Almost

So the month of June is always crazy for us, but I think this year it was far more busy than ever before. Out of the last 2 weeks, we've had 2 evenings without a dinner or other major event happening.  They've all been really good things, but combine that with packing & preparing to leave our house for 7 weeks...and I'm EXHAUSTED.

Some of the highlights just from this week:

1.  Juliana got to go to 2 sleepovers :)  The first was for Kathryn Mattica's 10th birthday, and was with the other (all older) girls from church.  The second was 2 days later, with Christa, while Kyle, Levi, and I went to the graduation dinner.  I have to say, she was pretty tired once she got home from both.

She cuddled with Lily all night :)

2. Graduation / Graduation Banquet / Annelise's Graduation Party

Graduation was extra exciting this year because Annelise Zacapa was graduating.  So hard to believe she's all grown up and going to the States to study in a couple months.  We's so proud of her, but its a little sad.

My date while Kyle was an usher at the banquet

3.  Kyle's birthday

Kyle turned 31 on Wednesday, which happened to be the day of Graduation & the banquet after.  So we celebrated the day before and the day after.  On Tuesday we had a BBQ with a few friends, and on Thursday a potluck with the people from our bible study and also our surprise guests, Joseph and Ruthi!

 Today we finish packing, cleaning up the house, finishing up other last minute things...and tonight we have dinner with the Raineri's and Mattica's before we part ways for the summer.  In the morning we leave for the airport at 8:30, fly from Tegucigalpa to Houston,  pass through customs & immigration, have time for supper, then fly to Dallas, and finally run to our next plane to Denver.  We have a rental car waiting for us there and we will drive to Ft Collins to spend the night with my aunt and uncle.  One very long day, Levi's first time flying, and our first time flying with 2 kids...  Please pray for smooth travels, safe flights, and patient kids & parents :)

Rough Month in the Webb house

Three weeks ago Juliana came down with a fever, and it took me a few days to figure out that she had a cold (she didn't have any other symptoms for awhile).  And although she tried to remember to cover her mouth when she coughed and sneezed, its nearly impossible for a 3 year old to keep her germs to herself.  A week later both Kyle and I got it, and a few days after that Levi.  From there it turned into sinus infections, ear infections, etc...  All 4 of us have been on antibiotics at some point during the last few weeks but I think we're mostly recovered now.

Other than being sick, the end of the school year always brings some new and different things.  My residency card and both of our driver's licenses expire every May and those generally entail many hours of waiting in line at Immigration and Transito.  This year we also needed to go and apply for Levi's Honduran passport, which is a different office (and set of lines) at Immigration.  However, sometimes offices and businesses show preference to pregnant women, the elderly, and handicapped, allowing them to go to the front of the line.  On a few occasions banks have allowed me to go to the front of the line when I have had Juliana or Levi with me, but not always, and they make Kyle stand in the regular line.  BUT at each of these appointments this month they have allowed me/us to go to the front of the line...making it a half our appointment, instead of waiting in lines for the entire day!  You can be praying about Kyle's residency and driver's licenses, though.  The school is changing him to a 5 year, non-immigrant residency, which they have been working on for months.  He is supposed to always have either a card, paper, or stamp in his passport that says he is legally in Honduran, but at the moment he has nothing.  He also doesn't have a valid driver's license because you're not allowed to renew if your residency is being processed.  We really need his residency to be completed before we leave in 3 weeks.

Levi is 7 months old today!  He has really enjoyed getting to eat "solids" the past month.  He had 2 teeth pop through about the time he got sick, and he's really wanting to crawl.  Some friends loaned us their exersaucer, which he loves!  He also loves his big sister and we're pretty sure he's the smiliest baby on the planet :)  He'll go for his 7 month check-up and a couple shots tomorrow.

Juliana is as dramatic and fun loving as ever.  This afternoon she slipped on some gravel, scraped her knee, and then started screaming.  When I picked her up, she told me "That dirt made me ANGRY!!!"

