First day of school/last time at Peruvian preschool for Sophia!

USA school year: August-June
Peruvian school year: March-December

The boys started their second semester in February and Sophia started at her Peruvian preschool in March.  The difference is that the boys are still in the same school year, whereas Sophia started up a whole new year.  The weird thing is that she will only be in preschool until August when she will start Kindergarten at ICSL, the school where the boys attend.  So between August 2013 and August 2014 the kids will have 3 first days of school. :)  Awesome!

Arequipa, Peru

Who doesn't love a good road trip story!?  We left at 3am on a Saturday morning to drive to Arequipa, a city in southern Peru and the city where the two youngest boys were born.  About 5 hours into our trip, the car starts acting funny and refusing to shift gears.  Not a great thing when our total trip is about 13 hours and we are less than half way there.  We pull off in Nazca to look for some transmission fluid, but it's just before 8am so finding something that's open was a challenge...thankfully we located one little hole in the wall and the guy poured it in.  It took and we were off again.

Our entire trip was about 1,000 kilometers....at the 999th kilometer, our car overheated and refused to budge.  An entire day of coastal beauty, desert hills, passing large trucks and buses and then smoke started pouring out the engine.  We were so thankful that our friends lived right around the corner and we had made our entire trip without breaking down until the very end!!  Such a blessing!!

The car entered the shop, was able to be fixed (a hose had a hole burned in it), and two weeks later we were on our way back home.  The boys enjoyed a week of summer camp, playing with friends, and even some rain!! While Jeff enjoyed teaching a week long class at the Bible institute and I actually relaxed more than I had in years--I managed to finish reading 4 whole books!!!  Good times.

This guy is amazing with his mad Peruvian driving skills!

Squatted land.

There's not really an adequate caption for this...oh my goodness!!!

So much traffic to pass--super slow trucks.

Beautiful volcano Misti, overlooking AQP

Workers planting in the field.

Flying through the holidays and into 2014

We managed to soar through Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years without even pausing to take a breath.  The kids finished their semester just before Christmas and Jeff finished his school year the beginning of December...it was, without a doubt, the busiest 4 months we've had in years.  Between heading home on Home Assignment for 6 weeks of full-on "busy" and then coming back to Peru only to start school the day after our arrival, we hit the ground running.  Jeff taught 2 classes and I volunteered for various school functions, including co-planning the biggest fundraiser that the school hosts each year.  Now that we are well into 2014, well, at least 2 weeks into the new year, we've decided to slow down a bit. We'll see how well we do with that goal...

The ice cream lady waits outside for school to get out and then sells anything from popsicles to ice cream sandwiches.

I enjoyed being part of a Christmas Bazaar, selling some handmade ornaments, Christmas tags, and other crafts.

Packages wrapped in brown paper...I love this!

Sophia participated in a Christmas/end of the school year program--as a little Flamenco dancer! 

New Year's Eve...fireworks light up the entire city for at least 20 minutes straight!

We started a new New Year's Eve tradition...grilling pizzas on the balcony and then eating s'mores!

Our new foreign exchange student...aka the teenage boy

So we are now hosting a foreign exchange student, we've had him since October 25th, and he comes from the land of teenagers.  Seriously, people, this new thing called "teenager" is like having a foreign person in my home.

Now I've always felt fairly secure in my parenting skills, not always encouraged or perfect by any means, but at least feeling some semblance of control as a parent.  This new phase has thrown every confidence I might have gained over the years, right out the window.  All of a sudden my teen boy enters the house and in walk snarky attitudes, forgetfulness, moodiness, face book, girl craziness, and oh, did I mention moodiness??  I thought we'd at least ease into this stage, you know month by month I'd have the wherewithal to tackle these new attitudes one at a time...but it literally happened overnight.  Bam.  I have a teen.

Remember those book titles that you thought "someday" you would have to read?  Those well meaning people who mentioned this book and that as being helpful....well now I'm scrambling around trying to find that long forgotten book list like a woman in the path of a hurricane!

I had one of those moments this morning, where everything I wanted to tell him all these years just died a slow death in my head--and I realized it's time to tackle this new stage head on.  Because even though he is all of the aforementioned things (forgetful, moody, etc.) he is also still my sweet boy who is funny, smart, passionate, and dedicated to making a difference in the world.  I realize it doesn't have to be a negative, uncertain time in my life, and even though we've never walked this path as parents, he's never been a teenager before either.

