Momma Marcie and the other kids

Watch this link first, then see below for translation:

Momma Marcie

This is just SO classic of all our kids! I think Will and David keep talking about horses. Marcie is busy playing Mommy. I love the switch between the stern "No, no, come!" and the sweet "Okay?" Her exact words at the beginning are "No, no, Gacie! Hands! No! Hands!" [Hold hands with her.] Will at first says, "No," but then says, "Come on!" He keeps babbling about horses or something and Marcie says, "Hold the hand," then turns around to yell, "Come, David! No, no! Come, Gacie! No, no! Okay?"

In the past couple of days David and Marcie started speaking in complete sentences, not leaving out any words. It's SO fun to hear them converse with each other and Gracie. Seth and Will have lots of words and disjointed sentences, so they can definitely communicate what they want to. Will's latest cuteness includes saying he's big and strong, then listing all the other kids (the ones I tell him it's his job to protect), but listing Mommy and Daddy and Isaac, too. I tried to get it on camera, but he's more interested in seeing the screen of the camera than he is in performing for it.

There will be no real blog post until our normal way of posting pictures comes back online. It's been out for days. Sorry folks! We appreciate your continued love and prayers and are doing well. :)

Gratefully,
Carrie

Swimming for the first time in PNG!

Thank God for helpers! Our Ukarumpa "family," James and Natalie, as well as our wonderful "mother's helper," Dilu, came with us. The pool is at a nearby restaurant. It's a beautiful spot! It was nice not to cook either. :)

Marcie refused to wear a shirt. From now on it's obligatory - no sunscreen is enough to protect her fair skin!

Seth, Will, Gracie

"How much fun is this??!!!" - Will, with David behind him

David's delight is evident in his little trotting run and huge grin

Three boys in a row: David, Will, Seth, with Gracie lying on the edge of the pool, Isaac on the far left, and Marcie's head barely visible, lower left.

Isaac and Dilu were a huge help because they could touch the whole time and help babies in and out and around.

Sleeping David and Seth with a very-nearly-asleep Gracie between them. The sun and fun wore us all out!

Christmas and Homesickness

Hi all,

I've been working on this blog post for over a week and just haven't known how to finish it. I'm sure it comes as no surprise that Christmas makes me miss "home," my family of birth. Also lots of other things (and people!) in the U.S., although I am still immeasurably grateful to be here in PNG with six healthy, happy kids! I treasure my friends who have become family here, and I will soon receive family in the form of my "in-loves," Gavin's parents! They arrive mid-January - woo-hoo!! That will be such a nice boost and huge blessing! If you think of it, please pray for their transition.

As I wrote my mom-in-love today, I wish I could say our Christmas Day was magical, but honestly it was mostly just hard. Life just isn't "easy" with five two-year-olds, so it was more of a gut-it-out kind of day. I really missed the magic of Christmas, including the Christmas Eve carol service that didn't start until 9 p.m., so we had to miss it (no babysitters!). I was just super homesick for the first time since arriving back here. Thankfully, it was just Christmas Day and the day after (which was Christmas Day back in the US) that were hard for me. The 23rd and 24th were great days with friends! So having two hard days out of the whole season of really good days is nothing to complain about. I know each year will be different, and, Lord willing, the magic of Christmas Day itself will return at some point before too much longer. Gavin often talks of how eager he is for the kids to get older, and I keep thinking I want them to be small as long as possible, but some nights we fall into bed and I realize, "We NEED these kids to grow up!" It's just so constant and exhausting at these younger ages. However, it's certainly a very good, rich, blessing-filled life at the same time, and they are SO cute! Sometimes in life lots of blessings equal lots of work [I know anyone who's ever taken care of children can say a hearty, "true, true!" to that statement!].

