Garage Sale Queen!

Do you know a Garage Sale Queen? I'm sure glad I do! She goes by many names, but I call her 'Mom'. And this past week she dominated the Bis-Man Garage Sale kingdom. In the process the Vetter family nursury went from 0% stocked, to 80-85% done! Check out the pictures, we made a major haul! It filled my SUV, and we had to leave the big piece, a changing table, back with Grandpa for some reinforcements.

We got big things, like crib, swing, blanket sets, bouncy chair and we got teeny-tiny things like newborn onesies and socks that barely fit two adult fingers. Overall we had 70+ items of clothing in a range of sizes to grow into and out of. Here's the amazing part...are you ready? We wrote down everything we saw laid out in the living room and estimated the cost of each item when bought new (with some internet search help). A conservative estimate puts us as $1300 of supplies, we spent LESS than 20% of that!

It was amazing to set everything up in the room that will be our nursury soon. It finally started looking like one today! I just keep thinking about all these great things and how right now they're clothes on the shelf or a cute toy on the floor - but before long they'll wrap around our baby and be drooled on and played with and washed a hundred times. These are my baby's things! How amazing is that!

Thanks for everything, Mom and Dad! I had a great week at home, and am very grateful to be this much more prepared for the little one's arrival!

Brandon in Africa

Brandon is in Tanzania - and many have asked how things are going. I'll give you the update on the few things I've heard, but I'll make him blog and show pictures later so you get it first hand. The highlights I know are what I receive in a text message when I wake up and he's finishing a day for work (8 hr difference). We've talked for a few minutes here and there too.

The first week they worked hard at Huruma Orphanage, where the main task was digging a latrine. They got it down to ten feet deep, but needed to stop there for lack of ladders or means of getting out of a 10 ft hole. The goal is to be 30 feet deep, but they won't personally dig much beyond 15 as armatures. They'll leave money for Zachariah to hire it out. Problem is, knowing Zachariah, he's going to try to keep working on it himself because it needs to get done. That's not good work for a man his age or build.

On the weekend they went on safari. The highlights I heard about there were the white monkeys with blue balls - also known as blue-scrotum monkeys, apparently. The elephant they watched push down a tree with it's trunk (look for footage on that later) and lots of good giraffes, lions, elephants, etc. Sounds like they had lots of luck finding the 'good stuff'.' They're with our same driver from last year - who is an excellent tour guide and really funny, nice man - so I know they're having a good time whenever they're travelling, and especially on safari.

This week they're in the small village of Minjingu, and a neighboring village. In Minjingu is the preschool we helped clean up and clear out last year. They have been doing improvements and final touches there. I guess Robbie and Amy built 2 picnic tables from scratch! Cha was painting some original art work on the walls, which is incredible I'm sure. Everyone else was running chicken wire along the fences to keep out the goats (always a concern), and once again dealing with the bats. They 'smoked out' the bats, literally with a flaming paint roller on a long stick. They were trying to find the opening to close it up - Brandon was standing guard to watch for the bats' exit. I guess they came flying straight towards him, he tried to duck out of the way, but tripped on a rock and fell and rolled and made everyone laugh at him for what seemed to be a big over-reaction to a few bats flying overhead!

In the second village they're constructing a new preschool building. Some were laying brick, some clearing land - like cutting down trees with machetes, some picking rocks and mowing the grounds. All in all, it sounds like they've stayed busy. They've also found time for fun. I've heard of at least one volleyball game, that they lost. They taught some local kids the basics of baseball with a stick and fruit from the ground. I guess that was a neat evening because there were about 8 kids around when they started playing, then about 15, eventually over 30 kids joking around with our team and learning this new sport.

They'll finish work in the villages tomorrow, go back to the main city, work again at the orphanage, attend a real African church on Sunday, and head home. From my time they begin travels on Sunday around 1pm, they'll arrive in Sioux Falls about 7:00pm on Monday. Please keep the team in your prayers, and ask God to bless the projects they're working on and the people they're with.

I heart Kentucky!

