And they're off! (Sniff)

Our time with Granny and Grandpa here has come to an end : ( We delivered them to the airport last night, which was very hard for us all. I still can’t believe what a great time we all had together!

I have a new found appreciation for my parents, too. Before I moved here and got involved in babies homes and adoption, and my sister got involved in foster care in the U.S., I pretty much took it for granted that my parents loved me, cared for me well and kept me safe when I was a youngster. They did so much more than that but those are, what I thought, basics. Some of the things I’ve seen, experienced and heard about first hand from my sister (whose a foster parent to the “hard” foster kids) has given me such a greater appreciation for my parents and my upbringing. I never, once during my childhood worried about if I would be able to eat or have a place to sleep the next day, nor worried about my safety. The older I get the more I realize what a blessing that was and have a lot to thank my parents for! Well, plus the fact that they would travel thousands of miles to visit me and my children and would stay several months to help me when I’m an adult : )

My mom and dad celebrated their 39th (??) wedding anniversary while they were here. In honor of their anniversary they took the youngsters and Sarah out to eat ( I was slaving at work) and the kids, of course, had to dress up for the event. Get a load of the results!


If you’re smart, don’t mess with Ella. Gad*ffi has women bodyguards and we’re wondering if Ella could grow up to be a woman bodyguard someday. It looks like there’s a lot of potential there – must be the princess dress ;) Frankie on the other hand, well, from this picture it looks like he’ll have a good chance at growing up and becoming a clown!


Granny and Grandpa took the kids and dogs for a picnic in the Botanical Gardens too, one day while I was at work. They are quite the crew (hang on Granny! Glad the dogs didn’t see a monkey!)!

During one of our trips to the zoo, Granny got to pet the hyena,

Grandpa got to ride the camel,

And I got to pull the rhino’s tail! (this is a picture of my arm and hand reaching through the bars and grabbing onto her tail : )

Hello, big fella!

Granny and I shamefully exploited poor old Grandpa while he was here. The poor man probably babysat and played more games of Uno than ever before in his entire life! Even though the poor guy was hungry most of the time, he never complained and was a big help.

And then there’s Granny. Wow. Can’t say enough about ol’ Gran. She cared for children, (not only mine, either! But the neighbors AND another friends!), fed us all, taught children, washed clothes, cared for animals, played Rummykub, cribbage and Yahtzee with me, went shopping, gardened, washed and doctored the kitten – you name it, she probably did it! What a huge help she was in EVERYTHING. I love yah, Nan!

Coming to an end :(

My parent's time here is drawing to an end and I am sad :(. But I am also really happy. We have had such a good time together and I am so blessed to have parents who will pay a ton of money, travel a long way and stay for such a long time! And they are such good grandparents. Wow. Such a blessing!

We really have had a wonderful time together. They have both (especially Mom!) gotten to know Frankie really well and little Ella just started where she'd left off last summer in her relationship with the both of them. We will all leave our two months together with some great memories and some great achievements! Granny taught Ella to read while she was here (old homeschooling grannies are great!) and Ella has shared endless games of Uno, Crazy 8's and Memory with her Grandpa. We have some statements from Ella that will forever go down into H history and that she will never live down :).

The only one who will probably be glad to see them go is Bridger. Seriously! He likes them well enough but really is used to having access to whatever piece of livingroom room furniture he wants, whenever he wants. That's just not been possible this summer, which he's taken good naturedly enough, but will be perfectly happy not playing musical chairs (and um, beds) with them. Ha! He is such a funny dog!

We've had some really great times at the zoo together. And there is no doubt where I get my zoo enthusiasm from! The apple didn't fall far even if it it did land in Africa!

Ed walking with Frank, his only H grandson- the future of the H line

We have been thinking about this pair. Edwin Norton H had a son, Ed Jr, who had six children - three boys and three girls. Out of those 3 H sons (my dad being the oldest) only one son had any boys. And so far those boys have not produced any sons nor does it look very likely that they ever will. Then my dad's youngest unmarried daughter produces a son, Franklin H!!! Yep, it looks like it will be up to Frankie to carry on the Edwin Norton H Jr line of H's!!

What's even funnier is that Great Grandpa Sam H came from Norway. So these are all leftsa eating Norwiegenish men. Then enters Frank :). Mom and I have started calling him Ole :). We really crack ourselves up!

The kids and their "little" friend, Jennifer

The teeter totter has never been so fun!

Although it's a little squishy...

Somehow I never remember him doing things like this when I was a kid. He was too cool then I think ;)

Granny helping Ella with her reading, while Bronco sleeps on one of his favorite "pillows". He will sure miss Granny when she's gone!

A pancake dinner in the living room on a rainy evening

Granny reading the bedtime stories

Looks like she read two little grandsons right to sleep!

It's so neat how far God has brought our family. We haven't always gotten along so well and five years ago the thoughts of spending so much time together in such a tight place would have sent me puking (seriously! I puke when I'm stressed :). Mom and I have always been close but my dad, not so much. So it's really something to see how far He's brought us (ME especially!). Of course, having a kitten helps ;)

Welcome to the family, Bronco!

A week and a half ago, when we came back from Jinja, we stopped at the USPCA and picked up a kitten to replace our wonderful cat, Cody, who was killed a month or so ago. I am most definitely a dog person but we were missing a cat around the house and Frankie especially liked Cody and I thought that both kids needed kitten (I want my children to be well rounded ;). Yes, I did it for the children :)

Although we were kitten shopping and can NOT have another dog, my heart totally melted at the sight of all of the dogs there! Ugandan dogs are awesome - they all look alike, have really long noses (like our Sanyu!) and the prettiest, friendliest eyes. There were runs full of them and they set to barking and jumping at the sides of their pens to lick our fingers. Then when we turned to leave - SILENCE. All you could hear was their whimpering!!! Needless to say, I grabbed our kitten and Frankie and MARCHED out of there before I succumbed and brought home a car full of long nosed, friendly dogs!