Some friends of ours have a family property on the beach in the south, which we used to go to fairly often, but haven't been able to go in 2 years.  We finally worked out a trip over Mother's Day weekend, with about 30 of our friends.  It was a wonderfully restful time, which we feel was needed before we head into the final few weeks of the school year.  The property has all kinds of wildlife that roam freely (deer, raccoons, macaws, emus, and supposedly a crocodile that walks from the ocean on one side of the property to a pond on the other side...).  

You'll see the macaws in the trees and the wooden stands down below where the workers put their food and the baby macaws live.  If you look closely there is a mommy emu eating the macaws food out of the feeder, while the baby macaw walks around on the grass in front.

Happy Mother's Day! 

Apparently the weekend was exhausting for some :)

I think in my last post I had mentioned that we were trying to get Google Apps set up for the Honduran Fellowship, but had been denied.  Well one or 2 days later we were approved and have been getting it set up for each of our users.  We're starting to see the benefits of having our files and contacts saved online and accessible to each of our staff, and once all of the kinks get worked out it should be even better.  I'm now starting to update some parts of the website that haven't ever been changed since it was created.  Should be some good changes coming up.

Kyle's end-of-the-year Athletic Banquet for soccer and volleyball was after school yesterday.  It went very well, the kids seemed to have a lot of fun, and I discovered that I could pretty easily fit 22 extra large size pizzas in the back of our Escape :)  I was also put in charge of playing music, so Juliana and Levi got to come along...they both had a great time getting out of the house and playing with the coaches and students.  

Now we are finishing up the last couple weeks of school, and preparing the computer, youth group, bible study, and our house for us to be gone for the summer.  Quite a feat to prepare to travel for 7 weeks!  I can't believe we fly out in 3 1/2 weeks!!!  By the way, we're trying to work on a schedule for the summer to see everyone we can and talk about our ministry areas, since they have changed a bit since the last time we were back.  If we haven't talked to you already and you'd like to see us, let us know so we can work something out.  

My big boy and the little photographer

Levi is 6 months old this week!  How in the world did that happen so fast???  As of last week he started rolling from his back to his tummy, so he's no longer safe to leave anywhere but the floor :)  He can also sit pretty well without falling on his face, weighs just over 19 pounds, and has his first tooth just starting to poke through.  We just started him on solids this week, and although he's still working on keeping the food in his mouth and swallowing it, at least he opens his mouth and has somewhat enjoyed everything except for plain yogurt.  Its amazing how 2 children can be so different...Juliana got her first tooth at 14 months (she was already walking) and would close her mouth and refuse to eat anything.

How can you resist that face?!?

Juliana has recently decided she wants to be a photographer and is constantly asking to borrow my camera.  I just uploaded my pictures and there were  400 some on it from the past 2-3 weeks (usually there's maybe 20).  She had taking pictures of every inch of our house.  Many of them were out of focus, but she got some interesting ones :)

She figured out she could take pictures of herself by using a mirror :)

She's quite the creative girl...

This week Kyle is gone with the volleyball teams at their tournament in San Pedro.  A couple weeks ago the kids and I went to one of the friendly games that his Varsity girls team played...where I decided that we wouldn't be going along with him to the tournament.  Sitting in a gym for 2-3 entire days, with a 6 month old and a 3 year old just doesn't sound like a whole lot of fun :)  Juliana asks every hour or so where daddy is, if he'll be home today, what he's doing right now, and if we can "skype on him".  Unfortunately he hasn't been at the hotel much, but she did get to talk to him at lunch today.  His girls team lost their first game this morning, but were playing another game this afternoon...and the other teams had 3 games this afternoon/evening as well.  He said they really needed to win if they wanted to go on.

I have been busy working on things for the Honduran Fellowship the last week or so.  We wanted to set up Google Apps for NonProfits in order to make it easier to share files/contacts/calendars between the 5 staff members (instead of having 3-4 copies of everything and trying to keep them all updated).  After spending 3 full days getting everything set up we were denied because of a question over the non-profit status of the Honduran Fellowship.  I'm hoping we can get it straightened out and not have to come up with an alternate plan, but the Mattica's had to make a quick trip to the States this weekend.  

