an adventure

Last Sunday my adventure to the Philippines for our region's Homeschool Conference began. The day before we were leaving it snowed a ton in Tokyo, so the Brents decided we should leave extra early the next morning to be sure we would make it to the airport on time even if the roads were bad.. extra early meaning 4am!! So I rolled out of bed, they picked me up, and we went on our way. We were on our way only about 30 minutes when one of the kids got sick and threw up in the car! Great start, huh! But luckily we had left extra early, so even with the quick clean-up stop we made it to the airport with plenty of time. Only problem was.. when we tried to go through immigration we realized that I did not have the correct re-entry permit.. which means I could leave Japan, but I couldn't come back!! So we had to scramble to fill out paperwork and buy the correct permit and then run to catch our plane! Here are the kids on the plane:

After a smooth flight, we made it to Manila with all of our luggage. (Thank you, God!) We stayed one night in Manila, and the next day we headed for the retreat center where our conference would be, about 3 hours away by bus. I was trying to fall asleep listening to my iPod when our bus pulls over to the side of the road.. broken. At that point I was thinking, well I don't really have any place to be and I do have a Reese's in my purse.. and at least I will have a story to tell. So oh well. We all laughed as a truck came and towed our bus... to a junkyard in the middle of the jungle. With a shooting range next to it.


We waited there for almost 3 hours for a new bus to come. But really we didn't have much to complain about because although our bus would not drive, the air conditioning still worked! We were bored, but at least we were cool. And hey, the jungle junkyard did have a toilet hut and a snack hut. It's the little things...

Anyway finally another bus did arrive, and we even found a Burger King on our way to Caliraya. It took us awhile, but we eventually made it there:
I'm happy to say that the adventure part ended there. The rest of the trip was wonderfully uneventful. It was a great chance to relax and reflect on my time here in Japan so far and (of course) on my job as a homeschool teacher and how I can be better at it!

And as fun as it was, it was even more fun to come home to Trent :)

Thank you for praying over the trip! I am so glad to be home!