Adapting to life as a family of 4 has
been challenging at times, not least for Noah, whose first act in greeting his
new sister, Emily, was to give her a hearty slap in the face! We do wonder
whether people who post adorable photos of their toddlers tenderly holding
their newly born siblings have been using the powers of photoshop (or perhaps
even behaviour enhancing drugs), as it took us all of 13 weeks to finally get
the photo below of Noah actually showing some sort of affection to his sister!
Thankfully since then things have steadily improved and he is finally on his
way to becoming a very loving big brother!
It was great to spend time with
family whilst in the UK and whilst it was not always easy, Noah in particular
testing our powers of patience, there were also many moments to treasure.
Sarah continued to show her mixed
abilities when it comes to her hairdressing talents. Thankfully she has moved
well beyond her inauspicious beginnings which left Tim looking like Jim Carry
from ‘Dumb and Dumber’, but still managed to leave Noah with a sizable bald
patch on the left side of his head, when accidently using the wrong setting on
the clippers (3mm instead of 13mm!). Still, a dodgy haircut or two is par for
the course when it comes to toddlers!
Whist Sarah may be accused of
negligent hairdressing, Tim may be accused of worse as it was on his watch
during a function whilst in the States that Noah sneakily chugged someone’s cup
of vino before announcing that he would like some ‘more special water please!’
Emily has played her part as well,
including her most prodigious guffs (to which Noah will announce “Emily did a
BIIIIIG fartie!”) and a wondrous 7 day poo amnesty (I’m sure you can all guess
how that ended!).
Our return to Uganda in August was
not the easiest of transitions. Arriving back to a dirty house, a car that
wouldn’t start and an empty water tank may have had more than a little to do
with Sarah announcing on the very first day that she was getting on a plane and
going straight back home! Things then got even more challenging as we
discovered a poisonous snake in the house, just a meter from where Emily had
been lying on the floor.
Enter Katende and Tim with sticks to give it a good
battering and after that our trusty farm manager Stephen (usefully formerly a
pest controller) to come and spray the house, requiring us to move out for a
night.
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| Stephen strikes his best Winston Zeddemore pose as he prepares to vanquish snakes! |
Thankfully it has got a little easier, although the fact that this month’s
water bill is just 85 pence gives you an idea of just how little water we’ve
had to survive on this first month back!
We are all getting back into the
swing of things, Sarah picking up things on what has been a VERY busy Baby Unit
as well as taking on River of Life communications (Facebook and Blog - do take a look!), Tim
preparing for a new season at Synergy, Noah settling back into playgroup and
Emily doing her best to make her presence felt with squawks, screeches, giggles
and of course BIIIIIG farties!
As the ever-expanding Crow Clan we
ready ourselves for another year in Uganda and look forward to what God has in
store!
