Weekly Updated: 18 months, beach clean up, RS party and beach party

This weeks post is cover the last 2 weeks. I'm a bit behind as our commuter is still having issues.

Count down time:

- Less then 1 week till our 6th year Anniversary, it sure doesn't feel like 6 years.

- 1 month till term.3 is done, yay!!! then only 2 terms to go.

- 2.5 months till Lincoln is 4.

- 4.5 month till Nana-moto comes to visit.

-5 months till our med student families leave :( then we will be the only 

med student family form our University.

- 5.5 months till my Lacey girl will be 2.

- 9 months till we are Canada Bound- home time- family time. We just made it to our half way mark a month ago, the count down is on.

With family back home having to boil their water. Last week Lethbridge had a city water emergency, boil water order due to all the spring run off. It made me smile as family got to experience what we have to deal with here all the time... I also have to boil my dish clothes with bleach. Here dish clothes get so stinky, as they never get a chance to dry as its so humid here. They still stink even after I wash them so I’m trying boiling with bleach.

It has started to warm up again. When we go swimming we aren't cold after. We also feel it at night when we don't need sheets any more to keep warm. I'm not sure if I'm ready for the hot hot summer temperature that are coming, I really enjoyed the winter weather here.

Lacey is 18 months. Lacey is very good at pointing to her different body parts when I say one of them to her. One night Lacey was laying on our bed before bed time and she lifts her legs up and points to her bum and says "bum". I knew she knew where her bum was but didn't know she knew how to say it.

It seems like in the past few weeks Lacey has really started to talk. Lacey's new words: NO, that, help, one more, owe, up, says ease for please, mumbles something with a W for water, more, dog, bubbles, goggles, done, and pool. Most words she will try and she usually says the beginning letter sound.

At 18 months Lacey is in size 12-18 month clothes, weight - 20.5 lbs,  height? I'll get her weight and height and update this later.

Lacey is a bundle of joy to have in our family. She is so much fun to be around. She is a girly girl who loves to get dirty while having fun and enjoying life. She is a very strong willed girl, feisty and silly. Even though Lacey is a wild silly girl she is also VERY caring and SO willing to share with anyone. She's always concerned about other around her. We love this girl so much.

Kiddos ready for church.

One of my favorite thing that Lincoln said this past week. Lincoln got to watch a show one night with Josh and I. He said to Josh (dad) " I'm going to sit with me, if your lucky you can sit with me too."

Lincoln has also been into asking question about when he was a baby " When I was a baby, did you feed me milk?" or " When I was a baby, was I in your tummy?" or " When I was a baby, did you show me how to say talk?"......... 

Lincoln knows how to spell his name and dad. He loves writing Lincoln and dad on the sidewalk with chalk.

Bubble time!

 Lacey sure tried but couldn't figure it out. She still had lots of fun.

This is what our backyard looks like here.

Letter F 

Fox

Fish hand prints

Feathers

Letter G

I made the Giraffe with Lincoln on the left, once we were done Lincoln wanted to make his own by himself. I was very impressed with his G he cut out.

Grapes finger painting.

Beach Clean Up: 

The University held a beach clean up one Saturday morning for the student to help volunteer in the community. we meet at the University and took the University bus to the beach we cleaned. We cleaned Guana Point, which is just south of Gauna Beach ( on the West side of the island).

 

From Gauna Point you could see St Barth's which is the island to the west of St Maarten.

Here's a before picture of how much garbage was on the beach.

The kids and I tagged along for the clean up plus we got to see Josh then he went back to studying. This was our second beach clean up we have done on St Maarten. The first time was with the church at Guana Beach. 

Dead puffer fish a student found.

The kids seem to have fun helping. It amazes me at how much garbage ends up on the beaches here.  It's sad that the locals aren't taught to clean up after themselves or recycle. There is no recycling on the island. It all goes to the land fill with is located in the salt pond.

Our clean up crew.

Guana Point after an hour of cleaning it up.

Free Health Check:

The University held a free Health Check for the public one afternoon. Josh really enjoyed the hands on experience with the public.

Group picture all off the students who volunteer for this event. They had an amazing turn out  from the public with around 200 people that showed up.

Releif Society Birthday, 172 years!

For our church RS party, well lets just say it's not done like back home. It was a family activity rather then RS, from 10am- 4pm. Locals like to party and when they have parties they are a whole day thing. We arrived at 10am and of coarse they were still setting up. Welcome to island life, everything is slow and unorganized. 

We had lots of fun, there was a bouncy castle, face painting, box tunnels, music and more. We could only stay till noon as we had to get home, have lunch and get Lacey down for a nap as we had the University Beach party at 3:30pm the same day.

 University Beach Party/ BBQ/ Bonfire: 

The SGA hosted a beach party. Josh is the treasurer and was in charge on getting everything for the party. It was a lot of work, they were planning for 40-50 students. One big grocery trip to Cost U Less, Grande Marche, Prime, Carl & Sons Bakery and the Chinese Store and we finally got everything that we think we needed. I hate being in charge in case we forgot anything. But no one else wanted to do it....Josh and I didn't it. I was very impressed that we pulled it off. Great team work.

This was the first time for a lot of the students to be going to the beach.

They really eat, sleep (very little) and school.

We had hot dogs and burgers for supper.

Daddy time = happy Lincoln

Lacey and pop. We almost never have pop in our house and its a good thing we don't cause Lacey is a pop addict. If she sees it she wants it. She also knows how to say pop.

Kids had a blast with their friends.

Lincoln and Eli goofing off.

Lacey and Lincoln loved the fire and making fire treats.

We had a bonfire on the beach after dinner. A lot of the students are from big cities and had never experienced bonfires before or smoories. It was a late night for the kids and they didn't get to bed till 9:30pm, but it was worth it. They were just tired for church the next morning.