A Night Without Kids

Ryan and I decided that it was time to get ourselves to Manila and go to the LDS temple. It's the closest one to us and is found an hour north by plane or a 20 hour boat ride. We were able to get a couple of kids from our ward to stay the night at our house with Brayden and Sydney and Ryan and I took off Thursday morning. Since we've done all our journeys with our kids I hadn't realized how wonderful and stress free everything was with out them.
Our hotel was across the street from the Manila Bay and the U.S. Embassy. We tried to take a picture but apparently that's not aloud and we got in trouble by the security guards. We were also a block away from a place named "Rizal Park" where the Philippine Hero Dr. Jose Rizal was executed in 1896 by the Filipino native infantry backed by the Spanish troops. He was charged with implication to the Philippine Revolution against the Spanish rulers and was sentenced to death which ironically the catalyst that precipitated the Revolution. Also at Rizal Park is a HUGE statue of Lapu-Lapu, a Muslim chieftain who was first national hero that resisted Spanish Colonization. We were able to take some great pictures but unfortunately most of our pictures didn't turn out! :(

The left is a picture of Dr. Jose Rizal guarded by 2 soldiers 24/7 and the right has a statue of Rizal being led to his execution but you might have a hard time seeing it through Ryan...

After our walk through Rizal Park we explored a bit until we found ourselves at the Manila Bay where we walked along the coast line. It was so disgusting! Where we started they were filling up this garbage truck with trash from the ocean and then only a little bit away were these kids swimming and washing themselves. Other then the trashy ocean it was a really beautiful walk with a breeze to help cool us down from the hot hot sun.

Ward Party

Today was the one day during the year when our ward from church all gets together and leaves their worries behind, eats good food and plays together. We drove an hour south of Bacolod to a black sand beach named Soleo Beach and rented a couple huts where some of the ladies grilled some fish and pork and fed me raw fish salad in a vinegar dressing. The kids had a blast playing with all the youth, swimming in their clothes and getting all sandy. It was the perfect day; hot, sunny, no wind and when we arrived the tide was out and the beach was waiting!!The kids were pretty tired by the ride home where they Brayden actually laid still for the hour and Sydney fell asleep on one of their favorite babysitters lap (Edgar (Nonoy) Regodos).

The Versatility of the Filipino Motorbike

We had been in Bacolod maybe an hour and everything was new, different and the sun was setting, it quickly getting dark. I was a wondering what we had gotten ourselves into. No familiar stores or restaurants to give us a little comfort and after the attack at the "then" Bacolod airport of porters, taxi drivers, and strangers stares I was starting to get a little freaked out. I was happy to be on the way to the hotel with the promise of dinner and I sat anxiously in the back of the van tightly holding onto my children. It was then Ryan saw one of the most shocking things up to that point in our lives. There driving in front of us was a motorcycle with a welded on side cart carrying a huge pig and what looked like a donkey. At that time we had no idea that 1 1/2 years later that would be nothing! Since that time we've seen pigs the size of cows, chickens, huge bamboo, furniture, 12 people at once, people driving while holding tightly to their open umbrella, and goats (just wait for the jeepney post to hear all the tasty sights when there is more space!). There is nothing that these people can't carry on a motorcycle!
We've been able to collect some pictures of a few of our favorite motorcycle passengers so far:

You can never have enough chicken!!!

Pork + Rice = Dinner

This is how we got around while Kait was here... always good for some stares!

3rd Time in Boracay

The most famous beach in the Philippines in on an island named Boracay. We've been fortunate to have already been with family on 2 occasions and really enjoyed it. Ryans aunt and uncle made the trip out to the Philippines for a week to visit us and check up on what Ryan has been doing at Focus.

After their arrival on Sunday we left Monday morning for the journey to Boracay arriving in the afternoon and easily finding a beautiful beach front cottage with 2 bedrooms, a hot shower bathroom, sitting room and great porch. It was one of the nicest accommodations i've ever stayed in and everyone had enough room.

