Okay I think the blog is going to go back to more reasonable sizes now that all our adventuring is done and Noah is home.
On Monday, August 17, we woke up to some fun photos from Noah's first full day home. Even though I was still feeling sad in his absence, it helped to see him snuggling Trouncer...
And randomly running into my brother Nathan, along with Ana and the kids.
He also hung out with his friend Jacob.
Another thing that helped with the sadness was working out at the Morrison gym again. The first day of school at Morrison had been the week before, but we didn't attend b/c of vacationing with Noah. So on Monday Terry agreed to come with me to work out and try to be healthy.
While we were there, we talked to the high school counselor about Samuel and Ezra's classes - they are both taking one class at the school in addition to their homeschool studies. It was a complicated mess, but everything got worked out in the end. Later that day, the boys' school books were delivered after a bunch of importing confusion.
That afternoon, Terry went to the LKIC staff meeting and I biked back to the school with the boys. Only Ezra was able to take his class (Engineering and Design) since Samuel's wasn't sorted out yet. But we did get him a library account and brought some books home.
Early that morning, Evie went to her first day of helping at a cram school summer camp. She came back pretty tired and said she was sad that the kids have to sit in classrooms their whole life. Taiwan does the most school out of any nation. They go to normal school during the day and then English cram school in the evenings. During the summer they go to a variety of camps as well, which is generally more classroom time. But as the week went on and she got to know the kids, they were endeared to her and she became very fond of them. I'm sure the feeling was mutual.
This is her upon arrival home on Monday - Marco Polo videoing a friend while Porky got in some snuggles (he likes the new couch and also probably missed Evie).
On Tuesday, August 18, Terry and I slept just terrible, so we slept in and put off working out until the afternoon. Afterwards, we took a couple of laps around the park and stopped for this picture next to the koi fish.
Evie after work. The Evie-Porky thing seems to be a feature.
That evening, Terry finally went back to EC Talk at Aroma Church in Taipei. This time he drove himself in our new van...and regretted it. Parking was a supremely irritating pain. I don't know if he'll do it again.
Wednesday, August 19, began with Evie going to camp and Terry and I going to Morrison to workout. We talked to the admissions lady and she told us everything was finalized for Samuel's class. We biked home in a misty rain, but by lunch it was pouring.
That afternoon we took Samuel back to the school by van since it was raining. Here is his first day of school photo. He is taking AP Computer Science! It is definitely new to us, but he's liked it so far. Hopefully it'll be a good thing for him. He's one of only five students!
We took a selfie since we were there too. Samuel stayed for swim strength practice. He's decided to join the swim team! I love athletics at Morrison b/c they're super chill. They only have a couple events per season and the practices get done by 5:15pm. They don't eat up your entire life the way they did at home - either RCC or public school was like that, in addition to fancy traveling sports teams.
Next we got groceries in the van (thankful) but Ezra biked to class and back in the mist.
Samuel was trying to catch up on some online work like reading the syllabus, etc.
Porky snuggled with me that night!
Ezra placed Porky back-side-down in his bed and he stayed like that for a while. I think Porky likes Ezra b/c he plays with him the most.
Thursday, August 19, jet lag hit Noah pretty bad and the poor guy only got an hour of sleep. He still managed to put together the cool Lego car he bought here in Taiwan.
Beautiful orchids at Morrison that morning.
We did an upper body FASTer Way workout.
Then Terry met with Pastor Nanson to discuss evangelism options for LKIC.
Taiwan has funny things. Terry always looks for them to post in his socials story.
That morning Evie's camp visited the sock museum in Linkou and she rode in an Uber with these kids. She's really grown to love them as the week went on.
After their sock museum tour.
Evie took on more and more responsibility as the week went on. The entire curriculum was based on socks and Evie had the brain wave of having a sock puppet show. 😂
Terry took these pictures b/c he went in to help that day too. Evie volun-told him to lead some games.
The boys played piano and pool before chilling for their last week of summer. Poor Porky puts up with a lot, but b/c Ezra plays with him, he doesn't seem to mind too much.
Porky snuggles every day after work.
😃😄😂
On Friday, August 20, we woke up to happy pictures of Noah's day, including dinner with my folks.
Samuel joined Terry and I for leg day at the school.
I didn't even have time to shower before meeting Lillian for coffee. I think there might be more dogs than babies in Linkou but I can't prove it. Taiwan has the lowest birth rate in the world! Maybe that's part of the reason we're here - to show what a family looks like. Here is the shop's owner's dog (?). I thought he didn't even look real in the photo but he definitely was.
We always take pictures of each other.
But I was unshowered so I was ashamed.
After lunch Terry joined the camp again and watched the presentation they made for the parents - the sock puppet show.
I think Porky is comforting us the week after Noah's departure b/c he sure has got a lot of snuggles...or maybe I just have nothing else to photograph now that our adventuring is done.
It rained again that afternoon and Terry and Evie saw this guy with a grocery bag on top of his head on their way home from camp. I guess it's almost as good as an umbrella?
That evening, Terry and I finally made it back to bible study at Nanson and Flora's, which was great. I had never seen a baby rocking swing like this! It works via spring like a Johnny Jump Up and just continually rocks the baby gently up and down.
Saturday, August 22, was very chill. Maybe not for Samuel b/c he had swim practice 7-9am! He and Terry got up at 5:30am and a friend took him and some other homeschool students to the pool. Terry went back to sleep. We had pancakes when Samuel got home and then watched Wingfeathers with Noah. So sad that only last week he was here in person to watch!
Noah called us late b/c he was having such a good time with his roommates. His good friend Jared moved in and Jonah returned from his internship.
Samuel was so tired after swim practice!
I took no other pictures that day, but we had pizza and watched the first Hunger Games movie since the boys had never seen it before and it was Evie's choice as a reward for successfully completing camp.
For Sunday, August 23, we had church. Evie and Samuel went out afterwards for lunch w/ her friends and then had church youth group...whom only homeschoolers go too. Terry and I shopped and then hung out with Ezra.
Noah had gone to his childhood friend Jack's wedding reception.
Terry took Noah's place in duck game. I wrote the blog and Samuel did Computer Science homework.
My friend Camilla sent me a photo of Noah at church on Sunday! Of course that was our Monday.
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