Travelling

The prospect of air travel with four little kids isn't something that personally excites me. That said, our kids did pretty good (once again) getting on and off airplanes for the day, and for that I'm thankful! Amy and I kind of mentally prepared ourselves because Charlotte currently falls in that age bracket of kids that is certainly the toughest age to travel...according to me. You can purchase my parenting advice book "How I Think You Should Raise Your Kids" in most major bookstores. The age I'm talking about is just under a year, and up to approx. 2 1/2 yrs. This is the "red zone", as they want to crawl, walk, or run, have extremely short attentions spans, and don't have any concept of where they're going. "Just hold still for 15 more minutes and we're there..." doesn't mean anything to them. But, by the grace of God, we were blessed with a sleepy Charlotte for the majority of the trip! That made things a whole lot easier.

 Helena playing on the Leap Pad in a quieter part of Jakarta International Airport. Having tricks in your bag (by tricks I mean video games) is a real asset when it comes to giving the kids something to do. So, here they're all glued to screens...I know, I didn't recommend this in my book, but better to do as I say, not as I do.

Boy, when I was a kid, if I was bored, my Mom would give me an old stick, and air conditioning was being allowed to roll down the station-wagon window 4 inches (probably only 4 inches so i couldn't throw my old stick at on-coming traffic).

 Simon with Amy's cell phone....

 Luke with the iPod...(and Dad with his camera)

 But not Charlotte! This was the time for her to run and stretch those legs, before boarding the 2nd flight of 3.

In Tarakan we were greeted by most of the MAF Tarakan team, and instantly felt at home. We're thankful for all the efforts people made here to help us feel at home in our first week!

Next time I promise some pic's of Tarakan.