Amazing Auntie Helen

Well! Auntie Helen had been talking about the possibility of perhaps coming to visit us on the island. All of a sudden, she had booked her flight to come visit us! We were ecstatic! 

We did all our usual island activities such as snorkeling and swimming at the beach. Josh and Emma took Auntie Helen hiking up the Quill. She made friends with a chicken. I wonder if she named him. I took Auntie Helen and Emma out early one morning for a photo shoot. Such model quality! We enjoyed eating treats and watching Disney Pixar’s, Brave together on the couch. We sure laughed a lot with each other… playing Smurf, our special “cultural” moments… (that’ll remain an insider)

Lots of laughs.

Yup. This is pretty much how it goes with young twinners.

So… here is one of our unforgettable memories that we shared together (Auntie Helen, Emma and myself). One day, we went sun tanning at Zealandia. The waves rode up quite far onto the beach so it was tricky to find a spot to lay our towels out. Normally there is no one at Zealandia beach, but there happened to be two men fishing from shore. We found a dry-ish spot that was somewhat near them. We were all wearing bikinis as to ensure the most tan coverage. I laid down on my stomach and my aunt pulled my top’s string so I wouldn’t get a line. I laughed and said that if a wave were to come up I would have to remember to grab my towel for coverage. A few moments after I said that a wave washed up. In frantic commotion I grabbed my towel as I stood so I could remain decent. The wave was dragging back with it some of our belongings. I was unable to move for fear of exposing myself. We looked over at the two men who were fishing … they were just laughing at us.

If you grab your  magnifying glass you'll
see Emma, myself and Auntie Helen
with the little chicken nugget girls asleep
in the stroller :)

Emma, the girls, Auntie Helen and my self flew to Toronto, where we spent a couple of days at Auntie Helen’s house. Bless her heart in hosting us with my two little munchkins, getting into things and being slightly miserable as they were out of their routine. She took us to the St. Lawrence Market, which is right by her home. There we enjoyed a peameal bacon sandwich. Other highlights from that trip included her telling us about her younger years and showing us a bunch of pictures. It was crazy too see how much she reminded us of our mom, (only blonde, of course) On our final night with Auntie Helen, we set the table really nice and had a delicious late meal together. Eating slowly, enjoying the moment. We visited and told each other how grateful we were for the time we were able to share. She then treated us with salted caramel gelato. Divine.

Auntie Helen helped Emma and I with our posture and taught us about Toast Masters, which is a club that aids people learn how to public speak. I’m so grateful that we were able to spend some quality time with Auntie Helen. She is such an accomplished woman and she has done so much. She is very a very motivated and hard working individual. She cheered in high school, she was a flight attendant and was very involved with the “upkeep” of stewardesses. She organized fashion shows at a young age. She is such a genuine, generous, beautiful woman. I love her and look up to her a lot. 

Koo Koo ka Choo :)

How to Have the BEST day ever! By ‘Chance.’

Well, maybe I don’t quite know how to have the best DAY ever, but today I learned how to start the best day ever!

This morning I took Emma out to Zealandia to have a photo shoot. We wondered left and took some pictures then wondered if we would have to wander to the right side of the beach. We needed to be home by 7:30am because Josh was taking some friends snorkeling. With 20 minutes left before we needed to head home we decided to quickly go to the right side of the beach and take some pictures by some cliffs. On our way back, and we were rushing, I stopped dead in my tracks. There right in front of me was… a baby sea turtle! How awesome was it that I had my camera there! We got some sweet pics and this video... Koo Koo ka Choo 

No words can express the joy Emma and I felt as we watched that little turtle find it’s way into the ocean. We named little sea turtle dude, Chance. We thought that name was fitting as he was given this chance to make it back to ocean. Not only did we leave there with some amazing pictures, we left uplifted.

We got back into the jeep and drove home. I spat out a song about our ‘Chance’ encounter with the tiniest creature that really left a really big impact on our hearts. I wish I could remember the words.

I don’t know much about sea turtles, but it’s my understanding that mother sea turtles hatch their eggs on the shore. The eggs are left there on their own until one day, in the middle of the night, they hatch and the moonlight shines over the ocean to light the babies way home.

This little turtle was heading for the ocean in the sunlight. I feel as though Emma and I were his guardian angels. Who knows what creature may have snatched him up as a snack? Our presence there kept him safe. It was an honor to watch him find his way home.

