oooOOHHH November!

November was full and blessed from the very beginning...literally, with Gabe,
Missy, Forest, Willow, and Noah the Dog arriving shortly after midnight on November 1st. We'd been hoping they'd come visit for Missy's birthday. Our time together was awesome. Even though there were eleven of us living in this smallish cabin, it worked out very well. (We can handle even more than that--hint,hint). We did everything together from laundry, cooking, playing and snuggling with the little ones, stoking the wood stove and bible time, to watching the Blue Planet and making Pumpkin Moose Cookies (or as Forest calls them--Cookie Moose!). We hiked the rugged trail to Bass Lake Falls. This is a tough hike, up and down steep, wooded hills, with lots of rocks and tree roots. We all planned to carry Forest but he wouldn't have that! He hiked the whole way there and back at only 2-years old...amazing. We got to see Willow roll from back to front for her first time and the girls got practice sharing and caring for their niece. Missy and I snuck to town for 'girl time' and had a coffee while the guys went out to Moser's. We had fun celebrating Missy's birthday (30th teehee). Moriah made her a Sunflower cake and we tried out the ice cream maker with yummy results! It was a full and blessed four days together. Would have been harder seeing them go except we were going back to Iowa to be with family for Thanksgiving just a few weeks later (see below).



We went for a drive up the North Shore and to the end of Gunflint Trail on the following Saturday. Lake Superior sparkled like diamonds in the sunshine. We hadn't been to Grand Marais in 20 years. We love the little 'coastal' villages along Lake Superior, Grand Marais tops them all. The Gunflint Trail was quite long, tree lined, and sparsely populated. Towards the end of the trail there'd been a forest fire some time in the recent past. The terrain was very rocky with charred trees. Sea Gull Lake at the end of the road was a nice picnic spot.

The following two weeks was deer hunting season. Steve had gotten his drivers license so he could then get his hunting license for the season, but in Minnesota they send your drivers license in the mail and it never arrived in time. We were blessed, in spite of that, by our friends, the Mosers. We helped them process six deer and they shared venison with us. We processed in assembly line fashion, everyone with a job from the oldest down to Sarah who marked packages. One of the days we sang and worshipped while we worked which was great fun! I never remembered to take the camera so you'll have to take my word for all this.



And then it was time to go to Iowa and celebrate Thanksgiving with family and friends!! We celebrated with family at Gabe and Missy's on the 21st. It doesn't get any better than that! Only Jake was missing due to work. There was lots of food and fun. Both Aaron and Karla made apple pies that looked and tasted like masterpeices. Some of the 'girls' get to bring the same thing every year because we all like it so much--like Brooke's mashed potatoes, Sherri's Cheezy Corn Casserole, Missy's sweet potatoes, Marion brought Green Bean Casserole...we didn't get Rebekah's Rye Party Puffs since she'd had surgery on her finger the day before:~( Aaron got a 'turkey carving lesson' with Dad. All the 'cousins' had fun playing together and making 'Turkey Cookies'. The 'big kids' got a little wild and enjoyed the Wii. And I (MOM/Grandma) got a wonderful 'fix' with those I love most.


Our days up until Thanksgiving were more than filled with visiting family and friends. Sunday we went to visit Maggie's birth brother, Jaffer, and all his family. We enjoyed watching him play soccer with his team. He's very talented for his young age. We had pizza with Maya, Sean, Jaffer, Levi, Samuel, and Rael and saw their new home. It was good to catch up. We watched a video that Shawn had taken just a few months after all the kids had arrived from Liberia. They all were so little..and their accents were thick! The afternoon went all too quickly.


Monday we visited John and Grace's birth siblings, Aleah, Lawrence, and Samuel. We had lunch together and the kids played for a few hours. We've been friends with the Wallaces for years. We got to meet their two newest family members that they recently adopted. They are a blessed family!


We went to Vinton after that to spend time with my wonderful Mother-In-Law, Marion. Jake, Jacob, and Katie were there and Steve's brother Dan too. Marion made a wonderful supper for all of us..amazing that she can still do it all at 84! After that we went to our friends, the Cashman's, house for a much needed friend 'fix'.

I spent most of the day Tuesday in the kitchen making cheesecake for Thanksgiving, Forest and I making our new traditional Cookie Moose cookies, and I also had the priviledge of preparing the main course for Gabe and Missy's Tuesday night Fellowship Group. Steve and the kids went to our grandson's (Jacob, Logan, and Alex) wrestling meet late in the afternoon. We all enjoyed spending time Tuesday evening sharing a meal and a short bible lesson with the young couples in the 'group' and playing games.


