Raining in the Babyroom

Sometimes I wonder what our life would be like if we weren't in Haiti.  What would my “other self” be doing right now?? Would I be more stressed?  Less stressed?  Would I feed my kids healthier food or not?  Would they be spending more time with other kids their age or less?  Would they sit still better in church…or not J

Obviously I will never know, but it’s fun to think about sometimes.  I really think it’s a neat opportunity for my kids to spend some of their growing up years in Haiti, and with all the different experiences.  Sometimes cultural differences can be, well, different, but for the most part that’s all they are. 

I want to relate a few instances of differences in our life now compared with what it may have been, but that’s not to say it’s worse.  Just want to highlight a few things….

The first Sunday Cassia went to church, it was raining.  During the service, of course Cassia got hungry and wanted to eat.  With Orrin, I would take him out to the babyroom at church to feed him.  But here, there’s no baby room, just a cement “bench” by the front steps outside.  But with the rain…. I leaned up to Jami and whispered, “What do you do when it’s raining in the babyroom?”  You feed the baby sitting in the church bench and nobody thinks twice.

Orrin’s potty training isn’t going so well, but he knows how to go.  So, I’ve taken to letting him run around with just a t-shirt on.  If he has a diaper on (OR underwear!) he will use them.  If there’s nothing but air, he will use the toilet (or “the outside”, as he says).   I can’t see myself letting him run around the yard in the middle of Forrest, Illinois (especially in March!) with no bottoms on, but it’s working out pretty well here!

One major factor that makes our past and present lives so different is the weather.  Here there are rarely coats to worry about, there’s never snow to wonder if it will slow down your traveling (it’s just demonstrations here J).  Right about now, I would be REALLY REALLY REALLY ready for spring, for planting my garden, for going outside for a walk, pushing the kids in a stroller.  Here, my tomato plants are about a foot tall, and hopefully will produce some tomatoes soon.  I’ve got lettuce growing, and watermelon plants look promising if I remember to water them.  There is not much option for using a stroller here with the mountain we live on.  But it’s so nice that we can go outside and be comfortable most every day of the year.  Some days, it’s my sanity-saver!  Orrin can go outside with his little TONKA truck, push it all over the yard (and in the garden), fill it with leaves, dirt and rocks, or watch the other neighborhood kids ride it down the “hill” in our yard.  It’s really helpful if he can be out of the house when I’m trying to get a crying baby to sleep!

Carseats are another thing that is so different here.  I never would have let my kids ride around in the car without a carseat in the States.  (For one thing, I would get majorly in trouble if I got pulled over).  But (gasp!) down here, we rarely use one.  Most of the vehicles we use are made for getting as many people and/or equipment in them as possible, so the back seats are side-facing and it’s not real easy to strap a carseat in.  We did the other day when we went all the way to Port to get a work team…8 hours is a long time to hold a baby in the car!  We don’t have seatbelts in back, so David had to rig it up.  The result was that Cassia had her own “oh no” bar to hold onto around the curves J

One thing I don’t think I’ll ever get used to is the plethora of advise that’s freely given J  One day in town, David was in a store buying paint, so I decided to do a little clothes shopping in the street by where he was.  And as I walked around, browsing the clothes with Cassia in my arms, there was a constant chatter.  And in English, this is what it would sound like.  “Sun, sun, sun!  The sun is bad for the baby’s head!  Sun, sun!  It will make her sick!  Don’t hold her with just one arm.  Don’t hold her across the stomach.”  Then when she started fussing, it was “Hungry!  The baby’s crying!  Sun, sun!  Cover her head!  Breastfeed!”  In about 5 minutes, my nerves were completely shot, so I went back to the vehicle and when we drove away, Cassia fell asleep, which was what she needed after all…not to eat or have her head covered or lay down flat, which she despises, by the way J