In talking about it more with Emma, that little sea turtle taught us a life lesson. On our journey through life, sometimes we have to have the strength to do things on our own. We have guardian angels and a loving Heavenly Father watching over us. The waves will push us back and try to keep us from getting home, but through our endurance we will make it.

This day is a day that I’ll always remember and look back on with so much thoughtfulness. 

Lately

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Babies.

Hard to believe my little chickellettes are going to be a year and half soon! I love our cuddles and snuggles and story time. I love listening to their babbles and watching them dance and listen to them sing. Being their mom is my greatest joy and my highest honor and privledge.

 Fayleah Reagh :) My little squiggly girl! Her new favorite word is no. Oh boy. She has been quite the mama's girl lately! Giving me extra cuddles and saying Mama! A kazillion times a day. It never gets old :) She was singing in the car the other day- so adorable! We had just been singing, Jesus wants me for a sun beam, and she kept going. She's working on her manners, saying please and thank you. Her smile brightens my day. I love my little Fay.



 Eden Beverly. My little pibsqueak! This little princess likes to bite her sister. She is good about staying in her time out and saying sorry to Fay and giving her loves. She is very good about using her manners. She, as well as her sister loves to read books. She gave me a teenage attitude look the other day! I couldn't believe it!
She's got a lot of spunk but is such a little sweetheart. She's our little face maker. I love my darling Eden girl.

Eden left Caleb center Fay right

We started a little play date group called Toddler Tuesdays. I love alliteration. Big fan. Camille has two little boys, Liam almost 2 and Caleb now 5 months. It was so interesting to see how Fay and Eden interacted with baby Caleb. So cute I tell you! Eden especially loves the baby and gave him lots of loves.

One day not too long ago, Emma wrote this amazing tribute to our mom and posted it on her blog. She read it to me while still in it’s rough draft. I sobbed like a…baby. Emma let me cry on her shoulder and said, “You must miss mom so much.”

Eden and Fay hurried over to pointing at me and said, “Baby? Baby.” We laughed through our tears and Fay and Eden gave me hugs. Such a tender little moment.

 Santa came…

So we’ve been living with a very small fridge. It’s been beyond annoying as you reach for one thing, five others topple out. It’s always stuffed to the max and just… plain annoying! So… just because we are broke students doesn’t mean that we can make smart investments. Right? Right. Buying big ticket items like a fridge here on the island is stupid expensive, so we had it shipped on the school shipment from Florida. We know we’ll get at least what we paid for it when we are ready to sell it when we leave. So,  yes! We ordered a new fridge! And it is a gift from above! Good news, our landlord already wants to buy it!

Facing Death Square in the Face, I’d say!

I can’t believe I forgot to mention this crazy experience of Josh’s in the last blog post! Shame on me!

So Josh went spear fishing with Todd and Andy a while back. They went out by White Wall. The weather had been a bit stormy, but hey, why not go fishing!? When Josh finally got home he recounted to me of the excitement of his fishing trip, which I ‘ll sum up to how I see it.

Near death experience number one: Rock climbing down face of mountain.

Near death experience number two: Hugging to rock face cliff for dear life as waves, big waves crash upon you, waiting for the wave to recede so you can jump in the water and ride the wave out away from the rock face.

Near death experience number three: Spear fishing amoung … SHARKS! Yes. I said the word sharks. Reef sharks. Black tip Sharks. Ranging in size from 3-6 feet, ladies and gentlemen. So yes, Josh was swimming and fishing in the water for say 2 hours with sharks. Might I add that Todd never told Josh or Andy that there would be sharks where they were going until they were climbing down the mountain. He told them about a time that he and Sod went fishing there, and a 6 footer came and snatched a fish off of Todd’s spear. Todd gave the shark a little jab to make it go away. It did go away… and came back with MAMA! A 12 footer!!!! BAH! He then left the water. Smart boy.

Near death experience numbers four, five and six: Exiting the water, getting back onto hugging rock face and climbing back up.

Glad he lived to tell about it! I won’t lie, I wasn’t too impressed when he told me about this. He was amused. I was not. But hey, it does make for a great story, and what an experience!

