Temporary transplant!

We've been transplanted.  Uprooted (willingly ;) ) from the sandy coastal savannah of Accra & re-planted in the cool soft dirt of our native Pennsylvania.
Our feet are planted on this side of the ocean now & are soaking up love & encouragment of family & friends.
At times, we wither. Changing the soil affects the roots. I think Rory said it best. "Mom, even my skin is tired!"
But we are being nouished, fertilized &, yes, even pruned. The awesome variety of physical food is the smallest example of this. Our true growth is coming from the wisdom & encouragment offered by so many of you.
New scenery brings challenges too. Meat, fruit, veggies that are utterly foreign to my little people. They had forgotten grapes, blueberries & broccoli. They have been reaquainted with booster car seats & seatbelts, air conditioning, & drive thru food. Buckled in a seat without the wind in their face, no horns blowing, no hawkers chatting with them seems, well, a little boring. What they have discovered is the church library, a multitude of cousins &  the endless snack aisle at the store.
The weather is turning toward fall season. Cold air that makes us shiver. Some of us shiver in delight while rediscovering shoes and  socks. Some of us reach for leggings, a blanket & a hot drink. :)
We are taking great joy in worshipping & learning with our home church. They are present in our lives here in the States & at home in Ghana in so many tangible ways. These Senders have been the hand of God in our lives, making ministry possible.

October 17 we will return to Accra. Stronger, we pray for the growth we've been allowed here. And ready to again plant seeds for the God of the harvest.

Max trying out Karsten Weaver's nifty bow & arrow.

Jon & I enjoying his Mom's delicious dinner of burgers, stawberry spinach salad & corn.

Elle & her cousin Hadassah picked up where they left off. Lots of giggles & escapades. We make sure to keep them in sight. :)

August 7, 2012

Last post was a serious skinny on the weather. Shame. Shame. On me.
Clearly, I am no meteorologist or even able to do web research beyond wikipedia. Please realize we, like you, feel most like sharing news when it is at extremes. A bad habit. One I am unlikely to break unless I convert this to a daily journal. That is something I don't want to write and you don't want to read. Rather, we look forward to educating many of you on our life here in person while we are visiting Pennsylvania.

We have many days in the pleasant space between monsoon & drought.  I'm happy to report today was beautiful one of those. Sunny. But not blistering. Breezy. But not door slamming gales. Days like this feel like a warm Pa spring to me. Some ancient ambition, programmed by my practical Swiss-German Anabaptist mother, springs to life & I desire to clean. So far the the kitchen, spare room & both porches have suffered a scrubbing. I must say, furlough is giving me an extra nudge too.
August 14 is just days away! Cleaning aside, we are in that funny limbo between things that can be done on ahead & all that last minute stuff that will come in a few days. The list's of do-before-we-go & don't-forget-to-pack & even things-to-buy-in-Pa are worked on daily.

My hands are busy & my camera is broken (sob!). Painting a picture with words is not my talent. The pictures are, oh, so important.
Thanks to the ipod, I've been able to take some pictures. The quality is poor but I think you can still tell who is who. :)
Elle is enjoying my Morning Glory vine. She is fascinated by the delicate purple flowers & is quite sad each time they wilt in a cup of water. Somehow leaving them on the vine just isn't an option. ;)

 My dear husband had a birthday last Sunday. He had a weekend of fun planned for us all to celebrate. And then came the aching legs & headache of malaria. So we hung out at home trying to keep a little quiet so he could rest. Rory kept going in, rubbing his back. "I'm just so sad when Daddy is sick," he would say. Happily, for all of us, he perked up on Sunday. His only gift was this lovely local shirt. He insists his birthday party starts August 14 & included Phillies games & hunting. :)
He couldn't even tolerate a birthday cake! He did manage a few of the homemade noodles the children & I made for lunch Sunday.

 Jon was also able to help  with the singing for our little Sunday school time. The boys insisted on wearing their Sunday shirts even though we were staying home.