Playing Catchup

Well, we moved into our house 5 weeks ago, and I feel like since then its been non-stop activity.  I had planned to catch the blog up last week, but our internet wasn't working well enough, so now there's even more to post about!

Our Move

We were told the 2nd to last week of February that the school wouldn't pay rent for March for our house so we had to be out by the 28th (and have it cleaned up after we were out).  Kyle was out of town Feb 22-24 so I finished up the packing and as much cleaning as I could do (I packed an entire house by myself!)...while the school maintenance and administrators finished up as much of the new house as they could.  The plan was that it would be completed & cleaned by Monday, we could move Tuesday, and have the old house cleaned by Thursday.  Well Monday morning, Kyle wakes me up early to tell me he has to go on a field trip with the seniors on Tuesday during the move.  Probably not the best idea when your wife has already packed the entire house and you have 2 very young children...

Anyways, I finished up the packing even more quickly than I thought I could and then had to make a quick trip down the mountain in the afternoon, in order to return to the house by 5 to start the move early.  Thankfully we have incredible friends who came to help us and we moved about 1/3 of our boxes and the couches.  The next day Kyle was gone and some of the school's maintenance men moved the rest of our boxes, appliances, and beds...the rest were still finishing up the new house :)  We did get everything in the house and a couple friends came over to make beds and unpack the kitchen.  We still have nothing hung on the walls and a few things not finished on the house, but hopefully things will slow down a bit now and I can think about that.  

Kitchen 

Dining room

Downstairs living room

Levi's bedroom

Upstairs living room 

Juliana's bedroom

Our bedroom

ABSH Soccer Tournament

A week after we moved in Kyle had to go to San Pedro for 5 days for the national soccer tournament (2 of our teams qualified).  I was exhausted from working on the house (and never getting caught up) so the kids and I went along.  Usually our teams don't do very well and I end up spending a lot of time in the hotel.  But this year they did really well (our boys team got 2nd place) so we spend pretty much the entire time at the games.  

HFMM Retreat

After the tournament we returned home, and had a VERY busy 4 days before leaving again.  March 15-17 was the yearly retreat for the Honduran Fellowship of Missionaries and Ministries (the ministry that I have been working for the last year).  My official title is Website Manager, but I am also in charge of creating a database with contact information for each missionary (and trying to college the info from each person) and had a few other things to work on before the retreat.  Kyle had a few things going on at school, so he was coming and going throughout the weekend, but we had a very good time.  A speaker came from Florida, and did 4 sessions on being set free, which left us with a lot to think about.  I can't say that I came back all that rested but it was good to meet up with some old friends and meet some new ones.

Semana Santa/Easter

After the retreat we were home for 1 whole week!  A week filled with laundry, cleaning, LOTS of baking, and repacking.  Earlier in the a group of our friends decided we should all vacation together during our week off leading up to Easter.  After MUCH searching during January that we could afford and would hold all of us...in fact it was even able to hold a few more :)  So last week 27 of us from our church, school, and a neighboring ministry set off for a beach house near Omoa Honduras.  Some of the group was able to go on Saturday & Sunday, but the rest of us had to wait till Monday because of church responsibilities.  Apparently it was hot and sunny over the weekend, but after we arrived it started raining...and rained and stormed for 48 hours straight...during the dry season when it often doesn't rain for months at a time.  It finally stopped raining Thursday morning and we got home time at the pool (the beach & ocean were too dirty after all the rain).  Friday morning, the day we were supposed to leave, was sunny and nice so we actually decided to stay an extra day and return home Saturday.  

Juliana swimming in the rain

Levi getting a little sun on Thursday

Easter morning we had our annual after-sunrise sunrise service...the sun just comes up too early to have the service at sunrise.  As it was, we were up at 4:30, and left for church at 5:30.  That afternoon, Kyle played tennis with a friend, while the kids and I went to an egg hunt.  

At first she didn't want to go down into the yard with the
kids to collect eggs, but then realized there was candy inside...

