The Honeymoon is Over?

We had to title it this way because we kept hearing over and over again about the "honeymoon" period we would experience the first 3 months where everything we would seem new and magical. Well, according to the calendar, we've left that period and entered the "Sad Homesick" period. We feel like people have been looking at us and waiting for the moment when we will have our nervous breakdown. While we do experience homesickness here and there (especially when you all send us really nice notes, so please stop that! Not really.) I don't really feel that different. I think we are just experiencing for real how difficult it is to live in a 3rd world country. Don't get me wrong, the next blog could be titled "nervous breakdown", but for now we are doing ok adjusting to our reality check.

• Instead of it being funny when a giant cockroach is hanging on to the inside of a shirt you just put on, it's just plain irritating (just ask Noella). 

• We've realized with a SHOCK just how expensive electricity is down here, like as much as our rent, so we will be cashing in the rest of our life savings to pay that utility bill this month.
• Cory has had his share of a reality check with car troubles too. We never know if it will start or not and this past week, he was stranded at the store. He had Gavin with him, so the boy got to sit in the driver seat to work the brake while Cory and a some guys he found pushed it up the hill backwards to start the manual transmission. 
• I've had to face my most terrifying nightmare of tarantulas. I know it's irrational, but it's been my biggest phobia as long as I can remember. We've saved the dead spiders in a jar on the kitchen counter. I figure I need to face it daily and desensitize myself (or stop cooking dinner in there!).

• I think the biggest challenge has been learning flexibility. I'm such a planner and it's been really hard for me to go with whatever's happening that day. For example, we sat around a lot last weekend since our car didn't want to start. I haven't been to church in weeks because of this never-ending Dengue Fever, so I was feeling bored and restless that we STILL couldn't go or do anything else.  Monday comes around and I have a day planned full of school and normal routine household chores. (I know, we should have been doing school stuff on the weekend, and the kids object highly to that.) However, my structured morning turns into a circus at our house of people stopping over to hang out for the day. I found myself frustrated despite the fact that I kept repeating "be flexible" quietly to myself. Then I remembered that this is why we are here and what I had been wanting all weekend. We are so American that we think every social encounter needs to be entered on our calendars first and planned a week ahead of time. One day I'll finally get it and then I'll never fit in with the social calendars back in the states. 

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• The biggest reality check is just living in complete trust. We have to believe in God to provide for all of our unexpected expenses. I have to remind myself that He brought us here so He will take care of us. There were always ways to plan or budget for things back home, but here we can only pray.