Home Sweet Home

I just arrived safely back at home.  After 12 hours of straight driving, lots of snacks, a passenger seat loaded with toys to hand back to K throughout the drive, a couple of stops to break the trip up, 2 audio books completed, and 1 more started, I have to say that it's nice to relax.  I pulled into the winding driveway of our house almost wanting to kiss the ground after the long drive and then saw my hot husband waiting in the driveway with a huge smile to welcome us home.  Home never looked more beautiful!  10 days is a long time to be apart.  Our record prior to this was 5 days.  We doubled it and could definitely tell.  Though the best part of getting back home was seeing how excited K was to see Kai.  He gave him the world's longest hug (seriously he just didn't want to let go), and has been laughing and playing with him since the second we walked in the door.  It's one of the sweetest things to witness.


I have a crazy story to share when I have a few more minutes involving a semi truck, a police officer, and two 911 calls.  Don't worry, it's not quite as terrible as it sounds.  However, we have much more exciting news that we'll likely be sharing tomorrow if our little one isn't too shy.  Our ultrasound is scheduled for tomorrow!!  Well, I must go for now because I have a family to enjoy now that we're all together again :-)

40 Days: Here and Gone

40 days have come and gone. We’ve seen much and learned more. We are busy packing and it’s always hard to say goodbye to a place, even that you’ve only known for six weeks, that you’ve begun to call home. We’ve enjoyed the friendships we’ve made and the memorable moments we’ve lived. I’ll miss the walks along the dirt path to the dental clinic to peek in and say hello to Kai everyday. I’ll miss the beautiful, rich smiles of the local people and shouting out, “Mahna Ohna Tup Ko!” every time we meet. I’ll miss chatting with the other missionary couples that have become good friends in our brief stay here. The city noises and smells that once were not so familiar will even be missed.

As all things, this chapter must close for us to move on to the next one: graduation and life after. But we will not forget our time here or the experiences lived. I know once we get back to our “regular” home, we’ll look back at pictures and miss it, remembering the great times in Madagascar. But for now we’re torn between the excitement of getting back home again and the sadness of leaving. I still have a few more posts that I didn’t manage to get up before we left, so the travel side of the blog is not quite over yet.

I wrote this yesterday, but didn’t have time (or a good internet connection to post it) so I am posting this from the Paris airport. We have a 6 hour layover here because our original flight was from Madagascar to Paris, Paris to Amsterdam, Amsterdam to London. Because of the lovely volcano that has been sharing it’s ash with most of Europe, our flight from Amsterdam to London was cancelled. They re-booked us from Paris directly to London. We weren’t too sad about that. It ended up taking off an hour of travel time and a lot less headache from all the connections. As I write, we’re in the Sky Lounge enjoying cushy seats, great food, free internet, and a little sleep. Kai and Kasen are out! Leaving at 1 a.m. and flying 11 hours can do that to you. So for the moment, I have a few cherished quiet moments. These are rare, so I’m seizing the moment and I’ll write more later :-)