Happy Halloween!

Fera and I would like to wish you a

H A P P Y H A L L O W E E N ! ! !

A few weeks ago, we painted pumpkins based off of my movie, "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown". (Mine was supposed to look like Linus, but it looked more like a spider with a smiley face.)
Fera likes to stick her tongue out in pictures, and I have no idea why.
My face represents my tiredness lately...



Fera with her new friends, Linus and Charlie Brown

This was my sad attempt at taking a photo of us. Fera's a pro at it b/c she takes photos of herself all the time. :-P

Haha, I think this one's really funny. I was trying to turn Linus' head toward the camera when Fera pressed the button.

Again, I'm not sure why she's doing the tongue thing...

Random note to brag about myself: I conquered my fear of my oven on Saturday night. I taught myself how to light it and not burn anything. Woot!

I made corn casserole for our Sunday morning brunch. I didn't have any major problems. I got to use Samini's mortar and pestle, which was really fun, and it actually turned out right. Yay for me!

Ahhh, the joys of corn grinding!

Again, another reflection of my tiredness.

I look drugged here... :-P

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The tiredness continues, as does the grading and other endless school work...

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Little Miss Alia turns 3!

Today is Little Miss Alia's birthday. Last year, her birthday was on a Friday, and so I had invited some teachers to come over and celebrate with her. They did come over, but she was extremely crabby and went to bed at, like, 7:00ish. So we ate her ice cream and cake without her.

Those were the days of her terrible 2's, for sure.

Lately, she's grown out of her former crabbiness and is much more cheerful.

I woke up super early this morning (Saturday), mainly b/c I'd woken up super early each morning of Youth Camp this past week, and I managed to catch Alia and Samini before they went grocery shopping in Bogor.

I took these photos on Lisa's front porch, next-door.

(She's getting sooooo big!)

Happy 3rd Birthday, Alia Bia! :-D


Here she is, sitting like a frog, and trying to figure out what in the world this present is. :-P

Heyyyy, it's The Cat in the Hat!


Alia knows this guy from the beginning of the movie "How the Grinch Stole Christmas", which we've seen about 10 times already. She loooooves Cindy Lou Who and the doggie, and she likes to say that the Grinch is yucky. ("Yucky" is the only adjective she knows to express negativity for something. Scary, broken, and weird things are all considered yucky. I'm still working on building up her vocabulary.)


Looking it over...


Her new friend!

Family photo: Ibu, Alia, Mr. Cat in the Hat

Trying her hand at drawing on the mini Magnadoodle

SUCH a beautiful girl!

This is a cute photo of Samini playing with The Cat in the Hat. :)

Alia's giving her drawing requests to Lisa.

Now it's time to do some grading, as usual.

Pretty soon, I'm going to make an attempt to use my gas oven, which I've never done before. I want to make corn casserole, if I can find any canned corn. If not, then I'll have to buy ears of it and shave it off, which could be a lot of work. We expats are going to have a Fall Brunch after our home church meeting in the morning, so we're supposed to bring homemade, Fall foods. Canned pumpkin can only be found in Jakarta, in select stores, and is $10 for a large can of it, so pumpkin anything is out of the question.

Wish me luck!!

Mandy's musings, part 3

It's been awhile since I've posted on here about anything worthwhile. I don't have anything major to report on, but many smaller, random things are in the works...

• I recently learned more information about my 7th grade field trip to Bali in March. I'm so excited already! We'll visit a turtle farm and possibly see some turtles hatch; visit an organic farm; spend time in a village with no electricity (culture shock for my kids); do something at a waste management facility (NOT exciting for me); and I think something involving recycling stuff. Oh, and some water activities. The theme is, "Go Green", so our interdisciplinary unit will be focused the environment. I'll appreciate our sun's rays by laying out on the beach-hopefully. No one else will join me, though, b/c they all want to be white, not browner... :-/



• I will be going to Singapore during my Christmas break for 2 weeks to spend time with my friend Joy, whom I stayed with in April. I'm very excited to be in a land where cars actually drive in the correct lanes AND where traffic STOPS at stop signs/lights, and where I can speak in English and be understood everywhere I go! Maybe I can get a tan in Singapore...? I'll leave the morning after Christmas and will ring in the new year before anyone else in the world! :-D It's just a little over 2 months away...yay!



• My play is LESS than a month away--yikes! It's going to be on Friday the 13th (of November). Hopefully, that won't be unlucky for us... The kids are still great and have awesome attitudes, so I'm enjoying it!


• You haven't heard from me very much lately b/c I've been preparing for all of the above. I'm also getting ready to go to our annual Youth Camp tomorrow, for 2 1/2 days. I get to share a cabin with 3 other women teachers my age-yay!- and 19 7th grade girls. Yay. :) I'm bringing Ibuprofen.


• Little Miss Alia will have a birthday on Saturday! She's such a big girl, considering she's not quite 3 years old. She's been spewing out Englindo like CRAZY lately. Hopefully, growing up bilingual will be an advantage to her, since she doesn't have any sort of play stimulation at my house and no social life.


• I had a rat in my house on Saturday night! It was sooooo horrible.... I was grading on my couch, minding my own business, when I saw something dark run quickly across the room. I thought it was a cockroach, so I ignored it. Then I saw it WALKING, and with a tail, and I flipped out. I called Lis, who was, thankfully, still awake (actually, I woke her up), and she came over and chased it out of my house with her coconut brooms. She kept asking me if I wanted her to smash it or trap it. I was screaming like a banshee and wanted neither, so she finally chased it out. My throat STILL hurts.
• I've had a student teacher for the past 2 weeks, which feels funny to me; it makes me feel very old and experienced, which I'm not. :-P I have her for only one more week, but I don't know what to do with her, since she's not majoring in English. Oh well.
• I've begun Christmas shopping for Christmas 2010. :)

Indonesia has just created a new, 2,000 rupiah bill over the past month. How exciting.




I think that's all I have to say... Time to go pack for Youth Camp! :)