Halloween Costumes

Quinn the pirate and Walker the devil.

Students of the Month

Gifft Hill School gives out a Student of the Month award to a student in each class. The special teachers als ogive one out. Quinn recieved one in First Grade for his hard work both in class and at home (homework). Walker received hers for Spanish. Both kids were so excited! Their mom is super proud!

Dear Mrs. Gray

Imagine me sticking my tounge out at you!

Happy Halloween

Even on St. John we celebrate Halloween. It wont be the same, no houses to trick or treat to but lots of the local restaurants have parties for the kids and the kids can trick or treat there. It will be fun!

To all of our Windhaven Ct neighbors, have fun!

Stuff-with pictures!

Playing Uno on a Sunday at Maho (below) isn't beautiful!

Our frogs have finally all left. I know that the picture is blurry but the frog is on the right toggle switch towards the bottom of the switch. That is how small they are!

My man (dressed like a SEAL) out to do some yard work.

Finally-Hurricane Omar Pictures

I know its sideways but its the best I could do. Here is the missing part of at the end of our driveway.

The sunrise the morning after.

The brown part is were the wallt at the end of the driveway use to be.

Water rushing at the gut by Mongoose Junction.

At one point the water was flowing up and over the road. This gut is normally dry. It was reported that we received almost 3 inches of rain in less than 45 minutes.

Milk Update

I received lots of email about freezing milk. I know you you can freeze milk, I do it every time I go to St. Thomas. The young and "I dont cook" guys that work for Jay do not.

Frozen Milk

Yesterday I went to St. Trauma, also known as St. Thomas, to do some grocery shopping with my friend Megan. Jay was having everyone over from Wharton Smith for dinner so I had to stock up, those boys can eat a lot! Anyway, I have started buying milk in half gallon cardboard jugs. I can freeze them and pull them out as we need them. The milk I had been buying at Starfish always seemed to go bad. So I bought 11 1/2 gallons yesterday. 5 were for a friend and the rest for me. I put my 3 in the freezer and the rest in the fridge. Since our freezer is so small and our ice maker/water dispenser is not hooked up I use the ice maker to store stuff. I put the 3 in the freezer and left it at that. Next thing I know 4 hours later Jean-Claude and Andre are telling me I cannot put milk in my freezer becasue it explodes. JC had gone to use the ice maker and ended up chopping up the milk carton so I had milk running down the inside of my freezer. Since milk is so expensive I saved all of the frozen chunks that had not come out of the carton and put it in a pitcher to use. What do the kids ask me this morning..."What's that white stuff in the lemonade pitcher?"

KATS

Yesterday Walker started KATS. KATS-Kids and the Sea is "an educational program designed to develop the vital linkage between the Virgin Islandss greatest human resource-its youth- and its greatest natural resource-the sea." The children learn knot tying, how to row, ocean saftey, docking, anchoring, first aid. The program goes until Christmas. Walker really enjoyed her first week. Jay took her to Coral Bay where they have the program yesterday. He took Quinn with him and they played baseball in the field there. I got to spend some time in the house alone! I really enjoyed the peace and quiet.

Storm Photos-not really I cannot up load them

We went out driving on Wednesday afternoon before the storm hit to see some of the areas were there was a large runoff. This is one of the spots.

This is our house from across the salt pond. If you look to the right the brown area is where the hillside collapsed. We are hoping it wont rain any more the the driveway wont go with it.

A beautiful sunrise after a long night.

6:58 am, time to go swimming!

Hurricane Omar

Hurricane Omar passed to the east of us late last night. The outer bands of the hurricane hit us beginning around 11. By 4 all was quiet and I could finally sleep. We had power throughout the whole storm. The only damage to our house is part of the wall by our driveway has collapsed and one of our downspouts was sheared off. I took some pictures and will post them once I get our house back in order. As far as Jay could tell there was not any damage to the job site. We are going to head up to school this afternoon and see how the school fared.

The worst part of the storm was how loud it was. The wind was whipping between the kids room and the main room. There were a few booms which we think was the wall collapsing and the gutter falling off. The hard part was that since the storm passed at night you could only wait until sunrise to see what happend. Both Jay and I were up for the sunrise.

On a side note, the kids were in the pool today at 6:58 pulling out the patio furniture.

Thanks to everyone for your prayers and emails!

Hurricane

We made it. More details later

Sent from my iPhone

12:37pm

It has started raining. Walker is watching a movie. Quinn is looking for something to do, he will probably get into trouble! Jay is on the phone. No surprise there! Some of the patio furniture is in the pool. Our outlets have not started to leak so everything is going great. Gotta go finish getting things off the floor!

Getting Ready

We went to get the mail this afternoon and this was the line for gas.

Jay finally got around to helping. He decided to put up some of the hurricane shutters. I guess he had to work today. Since school was cancelled here is how I spent my day...
I got a VI drivers license
I got a flat tire.
I went to the service station to get the flat fixed, no such luck.
I went to the auto parts store to see if they had any tires, no such luck.
I visited Jay's office way to many times.
I went back to the service station (also the gas station) to get 3 tires that I got from Jay's work put on the car to match the spare Jay changed for me.
Went to the pet store to get fish food.
I got the house ready for Hurricane Omar. That list is too long to type. I am tired and going to bed!


Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers for the next 48 hours.

I will update the blog with how we are doing if possible.

Tropical Storm Omar

School is cancelled today due to the approach of Tropical Storm Omar. It's like living in Atlanta with the threat of snow...cancel school for a few days! The kids are in the pool after moving everything in their room off of the floor. Now it is my turn to go upstairs and move everything off of the floor. Hopefully Omar wont turn into a Hurricane until after it passes us.

Is it or Isn't it?

The big question is will Tropical storm 15 become Tropical Storm Omar and then turn into Hurricane Omar and hit the USVI sometime later in the week? We will keep you posted.

Reef Bay-The whole story

Just before we left we took a group shot in front of the sign. What we did not know was that there was a giant ant hill there too. The kids were covered in ants! What a way to start the hike. Reef Bay is about a 3 mile hike, each way. On the way we stopped at the petroglypihs. We had been there before when it was not raining. When it rains there is a 40 foot waterfall there. It was amazing!

Here is a picture of the waterfall from when we hiked the Lameshur Trail to the petroglyphs in the spring.Both kids saw the waterfall at different times. On the way down Quinn hiked with Mr. Paul, John Thomas, and Arjuna. They did not make a stop at the waterfall. All of the girls took a side hike there. So on the way back I took Quinn to see the waterfall.

At times the rain water was so plenteful that at some of the crossings the water was knee deep. In some spots the rushing water was so strong you could feel it pulling on your legs.

At the end of the trail we spent some time on the beach swimming and playing in the surf. We also briefly explored the sugar mill plantation that was there. On the way back up the trail it started raining again. We were wet, there was no way around it!

At then end of the hike everyone was soaked. It was worth the hike!

Reef Bay Trail

We finally did it, in the rain! I'd like to thank Mr. Luke for properly outfiting me for the hike. Every time I stepped in rushing water in my Keen's and the water went right through them, I thought, "Gee thanks Luke". Every time I popped a handful of trail mix in my mouth or took a sip of water out of my camelback in my great back pack, I thought,"That Luke is such a great guy, I couldn't have done this with out his help" More on the trail after I warm up. It rained the whole time!

What to do with her

When Walker had her first communion in May her Uncle Matt and Aunt Jen sent her a lovely charm bracelet with a first communion charm on it. A few weeks ago I asked her where it was. "What are you talking about" was her response. It's not like she never wore it to church EVERY sunday. So here I am all pissed off thinking that it is gone forever. We have moved furniture around a few times since it disappeared but it never turned up. It was not in her jewelry/cigar box. Today I took matters into my own hands. I decided to go through her room. As I am going through her American Girl stuff I look over and see the bear with the bracelet on him. I take it in and show Walker. This is what she says"Oh yea, oops" with a smile on her face. She knew the whole time.

WAPA Bill

We got our WAPA bill from the past month. Yes you are reading it right, it is $1472.81, One thousand four hundred seventy two dollars and eighty one cents. (Just in case you thought I put the decimal point in the wrong spot). We are not big energy wasters. I only use the dryer when it is raining. We have a pool pump, a portable ac unit in the main room and one in our room. Thats it. I unplug stuff when not in use. The cost of electricity on island is out of control. It is about fifty-three cents a kilowatt. In the states its between eight and twelve.

Earthquake

We had an earthquake here yesterday morning around 6:40 . It measured 6.1 on the richter scale. Jay and I were still asleep but the kids were up. They did not notice it. It woke Jay, the man who sleeps through everything, up. Me, nothing. Slept right through it!

Good Morning

Here is my view every morning as I wake up and head upstairs for coffee!

Our babies are leaving

Our first frog hoppped out of his cage today. He hopped off into the grass. He will probably be eaten by one of his own but the kids dont know that. They are about the size of my pinky nail. Walker cried when Sparkles left. Yes she named her. Our second one left tonight and I think another one will be gone by tomorrow morning.

Bishop Herbert Bevard

The Virgin Island finally has a new bishop for the Catholic church. His appointment was announced in July and his ceremony appointing him was in August. He made a visit to Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Church on Sunday. We of course were in the front row. (we had no idea he was coming!) Anyway the kids enjoyed it and were exceptionally good. Having the Bishop there even made Jay sing!

Kayak

The kids had been begging us to take the kayak to the beach. We finally gave in after a great morning in church (thanks to the bishop). The kids had a great time paddling around Maho. It was funny watching them paddle and then realize that they could not turn around so they would just turn their bodies around and paddle the other way!


Jay thought he had the kayak on nice and tight. As we drove up the driveway the kayak slid from sight. No it did not fall off but we had to do some readjusting at the top of the driveway.

By the end of the day the kayak became a dive platform.

Legs

Frog legs anyone?