We stayed for a couple of nights and although there have been some typhoons blowing through the Philippine area we were able to enjoy the on and off again showers by playing on the beach and in the huge waves. We spent one day on a boat snorkeling and going around the island. We enjoyed the great food the tourist savvy island had to offer while Ryan and I experienced our first Lobster as a late night snack. The first night we were able to get to a place and sit down while they brought the Lobster out of the tank, trying to wriggle out of the guys hands. It had beautiful green and blues to it, it was almost too bad they had to take it away and cook it. The second night Ryan's uncle went to the wet market and bought the Lobster himself taking us back later to show us the market. Prawns the size of your hand, tons of fresh Lobster and Crab, we even saw an Octopus. It was great.

Unfortunately we had to make our way back to Bacolod so that the boys could spend at least one night in the office working so we left early Wednesday morning starting out by taking a pumpboat and arriving back in Bacolod that afternoon.

The New House

The last week in April we moved into a new house, new subdivision and new ward. Thankfully when we moved my sister was still here and so had an extra set of hands to help us out. We also had the young men from church load and unload the truck and the young women cleaned the house so all I had to worry about was filling boxes and then finding homes for all the junk we've collected over the last 1 1/2 years. Wow, I can't believe we've been over here for 1 1/2 years already!We were able to get everything loaded and moved with only 2 trips before treating the youth to some pizza and taking them home.

With every new house we've moved to here comes fumigation! For the first couple of weeks before I would go to bed I would spray the kitchen, bathrooms and other sneaky places with death spray and wake up to find cockroaches on their backs. I was able to catch a mouse in a sticky pad while it looked up squeeking at my sister and I and fumigated dead it's babies out of the kitchen. I found a couple of ant houses and since getting rid of those have gotten rid of our ant problem. I can now happily say that our house is pest free... except for the lizards of course.
I was going to make a cake and started dumping the cake mix into a bowl to mix up. While I was pouring moving things jumped out! I freaked, screamed and dropped the bowl not knowing what to expect. There were 3 lizards in my cake mix! We assume the mice ate a hole in the box before we killed them and the lizards were using it to their advantage. Too freaky.

We now have everything unpacked, with a home and are all feeling very happy and comfortable in our new place. The house is in a very private subdivision (no one but home owners can get in) and since it's new their are a ton of empty lots with nice mowed grass. Our house is in the back corner of the subdivision with only one other house close by so we get no cars and have a lot of grass to play soccer and play frisbee in. We can let Kula out of the yard and play with us while he runs around after the ball. Brayden loves to ride his bike up and down the street trying to go faster each time. The pool is only a couple lots away although we have to pay each time we swim which really sucks!

I have some really beautiful orchids in the garden and some pineapple bushes just on the other side of the fence with banana trees. I think our only disappointment is that the subdivision is so new their aren't big lush trees like our last place. Also no coconut trees for Ryan to climb up for our Sunday evening snack.

We start attending our new ward at the end of May which we really are hesitant about. We love our ward now and we love being the youth leaders so we'll really be sad to go although our new ward is very excited to have us. We do have friends already in the ward and quite a few people from Focus also attend their so that's a bonus.
The house is also a lot closer to the kids school which will mean a lot less time in the car for me especially with them both starting up in regular class again in June!!

Mambukal Youth Camp

The interior of our island is beautiful! Filled with lush green jungle, bright green rice fields and sugar cane crops. Halfway between the East and West coast of the north tip of Negros is a great place called Mambukal. It's known as the mountain resort with great cottages, hot springs warm from the volcano, huge fruit bats and waterfalls. Every year the youth from church go up to Mambukal for a 3 day Multistake Youth Conference. We were able to bring the kids up for a couple of the days so that Ryan and I could enjoy some of the activities.

While I learned how to make a belt tying knots together Ryan hiked up to some waterfalls with our day pack and Brayden on his back and was able to take a couple pictures of the kids playing in the falls during their hike!