Levi

Levi is now 5 months old.  We took him for his checkup and shot on March 22nd (same day as our 5 year anniversary).  He's a growing boy!  He's staying right about the 75-80% for height and 70th% for weight.  The doctor keeps insisting that he should be rolling from his back to his stomach, but I think he's just too contented to be wherever I put him.  If I put him on his tummy, he usually just stays there...sometimes he uses his arms and legs to rotate a little to see a different direction...but he just stays on whatever side I put him.  I think his favorite things to do right now are smile, laugh, and scream...he can be one noisy boy!  He is definitely more contented than Juliana was...sometimes I wake up during the night and can hear him from his room just laying in bed talking to himself :)  We took him to the embassy on March 4th to report his birth and apply for his passport, which we picked up last week...so he's now a US citizen!

Juliana

Juliana's not really growing, but she's definitely learning :)  She has been singing some of the Easter songs from church this week, and has mastered the ABC's pretty well (though sometimes it sounds like 'Elmo and a p' in the middle).  She has a little table and chair in our upstairs living room with all her markers, crayons, and coloring books, and sits there a lot doing her "school work".  She loves being in the new house, and being able to yell "good-night Christa" from her bedroom window (the teacher's apartments are right outside her window).  She's starting to get back to her old self, but isn't quite there yet.  I've been working on making her bedtime earlier and things to try to help her more.

Kyle and I

Kyle has had a very busy spring.  In addition to his job he is coaching volleyball...head coach for 1 team and assisting 2 others...so he has practices after school 4 days a week plus Saturdays.  By the beginning of May sports will be over and hopefully he'll be home a little more.  This week I've been unpacking, cleaning up, doing large quantities of laundry, had 2 bible studies yesterday, and am trying to catch up on bills, emails, and a lot computer work that have been piling up for the last month.  

Sorry for such a long blog post...I should probably start blogging after each activity instead of waiting for the end of the month :)

We're Moving!

It has been a little busy around here!

Since I last posted, Pinares hosted the ABSH Knowledge Bowl (for all of the schools in the Association of Bilingual Schools of Honduras), which Kyle was in charge of planning & running.  It definitely wasn't as much work as it was last year, but it still involved a big time commitment.  I didn't have an official job, other than to buy the snacks for the workers & coaches from other schools in advance.  I was given $325 to go out and buy large quantities of fresh fruits & veggies, donuts, cakes, chips, cookies, kool-aid, tea, cofee, etc...probably the most fun job of the knowledge bowl :)  I also ended up printing award certificates the last morning.  Then Kyle had a few days of school with no big events, and now he's away for the weekend at the Art & Music Festivals in San Pedro Sula.  Next Saturday is Family Fun Day (a carnival-like/fundraiser/fun day that our school hosts).  And then 4 days after that Kyle returns to San Pedro for 5 days for the Soccer tournament.

In the meantime our house has now gotten almost completely finished.  Our move date was delayed a little because the electric company had to come up and install the meter and give approval.  They have done that and I think the electricity was supposed to be finished up the end of this past week or tomorrow.  The school also hired 3 maids to go in and clean our house today, then they will return on Monday to clean again after the dust settles.  Then they are planning/hoping to move & install our hot water heater, water purifier, dishwasher, washer & dryer on Monday.  So we could be moving as early as Tuesday.  But if not Tuesday, then Wednesday or Thursday (because we have to be out by the end of the month).  SO...I have been packing up and cleaning the house.  I have gotten it nearly completely packed and have been working on leaving it clean for the landlord.

All of the packing has been hard on Juliana.  She is definitely excited to move to the new house (and to see Christa's bedroom  from her room) but she has a hard time when I pack up something she wants.  Plus I've been busier so she's had to play more on her own.  She was crying every night when I put her to bed (and at nap time), so for the time being she's sleeping on my floor in a sleeping bag.  And when I leave her with someone she screams and won't let go of me (which she's never done before).  I think Levi might notice that things are different too because he cries almost every time I put him down.  Which means I carry him around a lot while I'm packing and cleaning.  Which means I get more exercise I guess :)  This is definitely a good move, but I think we're all ready for it to be done with...

