My Three Sons & More

Roots

2011-02-08T13:08:00.001-08:00

I love trees. I always have. There's something about the way they represent life that I just can't get enough of. When I was in college, I looked up every reference to trees in the Bible. Amazingly enough, there are quite a few, and it's all pretty fascinating. I concluded, after my study of trees, that that's exactly what I wanted to become. The awesome thing about trees is this: no matter how grand or big or majestic they look above ground, their true strength lies in what's underneath. The part you can't see. The roots.

When I take an inventory of the last six months of my life, it gets pretty overwhelming.

June - we began packing our house to move from Turkey. Nathan is diagnosed with an eye condition that may or may not be corrected with glasses. We're surprised with an unplanned pregnancy. (Yikes!)

July - Final goodbyes to good friends in Turkey. We begin our journey through Europe, and I barf my way through Bavaria as morning sickness strikes with a vengeance.

August - we're home! But our house in Panama City isn't ready. I stay in Savannah with my family since morning sickness took the option of sitting, standing, moving, and breathing without dry heaving away while Tristan reports for duty and commutes back to Georgia for the weekends.

September - the house still isn't ready. They ran out of the tile we had originally selected. We pick out a new tile and move into a condo still living from the suitcases we packed back in July.

October - Our house is. . . . . . . .not ready. They laid the wrong tile. Extend the stay in the condo.

November - November 1st: 5 months after packing our boxes in Turkey, the skies part and the angels begin to sing as the big orange truck delivering our stuff pulls into the driveway of our new home. The night after our last box is unpacked, Zack falls from his top bunk. Broken femur. Full leg cast for six weeks.

December - Zack's six week cast turns into an eight week cast. We travel across Georgia and North Carolina visiting family over the holidays.

January - Zack's cast is removed, but he still can't walk without crutches. Another four weeks of Tiny Tim. The week after the removal of Zack's cast, Tristan sits me down to inform me he's been tasked with a deployment. He leaves March 5. Baby's due date? February 25. Deployment time? Seven months.

When I think about the craziness of the last six to eight months, it's easy for it all to seem unfair. Wasn't being pregnant enough, or dealing with Nate's eyes, or handling Zack's leg, or moving across the world? It's easy to hyper-focus on the realities of my own life and get caught in the abyss of self pity. But the reality is your list doesn't look much different than mine. It's different circumstances, different events, different struggles, but it's all life. The question for me becomes - where do I go to get the strength to go through it?

Roots travel to where they find nourishment. I have a lot of places for my roots to travel, lots of places from which to draw 'strength.' The reservoir of anger and bitterness is full of promise, so is self pity. I could draw from those wells forever. Their supply is endless, and although they provide fuel for the outside, they rot. They rot from the inside out and produce nothing more than a false outer shell. The oasis of chocolate thunder from down under is a delicious stop; I like this place. Hot brownie topped with ice cream covered with chocolate. MMMmmmmm. My husband warned me that I could possibly outweigh him by 500 pounds at the end of his deployment if I set up camp here. As much as I love brownies. . .and ice cream. . .and brownies and ice cream. . . together. . .covered in hot fudge. . .I don't like the idea of being compared to a large Japanese man wearing nothing more than a thong. Nope, my favorite place to send my roots is the very shallow reservoir of myself. I easily fool myself into thinking I can handle a lot. And the reality is. . .I can. I was born a Carnes. All us Carnes were born strong. . .at least we like to think so. I can do more push-ups than you (on my toes), I can throw a frisbee farther than you (no, really. . .I can), and don't even think about leg wrestling me because these legs were given to me by Zeus himself and could crush you. (I out leg wrestled every boy in my fourth grade class and the victory may have gone to my head.) The problem with myself is exactly what I stated in the first place. It's shallow, and the fruit it produces is pretty nasty. A Proverb states that 'pride comes before the fall,' and although I may look mighty and big and majestic, it would only take one storm to blow me over and reveal the shallow depths of the roots beneath me. Family, friends, church. . .those are all great places, too, but if I seek to find strength in them alone, I'll be sorely disappointed. My needs run deep; deeper than any other person, organization, or self help group can provide, and so do yours. If we're trying to draw strength from one another, we're gonna dry up fast. So, if all these places provide false nourishment (no matter how delicious), to what source can I go? To the only place that promises to supply strength in my weakness, hope in my sufferings, peace in my circumstances, joy in my trials. To The Source. If you don't know Him, please find someone who does. He's the only one I've ever known to turn sorrow into gladness, death into life. He uses what's weak in this world to shame the wise, and His power is made perfect in my weakness. When my roots are firmly planted here, I need not fear the storm that's coming. No matter what the circumstances have done to the 'visible me,' my true strength lies where you cannot see because it doesn't lie in me at all. Herein, however, lies the struggle. I can choose where to put my roots. It's a daily choice.

This is my last post to this blog. In one week and one day, I will have four sons rendering the title of this blog useless. Somehow I feel it completely inhumane to allow my fourth child to be lumped together with the words 'and more,' so my new blog is www.thejourneyofroots.blogspot.com. Due to my obvious obsession with the analogy between horticulture and life, I thought this title to be appropriate. Isn't everyone's life a story of where their strength comes from? Where we put our roots? It's my daily choice, and it is a journey. I don't always plant myself in the right place - I love brownies. . .and chocolate. . .and hot fudge. I rely on myself way too often, and please don't misunderstand me. . .friends and family can absolutely provide amazing support. I've got the best mom ever. She can do more push-ups than your mom. . .sorry, there I go again. I've got amazing friends. They are a huge source of comfort, love, and support, but I can't depend on them alone. My roots are about to take another deep dive. Yours probably are, too. Because I write to figure things out, and because my brother has a facebook page about his beard, I'll blog about the journey of those roots. Thanks for reading. I'll see ya on the flip side. . .ready or not. . .baby #4 is on his way. 'Til then, smile, God loves you.

Ticks, Beards, and Blogs

2011-01-27T16:41:00.000-08:00

I started a blog this morning that was going to be incredibly insightful. It's still in my draft section, but I can't finish it today. Not today. . .today we found a tick in Micah's back. As if my life wasn't filled with enough at the moment, an engorged tick had to find its way onto my sweet son's little body. It had been lodged in there for over 24 hours. The boys played in the woods yesterday while I fixed their lunches, and due to their weekly Awana Wednesday's, baths weren't in the cards last night. By the time we found it, it was pretty big. Thankfully, Tristan had taken the day off, so his skills were put to work as he carefully tried to pull out the nasty blood sucker I have affectionately named. . .ugghh, I can't do it. . .you have no idea how much I'd like to name the tick after the man who assured Tristan he wouldn't deploy this bucket only to call him with a last minute tasking, but I won't. Alas, my conscience wins. There would, however, be no guarantees if I was locked in a room with him armed with a frying pan. I'm kidding, I'm kidding. . .sort of. Back to the tick: Tristan succeeded in removing the body, but the head popped off and remained under Micah's skin. It was awful. Poor Micah had to endure a minor surgery while Tristan probed around his back trying to dig out the rest of the bug.

Quotes from a sobbing Micah:

"Is it going to make my heart stop beating??"

"I NEED GOD RIGHT NOW!"

"Why *sob* did *sob* God *sob* make *sob* ticks?"

"I wish Adam and Eve had never sinned!"

. . .and last but not least. . .

"Mommy, ticks belong in hell!"

It was a terrible thing to endure. For him and for me. I can't imagine too many things exist that are worse than watching one of your children in pain. I would have happily swapped places with him a dozen times. Thirty grueling minutes later, the rest of the tick was removed. After pouring a bottle of alcohol and a bottle of peroxide on the wound then smothering it with a tube of Neosporin and covering it with a Lightening McQueen bandaid, Tristan mentions that ticks can cause temporary paralysis in kids and to keep an eye on him. If he begins to get a red rash around the wound, he has lyme disease and needs to go on antibiotics immediately. Seriously? I know the actuality of either of these things occurring is very small, but seriously? Good grief. . .at this point my life has almost become a complete comedic mess.

On a very different note, my brother has started a Facebook page for his beard. Yes, you read that correctly, and you, too, can become a fan at www.facebook.com/JimmysBeard. I find it to be incredibly hilarious and clever, but don't tell him I said that. I have to retain some sort of older sister dignity. . .it's an unwritten law in the book of older sisters. It's his "glorious achievement in record time on display for all to see." It is pretty impressive. . .and disgusting. I would love to get into the psyche behind a man and his beard. . .it's a very strange and dynamic relationship, and I almost feel that a man would stand in the way of a moving car to protect his beard as if it were his own child. . .but I'm not going to get into that now. The relevance of my brother's beard is this: If he can maintain a facebook page about a beard, I can maintain a blog about matters that are much more sophisticated and important. . .like ticks. Knowing that my life is going to be pretty insane for the next nine months, and being keenly aware of my dependability on processing life through words, I shall blog. I shall blog as long as my brother's beard maintains a place on the world wide web. And that is all. 'Til next time, smile, God loves you (and Jimmy's beard, too).

Bring Back that Bloggin' Feelin' - (woah-oh, that bloggin' feelin')

2011-01-13T04:09:00.001-08:00

I'd rather be sleeping right now. Sleeping. . .not blogging. It's 4 o'clock in the morning, and thanks to this pregnancy and an incredibly overactive imagination, sleep is nowhere in sight. Anyway, I thought I had 'lost that bloggin' feelin' - (woah-oh, that bloggin' feelin' (sorry, I couldn't help myself)). Blogging has allowed anyone to become a published author. I mean anyone. It's a great thing, but the reality presents itself that who, if anyone, would actually read another blog. I've gotta be honest. . .I don't read other people's blogs. . .often. There, I said it; now excuse me while I bury my head under the covers. Isn't that awful?! After having spent the time to blog myself, after feeling the satisfaction of having others read my published content, I still don't faithfully read blogs. It's not that I'm not interested. It seems that juggling the overseas move, raising three boys, homeschooling, cooking, cleaning, laundry-ing, and oh - being pregnant - have left me with very little free time. I also read somewhere that blogging is like raising a plant. Uh, oh. . .that's not good news, folks. Not good news at all. I've never kept a plant alive for any amount of time. Maybe it's because all my life giving qualities are being spent. Who knows?

I wrote that paragraph well over two weeks ago. The blogging feeling certainly left as soon as it came. . .again with the raising of a plant. I'm just not good at it, but I'm hoping to be better. Life for me has taken a change in the past two weeks, and although it's a pretty stinky change, I'm kind of excited for what it will produce in my life. For that reason, and the fact that my three sons is about to become four, it's about time to retire this blog and begin (maybe) another one (possibly). (Isn't commitment the first step? I'm in trouble.) Blog - it's been fun. . .I will forever cherish the memories you will never allow me to forget. The Flying Rat, the Sheep Poo, and the cleaning lady who stole my sunglasses. Wait - I never blogged about that. . .I guess some things are better left unsaid. I have vowed to myself, and to this beautiful plant my husband brought home for me, that I will write one last blog - and water the plant. 'Til then; smile; God loves you. :)

. . .and so it goes.

2010-07-16T13:28:00.000-07:00

5 am, the alarm clock goes off this morning. 5am is really too early of a time for anyone to be awake, and it's especially too early for someone who is a crazy procrastinator and never finishes her packing until midnight the night before. (Except this time it really wasn't my fault because the driers in the TLF's took 8 years to dry a load of laundry.) Anyway, one hour and fifteen minutes later, we were on the airport shuttle leaving the gates of Incirlik for the very last time. (Hallelujah chorus begins). I felt no remorse, I felt no sadness. . .just the feeling of freedom! (you could also start singing the George Michael Freedom song here if you'd like.) Our shuttle man dropped us, our 4 checked bags, 5 carry ons, 2 strollers, and 3 car seats off at the curb, and we were on our way! Except we weren't.

You see, the morning that we were breaking free from Incirlik was also the morning that every single computer was down in the Adana airport. For those of you who haven't been to Turkey, airports are always crazy places. 'Waiting your turn' does not exist here - whoever can push the hardest or manipulate their body the best gets to go first. So, imagine this already crazy place 10,000 times crazier because everything had to be handwritten, and of course, out of the 8 counters available, only 2 were open. The line wrapped around the airport. I know I've mentioned before that one of my favorite things to do is sit around a Turkish airport with my 3 children while they get chubbed incessantly, and ohhhhhh, it was a blast. We finally boarded our plane and wondered if we'd ever see our luggage again, but I didn't care! I was on a plane headed west! Life was good! Except it wasn't.

Because everything was handwritten in Adana and there were no working computers (which how does an airport even run without computers?), we had no boarding pass for our next flight from Istanbul to Munich. We also weren't sure if our luggage was going to make it all the way to Munich. Would we need to claim it, then recheck it? And, as life would have it, it seemed that every single person on our flight also had a connection in Istanbul thus putting them in the same predicament as us. Again with the lines and the pushing and the twisting and the turning at the 'Help Me' counter. Again with Shannon being in charge of the 3 boys in a Turkish airport for a ridiculously long period of time. Fun, fun, fun. After Tristan succeeded in securing our boarding passes for the next flight, he looks at me and says, 'run.' Run? Three kids, five carry-ons, one guitar (I forgot to mention that earlier), two strollers, and I have to run? That was fun, too. Until we got to passport control where the man checking our passports was literally reincarnated from a sloth. I'm sure he started moving even slower when I started muttering harsh slurs under my breath, but I just couldn't help it. He was half sloth-half man, and I'm still bitter. We made our flight, and sloth man better be glad we did because I'm not sure of what I would have been capable of if we had missed our flight. I may have been a little ornery.

The flight to Germany was flawless. The boys did great; I was able to rest. But the bubble was burst again when we went to pick up our bags. Really, I have to give the Adana people some credit because all our bags made it, but Zack's car seat did not. Let the fun begin again. We, of course, had to sit and wait for every piece of luggage from every plane that had landed in the last 30 minutes to be brought out, and then, once we were sure that our seat was really not in any luggage we had seen , we had to stand in another line to report our missing baggage. Did I mention we all had woken up at 5am this morning? The kids were tired; I was tired. It was such a bad combination, and after 2 hours of sitting in the Munich airport, we were finally on our way.

Tristan drove straight from the airport to the Haufbrauhaus where he consumed a liter of beer; I'm pretty sure he deserved that one. I drank nasty water because the Germans don't believe in water without bubbles. We also received a plate that had every color and size of hot dog you can imagine sitting on top of a bed of sauerkraut. mmmmmm. Multi-colored sausages, sauerkraut, and carbonated water: dinner of champions. We left Munich in time to drive to Salzburg, Austria, before our hotel closed down for the night. They would not accept check-ins after 9pm, so we hit the road, except we didn't.

When we put our destination into the GPS given us by our rental car company, we discovered that Austria was not in their system. No map, no GPS, no cell phone; really, no clue how to get from point A to point B. That was a whole other adventure that I could write an entirely different blog post about, but I won't. Suffice it to say, that we pulled into the hotel's driveway at 8:59pm. What a way to start our 'relaxing' vacation, huh? But there's always tomorrow, and tomorrow is looking good! Til next time, smile' God loves you!

Midnight Rides

2010-07-13T05:16:00.000-07:00

The night before last was the last night in our house. As a matter of fact, it was a whole evening of lasts. It was our last service at the chapel, it was the last time Tristan led worship in Turkey, it was the last time I did all the crazy hand motions for the kids' song, and it was the last night we had to sleep on the u-shaped bed we received as temporary furniture. Praise be to the one who remodeled the Hodja rooms because the beds here are amazing. (The Hodja is the on-base hotel where they put you up after you've turned in the keys to your house.) And as life would have it, our last night was anything but ordinary.

Sometime in the middle of the night, I was woken up by a power outage. Most power outages are scheduled; this one was not. I decided I needed to get up and investigate, so I made my way to the bathroom threw open the window to have a look at the rest of the neighborhood. Every light in the neighborhood was out; every light on base was out. I'm not sure whether to attribute my over active imagination to being pregnant or the lack of sleep provided me by my U-shaped bed, but either way, I was sure that something was amiss. Two cop cars rode by with their red & blue lights on. Another one drove by with a spot light (at least I think it was a spotlight). That could only mean one thing. This outage was a huge conspiracy, and with tensions high between US, Israel, and Turkey, 'they' were coming. I kept a close eye on the fence, waiting to see hundreds jump over and imagined myself channeling Paul Revere running through the streets with a flashlight warning all the neighbors. Except then I remembered we had already packed up all our flashlights. I never did see anything out of the ordinary and soon all there was, was the barking of the one millions dogs that live in the alley and the mooing of a cow. Actually, this cow wasn't just mooing, it was in labor. I've never heard anything like that in my life, and I'm certain this farmer woke up to an extra cow the next morning. So, after being convinced that there would be no need for a Midnight Ride and after listening to the birthing cow, I decided it would be okay to go back to bed.

Just as I was about to fall asleep. . .mommMMMMYYYYY!!! It was Micah. He couldn't see, and he was scared. I decided sleeping with him in his bed would be a better option than the U, so after we had a long conversation about how - no, another night light from a different room would not work right now, and no, i couldn't go to the store and buy a new night light, and no, the moon was not turned off, we tried to go back to sleep. Except Micah's pillow is about as thick as a sheet of paper. Being the good wife that I am, I woke Tristan up and asked him to sleep with Micah while I snuggled smack-dab in the middle of the U. Except that didn't last very long. Ten minutes later, Tristan was back in our room with Micah, so the three of us attempted to sleep in the U the rest of the night. Needless to say, none of us (except Micah) slept very well.

So, that was the memorable last night in our Turkey house. We have 2 days left here! Can ya tell I'm excited!

'Til next time, smile God loves you!

The Car is Gone, and There's a Bun in the Oven

2010-07-08T10:06:00.000-07:00

The following post is one I wrote a few weeks ago but forgot to publish. I guess that's what happens when your house is full over movers, packers, boxes, you're trying to keep some form of sanity in your home, and you're pregnant. What?! Did I just say that? Holy cow, I did, and Holy cow, I am. Never in a millions years did I think that the 'more' in My Three Sons & More would include another child. Being that our youngest has seemed to channel five Tasmanian devils (the cartoon kind) into his being, I have felt pretty content with the size of our family, but God obviously has different plans. Many people think we have a girl on the way, but ya know, I'd be happy with another boy. After being a mom of all boys, there is just something special about it, but we'll be happy either way it goes. . .once it all sinks in. Right now, the only dose of reality I'm getting is the nausea that is taking over my life every moment of every day. I'm thinking Chick-fil-a sandwiches on wheat buns will cure all it all though. We're outta here in 8 days!

Smile; He loves you.

Ode to Turkey

2010-07-07T03:12:00.000-07:00

The car is gone,

our house is packed,

we have no food,

we're headed back

to the land of the free

where Chick-fil-a's

awaiting me.

Thank you, Turkey,

it's been fun,

We've had a blast

in your hot sun.

We've seen your sheep,

we've smelled your poo,

we've walked through ruins

a time or two.

So much history

in these places,

many friends,

we'll miss their faces.

We'll miss the tava,

it's the best.