Cassi’s visit: How to Stuff Statia into a Week

About 2 weeks ago I got a facebook message from my friend Cassi asking me what our plans were for Canadian Thanksgiving… hmmm let me think, tough one, um beach maybe? Ha. No plans. She asked if she could come for a visit, I got very excited but didn’t get my hopes up too much, just incase it was just an idea she had rather than an action plan. She then asked me how to go about booking the flights, and lo and behold the next message I received was, “Flights booked!”

SUCH excitement! Such spontaneous-ness I love it!

So Cassi arrived safe and sound Sunday, September 30^th at around 6:30 pm. The sweet thing came baring gifts  (PS THANKS MOM AND DAD!!!!)

Monday morning Cassi, Fay, Eden and myself went for a small drive around Statia. We got bread and sugar donuts at the bakery, checked out a funky store called Yellow, and drove out to White Wall, where we then got rained on.

That afternoon we all (Farrell crew, Cassi and Emma) enjoyed the beach… and the pouring rain at the beach. Josh (in his infinite wisdom) took the windows off the jeep before we left to the beach so we continued in the wetness until we were safe from the elements in our cement walled home. That evening we went to ZUMBA where… Cassi endured little movement as she was having malfunctions with her shorts. Haha. Monday ended with apples and skor-dip as we had our weekly girls night watching The Voice and chatting about life.

Tuesday began early for us all… (normally it’s always early for the Farrell crew as our little chicken-nugget girls get up at 5:30am, Emma generally sleeps in til… 1pm. Just kidding more like 10ish or so.) Anyways… Josh took Cassi and I out snorkeling for our very first time! Josh had been before but this was my first time here, and Cassi’s first time snorkeling ever! Big thanks to Emma for watching the girls for us! It was a little scary at first… but hand in hand in hand (me holding hands with Josh and Cassi) we went out to explore the big ole blue.  And let me tell you! It was soooooo cool! We saw lots of coral reefs and lots of fish. My favorite fish were ultra-violet purple with a bright yellow stripe, and darkish blue ones with glowing aqua colored polka dots! We drove out to the Botanical Gardens that afternoon. Then we had more beach time that afternoon.

Wednesday, I took Cassi out birght and early for a photo shoot. There’s this cool perched boat that I’ve wanted to take some pics at. Then when we got back Josh took us snorkeling again! This time we went to a rock jet out and saw a little SEA TURTLE! He was so cute! And surprisingly beautiful! The sun reflecting from patterns on his shell were so pretty! We all got multiple stings by tiny jellyfish; it got rather annoying so we called it quits after a short while. 

what the?

On our way in Josh and I saw the craziest looking sea creature!

spot the turtle!

Cassi, Emma, the girls and I went to the fort before lunchtime. It’s pretty to cool to look around there and see the beautiful view of the ocean. Last time we went to the fort, Emma wandered off and found a path to an old, old church and graveyard. So Emma showed that to us, and I’m so glad she did! It was really neat, and another great location for pictures. We went to the beach again that afternoon, surprise, surprise. Then I took Cassi out to my favorite restaurant here on Statia, Papaya. We had great food and even better conversation. It was so nice getting all caught up with each others lives. When we got home we played a funny game with Josh and Emma. It’s off a show called Trust Us With Your Life, where they bring in a mime that acts out the lyrics to a song and the person trying to guess wears noise-canceling headphones so they can’t hear. – So we acted out songs and made each other guess. It was pretty fun.

Thursday morning we were pooped. So we just chilled during the morning. While Fay and Eden were having their afternoon nap, Cassi and I headed out to Zealandia to get our suntan on. We layed down on our towels and watched this grey wall move towards us. Then… we got rained on, so after being there for a grand total of 5 minutes we packed up and headed home. That afternoon we went to the beach. Then went to Zumba that evening.

Friday. Oh dear. So Friday morning us girls went to the beach. Found lots of cute little seashells… then we packed up and headed for home. While driving past the park I looked over to see what was going on, as they were setting up tents and stuff and…. BOOM BOOM! :S I ran into a concrete wall on our side of the road. How embarrassing. And bad. We were all ok, thankfully. But the poor jeep… Some kind locals stopped to make sure we were ok. I hadn’t brought my phone to the beach so a man named Jose Romero gave us a ride home so I could get a hold of Josh. Jose was very nice to us and told us to be so grateful to God that we were all ok, and that the crash happened while I was driving slow and that no one else was involved. I am grateful indeed, but feel very foolish…So I called Josh like 4 times cuz he didn’t answer…he was taking an exam. Anyhoo…. Long story short, the jeep is at the mechanics now… I broke the steering box and one of the pipes to something sheered off. …. Moving on. Coincidently enough, our scheduled plan for Friday evening was to show Cas the Slave Trail and walk to and from the beach, stopping at a bakery on the way home to get butter bread. Crook, the beach dog followed us home that night. Then we had a BBQ at Bridge’s place with Nate and Wolsey’s. Then Nate came over and we watched Phantom of the Opera. It’s a great show but man, I forgot how long it was!