Wednesday a.m. was spent with Ben, Kaelyn, Carter, and Joseph. After that we followed Ben to Center Point to drive by the house (very nice I might add) he and Rebekah are buying.
Wednesday afternoon was spent with our friends, The Deardens. Mark had the afternoon off so we all got to visit, play, and munch around the kitchen counter just like old times..I guess this is tradition!


Wednesday p.m. was spent with Aaron, Karla, and Phaedra. We shared pizza, listened to Aaron's music he's written and recorded (very awesome), watched a movie, played with Phaedra, and Karla helped the girls in creating mermaid costumes for their dolls. They all created in a circle on the floor with beads, lace, jewels, and sparkely fabric. We had a great time with them. Ahh, sweet memories. The girls are still creating with the supplies Karla sent home with them.


On Thanksgiving we went to Missy's parents and our friends, Kent and Becky Pearson's. This is the third Thanksgiving we've had the priviledge of spending with them. We got to meet Kent's son and his wife, Justin and Mirza, and some of Gabe and Missy's friends, Andrew and Vanessa and their daughter, Ava. We got to see Missy's Grammy and Grandpa Don. Of course the food was wonderful! Pat did his usual deep-fried turkey magic. It was fun for us 'grandparents' to share Forest and Willow and, perhaps, a little comfusing for Forest with three grandmas there. Some of us played a fun game of Fill or Bust. It was great to see Shannon and Christie too!


We were to go home on Friday but persuasive Missy talked us into staying another day. I needed to do some grocery shopping while in Iowa since we live 1 1/2 to 2 hours from the nearest WalMart and Sams. While Missy and I made a trip to Sams, the guys cut and hauled wood and the girls babysat. Friday night we enjoyed a yummy meal of Mexican food prepared by Mirza at the Pearson's. We are so glad we got to meet Justin and Mirza.


We decided to stay Saturday too so I could get to the Bent and Dent and String Town to finish stocking up on wheat berries, oats, and such. The guys finished putting up Gabe's winter wood supply. Then we enjoyed some down time.

We left early on Sunday and got home by 3:30-ish. Monday brought a few inches of snow, very slick roads and thankfulness that we didn't delay our trip home another day.

WE ARE FROM LIBERIA, WEST AFRICA

John(10), Grace(8), Maggie(7), and Sarah(3)

In February 2006 we were all adopted by an American family. Only two of us were brother and sister, but now we are all family. Our new Mom and Dad came to Liberia to 'carry' us back to the United States in a big airplane. We hadn't seen many white people and we thought our new Mom and Dad looked like they glowed. When we saw pictures of our new brothers and sisters in the U.S. we wondered if they'd like us. We were a little scared of all the changes that were happening in our lives but we were also very excited! Before we left Liberia we got to show our new Mom and Dad 'our world'...


A typical Street Market in Monrovia. We shopped for everything from food to flip flops at the markets. It wasn't a very safe place for children since there were people who wanted to steal our money and things we bought. We came here anyway to buy things we needed.


Our driver took us places in the car every day! We were used to walking wherever we needed to go. It was fun and we loved bouncing up and down in the back seat! American viewpoint: The roads, if in the U.S., would have been considered impassable being mostly dirt and full of holes and ruts. Traffic was usually bumper-to-bumper (mostly taxis), with lots of people walking around and between cars.


We got to go to the ocean twice with our new parents and everyone staying at The Guest House. The ocean had always been part of our lives since we lived close to it.


We felt safe hanging onto Daddy.


Sarah didn't like the ocean. She said it was "scarey" so her and Mom looked for shells instead. Mom and Sarah began to notice crabs about 5-inches wide coming out of the sand. Mom hollered at John to come see. Mom readied her camera to take a picture of the crab coming out of the sand, and as soon as it did, John hit and killed it with a board. John was proud and Mom was sad...until she realized that this was a way John helped provide food for his family and something to be proud of. Mom wouldn't let us eat it.


One of the huts at the beach.


This is where we ate at the beach. Mom and Dad bought us chicken! We ate everything, even the bones which everyone here does. We didn't know that in America we would have so much food that we wouldn't need to eat bones anymore (Mom didn't want us to anyway).


We got to take our parents to the orphanage, where we had lived, and introduce them to our friends. We were excited to show our new parents, clothes, shoes, and toys to our friends. Mom and Dad were happy to see where we had been living and to meet all the kids there. Some of the children were being adopted by Mom and Dad's friends, so they had special hugs to deliver and pictures to take. Mom and Dad said they adopted four children because they were approved for four. They knew that their hearts would break more if they came to the orphanage and knew there was another child they could have helped. We're all glad they did!


