Moving Day!

April 29^th – Moving Day

When we woke up on the morning of April 29^th Allan woke up to a fever and chills!  Our flight was scheduled to leave at 11pm from LAX and we still had several suitcases to pack.  The only thing on our agenda was pack and get to the airport on time.  I went downstairs for breakfast and my dad told me he was implementing a deadline of noon.  By noon that day we had to be packed and whatever was remaining they would clean up and take care of themselves.  At noon our family was going to sit down for a nice lunch together, then relax for the remainder of the afternoon, before we headed to the airport at 5pm.  My dad said he could help me pack while my sister and mom took the boys out for the morning.

Sending out a call for help

With Allan down and out and the tasks set before me, I decided that asking for prayer from our friends would be a beneficial and essential thing, so I put out a quick post on Facebook to our friends asking them for four specific prayer requests:

1    
     Allan’s fever and chills

2     Noah’s congestion, which causes lots of spit up

3     Traveling with young children and lots of luggage

4     Saying goodbye to my family, which was the most dreaded thing of moving

I then got to work at the task ahead, with my phone in my pocket so I could quickly capture God’s answer to these 4 prayer requests and be able to write the blog entry you have before you now.

Allan’s fever and chills

With Allan having a fever and chills that meant he wasn’t able to help pack.  Instead he took some ibuprofen and slept.

And he slept and slept…

While he was resting my dad was able to pack all of our remaining items into the suitcases we were going to take with us to the airport.

And while Dad was packing and Allan was resting, my sister and mom distracted the boys from the hustle and bustle by taking them out of the house.  One donor gave us money specifically for new toys for our boys during the move.  They were excited to be able to pick out a couple new toys.

While I was helping my dad pack our remaining items I would check on Allan from time to time.  Once Allan started to wake from his sleep he saw my face and said, “wow this is the most calm and happy I have seen you in weeks!  You are doing a great job today.”  That is a rare comment (for me to remain calm and collective during stressful times, so I knew that was also an answer to your prayers so I took a picture of my face at the moment).

The timing was perfect and God ordained.  Allan’s fever broke right before lunch.  My dad finished packing all of our remaining suitcases right before lunch as well.  This enabled our family to sit down together and enjoy the special meal my brother in law made for us.  He made homemade raviolis (pasta made from scratch too, my favorite!), and ice cream with homemade caramel and butterscotch for dessert!  Then we relaxed the remainder of the afternoon before we left the house at 5pm.

Noah’s congestion

Noah is a spitter.  He spits up a lot.  But he is what they call a “happy spitter”, meaning he is not bothered by his constant spit ups and he gains weight and has the appropriate number of wet and dirty diapers.  So there is really no concern, except for added laundry.  But Noah had a cold the day of our move and when he is congested he spits up a whole lot more!  The day of our move I realized I had packed all of his bibs!  Yikes!  But half way through the day I found a small stash that I had forgotten about, which was a blessing to have during our travels.

Your prayers didn’t stop little Noah from spitting up.

 

He spit up a lot, but since I was trying to capture it in pictures (for this blog post) it started to become comical and made me laugh.

The best memory of his spit up was during lunch when his little cousin, Payton came to smile at him.  He was leaning over and spit directly into her mouth!  Ha ha… needless to say Payton didn’t think that was too cool (only regret is I didn’t get a picture of it).  But Noah stayed true to his title as a “happy spitter” and was unaffected by it all.  I can’t quite same the same to little Payton… and the carpet in LAX… and the seats on the airplane… and my shirt.

Traveling with young children and lots of luggage

All in all, we had 8 pieces of luggage we were going to check in at the airport; and 2 car seats, 3 rolling suitcases, 1 pack in play, 1 diaper bag, 1 messenger bag, and 1 stroller we were going to take on board (or check at the gate).  Add all this to a young family of 5 with three boys age 4 and under and you have the equation before you that needed to be solved as to how to travel overseas.

