Naomi's New Best Friend!

At the beginning of this month we were really excited to welcome back Auntie Rachel for her second visit to us in Coshocton. She is Jenny's longest standing friend and once again she left her hubby and kids to stay with us for a week!

We took little trips out to Roscoe village and Amish Country. We baked for and went to our last MOPS meeting. Abigail enjoyed baking with Auntie Rachel instead of her mummy for a change ... and of course taking a few taste tests along the way!

One evening we went shooting with a couple of girlie friends here. It was an early birthday treat for Jenny and lots of fun. Abigail went to play with a friend while Mark and Naomi came along ... mostly to be amused at the facial expressions of all four women as the guns got more and more powerful! It's not everyone's thing ... it may even be perceived as shocking behaviour by some of you reading this. It definitely was a cultural highlight though and a great way to celebrate a birthday!

On the Saturday that Rachel was here, Jenny and Abigail disappeared for a couple of hours to a princess party to celebrate Bri's 4th birthday (one of Abigail's best buddies). On arrival, all the little girls got fitted out with tiara's and tutu's, which they got to decorate with sparkly gems. It was a fun afternoon

Abigail loved the tutu from her party so much that the following day she decided she was going to wear it over her jeans and snow boots when we took a trip to the zoo! She even chose to have her face painted in colours to match it.

We had lots of fun together at the zoo (enjoying the 'free' entry that our annual pass allows) ... seeing the animals and being goofy too. It seems we took more photos of the goofiness than of the animals! 

Rachel tried a North American delicacy that she'd never had before ... funnel cake. It is deep fried batter covered in powdered sugar. Yes, very healthy. As you can see it went down really well with all three girls below.

Over the week, Rachel became Naomi's new best friend. She was a bit wary at the start, as she is with lots of people but over the course of the week, Naomi definitely warmed to her. In the last few days she would choose to go to Rachel instead of us and now when Naomi sees photo's of Rachel, she gets very vocal and starts flapping her arms all over the place!

We had a great week together and had a chance to catch up on everything face-to-face rather than through sporadic emails and phone calls. On Rachel's final day, although her flight back to the UK wasn't until the evening, Mark took a day off, so she and Jenny could have a girlie day of shopping and restaurants in Columbus, minus munchkins. A perfect ending to her time here. (Mark was totally shattered when Jenny got home that day though, after going solo with both the littlest girls from 10am til 6.30pm ... his longest stint to date!)

Weekend of Celebrations

Just a few days after we returned from Florida we enjoyed a BIG weekend of celebrations spending it with good friends and having lots of fun! Life has been a little crazy these last few weeks, so sorry this update has been a bit slow in coming!

Saturday 21st April was a special day for two lovely friends, Adam and Kyla, as they got married. It was extra special for Abigail too, as she loves Kyla to pieces and was her Flower Girl. She has been looking forward to it forever and loved every minute of it on the day! From getting ready with all the girlies in the bridal party in the morning ...

... to twirling in her dress and posing for all the photographs!! We told her that if she smiled nicely when they wanted to take her photo's then it would go quicker ... and amazingly that worked!!

Abigail got to hand out bubbles to all the guests as we walked out of the wedding ceremony and then spent the reception blowing the remaining ones all over us!! As well as hanging out with her favourite bride and other members of the bridal party of course!

Abigail did a great job sprinkling her petals and sat nicely on her little step at the front of the church during the service. We were so proud of her. We all had a good time celebrating with the newly-weds and friends. Abigail was so tired at the end of a day filled with excitement, that she asked us if she could go to bed even before her usual bedtime!!

If the Saturday was all about Abigail, the Sunday was definitely all about Naomi, as it was April 22nd, her first birthday! She had lots of fun opening her cards and pressies (with the help of her older sister) and even managed to pull a surprised/shocked expression on her face each time she opened something new!

 

One family tradition (for the girlies at least) is to measure their height on both their birthday's and their half birthday's. This year Naomi measured 2ft 3 3/4".

