How long have we lived where? 2022
A little over 3 years ago as we contemplated what should have been a 8-9 month stay in the UK, I put together a chart of where different members of our family had lived their lives. Abigail (9) asked me again recently for some of the data so we did an update. The last year …
Tadpoles
This is one of our girls’ favourite times of year in Nigeria – when streams run down and pool a bit with just the right kind of environment for tadpoles. This year Rebekah appears to be naming hers, and there seems something of a K-Pop theme. I guess tadpoles read backwards, which would be why …
Where’s home again?
It’s an innocent question but one that can be surprisingly difficult to answer for people who have grown up in a variety of places. I previously wrote about making a spreadsheet just before we left for what we expected to be a 9 month trip to the UK in 2019-2020.
Enlarge your tent!
As our girls grow we have found they could sometimes do with a little more space for doing increasingly independent homeschool. We also like having people stay with us, and a little extra space makes hospitality that bit easier, and so the opportunity came up to revamp and extend our house in Jos before we …
Too long away
Kai! (Exclamation) We have been away from Nigeria for too long! It sometimes just strikes me. One way I notice is that when I call up translators on the phone or sign off to friends in Nigeria I have to work just a little bit harder to remember all the correct greetings. And the funniest …
Where’s home?
Kids who grow up across cultures and countries often get mildly flummoxed by the innocuous question “Where are you from?” Of course it’s common enough for Nigerians to ‘be from’ a place they’ve never actually visited, but we’re a fairly complicated mixture.
Look at all this mess…
Here’s a cartoon we made, somewhat modelled on a favourite book: Look at all this mess
Premature Mango Harvest
One morning there was suddenly a huge crashing noise just outside the homeschool room; one of our mango trees had over-reached itself in enthusiasm for producing hefty fruit and a large branch crashed to the ground. Green, unripe (but rather large) mangos were scattered all over the place. We picked up a massive basket load …
Homeschool resuming
Homeschool started again for Rebekah and Elizabeth a few days after we arrived back in Nigeria. Rebekah was back to her familiar pink desk, and Elizabeth chose purple for an identical desk that our carpenter Weze made for her. Abigail is keen not to be left out, but she also lost no time in forming …
Threatening Rainbow
Never before had a rainbow seemed so threatening. It was on the walk to school this morning. With the clouds rushing towards the low winter morning sun overhead, I looked West and saw a rainbow. Actually it was my daughters who spotted it first and they love a good rainbow. But where they saw pots …