yep, they are going to do just fine in the jungle! (Life in Oklahoma post #4)

Our kids are sure braver than me :)

Now, I realize that the animals and creepy-crawlies of the jungle will be vastly different than the ones found here in Oklahoma!  I realize that.  However...we have at least been VERY encouraged that our kids will do just fine in PNG (in this area, that is).

If there is one thing I hate, it is bugs.  And reptiles.  And rodents.  I guess that's more than one thing :)

Well, here in Oklahoma, we have been spending a LOT of time outside!  And there is a lot of..."wildlife".  Our kids are thriving with all the new "pets" they are finding (*shudder*)...

Our kids found some pretty cute frogs one day, and kept them for about a whole week. Halle toted hers around in a Gatorade bottle, even bringing him with us to the creek one night :)  She let him out to swim, and we almost lost him (there were tears!)--but thankfully, Halle spotted him and she put him safely back in his Gatorade bottle :)

They put their frogs in a Lego Duplo car to ride around :)  Haha!  I just love these kids!

Speaking of pets...meet our Ling "class pet"!  This is Harry, a tarantula that was discovered in our classmates' house.  UGH!  My brave friend trapped him under a bowl--and now he lives in a clear plastic tote as our class pet :)

Our kids have loved hunting for scorpions!  We have caught a ton of them!  And Kaine even sent a couple of them to his good friends in Indiana...lol!  Here they are, ready to go scorpion hunting...

Coolest thing ever--if you shine a black light on them, they glow!  It is so easy to spot them!

Dads and kids before church, hunting for bugs and reptiles :)

Some of their findings:

Here is Layla, with a drinking glass full of daddy long legs :)  Gross!

Probably the thing that our family has spent the most time on though, is crawdads!  Kaine has absolutely LOVED catching crawdads!

The other kids love them, too.  One of the creeks that we go to just happens to be right behind the splash pad in town.  So after catching a bunch of crawdads one day, our kids took them to the splash pad to play with them...naturally :)

Layla wasn't a fan of this trick, played by a sibling who shall remain nameless :)

Even though our kids love playing with their crawdads, they still decided to cook them :)

Here is the crawdad meat from one of our catches :)  Haha!  It is not much, if you can't tell.  It's in a baby food jar in the freezer right now...Nathan says they are saving up for a feast!  

I am so thankful for the ways that God is allowing our kids to adapt.  He is so gracious!

some family quality time...(Life in Oklahoma post #3)

With all of the busy-ness of Linguistics, we have been able to get in some very good quality family time down here in Oklahoma!  We really are kind out in the middle of nowhere, but it happens to be GORGEOUS around here.  A huge lake, hills, trees--and lots of wildlife (*shudder*).  But more on that later ;)

Here, our kids are at a different stage of life that they have never experienced.  Even though there are many sweet kids who live here with us, our kids are the oldest.  And there is especially no other kids even close to Kaine or Halle's age--which has never happened in their life!  At Gateway, there were kids galore their age. When we lived at NTBI in MI, there were tons of other student or staff kids there who they played with.  And in Bluffton, they have amazing friends who have our kids over a LOT.  And the peak of it was at MTC in MO...where we lived on a hill among many other missionary families, on a beautiful campus filled with kids!  They spent hours outside with friends!  

But here, our kids play with each other the most.  Which I truly love!  The other day, Kaine and Halle were out for 2 hours together, catching crawdads in the creek.  I LOVE it when they go and do that kind of stuff together!  So this has been good for family/sibling time :)

they were all pretending to text...haha!  ahem...they might have been imitating me...

Not a lot of places to go around here, but there is a Lowe's! :)

Layla helping me do a little bulk shopping for our group :)

Here's a change from the other blogpost I did (the one about our new family "dorm")--Nathan decided to make our kids a lego loft!  It's pretty awesome!

We have also explored the outdoors...more than ever before, really. There really isn't a lot to do...but like I said, there are some beautiful areas around here!  Some of our favorite places we have found:

A creek near our campus.  Our kids LOVE playing in this creek!!

Here is that gorgeous lake I mentioned.  We found this amazing spot last weekend!

We grilled while we were at the lake...here is Kaine, with a bologna wrapped hot dog.  YUM!  (not)

We were also thrilled to find a splash pad in town!  Sad thing though--it closes on Labor Day.  Oh well.  The guy told Nathan that it costs the city $12,000 per month for the water bill!  Wow.  Okay, so I can see why they close it on Labor Day, I guess :)

Behind the splash pad, there just happens to be another creek with this awesome waterfall!  So cool.  We are really starting to like this area a lot!  Too bad we only have another month or so...oh well :)

I'm off to bed!  This weekend is the Cherokee National Holiday, so we will be off to a Cherokee parade in the morning!

So Many Cute MK's...Life in Oklahoma Post #2

Something else we are loving here in Oklahoma, is all of the other kids ("MK" stands for Missionary Kids, just in case you didn't know that acronym).  Layla and Daisy love playing with them, because the other kids are younger (like, even younger than Daisy).  But also for Kaine and Halle, because something that Nathan and I reeeeeally want for our kids is for them to play with and help out with younger kids.  

When Nathan and I were houseparents at Gateway, there were some other houseparent families there who had older kids.  And those older kids loved on, paid attention to, and played so well with our kids (Kaine and Halle would have been under 5 at that time).  Nathan and I so appreciated that, and ever since then we have really wanted to cultivate that in our kids as they get older.

Well, this living situation is pretty much perfect for that cultivation!  Kaine and Halle (and Layla and Daisy) have multiple opportunities to be blessings to the younger kids here!  It is really neat to watch, and it makes my mom heart very happy :)

Ashea is the sweet little girl who lives in our building.  So our kids get to have a lot of time with her!  She is so adorable, and I could just listen to her sweet little voice talk all day long.  Such a cutie!  Oh, and her family is also headed to Papua New Guinea!

Daisy and Ashea helped me take out the trash the other day...talk about melting my heart!  So sweet.

One of Ashea's favorite things to do with my kids is to "Watch Sofia?"  She looooves watching Princess Sofia on the ipad!  Our kids love it when I let them, too :)

Little Judah...oh my goodness.  I wish you could all meet this cutie!  Layla and Daisy get along super well with him!  He is headed to Africa with his family...

Judah and his brother are half German, and they happen to have matching German soccer jerseys with Kaine!  I just love this picture!

A picture of all the girls (including Ruby, who I haven't mentioned yet)... Layla got hurt right before this picture, if you can't tell by her super sad face:) 

I mentioned this at the end of my last post, but here are the kids doing their worship song with John.  This was so awesome!  We love our worship nights with everyone!

Looking at all of their "pets"--aka, frogs, lizards and crawdads :)

All of these sweet kids will be scattered around the world as their families take the Gospel to the Unreached.  Pray for them!  Their future will not be easy, but it will definitely be such a blessing.  These kids are priviliged to be able to experience such a ministry!