.  It starts exactly on time and those who are tardy are LOCKED OUT until the ceremony is over!  Here's a picture of the late crowd (including us) a few Mondays ago!  I've since decided that we will not attend the flag ceremony until the boys know more language and are more mature.  It's just too hard for them to stand still at attention for so long and they disrupt it for everyone else.

Pet therapy on the walk home after sekolah.

      The walk home after school is full of fun.  This nice dog lives just a few doors down from the sekolah and we always stop to say hello to her.  We don't usually mix with random dogs, but we've met the owners and "Sheri" is well cared for.    The boys also enjoy putting their hands in gravel, looking in the waste-water ditches, poking sticks in the mud, collecting ladybugs to bring home to our yard, watching the neighbors chickens, banging on lightpoles to disrupt the ant nests inside and pointing out ripe fruit in the trees or butterflies passing by.

Loving the gritty feel of gravel on the way home from sekolah.....

Sekolah 2

As promised, here are pictures of the the boys in their Wednesday uniform.  It's the PE uniform and on Wednesdays the class usually does more physical games like taking turns jumping on a small trampoline or taking turns kicking a ball.

Pak Dody and the kids gather around a bucket of water to learn how the game works.  

On this day, we went to the alley behind the school and played a water relay game ....uh, kind of.   The pacing was pretty slow, so the line of the bucket brigade became very zig-zaggy and stretched out at times as little feet wandered!

Joshua receives the "bucket" from a classmate.

Some of the older kindergarten girls really enjoy playing with Joshua.

After the exercise time, there is snack/break time.  When the kids finish their snacks, they have some time to socialize and look at books or play with a few wooden toys.

Jonathan really enjoys looking at books during break time.

The classroom (really a converted garage) is transformed for table work.  

My favorite days are when we have table work.... only about once a week.  The boys seem to do better when they have their own place to sit and an individual task to perform.  

Josh is excited to be sitting at his own table!

Rare moments of focus....

On this day, the kids were working on a puzzle worksheet.  The pieces would eventually be put together to form the letter K.  First they had to use a perforating tool and a padded board to perforate all the puzzle pieces, so they could then be punched out and then glued onto the puzzle.  I was amazed at the amount of focus Jonathan was able to give to this project!  He and Joshua really enjoyed having a hands-on tool to work with!  They stayed on task much longer than the other boys.

As you can see, most of the boys have left their work and only the girls and Jonathan (and Joshua with some encouragement from me) are still on task.  

Going to sekolah has been much more difficult than I had anticipated.  It's only 2 hours a day, 3 days a week, but I feel like it has changed the entire rhythm of our lives and we haven't found our balance yet.  The 100% instruction in the local language just sounds like gibberish for the boys and the pacing is so slow that they just have a hard time staying engaged.  It would be one thing if the classroom control is good, but the reality is that most of the boys in the class are running wild most of the time.  When we decided to attend this sekolah, we knew of it's weaknesses but we chose to move forward.  Now we're feeling the weaknesses very strongly.  We are committed to sticking it out until the end of May, when we will start our summer travels.  God has given me the gift of persistence, and I'm just holding on to hope that someday soon, the language will start making sense to the boys.  We'll turn a corner and start having more good days than difficult days.  As the Lord reminds you, please pray for us in this endeavor!  

My eventual goal is to be able to leave the boys in class and just wait on the porch until class time is over, however after 3 months we're not at the point yet.  Another American mom, who used to teach preschool in the US, had been encouraging me to just drop the boys off at the door.  She has since started spending some time at the sekolah as part of her language learning.  Last week, after seeing the classroom experience firsthand, she told me "I get it now.  I understand why you will never be able to leave them there alone!"  I gave her a big hug!  

 On the plus side:  although our school days are still difficult, the boys' attitudes are already changing.  Jonathan used to say "I don't like those kids.  They don't speak our language."  Now Jonathan and Joshua both know the names of some of their school friends and talk about them at home.  They both are using more local language words at home and both sometimes sing some of their sekolah songs at home.  Joshua especially seems to be absorbing a lot of language and has learned several songs that he sings often.  Jonathan is more interested in learning local language words so we are all more motivated to be learning more language.  