Speaking of the kids being cute: Gracie speaks in all full sentences now. "It's my turn to swing!" "Daddy, I need you to help me with my pants!" "Mommy, look at me!" It's always so startling to hear a full sentence come from that tiny body. Last night Gracie told me I was a "good girl, Mommy!" for helping her find a toy behind Will's bed. She also says about thunder "They're talking in the clouds!" and when I said it was time to go to bed last night she said, "No, first I want to play with the cars!" She is SO verbal! She has a running commentary about her life. "I got the blanket." "I put the binkie nigh-night" [We make them leave their pacifiers in the crib.] "I need help to open this." "I need to wear the pretty clothes. This is Marcie's clothes." She tells the other kids to "move back!" when they are in her way, but she also says "thank you" without being prompted, "bless you" when someone sneezes, and used to say "excuse me," but I haven't heard her say that in a while. Marcie is also very verbal and strings plenty of words together to communicate. Will is definitely stringing words and concepts together. Seth and David still mostly just talk in short sentences. Seth's current favorite thing to say is, "No! My turn!" He is definitely the most mischievous right now. There is nothing lacking in his energy level, even if all his ribs show and his hips look hollow.  Since his last check-up he's only netted a gain of 2 oz despite an initial jump of a full pound. So weight for height, he's actually skinnier now that he was at his appointment in November when he was only in the 5th percentile for weight. So please keep praying as you think of it, please. I have been convicted of my lack of perseverance in prayer. I think, "Problem solved!" and move on, but this is one issue we're going to need to continue keeping an eye on in prayerful anticipation of God's work in Seth's life. He's been SO healthy, it's awesome, so we praise God for that.

The other day I told Will that God made him big and strong, and that it was his job to take care of and protect the littler kids. He grinned his dimpled grin and went around the room gentling touching each of the other kids' blond heads in turn, as if blessing them. He loves being told that God made him big and strong, and he tries to repeat the words. David continues to be a little engineering genius, Marcie takes care of everyone and everything she sees that needs doing (in a sweet, motherly way - she loves to wipe noses), and Seth tackles life and challenges head-on with a heart of bursting affection for his sisters. Will and David are the big wrestlers now. They laugh so hard at each other! The girls and Seth keep their hug games to themselves. It's adorable!

They all say "keput" instead of "ketchup," and four of the five would drink the stuff if they could (David especially). Seth is not such a fan.


I can hear the boys playing in the huge water puddle below our study window. That will be fun to clean up . . .

I'll attach some pictures (such as they are - sorry, we didn't get many good ones) and get off for now. The kids need me to work on lunch!

Love and gratitude,
Carrie for all

Isaac opening his stocking. Yes, Pringles and Fanta are big deal and great stocking stuffer on the mission field! :)

Gracie putting the shoes on her Anna doll

Isaac showing Will the finer points of his new Tonka firetruck (Marcie in the background)

David was obsessed with this truck. As you can see, he takes it very seriously. It's still the one he looks for. He knows it's his!

Happy mayhem! Our little friend Annika sent a card wishing us a Merry and Messy Christmas, and she was right on! Seth loved this little puppy book he got. He read it for days!

This was my brother's favorite book as a kid: Richard Scarry's Cars and Trucks and Things that Go. As soon as Will unwrapped it he temporarily forgot all about the cars and trucks and trains he had to play with, and he's been enamored with the book ever since! In this picture he just finished saying "Yellow truck!"

The kids goofing off with their floaties yesterday (we went to a nearby pool - fun! Pictures to follow.) I couldn't get Seth to stand still long enough to take a decent picture of him:

Marcie (taken through a dirty camera lens yet again)

Gracie (seriously, isn't she so cute?! She's the only one who would really pose for me)

David doing a great Queen Amidala impression

Will grinning because I took his floatie off

Four more great group shots from Friday play date!

My personal favorite because they are so goofy and happy!

Finally, some more Christmas fun pictures!

All the kids love playing with the Fisher Price nativity set, but Seth is our
animal lover and therefore the most devoted. 

