Day 735. Last night I shared with you how busy first Sammy and then Emmy kept me. Emmy woke up every few minutes, needing to be rocked, then put to bed. In between I was getting everything ready for our trip, so we could just leave in the morning. I was so exhausted, and with everything ready, I started heading to bed right after 11pm. At 2 am I tried about 7-8 times to put Emmy back to bed before I gave up and let him sleep in our bed. However, he stayed quite awake for some time. And he was up for good really early, asking for food really early too, so I got little sleep last night. Since we had to leave at 6:30, I finally just gave up and got up, as he was crying for food early too. We dressed them, loaded up, and left on time.
Randy had put the car seats on the strollers, as we were gonna ride a car later. It meant that they had less moving room and didn't sit as upright. We took the 6:45 S-train that took us all the way to the other end and the edge of town, where our train arrived 20 minutes later. When we got on the train to Linz just before 8 am and went to the baby/stroller area, there was just one single guy there, so we had plenty of room. We had just over an hour on the train and forgot to bring any toys. Thankfully Tammy had her rabbit with her, but we should have brought her doll as well that she wants when she's tired, which was the case later. They were having fun, running around, and climbing over the backrest of the bench to the bench on the other side. Emmy also had fun hanging off the railing. They were definitely getting a little bored at some time and were impatient to arrive. We put them back into the strollers, got off in Linz and went outside, where the pastor was already waiting for us with his big car. Emmy especially had already been excited about riding in a car, and now he and his sister were really impatient to get in. However, Randy had to fold the strollers and remember how to put the car seats in, which he didn't really, so we improvised. It was only a 5-minute ride to the church. Emmy sat in the front, and Sammy and Tammy in the middle with me, and Randy in the back. While they can still use those baby seats according to their weight, I think it's time to move on to the next kind of seat as they hardly had any room for their legs.
We unloaded at the church, took our stuff upstairs, where they thankfully had a baby room, and then I set up our Mali table in the lobby. I had only done a table and presentation once in our own church since the little ones were born. While the others had stayed upstairs, it wasn't long before they came downstairs to join me. They had missed their Mommy. And so I took advantage of us all being there and no people yet and asked someone to take a picture of us. Once done we went back upstairs, where the service was about to start.
And then we had a very pleasant surprise. Barbara, who had come to Mali with us last Christmas and was a tremendous help with the little ones, had come just to see us and not told us in advance. The little ones showed no signs of recognizing her. Last Christmas was ages ago for them. Barbara joined us in the baby room during the service, which was great, and the only time she could spend with us. They had fun with her, and she with them.
We had some seats in the back of the sanctuary as well, and were there for a little bit. However, the baby room was better as it kept them busy. Then they showed my Mali presentation video, and it was time for us to go up front to talk . Our first time being on the stage like that. I was holding Tammy and Emmy, so I asked Randy to hold the microphone for me. Then Tammy went down, as her rabbit had dropped, and Emmy went down eventually as well. All the while I was giving a great testimony from Mali. Randy was standing next to me with Sammy. Once I was done sharing, the pastor came up and prayed for us all, which was nice.
We left the stage and went back to the baby room. Just before the service ended I went downstairs with Emmy and Tammy to be ready at our table. And then the people came, and I regretted not having brought more books with me, as I could have sold more. We had some good conversations and met new people who want to stay in touch with us. It's been so long since we've done this, I really enjoyed it and realized how I'd missed it, but also how important this is. While we were busy, the kids were running around, and I tried to keep my eyes on them and to always know where they were. Some kids came down with balloons that looked like soccer balls, and in the end our kids had received two of them as a gift. Only one came with us, and when I tried to get it out from under the stroller on the train later, it popped, which really disappointed them. But we still have all those balloons from their birthday at home.
Another time Tammy got a hold of a little milk pack and when I looked over at her, the milk was all over the floor. I constantly had to defend whatever I had lying on the edge of the table and had to pick stuff up quite a lot. As well as to keep them from pulling other stuff off that the church had lying out.