I've been wanting to post these for awhile now. We managed to find a day with (almost) no rain for Audrey & I to take the kids to Ghana University's botanical gardens. We mostly go for the wide open spaces for the kids to run in & the nice play ground.
On the way home we stopped at Maxmart for ice cream. Rory was determined to have mint chocolate chip. He's never had it before. Our standard ice cream fare isn't even ice cream, it's FanIce, a sorry replica we can get easily here. He loved it & was glowing to have a special little dish all to himself.

 Savannah, Arielle & Elle enjoyed their treat too. The server even gave them some broken pieces of sugar cone for free. It was a good field trip. The Bontrager's have become our family. The children call each other brother & sister, alternately cheering each other on & fighting like loving children do. Through sleep overs, car trips, birthday parties & school recess time on the Bontrager swing set, we've gained some awesome brothers & sisters.

To many of you we say, " See you next week!"

rain, rain

 Elle & Sunny stayin' warm. Yes, Aunt Linda, that is Elle's baby towel. She sleeps with it, plays with it & refuses to let the boys touch it.

It's been raining every day. The only Ghanaian I've ever heard complain about the rain is a friend who lives in a low lying area & the rains bring a pond of water up to her front door. "Ah," she says, "The rain, it is too much."
In rainy season many exceptions are made as people endure the rain. If a school child is caught in the rain or must wash a very muddy uniform there is no chance it will dry by morning. So they are allowed to wear street clothes the next day. If children are not in school we are often told it is because of the rain. I would have to ask a headmaster how acceptable that excuse is!
Last year our co-workers has made an appointment with a man to do some work at their house. When he didn't arrive at the specified time, there was no phone calls or frustration. It was raining. The man came two days later. The work was done. Americans, adjust yourself to that kind of flexibility!
We see all sorts of improvised rain gear. From banana frond umbrellas while waiting for transportation to plastic bag rain hats. No one wants a wet weave. ;) Jon snapped a picture out the window, showing the latest fashion in rain gear.

The southern section of West Africa has a varying savanna climate two rainy seasons occurring from April to July and from September to November. The northern part of Ghana has only one.
Average rainfall 83 inches, 8 inches of it being in June here in the coastal plains. (wikipedia) Air quality improves (less garbage/refuse smell), plants grow immensely & mosquitoes spread the malaria parasite.
3 foot deep concrete gutters here in our neighborhood & large canal type water channels are present in Accra to carry the rainwater. But in our part of town, trash, & eroded dirt almost fill our gutters. Water runoff is not part of the building code (smile) so the dirt roads carry pockmarks & craters.
Rainy season especially the months of June & July are marked by dreary days punctuated by downpours that fill the rain barrels & soak the laundry in seeming seconds. Some days play the game of alternating sun & rain. Sometimes I play along: wash out, wash in, wash out. Musty smelling indoor dried laundry compels me to chase the sunshine.
So when this week ended with 3 sunny days in a row, I did a happy two-step the whole way to the wash line.

Max scrubbing muddy shoes quickly while the sun is shining. He is a great help to me!

Rainy season Sundays are especially challenging. The cool rain keeps the windows up most of the way & fogs up the windshield. Our defrost? The multifunctional hankie. It serves to wave in worship, cover a women's head in church, wipe up & dust off.
A jolting 1.5 hr drive to Adawukwao left Rory with his chin in a plastic bag & Max trying to keep his eyes on the horizon. He is not convinced (Mom, I gave you due credit. Max, Grandma always told me do that &, for goodness sakes, put the book down!).
A misty rain kept us cool during the service & made enough mud that Elle & Rory got back in the truck to leave streaked with dirt. Rory's hands were even cold to touch. But we did get to see Pas. Frank's new baby son, Kingsley. Very cute.
Were we local church members we would have lifted a stack of plastic chairs or tossed that infamous hankie over our head to dash home. And I would have pulled out the heels & for Jon, the white dress pants. And return home with them spotless. It's an amazing thing! Let's remember we are guests & for now are leaving the heels & white pants at home. :)
 We are enjoying the cooler temperatures, hearing the children say they are cold & doing our share of watching it storm from the front porch. Tomatoes are growing, a flowering vine (whose name & seed packet have long been discarded) has overcome it's bug infestation & is climbing & flowering. The bougainvillea is over the wire (!) at several places.