We celebrated Valentines Day at the orphanage. Gifts and candy had been sent from America.


This is the kitchen at the orphanage where these ladies cooked our food. They cooked us rice, beans, teas and bread, vegetables, baboon, pork, cacawa (oatmeal), and many more things. Here is a list of other food we ate in Liberia...bananas, coconut, mango, pineapple, plantain, oranges, limes, tangerines...cassava, cassava leaves, foofoo, sweet potatoes, bitter ball (like tomato), peppers, onions, garlic...bulgar wheat, corn...fish, crab, termites, goats, snails, lizards, monkeys, rats, large grubs, sardines...white bread, can milk, palm oil, beans. Our favorite foods...Jollof Rice with chicken, Pepper Soup, Palm Butter Soup, and Plantain Chips.
Our favorite foods in America...Daddy's deep fried chicken, shrimp, ice cream, any kind of fish, mom's cheesecake, brownies, and spaghetti. Our food in Liberia came from either the market, a relative's farm, gathered from the wild, from fishing traps, and sometimes we would steal food if we were very hungry.


We sang a lot at the orphanage. Here we're singing for our new parents. Singing and dancing is an important part of Liberian culture.




More singing! We learned lots of Christian songs at the orphanage.


This is the well at the orphanage. People in Monrovia got their water from wells like this. When John and Grace stayed with their Grandpa and Grandma in a village in the 'bush' they got water from a creek. Notice the woven wall behind the well...this is woven from plam leaves and what the outside walls of many homes are made of.


John got his hair cut while we were visiting the orphanage. Most guys in Liberia have very short hair. A straight razor blade against a comb is used for this so wiggling is a bad idea. "The first time my Mom cut my hair in America with electric clippers I couldn't sit still it felt so funny buzzing against my ear!"


Maggie getting her hair plaited (braided) by one of the Nannies at the orphanage. It is a lot of work to keep our hair looking beautiful. Some of the plaits with extensions take many hours.


This day we were saying good-bye to our friends. Some we will never see again and some we are still friends with in the U.S. because we know their 'American' families!


Friends...


Good-bye to friends and family.


At the Guest House we had so much food to eat!! We even had Plantain Chips every meal! We weren't used to having so much food to eat. We had plenty at the orphanage but before that we didn't always have food. One meal at the guest house, Mom left Sarah eating her supper at the table to go get something and when she came back a couple minutes later, Sarah's plate was empty. Mom asked Sarah what she did with her chicken leg bone and Sarah said, "I eat it". We all thought Mom was funny for asking. After we came to America, Sarah would cry in the late afternoon every day. Mom finally figured out that Sarah was worried she wouldn't have food to eat, so each afternoon Mom would sit Sarah on the counter and let her nibble on food while Mom fixed supper. Sarah still humms when she eats, even though we've been in the U.S. almost four years.


Here we're watching a movie at the Guest House where there was electricity that came from a generator. Some nights the generator ran so the air conditioners could make things cool. We'd never experienced that before! Most homes in Liberia don't have electricity. Our families used candles and lanterns for light, cooked over an open fire outside, and never had air conditioning! Liberia is near the equator so it's hot and humid all the time. We had two seasons--the rainy season and the dry season. Our temperatures were usually between 80 and 100 degrees every day.


Sarah didn't like sharing her Daddy's lap with this little girl.


These men work for the orphanage and sing good together. The temperature this day was about 100 degrees.

Some other things about our lives in Liberia...

HOMES: Homes are small and square. They consist of one or two rooms. They are made from either mud bricks, woven grass mats over stick frames, or stuccoed grass mats. The rooves were metal, sticks laid side by side, or grass.

FOOD: We had times of plenty and times of no food. In times of want, food was picked up off the ground at the market. John's Grandpa owned a farm that was two days walk from Monrovia. "Grandpa grew lots of fruit, vegetables, made palm oil, and had fish traps. I helped with all of this when I was there." John knows how to make snares to catch food and has caught rabbits in America with these.

FAMILY: The family structure in Liberia is different than America. It's normal for children from one family to live with different relatives and rarely see their siblings. It's also normal for many generations to live in the same home. Maggie's Grandma lived with them some of the time. John lived in the 'bush' at Grandpa's farm some of the time. Grace like living with her Auntie, who lived by the ocean, so she and her cousin could look for shells. Sarah was so young that she doesn't remember. We know that she lived in a village.