More and more people had left, and we had met the family that was going to lunch with us. We finally started packing up and left to pack the car up again. Emmy was all excited to be riding a car again. By now it was noon and they were all tired. And he was impatient to get into the car, but we first had to put the car seats back in. This time Emmy was in the middle with his brother and Tammy in the front. It was only a few minutes to the train station and then the restaurant right there, but Sammy fell asleep first, and then Emmy. The girl was still wide awake.
When we unloaded at the restaurant, Emmy woke up but Sammy continued sleeping. We had to say good-by to the pastor, and then went into the restaurant with the family who has a project in Kenia. By now Emmy was also continually asking for food because he was so hungry. They'd had some snacks all morning. We put Tammy and Emmy into high chairs, and Sammy on the floor next to them, where he still slept for a while before waking up and then sitting on Daddy's lap to eat some food as well. We were given the menus that I quickly looked through to pick food for the five of us, while hearing Emmy asking for "Essen". It's convenient that one adult dish works well for three kids, and I got them some pasta with salmon. Of course Emmy kept asking for it, while we were waiting. At the same time I tried to talk to our new friends who I was hoping to give some good input for their project. Our food finally arrived, and it was the biggest plates the little ones have ever had. They gave them dessert forks that they used to eat, and they did pretty well. Sammy wouldn't eat anything though.
We had a great time, and our friends also enjoyed the kids. Emmy was really cranky until he fell asleep on my shoulder. Then it was time to make our way to the train station. I put Emmy into the stroller, where he continued sleeping. Tammy didn't want to get in but wanted to be carried by our new friends, so they did. Once we got to the train station, we said our good-byes. We put Tammy into the stroller and made our way to the platform. The train arrived just after we got there, so perfect timing.
This time the train was pretty full. It was 2 pm. We were able to find some room for the strollers and for us to sit. It wasn't long before Emmy woke up again, but he was still very tired and cranky. Tammy was running around most of the time, while Randy had Sammy, and I had Emmy. I was very tired myself.
After just over an hour we arrived at the edge of Vienna and went to the platform our train home would leave from. We had about 20 minutes, but the train came early and sat there, as it's its final stop. On the train, we could not keep them in their strollers, so all three came out. Emmy discovered the big, green button right where we were and had to push it of course. It made the handicapped toilet door open, and push it again, and it closed. It was way too much fun and they did it quite often before I put a stop to it. Once the train was moving, I didn't want them to move around, but it was hardly possible to keep them from doing so. Emmy was still asking to ride a car, but I had to tell him we were not riding any more cars, but that it would not be long until we did again.
I was glad when we got home at 4:15 but was also very tired. And Tammy hadn't even slept once! We decided to go ahead with dinner and put them to bed early. And so they stood on the chairs in the kitchen with me, as always, while I got their dinner ready. From the dining room table they went into the bathtub. By now Emmy was already so cranky and tired, he was just crying and came out of the water early. By 5:30 they were all in bed and fell asleep rather fast.
We still had a coupon and so we ordered food online, which ended up taking 90 minutes before it was delivered. In the meantime I started going through today's pictures. At 7:15 the food arrived, and we went downstairs to eat and watch the second half of the movie we started two weeks ago. I had to go upstairs because Emmy was crying and found him standing by my empty bed looking for me. Then he was asking for Daddy so Randy came upstairs and sat down with him for a few minutes, before he came back downstairs so we could continue eating and watching. Once we were done, I went back to work to edit the pictures and write my report. It was just after 9 pm, but I was so tired that my eyes were falling shut. I tried to start writing my report and leave the pictures for tomorrow, but I was incapable of doing so. I really couldn't do anything, I just had to go to bed, and so I did just before 10 pm. It was only 20 minutes later that I had to get up again because of Emmy. While the other two sleep through the night most of the time, Emmy comes constantly to my bed at night.
