Our Time is Coming to an End

Our family is now in the last stages of our time here in Salatiga before we head to the island of Papua. That means that we are finishing up the packing, starting to say good-bye to our beloved friends and doing all of our favorite things just one more time. And since this is a pretty high expat area we also found ourselves helping other people move onto their next destination as well. Which is what we ended up doing a large part of two weeks ago for a family and we are learning the benefits of having a large front porch. As the family that we helped move was not able to get everything into their container we were able to offer them our porch as a storage area. And then that storage area turned into a work area as they made three extra crates that would allow the rest of the remaining furniture be shipped to there destination.

At the moment we have about a week left here before we take a small family vacation then we return to our house for just enough time to fill our own container and then send it on the way. We are looking forward to completing this next move but it is also so hard to say good-bye to everyone. Thankfully we got to be here for the end of Ramadan which is called Idul Fitri which will allow us time to visit with our neighbors and learn more about this holiday as well. We just had a hard time getting to sleep as it is a very noise time as well!!!

Along with all those activities Greg had the special honor of standing in for our friends daughters baptism that they could not attend. It felt a little strange to us when they explained the situation but also a great honor to be a part of the the event. They have become such dear friends and we will dearly miss them when we leave. Please keep our family in your prayers as we prepare to leave and make the adjustment to another Island which means the kids will be attending a new school, Greg will be going back to work, I will have to learn where to shop again, and just adjust to a whole new environment.

Stuff ready and waiting for our sea container to arrive.

Smaller stuff waiting for a home insides a piece of furniture.

Building the box to secure our motorcycles in the sea container

Box finished and waiting

The other family's stuff that just won't fit in their container.

The crew sorting and sizing up to build the extra creates.

Mbak Fani's Baptism.

Baptism was a local pool after the baptism a lot of the kids went swimming.

The reason her parent couldn't come.

Cooking and filling boxes of food for lunch.

115 boxes loading into the angkota (public bus).

The youth retreat where the food was needed.

Road Less Traveled

Short clip from my recent ride through in the mountains near Salatiga.  I found a new way home :)





Road Less Traveled from Greg on Vimeo.

Singapore

On June 30th I (Julie) headed to the airport with my son Franklin as we began our journey to Singapore. The purpose of this trip was to do some educational testing with Franklin so that we can better understand how he processes and learns things. I will be honest that this was a hard time for me as I had heard how this place was really good for some families and then I had heard how some people found it a waste of time. So my prayer going into this was that we would not be wasting time and money and that we would hopefully walk away with some kind of answers.

The testing was broken into three days with one of those days actually including six hours of testing that Franklin went through. We are so proud of him as he went through all of this and never complained about anything. And every specialist said that he worked really hard and that they were all impressed with his imagination. At the end of day two we had one confirmed diagnoses, learned some key things about how his brain is actually processing things, and talked about another possible diagnoses that would require blood work. Also, they confirmed that he really is not that far behind for his grade level as we had thought all around and that the areas that he was low are due to the diagnoses. It was a amazing time of learning about my son and can't wait to start working with him now that I better understand some things.

And in between all the testing we found time to hit the hotel pool and of course walk through the mall that was right across the street. This mall had about ten floors to walk through and all of his favorite places to eat so that made for one happy boy. On top of that he found is favorite candy (Skittles), obtained three new Archie Comic books and watched a couple of movies. With all of that though I think that his favorite thing was watching some of the really cool cars that would drive by. Singapore is one of the richer countries in the world so you can imagine what he got to see.

Enjoying a Quzinos sub for the first time in over a year!

 Nothing like a cold pop and cartoons to help you recover from a day of travel.

                         

As you can tell it has been awhile since he has been able to enjoy a package of Skittles.

               

The view from outside of our hotel room.

                                                   

 This was our bus station that we would use every day to get to the doctors office.

                     

Just hanging with the locals!

                                                           

 This picture and the two below are just views of the city around our bus station.

                           

 Looking down from the top floor of the mall towards the bottom.

                             

Waiting to watch a movie after finishing up three days of testing.

                                 

Finding three of his favorite books made the flight home a lot easier.

                               

My take home pile for the kids that were left at home plus the new books that Franklin bought. All three of our children love to read these comic books.

                           

Donating Skin to the Road (Warning Pictures NOT of my good side)

Some of you maybe already aware from FB that I had a mishap with JR (my motorcycle) the other day.  I can say that I'm very thankful that this experience of mine was one that I did not share with any of my family members.  JR came away with some minor cosmetic damage and some damage that I will need to repair before any more long rides.  The cosmetic damage will remain as added character and a reminder that I'm not invincible.  Not that I thought I was invincible but it is easy to take things for granted.  Unfortunately I really have no idea how the other fellow fared in the collision.  I was too dazed to wrap my head around what I should say and how to make sure he was okay and that everything was okay on his end.  I think the few words I did speak were likely English which may have confused him as well, which might have made the situation end quicker. I don't remember what I said or if what I said would have made any sense to the young fellow.  Anyway he drove off and so I continued home were the pain and shock set in for an hour or so after I arrived home.  No broken bones to my knowledge just some bruises and 4 spots of road rash along the right side of my body ranging from my toes to my shoulder.  There are things that I could complain about but truthfully I'm so thankful that this experience happened on my way home from downtown not on the way home from the beach.  I'm also very thankful that no one was seriously hurt and that the bikes can be repaired without to much expense.  I'm also very thankful that the young man didn't want to take me to the cleaners because I'm a foreigner.  God is good even when things get difficult God is still good and faithful.  I added a couple pictures but just be warned there are a couple of my road rash.  Thank you for your continued prayers and support as we consider it a great honor and privilege to serve here in Indonesia.

Broken signal light, twisted handle bars, bent foot peg, front fender and tire don't line up, broken front headlight housing, licence plate already fixed before the picture it was nicely wrapped around the headlight before and some scratched up plastic.  The gas tank came away untouched and no damage to the back of the bike the mirrors survived which surprised me.  Heading today to get it fixed up the only thing that concerns me is the front fender and tire situation everything else is easily repairable.