FUN: Jumping rope, killing lizards, marbles, rubber band game, hop scotch, dances, and playing in the bush.

CHURCH: Not all of us went to church. "Church was long. We took food, read from "The Good Book", ladies dances, and we sang songs.

HOLIDAYS: For Christmas we would put on our good clothes and make our hair fancy, go to a movie, and then we went from house to house and were given money. we did the same things for New Years Eve and The 26th. We didn't celebrate birthdays.

COMMUNITY: In the villages there was a party at harvest time. In Monrovia there was the GeoDeville Parade that had to do with voodoo and black magic. "That was scarey." American doctors came, dressed in blue, and gave children shots and medicine.

SAFETY: It was much safer in the daylight. At night we locked up so 'RORO' (robbers) couldn't steal our things or us. Kidnapping children happened a lot. Some of us had close calls. Girls and children weren't respected or treated well so we always had to be careful. Some of us saw people shot on the street. We had things stolen from us.

WAR: Us older three remember the war. We would hear 'pop-pop-pop' from guns and we'd run into the bush and hide to be safe. Soldier would burn houses and steal boys to be soldiers. We saw people be hurt.

SCHOOL: Only John and Maggie had a chance to go to school. They wore uniforms and took their own food. "Some teachers were mean and hit with sticks if we had an answer wrong."

CHORES: John had to fetch water, start the fire, use a slingshot to keep birds out of Grandpa's rice. Grace had to sweep, milk the goat, gather eggs, make cacawaw or rice for breakfast, and help watch her little siblings. Maggie washed dishes and hauled water.

LAUNGUAGE: Broken English is the main language. Bassa and Pele are languages we knew how to speak. Sarah had French background and used 'la' and 'le' in place of 'the'. Sarah has no accent left, while us others still have our Liberian accent.

AND NOW: We have lived in the U.S. for almost four years now. We love it here and have a great family! Our parents taught us about Jesus and now he's our Saviour too. We've got an education and can all read and write. We've traveled a lot and been many places, even Alaska! Even though we were used to hot weather all the time, we love the cold and snow! We are learning many new skills.
Some day we may go back to Liberia to visit and tell people about Christ and His love for them.


Every year in our area we have a Liberian reunion where we get together with all our friends from the orphanage. This is all the adopted kids with their families.


Here we girls are in 2007 at our homeschool Social Studies Fair. Our subject was Liberia so we dressed up in Liberian style clothing.


John then...


John now!


Grace then...


Grace now!


Maggie then...


Maggie now!


Sarah then...


Sarah now!

Putting Up Wood

I am alone in the cabin, a very rare thing. I'm even thinking in hushed tones it's so quiet. Steve and the kids are outside working on our winter wood supply. Steve had six cords of logs delivered a few days ago. We're hoping that will get us through the winter. The wood stove here, although it's a soapstone, is ancient and gobbles up lots of wood, so we'll see.... The wood's been rained on and pretty wet so Steve and John have been stacking the logs in a grid in the garage and leaving them overnight with the heater and fan on. It's working well. The dry wood is cut to length, split, and stacked the next day.

The girls and I have spent this week settling into the cabin, arranging and rearranging to make things fit. We are all satisfied with how the cabin has 'come together'. Organization is the key to small space living. And of course, not too much 'stuff'.


Unloading the six cords of logs.


Stacking, drying, cutting, splitting, stacking, hauling, burning...An old Chinese proverb says--"He who heats with wood is warmed twice". That's all wrong. I'm counting at least seven times and that's without getting it from the woods ourselves!






This little guy, the kids call him Jackson, kept getting in the way of stacking the wood. The girls were also distracted by Grace's ability to have a Chickadee land on her hand.

And now for some 'after' shots of the cabin...


Where there was just a futon and one chair, we've squeezed in a couple extra chairs, Steve's leather and my rocker.


We got the oil lamps out that we've eaten by for years (hint: low light helps make low voices).


We added a shelf in the kitchen for the Berkey and the grain grinder, then decided to dig out our canisters and favorite pans (thought we'd live without these for a while, but alas! we are set in our ways).


We changed a few pictures around in the bathroom, added some baskets, replaced a shower curtain and bath mat, and now it fits US!


Our quilt, their chair...just add sunshine!


The loft had two twin beds. The girls added a full size bed, rearranged and made a very nice space to sleep four and to share with guests (hint, hint).


We're still working on 'John's little corner of the cabin'.


Rose has reached new heights and is feeling pretty good about it.


These two are regular visitors to our yard.