We'll miss the market,

Fresh produce? Yes.

We'll miss the mosque calls,

wait - that's not true,

5 am wailing?

No thank you.

We'll miss the travels

that we've taken:

Antalya, Izmir,

Hell & Heaven,

Karatas, Alanya,

Yumurtalik, too,

these are the places,

to name a few.

We've learned some Turkish,

ate strange food,

seen sheep heads

and their livers, too.

We've hiked up castles,

we've swam the seas,

Chartered a boat,

and drank lots of tea.

So, thank you, Turkey,

It's been a blast,

Our time here,

has gone by fast.

You will be missed,

but I must say,

Thank the Lord

I'm goin' home today!

(well, I'm not really going home today, but that's the only thing I could come up with that rhymes.) Peace out, and smile, God loves you!

Car Ride

2010-07-04T02:42:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we took our very last Turkish outing to a place called Tasucu (pronounced Tashaju - 'c's are pronounced like 'j's here - but we can talk about that later). It's about 2 1/2 hours west of Adana, and although the drive is long, the view is absolutely worth it. It was beautiful, and to make the day even better, we spent it with some really sweet friends who were also up for the long car ride.

I'd love to use this blog post to discuss the absolutely perfect temperature of the crystal clear water, or to go on and on about the view of the coastline, or to talk about what a perfect day it was; but I'm not. This post is dedicated to our ride home, because that, in and of itself, was a never ending adventure.

We left the beach a little later than I had hoped. Right as we were beginning to pack up our never ending supply of towels, food, sunscreen, trash, inner tubes, shovels, and all that other stuff that is caked with sand by the end of a beach day; the wind picked up. For those of you who don't know my husband, he's a kiteboarder. For those of you who don't know a kiteboarder, they are also wind worshipers. The wind holds an unseen power that places its worshipers in a trance causing them to do nothing but what the wind is calling them to do. It doesn't have to be a strong wind, even the rustling of a leaf can bring about this wind trance. So, the wind trance began, and my ever-lovin' husband popped his ever-lovin' kite up in the air and flew across the water for the next hour. I can't honestly say that I was all that ever-lovin' upset because he did have a great time, and the kids all loved it. He gave them rides on the back of his harness, and watching the boys laugh so hard they couldn't breathe at the feeling of being drug across the top of the water at warp speed was definitely a memory in the making. But all that is to say, we left a little later than planned.

When I say we left, I should really say we started the grueling process of de-sanding everyone and everything before entering our van. I think it took an hour before Tristan had packed out the car and cleaned everyone off, and then it took another hour to buckle everyone in. (Because the van was so full, access to the seat belts and their buckles was almost impossible.) This is the run down of our trip home:

- Nate gets a fever - Tristan has to dig in the back of the van to find the medicine -this happened before we even started the car..

- Fin, our sweet little guest passenger has to go "pee pee, right NOW!" Jungle pee stop #1. As we are about to pull out, Micah announces he also needs to go. The huffs and puffs of Tristan trying to unbuckle and re-buckle him back in begin.

- At a stop light, we end up next to Gokan, one of Tristan's kiteboarding friends. What are the chances of us pulling up next to someone we know in Turkey at a stoplight? It was crazy. He rolls down his window and passes us a CD he made for Tristan.

- After the boys movie ends, they want to listen to the beaver song at least 10,000 times. I'm convinced I'm going to have nightmares about beavers for the rest of my life.

- Tristan's phone rings; it's Gokan. He had stopped, bought our family some food, and wanted to give it to us. How nice is that?! Tristan asks him if he wants us to stop and wait for him. No, Gokan says, he'll catch up with us.

- Our friends who are following us put in the phone call for jungle pee stop #2.

- Gokan has caught up with us. We pull over, he hands us a bag full of donut hole type things, then we're off.

- At the toll booth, Zack begins throwing up. After I put on my super mom cape, I flew to the back of a van with a plastic bag.

- We pull off the side of the road to give our guest passenger back to his original owners. (They have a little car, and it was a much more comfortable ride for all involved for one of their kids to ride with us for the majority of the ride.)

- Zack has a fever.

- Nathan begins to scream that he needs his sunglasses. It's 10pm.

- 10:30pm, we pull in our driveway, lug our fevered, sandy, dirty boys upstairs and lay their poor fevered, sandy, dirty bodies right into bed.

It's now 2pm the following day. Zack has still not gotten out of bed. Poor little guy. Nate and I have bonded doing puzzles, although he refuses to do the one with the Count from Sesame Street because he is 'dilly when he counts.' Tristan and Micah have gone to church, and I'm still in my pajamas wondering how in the world I'm going to get all this sand out of our house. Happy Fourth Everyone!

I'll be here, sitting on our temporary furniture, in our fully tiled house, waiting for next Friday. It's almost time to go home!

Til next time; smile, God loves you!

Izmir

2010-06-17T09:53:00.001-07:00

This post is meant to be read to the tune of the Lone Ranger as it best reflects the pace of my life recently. If you don't think you know that grand 'ole tune, you really do. . .you just don't know you know it. Dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-da-da. Did that help? Okay back to my life. Last Saturday morning, we left for Izmir. Tristan had another TDY with a fellow guy from work, so his family and our family left for a 7 day trip to the Western coast of Turkey. West Turkey is a lot different than East Turkey. West Turkey - beautiful, clean(er), more modern; East Turkey - sheep, sheep, and more sheep. After our plane landed, we made our way to the rental car station, loaded up our 3 car seats, 1 stroller, 4 bags, 2 carry-ons, 3 children, (and that was just our family), and headed straight to some old ruins we had heard good things about that were located in the middle of nowhere.

First city - Priene. I have no idea the significance of this place other than the fact that it's really old.

Second Stop - Miletos. Again, no intellectual information to impart about this place either, but here are my boys running full speed to channel their inner mountain goat.

Last stop of the day - Dydima where the temple of Apollos is located.

So, after our last, impressive stop, we headed to our fabulous hotel to end our exhausting day.

Day 2: Bergamum (ancient Pergamum) After spending hours trying to find an ancient Greek home turned restaurant, we made our way up the narrow winding road to Ancient Pergamum (one of the Seven Churches in Revelation). 'Narrow' and 'winding' are not really strong enough to describe this road, and as we rounded the final curve, we found ourselves playing chicken with four tour busses who were wanting to come down. Four tour busses, one road barely big enough for our little rental car. The busses wanted to come down, we wanted to go up. I can't even describe the insanity of the next few minutes that went by, but after being forced to back down the incredible, windy, narrow road, and to pull over to the non-existent shoulder of the incredibly narrow, windy road, we watched as the busses drove within centimeters of our cars as they began their journey down.

Then we hiked around Pergamum.

We also went to St. John's Basilica.

Day 3: We spent the afternoon near a beach in Cesme while the husbands kite-boarded. Last year when Tristan was in Izmir all by himself, he found an international kiteboarding school. He met up with the guys who were all the way from Australia to England, had a great time with them, and told them he'd be back. Well, we were back, and since the last time Tristan had visited this wonderful land of kiteboarders, they had supposedly built a playground with a grassy area for the kids to play on right next to the beach. That's my number one complaint about going to watch Tristan kiteboard with the kids. He flies across the water at warp speeds completely oblivious to the three ring circus I'm trying to conduct on the ground. Hearing that there would be a playground and some grass in which the kids could frolic until their hearts' were content made the idea of watching my husband kiteboard a little more appealing. I had visions of swings, slides, white beaches, and playing soccer in the field, and all that came to a screeching halt when we pulled into the beach. It wasn't a beach at all, it was more like a cove; a dirty cove. And that fantastic playground? It hadn't been built yet. Oh, there was a slide, but it was lying in the dirt among all the other non-built playground equipment. Awesome. But here we were, and here we would stay, so we made the most of it. True to the man's word, there was a grassy area for the kids to frolic, and the New Zealand kiteboarder found us a ball for the boys. All in all, it wasn't too bad.

Day 4: I took this picture of Tristan reading a bed time story to the boys. It's my favorite.

Day 5: Our family took a solo trip to Sardis - another home to one of the Seven Churches. While visiting the ancient town of Sardis, we came across a real live archeologist doing real live archeology work. I've seen them on TV, and I've heard them lecture in college, but I've never seen one in its environment doing its thing. He was from Missouri. I wish we had taken his picture, but we didn't.

Day 6: We spent a day at Alicati Beach, Windsurfing Capital of the World. It was beautiful! After a fun filled day at the beach, we headed into the town of Cesme where we toured. . .wait for it. . .another castle, then ate some dinner on the water. The atmosphere was wonderful: a nice breeze, beautiful scenery, boats coming in and out of the harbor. . .then they turned on the Turk MTV. It's so funny how much Turks love their TV. There's a TV in every restaurant, even the really nice ones! And anytime we go to a restaurant, they seat us near the TV, turn it on, and crank the volume. They are doing this, of course, to be polite because they think that's what we like, but after the children become completely mesmerized by the voluptuous Turkish women dancing to their voluptuous turkish songs, we usually ask them to turn it off so our kids will actually eat something. When we asked at this place, the owners became very offended. It was a little uncomfortable, but after Tristan successfully communicated in Turkish that we appreciated the offer but we really just wanted to enjoy the scenery, everything was okay. Tristan -1, Voluptuous Turkish women on TV - 0.

Day 7: We drove into Ancient Smyrna and almost died 100 times in the process. This is what we had to drive through to get there:

Ancient Smyrna is another home to one of the Seven Churches. It was hot, I was ornery from almost having died 100 times, so we didn't stay long. But I did have time to get a fantastic shot of the boys.

We flew home that night, just in time for Nathan's 3rd Birthday, and called it a week. I'm not sure how long I can keep this pace up, but life is certainly not slowing down anytime soon! Packers are coming in two weeks. . .it's time to get busy!

'Til next time; smile, God loves you.

Antalya

2010-06-04T19:22:00.000-07:00

We spent last weekend in Antalya with some good friends, and it was amazing. Beautiful, clean, everything an earthly utopia should be. Due to the fact that I tend to be quite long winded, I have limited myself to an acrostic poem (albeit a lengthly acrostic poem) about this wonderful city. Don't kid yourself, people. . .this is what happens when you're homeschooling a first grader. . .life can be summed up in acrostics. (Which also reminds me of the time that my brother's friend wrote an acrostic poem about me on a brown paper lunch bag then drove to my college apartment and left it on my front door. . .weird. . .but that's another story for another time.)

A - Amazing! Oh, wait. . I already said that. It truly was though. It has to be one of the most beautiful cities on earth as it hugs the Mediterranean coast line. Everywhere you look boasts a view of turquoise blue water. I mean real, unedited, turquoise blue water. Amazing.

N - Nostalgic. Tristan and I went to Antalya the summer before we were married. That was nine years ago. Although everything looks so completely different, it was really neat to go back and kind of come full circle. We took pictures in the same places we had been before, except this time, we're married and have three little buggers in the pictures with us. Tristan brought me coffee every morning with a twinkle in his eye trying to bring forth the memories of that summer many moons ago, but that music was brought to a screeching halt with every egg that was dropped on the floor at breakfast, complaint of the 'long journeys' we were taking, and fight over who was going to ride in the stroller. Aww, children.

T - Turquoise water. I know I've already said that, too! But, seriously, how many applicable adjectives begin with t? Saturday morning we took a two hour boat ride on that turquoise water along the coast that was breathtaking. We were the only two families onboard. It was absolute bliss.

A - Ancient. Antalya is really old. Hadrian's Gate is there. He was the emperor of Rome from AD 117 to 138.

L - Lovely. We stayed in the most charming, wonderful hotel in the old city. Traditional Turkish breakfast (which always includes bread, tomatoes, olives, cucumbers, cheese, and hard boiled eggs) was provided every morning along with an amazing dinner every night. Dinners were in the garden, and due to the horticultural nature of my first born son, now would be the appropriate time to apologize to the hotel staff for the abundant flower picking that was done during our time there. Oh, yeah. . .and the aloe plant. . .sorry about that, too.

The boys had never seen an aloe plant before, so I, the always-looking-for-teachable-moments mother, pulled off a leaf from the largest aloe plant growth I've ever seen in my life from a very inconspicuous place to show them the gel inside those plants that is filled with many healing/medicinal properties. My grandmother had an aloe plant in her house growing up. She also had a floor heater which my cousins and I would try to leap over in a single bound. It was a more than a single bound sized water heater, and we all suffered many a burns from it therefore utilizing the healing/medicinal purposes of the aloe plant thus bringing this rabbit trail back around to the original story. The boys were captivated by this mysterious gel and were convinced that it contained the ability to heal all things wrong in this world. Every night after dinner as I put on their pajamas, aloe leaves would fall from their pockets. Not just one or two, but like five or six. Upon closer inspection, I would see the pale yellow stain the gel leaves on the skin all over their little bodies. They would bathe themselves in aloe gel, then keep the leaves in their pockets to save some of that miraculous stuff for later. So, Hotel Tuvana, I sincerely apologize for the trauma my boys inflicted on your abundant aloe plants during our stay. The end.

Y - Yay! Okay, so I know that's pathetic, but it's five o'clock in the morning, and that's all my brain is capable of at the moment. This acrostic is proving to be much more difficult than anticipated. Due to the lameness of my Y word, I will use this opportunity to talk about my cousin who is now living (sometimes) in Antalya. Marvin is his name, and I thought about changing his name because I often do that anyway due to the nature of the internet and the crazy people that are out there, but 1) Marvin is too fantastic of a name to come up with an alias and 2) you probably know Marvin, and if you don't. . .you probably will before you take your last breath. He is a bone-fide international man of mystery. He's done everything and been everywhere. A real James Bond. But instead of guns, think fishing poles. Nobody really knows what he does other than captain a bunch of really big boats, but he's never in the same place for very long, and he has everything you've ever needed to tackle life in his trunk. Seriously, he does. He visited me once in college, and I happened to mention that I'd like to go climbing, to which he replied, "Let's go!" Great. . .I thought. I"ll just figure out a time it'll work out for us, rent some camping gear, get some ropes. As I'm planning this massive expedition in my head, Marvin simply walks to his car, opens the passenger door and says, "Let's go."

Now? Seriously? "Yes, Now." At that moment he had everything needed to go climbing in his trunk-ropes, those thingys you stick into the rock (you can tell I'm an avid climber), and whatever else you need to climb-all that stuff-in his trunk. Unbelievable. There was also that time that he wanted to take me mountain biking (he also trained for the Olympics for biking or cycling or whatever it's called), but I didn't have a bike. "No worries" he says. He simply drove me to some random house in Atlanta and stopped the car. "Wait here," he says. He hops out of the car, tries the front door; it's locked. He disappears behind the house, and the next thing I see is a bike flying out of the window with Marvin behind it. He throws the bike in the trunk, and away we go. What that was, to this day, I still don't know, but I still have that bike. It's a Trek bike with Grateful Dead stickers all over it. If it's yours, I'll give it back. I promise. So, that's Marvin. So, after our family moves to Turkey, who would be the one to move here, too? Marvin. Who would also be the one to get in touch with the same ministry Tristan and I were tied to 9 years ago when we came? Marvin. Who is the one spending time with the family Tristan knew 9 years ago when he worked the kids camp here? That's right. . .Marvin. So, unfortunately, when while we were in Antalya, Marvin was not. But we did visit the church we came to 9 years ago, and I immediately became famous because I am. . .Marvin's cousin. :)

A - Australian accented Turk. That was something! It's not uncommon for Turks who speak English to have an accent. A Turk in the alley sounds like he's from Texas when he speaks English. But this guy sounded like Bruce the Great White Shark. It was great. :)

So, there's my poem. It was an amazing weekend with great friends. A day at the beach, a day on a boat, a day to shop. . .it couldn't have been better. If you'd like to see a flip book presentation of our trip, all my picks are on Facebook. We took a 'few.'

We are now packing up to get on yet another airplane. We leave in an hour. I'd better get ready.

Keep smiling . . . God loves you!

Palm Trees

2010-05-09T05:44:00.001-07:00

I love palm trees. It may have something to do with the palm tree that was in my grandmother's backyard while I was growing up. It was in the shade of that palm tree that my mother allowed an incredibly chicken poxed cousin to chase me around the yard while I screamed in horror desperately afraid of the disease that was on my heels. Well, maybe that's not the best palm tree memory, but whatever the reason, I love them. They just make me feel good (aside from the whole chicken pox story). We have a bunch in our side yard, and when life's storms head my way, I love to watch those trees blow in the breeze as the daily grind of life melts away for just a little. I've been spending a lot of time under those palm trees recently.

Mid March brought the first wave of storms in the form of pneumonia, RSV, and strep throat. That was a blast. Nate started the party with a small bout of pneumonia. As his infection was healing I was able to attend a women's retreat in Cappadocia. That really was a blast. I was able to meet some incredible women. I mean really, incredible women. The night before I came home, I put in my nightly phone call to check up on my littlest pneumonic buddy to which Tristan replied, "Nathan's doing much better, but Zack threw up in his bed this morning." Relaxing weekend over; harsh reality begins.

We spent the next few weeks passing this bug back and forth between every member of the family. In the midst of all the germ sharing, Tristan hopped on a plane and headed to Poland to be the attending doctor for the Europoean Club Beyond (basically Young Life for military kids) mission trip. He would be gone for 8 days, meaning, I would be alone for 8 days with some very sick and very whiney children. But wait. . .what's that sound I hear? That would be Super Mom! And Super Mom would be my mom, and she was on her way to the rescue. She was here the entire time Tristan was gone which was amazing for many more than 2 reasons, but here's 2: 1) I ended up catching this bubonic plague which left me almost completely incapable of taking care of three sick kiddos by myself for any length of time and 2) the earth's crust decided to move and shoot lava thousands of feet into the air leaving Tristan stranded in Europe. I would still be suffering from stress induced ticks had my mom not been here to help. So to make a long story, probably even longer (since I have the tendency to do that), Tristan was stuck in Germany for an extra six days. His only escape was renting a car, driving it to the German border at 3 o'clock in the morning where he had scheduled a cab to meet him to carry him into Switzerland. How he managed to get a cab (who spoke no English) to meet him in some remote village in the middle of the night is beyond my level of comprehension, but Tristan has a way of doing the impossible, so his non-English speaking driver (who ended up being Turkish. . .go figure) was waiting for him at 3 in the morning. He drove Tristan to the Switzerland airport in Basil where he boarded a plane and headed back to Istanbul. Mom left a few days after he got home. Phew.

The storms have seemed to pass (at least for a short time), and this weekend was my calm. Yesterday we spent the day at the beach with some great friends. I love the beach. Today we drove up to a place I have no idea how to describe, but there were geese, olives, quails, honey, peacocks, quail eggs, flowers, horses (well, one horse), and ice cream. We had another great afternoon with some really good friends.

So, as this peaceful weekend comes to a close, I look forward to some crazy days ahead. Packing-out. . .movers. . .boxes. . .brick beds. . .the joys of moving a family of five back across the Atlantic ocean. . .I think I need a palm tree.