 State of the union is rainy. Spirit of the union is cheerful (37 more days!!).

A Sunday afternoon storm watch. With blankets & books. After, of course, Max & Elle indulged in some puddle splashing & a dip in the rain barrel.

how to date your wife while living in west africa

Venturing out to celebrate our 11 year anniversary on June 1, 2012.

Drop the kids at the neighbors. Thanks, Audrey & Ron!

Wisk [actually, rattle] her off to town in the Tata.

Go to the nicest restaurant at the [only] Accra Mall .

Sit near the huge sparkling windows so she can ogle every glamorous pair of shoes or dress that passes.

Let her have all the sour cream - and guacamole -while you enjoy the cheese on the appetizer nachos [after 11 years you know she likes that green stuff just as much as cheese]

Join her in ordering just water....our spending does have limits.

Don't complain when she orders a meal more expensive than yours- and it's a salad.

Laugh with her at the ridiculous fountain for hand washing [the kids would've loved it] and the attendant standing guard over it.

Wander into Shoprite [the most 'normal' grocery store in Ghana] & only buy some doodad on clearance. No potatoes. No hotdogs. No pretend butter.

Let her order a ghc 7 caramel latte & be totally cool with the guy making it giving her a wink & dashing her the cost of the flavour and don't roll your eyes when she wonders if they could make it skinny.

Pay waaaay too much for a cinema ticket- but enjoy laughing at a ri-dic-u-lous will smith flick. We take ourselves way too seriously these days. This place is an emotional rollercoaster [only for her of course] & it feels good to just get off for awhile.

Take her up on running through the rain to our India-made luxury pseudo-jeep. Maybe a lady would've chosen waiting for you to pull up at the entrance but this girl has come too far in 11 years to bother with that kind of nonsense.

Last bit? Do this again. Soon.

Walls of peace

And the peace of God which passes all understanding will guard your heart & your minds through Christ Jesus. [Ph. 4:7]

Ever felt like a prisoner in your own home?

That's when the children...the schoolbooks...sickness...no money...no vehicle or just no reason to go keeps you in one spot. Those walls just close right in, don't they? When my 3&4 yr olds were infants I often fought those feelings from behind a pile of diapers, dishes or laundry.

Then the walls were mental. I [usually] had a vehicle, sometimes I had a place to go. Like Nanny or Grandma's house or the mom's playgroup at church.

Now I have concrete block walls, barbed wire, gates, padlocks, barred windows, barred doors & a guard [not so much] dog. And more reasons to stay home than go away. Sound like prison? Yep, & it has felt that way at times.

Within these walls, in a way more focused than ever before, lies my purpose. To care for my husband. To make his labor easier. To care for my children. To keep them clean, healthy & learning to labor with me. [NO, shoving the toys under the bookshelf is not cleaning up. YES, I love when you do the dishes..so do the ants. ;)]

These walls that pen us in also seem to hold onto our attitudes & tensions rather well. We all want to do better at letting them blow up & over the wall. One of the things the children pick up so quickly is my continued attitude about living, in these walls, in Ghana. They've heard enough about the obedience part of moving here! I have to show them consistently that home is wherever God has placed us. Pennsylvania is not the promised land of toys, fast food and all that other stuff that just doesn't happen in West Africa. Snow & Cherry Crest Adventure Farms top Max's list. But it is the land of Nanny, Grandma & Aunties!

The walls, locks & gates have also been a practical adjustment. When we leave, we go out through the back porch where the door grate is separate from the door. Makes padlocks much easier. However, when my mental list is scattered, and I have to go back in for something...through several padlocks & two doors. Not good. Once in the shuffle to leave, we had locked the house & were locking the front gate when we realized Rory was not with us. Jon went back in to hear him calling "Daddy" from the washroom! Poor fellow.