Saturday morning (again, thanks to Emma) Josh, Cassi and I hiked the Quill. Hike is a settle word…. It’s starts as a hike. We hiked up to the Crater Rim and looked around at all the beautifulness. Then decided to mountain climb up to The Panoramic View. Seriously you yank yourself up with skinny trees most of the way. Once you get to the top though, it’s quite phenomenal.  On our rather careful descend down that second part of our hike, the fresh air or sun or something must have gotten to us because we all thought we were pretty funny. Then on the rest of the way down we almost got lost 3 times. Fewf that we didn’t!

Apparently we didn’t think that our 3-hour morning hike/climb/intenseness was enough for the day. We decided to walk down to the beach again. Crook (the beach dog) followed us back down to the beach. Josh, Cassi and Emma went out snorkeling and saw a very big stingray.  We left Crook and the beach to head home. When we got to the top of the Slave Trial a local man, that we now know is called Saggie, was sitting down and started talking to us. Saying things like how he knew us and stuff. Then he gave Cassi, Emma and I each an original drawing of his. Pretty nice! Pretty funny! We had Cool Corner for dinner that night. Yum.

Sunday morning was chill. Josh and I took Cassi to the airport to see her off. It was sad to see her go. We had such a fun great time and were so thrilled that she came to visit us. Her plane took off into big dark grey clouds. I was happy to hear that she is home safe and sound.

And that, my friends, is how to stuff Statia in a week! Success!

Canadian Thanksgiving.

Sunday evening we had our Sunday regulars over for dinner, Nate and Lauren. We’ve become pretty good friends with these two! Josh made sweet and sour meatballs and rice for dinner. Super yummy! I made pumkin pie for dessertJ

We invited Bridges over for dessert and we had a fun little gratitude night. Everyone handed some pieces of paper and wrote things that they were grateful for on them.  Then they folded them up and put them in a jar. Then we passed the jar around and took turns reading eachothers thankfulness. Here is what everyone came up with:

I am thankful for…

The gospel, my wife and kids, the support from all my family

The cool breeze that comes every so often

My family

My apartment, my food, and for my air-conditioning and nice bed

Belly button lint (silly Josh)

My bed

My Dora bed (cute little Lucy Bridge)

A supportive family

All the joy that pumpkin brings to my life.

The gospel of Jesus Christ, for being guided by the Holy Ghost, I am grateful for my Mom, Dad and Nana, for my friends who love me and support me, for love and the                 

       Church

This awesome thankful jar

Awesome neighbors

Lucy

Forgiveness

Jesus Christ, people who love me for who I am, Mormon-Canadian- Statia friends!   

   Freedom, nature, love, laughter and fun times, memories of my favorite moments, 

   health, the family I was born into and the family I’ve found along life’s way.

   Hannah’s pie! Dreams, hope, the chance to make a difference, my home in heaven.

To be able to go home for Christmas! So thankful for family and friends

New friends

Canada, where there are yummy chain restaurants and modernization galore! J

A living Prophet

We ended Sunday night answering and explaining questions that our friend Lauren has about our faith. Nate especially did a tremendous job teaching her.

It was a pretty special thanksgiving, one that I’ll always remember.

September 4th, 2012

JENNA’S Visit!

Long time no blog! Ok so in a nut shell, Jenna’s visit was great! We had a lot of fun and did lots of fun stuff. We had 2 great beach days at the beginning of her trip, then we had Tropical Storm Isaac for a few days…which ate our beach. So we had 5 beachless days. SAD FACE! … The sand at our beach is still gonzo (the storm ate the sand… and also brought some jelly fish to our area) The locals say that the sand will return anywhere from a few weeks to a few months. The locals say that we need a northern sea to come, and then our sand will return. So we finally explored on over to Zealandia beach. What a blast! The locals do NOT swim there, and think that you’re crazy if you do. There are dangerous rip tides and people have drowned there. We were desperate for some beach so we went and tried it out. Don’t freak out. We didn’t go in past our wastes so we were fine. We played in the waves and the girls played in the sand. Hold on to your suits!