Look how Seth lined up all the Little People in the manger scene!
He even grouped them: Shepherds, then Wise Men, then Angels

David made one of the wise men the driver of a car in which "baby Jesus" was a contented passenger. 

The girls were so thrilled with their new butterfly t-shirts they had to run and show me and then happily pose for a picture.
They are very much into butterflies right now. 

You wouldn't think it, but this was a favorite game one night recently. Gracie doesn't mind being "put upon" by Marcie!

Will with his new Mommy-made haircut (for better or for worse; he moved a LOT!)

The boys today (before I forgot to clean the camera lens)

A better picture of our matching boys after church. Isaac matched accidentally, but was happy to pose with his brothers.
Aren't they the handsomest four boys in the world? ;) Happy, too!

Enjoying the tree. They are very gentle with the ornaments. My mom used to let me play with our ornaments, too. Fun!

More Sunday Christmas photos

These aren't as good, but they're cute. I think the glare I mentioned in my last post (with the best picture) was actually a smudge on the camera lens.

Isaac was off playing, as usual. We don't deliberately leave him out of photos, he's just hard to corral! He has his own plans and activities. :)

2.5 years later: Four realities I was not thrilled about

This is a follow-up to the post I wrote April 2012. Four realities I am not thrilled about - Jones' Clips: Gavin ...

I have been meaning to do a follow-up for ages now and never got around to it. The kids are outside happily playing with my little PNG "mother's helper" keeping an eye on them, so we'll try to get this done as quickly as possible. :)

So, the first thing I wasn't happy about was having to gain 80 pounds by eating 5000 calories a day. Neither one of those things happened. The closest I got was 60 pounds, and I never managed to consume that many calories (without throwing up, anyway). Along with that, reality concern number four never materialized: My stomach never grew to the size it "should" have because I had the babies much earlier than I had hoped and prayed for. Therefore, I did not need a tummy tuck, which I thought was going to be absolutely necessary to repair separated abdominal muscles. My stomach went back to normal, minus the c-section scar (which in my case runs vertically almost up to my belly button; that's always how emergency C-sections are done, I'm told). I don't even have stretch marks except a few tiny ones around my belly button. I have recently found out that lots of people here at Ukarumpa just assumed I got the tummy tuck since I had said I would need one (when I knew nothing yet about God's timing for my pregnancy and our kids!). While I WISH I could have carried the babies a lot longer, since I didn't have any choice in the matter I do thank God for good genes that allowed my body to bounce back quickly. That made it SO much easier to care for 5 preemies in the NICU!

The second thing, even more a concern for me, was having to feed preemies every two hours around the clock. First off, turns out I was wrong. It's every 3 hours. Secondly, while some people had already volunteered to help, little did I know how MANY people would join our army of volunteers! What a stupid waste of worry energy that was. I got up less with the quints than I did with my single baby, Isaac. I got up a lot to pump, but that's different somehow.

The third thing was fear that I wouldn't bond with the quints because they would be in the NICU for so long and there would be so many of them. WRONG AGAIN. I bonded immediately with my babies, with a lioness's protectiveness and a tenderness that overwhelmed me. I actually bonded much quicker with them than with Isaac because of the postpartum depression I experienced after his birth. (Poor little guy. I've sure bonded with him since! I remember thinking no one could love a child as much as I loved him as soon as I got over the postpartum.)

The fourth "reality" - nasty extra tummy skin and stretch marks - I addressed in the first paragraph since they kind of go hand in hand (just in case you skimmed and missed it).

Bottom line: None of the "realities" I was dreading ever materialized. None. Note to self: worry is a waste! Trust God! It won't be easy, but He's faithful. Always.

Love,
Carrie

The kids on Sunday after church in front of our tiny Christmas tree. I love how Marcie and Gracie are holding hands. Seth was trying to hold Marcie's hand. They were all so happy! Sorry for the light glare between Gracie and Will.