statia church life

church was something we were very curious about moving to a tiny tropical island...how would it work, how many people would come, where would it be...??? what i can tell you now after attending our meetings every sunday with our little LDS group for the past 2 months is that church is one of our favorite things in statia!

here is the view as you walk into the erickson's home where we hold church every week. they turn their living room into our chapel for the day, and i'm always just so thankful that they open their house to us week after week. it's perfect!

it's also hot hot hot as everything else is on statia. here are the jensen's trying to cool off before sacrament starts!

here is the nursery room where we have 4 little ones that play together every week. pretty good considering we only have between 20-24 memebers in total every week!

here is our organist, tiffany, and she's also a primary and sunday school teacher along with the rest of us!

here is randal, brother cooper, our "group leader" with his cute little alivia :)

our little LDS group family!

we stick with the "pre-assigned seating" rule of thumb even in statia. here is our spot every week! haha

one of beckam's favorite part of church - patches and cocoa, the ward pets! only in statia!

we have to leave the front door open for air flow, but this requires some security measures to keep mads in the house instead of out playing with the rats and snakes and lizards. love it!

walking home from church like we do every sunday! i love our walks to and from church, and i love church on statia. where else can you wear shorts and flip flops and be done all your meetings after an hour and a half! love you my little LDS statia group :)

little nemo!

swimming lessons saturdays are one of our favorite things in statia. beckam asks about the pool every day and has really progressed with his swimming if you can call it that! the school rents out the pool here, and then some of the students volunteer and teach the kids swim lessons. it's awesome :)

 

mads LOVES the water! he floats around in his floaty and plays with flutter boards and watches the kids swim and spalshes and is just a happy little camper! we still dunk him every once in a while too, and he loves it!

 

 

i love the next 3 succession pictures. beckam was so happy with dad carrying him around, totally not ok with being on his own, and completely unimpressed that his dad would ever do that to him. haha love it!

 

 

 

beckam has actually become quite the little nemo though. he went from keeping his legs around me with a death grip to swimming on his own completely! he started in maddox's baby floaty and now jumps in and swims back to the ladder with his puddle jumper wonder. it's awesome, and we're so proud of him! his favorite thing to do though is to sit on the side and kick and splash whoever is swimming by. thankfully, he can take some of his own medicine!

 

cara and lianna were practicing their synchronized swimming routine - you go girls! haha

 

my happy little swimmers! can't wait for many more swimming saturdays!!!

 

 

ward party - statia style!

here are a few pics from our 1st "ward" (or LDS group as our small clan is called) party. we had it at our beach, and randal arranged to have a BBQ brought down, and it was probably the best meal i've had since we've been here! mmmm......burgers.....

 

cara and mad dog

 

me and the boys enjoying the grub!

 

jeremy bought all the kids popsicles for dessert, and they were in heaven! pearl and beckam were "cheers"ing it up, and the moms were on hand with paper towels trying to keep the stickiness to a minimal - good luck!

 

 

the kids enjoying their popsicles while playing in the ocean! it was a great ward party if you ask me!

 

the caribbean sun

i know that we all share the same sun no matter where we live, but it is definitely hotter here! we made fast friends with the caribbean sun the other day, and here are the results......

 

we usually go to the beach after 3pm and rarely use sunscreen. we switched it up this time though and went at 10 which was just fine and dandy, but we neglected to remember the sunscreen yet again, and we learned our lesson! beckam's looks worse than it really was, but me and dust got it bad!!! i knew that vinegar was supposed to help as we sat around trying not to let our backs or shoulders touch anything, but we had none, and all the stores were closed. so, i googled home remedies and found out that mustard has high levels of vinegar! haha dust was in serious need of some relief, so much in fact that he let me rub our honey mustard all over his back - ewww!

 

it definitely helped, but he was still walking to school with his backpack on his front for a few days to come! i didn't think my burn was as bad to begin with, but when my shoulders were still itching as bad as i've ever itched 2 weeks later, i knew that my skin had some real damage! it's of course better now, and the peeling is over, but we will never hit up the beach without sunscreen again! lesson learned!

 

p.s. i'm catching up on blogs, so there's another new one below in case you just can't get enough of our statian adventure! enjoy ;)

the blue store

every day, beckam asks if we can go to the blue store. it may be because it one of the only places on statia where you can get ice cream, or it may be that he just wants to get out of the house, and he knows it's the closest and easiest destination, but either way, we LOVE the blue store!

 

ice cream days are always a hit! oh and just in case you're wondering, the ice cream here isn't exactly the same as back home, but it tastes just as good on a hot day!

 

 

 

 

 

aren't these 2 just too cute together! haha i love how there's ice cream running down the cones and all over the place too. welcome to statia!

 

a sweet timer shot we got on our way home of the crew. yay for blue store runs!

 

i also had to include this picture. usually, mads it the one falling asleep, but beckam used his little brother's head as support this time - too cute! we love our walks here and love that cooper's lent us a stroller where our boys can sleep on the way to wherever we're going!