That's all from me. . .remember to smile; God loves you. :)

Ding, Dong, the Rat is Dead

2010-03-15T07:02:00.000-07:00

Four months ago, Tristan and I did a little Christmas shopping in the alley. It was a night we had planned for a long time. A babysitter was home with the kids, Tristan was prepared to endure hours of shopping while I picked out the perfect presents to send home to family, and the Kid Rock Concert was later that night promising a couple of hours of drunk airmen, tank tops, and really loud music. Perfect, right? Tristan and I strolled down the alley hand-in-hand discussing the niceness of shopping without six other hands needing, reaching, or grabbing for anything and everything, and that's when I saw it.

Before I go any further, I must describe the alley. Actually, I'll just import a picture as it's pretty difficult to describe to one who hasn't been.

Not exactly Rodeo Drive.

Okay, back to the story. As Tristan and I were walking hand in hand, discussing how nice it was to be just the two of us, and contemplating the Kid Rock concert we were about to witness, a humungous, dirty, gray, hairy rat with an unbelievably long, raw pink tail scurried across a storefront and ran into an alley. I caught it out of the corner of my eye, and I really didn't think it was a rat but a really fast possum which was terrifying in and of itself due to the fact that I had a pretty traumatic experience involving a possum and a grill, but that's another story for another time. As I opened my mouth to ask Tristan if he had seen the giant rodent, the humungous, dirty, gray, hairy rat with the unbelievably long, raw pink tail did a U-turn and began heading back our direction. HOLY MOLY! It was a rat, and it was huge. It ran along the side wall and darted into the barber shop where six Turkish men were enjoying a cup of chai. (Why these stores keep their doors open at all hours is beyond me knowing creatures of this sort lurk among the shadows.) At this point Tristan and I were frozen right in front of the shop wondering when or if the men would see the rat and what they would do when it was spotted. The next events that took place happened in under ten seconds, but for me life slowed to the pace of a movie when all the characters move really slow and all the voices sound about six octaves deeper. You'll understand why in a minute.

It hardly took a second for the men to spot the rat. All five jumped up (surprisingly, no tea was spilt in the process), and as I watched in anticipation waiting for one to grab a broom, a crowbar, or whatever it is you use to combat a giant rat with a really long pink tail, the unthinkable happened. A large Turkish man walked right up to the giant rodent, raised his knee in the air, then with all his weight behind him, stomped on the rat like it was a bug. Okay, for someone who despises roaches and feels a wave a nausea sweep over her when she hears the sound of one being crunched under a shoe, this was a thousand times worse. The man's foot never made contact with the ground because the rat was so fat. It just kind of made this squishy sound that I'd prefer never to hear again for the rest of my life. And this is where all of life becomes a slow motion picture. After the rat stopped moving, the man again raised his knee, pulled his leg back and prepared to launch the rat out of the store with a kick that would've won the world cup. The now lifeless humungous, dirty, gray, hairy rat was flying in the air at warp speed (even though it was really in slow motion), and that's when my line of site was blocked by my husband. I saw the man kick the rat, I saw its lifeless body flying through the air, and then I saw nothing but the back of my husbands head. But then Tristan turned. He just took a step to the side, and that's when the rat again entered my line of site. The rat was coming right at me. Not just sort of at me, or beside me. . .right at me. Right at the center of me. I'm not a screamer; if I were it certainly would have been the scream 'heard round the world', but I yelled something. I have no idea what it was that I yelled or if it's even appropriate to repeat, but I yelled. Then I turned. I turned just in time to watch the humungous, dirty, gray, hairy, lifeless rat with the unbelievably long, raw pink tail sail centimeters away from me (CENTImeters) then land with a thud in the middle of the street. AAAHHHHH! I pulled every mean turkish word out of my vocabulary and started yelling them at the top of my lungs attempting to lecture about the inconsiderateness of kicking a dying rat at another human being while wagging my finger at all the men who were now laughing hysterically at the occurrences of the last ten seconds. Traumatizing? Yes. That was my first real life encounter with a real, live rat. Did I make Tristan carry me on his back the rest of the way? Yes. Do I still get the heebie jeebies re-living this experience? Do I even need to answer that?

So, although humungous, dirty, gray, hairy rats exist in this world, there is still a God, and He still loves you; so smile. :)

. . .and. . .I'm back.

2010-03-08T00:12:00.000-08:00

Wow, it's been a long time since I've revisited all this blogging stuff. Life seems to fly by without ever stopping to ask me whether or not I agree with the amount of time passing. I have four months left in Turkey. Four months. On one hand, it's really hard to believe that I've been here for almost two years. On the other hand. . .I still have four months. It's been four months since the last time I posted; that seems an eternity ago. Four months.

Of course, a lot of life has happened in the last four months. We've been a ton of places (Haran, Sanliurfa, Heaven & Hell), experienced crazy things that only people in Turkey would experience (the dying, flying rat experience), seen Kid Rock in concert (maybe not the highlight of my life, but hey, don't judge. . .it was a glorious thing to see hundreds of people with beers and American flags-whether they were completely inebriated or not), heard the chanting of Anti-American protests outside our gates (making the drunk, red, white, and blue Kid Rockers seem like a safe haven), been exposed to plots that would probably not be wise to post here, been back to the States (ahh, the States. .the 'walk outside and not smell sheep poo' states, the 'driving over 5 miles per hour' states, the 'not being forced to live on an AFB' States. . .the land of the free, the home of the brave, and although I am fully aware of the rapid decline of the place I call home, you can bet your life that the second I am off that plane, I will be kissing the tarmac). My parents have been out to visit; Tristan's dad and cousin have been out to visit, Christmas and Thanksgiving are now a distant memory, and my closest friend is moving on Friday.

That is one of the top ten most difficult things about being here. The assignment is short, which means that most of the people you meet during your time here will move before you or you will move before them. K, (my closest friend here) also just happens to be my neighbor, and not just my across the street neighbor, but the 'if you knock three times, i'll interpret your morse code' neighbor. . .we share walls, and I can't think of another person I'd rather share walls with. You become close with people you meet very quickly. Not many people in life share the same feelings and experiences as those of us who live inside the fences in Turkey, and once you've hung out with the same person more than twice, you become eternally bound to them. I've already lost a few of those eternally bound to me by the gates of Incirlik, but it's going to be a pretty difficult place without K. here. Her kids and my kids absolutely adore each other, we're in pretty much the same season of life, and we've shared a lot of moments in our pajamas because, let's face it, when you have three kids close together (or maybe any kids for that matter), getting dressed falls on the bottom of the priority list. Sooo, she's moving on Friday. That has probably been a huge source of my negative mood recently. That, and the fact that we just came back from the States one week ago.

The trip was an absolute blink of an eye. What was supposed to be two weeks, turned into a nine day sprint back to find a house, go to a conference, see family, and fly back. It was crazy, but it gave me just enough taste of home to really make coming back pretty darn difficult. I told Tristan he would need to give me a really strong sedative to get me back on the plane headed for Istanbul, and he really almost had to. Traveling for thirty hours is pretty unbearable with three kiddos, but if the destination awaits you with smiles from family and chick-fil-a sandwiches on wheat buns, it can be endured. Knowing the end of this 30 hour trip would result in dog checks, smelly sheep, and chubbing made getting on that plane feel like dawning a fat suit. But, here we are. and here I am with my closest friend leaving on Thursday while I endure for four more months. Four more months.

I've decided that in those four more months, I will be more committed to blogging the rest of my time here. Soon, like my friend said, Turkey will be a cute scrapbook. I certainly don't want to wail and moan the rest of my time away, and there are so many wonderful things about this place that are difficult to see through the military life. We have wonderful friends off base who just had a brand new baby-can't wait to meet her. I'm headed to Cappadocia in the near future for a woman's retreat- that'll be nice. We're planning another trip to Germany so I can channel Julie Andrews-'the hills are alive. . .' So, things will be good. Life will continue to pass at record breaking speeds, and before I know it, I'll be rocking away in a chair trying to recall those distant memories when my kids were young, when I was almost killled by a dying, flying rat, and that time our neighbors son was almost bucked in the head by a horse. 'Til next time; smile. . .God loves you. :)

next post--the dying, flying rat. . .

Izmir

2009-11-01T01:47:00.001-07:00

Last Monday night, our whole family packed up and headed to the airport bound for Izmir. Izmir is on the Western coast of Turkey near Ephesus. Tristan has gone by himself TDY a few times, but this time, the kids and I decided to tag along. Our flight didn’t leave until 10:30 pm, and after sitting in the Adana airport for an extra hour due to delay (which, by the way, is on my top ten list of favorite things to do with three small kids), we finally were checked into our hotel and asleep by about 1am.

This is where I write extensively about how amazing our hotel was. We stayed at the Swiss Hotel, and because we came with the whole family, they upgraded our room to an executive sweet. Because we were traveling with TDY Tristan, the military paid for it. Everything was operated by buttons. Our curtains opened and closed by the touch of a button. We had a light switch labeled ‘’ambiance’’ which turned on only those lights which would qualify for such a term. A small TV rested inside the mirror of the master bathroom, and we had a pillow menu. I’m not kidding. It literally said, “Pillow Menu” and contained choices such as down or fiber-fill, soft or firm, back sleeper or side sleeper. Because we were staying in the executive sweet, the hotel allowed us access to the executive floor club room. We reminded them that we have three small children, but the management insisted. That is one thing I am really going to miss about Turkey. Unlike American culture that sees kids as a nuisance, Turkish culture almost worships children. They love kids. A child literally brings a smile to any Turkish face, even if that child is throwing a wild tantrum in the middle of a restaurant. I’ve never seen anything like it, but I appreciate it more than words can say. I would have never felt comfortable toting my kiddos around a businessmen hotel in the States, and although I was careful to lay some serious ground rules for my boys, I not once felt out of place. (Other than the fact that most guests were wearing high fashion business attire with pointy-toed alligator shoes while I was sporting the usual flip flops with old navy t-shirts. . .maybe should have reconsidered my clothing choices.) Anyway, the hotel was ridiculously nice, and my extensive bragging of it is over.

Tristan worked every day, so I was on my own with the kiddos. They were so good! Every morning we took the elevator downstairs to eat breakfast (which was the best hotel breakfast I’ve ever had in my life; and yes, they did have bread with chocolate.) Whenever anyone sees me walking around with three boys, “Mash-Allah” (the literal translation is ‘'God has willed it’', but it’s used to express joy and praise) is echoed in our wake, so without doubt, I had much help every morning getting the boys their food and juice. Every morning after breakfast, we spent time at the park, swam in the indoor pool, took naps in the afternoon, and waited for Dad to come home.

One morning the boys and I took a walk to the Cordon, and as we were checking out the ships, a group of horses came galloping up. They were practicing for a parade or something, but we had front row seats for the event. Due to the celebrity my kids bring me, we were asked if we wanted to ride a horse, but the boys were a tad terrified. I think that was the first time they had been that close to a group of huge horses.

We spent our first evening at one of Tristan’s co-workers homes. He’s married to Turkish national who’s from Izmir, so they gave us the low down on the places to see while we were in town. We took a night to walk up and down the Cordon (the water front Boulevard),

we toured the Izmir chapel (amazing!),

we walked to the Big Clock,

and the last day we were there, we went to Ephesus.

We picked up the rental car in front of our hotel room Saturday morning and were off on our hour and a half drive to Ephesus. About five minutes into the drive, however, Tristan looked at the gas gage to see it below empty. That’s a problem. We had no idea where the closest gas station was located, and I had visions of us running out of gas on the side of some random rode. Would I sit in the car with the boys while Tristan hunted for gas? Would the rent a car place come and find us and bring some gas? Do we know how to say, “We are out of gas” in Turkish? While I mentally went over the use of car keys as a weapon and while Tristan was on the phone giving our rent a car lady his best, serious lecture in Turkish about the ridiculousness of giving someone a rental car with no gas, the glorious sighting of a petrol station appeared. We absolutely prayed our way to the pump, and after filling up, we were on our way.

Before arriving in Ephesus we stopped at a site called The Seven Sleepers (because Tristan is a sucker for those brown signs) which was less than impressive, then we headed to the place where Mary, mother of Jesus, supposedly spent her last days. It was a very reverent place and a little eerie at times. Finally we made it to Ephesus. Tristan and I had been there about eight years ago, so it was really neat to go back two wedding rings and three kids later. We hired a guide to take us through the city, and although I didn’t feel like I learned a massive amount of information, it was neat to have someone walk us through. Nathan was photographed so many times with random people that Tristan and I began joking that we needed to start charging a Lira per picture. That child is going to develop a severe rock star complex and is seriously going to wonder where all his people are when we get back to the States. After a full viewing of the ancient city, we headed to the Napa Valley of Turkey.

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It was such a sweet, quaint town, and after arriving, we wished we had planned our day to spend more time there. We were only able to eat a quick dinner and taste a few wines before we had to get back on the road and head to the airport.

We were finally tucked into our own beds by ten that night, fully exhausted from a great week away. Seeing Ephesus and Izmir? Check. :)

Til next time; God loves you!

Cappadocia Pics

2009-10-13T06:14:00.001-07:00

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Tristan said I didn’t include enough pics of Cappadocia, so here they are. Now that I’ve found a fantastic new way to do this, it’s not half as painful. :)

O, the Places You’ll Go

2009-10-12T06:42:00.001-07:00

July 7th; the date of my last post. I cannot believe it’s October!! The summer seemed to go by at a snail’s pace, but once September hit, life began cruising by!

Tristan had to work a ton in July and August which meant taking trips on the weekends was not possible. We spent a lot of time at the pool; really, that’s the only thing to do on base in the summer. Micah learned how to swim without the mandatory life vest though, so that was a definite plus. He’s so cute swimming like a big boy. J We took a few trips over to Kizkalasi which is a big beach destination for Europeans, and we also welcomed the new doctor Nick, his wife, and their sweet son to base. We are SO glad they’re here. Tristan and Nick went to residency together, and he was really thankful when Nick arrived.

September began with a bang. The first weekend we took the eight hour “sneeze and you may die’’ road trip to Alanya. We had heard so many wonderful things about the city. It’s on the beach, it has a very European feel to it, and it doesn’t feel like Turkey (at least the part of Turkey we’re living in.) We were really excited for the opportunity to get away for a long weekend, so Friday afternoon, we packed up the car and headed out followed by some friends from base. Almost the entire drive is along the coast, and it’s absolutely breathtaking. The only problem is the lack of guard rails and shoulders along the road. There are places where there is literally a hundred foot drop off straight into the ocean and there are no shoulders or guard rails to speak of. We decided that attempting to tackle the cliffs after dark wouldn’t be too wise, so we stopped half way at a little inn along the coast. I was pleasantly surprised by the place, and the next morning we woke up to a gorgeous sun rise above the Mediterranean. The kids and Tristan went for a swim, we ate breakfast, and we were on our way.

Alanya was beautiful! We stayed in a really nice, all inclusive resort right on Cleopatra’s Beach and spent three days just relaxing. The sand at the beach was pretty incredible; it actually wasn’t sand at all. Rumor has it that Mark Antony had it imported from Egypt to impress Cleopatra, but the sand is really finely ground rocks that ‘sparkle’ in the sun.

So, we had sweet sand with a history, a nice resort, and topless women. AHHHHHH!!! Topless women!!! And not just any women; old German women. Very old German women. Very old, large German women. That would have been a nice little fact to have known about the place. One would think that after two days of seeing more than one ever wanted to see of very old, large German women, one would become accustomed to it all; but no. It’s a lot like diving into an ice hole, I’m not sure it matters how many times you do it; it’s just as shocking every time. We left the beautiful, topless beach of Alanya Tuesday morning and drove the cliff side (aka scary side) for eight hours on the way home. Tristan really did an amazing job despite my white knuckle grips on the arm rests. We went, we saw (way too much), and we conquered the drive to Alanya. :)

Just a week after arriving home, my parents came for a two and half week visit! YAY! It was SO great to see them. The boys just about wore them out! :) We were able to have a few down days with them while Tristan finished working the rest of the week, then Thursday we left for a trip to Cappadocia. That was my third time going, and it’s no less amazing. The landscape is so incredible, and we stayed in the coolest hotel I’ve ever stayed in in my life. We had been there before with some friends over a year ago, but this time we stayed in the family suite. The hotel is made up of a bunch of cave homes that date back a thousand years. Our suite had two bedrooms, a living room, a cool cave kitchen, and it’s own garden in the back. It was beautiful and so unique! Every morning we ate omelets cooked to serve, bread with chocolate, fresh fruit, bread with chocolate, we drank cappuccinos, and did I mention we ate some bread with chocolate? I think I consumed a jar of nutella just about every morning. It was deeee-licious, as Nate would say. Anyway, our table overlooked Cappadocia, and it was just beautiful. We spent our time there touring the open air museums where the cave homes/churches are, hiking up a cave castle, eating chocolate bread, and making a little pottery.

The first town we stopped in was called Avanos, a famous pottery town. Tristan had been there nine years ago, and he took us to the place he had been with all his buddies after he graduated from the Academy. The owner of the shop immediately invited us inside to give us a live demonstration. After blowing our minds with his pottery skills, he opened up the wheel to anyone who so desired to try their hand at pottery. I was the first to take the bait, and after a few minutes of thinking I had a handle on the whole pottery making business, I made one very minor mistake and my beautiful makings of a bowl quickly became a heap of wet clay. My mom was next to go, and although her creative abilities exceeded mine, the end

result was the same – a heap of wet clay. Then, Tristan took the seat behind the wheel. He was the pottery master! He kicked the wheel round and round as if he was born doing it and ended with this amazing bowl. (of course, the pottery man stepped in a few times to help with the shape, but really. . .Tristan may have missed his calling.) The whole event was a very cool experience, and my boys reminded me the rest of the day that I’m not very good at pottery.

Before we left town on Saturday, we made a stop at one of the 150 (!) underground cities where Christians lived during the time they were being fiercely persecuted. It’s absolutely incredible that people lived every day of their lives down in these holes. The stairways and tunnels are so small and narrow. There are bigger rooms where they would gather for church, and there was even a room for a missionary school that included a basin for baptizing. Every so often there would be huge boulders in a crevice in the wall that would be rolled over to block the tunnel in case of intruders. We all kept mentioning how convenient a time machine would have been be to see how life was lived back then. Amazing.

(Missionary School Room)

We drove home Saturday night, had church on Sunday, and Monday evening Tristan and I left for a five day vacation to Cyprus without the kids. It was amazing! We were really looking forward to time away from it all, however, we found ourselves in the middle of the biggest Muslim holiday celebration. The week we went to Cyprus just happened to coincide with the week after Ramadan. Ramadan is a month long event where no one is allowed to eat or drink anything (not even water!) from sun up to sun down. The week following Ramadan is called the Sugar holiday; it’s kind of like Mardi Gras without all the parades and beads. Anyway, we were surrounded by celebrating Turks and the resort was full to capacity. Thankfully, not many Turks like to sunbathe, so the beach was never over crowded. We spent a few days just sitting on the beach all day long (amazing!), and one afternoon we took a bus into the town of Kyrenia. Very nice, clean, and had a very European feel to it that may have had something to do with all the Brits that were there. Cyprus used to be owned by England, so everything there is British. They even drive on the wrong side of the road which absolutely terrified me when we first arrived. Turkey traffic is absolutely insane; there are no words to describe the craziness on the roads, so attempting to navigate the insanity from the wrong side of the road was a death sentence. Thankfully, there was hardly any traffic from the airport to our hotel. Phew. We came home from Cyprus fully relaxed and in one piece.

