TFD

Last week here at SWIM, we facilitated a TFD training workshop. Tom Clarke, who has quickly become a good friend, (he's a Taswegian) came over to the Solomons to run this workshop. It's purpose was to give prison workers and volunteers basic skills to work with sexual and violent offenders. Tom has drawn from his vast experience working with inmates and has developed this program to help people change detrimental thought patterns. Tom really knows what he is talking about and all the participants definitely benefited from the course. If you know people, or community groups that would like to be involved in this course, check out Tom's website - the TFD project.

Tom's a really neat guy - we are so blessed to have had him stay with us. We introduced him to iced coffees, and he introduced us to salt and pepper squid, both of which we all ended up liking alot. Unfortunately, though, we didn't have a group photo with us and Tom!

While Jair was busy participating in the course, I helped the local women cook up a storm! We did the catering. It was a very very very busy week last week. It taught me about stress management - well, learning from my own mistakes, that is. I was relieved when it was over, but thinking back it was a lot of fun as well. Judging by the comments (and the weight gained by some people;) I think it was a success! The locals loved the iced coffee served with lemon crunchy muffins, chocolate cake or caramel slice for morning tea. We had a good variation in each meal, keeping with the local style of eating staka kaikai tumas (stacks and stacks of food). We had a bit of a western influence sometimes (hamburgers on the last day) but plenty of good local food. I took a photo of my plate of lunch one day:

Clockwise from left - salad; cassava rolls;bbq fish and chicken - local style; curried chicken, rice, curried egg sandwich; deep fried fish.

At SWIM we've never really done catering before, although we get asked about it all the time. Now we know that if we ever want to go down that track, as a way of helping the SWIM base be more self-sufficient, we definitely have the know-how and woman-power to pull it off with style. I'm so impressed with Grace, Helen and Margaret who did fabulous job in the kitchen with me. Trifala barava save tumas!

Theresa helped out in the kitchen as well...

Well, helped herself to what she thinks are great toys - kitchen implements.

So potential career for Theresa? Chef or Climber? I think the latter ;)

1 year old!

We celebrated Theresa's first birthday on Saturday, the 12th of November. It was a very joyous occasion... A whole lot of friends came over for the party in the afternoon. At 3, right when the party was meant to start, a thunder and lightning storm hit. It poured down with rain for a while, hence the umbrellas!

There was a cake, of course...

Party games...

good times...

We are so thankful to have Theresa in our family...

Theresa is joyful and she's a joy to us. Earlier this year I was thinking about when you adopt a child, God gives an orphan a family, but He also gives childless parents a child. He has certainly done that with us and we are so thankful for the great first year we've had with this delightful baby. Happy birthday Theresa! xox

How To...Carry Your Baby Isabel Style

Even though the Solomon Islands is one nation, there are many different people groups inside, who, although they come under one cultural umbrella (Melanesian Culture) have amongst themselves different ways of doing things.

Modern Honiara Women, carry their babies in Cheap, Chinese Made Front Packs.

Women from Guadalcanal and Malaita (and most other islands) carry their babies on their hip, with a lava lava (sarong) wrapped around the baby and tied up by the mother's shoulder for hands free capabilities.

I made myself a little "pea pod" - it's great. It's got clips, wasn't that hard to make, and because I made it myself, I could choose this funky lime green fabric. I love it. Theresa loves it. Ideally, she sits securely on my hip with the pea pod holding her in place.

Except that Theresa has a very passionate, excited personality and she's not happy to sit comfortably by my side but is always trying to lean forward and engage life to the fullest.

So I decided to start carrying Theresa Isabel Style. On the island of Santa Isabel, women carry their babies in a lava lava tied on to their back. It's a distinctive part of their mothering and you can usually pick out where a woman is from by how she's carrying her baby. Babies are carried like this from birth, which I find a bit scary, but it's definitely a good method to use when your baby can sit up by herself.

Theresa loves Isabel style because she can get a good view on the world, but she's so tightly strapped in place that I can rest assured knowing that she won't fall out. And it's really cuddly.

This is how you carry your baby, Isabel style.

First you put the scrunched up end of the lava lava over your right shoulder and then get your baby to stand behind you as if she's going to have a piggy back. Then drape the length of the lava lava over your baby's body, tucking the middle of the bottom edge of the fabric under her bottom and reaching to her knees. Then pull the lava lava across to your left hip and then up to meet the other part you previously draped over your right shoulder.

Tie it in a lose knot. The higher your baby is on your back, the more comfortable it will be for you. If she's sitting low, I find, it pulls much more on your muscles and hurts quickly. Anyway you kind of adjust your baby so she's sitting where you want her to. Also, you want the top of the lavalava to cover her right arm, but leave her left arm free. Then tie the knot tight. Make sure the whole thing is tight - there will always be enough room for her to breath, but you don't want her to have to much room because she might lean back and fall out! Maybe, I haven't let Theresa try that.

Isabel Style is a good way to carry your baby if all you have is a lava lava or a length of random fabric. It's hands free, comfortable, baby gets a good view and feels secure, and it's incredibly cost effective. It's for daddy's too!

Theresa snuggled up to her daddy all the way to Church on Sunday like this.

There are other ways of tying, although I don't find them very secure. This might sound confusing, but once you get the hang of it, your baby will be happy to well, just hang there.

We love it!

One of the Last Very Firsts

Our sweet little Theresa is almost a year old. I can't believe it. Last week, she attended her very first birthday party - the party of her two little friends Anneka and Keelah. They're twins who are two weeks older than her. She loves playing with her, in a little, baby kind of way (you know, pulling hair, driving the walker over each other kind of thing - just your usual baby love).