Anyways, back to our new kitten. There were three kittens to choose from - a black kitty with white feet and a nose, a calico kitty, and a white kitty with a couple of gray splotches. The black and white was the prettiest but unfortunately not too friendly. The calico was friendly but the homeliest white one would not stop purring and was totally NOT afraid of the dog that was wandering about. PERFECT for a H kitty! I have always sworn that I would NEVER have a white dog or cat living in this country with RED dirt, but we walked out of there with a friendly WHITE kitty nonetheless. So much for my resolve :)

What a fine kitty he has proven to be! From the start he was TOTALLY people and dog oriented - the only thing that made him puff up was Ms Dave, who thumped her feet at him. It took them only a couple of days to get used to each other and they are fast friends now. Although homely, he really is the perfect kitty for us - loves people and thinks he's a little dog!

After much discussion, Granny and I settled on the name Bronco for him. It's easy to pronounce and goes well with Bridger.

Ella and Grandpa are teaching Bronco to play Uno.

My parent's involvment in all of this was a hoot. They KNEW that we needed a kitten and I'm so glad that I got one while they were here! Although Grandpa is sort of a kitten hog...

Hilarious! A man and his kitten...

When not sleeping in the arms of his grandfather, Bronco's favorite place to sleep is up on the table snuggled in a hankie :)

This was taken after we first got him and yes, he is a homely fellow. Although now, 1.5 weeks later I must say his looks are improving!

Unfortunetly this bald spot seems to be a bit of mange (or cat scabies). So we have bathed him in flea shampoo several times and doused it with iodine to kill the little mange creatures that were burrowing into his skin. He is on a continued treatment plan and seems to be getting better. I was not looking forward to having a white BALD kitty, that's for sure!

Like his grandpa, Frankie seems to like Bronco quite a bit too!

Bridger wanted to be sure that Grandpa still loved him, too. He has been a pretty good boy about sharing "his" chair with his grandparents... He is one ridiculous dog!

Eastward Ho!

Last week I loaded up the family (in my car with my NEW SHOCKS!) and we headed to Jinja for a few days for a much needed little break. The week before we'd had some serious conflicts with a "friend" of our neighbor and my nerves were frazzled and I just needed AWAY. So away we went!

The main purpose of our trip was to visit another of the children that my mom sponsors through Compassion International. He is from Busiu, which we've visited twice, but this time we all agreed that it would be best for everyone if we just met in Jinja. Unfortunately I didn't have my camera out to get any pictures (took a bunch with my mom's camera though!) but we met at a nice touristy coffee shop (The Source Cafe), chatted and played Crazy 8's for over an hour. Unlike the last time we saw him, he was positively beaming and it was fun to watch him interacting with my mom and Ella. Couldn't figure out their accents to save his life!

Once again we stayed at beautiful Mto Moyoni, which is just down the road from where our neighbors and their four girls moved last Sunday. It was good for Ella to see their new house and to realize that our friends aren't "gone for good." We also delivered their turtle.

"Nile goddess" or something! The child is all long legs and arms!

Standing overlooking the Nile River

My young ones and I

The young ones and their grandfather

Wednesday and Thursday the weather was gorgeous so we got to eat our meals outside.

The had just finished re roofing one of the banda's.

Kinda pretty...

How lucky we have been to have Granny and Grandpa come visit us! You would think that after five people, all their stuff, two dogs and a bunny crammed in one small, two bedroom, one bathroom house for three weeks, that we'd be sick of each other yet but surprisingly it isn't so (or maybe I should just speak for myself ;)!

Chillin'

Granny and I were calculating and at the end of this visit, she will have spent a total of eight months in the last two and a half years, with Ella. While their grandparents do live far (make that very far) away, my children have been ultra blessed to have been able to spend a lot of real quality time with them. We are all blessed :)

This was supposed to be a shot of Ella falling into the Nile River but she just looks way to happy!

On Wednesday we spent the afternoon at the Kingfisher Resort swimming. We'd never done this before and it was great! The pools are PERFECT for kids and SO CHEAP! They had a blast on the little slide and I was relieved that Grandpa was willing to swim and play with them pretty much non stop so that I didn't have to!

Little Ella was smart enough to take a breather now and then :)

Frankie even got a handle on the slide!

And of course Ella had to go down face first :)

Frankie even worked up the courage to go down face first too!

The Swimmers

Even though the kids were pretty pooped, I hired a boat to take us out for a half and hour and take us to see the "real" source of the Nile. Frankie had never been on a boat before and Mom and Dad had never been on one on the Nile before either!

Sailor One

Sailor Two

Sailor Two and her Sailing Granny!

The Sailing Grandpa

This was our boat

Here we are with the source of the Nile river behind us. Not only does Lake Victoria enter the Nile here, but there is a spring that bubbles the water up as well. It is said to be 90 meters deep at this spot.

We passed some guys in fishing boats

Rather intently looking for birds and monitor lizards. She was SO tired that she was slurring!

Love this pic :) The spray was spraying up into his face which he kind of liked but kind of didn't like, as he was also really tired.

Back at Mto Moyoni

The kids and I slept up in the loft which, as you can see by their faces, was a real hit! I even managed without falling down the latter :)

So, we had a really good time and enjoyed ourselves immensely. Frankie started out screaming because he was told that it wasn't called "Ginger" but "Jinja" (that made him really mad for some odd reason!) but ended the trip on a happy note, with a new kitten and a belly full of Ethiopian food. Yep, we picked up a kitten on our way home through Kampala, which I will post pictures of later!