My parents left the Wednesday after we came home from Cyprus, but not before they were able to watch Zack play his first soccer game. Zack spent most of his time thinking and processing through the chaos on the field. He’s an observer, and he likes to have all the facts before he commits to anything fully, so he spent a lot of time observing. We’ll see how the rest of the season goes.

Since Mom and Dad left, life has been nonstop. A new chaplain arrived over the summer who we absolutely love. That is such a blessing. Zack took a fall from the top of his bunk bed and fractured the bone above his eye. That was a terrible ordeal that occurred last Sunday night, but in a few days, he’ll be good as new. I’m kicking homeschooling into high gear, and Tristan is working like crazy. Time is going to fly by!

I’m still not in the habit of this blogging business. . .I need to realize that if I would just write a little a little more often, it would be a lot less overwhelming. I’m leavin’off with a picture of Micah on two wheels! A feat he accomplished while Grandmama and Granddaddy were here. . .what perfect timing! :) ‘Til next time, Smile! God loves you.

The Weekend

2009-07-07T05:45:00.001-07:00

I have officially spent aproximately 6 hours uploading pictures to the web. Our computer is SO stinkin' slow at uploading. I tried something different this time. . .uploading them to a free site then publishing them from there, but that still took half a lifetime. Oh, well. With enough chocolate chip cookies and kiteboarding days, maybe I can convince Tristan to upgrade our service.

This week has been rough. I think coming back from England. . .beautiful, non-smelly, English speaking England. . .made the week a little more difficult. Plus, the whole being in a foriegn country on July 4th thing. We did have a great weekend, it was just a tad different than what I'm used to.

Tristan had the day off on Friday, so we we took a trip down to the beach at Karatas. The Mediterranean was beautiful, and the beach was actually pretty clean, so for the first few hours, I was really enjoying myself. Then Tristan left to kiteboard. I know I've mentioned before that Turkish people LOVE kids. I'm not sure I can convey that concept enough. They L-O-V-E kids. So, the second Tristan was off in the water, a group of about 10 teenage Turks came over. They started playing with the kids, which is fine and nice. They really are very sweet, but sometimes it gets overwhelming; especially for the kids. Having mobs of complete strangers rub your hair, pinch your cheeks, and beg for kisses can't be all that comfortable. Then the second wave of Turks came over. Then a third. The third wave being the 8 to 12 age group. There are now about 20 Turks around me from ages 8 to 18. None of them spoke any English other than 'hi' and 'bye' but we tried to communicate as best we could. Somehow in this communication, they came to the conclusion that I was an American singer. I'm not sure if it was my fabulous over-sized sunglasses that did it, but soon they were all chanting, "Sing, sing, sing" over and over again. Being the only American among a large group of Turks chanting turns out to be pretty traumatic. Then the drum beat started. I'm not sure where the drum came from, but there it was. Someone was beating on the drum, and then the Turkish dancing began. I knew if I didn't dance, the chanting might begin again, so I arose, did my best Turkish dancing for about thirty seconds then sat back down. Of course, out of all that took place, the only thing Tristan saw from the water was my thirty second dance. Wonderful. After spending the next few hours with the kids and thirty of my closest Turkish friends, it was time to head home.

Leaving the beach has never been one of my favorite things to do. There's just so much sand everywhere, and trying to clean off the kids and the massive amount of stuff bringing three kids to the beach calls for is a mondo task. Multiply that by at least 100. The sand at Karatas is really not sand at all. It is dirt. Black dirt. Our kids, towels, and toys were all covered in black dirt with no place to rinse. The boys are tired and miserable, and if you think our new friends left us as we were packing, you are so wrong. The Turkish kids are really very sweet and really want to help. . .so we were followed to our car by a mob of Turkish kids, but after the helping is over, the cheek pinching and kissing begins. Our poor kids.

July 4th was a little disappointing. I'm so used to big cookouts, volleyball, friends and family. Tristan kiteboarded all day, and although he really wanted us all to go, I had little desire to repeat the day before. He came home in time for us to head to the base July 4th celebration. It was actually a pretty good time. They had donkey rides for the kids (really, where else in the world are you going to get donkey rides on July 4th?), a great concert featuring some band from Nashville, and fireworks. The kids loved it, and it really turned out to be a great night.

Waiting for the concert to start.

What 4th of July would be complete without a sheep pen?

Donkey rides!

The concert

The kids are up from their nap, so my time is up, too! J Til later, smile; God loves you!

p.s. The pics that took me hours to upload are of England in the next post. :)

England Pics

2009-07-07T04:46:00.001-07:00

Life in the Fast Lane?

2009-07-04T04:51:00.001-07:00

Friday morning (June 19th) we flew to England. Tristan had a TDY (Temporary Duty) there, and I tagged along because England is also the home of our good friends from residency in Florida. Tristan and Josh graduated from Eglin together, and his wife Susan and I became super good friends as we navigated through those three crazy years. I was SO excited to see her. . .which is a very good thing because the thought of getting on another long flight after just arriving home from the States not too long ago was not in the least bit fun to think about. The boys did awesome though, and this time around, we did remember a stroller and shoes for Nathan. After six hours of travel time, we made it to Stansted. . .but Nathan's car seat didn't. We finally picked up our rental car after adding on a car seat charge (which was ridiculously expensive, by the way), and were on our way to Susan's. Our car was a true UK car. . .steering wheel on the right , stick shift on the left. Tristan was pretty incredible. I think I would have had a hard enough time trying to convince my brain that driving on the left was actually right much less teaching myself how to shift with my left hand, but Tristan drove like he had been driving that way his whole life. We made our way onto the interstate and were off. Except not really. After spending way too much time in the left lane, we realized (after being passed by yet another semi) that we were not in the fast lane, and that too was backwards in the wonderful land of Britain. We finally made it to Susan's (yay!) had dinner, and called it a night. We were heading out early the next morning to spend the weekend in London. We had to drive an hour to get to the "tube" that would take us the rest of the way. I guess London is so congested that you have to pay 8 euro just to drive in the city. London was awesome! I LOVED being there. I think being in a foreign country that also spoke English was the most enjoyable thing for me. I didn't feel inhibited in any way, and everyone there was so friendly and willing to help every time we went up and down the stairs of the subway with two strollers. (something we did WAY too often.) We packed so much into those two days, and it was worth every moment. We saw the London Tower, Big Ben, The bridges, Westminster's Abbey, and we decided to complete the day with a trip on the Eye. But first. . .dinner.

We were starving and were so looking forward to having dinner at a pub. I know England isn't known for its food, but we had been recommended a place that had 'really good burgers.' I had been dreaming about that burger all day. Turkey isn't known for its burgers. . .lamb kabobs? yes. Burgers? No. We found the restaurant, but they did not allow kids inside past six. It was seven. BOOOO! There's not much worse than really craving something only to have that craving seriously denied. We ended up finding a Noodle Hut that looked delicious until our sweet and sour chicken came out with neon pink noodles on the side. BOO, again! We ate until we weren't hungry anymore, but there was little satisfaction. Anyway, it was time for The Eye.

The Eye is a huge ferris wheel that allows you to see all of London. We bought tickets right before sunset (which is about 9:30PM) and stepped aboard. It was SO beautiful, but after about five minutes into the ride, I noticed Zack starting to do the squirm. The "I'm about to wet my pants" squirm. We had at least 25 more minutes to go. . .uugghhh. The men on board kept saying, "it's good for him. . .builds muscle," while all the women kept looking back and forth between me and him with sympathetic eyes. About fifteen minutes into the ride, he assumed a Buddha like position and didn't move again until The Eye was over. Miraculously, he made it to the end; we rushed off and ran straight to the bathrooms just to discover they had been closed ten minutes prior. Poor Zack! We went three different places looking for a bathroom, but in the end, it was a cup by a trash can. Desperate times call for desperate measures. We then headed to McDonald's so I could eat a burger.

After an incredibly full day, we walked up to our bed and breakfast that was right in the middle of London ready to crash. We were SO tired, but we found out that they had given away the family sweet we had reserved the night before and left us with one room with one double bed. A family of five. . .one double bed. Tristan and I got ready for bed while the boys fell asleep; we then put them on the floor and then crawled in bed while Nathan poked us in the eyes all night long whispering, "hi, mommy. . .hi, daddy."

The next morning was Father's Day, and after our 'incredible' breakfast provided by our Bed and Breakfast (one egg, one piece of toast), we were off to visit the church of one of Tristan's favorite worship leaders, Tim Hughes. The church was awesome, and although we didn't attend the service Tim Hughes plays for, it was so neat to be in a place with other believers from around the world. After church we headed to the Natural Science Museum, and although the museum was free and really nice, we were all so tired, it was hard to enjoy it. Getting the kids to walk for more than 50 yards was a feat. Before we left London though we knew we had to see the Palace. After almost dragging our poor tired kids across the city, we stopped for a picnic, took some pictures of Buckingham palace, then loaded the tube to head home. What a weekend.

We spent the next few days recovering. Tristan went in to work while I was able to just walk right over to Susan's house. Susan lives in the cutest English village, and it just so happened that her neighbors (the only other Americans living in the village) were heading back to the states for a month, and they let us stay in their house. It was SUCH a huge blessing! It was literally right next door to Susan's, so every morning we would wake up, eat breakfast and walk over to her house. Our kids played so well together and her back yard may as well be a nature walk, so it was such a nice relaxing week. Susan and I were even able to spend an afternoon in the cutest village while here mom stayed back with the kids while they napped.

Tristan didn't have to work on Friday, and we took the day to visit a castle and drive to the coast. It was a great way to end the trip. So, now we're back in super hot Turkey. I would move to England tomorrow if given the opportunity. More to come, but for now. . .smile; God loves you.

Showers, Bunk Beds, & Training Wheels

2009-06-15T01:47:00.000-07:00

I take long showers. I haven’t always. In college I used to pride myself in being able to wake up ten minutes before I had to leave for class and be showered and ready in time. You can ask my roomie. Now is different. A shower is the only time of day I am totally and completely by myself. No needs to be met, no mouths to feed, no bottoms to wipe. Wow, I feel relaxed after just writing that; I think I may start extending the length of my showers. Anyway, I do a lot of thinking in my long showers, and this week, I’ve been thinking that way too much growing up has been going on in the Sevdy household.

Last week the bunk beds that we had made over a month ago were delivered to our house. The boys, of course, were extatic, and it took them three hours to fall asleep that night.

Because the bunk beds were now in our home, the toddler beds were free for for Nathan. I wanted to get one last picture of him in his crib as our trusty ole crib will be retired after over five years of continual use, but convicing him to step foot back in there was no easy task.

After heaving his brothers into the crib, he decided a smile would be alright.

That night, he skipped his usual story and song and jumped right into his bed. From toddler beds to bunk beds, crib to toddler bed. . .my boys are growing up.

As if that wasn’t enough growing in one week, Zack decided he was ready to ride without training wheels. He had tried earlier in the day with much frustration, but after the afternoon passed, he bravely made his way up to Daddy to announce he was ready to try again. He looked like a pro! One time around the block, and he was off. Stopping and starting was a different story, and for those of you who have yet to experience the four to two wheel conversion, I would highly suggest wearing something other than flip-flops. We chased Zack around the block over and over again while he pedaled at a super sonic speed so he wouldn’t bust it everytime he was ready to stop. I’m happy to say that he has since perfected his starting and stopping abilities all by himself and that I have since bought a new pair of flip flops.

I know all of this is part of growing up, but it certainly forces you to look back and realize how fast the time really goes! They grow up fast, but the ride is certainly worth every moment.

As far as Turkey time goes; we took a hiking trip up to a village I have no idea how to pronounce much less write a few Sunday’s ago. It was supposed to be an hour away, but 2 ½ hours later, we pulled up to the hotel our magic yellow book spoke of. The magic yellow book is our permanent traveling companion. It gives us secrets that we would have never known otherwise, and if one is wise enough to interpret the writings of this book, one can avoid many, many wrong paths. Unfortunately, we are not one of the ‘wise ones’ as the descriptions in our trusty book are as follows : “Follow the dirt path in the small village and turn left at the tall tree.” Really? The tall tree? Small village? Everything is a dirt path and every village is small. We finally stopped to ask a lone Turkish man selling produce on the side of a road (which looked like it hadn't been traveled by humans in at least 100 years) how to get to where we were going, and after saying a bunch of stuff in Turkish that Tristan and I only pretended to understand, he gave us a handfull of humungous green beans, and we were on our way. As mentioned before, 2 ½ hours later, we arrived to our hiking destination. We hiked up through the remnants of an old castle in the mountains, ate lunch at the top, then headed back down only to be lead the wrong direction by a well intended Turkish man. When we realized we were going the wrong way around the mountain, we tried to turn around and take the switch back in the opposite direction, but that led us right past the well-inteded Turkish man. He very charismatically (and with a smile) turned us around and pointed us back in the direction we didn’t want to be heading. He had a hoe, so we went back the way he pointed us. That put us right in the middle of the village and on the opposite side of the mountain from our car. We got to experience a little rural Turkish culture while hiking back up to where we started, and all would have been fine and good if the kids weren’t so tired from the hours of hiking we had just completed. If you’ve never hiked up a humungous hill with two children on your back or hips, you should try it. It was a super way to end the trip.

We did have a great time though. Turkey is really beautiful when you travel away from base. I always wonder if the people in theses small villages even realize how beautiful their surroundings really are. I’m sure they do. So much is truly breath-taking, and although the lives of these Turks are hard and full of work far beyond what I could ever imagine, they certainly have some amazing real estate.

(The livestock off the road never ceases to amuse me.) :)

My time is up; mom time is back on. ‘Til next time; smile, God loves you!

The Hills are Alive. . .

2009-05-22T04:23:00.000-07:00

I've had a great week. Tristan came back from a Men's Retreat Sunday morning after which my girlfriend and I decided that men's retreats should happen more often and be absolutely mandatory. Not only did I get to have some girl time with a good friend for two nights, but I also received a new and improved husband. :) (Not that he wasn't already fantastic, but. . .) Anyway, we had a very normal week filled with lots of homeschooling, park time, and bike rides, but Wednesday night Tristan took the family to the north side of the lake in Adana. He's been telling me about it for awhile now, but he hadn't had the chance to take us all over there until this week. I was a little skeptical of how truly amazing this place really was because (and for those of you who know my husband) everything to him is AH-mazing. He could look at a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and talk for hours about how amazing it is. Anyway, he was right. The lake was beautiful! and it was just our family there to enjoy it.

I often get overwhelmed going off base with the whole family. The village that we live in isn't my favorite, driving into the city of Adana is congested with crazy traffic, and being an obvious American, we are the target of lots and lots of stares. Not just uncomfortable 30 second stares. . .really awkward, long, intense stares that do not break until the cars start moving again. You'd think that with Adana being so close to the base, we Americans wouldn't be quite the spectacle, but we are, and it makes me uncomfortable. It doesn't bother Tristan, but it's usually the men who stare, and men don't usually stare at men. So, it's me receiving everybody's scary eyes, and I just don't like it. Now don't get me wrong. . .it is certainly not like that everywhere, it's just the part we always have to drive through every time we go off base.

Anyway, the northern part of the lake was beautiful. We were totally and completely away from the congestion of Adana, and we were completely surrounded by nature! Hills, trees, cliffs, water. . .it really was breath-taking, and it was all just a thirty minute drive from base! I'm so used to being in the crowds, constantly checking on the kids and my surroundings, attempting to speak Turkish, that hanging out with nothing but the lake and the trees was like a huge burden lifted. The boys skipped rocks, waded in the water, and Tristan kite-boarded while I just enjoyed Turkey without worrying about random people trying to pick up my kids and translating my thoughts into Turkish. It was such a nice time!

We were supposed to head to the beach this weekend with our friends from Adana for memorial day, but Nathan woke up this morning with a fever, and by lunch time, Zack was lying on the floor curled up in a blanket. Needless to say, it looks like we'll be hanging around here. As much as I don't like my kids getting sick, it's nice to sometimes have a pause button on the normal grind of life just to care for your kids.

That's all from me, but I will accept high fives for getting a blog out less than a month after my previous blog was posted. Smile, folks. . .God loves you. :)

We're Back!

2009-05-07T04:09:00.000-07:00

We are back in Turkey! We’ve been back for about a week now, and we’re still working on getting our bodies used to the dramatic time change. All the plane rides, time changes, and craziness was worth it though. We had a blast back in the States. We left Turkey on March 28 and began our 29 hour journey back home. Our day began at 3:30 in the morning because (as life would have it) Daylight Savings Time for Europe began the same day our flight left. That made our 6:00am flight feel a lot more like 5am. We set every alarm in the house wondering which ones would switch to daylight savings time on their own and which would not. (Of all the alarms we set, only two went off.) Needless to say, neither Tristan nor I slept much that night. Morning came, however, and the first dramatic encounter came when I mentioned to the boys that we would have to ride a shuttle to get from base to the airport. Zack immediately began crying which caused a chorus of tears from all the boys. After I calmed him down enough to figure out what was wrong, he informed me that he was not interested in going to space. . .ugghh. After convincing him and Micah that the shuttle was actually a bus, making a mental note to never use the word ‘shuttle’ in reference to ground travel again, we were off to the Adana airport. About five minutes into our ride, I, however, question Tristan on the whereabouts of Nathan’s stroller after which he asks the whereabout of Nathan’s shoes. Four airports, three layovers, no stroller & no shoes? Not a good combination. I will never again scowl at long, kid-free layovers, and may I suggest that anytime you find yourself in an airport for a long period of time, may you think of me with my three children (one with no shoes), ten bags, one kiteboard, and no stroller, and may you pitty me and be thankful for an extended period of time to do nothing. Thankfully, Nathan’s pajamas had footies. . .

Our flight from Istanbul to JFK was an incredibly long 12 hours. Our plane was flying against 175mph winds, so we may as well been flying directly into a hurricane. Nathan (who had to sit in our laps the entire time) did not fall asleep once making the trip that much more unbearable. We were thrilled when our plane finally touched ground in the States. We quickly grabbed all our bags, rushed through customs, and flew through the airport to get to our gate in time to make our connecting flight to Atlanta. I’m sure we were a sight to behold. We made it just as they began to board the plane. Thankful that we made it, we found our seats. The plane pulled out of the jetway, and then we sat. We sat, and sat, and sat. For four hours we sat on the tarmac. I think we could have driven to Atlanta faster. SIX hours after we boarded the plane, we were finally in Atlanta, but this delay had caused us to miss our connecting flight to Savannah. Two o’clock in the morning, no stroller, no shoes for Nate, no sleep for 24 hours, and no bags (they were sending them on to Savannah without us the next morning). Fortunately, Atlanta used to be home for both Tristan and I, and our good friends Mike and Libby came to our rescue.