Now that Theresa's almost a year, she's drawing to the end of some of her significant first experiences, like laughing, standing up, throwing a tantrum about eating eggplant, and playing indians. Obviously, she's got many more first to go in her life - reading, jumping on the tramp, etc etc, but she's getting to the end of her baby list.

Including going to her first birthday party.

We both had a big list of things to do before the party in the afternoon. It was 10:10. Theresa was sleeping, I was in the kitchen making something when I thought - "shoot! I don't have any presents for the twins - and there's two of them = two presents needed."

Frantic think - what can I do. Buy something? Nothing in the Solomons worth buying for a 1 year old.

Making something was my only option. Fabric book? Too difficult in the 2 hours I had left.

photoframe - hmm no.

think think think.

Then I remembered a cool blog on making hair clips for babies.

So I gave it a go.

I think it turned out pretty well (in fact, I tried it in my own hair and wanted to keep it;) I think I'll make some more.

The cutest thing is that Keelah was wearing red (at least, i think that's Keelah - they're identical so it's kind of hard. I think Anneka has one more tooth than Keelah...) so her hairclips really matched her outfit.

Theresa was all excited about eating cake so she stood up randomly. Probably the fourth time she's done that without holding onto anything.

And she loved ice cream - well, you wouldn't think so from this photo but she just kept coming back for more. She did think it was cold on her little gummies though. oh well, good for teething (she got her fifth tooth a few days later!)

So that's another first knocked off the list. Next week will be the real first - first birthday!

Sunday Afternoon Walk

On our Sunday afternoon walk this week, I came across these beautiful flowers in the dirty creek that's at the back of SWIM.

How could something so beautiful live in such an awful, smelly place. You haven't seen the creek - believe me, it's terrible. Stagnant, crocodile infested, dirty water. (Ok, the crocodile part isn't completely accurate, but crocodiles have been found in parts of the same body of water)

But I found these beautiful flowers in there. They were quite fragile, bruising even if you blow on them, which the fan was doing.

I also found this flower in a random bush in a random patch of lawn. I thought it was quite pretty.

The only vase I had for it was an old WW2 coke bottle, found in the dirt outside the boundary fence.

I rather like these Coca-Cola bottles, the contents of which was swagged down by a thirsty American soldier who just wanted a break from the sweltering heat, the flies, and the bombs in 1944.

Now the bottle holds flowers.

Then after my walk, I found this bug on my floor.

Another crazy bug!

Another crazy red bug with wings that have blue dots on them.

Speaking of crazy bugs, I have these killer ants at home, that ate my camera! For the second time in one week, I found these ants nesting in a camera case - thankfully the first camera was fine. I got there quick enough to deal viciously with the ants. The second camera though, found infested one week later, sustained permanent brain damage. Which is sad, because it was an old film camera which I hadn't developed for years, keeping it as an ongoing time capsule. Now nobody will know the photos it held, because the ants ate it.

Oh, life in the tropics - where you see so vividly a dichotomy between the effects of sin on ants, and the beautiful intricacies of creation.

Eeney, Meeney, Miney, Matchey!

I have been procrastinating about writing for way too long now. First I went away for over a week with Theresa (I will write about that some time), then we had Ant and Matt over so we were all super busy. But today is the day and I had to sort through all the historic things I wanted to write about...

Recently (or not so recently) my friend and fellow blogger Talia wrote about wearing matching clothes with her baby. Being matchy matchy is cool. Unfortunately I can't really match with Theresa because not only is there a lack of fabric stores to choose the same fabric to sew clothes, she also cruises around in a nappy all day. I mean, she probably spends about 6% of her life in clothes - that's when we go to church or go to town, which is seldom. I can't really match with the whole nappy thing. To make matters worse, she's usually a nuddy buddy at the moment - we're trying to combat her nappy rash. So, again, matching is not an option for us two.

But, I did think it was really adorable that only a few days after I read Talia's blog about matching, I saw this:

Our friend Mercy had dressed her two girls, Anna and Rebekah, in matching clothes for Church. They even do the whole Matchey thing here! (BTW - Mercy made the skirts - she's a very lovely, creative Solomon mother).

Also at church I saw these awesome bugs!

What are they? Anyone know?

This is what the kids thought of me taking photos of bugs:

They weren't so interested. Meh - bugs.

Very Special Event

How do I start this blog post? I'm still coming to grips with how big this event was. On Sunday we had a custom handover with Theresa's biological family. We went to their place, joined by Rob and Jemma, and Ant and Matt. As well as the family, we were also joined by the pastor and his wife who got the family in contact with us before Theresa was born. So we were all gathered together. Lots of relatives had come from their home island to be a part of this occasion.

Then we were called to sit next to the Patriarch of the family and his wife, along with his sisters and brother. He got out ten strings of shell money and explained what it represents - the ten strings, the ten commandments, making what would happen as firm as that. The black shells - our sin, but the red thread is Jesus' blood which gives us redemption.

Then we all held the strings of shell money and lifted it up while Theresa's birth mother carried her under the strings.

She held our baby for a few moments and I cried as I realised just how big it has been for her to willingly and wholeheartedly give her baby to us.

Then she placed my baby in my arms and sat next to us and the Patriarch led us in prayer. Afterwards we had an opportunity to say a few words. Tears choked us, but all we really wanted to say was that we are so thankful for their gift to us, and that we promise to bring her up in the fear of the Lord.

It was so special. A defining moment in Theresa's life, I think. I'm sure the 2nd of October will always be a day of celebration for us. These kinds of events, exactly like the legal events, confirm more and more, Theresa's place in our family.

Afterwards we celebrated with a feast, meeting the family and talking. Then we went home, and I put our precious baby to bed.

Our precious baby.