In happier news, we had Levi dedicated at church on Sunday :)

 Last Friday was the Pinares teacher retreat.  We drove to a retreat center an hour and a half away.  The morning had 2 sessions, then lunch, and then a couple hours free time in the afternoon.  The pool at Palabra de Vida is COLD, but Juliana really wanted to swim, so Kyle braved the water with her.

What a cutie

Waking up is hard to do

Juliana can't wait till Levi is big enough to play :)
(Can you see all the drool coming from his mouth?!?)

Reasons I Don't Blog as Often as I Should

#1 - The never ending pile of laundry 

#2 - The extra creative 3 year old

#3 - How could anyone resist those chubby cheeks? :)

We're all doing good here...today I'm working on packing up as much as I can around the house.  Still no move date yet, but it's estimated around 3 weeks from now....although we might have to move during the week or without Kyle as his entire month is packed full.  Levi's still focusing on his growing :)  He's a very contented guy with a great little chuckle that just makes you laugh along with him, and he chews on EVERYTHING.  Right now he's lying on my lap, gnawing on my elbow :)  Juliana is her usual joyful, energetic little self.  We've been reading through a new toddler Bible that some friends passed on to her for her birthday.  She's also super excited about our neighbor's new baby and her first dental check-up coming up soon.

Busy Christmas

I made a goal about a month ago to make it through Christmas preparations, the holidays, and Juliana's birthday...and then I could relax a bit before we move.  And I made it!  So today I have tried to ignore my house that looks like its been ransacked (at least mostly), played with Juliana and some of her new toys, caught up on some computer work, and after I took a shower I put my pajamas back on.

Its been a whirlwind of a month!  School ended on December 19th (I think) and before that we had Christmas concerts at school, Christmas and birthday shopping, and Christmas parties to plan and attend.  Once school ended we cleaned the house and went grocery shopping, as our cupboards were starting to look pretty bare and we had company coming.  My parents arrived on December 25th to meet Levi and spend lots of quality time playing with Juliana.  We didn't really go to very many special places, other than to Chiminike, the children's museum, have dinner/game night with the Raineri's, and my dad and Kyle went to see the Hobbit.  We spent most of our time at home playing games, reading books and playing with Juliana, holding Levi, etc...

My parents flew out the 31st and we spent the evening at the WGO Mission House playing games with several friends.  I believe both Juliana and Levi were awake at midnight (Levi slept throughout the evening though) and thankfully they both slept in the next morning :)  I spent New Year's Day afternoon working on website and database things for the Honduran Fellowship.

The 2nd we spend cleaning our house again, in time for the Mohagen's arrived!  We had a great time teaching them to play Settlers of Catan and referee-ing the two little 2 year olds who love to play with each other, but can't seem to actually get along for very long :)  I believe the only thing they can always agree on is that they both LOVE Dora.

Long before Christmas break ended I was busy preparing for Juliana's 3rd birthday party...realizing that I had scheduled myself too many things for this week...and Juliana wanted to invite many more people than I was originally thinking.  I had agreed to substitute on Monday for a teacher who was returning late from break, and Tuesday I had Ladies Bible Study in the morning and our Home Group in the evening.  Between all of that I made 6 dozen cupcakes, cleaned the house yet again, did at least 5 loads of laundry, decorated the house for the ballerina party, fed Levi (which if you've seen him recently you'll understand why it takes so much of my time), and tried to make Juliana's day extra special.  We ended up having between 40 and 50 people in our very small house (most people ate standing up) and Juliana had a great time.  Seriously, how can she be 3 already!

birth day

1 year old

2 years old

3 years old

And to top it all off, we're moving sometime in the next month, so we've been VERY busy looking all over this city for floor tile, bathroom tile, light fixtures, kitchen appliances, dining room and living room furniture, cabinet knobs and handles, and I can't remember what else.  Several times we've completely worn the kids our.  This is what they look like, and what Kyle and I feel like :)