I want to embrace this phase because I choose to do so.  I want to stay focused on helping my teenage boy make good choices.  And most of all I want to encourage a rich relationship that will last until I'm gone.  So while yes, he still seems foreign to me most days, it's not necessarily a bad thing. :)

Winter wife vs. Summer wife

Yes, I admit it...I can easily sum up my life in two separate personas--on any given day I am either the winter wife or the summer wife.  There is no gray area here, no middle ground.  I am one or the other.  I do not ride the fence on any of these points, I'm on one side or the other.  You may be wondering how a woman can be so easily defined, must be heaven for her husband, you are thinking. Though I may waffle between being winter wife or summer wife...I can say with conviction that I'm slowly learning to wear both seasons with grace, mercy, and patience.

Winter wife.

Winter in Lima gets down to about 60 degrees. I hear what you are saying, "Oh poor you, how terrible that you have to suffer so." and I agree, 60 degrees doesn't sound so awful.  However, with an average of 88% humidity, overcast skies 95% of the time, and no insulation in the cement walls of my house...winter wife finds the occasional moment to feel sorry for herself.  Winter wife also admits to wearing hoodies, socks, and fleece pants to bed.  At the same time.  For weeks on end.  I might also add that winter wife does not shave her legs.  It doesn't matter how hot that shower is, the minute the water stream stops--the temp inside the shower drops 25 degrees.  Winter wife begs for a small gas heater.  Winter husband wants to snuggle. Winter wife dreams of tropical islands and sipping brightly colored drinks with umbrellas in them.  Winter wife actually drinks copious amounts of coffee, tea, cocoa, and anything else she can hold in her hands to warm them.  Winter wife gets into bed and pulls the covers over her head to warm her nose.  She adds so many wool blankets to the bed that she finds it hard to turn over, get up, or heaven forbid, rush out to check on the children should a small animal be attacking them in the night.  Winter wife does not want to get up in the night, but suffers through the dark mornings to go for a run a couple of days a week...in shorts.

Now let me present Summer wife.

Summer wife wakes up and rejoices over the fact that the sun will be rising any moment.  She goes for a run anticipating the misty cloud cover because she is sure the sun will be out later.  Summer wife shaves her legs and starts wearing flip flops at the first hint of sunshine...even if her toes are actually turning blue from the cold. Summer wife knows at exactly what time the sunshine (if there is any) will come streaming through the windows in any room (Kitchen around 4pm, Sophia's room around 1pm, back patio between 11-1pm). Summer wife is more apt to agree on afternoon weekend outings to the beach, as opposed to staying home and staying warm.  Summer wife breaks out the sunglasses and wears them to take out the garbage...just because she can.  Summer wife smiles and dreams of tropical islands and sipping brightly colored drinks with umbrellas in them.  Then she makes a large jar of sun tea.  It's close enough.  Summer wife also wears shorts and a tank top while putting up her Christmas tree....did I mention I live in the Southern Hemisphere, while summer husband pines away for a cold day on the slopes. 

I have some summer kids and some winter kids...they appreciate one or the other, but seldom both.  Like their mom.  I know it's all a matter of perspective, and what I'm trying to learn through this self-seasonal evaluation is that regardless of the season, I need to live each day to the fullest whether I'm wearing a tank top or a parka.  Because one will end and one will begin...all year long.

If my mom tells me I'm a princess, then it must be true!

When Jeff and I chose to try for another little Krohn, we were blessed beyond belief to find out it was a girl!  Sophia has been the sweetness to our family, the light in our lives, and the touch of pink that we all needed.  Her brothers adore her and she adores each of them.  She makes us laugh, gives us that little taste of drama, and now I'm not the only one to leave long hair all over the house.

When we were planning for our Home Assignment, I had talked to my Mom and we decided an all-girls trip was in order...and we knew just the place!  Disneyworld!!  We lived, ate, and breathed princesses for 4 days straight and we'll never be the same. :)  I will admit there was a sense of entitlement after the trip was over, and it took a couple weeks to come down from the princess "everyone look at me and spoil me" platform...but it was worth every single princess wave!!

A combo of history AND Hell's Angels?? I think yes!!