Settling, Shopping and bugs

We have been in our new home for two weeks now. it’s still new and an adjustment but we are slowly settling in.

We took our first trip to Lilongwe to go shopping for household essentials and groceries. It’s a two hour drive to get to the city from where we are but once we get there we have access to most everything we could need.

The grocery stores are similar to home, the brands are not! I am able to get pretty much everything I need here so that is nice. The girls will eat pretty much anything but it’s easier for me to be able to cook what I know! I have been doing a lot more baking and cooking from scratch which is fun but also a little tricky because our oven is a little temperamental and what should cook in one hour usually takes two! I purchased an instant pot which makes it feel a little bit more like home! I can use my credit card for most big purchases but when I don’t it is a challenge to get used to the currency. The exchange rate is roughly 800Kwatcha to 1USD so you quickly get into the ten thousands when making large purchases. And the largest bill they have is 2000 so you have stacks and stacks of bills. If I make 100$ purchase then I owe 80,000 and have to give a stack of 40 bills. So I have organized my wallet into stacks of 10s for easy counting. I am so used to using a calculator for all my math that I am really rusty on basics but slowly it’s coming back!

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Emma got a permanent cast placed and it is solid plaster. She unintentionally uses it as a weapon and I have been hit with it too many times! it’s not as cute as her little pink cast but I am praying that it does it’s job and she heals well this time. They said she can get it off on the 17th but that seems a bit soon to me so if we do get it off then I will most likely keep it splinted while she plays.

Robby has been working inside our apartment during the evenings and weekends to make it more efficient and homey. He just finished putting p traps in the sink so we no longer have sewer gas smell(most of the sinks here do not have pee traps) I don’t think he could have done anything more romantic for me, ever. He gets to claim that as an anniversary gift for our 7yr anniversary on the 20th! he also hooked the washer up to drain into the waste line so when I do laundry I don’t have to empty the water from the plastic garbage can into the shower. It originally had the water draining into the can and I would have to watch it carefully so it didn’t overflow.

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We took a trip to a wildlife preserve and saw zebras, baboons and some African deer type animals. The girls were mostly just interested in when we would eat next. That’s usually what they are interested in just in case anyone was interested in what they were getting out of the experience…

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Our next step is to buy a car. We are watching the listings and trying to find the right one. One that is big enough for all of us, reliable and I would like it to be automatic but that’s not essential because I probably won’t drive!

Pray that we stay healthy and Emma continues to heal. We miss you all!