In the afternoon we had a couple of friends round to celebrate. Ordinarily we may not have done anything too special but we figured this would probably be the only year that Naomi and her two fairy godmothers would all be in the same place for her birthday. So, they came with their families to mark the occasion.

Abigail decided that Naomi's cake would be a 'Kitty Cat' one (Hello Kitty to everyone else!) and that it would be pink. With her big sister's added assistance Naomi's cake was made and decorated with all three of her family members playing a part. She wasn't so interested in blowing the candle out herself though but Abigail was very quick to assist in that department too!

It was a fun afternoon ... but I'm sure we, like many other parents, can't believe how quickly our little girls are growing up.

Since that weekend loads more has been going on, including the MOPS resale where we sold a lot of our baby stuff and made $240. We also had the opportunity to speak at our church's missions conference. It was a real privilege to share with them all and had the added bonus of picking up some more supporters, both in prayer and financially. One of the more interesting parts was at the family night when we had to share our calling into missions as if talking to the persecuted church ... without using 'dangerous' words like God, church, mission etc but still getting our message across. Try it sometime, it can be very amusing ... but is a day-to-day reality for many, including several of our close friends.

Florida ... at Work!

Whilst still on Rapid Response in PNG, I was asked to consider travelling 1,100 miles south to Florida to help Missionary Flights International (MFI) a week after returning home. Thankfully, I had a few more weeks at home before heading south ... and the whole family came with me this time which made the adventure all the more fun.

MFI fly missionaries, aid, food, medicine and equipment in DC3's from Fort Pierce, Florida to Haiti and the Dominican Republic. At the moment they have 2 Douglas DC3's with turbine engines, 2 Douglas DC3's with radial engines (that are for sale/sold) and a Cessna 310. The turbine DC3's need regular maintenance, the radial DC3's need to be worked on to get them ready for sale. The C310 had an accident when it had to land without it's nose landing gear, which means a lot of work is required to get it airworthy again.

Part of the this trip was for me (and the whole family) to get an insight into front-line maintenance. This kind of maintenance is very different to what I have been exposed to at MMS. When working with a front-line maintenance facility, you have to get the maintenance done in-between flights and not the other way round. I got to help with a 'phase inspection' on a DC3. The first part was to check the wheels, tires, brakes, axles and bearings. Everything on a DC3 is so much bigger than anything that I've had to deal with on Beechcraft, Cessna and Piper aircraft. As you can see from the photos below, the main wheel bearings take more effort to repack with grease. The bottom right photo shows the difference between a Cessna bearing and one from a DC3.

The other part of the 'phase inspection' was to check over the two engines, inspect the oil, fuel and air filters/screens, and replace all the the fuel injectors. This has been very useful for me as this will be the kind of maintenance that I will be performing once on project with MAF, as almost all projects have a Cessna Caravan that have turbine engines.

Whilst at MFI, I also got to experience a flight to Haiti. When a flight has more than 19 passengers, they are required to have a flight attendant on board and this responsibility fell to me. After reading up on the requirements and safety responsibilities of a flight attendant, answers some multipal choice questions, and shown the ins and outs of the aircraft, I was qualified to serve as a flight attendant. We flew from Florida to the Bahamas to refuel, then on to Haiti to drop off 30 missionaries and then pick up 22 others to bring them back home. It was a very busy day serving all the people, loading and un-loading baggage and being on call the whole time, but it was also an amazing experience. One that Jenny wished she could have done also.

I also got to help troubleshoot numerous issues on the aircraft. When an aircraft returns from a trip, any problems are noted by the pilots and it's up to the engineers to discover what is causing the problem and then fix it before the next flight. The troubleshooting that I was involved in, included a broken cabin door latch, erroneous engine temperature readings and failure of cabin heat from the left engine.

  

We had an amazing time down in Florida with MFI, and it was really useful to be part of the team working to get the aircraft ready to fly the next day, no matter what had to be done. It gave me more confidence in my abilities and encouraged me that I will be able to perform my tasks when we finally arrive on project.