Mike and Libby are awesome, and although the entire ordeal was miserable, I’m really thankful we had the opportunity to spend extra time with them. We stayed the night at their house and spent the next day washing our airplane clothes, catching up, and eating Chick-fil-a (first things first, people). My dad was leaving for a trip that morning and changed his flight from departing from Savannah to departing from Atlanta. He drove a car up to Mike and Libby’s that we were able to drive back down to Savannah that afternoon. After fully enjoying our time with good friends, we packed up the car and began the four hour drive to Savannah.

The boys fell asleep almost immediately, and Tristan and I enjoyed the rare opportunity to talk for more than two mintues without being interrupted. Two hours into our trip, however, things began to look quite unfamiliar. I’ve driven from Peachtree City to Savannah countless times; I couldn’t believe I wasn’t recognizing anything. . . “wow, I really haven’t done this drive in awhile,” I thought. I was quickly brought back to reality with an alarming jolt when I saw a sign for “Tiger Town-1 mile ahead.” Tiger town? TIGER TOWN? To all of you non-SEC’ers, that would be Auburn. To all of you non-southeasterners. . .we may as well have been in California. . .we were in Alabama. Savannah, GA, is on the most eastern part of Georgia. . .Alabama is very much west. Alabama. We were in Alabama. I will spare you the grusome details of the “why didn’t you notice the ‘Welcome to Alabama sign’???!!!!” or the “I thought you knew how to drive to Savannah!!!” conversations. Suffice it to say, that eight very long hours later, we pulled into my mom’s driveway. What a way to start the trip.

After our bodies adjusted to the time change, we really began enjoying ourselves. The first weekend, Tristan and I drove up to Atlanta minus the kiddos. We had a planned date night with Mike and Libby that included a much anticipated trip to Carrabba’s. It was deeee-lish (as my friend Katie would say.) You truly do not even understand how much I was looking forward to just eating. We have a Burger King on base which we are convinced serves radioactive fries because they are always neon green and basically glowing. There’s also a Taco Bell, but I never really cared for those in the States, so I would have to be crazy to try it over here. Soooo, food was high on my priority list, and Carrabba’s did not disappoint.

The rest of the weekend I spent with my very best friend from college while Tristan headed out for a TDY in Texas. Becca and I had a blast. We always do. We always laugh until our sides hurt about anything and everything, and we always eat at really good restaurants because she never has any food in her pantry. (Sorry, Becca.. . you just don’t. . .at least buy some peanut butter!) We had so much fun, and I’m so thankful I had the opportunity to see her while Mom took care of the kids.

I drove home from Atlanta (the right way this time) and spent the rest of the week with my mom and the kids. We drove into Savannah one morning to spend the day with my sweet Grandmother and really just hung around Mom’s house the rest of the week. The boys were introduced to Wii bowling and were absolutely amazing at it! They easily beat Mom and me, and their scores were always well over 100!

Tristan flew back into Savannah on Saturday, and his mom flew in from San Diego that evening as well. The boys were able to see ‘Nana’ for a few days before she went back to California. We celebrated Easter, had a big Easter Egg hunt for the boys in Mom’s front yard, and ate a lot of bananas foster.

The next Tuesday we all drove down to Jacksonville, FL, where we met my brother and his wife to spend four days at the beach. It was SO nice to relax by the beach, play some ladder ball, throw the Frisbee, search for shells, and make drip castles with the boys. It was such a nice way to end our time in the States.

Before driving back up to Savannah, however, I was able to spend a day with one of my best friends from Florida (who now lives in Alaska.) Kandice was in Jacksonville with her family for her sister-in-law’s college graduation, and we met Thursday at the zoo. It was AWESOME to see her! Seriously, what were the chances of she and I being in the same place at the same time being that she lives in Alaska and I in Turkey?? Zack and Jaden were buddies back when we lived in Florida, and they gave each other the biggest hug. It was SO sweet. Jaden was adorable telling Zack that he promised they would be friends forever. After a trip to the zoo, dinner at Chick-fil-a (you can really never have too much), we parted ways.

We left Savannah to come back to Turkey that Saturday. Our trip was jam packed full, but we had an awesome time. Thankfully, the boys did SO well on the trip back, and we are on our way to getting fully acclimated to the time change. I honestly wasn’t looking forward to coming back. After being around such good food, family, and people that speak English, leaving was bittersweet, but now that we’re home; it’s nice to be back into the swing of things. Hopefully, the swing of things includes being better about blogging! I’ll get into a habit eventually! Since my posts always seem to be forever long, I will finish here, but remember to smile; God loves you!

(Nate out on the plane ride home.)

What a month it's been!

2009-03-15T04:44:00.000-07:00

Turkey may be one of the few places in the world you have to yield to at least five to one hundred herds of grazing animals on your way to any destination. Friday was Zack’s birthday. He’s FIVE years old! I can hardly believe I have a five year old in the house. I heard a quote the other day, “a mom’s days are long, but the years are short.” That couldn’t be more true. Anyway, Friday was conveniently a family day so we took a family trip up to Black Castle to start off Zack’s special day. As noted in the first sentence, we must have passed at least 10 herds of grazing sheep, cows, and goats. It never ceases to amuse me.

Black castle is by far my most favorite castle we have seen. Most others only have ruins of walls left, but Black Castle actually had chambers we could enter as well as long corridors we could walk through. It was the first time visiting a castle I really got lost in thinking about how life used to look living there thousand of years ago. The boys had a blast entering all the small ‘secret’ doorways that must have been home to all the ‘knights who fight dragons.’ Zack and Micah were excellent tour guides revealing to us where the princess lived and where the knights kept their horses. We had so much fun hiking around with the boys. Climbing castles is definitely one of their most favorite things to do. We stopped and had a picnic lunch before leaving where Nathan was finally able to get out of his back sack and run around. He’s such a little ball of personality and was into absolutely everything in the short time he was ‘free.’

After lunch we packed up and drove about six miles to find some “amazing ancient aqueducts” used during the time of Alexander the Great. Amazing? Really not so much. Thankfully we didn’t have to go too much out of our way to get there. The crazy thing about most of the ruins in this part of Turkey is that they have not been marketed as tourist destinations, so you are literally driving and hiking around people’s backyards to get to some of these places. The Aqueducts are no exception. They were situated right in the middle of someone’s farm land, so here we were in our Honda Odyssey plowing down dirt roads in search of these aqueducts. We passed some farmers, who although I’m sure are not strangers to seeing crazy Americans driving through their lands, just stared in bewilderment. The Aqueducts were certainly less than amazing, and although the history behind them is significant and interesting, i would have been just fine just reading about them. Anyway, our day trip came to a close as we headed home in time for Zack’s birthday party.

Zack’s party was great! It was thrown together at the last minute as the past few weeks have been an utter blur in my mind. The second week of February, we found out the new houses we’ve been eagerly waiting for had been completed, and we were one of the lucky families (due the number of kids we have) given the opportunity to move. I know moving after just arriving six months prior seems a little crazy, but upon seeing the new houses, you would absolutely understand. They in no way even compare to the old houses. We received word we’d be able to move in much earlier than expected, so the last week of February we started taking van loads over to the new place. Of course, the day before the big move, Nathan wakes up with a fever and runny nose which quickly spreads to his older brothers in record time. Nothing like moving with three sick kids, but on the up side. . .all they felt like doing was lying around, so I was able to get a lot accomplished while they wallowed on the coach watching endless episodes of Jay Jay the Jet Plane and Boz.

We spent the first week of March trying to get as settled in as possible because that Friday we were headed to a resort for a marriage retreat with the chapel! It was something we had been looking forward to for some time, but unfortunately, the morning of the retreat, Nathan was still pumping out some pretty high fevers. Tristan ended up listening to his lungs again that afternoon to discover that he, indeed, had pneumonia and an ear infection. Between unpacking, being up every night with a pneumatic child, and wiping noses countless times during the day, it’s easy to understand how Zack’s birthday snuck up on us.

Today we took the kids to a ‘fishing rodeo’ they had at the pool on base. It’s kind of gross to be fishing in the same place you swim, but they do this every year right before they sanitize the pool for the summer. The boys had no luck with the fish, but it was a great way to spend the morning. Poor Nate was so frustrated he couldn’t get out of the stroller as ‘’ishies’’ are some of his most favorite things.

We are beginning to prepare for our trip back home to the states! I cannot even express how excited I am to go home for a little while! Goodbye 5am mosque calls, hello Chick fil a! It’s going to be so nice to spend some time with the family as they get to experience the fullness of my three crazy boys. This may be the first trip for which I am actually packed and ready before midnight the night before we leave! The suitcases are out, I’ll be packing, you’ll be smilin. . .God loves you!

Christmas and Beyond

2009-02-05T04:56:00.000-08:00

It seems I have dropped the ball again. I was doing so well before Christmas keeping up with all the blogging, but the holidays hit, and Tristan became the worship leader for the chapel. Sundays used to be the day I would blog away, but with Tristan’s new responsibility, Sunday’s are a little less layed back than before, so I’m trying to find time during my week in which to write about our time in this wonderful land of Turkey.

So, to continue where I left off over a month ago, we had a great visit with Tristan’s Dad and sister Tessa. They arrived the night of Zack’s performance in the Christmas play which couldn’t have worked out any better. Zack was a wise man, and a pretty cute one at that, and had the responsibility of popping out of a box when his time came and standing by the manger scene on stage. He was supposed to sing the last song of the night with the rest of the children on stage, and since his performance during vacation bible school was a little less than stellar (he sat on the floor the entire time while the other kids sang their hearts out—in his defense, it was only a week after we arrived in Turkey, and that was his first experience in such an atmosphere), we practiced all week. I set up a stage in the living room where he would sing and do all the motions while an audience of stuffed animals would cheer him on. He was great, and I was sure he wouldn’t disappoint! He did pop out of the box, and he did go stand next to the kids dressed as sheep (who were shedding their glued on cotton balls with every move they made), but when the song came on he just stood there staring off into the distance as if he was contemplating something very serious. When I asked him what he was doing, he said he was, ‘watching the star shining in the east.’ I couldn’t argue with that. At least he stood this time around. So, it didn’t go as well as I had hoped, but having Tessa and Grandpa there for Zack’s first interpretation of a wise man was really nice.

(Grandpa getting some love from Nate)

(Zack before the play) :)

The time change was pretty hard on Tessa and Grandpa, so we spent a lot of time lounging around while they were here. The weather didn’t help us out much either as a front moved in dumping lots of rain. Christmas Eve finally rolled around and we once again got all dressed up for the Christmas Eve Service at the Chapel. They do one service for all the denominations on Christmas eve, so it’s a pretty big turn out. I had been asked two days before the service if I would sing Silent Night while Tristan played the guitar. This terrified me for two reasons: one, singing in public is not something I’m entirely comfortable with, and two, they asked me to sing it in German. What!!?? I took French in high school, I now live in Turkey. . .how does German fit in with all of this? Not to mention, where and how am I going to learn German in two days? Thankfully, my trusty father-in-law was in town who knows almost everything, and when asked whether or not he knew Silent Night in German, he dutifully began belting it out. Whew. I also discovered that the piano player for the service spoke German, and you’d better believe I just about begged her to sing with me. . .so my German solo became a duet. . .phew, again. We left the service singing Christmas carols in the car on the way home (a full five minutes) and piled into bed anticipating Christmas morning. Christmas was great. . .we opened presents and had a super dinner. The day after Christmas we took another trip to Tarsus, and Grandpa and Tessa waved goodbye the next morning heading to France. I’m so thankful that we had family in town for Christmas day. This was the first time in all my 28 years that I haven’t been with my family for Christmas, so having Grandpa and Tessa here made the day much brighter.

(St. Paul's Church)

(Grandpa in his Turk Pants-I know you all are jealous you didn't get some for Christmas, too)

(Tarsus)

New Years Eve was a blast. . .we invited some friends over for dinner and games and had such a great time. We made a rule, however, that Turk pants were required attire, and although there is enough room in a pair of Turk pants to fit you and three of your closest friends, they are actually quite awkward and uncomfortable to wear. Not to mention the fact that at times you feel you aren’t wearing any pants due to the maximum air flow the pants provide. Anyway, we played Balderdash until the wee hours of the morning (which is really like midnight for us people with kids) and when midnight hit, watched fireworks from all different places in our time zone on TV.

(Tristan & Frank)

(Katie and I-admit it. . .you're jealous. . .) :)

Since the dawning of the New year, we have hit the ground running. This is such a busy season of life for us, all the more reason I’m thankful for where we are. Tristan couldn’t have a better environment at work and is home most days by 5:00! The Surgeon General says this is the best keep secret for doctor’s in the Air Force. . .nowhere else in the world would he have such amazing hours! I am SO thankful for that. . .having three crazy boys 4 and under is pretty taxing, and I’m so blessed that Tristan is home as often as he is. I know i’ve mentioned how much I love the Chapel, mmmm, maybe a few dozen times, but I do. We are learning so much in such simple ways. The humility and transparency of our Chaplain and his wife is enough to glean from in and of itself. Last night, the church held a service in honor of the persecuted church. The Chaplain had the lights almost completely turned off, the worship team didn’t plug in, and we had a service similar to the way so many have to worship around the world. In the midst of the service two guys came in and “arrested” Chaplain Tims. . .it was very moving and powerful. It definitely forces us to realize how much we take for granted. We were also confronted with the reality of Christians who suffer persecution here in Turkey while having breakfast with our friends in Adana Sunday morning. People here have suffered from others who show a false interest in the faith. We heard stories of men who have come to a church asking to be told more about Jesus only to gain access to the leaders so they may kill them. We have much to be thankful for in the States.

I’m going to leave now with some pictures of the trip we took to Hieropolis. . .about an hour away. We went with friends Frank and Katie and had an awesome day out. Thanks for being patient as I figure this whole blog thing into my crazy schedule!! I will return, sooner than later, and until next time, remember to smile; God loves you!! :)

(p.s. The pics are in a slideshow at the top right of the page)

Parent's Visit II

2008-12-28T05:22:00.000-08:00

The day after we visited Anavarza, we drove two hours east to Antioch, the place where believers of Christ were first called Christians. (I won’t mention our speeding ticket we received on the way—we were going six kilometers over the speed limit. That equates to about two miles per hour. . .grrrrr Turkish police. Tristan tried to Turk talk his way out of it—he went down swinging, but we were slapped with a 180 lira ticket anyway.) Our friends Jake and Rana who live in Adana invited us to join them. Rana is from Antioch and her parents still call it home, so we jumped on the opportunity to have someone familiar with the area show us around.

The day we went to Antioch must have been the day to go; the city was SO crowded! Finding a place to park was no easy task, but we finally made our way to the mosaic museum where we were to meet Jake and Rana. The Museum was pretty impressive compared to the other ‘museums’ we’ve visited over here. They had collections ranging from the Hittite period (500 B.C.!) to the time of Roman rule. I know I’ve said this alot, but seeing the detail and intricacies of each mosaic, carving, pottery, sculpture is mind blowing! I love it! Being surrounded by all this incredibly old stuff forces one to think about the lifestyle of those living during these ancient time periods. Dad and I kept talking about how neat it would be if we could really see and experience how others lived in the past—but not for long, I really like electricity. . .and toilets. (Although those can be hard to come by over here at times.)

(sorry it's blurry! that tomb is from 300 B.C!)

(Those lions are from the Hittites)

After leaving the museum, we shuffled our way over to a Bazaar, a place where you can buy anything from shoes to Turkish pottery. It’s also a place that is extremely crowded--way to crowded for my liking. We had all of the kids in strollers which makes navigating a definite challenge, and we were a definite source of a rubbernecking problem as 1) everyone thinks that Zack and Micah are twins and 2) blond headed babies are a rarity to see in these parts which makes Nathan quite the celebrity. We quickly found our way out of that mess and decided it would be better to head on to Peter’s Church-the very first church.

St. Peter’s church was pretty awesome. It’s carved from the side of a rock, and although the entrance was updated when the Crusaders came through, everything else is in its original form. It’s nothing fancy, but it’s pretty amazing to think about the people who had graced the same floors on which we were standing. If only walls could talk, right? Behind the ‘pulpit’ area is a tunnel that is rumored to be the escape route for the Christians if ever there were a scare of persecution. The tunnel supposedly goes to Syria (12 miles from the church). After exploring and trying to wrap our minds around the events that probably occurred where we were standing, we left feeling very nostalgic and very hungry; so after a nice Turkish dinner, we headed for home again ready for another good night’s sleep.

(The front of the church)

(Looking from the pulpit to the entrance)

(The beginning of the tunnel)

(behind the pulpit)

During the next few days, we visited the Mosque Park in Adana,

We celebrated Christmas,

then Saturday, we headed to Tarsus where Paul was born.

Tarsus is my most favorite city I’ve visited so far in Turkey. It’s very quaint and peaceful,and a nice change from the hustle and bustle of Adana. We arrived mid-morning, stuffed Nathan in the back-pack carrier, strapped the older boys in the stroller and were ready to explore. We parked in an area that was right next to the place where the Roman Road (just discovered in the early years of 2000) is being excavated. The whole thing is fenced off, but as we were trying to stuff our camera lenses through the holes in the chain linked fence, a group of very finely dressed individuals came waltzing up—two of those individuals looking very American.

The two very American looking people saw us and absolutely lit up. They were two young journalists writing six stories about Turkey to be featured in a London paper. They were being wined and dined by the Turkish government and were being given a top notch tour of the city by the best tour guide in the area. The guy (Lee) was from Virginia, the girl (Leigh Ann) was from Canada, and they were so thrilled to be around others that spoke English, they invited us to tag along. We certainly thought we’d be imposing considering the three tiny cargoes we were toting around, but they insisted, so the super-duper tour guide pulled out some keys, opened the gate, and we were given access to the Roman Road! Talk about being in the right place at the right time! After trodding where Paul himself had trod many times before, the tour group invited us to journey with them to Paul’s home.

(The Roman Road)

(The entrance to Paul's home)

How in the world they know this was actually Paul’s home, I have no idea, but seeing the remnants of a home over 1500 years old was cool none the less. There’s a well outside the home (conveniently named Paul’s Well) that still draws water, and the Turkish tour guides opened the top so that Leigh Ann could bring up some holy water. After listening to the tour guide explain the life of Paul, seeing some ‘holy’water, and chatting away with Leigh Ann, it was time to move on. The group again invited us to go with them to St. Paul’s Church. They were so incredibly nice! On our way to the church, the Turks stopped to have some chai in a local cafe, and we were again invited to join them. Lunch time was right around the corner, though, and we knew bringing hungry kids into a quiet cafe wouldn’t be the best of choices. Plus, we were beginning to feel like we were overstaying our welcome and didn’t want to impose any longer. Lee assured us that was not the case, but we didn’t want to take advantage of the super nice Turks and compromised by saying we would get lunch and try to meet them at the church.

