The Crash

With writing these weekly updates we hope to keep our relationship with you informed and moving forward together. So our goal is to be able to sit down at the end of the week and just write a bit on the highlights both good's, bad's and everywhere in-between!

What's "The Crash" that we are talking about you might be thinking? Well, praise the Lord we're not talking about a 'real' crash between cars & motorcycles with us! We are however talking about theemotional crash that we noticed happened this week. With all the unpacking, cleaning, organizing, socializing, prioritizing, taking care of the girls, school, visa work, tax work, it's been a LONG-LONG-LONG week! There was a day where seemingly out of no where we just felt exhausted, tired, cracky, & moody! It was then that we realized that the excitement & adrenaline from packing, plane rides, and arriving on the field had finally wore off! But noticing the problem is 1/2 the battle they say. So Ruth and I have been extra vigilant in watching our mood/attitude and communication to each other and with our girls while trying to make sure we get much needed sleep during this time in our lives! Our unpacking in general is going fairly well. We have the big things pretty much set up and now we just have stacks of boxes/bins with piles of papers and things in each room waiting for us to buy furniture so we can put them away (upper left photo). Please be praying for us during this time that we'll be able to finish unpacking and settle in soon. Also please be praying for Chloe, Gwen & Addie with regards to sleeping through the night. Addie has ALWAYS been a bad sleeper and Gwen has been having some hard nights as well.

Another story Ruth and I wanted to share with you to help explain life being different here is how we finally 'got on the internet' in our new house! When we first arrived our missionary friends said "Here is your new place and we already went ahead and contacted the internet company and paid the bill for you (charged our mission account for us) so you SHOULD be 'all set' with emailing and updating family and friends". Sounds great right?! That's what we thought too! :) So I then went and hooked everything up and the internet wasn't working…. Huh, so I called the phone company and they sent a guy out to check on it and he said the phone line was dead. The next day a man from the phone company come and installed new phone lines (gave me a bill…). I then of course tried to connect to the internet but still no luck! I called the phone company back and the next day they sent a man over and he told me the outlets in my office were all DEAD! Man! Thinking this whole thing a bit funny at this point I called a handy man over and he found a neutral (white) wire loose up in the attic (I fell through the attic last year- try to stay out now…) and fixed it for me (gave me a bill…). I then of course (you know where this is going…) tried to connect to the internet but STILL NO LUCK! I call the phone company (feeling pretty stupid at this point) and told them that my internet still wasn't working and PLEASE send a man out again to check it out. After the weekend goes by the phone man comes out and tells me that my modem is malfunctioning and he will come by tomorrow to replace it. The next day he returns with a new modem and alas the internet works! Yeah! He then told me though that with your phone line being dead, your wall wires not connected, and the modem malfunctioning your house was most likely hit by lightning. Scary! We have many storms that blow through here and our new place in kinda on top of a hill. So now whenever a storm comes around I try to go around unplugging everything!

This week we were also saddened because we found a few of our things broken either from the move or from long-term storage in a harsh environment (heat, rain, humidity, ants, cockroaches, mice, rats lightning & robbers!). My 500Gig hard drive (middle picture) that has my complete old computer on it didn't turn on when I plugged it in 2 days ago. I'm pretty bumped about this because it has A LOT of information on it that I haven't yet transferred over and some of it is sensitive information. I'm hoping to see if I can take it to someone local and work out a deal with him letting me stay and watch him work on it while I study for a few hours if needed. That way I can make sure he doesn't decided to make a copy of it before returning it to me IF he can even fix it! Please be praying this burden is lifted and that it can be fixed! Our other sadness is TODAY I finally had some time and decided to open my guitar case (w/ guitar inside) that I had to leave here when we went back to the States. When I opened it I noticed the string were all really loose, then I noticed that the head of the guitar had broken forward (upper right photo) from the neck do to the tension of the string I suppose. So no more guitar for a while. I hope to take it to someone when I get a chance and see if it can be fixed. If not I'll look into buying another one in the future so that I can continue to practice worship songs for my family and for the church.

Well, I think that's enough said for this week! THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR YOUR PRAYERS and SUPPORT and FRIENDSHIP. You are greatly appreciated! 

Hope this all makes some sense in that it's 10:30pm and I'm fighting to stay away! I'm also getting up at 5:00am : )

Grace & Peace,

Ben, Ruth, Chloe, Gwen, & baby Addie