We tend to lock up as soon as it gets dark if we will be staying home that night. Ghanaians tend to go to bed soon after dark & rise with the sun. So there is often no coming & going after 7pm. Locking up means padlocking the driving gate & door gate & the three doors of the house. I used to go to take out the garbage & find myself locked in! Who is so determined to take out the garbage that they open 5 padlocks to do it? [That's when I use the city dwellers trick for garbage- freeze it! Thanks, Anna Z.:) ] And all that would make me sigh at my super-responsible padlock-loving husband. It's taken us a year, but we've worked out our evening routine now.

One of the favorite spots for the boys is in the orange tree by the front wall. They have a front row perch for the traffic passing, the construction going on next door & for friends to come home from school. They don't feel trapped. Instead, they enjoy the security & perspective the walls & tree give them.

I want that too.

Security in being a help-meet wife & truth-grace mother. And perspective on who is my priority, who is my standard & how very blessed I am to have spiritual walls of peace to guard my heart & mind through Christ Jesus.

[Now. Who has the keys?!]

Jon & Elle locking up after I left for the clinic this morning.

A Mother's week

  Happy Mother's Day!

 We are thankful for our mothers today. We send blessings to them back in Pennsylvania, knowing our siblings are honoring them as we wish we could...in person!  We are thankful we were able to skype with both of them this week. They patiently listened to the children [& to us!] & filled us in on the news from home.


Here is a few pictures from my week. Jon already posted this picture on fb. It was sweet of him. His confidence & encouragement have gotten this mother through some tough days this last year. This is the sort of picture you get when you try to take a nice picture after church but before lunch.

No mother's week would be complete without some food prep. This was my list all lined up on the table. Tomatoes to sauce, mango to chop, beans to soak, yogurt to grow [:)], & some sour lil oranges from the neighbors to figure out what to do with. The children like to eat them like their Ghanaian friends...chew out the juice  & spit out the membranes & seeds. I stepped in just about enough of those little gifts for one week & it's only Monday!

We were very pleased to find this Banana-gram game at a yard sale. Missionaries & other ex patriots living here have yard sales when they leave. And we found some good stuff! Max was happy to trade his phonics workbook for a game today. Here are his words of choice.
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Many days our electricity is off part of the day. Sometimes for 15 minutes, sometimes more than 12 hours. On a good day, I've got a plan for supper, Jon is home & we enjoy supper on the porch before darkness comes. And this time the lights came on while we were eating. I am always thankful for that. Clean up by candlelight is not as relaxing or romantic as you might think. ;)

We like lizards. Like this one. The boys love to catch them, feel quite sad if they pull off the tails [but love to watch the tails "run" around on their own!] & delight in chasing Elle with them. We often must have the wild animal conversation. A lizard would not be happy trapped in a jar.....:)

Especially not this lizard!!! This mampam was behind the house under the cocoa trees.
Here's the story in Max's own words.
Elle & I were playing with the bamboo sticks under the orange tree. She dropped chocolate spread from her bread onto her foot. She went to wash it off & started screaming. I went to see what was wrong & saw the lizard. Mom. We ran, yelling for you,  the other way around the house to get you. [I was sure someone had broken a limb.]
We took this picture from the back porch. It had climbed the wall by that time. I went across the street to see if some men working there wanted to kill it. They  like to eat them or sell them to the natural healers. They came with a fufu pounder to kill it, but it had jumped into the bush behind our house & they didn't brave the swamp to find it.
I wasn't getting any closer & had to take the picture with Elle hanging on me...so here is a better look if you want one.

http://www.mampam.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=51&Itemid=43

a furlough

When your undies look like this...It's time for furlough!!

We'll be returning to Pa on August 14 for 8 weeks.

We are excited!!

Below is our 100 day countdown underway. Max checks off each day as part of his school time. He is pretty sure August is still a looong way off. But, then, to him, so is next weekend. ;)