(Looking into Paul's home)

Unfortunately, that was the last we saw Lee and Leigh Ann because we got so completely lost in the roads and side streets of Tarsus. In the midst of our detour, we did come across a Roman Bath and Cleopatra’s Gate, and finally, we did arrive at the much anticipated St. Paul’s Church. The building was erected in the 1800s and has been kept up very nicely. After taking lots of pictures we walked back to the car but not before stopping at a restaurant across from where we parked. The food was the best I’ve had in Turkey so far and was a great way to end our day in Tarsus.

(Cleopatra's Gate)

The rest of my parents visit was spent relaxing around the house and playing with the boys. We did take a trip down to Karatas early the next week so my mom could see the Mediterranean, and that we did see plus so much more! The Monday we drove down was one of the biggest Muslim holiday's of the year. I wish I knew what it was called, but I don't. Islam believes that Ishmael was the chosen son rather than Isaac, and this holiday celebrates the ram that God provided as a sacrifice instead of "Ishmael" when Abraham took him up on the mountain. To celebrate this holiday, each family purchases a sheep, goat, or cow (only the rich can afford the cows), kills it, then shares the meat with seven poor families.

Driving down to Karatas was like heading back two thousand years. Wooden pens filled with sheep, goats, and cows to be sold were everywhere! I'm sure the site is similar to what Jerusalem would have looked like during the Passover. Almost every vehicle we passed had an animal inside being driven to it's final destination (in more ways than one). (On that note, can you imagine being in a Toyota with a sheep in the back seat? What do you do with a sheep in your car? Do you feed it carrots so it won't act out? Do sheep like carrots? And I'm not even sure I want to think about the presents that sheep could possibly leave in your backseat. . .I've had enough experience with those paddies.) Anyway, it was definitely a site I've never beheld before. Not only did we see the animals for sale, but we saw a good number of them slaughtered on the side of the road. It's almost like every family decided to kill their animals on the main street. People were shearing their sheep, killing their sheep, hanging their sheep, and I think I'll stop there to prevent this from becoming any more graphic than it already is. It was pretty crazy.

We did make our way down to Karatas and spent some time throwing balls with the boys and drawing snowmen in the sand.

My parents trip ended Tuesday night as they borded a plane early Wednesday morning homeward bound. We had such a great time, and the boys so much enjoyed seeing their grandparents!! Nathan still asks for "mamama" (grandmama) almost everyday. :) It was SO nice to have them here, and I am now counting down the months when we get to go visit them in the states!!

Phew, now that I have finally finished writing about my parents visit, I’m going to have to dive right into Tristan’s Dad and sister’s visit. They left yesterday morning, but I shall save that visit for the next post. Thanks for reading! Til next time. . .smile; God loves you!

Parent's Visit

2008-12-16T05:20:00.001-08:00

My parents’visit. Oh, my goodness, how wonderful it was to have them here! A friend told me after we arrived in Turkey that the first few months fly by as you’re in processing, trying to get your house settled, and taking in the fact that you live in Turkey; but when month four hits, you realize you’re not going home anytime soon. She was right. The fact that I can’t buy a gallon of milk (only half gallons in a carton), Starbucks is a plane ride away, going off base is a wild exhausting adventure almost every time, and my family and friends can’t drive to my house really began to hit home. Mom and Dad came at the perfect time.

They arrived Sunday night (Nov 30), so Monday we decided to take it easy knowing jet lag takes a little while to wear off. We went to dinner in the alley that night where Mom and Dad had their first experience with ‘special tea’ (among other things). Special tea is the code word in almost every Turkish restaurant in the alley for “this person has never been to Turkey before and needs to be inducted.” The waiter talks special tea up about how difficult it is to make, so the ‘new’person really thinks they’re in for a treat. The waiter brings out a cup that is so hot, it is visibly steaming out the top, then pretends to trip and ‘spill’ the tea all over the person’s lap (although there was never any tea in the cup to begin with). I’ve never seen someone not fall for this shenanigan. I’ve seen people push back from the table so hard that they knock their chair over and are dumped out onto the floor. It’s pretty stinkin hilarious. So, my dad was served special tea, and my mom was served complimentary baklava (a rubber snake coiled up on a plate that the waiter dumps in your lap.) What a way to begin a week in Turkey. :)

Tuesday we took a drive over to Anavarza, a castle built in the first century B.C. It’s crazy because these incredibly old ruins are just in the backyards of these rural Turk towns. So, after driving through the country side, passing who knows how many sheep herds, grazing cattle, and wandering chickens, we found our way to the castle in the middle of a very rural Turkish village. We had read in a book that there was a gate below the castle that marked the ruins of an ancient city, so sure enough, we found the gate and decided to take a look around. I will just go ahead and say now, that once you have seen ancient rubble, you’ve really seen all ancient rubble. It all looks exactly the same, but you’re always hoping for something more than just piles of rocks that someone says dates back to before the time of Christ. So, off in the distance we saw a building that looked more intact. According to our trusty yellow book, it said the building was an old church with carvings, so we decided to take the trek yonder. How hard could it be? Well, no one factored in that the brush we would be walking among would be more like razor sharp thorns, and we never considered the thought that this might be an area for sheep to take care of business. . .more like get rid of business. I’m not sure I have ever seen so much sheep poop. Actually, I’m not sure if I had ever seen sheep poop before this day, but I have certainly seen enough to last me a lifetime. “Look out for the sheep poop,”was a phrase the boys quickly picked up. Once you commit to something and find yourself in a ‘not so good’situation, you’re faced with a very difficult decision. Do you continue through the thorns dodging sheep paddies hoping this church is worth it, or do you turn around and go back sparing the skin you still have left on your legs (and yes, I was the only genius who didn’t wear jeans). That’s when we saw him. İt’s almost as if he was beamed down from heaven because we really have no idea where he came from. It was a Turk dressed in a sport coat and pants running through the sheep paddies frantically waving his arms around. My first thought was, “wow, we are the stupid American’s treading where we shouldn’t trod.” But as he came closer, I realized he was the tour guide of which the magic yellow book spoke. He spoke enough English and Tristan plenty of Turkish that we were able to communicate very well. He offered to show us this church and then take us up to the castle for 30 lira. We accepted and were now committed to navigating the sheep poo and thorns. Unfortunately, the church was a bunch of old rocks, however, there were a few pieces that still had the original carvings which amazes me. Knowing these rocks were carved thousands of years ago and still retain the definition they had blows my mind. Anyway, as we viewed the distance we had crossed wishing we could sprout wings and fly back, our guide shows us the path that somehow we missed. Ahhhh, a path. . .so we were the stupid Americans.

Walking back another guy approached us. . .from where, again, I have no idea. It’s like these people popped out of the ground. Anyway, he was holding some coins he had found just the day before in the rubble at that site. They had Caesar on them, and all I could think about was the coin the widow put in the box while Jesus and the disciples were watching. I wonder if it looked like this one. Wrapping your mind around the history that is at your feet is pretty hard to do.

We left the site of the city (ancient rubble), piled in the van, and drove a very short distance right into our guide’s backyard. He had ruins there, of course. In his backyard were roman baths with mosaics in the bottom that were actually in very good condition. Also in his backyard were goats, cows, chickens, and a small orange grove. The boys kept asking if we were at the zoo. After eating our packed lunches, picking a few incredibly delicious oranges, and viewing the roman baths, we were ready to hike up to the castle.

(look closely. . .Tristan is up there with a couple of cows)

Our guide was a wonderfully sweet man. My dad made the comment that he had a permanent smile etched on his face, and he was right. Not a mischievous smile, but a genuine, sweet smile. We were thankful to have him as negotiating the rocky terrain may have turned out disastrous if we had chosen the wrong path up. The boys did an amazing job climbing, and the view from the castle was beautiful. Seeing this massive structure while thinking about how in the world it was built is pretty mind blowing and impressive.

We left Anavarza exhausted and hungry and headed home. I’m sure no one had trouble sleeping that night.

Hmmm, seeing how long this one post covering two of the nine days my parents were here makes me realize I may have a slight problem with being long winded. I shall post this post and return with a more brief encounter of the rest of the week or alas, these posts may become close to a short novel. I’m sure you are all on the seat of your chair awaiting what’s next. :) Til then, don’t fall off (your chair), and remember to smile; God loves you!

I'm Back!

2008-12-14T11:38:00.000-08:00

After a month long hiatus, I am back! Whew, what a month it has been! Our stuff arriving was one of the best feelings ever although it took quite some time to figure out where in the world I was going to put half of our stuff. To be totally honest with you, we still had boxes lying around upstairs that I had not yet unpacked just a few weeks ago (a full month and a half after they arrived). Thankfully, knowing that my parents were coming the end of November was enough motivation to really find a place for everything. Since my last post:

Our family took a trip to Snake Castle where we hiked up into the ruins. The boys were troopers and did a great job climbing. We literally were on our hands and knees at some points trying to get up there.

I started homeschooling Zack through kindergarten. (He’s doing awesome by the way! He’s learning cursive and his handwriting is amazing-I shall go ahead and take full credit for that gene that was passed down). :)

(He wrote the 2nd and 4th line)

Tristan has become the full time worship leader at the chapel-something about which he is really passionate and really gifted.

We celebrated Thanksgiving with some great friends on base.

And I have found myself as the activities coordinator of the MOPs (Mother’s of Preschooler’s) program. This is the first year this program has been offered, so starting something like this from the ground up has been full of drama, stress, and satisfaction. (Not to mention slightly time consuming).

Anyway, we have had a busy month for which I’m incredibly thankful because before I knew it, my parents were a week away from arriving! Their plane came in November 30th, and they left the morning of December 10th. The time went by way too fast, but we had the best time while they were here! We did so much in those nine days that I think I’m going to post another blog filled with those Turkish times. . .so, til then. . .smile, God loves you!

And the Award Goes to. . .

2008-12-05T22:27:00.000-08:00

So, yes; I know I have justifiably deserved worst blogger of the year award. I am SO sorry to all who have been awaiting the next mind defying Turkish adventure. After our stuff arrived, my life nearly exploded trying to get every box put away along with other responsibilities in which we found ourselves apart of. I am returning; I promise! Right now, my parents are here visiting! (YAYYYYYY!) They arrived last Sunday and will go back to the States on Wednesday, so I am going to go enjoy my time with them while they are here, but I shall return!! Thanks so much for everyone who actually is interested in our lives over here!! I will write soon; til next time, Smile! God loves you!!

We're Back!

2008-11-01T05:20:00.000-07:00

Blogger is back!! Long story short - a Turkish website company became upset with google for allowing bloggers to paste their link on blogs. . .instead of insisting that those sites be banned; Turkey just banned the whole thing. Hopefully, blogspot is back for good! :) On that note, I will cut and paste the blog I began writing last week . . .

Our stuff came last Thursday! I can't even begin to describe what a relief it has been having everything. Having our own bed, couch, toys feels better than I thought. I don't think I realized how much we didn't have until it all came. The move-in day couldn't have gone better. We are so blessed to have so many friends willing to help out in any way possible. Laura (our neighbor across the street) watched all the boys in the morning when the movers took our prison furniture out, and Frank and Katie watched the little buggers all afternoon while the movers moved everything in. Laura came over to help direct the flow of traffic and the location of furniture and boxes, and Nilgun (my super sweet cleaning lady) wiped down every piece of furniture as soon as the wrapping was taken off. We have heard stories about how chaotic move-in day can be, but thankfully, our day went very smoothly. Nothing was broken except a bookshelf they dropped as they were unloading it from the truck. All in all, we made out very well. I was seriously expecting fish to come flopping out of the drawers of our furniture. . .I was sure it had fallen off a ship and had made it's new home the bottom of the Mediterranean.

(Laura & I organizing the kitchen in my fantastic pajama pants.)

Thursday night we went to Nilgun's house for dinner. She has been asking us to come to her house for some time, but Nathan has been so sick recently that it has not been possible. We didn't realize when we committed to Thursday night that Thursday would also be the day our stuff arrived. We didn't have the heart to cancel again. Nilgun stayed all day (she unpacked my entire kitchen!), and at 5:30pm we all loaded in the van and drove to her house in New Adana. Surprisingly, we made it to her house alive as we had to drive down roads that were certainly not made for cars, much less a minivan. Her family is so very sweet. They were so warm and welcoming, and they absolutely LOVED the boys. Especially Nathan. Nilgun’s husband couldn’t get enough of his cheeks. They speak hardly any English and we know very little Turkish, so we basically just stared and smiled at each other for the two hours we were there. It was a really sweet time, though,and I know Nilgun really appreciated it. She has adopted Tristan and I as her "niece and nephew."

The following weekend was spent doing some serious labor in the house. Again, our wonderful friends watched the kids, unpacked boxes, brought us breakfast. . .so nice. The weekend after that, Tristan was invited to attend a dinner in Adana with the uppity-ups of the city. We had the Turkish time of our lives! It was a fancy affair, so we all had to get dressed up. We met the other docs at the front of the base and headed off to find this restaurant downtown. I think there were twenty people at the table including the woman who owns the hospital in the city, the Turkish orthopedic surgeon for the area, some Turkish lawyers, and someone from the government (I'm sure he was very important, but I have no idea what his position was). :)

As the night wore on, the drinks kept coming, and fun became out of control. :) Turks are very passionate about their music-something we learned that night while eating. A live band accompanied our dinner, and in the midst of a nice conversation with the orthopedic surgeon's wife, she begins to bust out in her loudest Turkish voice the song the man on the guitar was singing. Wow, that doesn't happen in the States unless you're at a karaoke bar. As soon as I began to mentally question her social skills, about five other Turks from the table began to sing just as loud. Quickly, I looked around the room, and every Turk was passionately singing; or moaning, depending on how you view Turkish music. Oh, my goodness, it was so much fun. I began to wish that I was Turkish so I could sing, too. The song ended and everyone clapped for guitar man (he was actually very good). Then the girl in the red coat that had been sitting in the corner approached the stage. I noticed her earlier wondering, 'why the need for the long red coat in a restaurant,' but as soon as she took it off, I had my answer. Wondering how she zipped up her dress was the first thought that crossed my mind. The second was, 'holy cow, i hope she doesn't drop something.' I think if she sneezed, the dressed would have popped off with such force it would have landed on the other side of the room. Short? Yes. Tight? Yes isn't strong enough of a word. Anyway, when she took hold of the mic, all inhibitions in the room were lost. I'm not sure if it was the amount of Roki (the Turkish alcoholic beverage of choice) consumed at our table or the tight sequined dress up front, but soon, everyone was up dancing. It started with the lady at the end of our table-the one who owns all the hospitals in Adana-slowly rising out of her chair doing some sort of belly dancing. She made her way around the table, pulling everyone out of their chairs. Watching Americans try to dance like Turkish people is funny in and of itself, but the too tight shirted belly dancing woman made her way right over to Tristan and began to get her belly dance on. I'm not sure I've laughed so hard in my entire life. If you've read any previous posts, you may be aware that Tristan is an amazing guitar player. :) Watching him dance with a large Turkish woman wearing skin tight clothing was hysterical. We stayed at that restaurant long past midnight dancing the night away to songs we've never heard in our lives with people we've never met, but we had the best time doing it. :)

Ahh! So much has happened since I wrote this! I can hardly keep up with the pace of life, but I will be back later in the week to fill you in! Until then, keep smiling; God loves you. :)

BOOO! (and not the scary kind)

2008-10-27T04:32:00.000-07:00

I am thoroughly disappointed. Turkey has outlawed blogspot.com. Saturday night I sat down to write a post only to be encountered with a white screen and big red-lettered turkish words basically saying "This website has been banned" as of Oct. 22. BOOOO! This isn't the first time that has happened. Quite a few sites are outlawed over here (such as YouTube),but I guess it's something you have to expect in a country that doesn't really have freedom of speech. When I tried to watch some of the highlights of the olympics in August, I couldn't because it was American. I can still access the blog page through a proxy that allows me to surf the web anonymously, but I can't do anything but write. So, this post is a test to see if I can actually still post something on the blog. If so, I may continue to write without pictures, or I may transfer my page to a different site. For those of you who read this: if you could post a comment to let me know if this even went through or not, that would be great! Til I figure out what next to do, smile, God loves you!

Cappadocia & More. . .Lots More

2008-10-15T04:05:00.001-07:00

I have so much to write about, I hardly know where to begin! I know I seem to write that a lot, but life has been so much of a high speed roller coaster recently. Last week Tristan and I decided to go furniture shopping in the alley. Our stuff has still not arrived. We shipped it four months ago. Because our stuff is so late, we filed an inconvenience claim, and the company shipping our household goods responded by saying they would reimburse us 50% of the price of the furniture we buy in the meantime. We really need a desk, so we went shopping. We went to a place in the alley highly recommended by some friends, and as we walked in the store, we were greeted by a young Turkish guy. Tristan spoke a little Turkish to him, and we were then ushered to the back of the store where the office was located. We met the lady who owned the store and her husband, and the first question the woman asked Tristan was, "do you go to church every Sunday?" That completely caught us off guard. That's not a question you hear very often, much less in a country that is 99.6% Muslim. Upon arriving to Turkey, we went through a dozen briefings on safety and the 'dangers' of being too open about faith off base, so we weren't quite sure how to handle the question. She asked again, and Tristan affirmed her assumption. She then said, "I know you are a man of God. . .I could feel His power when you walked into this room." Crazy. We kind of smiled, let it go, and talked furniture for the next 30 minutes. (The furniture stores here make everything from scratch. You basically walk in with a picture of what you want from any magazine, and they will build it for a third of the price you would pay in the States). Throughout the conversation, the lady kept telling Tristan she reminded him of her very good friend named Jason. From what we could gather, he was stationed at Inçirlik a few years ago and became good friends with this Turkish family that ran the furniture store. The more she mentioned Jason's name, the more my mind kept getting pricked about something-I just couldn't place what it was. We finally finished working out a deal on our desk, but before we left, she said, "wait here. . .I have to show you Jason's picture." When she pulled up this guy's picture, it's like the floodgates in my mind were opened. In the picture, Jason was standing there with his wife Katie-I knew her name. How in the world did I know her name? I immediately asked the name of the girl in the picture, and when the lady behind the desk confirmed the name that was already in my head, a thousand miraculous puzzle pieces all fit together at once.

About a month ago, our friends who live off base informed us that a couple previously stationed at Inçirlik was going to be in town for a few weeks. They really wanted us to meet them, and the couple really wanted to meet us. That couple had shared Christ with a young man who worked in a shop in the alley and wanted someone to check on him. That couple was Jason and Katie. Unfortunately, we were never able to meet Jason and Katie. We never spoke to them on the phone, never communicated through e-mail. We learned of the Turkish guy in the alley through our friends who live off base. When I saw the picture of Jason and his wife on the computer at the furniture store, all of this came racing into my mind, and although I've never seen Jason and Katie, I knew that they were the people in the picture. I turned to Tristan and asked him, "Do you think these are the people we were supposed to meet?" Tristan's eyes got wide, and before he had a chance to respond, the woman behind the desk jumped up and said, "Are you who they sent? They said they would send someone. . .are you who they sent?" Tristan and I looked at each other with complete disbelief, "yes, we think we are." Just then, the young man who greeted us when we first arrived at the store came into the office. He looked at Tristan and said, "I knew you were the one God sent for me. When you spoke Turkish to me, I knew you were the one God sent." This was the guy. This was the guy who accepted Christ when Jason and Katie were stationed here. This was the guy they wanted someone to check on. Amazing. Absolutely amazing. The husband immediately closed down the store, and we all huddled in the back of that office and prayed. I can't even begin to describe how amazing that moment felt. It's one of those few times in your life you feel so incredibly alive, so amazed by God's power, and so humbled that He would allow you to be a part of His work. I will forever remember that moment. . .awesome. God is truly, abundantly, amazingly, indescribably awesome.