This Saturday there is going to be a day long field trip to some local sights.  We'll leave at 6:30 in the morning and get home at 8 pm or later!  It will be quite the language immersion experience and we're hoping that the whole family can go!  We've all had colds.  Jonathan and I are better, but Dave and Joshua are improving more slowly.  I hope we all can be better by Saturday so we all can go!  

Ashes, Ashes -- Living in the ring of fire

Our backyard passionfruit vine covered in volcanic ash

Keeping our lungs safe from chemical irritation....Joshua, just don't breathe too deeply since you won't keep your mask on!

     It's been a month now since Mount Kelud "coughed," but although I am behind in my blogging, I think it's still worth a show-and-tell.  You may remember that 3 1/2 years ago another of our local volcanos, Mt Merapi, erupted for days on end.  It was only 14 miles away from us, but the ash clouds were blowing in the opposite direction from our town and we were barely affected.  

     In this case, Mt. Kelud is about 150 miles away and only erupted for one part of one day.  The winds were blowing our direction this time and our whole region basically shut down for 2 days! The strength of the created natural world never ceases to amaze me.  Despite all of our technology and intellect, a natural disaster can take lives and cause everything to come to a stand still in no time at all.  Fortunately, this volcanic eruption resulted in relatively little loss of life.... less than 20 fatalities, from such things as an ash-laden roof collapsing or chronic lung disorders being exacerbated.  (By contrast, the eruption in 2009 killed about 200 people who suffered severe burns).  200,000 people were temporarily evacuated from the slopes of the volcano, but they were soon able to return to their homes.  

Mount Kelud coughs

     We went to bed as normal and got up as normal too, eating breakfast and getting dressed.  I woke up and thought I smelled cigarette smoke, but people often smoke on the corner outside our house so I dismissed it.  We only knew something had happened when we got a text message that school was cancelled due to ash fall!  We looked out the window and sure enough, it was a white world!

No swinging today ....or for the next several days as we waited for a cleansing rainfall....

The ash is not really dangerous for a normal healthy person....it's just uncomfortable.  It contains sulfuric chemicals so it will stings the eyes, nose, throat, lungs.  It will activate allergies and asthma for people are susceptible.  You really ought to stay in the house.  That is what we did for the most part.  We wore a mask if we had to go out....fortunately I had a supply left over from the last eruption!  Basically we just didn't go out at all for 48 hours.  Although it was the peak of the rainy season, this ash fall occurred  just as we had about 3 days with no rain!  I really didn't want the boys outside until some of the ash was cleared away.

Here we have Ash Days instead of Snow Days.... but the color is the same.  The smell is different....Ash Days smell kind of like cigarette smoke or spent matches.

Ben's last calculus class in our living room....

We still had our guest, Ben, on the day of the ash fall.  School was cancelled.   The students thought what he had to share was more important than a day off, so we had an impromptu calculus class at our house.

Bed mattress being used as a trampoline and couch totally dismantled....this is what happens when little boys don't get to play outside for 48 hours! 

The boys and I stayed inside for 2 days and 2 nights solid.  Fortunately we had enough food and water that we could do it without difficulty.  What was difficult was keeping the boys happy and active while cooped up!  I felt a bit sorry for myself, but then I remembered mom friends living in rainy, cold Oregon where long stretches indoors are the routine!

For a break from the house, we had dinner at this local restaurant that has a sealed-off, air-conditioned room.  

From dust we came and to dust we shall return....

It was a gritty, dirty world inside and out.  Our homes in the tropics have windows that do not close completely.  Although the air quality was better inside, there was still a LOT of ash inside the house.  The pile of dust in this picture was from our kitchen.  I swept a similar pile from the same area at least 4 times in the same day!

The mountain coughed on Thursday night.  I think the first big rain came on Monday, with additional cleansing rains over the next several days.  That's life in the tropics, where we live in the Ring of Fire!