A Day Like Today

April 20, 2016

Sometimes you have days like this: You start losing the 3 week battle with the tiny ants and are mostly just glad they’re not crawling on your skin at the moment, so you let them have at the puddle of sweet tea on the counter. This also means you’ve spent considerable time hiding food on top […]

Buffalo and Ducks…and other suprises

March 20, 2016

Sometimes when a day starts, you never quite know what it will hold. Like when you are going to a Chinese New Year something-or-other with friends (sometimes things get lost in translation) and you think it will be a big red dragon parade and instead you get rain, a variety of dragons, loud drums, a […]

Learning Language is like…

March 5, 2016

by Payton Downing There’s two things I’m new at: language learning and beginning a retirement account. Funny enough, these two things have some striking parallels that are worth musing over for a moment: Amusement One: Both need consistent inflow for anything substantial to happen. I’m sure your somewhat familiar with the retirement graph that shows a line that progressively get’s steeper and steeper as years […]

Guest Perspective

February 6, 2016

So if you wanted to know what you might encounter if you stopped by our corner of the world, our friend Dan did us a huge favor and wrote a snippet about his 4 days here. We figured it might bring something fresh to the mix! Dan was a great guest. He tried every food […]

The Hunted and the Haunted

January 22, 2016

So lately I’ve found myself on edge. I feel like I’m being stalked…by mosquitoes. Although I’m sure they’re acting purely instinctually, it seems a bit more intentional at times. In a room full of people, I will be bitten tenfold. Right now, I feel like I’m in the middle of an all-out war against these […]

A New Kind of Strange

January 12, 2016

Living in a new culture and climate is all about adjustment, flexing and bending with the current. There’s the life-changing adjustments that happen every once in a long while, but mostly life is made up of subtle, minuscule changes over time. It’s fun to look back and see what has become normal after 9 months. For […]

Tis a new season

January 7, 2016

You never really know what to expect when you celebrate a holiday in a new country, but this season held plenty of unusual experiences, not to mention a handful of blessings along the way. We got to celebrate with some Aussies (including but not limited to exploding bon-bon thingys, delectable food, and strange jargon–love these guys)… Plus, an old friend from […]

A Month’s Journey

December 14, 2015

Spending a month on the road was something I’d never thought I’d do, but it’s just a part of the path we’re on right now (yay visas!). In the end, you can either go with it or fight the current and end up exhausted. For Payton and I, a month is long, but doable. Finn […]

A Kettle in Singapore

October 13, 2015

Just over a week ago we experienced was a flurry of travel, although I wish it had been a real Michigan snow flurry after we encountered the sweat-inducing temperatures of Singapore. Several weeks ago God began our journey toward Singapore. Finn had an infection, a UTI to be precise. It involved lots of tests. Since then I’ve […]

Whatsa dasawisma? Part II

September 12, 2015

Just when you think you’ve got a grip on things, something slaps you in the face and reminds you that you, in fact, still have a long way to go. You can either take it in stride and keep moving or wallow in your own pool of pity, wondering why you weren’t as smart as you had assumed. If […]