Unfortunately, after such a high we were hit with a major low. Nathan kept waking up with fevers. He's been sick for about four weeks now battling this ridiculous cold that keeps rearing its ugly head. I thought he was on his way to a complete recovery as the faucet, otherwise know as his nose, had almost completely turned off. Then Saturday hit with a mondo fever. I begged Tristan to put Nathan on an antibiotic since he had been sick for so long, and Tristan agreed. Then Sunday came with a fever, then Monday, and on Tuesday when the fever was still lingering with the antibiotics, Tristan listened to his lungs. Pneumonia. I took Nathan to the clinic that morning to get an x-ray of his chest to confirm what Tristan heard. (Anyone who has ever had to take their baby in for a chest x-ray knows how miserable it is. They have to sit in a clear tube that pins their arms above their heads while you watch them scream with a look of panic in their eyes. . .not fun.) Fortunately, the fluid that Tristan heard in his lungs didn't show up on the x-ray, but what the pediatrician did see was a larynx that was almost completely sealed shut--indicative of croup. The opening of Nathan's larynx was so small, the doctor was surprised that Nathan wasn't struggling to breathe. Upon further thought and discussion with Tristan, both doctors agreed that he had tracheal laryngeal bronchitis with an overlapping mild case of pneumonia and sinusitis. BOOO! Dr. Carpenter told me to continue with the antibiotics he was on, it just needed a little more time to do its job. Fortunately, Nathan was fever free for the next two days! We had planned a trip to Cappadocia that weekend that I was all about canceling. I was pretty intent on never leaving the house again until all of my kids were completely healthy. We found out, however, that the power in all of Adana was going to be turned off during the weekend, so I was faced with staying home without power or staying in the nicest cave hotel in Cappadocia. After many pros and cons talks with Tristan, I agreed to the cave hotel with an understanding that we would take it easy. We left early Saturday morning with another couple Wes & Misty (they have become such good friends!), their son Talan, and made the four hour trip through the mountains to Cappadocia. As usual, the drive was spectacular. The mountains were beautiful and just a foretaste of the beauty Cappadocia had to offer. No sooner had we arrived though than Nathan broke out in hives all over his body. . .and I mean all over. From the tops of his ears to the bottom of his feet, he was covered. Tristan immediately recognized it as an allergic reaction to the antibiotics he was taking. Tristan is allergic to penicillin, and I guess he has passed that on to poor Nathan. Thankfully, Nathan didn't act too bothered by it, and we were able to enjoy our trip.

Cappadocia is an amazing city where people lived in homes carved out of the rocks. It's unlike anything I've ever seen before. . .part of Star Wars was filmed out there. Being in a place that was built thousands of years ago is so surreal. I think I'm going to let the pictures do the talking because I don't think my words will be able to do it justice.

We drove up early Saturday afternoon, and after checking into our hotel room, we spent some time driving around the area. We stopped and explored a few caves on the sides of the roads, but other than that, we took it pretty easy.

The rock behind us is called Camel Rock for obvious reasons. :)

A trip in Turkey isn't complete without seeing herds of roaming animals.

The boys had so much fun playing in the caves!

The place where we stayed was an old cave home restored and refurbished. Our family stayed in the honeymoon sweet; it was SO nice! Our "room"consisted of three rooms: a cave kitchen, a living area with a little cave cubbie hole where the boys slept, and the master bedroom. Past the master was a little hallway that led to the gigantic cave bathroom. The room in which we stayed is pictured in all its glory at http://www.esbelli.com/ if you have time to check it out. It's worth it! Staying in a cave that was built thousands of years ago was crazy!!! We stayed in a place two THOUSAND years old!! Definitely an experience of a lifetime. The following are pictures we took at the 'hotel.'

(Nathan was taking a nap when this was taken.)

The cave cubby hole the boys slept in.

Sunday morning, we woke up and ate a 'cooked to order' breakfast out on the terrace overlooking Cappadocia. While eating, someone working at the hotel informed Tristan he had a phone call. The caller was a friend from base who also made the trip to Cappadocia for the weekend. They had been trying to get ahold of us via cell phone but were unsuccessful. In passing, they mentioned to the manager of their hotel that they were looking for some friends, and their manager mentioned that he saw an American looking van parked at a hotel down the street. Sure enough, it was our van! To appreciate this you have to realize that the area of Cappadocia is huge! I think it is made up of four different cities, so the fact that they found us was pretty incredible. Anyway, they invited us to a secret church to have a mini service with some others that were also in town visiting. It was pretty amazing. . .again, this church was built thousands of years ago. Knowing we were in a place that Christians over a thousand years ago worshiped was awesome. We sang some songs and had some prayer time. A refugee from Iraq and a guy from Greece were with us, and hearing them pray in their languages was so neat. The whole experience was just awesome.

After "church" we headed to the Goremé Open Air Museum and toured some more cave homes and old churches. On our way back home we stopped to tour an underground city. Thousands of years ago, when the Christians were being heavily persecuted, they built cities underground consisting of hundreds of rooms connected by a labyrinth of tunnels. All my boys were asleep when we got there, and Tristan was so sweet to let me tour the city with Wes and Misty while he stayed in the car with the kids. We didn't stay 'underground' for long, but what we were able to see was fascinating. It's amazing to think that people lived that way for the majority of their lives! Most of the tunnels were so small you couldn't stand up straight to walk through them! After re submerging from the depths of earth, we headed home.

Oh, my goodness, this was a long post! Thanks for reading! I'm off to unpack some boxes, (Yes, our stuff came on Thursday-2 months late, but who's counting.) :) but I will leave you with Zack on a camel. . .something he's been talking about doing since we found out we were coming to Turkey.

Smile! God loves you! :)

Dans Ediyor

2008-10-02T04:55:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, Tristan, I, and the boys headed up to a resort called Pine Park about 3 hours away. It was beautiful. That is one thing Turkey can absolutely boast in-amazing scenery. We arrived early Saturday afternoon and met our friends, Jake & Rana. Jake is from the States, Rana is from Turkey, and they have a beautiful little boy Aksel. They are our true "Turkish" friends who live in Adana. :) Anyway, after we arrived, we headed down to the beach so Tristan could do a little kiteboarding, then the boys and I headed to the pool. So nice, but SOOO COLD!! I'm fairly certain the water temperature was just above freezing. We obviously didn't swim very long. After dinner we put all the kids down to bed and did a little babysit swapping. Jake and Rana enjoyed a little grown-up time while Tristan and I stayed back at the villa, then we swapped. Tristan and I decided to take a kid-less stroll down to the beach, and on our way, we were abducted by the Turkish dancing mafia. I guess a Turkish resort is not complete without a Turkish disco tech, and lucky for us, we unknowingly passed right through the Pine Park dance floor. Before we knew what was happening, we were shoulder to shoulder with at least ten other Turks doing some form of a Turkish line dance. I'm not sure the last time I laughed so hard. To say the music was loud is a severe understatement. To say the music sounded like anything you've ever heard--hmmm, that's not close to being a fact either. It's like super hip "bring a cobra up out of the basket" music to which you dance. So, we were arm in arm dancing away to cobra music turned techno. :) Fortunately for me, I am one coordinated mama and caught on fairly quickly. Fortunately for Tristan, he is really good at the guitar. :) I was warned to not post any negative comments about his dancing capabilities. :)

Still no word on our stuff. The Turks are celebrating one of their biggest holidays of the year right now (the week after breaking their fast of Ramadan), so we aren't expecting to hear anything until after the 7th. I am reminded constantly though, that God does not give us more than we can handle.

Just today I was faced with some harsh realities of this world, and although these are thoughts I would normally take to the pages of my journal, I shall blog about them instead. I have a friend who is in the midst of a nightmare she may never fully wake from. . .however, she is approaching it with such grace, faith, and steadfastness, it forces me to ask myself if I would be able to respond the same way. Would I trust Him? Would I embrace the trials and sufferings trusting that they are producing in me fruit that will last through eternity? I believe I can say Yes. . .a resounding yes! Not because I have the strength to do so, but because He does. Yes, because He lives in me, and He cannot be unfaithful to Himself. and Yes, that puts my "lack of stuff" issues into a very clear perspective. May we know and trust that He who begins a good work in us will not stop until it is completed. If God is for us, who can be against us? On that note; smile; He loves you.

Burn, baby, Burn

2008-09-26T04:46:00.000-07:00

Whew, what a week! Life is happening so fast right now, and I'm not complaining. I think that's a good sign. . .if life were creeping by, I'm not sure how long I would remain positive about living in a country that is burning away my lung tissue! Seriously, if you're not around people who smoke (which is everyone), you're just around smoke because they burn EVERYTHING! Anyway, last week, Tristan took me out for my birthday (over a month late, but this was the first weekend we felt good enough to go). We went to a place called sato (pronounced Chateaux), and it was excellent! The food is more Americanized, and although we do like Turkish food, it was nice to be eating something more familiar. We went to Karatas again over the weekend and swam with some of Turkey's finest trash; literally. Turkey really doesn't have the same standards of cleanliness that we are used to, and by the end of the summer, it shows. All the trash left over by a summer's worth of beach goers ends up in the ocean, and it's pretty gross. Needless to say, I think that was our last beach trip until next summer rolls around.

On our way home from Karatas, we stopped to watch a herd of sheep be shepherded across the road. It was so surreal, kind of like I jumped back a thousand years. The shepherdess led them to the edge of a cliff where they stopped to graze while looking out over the Mediterranean. Tristan and I were pretty captivated by it all until we realized that sheep do not travel alone. Once the realization hit that that humming sound was the army of flies coming for our open windowed vehicle, our nostalgia quickly passed and turned into a frantic race to get the auto windows shut faster than the flies could fly. Funny how we think if we press the button harder, the window will roll up faster.

Tristan, unfortunately, came down with another Turkish bug of death, but it passed in time for us to celebrate his birthday on Tuesday. We didn't make plans to go out because I started feeling pretty rotten myself. (Thankfully, I didn't get sick!) We did go out last night with Frank and Katie to an amazing Turkish restaurant in new Adana though. Adana is separated into old and new, with new Adana feeling much more European. For about two blocks, you can find just about any designer store you can think of, and being in a more modern area was really nice. . .well, it was almost a relief. Being in Turkey has been awesome, but going off base can be incredibly exhausting. Your brain is always on overload as you're trying to utilize the little Turkish that you know while you are being followed by every child in the village wanting money along with the insane amount of stray dogs that must be nursing at least 1000 puppies while the women give you dirty looks because you're not wearing a burka. It's a complete sensory overload. Being in a more modern, Westernized place was a really nice change of pace. There was not a pair of Turkish pants to be spotted, and I don't think I saw even one girl wearing just a head covering. Blending in a little more was just a fresh breath of air (even though it wasn't because, like I said, everyone smokes).

We still haven't heard anything about when our stuff will get here. We did find out that our crates arrived at Izmere (the army base on the Western side of Turkey), but the crane there was broken, so they just sent it back out to sea. It was supposed to return September 17th, but it didn't, and no word has surfaced on it's whereabouts. ughh. I'm really not concerned about our stuff; I don't even think I'd be too upset if it was at the bottom of the sea. . .it's just the feeling of being settled that I want. I'll keep you updated whenever we hear something!!

We're planning on taking a trip to the foothills this weekend. It should be beautiful, so I'll take lots of pictures! Hope everyone reading is doing well! 'Til next time, smile; God loves you! :)

Ewww, ewwwww, and one more ewwww

2008-09-14T09:19:00.000-07:00

I had my first encounter with a Turkish roach this weekend, and I have been left extremely traumatized. I was getting cups for the boys out of the cabinet, and that's when I saw it. Actually, I heard it before I saw it. . .that's how big it was. It was hangıng upsıde down crawlıng on the undersıde of the top shelf. Ewww, I get the heebie-jeebies just thinking about it. It was HUGE, and just to let the fact be known, I have lived in both Florida and Savannah, so I have seen my fair share of mondo roaches. Natural to my girl nature, I threw the cup across the kitchen and ran into the living room (which is really only about two steps away from the kitchen, but it somehow felt safer.) I'm not sure why roaches are so gross or why I am so terrified of them. Put me against any other insect, and I will certainly stand my ground and conquer whatever lies before me, but roaches. . .no way. Yuck, Yuck, Yuck. I finally gathered some courage to go back into the kitchen to close the cabinet door, hopeful that I could at least keep it contained in an area until Tristan came home. My brave husband did come home and inspect the cabinet, but found no creepy, large bug which is worse than actually finding one. Now I know it's somewhere in the house, and it's just a matter of time before it grosses me out again. I was on severe roach guard for the rest of the night. . .inspecting every drawer before I put my hand inside, looking inside the toilet paper roll, just to make sure it wasn't curled up inside. I didn't even set foot in the kitchen the rest of the night. Extreme, you say? You didn't see the size of this thing.

Sunday afternoon rolls around, and it's lunch time. I made Tristan open "the cabinet" anytime we needed something for the boys, and lunch time was no exception. I asked him to grab two plates for me, and with eyes rolled, he opens the door and pulls down two plates. That's when I saw it again. . .squeezed between the two plates with it's antennae slithering around. I screamed which made Tristan jump which sent the plates flying across the kitchen. Roach on the lose!!! EWWWWWW! I promise you that thing could run faster than me, and before we knew it, it had slithered under the counter top and into the labyrinth of cracks that run throughout our kitchen. Ew, ew, eewww!! I grabbed the Raid can, and told Tristan to start spraying. . .I would disinfect everything later. He did and minutes later it came crawling out from under the dish washer. I think it was his victory lap. He showed his slimy, creepy, super gross self one last time before he slipped away back under the cabinets. That roach has left me in a complete state of roach-a-phobia, and I'm not quite sure when I'll actually be able to open a cabinet again without all the hairs on my body standing on end. I know he's here, and the next time we meet, I will be ready. I will boldly carry my can of Raid with me from now until he moves his last. Don't kid yourself, roach, I have the bright red "Kills on Contact" bottle; I will use it immediately, and I will over spray.

'Til next time, Smile; God loves you!

Time flies when you're so busy!

2008-09-07T03:22:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it's almost been two weeks since my last post! Time has flown by recently as our schedules seem to be piling up! Last weekend was a blast. We had made plans to go out to eat Friday night with Frank and Katie, but our babysitter fell through, and upon further thought, we realized that Ramadan began last Monday. Those participating cannot eat or drink anything (not even water!) until sundown, so all the restaurants are pretty crazy at night. It probably worked out best that we stayed home. Anyway, Frank and Katie cooked an amazing meal for us, and brought it over. After eating, another couple Angie & Sean came over to play games. (Angie is a family practice doctor who works with Tristan.) We had SO much fun and ate enough brownies and ice cream to make us sick. Saturday, we drove down to Karatas (pronounced Karatash), a beach town about 50 minutes away, where Tristan kiteboarded most of the afternoon.

We had the beach literally to ourselves except for one Turkish family who immediately latched themselves onto us when they saw we had three kids. Saying "Turks love kids" is quite the understatement. Zack, Micah, and Nathan have gotten pretty used to being whisked away by complete strangers although the older two are more hesitant. There's a lot of cheek pinching and kissing going on with lots of high pitched Turkish words. (We've heard that Turks believe it's good luck to kiss blond headed babies, so needless to say, the boys get a lot of attention and a lot of kisses.)

Everybody asks if I'm uncomfortable with random people coming up and touching the kids, but it's something you get used to really quickly. The Turkish children are actually more aggressive than adults with the kids, so whenever a lot of Turkish kids are around, I put my guard up. Anyway, the Turkish family at the beach was very nice. They knew a little English, and we know a little Turkish, but mostly, it was a huge game of charades. At one point the oldest girls were trying to tell me they had a pet turtle, but all they could remember to say was "frog house back." After watching an imitation of a slow moving turtle, I got the picture. :) They ended up inviting us over to their house for dinner this weekend, but Tristan is on call and is not permitted to leave base. I'm part relieved although I'm sure the dinner would have been fine. Being so friendly and hospitable is such a part of the Turkish culture; I am still just very cautious of many things and still a little intimidated by the language barrier.

Last Sunday, Tristan led worship for the chapel. He did such an incredible job. . .that's where his heart is, and it shows. I can't say enough how much we love our church. The chaplain and his wife are wonderful, amazing people, and I am so excited to be a part of what they're doing.

As far as an update on our stuff goes, still no word. I was reminded the other day that God only gives us what we need, and for now, my needs are met; for that I am thankful. I'm just SO glad we shipped so much stuff in our first shipment that arrived to Turkey a week after we did!

That's all I've got for now! Until the next amazing Turkish adventure. . .keep smiling; God loves you. :)

Crazy

2008-09-01T05:11:00.000-07:00

So, I'm crazy. We went camping. It was an amazing, crazy, wonderful, frustrating time; and I am so glad we went. We piled ten people in two cars with three tents, two coolers, a grill, pack-n-play, kiddie potty, and enough food to last us a week rather than one night. Throughout the week Katie & Frank (our friends from church) kept mentioning camping, and I finally gave in. They are newly married, love kids, and weren't bothered in the least by the possibility that we may all be up all night long with the large potential of wailing and gnashing of teeth. The other couple Eric & Lauren felt the same way. Knowing that we had some kid friendly people inviting us along who also knew what they were getting themselves into helped push me over the edge.

The drive was just as amazing as the place where we camped. It was three and a half hours away, but the view was absolutely spectacular. We drove past Tarsus, a few castles, and the last hour was through the foothills of the mountains along the coast. I wish the pictures did the view justice! Around every corner was another "ooohhh" or "ahhhh." Around every corner was also another "HOLY COW!!" or "TRISTAN, WATCH THE ROAD!!!" The road was SO narrow, and there weren't very many guard rails along the side which was an almost ninety degree drop off into the ocean. Not much room for error. (In Tristan's defense, he did an amazing job driving!) I couldn't believe how fast people were going, especially around the turns. Huge trucks would pass another huge truck around blind corners just laying on the horn to warn people coming from the other direction. Craziness. . .that's what it was. Anyway, we safely arrived at our campsite, and it was breath taking.

Campsite doesn't really describe the place accurately. It was just a spot on the beach where we camped. No one else was there; just us, the cliffs, the beach, and the Mediterranean. . .beautiful. Instead of shells, there were smooth rocks of all different sizes and colors. Instead of sand dunes, flowers.

