Malaysia Photos

In case you haven't had the privilege of meeting our friends in person, here is Palm:

and here is Scott:

Hopefully I'll get around to posting a true tour of Malaysia for you. There is so much cool stuff I can't wait to share, but in the meantime, here are a few of the photo highlights: http://picasaweb.google.com/linsrbins/Malaysia#

Halfway 'Round the World

We're back from 2 weeks in Malaysia & Thailand. It was a phenomenal vacation, and we're so excited to share it with you. Since I don't usually have much else to blog about, I'm going to stretch this baby out and give you the play by play.

First up is our story of getting to the other side of the world (Malaysia is exactly 12 hours ahead of Boston's EST).

Days 1-3 (Saturday Apr 10-12): Travel Warriors...aka is that gel in your hair or au naturale travel grease?

Total Air Time: 24.5 hrs
Total Travel Time (door to door): 36 hrs

14:45 Sat afternoon: Alex Bonner cadillac shuttle to BOS (2.5 hrs pre-boarding)
17:10 Sat evening: BOS to LAX (6hrs flight time, 3.5 hr layover)
00:10 Sun: LAX to Taipei to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (14hr flight to Taipei, 2hr refuel stop, 4.5hr flight to KL)
12:15 Mon: Arrival at Kuala Lumpur
14:30 Mon: Arrival at the Feist Palace (aka Scott & Palm's)

To my chief resident, Robin Elliott, THANK YOU for giving me these 2 vacation weeks!

Food for Thought

I thought this slide show was fascinating. Check out the "feast" Jesus was eating at The Last Supper.

http://www.health.com/health/gallery/0,,20353913_2,00.html

I visited chef Jan (my mom) this weekend. Here is what she fed me:

Saturday Dinner:
Grass-fed organic beef meatloaf - I've never tasted meatloaf so good.
Sauteed organic snap peas, julienne carrots, shallots - I can't quite recall how many second helpings I had.
Organic baked potato and homemade whole wheat bread (kneeded with mom's own hands).

Sunday Lunch:
Organic turkey
Organic cauliflower and broccoli
Organic mashed potatoes turnips
Organic homemade (by mom) chutney



That Jesus ate little more than a few small rolls on His last supper yet I could eat two such meals in the same weekend is food for my reflection. Some of you might not be impressed by the veggies, but if you've ever seen me at a salad bar, you'd know this is just my flavor. I wish He could have had a taste.

Laughter

God gave me Ricky, and I am feeling especially thankful. I needed a few laughs this week, and they came...the first two from Ricky.

1) Yesterday evening, Ricky says, "So I had this awesome dream last night...(pause deep in thought obviously enjoying the memory)...I was in an ANTIGRAVITY room..."
This is where I stop and laugh, not AT him, just out of my joy over where his mind goes with it's completely liberated. So then I apologize for interrupting and ask him to continue.
He says, "There were moons everywhere, and I could pick them up and toss them around the room." Then he re-creates his moves, tossing planets around like frisbees.

2) No more than 30 minutes later, we take a trip to Trader Joe's. As we walk into the store, Irish music is playing. We're standing in the entryway, between the cheese and the bananas, with no fewer than 30 people within sight of us, and Ricky starts doing his version of Riverdance...all 250 lbs hopping up and down with pointed toes and all.

3) Today I'm riding home from work on my bike and a guy across the street (4 lanes over), with the window down, shouts, "HEY BUDDY!" I think, hmmm, "Is that meant for me? Or maybe some GUY in one of these cars?" Then he says it again, louder, "HEY BUDDY!" Now he's gotten out of his car and staring straight at me. I crack a huge smile and yell back the directions he's after. The funniest part is that this is not the first time I've been called "Buddy" on my bike. The police officer did it just a few weeks ago. My only probable conclusion is that I'm so stinking fast that there is no chance I could be a girl. Or could it be that I'm just that manish? Time to stop taking the 'roids.

November

Wow, so no Hardy blogging since October! Here's the Hardy November calendar for your update.

We kicked it off with a trip to Texas. We stayed in Angela and Jody's new house in West U and spent the majority of our days there eating, shopping, and playing trains with Hardy. I had fun seeing how much Hardy was using his trains to learn colors, numbers, and vocabulary. We went on for hours like this. Hardy: "What color is James?" Me: "Red." Hardy: "What color is Percy?" Me: "Um...(pause)..." Hardy: "Is he green?" Me: "...(pause)..." ...Is he? Is he green?" Me: "Is he green?" Hardy: "Yes, he is."

We also celebrated Maggie's first birthday. It was a princess party, with everything pink. Maggie wasn't so sure about being the center of attention, but the rest of the kids and I enjoyed the big event, complete with princess clown.

Midweek, we made a trip to Palestine and later shopped our way back to Houston...Thank you Cynthia! All my work friends are jealous of my mother-in-law.

Back in Boston, we celebrated Thanksgiving at dad's, with a table of 10 and a big bird. That Saturday we celebrated again with mom at Uncle Bob's house. Mom made a traditional roast beef and yorkshire pudding to celebrate our English roots.

I didn't take any pictures in November, so I stole this sweet one from Angela. It's a classic!

CTK Getaway - Rest

It's Columbus Day weekend (aka leaf peeper's delight), and this was by far our best of 3 spent together here in New England - we nearly hit the foliage peak dead on.

Last Friday, we joined our friends from church and headed to Winnipesaukee for 2 days - away from work, chores, and other distractions. We filled up on friends, natural beauty, and reflected on 3 powerful sermons discussing rest by RUF minister Joey Pensak...a beautiful weekend.

Growing Babes

The last and most exciting thing to share is the kids. We were so grateful for having the family travel with these two so that Ricky and I could see how their personalities are unfolding. Hardy is still a Thomas the Tank Engine fanatic (note the PJs). A few times I thought he might be striking up a conversation with me, but he was actually rehashing Thomas stories aloud. He's got those things memorized backwards and forwards. So while Hardy is impressively meticulous, Maggie is simply an animal; she'll crawl anywhere and eat anything. That's right, they're busting up gender stereotypes left and right. At one point I pretended to be attacking them both. Maggie looked up with a huge smile and started racing toward me. Hardy raised his eyebrows, stepped aside and pointed me toward Maggie! It was priceless. We miss them and can't wait to see them again soon.