Fire Pit

Here's the fire pit that Clinton made last year. We. Love. It. 

It's super hot in Thailand but November through February are cooler and are much cooler in the evenings (74F). For us that's cool. haha  So we've been having bon fires a lot. The kids love it. We eat dinner outside on the porch and sometimes we roast wieners or make banana boats or roast marsh mellows. 

Sometimes we don't do anything but enjoy it. It's all about creating family moments and making memories for the kids. 

This picture is hysterical to me!! The fire was so hot that Bang decided to roast his wiener from behind the wall! We were rolling!!!

Here's Colton's idea of how to roast a wiener. : )

Baby Chan with his big beautiful brown eyes.

Daddy's holding a sick baby Cayden. He had fever and was throwing up. Not too fun for him!

We had banana boats. A super fun idea I found on the Pioneer Woman website.

You cut the banana peel and through the banana just enough to stuff it with all kinds of goodness. I laid out chocolate chips, marshmallows, coconut, and Reese's Pieces.

After you stuff them you wrap them in foil and set them in the fire for all the goodness to melt and make an incredible gooey concoction!! YUM!

I just noticed the Paracetamol on the table............ AND I took the picture from the back side of the table. LOL

What can I say, I have six kids and they're ALL boys. My brain doesn't work like it used to. ; )

What do you like to do for family nights?

Try Banana Boats and tell me how you like them!

Love,
Amber

The Zoo

It's rainy season here so our family days have been spent in doors. But last Saturday, God held back the rain! So we headed to the Zoo. I took lots of pictures, but only posted a few. I was having so much fun with my camera that Bev bought me!! It takes amazing pictures!! 

This area is for the deer. There's no fences or anything around them. They roam free through this little forrest area. We saw about 20 of them. They're so beautiful! I love this one of the mamma and her baby fawn. So sweet.

Joseph loves to feed the elephants. He's grown up so much. This picture was taking me back two years ago when I was pregnant with Cayden. We were on family vacation in Kho Lak and we went over to Phuket to see an animal show. Joseph was petrified to feed the elephants. I think I even have a few pictures of him crying. Now he's got his own basket and he's feeding them on his own!

Need I say anything?!?

"Look at this elephant, Daddy."

He stuck his tongue out for the picture. ; )

I think this picture is so amazing it almost doesn't look real. I didn't do any photo editing at all. This is a la natural.

This guy was putting on a show for us! He swung around on his rope like crazy!

Love this shot!

Here's a picture of the water park they've added to the zoo. We were so excited to go but were sorely disappointed once we arrived. 

When we arrived there were village children running around naked, little boys standing in the pool peeing, people with food and drinks by the pool, people swimming in their jeans...need I go on. There are several reasons that the pool was heavily populated by the less cultured crowd. (i'm trying to be kind here, people. I'm really grasping for the right words)

1. For starters, they don't charge any extra money to get into the water park. You pay your $2.50 to get in the zoo and you get in the water park too. This invites the less fortunate to come by the dozens........ Truck loads of them!
2. Second, the don't require you to wear a bathing suite. There are really nice water parks in other parts of Thailand that require you to wear not only a bathing suit but also a swimming cap. If you don't have one you can rent one for $1 or 2. 

You probably think I'm being mean and exclusive, but I'm not, really! I love being with Thai people city and village alike. I mean I spent many of my first years in Thailand in the slums. I really love the poor. 

 But one thing I really have a hard time with is seeing a new place, which took a lot of money to build, be ruined by ignorance or lack of appreciation. I see the destiny for this water park if they continue on this path.

One of the times we got out of the pool, I noticed something white on Clinton's cheek. I was like, "Uh, honey, I think there's some snot on your cheek." He reached up to wipe it off and sure enough someone else's snot that was in the water had made it's way to my husbands face.........UUUUUGH! 

Need I say more, people?!?