Brandon and I reached 'our old Kentucky home' a day late because of some airplane problems, but we're sure glad to be here now! We've just had a fantastic weekend with all the wedding festivities, and getting to see the whole church community. The wedding was absolutely beautiful, and the couple thought of so many romantic details to make things very special. It was extra fun for us because every time we turned around there was another youth, parent, church friend or whoever ready for a hug and catch-up conversations. We've actually already seen just about everyone I wanted to connect with in these past two and half days. We even caught 2 families from different towns that came in for the wedding too. It's so exciting to be back and reconnect with all these important relationships and people. It's different having a 'spiritual friendship' or even just history in a faith community than other more basic relationships. I feel so close to these guys, especially all my old youth, because of the things we talked about, learned together, and been through in the past. It's not like a reunion of college friends, or hometown acquaintances, there's a lot of depth and love shared around here. I like it!

Kansas City

Brandon and I were off on a grand weekend adventure the last few days. We drove down to Kansas City for an anniversary weekend. B had bought tickets to 'Wicked' a couple months back. It was a great show! It's so funny and witty, and was crazy-well performed. Other than the big show on our actual anniversary, we just bummed around the city. I was impressed by how 'modern' of a big city KC seemed to be, at least the parts we were in. Lots of things were new or recently updated and very well designed and kept up. We went to the zoo, to a mega-church B keeps tabs on, and plenty of restaurants and wandering around. Our hotel was really fancy. We kept joking about the room which was advertised as 'contemporary hip'. It pretty well lived up to that description. When we first walked into the lobby we were offered free champagne by the desk hosts; and outstanding hospitality like that continued all weekend.

It was a long drive back and we both started to get a little overwhelmed thinking of everything that needs to be done this week before the next great adventures. In short: I finish my last day at the colony on Thursday (I told my students about the pregnancy and not coming back today). Brandon is organizing a hundred last details for Africa as well as doing class with the team this week. We're both getting ready for the Kentucky trip, which starts Thurs. Brandon is packing for the longer 2 weeks in Tanzania. And, just other miscellaneous things that come along with preparing for those trips and deadlines. So, it's busy - but we're looking forward to everything coming up!

Ultrasound!

We had an ultrasound done this week. It was really fun! It's so neat to see this little baby swimming around in there. He/She is so active - always moving arms and hands. I'm surprised I don't feel it more yet; Brandon keeps telling me to count my blessings because it won't be long before I feel every little move.

They took measurements on everything, and each thing kept popping up at 18 weeks and zero days, which was exactly that day of my pregnancy. I don't know how they measure the femur size to a particular day - but that's what the machine said! The only thing that measured different was the circumference of the head, which clocked it at 18 weeks and 5 days. I had to thank my husband for passing on big-head genes. 5 whole days bigger than it should be - I'm not concerned. Let's just hope his crazy-big brain comes with that package!

It was too early to tell the gender. I was bummed about that, because I thought we would find out. So, we'll have to wait and see. It's possible our doctor can do an unofficial ultrasound at the clinic on one of our next visits. But, that's just our plan, not his. We might just have to wonder and guess until October. That seems like forever away! As fast as the end of the school year has come, it still seems like the pregnancy moves super slow. I'm not even half way there yet. Maybe that's good, because our house isn't even a 1/4 of the way ready to welcome of baby. We've put off all the shopping and rearranging rooms and whatnot until summer. But, college graduation is today, I'm done in two weeks, then it's Kentucky trip, Brandon to Africa, I start my new job, and hello summer!

This whole week has just gotten away from me. We had 2 sick men in the house, along with 3 extra houseguests, 2 being little kids. Our permanent house guest got sick on Wednesday, followed by Brandon who got it really bad. He was entirely down for a day and half, and now just taking things as slowly as possible. It's a pretty busy week on campus, so there was a lot he couldn't get out of. Meanwhile I didn't sleep with him up puking all night, then couldn't do my afterschool naps with the little ones running around, so things have been on the crazy side. It was actually really helpful to have the other mom here, because she was a cleaning and cooking saint! I would have been in big trouble without her. It was fun to hang out with the kiddies too!

Well, the weekend should reestablish normalicy; although our busy May isn't exactly going to have a normal schedule. Should be fun though!