Rattins living Coram Deo

Ana and Moses were dressed in their uniforms and ready to go... but the Home of Love van never came... apparently nursery school children start their holiday today! A week earlier than anticipated... they must have run out of sugar at the school... So, suddenly, I have the four kids at home, without any forethought about how to occupy their time - a MUST for Moses, especially! So, out come my favorite activities: any Melissa and Doug activity (today it's the playdough set and Write-a-Mats) and any Usbourne books (central to our homeschooling). My goal is to set up a resource room at Home of Love with such activities to promote literacy and educational play after school and on the long holidays (nursery students will be on holiday now for 6 weeks!). We have the luxury of such wonderful educational resources for our children, yet Home of Love has, so far, worked hard to survive and there has been no extra money for books, games, and structured play activities. Pray that we can come...

I may have overdone it buying pineapples on the roadside today... (hmmm... 6 pineapples, really?!) And I'm reading an Amish book... So I decided to make whoopie pies, using ingredients that I need to use up anyway: posho (maize flour), mango puree (yes, from our crazy mango season), and pineapples. And, our summer guest is allergic to wheat (my new diagnosis for her - congrats!)... So NO wheat! 1 sticks unsalted butter melted (I substituted Blue Band margarine) 1 cup packed light brown sugar 2 large eggs, at room temperature, lightly beaten 1 cup mango puree 1 tablespoon mixed spice (includes cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, etc.) 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract 1 teaspoon baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda 3/4 teaspoon salt 2/3 cups millet flour 1 cup posho Mix it all together, dollop onto cookie sheets, bake at around 350 degrees for around 10 minutes. The filling: 250mL plain yogurt 1/2 cup grated coconut 1 cup crushed well drained pineapple Around 2 cups icing sugar (powdered s...

It's an eternal goal to get a photo of my kids, or, in my even WILDER imagination, a new family photo... ;-P Well, here's one! Too bad I had to sit them in front of a movie to get them to sit still enough to get them all in the same shot! ;-P They watched The Amy Carmichael Story - a 30 minute animation by Christian History Institute about that amazing missionary woman - if you don't know her story, you should read about her! Amazing and inspiring!

I'm not a food blogger... but I really wanted to share what I made for lunch today! One of the many many wonderful things about having Elizabeth here for the summer is that all she eats is produce (only a slight exaggeration!) so that has encouraged me to make new things with fresh produce. Plus, being pregnant and so tired in third trimester has made me a little more interested in making sure that we all get good nutrition. Gracie's a hard one, at times, because of her dietary needs and chewing/swallowing issues. But here was today's raging success! I made cottage cheese - still tastes like ricotta, so I made it herbed - here's how: - around 2 liters of milk brought to a boil (or near boil), salted, a little butter in it. - turn off heat and add vinegar (or any acid) and leave it to sit for 30 minutes. - drain through piece of cloth in collander and gently press over 30 minutes or so. - add heavy cream, or in my case, I beat up the skin from the top of the milk afte...

(My view of Gulu street from the coffee shop - shops across the way, a brief moment with very little traffic (I didn't want people think I was taking a photo of them specifically). This is one of the main roads in Gulu and one of the best ones too. And, yes, that's our faithful little car! We praise God for this car!) I'm sitting at a coffee shop in Gulu and thought it could make for an interesting post. I don't get out very often and right now I'm out so that I can study Acholi... so I should get back to that quickly. But, for life that seems normal to me now, I thought some might be interested in reading about a simple event like getting OUT of the house to do something that many of you do every day (or week) - sitting at a coffee shop on my laptop on the wireless internet! Gulu is somewhat flooded this morning - there must have been some significant rains early morning somewhere uphill from us - the roads were swollen with mud and muddy water as people made t...

It struck me today how far I have come in 10 months of living in Northern Uganda. First of all, I must remember that when we first arrived, we didn't know where to find anything. We didn't know the inside scoop on who sells what where. So that severely limited our selection. Secondly, Uchumi wasn't open ("big" supermarket that we can usually count on to have either sausages or "mince" meat [ground meat]. But, I also wasn't used to cooking entirely from scratch with the local materials with my tiny stove and local seasonings. But today I put together a rather delicious lasagna. Yes, lasagna. Something I craved for months here, but today put together quickly with what felt like limited effort. We have some boxes of lasagna noodles in the pantry from Kampala, so I did NOT have to make my own pasta, which certainly saved me a lot of time. But otherwise, I made the tomato sauce and ricotta cheese from scratch and invented a yummy recipe on the f...

(Aerial view of 3 engrossed girls - Gracie, Ana, and our friend, Mercy - coloring [or, in Gracie's case, trying to eat markers].) We've been interested in figuring out Moses and any "delays" he might have (from American standards). It's taken a while and now as he is blossoming before our eyes, we see a fine motor delay and language delay. The school system is very different here - perhaps the topic of a whole separate post in months to come. But they don't learn much in the "nursery" school years, so much of his delay can be attributed to a lack of early-childhood education and stimulation. (This is not a critique of Home of Love nor the school - this is simply how things are done here and we are comparing him to our rather advanced American 4 year old who just tested at a 2nd grade level!) But as we thought about his speech and comprehension delay, we compared his life to that of life in the family. In the "Children's Home," he s...

http://www.christianalliancefororphans.org/cafo-white-paper/

We live in an era of missions unlike any other. Missionaries through the centuries have followed God's leading into certain physical death. They packed their few belongings in a coffin, bade permanent farewell to their families, and traveled for months to reach their destination for a few months or years of feverish proclamation of God's word before their ultimate demise. There was no Skype, no facebook, no email, no phonecalls. Letters took months to reach loved-ones IF they arrived at all. Today, in Northern Uganda, we have electricity at least 40% of the time. We have a solar set-up to provide a little light and charging when the power is out. We have a little dorm fridge to keep milk cold. We occasionally can get meat and cheese. We (this month) can get yogurt all the time. And, Josh takes trips to Kampala periodically to meet with our missionary team leaders. Kampala has nearly everything. Yes, I had nori, rice vinegar, and sushi rice brought from the USA by a v...

(I want to blog a bit about Moses since his adoption into our family is somewhat unique: adoption from an orphanage that we continue to be fully involved with, living in his same community with his same friends. There is little written about "these types" of situations, so I pray that by sharing some of our journey with Moses, maybe I can encourage other families who are in this unique situation!) Moses was the baby at Home of Love. In fact, at the age of 4-5 years, he only lost the nickname "Baby" a few months ago when he started being called "Oyuba" (part of his Acholi name). Now, suddenly, he's the second oldest in a family of almost five children. He smothers "Baby Noah" (as he calls him) with way too much brotherly love and attention and loves being big brother to him. But we have had major breakdowns over one simple thing: getting dressed. Yes, the mean mommy that I am, I make him put on his own clothes. I help with buttons and t...

Noah and Fortunate having fun I have spent the last five weeks in the home mostly. Making sure that I'm home every time that Moses is home. We've had some very interesting times of adjustment and as this amazing kid takes everything in stride, he also has been trying on different things. Now he's on to crying about little things like Ana does. Makes a mama struggle since I'm 90% sure he's crying because he forgot to take his shoes off before his pants and now his pant leg is stuck, but maybe, just maybe, he's crying about something greater than that and I'm just not understanding... His (and our) language is coming along well - although, we're still struggling with basic communication, let alone more complex topics! Josh playing football with the guys (Moses in the "smart" orange polo). We finally ventured to Home of Love as a whole family yesterday. We (I?) were a little worried about how he would react and whether that would cause even m...