 

         

   Jenna took us out to dinner a couple of times and we had great meals and lots of laughs. We taught her how to play fruit basket. Baha! We had lots of late nights watching movies (when I say we I really mean Josh, Jenna and Emma. I would make it about 15 minutes in most nights and be ready to hit the hay) and eating salt & vinegar popcorn (big thanks to Jenna for bringing the S&V flavouring!) and pina coladas. We played uno and drank shots of water.

            Auntie Jenna brought lots of goodies with her. Amoungst Fay and Eden’s favorites are their Dr. Seuss books and new swimsuits. Josh was excited to have his free-diving fins arrive and I was happy for all the licorice that she brought ( i think 8 pounds worth!). Her spoiling us didn’t stop there! Ice cream is a delicacy here… it’s pricey. We had root beer floats an a few occasions, and plenty of pink tings (a Caribbean beverage- a grapefruit drink) and apple turnovers form the bakery.

            We are so grateful that Jenna took 2 weeks to come spend time with us, here in the Caribbean. I think she learned that life here for us isn’t always a holiday in paradise. It’s our life for the next few years. I heard a quote that went something like this…”Some people dream of living in a beautiful place, others make a place beautiful.” I think we’re lucky to have a bit of both going on here.

Twenty-Two vs. Sixteen-Months

            August 28^th marks Fay and Eden’s 16 months of life. It’s been great! I love being a mom! It is the most amazing thing, watching them grow and learn new things. They are so stinkin cute! Here is a link to a video of their latest things http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rOjl4knGRnc&feature=plcp

I love how allllll the animals are in the pic too :)

            August 28^th also just happens to be my birthday. I turned the big 22. Ha. Sometimes I feel much older and sometimes I feel much younger. The day was perfect. Breakfast in bed, a happy family, Emma and Jenna visiting, lovely facebook messages, amoungst my favorites were some pictures from my family back home wishing me a happy birthday. 

*** And a very sweet letter from a friend.  Jenna brought my favorite shampoo from home, what a treat! And Josh and the girls got me a new swim suit from Lime Ricki. We had a relaxing evening and then went out for dinner to Pink Papaya. Oh my heavenly days! The food is soooo yummy there! I had an Alfredo dish that I’m sure is the best on the planet!

Rolling In The Deep

            So… funny story. Emma and I went out to Zealandia one day, for a couple hours to bask in the sun (aka suntan).  We would listen to 4 songs on her ipod then switch to lay on our backs, then another 4 songs and switch back to our stomachs ect. For our final song I asked Emma to play a wicked awesome song. She asked which song she should play and I suggested Rolling in the Deep by Adelle.

            So there we were, eyes closed, ear buds in, belting Rolling in the Deep, feeling great. The song ends and we stand up to get ready to pack up and …. There are two army men about 20 feet away coming towards us.

            Needless to say we were super embarrassed. After talking to them for a few minutes we learned that they and their platoons are from Holland and are here practicing for hurricane evacuation procedures and they were just scoping out the area for drills. We were relieved to learn that the crashing of the waves masked our loud singing.

Welcome, Welcome

            We have two new families here on our island to add to our LDS group or ‘twig’ as the Hunters like to call it! The Hunter family of seven with both parents (Grant and Angie) and oldest daughter (Brittany) in classes, a son (Truman) working back home preparing for a mission and three other kids (Hailey, Savannah and Justice) are here with them. They seem super fun and we are looking forward to getting to know them better. Emma and I have sung with two of the daughters, Brittany and Hailey, in Girls Choir.

            Brandt and Camille Tidmarsh from Magrath are here with their two little boys Liam and Caleb. So cute! They seem super nice and we are also looking forward to getting to know them.

            Josh got asked by the school to be on the welcoming committee. Which entails going to the airport with Bongo (driver man) to pick up the new students, answer questions they may have about life and school here, and drop them off at their apartments. He does a great job, and is such a personable person. The added bonus is that he also gets paid to do this. Hurray!

The new semester has started, so that job is over now.

Looking forward to blogging again soon! Thanks for all your love and support!