We did a little research as to how to carry our bulky and heavy car seats through the air port in order to get them on board.  And we found a contraption called “Traveling Toddler”, which basically is a T-shaped strap that attached your car seat to your rolling suitcase to make it easier to pull a car seat through an airport.

A very simple device that needed just a little bit of investigation and tweaking before we were able to get it to attach.  But we got it attached and it worked great!  Here, see for yourself…

So I pulled one carry on with the attached car seat, and Allan pulled the other.  The third carry on (without an attached car seat) we put in the stroller and Allan pushed the stroller (with Jakob seated inside) with his other hand.  I carried Noah on my tummy with the Ergo baby carrier.  Our pack in play had a back pack feature so I carried that on my back.  Trevor walked on his own.  It was a bit awkward, to say the least, and I didn’t have a free hand to take a picture, but we made it.

Once on the plane, the seats we were sitting in was next to the bassinet attachment.  Basically they were the seats by the bulkhead.  So since there was a little additional room, they make it that a bassinet can be attached for those traveling with infants.  Our table in front of us was triple the size of a regular table and it came with straps.  Once in flight the flight attendants brought us a bassinet (more of a box with a cushion) that they straped to the table.  And presto!  Noah had his own bed. Noah slept the most, but we all got in at least 6 hours of sleep which was nice.

Once we landed in the Manila airport we had to collected all of our 8 check in luggage in addition to our carry ons by ourselves. In LAX we had the benefit of family to help us carry luggage and watch kids as we checked it all in.  But in Manila we had to gather it all on our own, as non ticketed customers are not allowed inside.  But as soon as we stepped into the airport, there were two employees ready to help us to the baggage claim.  And once in the baggage claim there were two new employees ready to help gather our check in luggage and load them all onto a large cart. 

While Allan and the other two men collected our stuff I watched the three boys.  Noah strapped to my tummy and the other two in the stroller. Allan then wheeled the cart out the airport to our friends (Sean, Vincent and Erwin) waiting for us at the curb!

Saying Goodbye to Family

My number one most dreaded part about moving overseas was saying goodbye to family.  It was hard and I did cry.  Waiting in line and going through the turn-styles to check in our luggage at LAX I recognized a very familiar feeling -- the feeling of being in labor and about to give birth.  Specifically that feeling you get when you transition from the first stage of labor to the second stage of active labor. 

I realize not all of you have given birth before (nor are all of you biologically equipped to do so) but basically it is this sudden overwhelming feeling that you are out of control and you feel like you can’t handle it and you want it to all stop (but obviously it can’t or won’t).  It is such a common feeling that in birthing labor books they list it as a sign that the baby will arrive very soon.  I obviously wanted to go to the Philippines (and I would arrive very soon) but in that moment I wanted it to all stop, I wanted to change my mind but I couldn’t.  The same way as giving birth with the outcome a precious newborn baby, I knew it was a blessing and privilege to go overseas but all I could see was the immediate.

 

After we checked in all our luggage the next step was to say goodbye and enter the “flyers only” zone.  We kept it short.  But one thing I needed to know and hear for myself was “it’s okay”.  I wanted to hear my family tell me it was okay to leave them. That is was okay to take their grandkids away from them overseas.  So I asked them through my tears and in their embrace “please tell me its okay, I need to hear its okay to go!”  And they affirmed me that it was.  Hearing those words were comforting and helped dry my tears and enable me to wave goodbye and walk towards the plane.

Now what?

 We have been living here in the Philippines for 1 week so far.  Most of that week has been filled with unpacking and adjusting to life and setting up our new home.  There has been logistical things we needed to do, like finish the process for my visa, apply for driver licenses and set up a new bank account – as well as practically things to do such as unpack and figure out how to keep our food away from ants and wait for our bodies to adjust to the humid tropical climate.  Still waiting on that last one.  But having the sweatiest head in the room does have its perks, as they usually will point the fan at that person.

If you have a facebook account and we are not yet friends, send me a friend request because this first month I am trying to post each day one new thing we’ve encountered about adjusting to life here.

Thank you for your prayers!  God indeed was more than faithful to answer!