We set up camp while the boys played in the water; then it was time for dinner. This is where the dreamlike idea of camping on the beach meets sand; a harsh reality. There was a bus station close to where we pulled off the road that had bathrooms and showers, but "lucky for us," the shower wasn't working that night. All of you who have children know that kids who play on the beach get sand in places you hardly knew existed. We had three little men covered in sand who ended up getting rinsed off in the front of the mosque reserved for those who have finished worshiping to wash their arms. We were a sight to behold. Three American girls with a screaming baby trying to rinse him under the freezing cold water coming from a faucet in the "lobby" of the mosque. Whether we were supposed to wash them there or not, I have no idea. We were ushered there by a large Turkish woman wearing a full on burka who was spouting a lot of stuff off to us in Turkish that I had no chance of understanding. Maybe she was telling us we should pray for mercy for this poor sand-covered child or maybe she was telling us to wash the baby. Either way, we washed the baby. After a grueling "bath" for the kiddos, we headed back down to the campsite to eat. Nathan went down in a pack-n-play in the tent surprisingly well while the rest of us chowed down on hot dogs and bratwursts. We kept Zack and Micah up with us while we roasted smores, and when they were good and tired, we all went to join Nathan in the tent.

This is where I write about how hot it is inside a tent in the summer in Turkey. This is also where I write about how it feels to be sticky, sandy, and hot inside a tent lying next to two sticky, sandy, and hot little boys. Now would also be a good time to mention the fact that among all the things that I did pack, I did not include pillows or covers. It is also appropriate to mention the high beam stadium lighting from the bus stop that lit up our tent as light as day. So, here I am in a four man tent, lying on the floor with Zack and Micah next to Nathan's pack-n-play (Tristan opted to sleep outside), trying to keep them quiet in fear they will wake the baby, with a high powered beam keeping us all from sleep. Thankfully and amazingly the boys fell asleep without too much of a problem; Tristan joined us some time in the night because the wind picked up outside; and sometime later, Nathan awoke and began barking like a dog-his most favorite noise in the world to make. I was sure that if I just ignored him, he would eventually lay down and go to sleep, but courtesy of the interrogation lighting, I'm sure he thought it was time to get up. Within a few minutes, everyone was awake, and we had a 3:30am party. The boys thought Nathan was hilarious, and Tristan thought that if we just took Nathan out of his pack-n-play, he would crawl around the tent and just fall asleep. Nathan did crawl. . .all over our faces, the boys, the food. . .and all you moms know, he did not lie down and go back to sleep. Tristan put him back in his pack-n-play which began the anticipated chorus of wailing and gnashing of teeth. Finally at 5am, we decided to pack up and head out. Many times in those few hours Nathan would be so close to falling back asleep, but one of the boys would laugh or cough or say something about how loud the waves were. I would love to say that we fell asleep and awoke to the sound of the waves crashing on the shore, but that is not reality when you take three kids four and under camping in a 4 person tent. I will say though that it was worth the experience. We left around 6 am apologizing profusely for the many interruptions throughout the night, but everyone was so nice and understanding. The boys slept almost the whole way home while I kept Tristan awake by hitting the back of his head at random times (by his request).

So, crazy? yes. Would I do it again? Absolutely. :) Fortunately, when we got home we all slept for about four hours, and because today is a holiday, we have one more day to recuperate before the week begins.

If you've read this far, thanks! I know this was a long post. I hope you all had a wonderful Labor Day weekend, and to all my friends in New Orleans; we're praying for you and your homes!! We're off for an evening family walk, but I will leave you with some more pictures of the weekend. Until next time, smile; God loves you!

(For those of you actually doing the math and wondering who the tenth person was-she's a girl who has just been stationed at Turkey and arrived the night before we left-Frank and Katie are her sponsors, so she tagged along!) :)

Tired of Being Tired

2008-08-27T03:37:00.000-07:00

Another week rolls by and with it comes another virus. Thankfully, I am the only one who has been affected by it. . .the kids are great, Tristan is great; it's just me. A lot of people I've talked to that have been here longer than I say that this seems to happen to a lot. I guess my body's just trying to build up immunities to all the new germs over here. I'm hoping I've caught the last germ. I am just totally wiped out everyday, so I'm looking forward to feeling better.

Tristan was on call over the weekend which means he can't leave base. I'm secretly thankful for this as we will be forced to do nothing every third weekend. Tristan is the extreme optimist wanting to go everywhere and do everything while I am the extreme realist (read party pooper) and enjoy spending some quality, do-nothing time around the house. We spent our time at the pool on base; browsed the BX more than once looking for things we know they don't have but thinking that if we just go back one more time, we might find it; and took lots of naps. Poor Tristan was called in every day and every night, so he was pretty exhausted by the end of the weekend.

Because Tristan was glued to base, he is already making big plans for this upcoming weekend. He's ready to scale Mt. Arat and swim across the Mediterranean at this point. We have some friends we met at church that are going camping this weekend, but for some reason, camping in the summer heat with three small kids doesn't sound all too appealing right now. Call me crazy. It's pretty amazing though that anything we do involves an amazing history lesson. Just within thirty minutes of where we live is the oldest working bridge in the world, three castles built in or around 400AD, Tarsus-Paul's hometown, and the King's Highway-the road Paul traveled during his ministry and the road off of which we live. It's pretty surreal when I think about it. I'll let you know where we decided to go, and I promise I'll post pictures!

Our stuff is still not here; they actually have no idea where it is right now-they've been trying to track it for the past week with no success. Ah, the joys of moving overseas. I'm off to nap away this cold; I shall return with the story of our adventure from the weekend (whatever that may be). 'Til then; smile, God loves you!! (Seriously, that is something to smile about.)

Bippity-boppity-boo

2008-08-21T04:44:00.001-07:00

As I am typing this blog, a wonderful Turkish lady is cleaning my entire house. Let the "Hallelujah" chorus begin. I have been so tempted to bust out the "Bippity-Boppity-Boo" song that Cinderella's fairy Godmother sings so many times today because that's exactly what it feels like. I am on the computer right now as my house is getting immaculately cleaned. . .bippity-boppity-boo. Sing it with me now; I know you all know it. :) Well, actually, that's the only part I know, but you get the point. Her name is Nilgun (pronounced Nil-goon), and she started at 8 o'clock this morning and hasn't slowed down. Not only has she cleaned bathrooms, floors, counter tops, but she has also pulled everything off of my shelves to wipe them down. She scrubbed my stairs with a sponge. She changed all the sheets on every bed in the house (including Nathan's crib). She pulled the stove out from the wall to mop behind it. She cleaned out the oven AND the toaster oven. She even mopped the floors inside all my closets. And just now she started a load of laundry. All this and more for 40 dollars a week! It almost feels wrong.

Before coming to Turkey, we probably heard more about how wonderful having a maid and a gardener is than anything else. Right now, I have to agree. Just about everyone on base has one, and fortunately for me, I was recommended a wonderful lady by Linda. Many people go through a few before finding one who does the job well. Amazingly enough, the money that the maids/gardeners make on base makes them very well off in the economy, so many workers vie for the job. I am so fortunate to have found a wonderful lady from the get-go. She speaks just enough English to communicate, but I'm anxious to learn more Turkish and am glad she only knows as much English as she does. It will force me to become better at their language. Having her come today was very strange at first. . .I am one of those who wants to clean before she gets here, but I think I am already cured of that. :) I just can't put into words how wonderful it is to be able to spend all day with the kiddos not worrying about when that toilet is going to get scrubbed.

Our stuff has stilled not arrived, and we have no word on when it will get here. 'Til then, I will enjoy my super clean house. I'm out, but 'bippity-boppity-boo' and God loves you, too. :)

All in a Day's Work

2008-08-19T03:46:00.000-07:00

I knew it was bound to happen. With three boys around the house, I'm surprised it took this long, but Nathan got his finger slammed in the door this morning. Zack was going to the bathroom, and Micah decided to shut the door to give him privacy not realizing that Nathan had his hand in the hinge of the door. Micah does nothing gently or slowly, so before I knew what was going on, I heard a blood piercing scream from Nathan. I pulled his hand out of the hinge and his pinkie finger was blood red and completely crooked. It looked like the letter "Z", and I was sure it was broken. I called Tristan immediately, and he, of course, told me to bring him in. I put a Praise Baby video on for the boys and ran upstairs to get dressed. While upstairs I heard Nathan and thought, "wow, the sound in this house really carries; it sounds like he's right around the corner." As soon as that went through my mind, Nathan waddles into my room. So much for the baby gate. Thank the Lord he didn't fall! Our stairs couldn't be more deadly (or ugly for that matter.) They are made of concrete and covered in painted speckles, an attempt to match the speckled cafeteria tile we have running throughout the rest of the house. After getting the kids dressed, we were off to the doctor's with a severe lecture about doors on the way. Miraculously, Nathan's finger is not broken. Thank the Lord, again! The pediatrician (who is also our sponsor and whose wife has been too wonderful for words) said that it will obviously bruise very badly, but because he's so young, there's nothing more to do. If he was a little older, he would have "buddy taped" it to the next finger but nothing more. Thankfully, kids bounce back so quickly. I left the doctor's very reassured, put on my superwoman cape, and braved the commissary with all the kiddos. (It's amazing what we're capable of when there is no milk in the house.)

My day quickly turned a corner when I discovered I had a package waiting for me at the post office. . .my flavia. :) I have been living without coffee for over a month now. I have no coffee pot, only a flavia machine - a drink maker that only brews one cup of coffee at a time, and although I love it, it only takes packages that can only be purchased on the Internet. My whole life I always told myself I would never allow coffee to become such a wonderful part of my day, but that was obviously before three kids and a move to Turkey. I now have enough flavia packets to last me the next six months, and I can't tell you how excited I am about tomorrow morning. :)

Tonight I am headed to Linda's house to do a little scrapbooking. (Linda is the pediatrician's wife, and as I said before, is wonderful!). I thought I was into the hobby, but I have never seen someone with so much scrapbook stuff so organized. She has a scrapbook room that could really be a scrapbook store. Anyway, it should be a nice time and a good way to meet some other girls on base.

Our stuff didn't arrive today, so now we begin the process of tracking it down. We've heard horror stories of people who have waited over four months. Hopefully, that won't be us. I'll let you know when our stuff arrives! 'Til then; keep smilin; God loves you.

The Lake

2008-08-17T05:36:00.000-07:00

I'm sitting down ready to write this blog, but I have no idea where to begin. So much seems to happen in one day that one week feels more like one month. Last Sunday was my birthday! Tristan came down with a stomach bug two days before and wasn't able to do anything but lay on the couch, but he still made my day special. :) Although he felt miserable, he still baked a cake (spice cake, my favorite), and took our family for a drive into Adana-the 5th largest city in Turkey about 15 minutes from base.

A drive off base is more like a high stress thrill ride. There are no lanes, and even if some do exist, they are ignored. I think completely ignored would describe it better. Everyone drives super fast, and everyone honks all the time. They honk to say hello. They honk to say move. They honk to tell you the light is green even after you've started moving. They honk just to hear themselves honk. It is the language of the road. I'm amazed there aren't more accidents. Not only is the road full of honkers, the cars are filled with an insane number of people. Cars here are very expensive, so everyone just piles into one. Tiny cars are filled with 8 to 10 people with babies in the laps of their mothers. Often we'll see motorcycles or scooters with a man driving, a young child sitting between him and the handlebars, a young child sitting behind the man with a woman on the back holding a baby. It's crazy! Needless to say, we had a briefing on driving within the first few days we arrived. "Check your mirrors every 2 seconds" is the rule we walked away with; you never know if a bus, a loaded scooter, or the occasional donkey will be behind you.

All that being said, we made our way through Adana and found the lake that everyone had been telling us about. It is beautiful!! Restaurants that are rumored to be very good are lined up along the edge of the street, and across the lake you can see the vacation homes. It'll be such a nice place to go once the weather cools off. The summer months are just so hot, so we enjoyed the view from our nice air-conditioned fiat.

The rest of the week rolled by. Tristan began work on Monday. I began to get into a routine with the boys. Then Thursday hit, and I came down with the stomach bug from Hades. I wasn't able to keep anything down, and by the time Tristan came home from work, I was lying on the bathroom floor unable to move. He then took me into the hospital to receive an I.V. Wearing my pajamas and smelling like throw up wasn't quite the way I wanted to meet all his coworkers, but so goes life. :) Thankfully, Tristan had Friday off, so he's been taking complete care of the kids for the past 3 days. I am feeling much better today; hopefully by tomorrow I will be ready to be back in the full swing of things!

We are about to leave for church, but I will leave you with some pictures of Tristan's field trip to Snake Castle with the boys on Friday! Our furniture is supposed to come tomorrow, so keep your fingers crossed with me! Until next time, keep smiling; God loves you!!

We're Here! Finally :)

2008-08-09T10:46:00.000-07:00

We're here! What a crazy month it has been, but we are here and are in the process of getting settled. So much has happened in these past few weeks that this post has the potential to be ridiculously long, so I will try to highlight certain parts hoping that I don't become too long winded (something I seem to come by naturally at times as I am my granddaddy's granddaughter.)

We left Auburndale with our car completely packed out. Never again do I want to travel with so much stuff in one car. We made it to Savannah in one piece though and had a great time at my grandmother's house. Tristan took his medical boards the day after we arrived, and on July 23rd we celebrated Micah's 3rd birthday (one day early) complete with a Thomas cake and birthday hats. We spent the rest of that night wondering how in the world were we going to get everything we had with us to Turkey. July 24th we headed out! For all those who were concerned, Micah started feeling much better, and we traveled with three healthy little boys! Thanks for all the prayers! The kids did great! We had a connection in Charlotte, NC, and then boarded a bigger plane headed to Frankfurt, Germany. Zack and Micah could hardly contain themselves as each seat had its very own TV screen. Unfortunately, those TV screens didn't work, but we had a portable DVD player that served it's purpose well. The older boys watched Cars and then fell right asleep while Nathan snoozed next to Tristan. We couldn't have asked for anything better. We landed in Frankfurt where we boarded another plane that took us to Nurmburg, Germany, where Tristan's friend Justin picked us up. It was a long day to say the least, but it went very well.

Germany was beautiful! Justin, who is stationed over there with the army, & Kelly have a really nice place and did a great job showing us around in the short time we were there.

We spent a day at a small German town's one thousand year festival,

spent an afternoon at a park,
and took a train to Nurmburg.

Nurmburg was really nice. We toured some cathedrals and walked up to the castle that overlooked the city. It was a whirlwind of a trip, but we had a great time seeing the sights and visiting with Justin and Kelly. We left Germany July 29th and headed on to Adana.

The trip to Adana took 12 hours: a one hour ride from Justin's house to the airport where we waited another 2, a 4 hour flight to Istanbul, a 3 hour wait for our connection, and an hour and a half flight from Istanbul to Adana. We arrived at 10pm Adana time and were absolutely exhausted. Unfortunately, our trip to Germany didn't allow us much time to acclimate ourselves to the time change, so we were all walking zombies. Our sponsor from base picked us up, and by 1:30am we were in our beds with our 9 checked bags and 5 carry-ons sprawled on the floor of the TLF (Temporary Living Facility.)

After just 3 days in the TLF, we moved into our new home! It's a 2-story, 3 bedroom, and other than the fact that the floors look like a middle school cafeteria, it is perfect for our family. Our backyard backs up to the biggest playground on base, and we have two huge trees that keep our yard shaded all day long-something to covet over here as the days are long and very hot. I love the housing area here at Incirlik. It's got a great community feel to it; actually, I kind of feel like I'm back at college. The base is very small; everyone walks everywhere. The chapel is a five minute walk from the house, the grocery store just ten minutes away on foot. Because the base is so small, faces become familiar very quickly. Tristan hasn't even started working yet, but most people we see on walks in the neighborhood already know he's the new family practice guy and refer to him as "Doc." They have everything we need on base-a movie theater, bowling alley, commissary, BX, thrift store, coffee shop, burger king, and a pizza hut. :) We moved into the house on a Thursday, and the next Monday our small shipment arrived. Fortunately, vacation bible school started that day as well, so we were able to send Zack and Micah off in the mornings while we got a lot of unpacking done. After about two days of serious unpacking, we took a break to find some carpets to cover our lovely speckled floors.

Buying carpets in Turkey is more of an experience than just a shopping trip. The store owners treat you as if you are a guest in their home rather than a customer in their store. We went to a place that had been recommended by many, and we were not dissappointed. They rolled out tons and tons of carpets for us, explaining the different patterns, fibers, quality. We drank hot apple tea (very popular here in the HOT summer) and visited with the workers in the store (if you are there less than an hour-I think they would be offended.) After deciding on our carpets (8 big ones for 600 bucks), the owner took us upstairs to the handmade ones that run in the thousands of dollars. They are really beautiful, and after learning about the histories and from where each design originates, I have a new respect for carpets. :) As we were about to leave, the carpet man ushered our family to a couch and sent someone off to buy us lunch. The whole afternoon was really a great experience. Turkish people really have an incredible culture.

I have so much more I could write about-our trip to Karatas, our experience at the fruit market, just driving around Turkey is an experience in and of itself, but in fear that this post is becoming way too long, i'll cut it short! I promise I will update this blog more frequently now that we have the internet at the house. For now, I'm out, but remember to keep smiling; God loves you.

6 days out

2008-07-18T12:55:00.000-07:00

I have finally succumbed to the peer pressure of starting a blog. Everyone is right. . .blogging is a great way to let others know what is going on in your life. Today is July 18th. . .in 6 days we (Tristan (my husband), Zack (my 4 yr old), Micah (my almost 3 yr old), Nathan (my 13 month old), and I) will board a plane and head to our new life in Turkey. I think even the thought of that is so surreal to me right now. I keep saying that life is happening way too fast for my emotions. The past few months have been an absolute whirlwind. From passports to psychiatric evaluations to renting our house to organizing everything we own into three different shipments to Tristan graduating from residency--life has been happening fast. Thankfully, we've had amazing support from our family. My mom has flown in to the rescue on more than one occasion, and this past week both she and my dad took on the mondo task of watching our three boys while Tristan and I chased some much needed R&R on a cruise. (which, by the way, was a blast.) :) Unfortunately, we came home to three sick kiddos with one (Micah) having pneumonia. ugh. . .nothing like a hard hit back to real life. I have no idea what we will do if Micah doesn't start getting better in these next few days. The thought of Tristan going ahead while I stay back and wait for him to get better is not appealing--I am already anxious about taking all three kids on the plane with both of us; I cannot imagine doing it by myself. (props to my girl Alicia who took two kiddos to Europe solo.) I really don't think that's a possibility though since Tristan misses me when I go to the grocery store. :) I guess time will tell.

Tomorrow I'm hoping to spend some time with my brother and his wife, then we are off to visit my grandmother in Savannah. If you've never met her, you really should--she is the sweetest, most wonderful 90 year old you will ever meet. :) We fly out on Micah's third birthday (if he's pneumonia free-poor little guy) and head to Germany to spend a few days with some good friends. Tristan reports to the base in Turkey on July 29th!

I'm not sure how much computer access I will have between now and then, but when I get settled in Turkey, I am hoping to update this blog once every few weeks. It's exciting to think about what God has in store for us over there--as a wise woman told me--"you are being sent there for a reason; keep your eyes open so you don't miss why."

Until next time. . .keep smilin'; God loves you. :)