After too many hours to count in airports and on airplanes, we arrived in America one week ago today!! We’ve filled our time reconnecting with our church family, getting clothes that aren’t see-through from too many hangings in the sun, cutting hair, and enjoying convenient food. Oh, and of course getting over that obligatory jet lag. Next week will be full of debriefs for us and the girls. Thank you for praying us back!! If you read our urgent prayer request we sent out via MailChimp, our friends did make it (miraculously) to Port Moresby!! We flew all the way to Doha with them where we parted ways.

All that being said, here’s a collection of pictures to give you a summarized version of our reentry.

We started our trip lined up outside the Port Moresby airport waiting to be tested for COVID. My anxiety levels were high at this point. Shaky hands and lots of prayers that we’d get the all clear to come back.

After waiting in a line outside, we waited in Tent 1 to get all the paperwork in line, followed by Tent 2 to wait for results. All in all it was about four hours before we got through to Immigration, but I didn’t care. We had all passed!! (Willa, however, was not amused.)

Joyfully we jumped onto the planes that would fly us over countless nations, through (too much) turbulence, and over a beautiful lightening storm. Gemma camped out with Bluey and Frozen 2 on repeat, mask firmly in place for the estimated 30 hours of flying time. We had one little hiccup in Singapore when Willa lost her stomach, but she was just exhausted and spent the rest of the flight time sleeping. Literally. The girl gets the award for most sleeping hours on our crew.

We arrived mid-afternoon last Friday!! The travel was pretty much this picture exactly. Us staring dumbly at the new world we found outside of Madang, trying to navigate everything just right. It was weird and felt a bit like sharks were lurking around, but honestly we didn’t truly see them. We were too busy being overwhelmed. Or curling up in a corner like Gemma.

When you go from night to day, day to night, bumpy roads to smooth, few people in your day to many, slow life to fast… it can be a bit much. Our tiger tempers can come out as we adjust to new paces and an entirely new clock.

To combat the crankiness we kickstarted our energy, and got a good dose of the American spirit, by ingesting a solid helping of flour, butter, and sugar in the form of a glazed Krispy Kreme donut. Been dreaming of that first bite where the glaze cracks jusssst so for longer than I care to admit.

We recommend following up a sugar rush with some animal therapy. It works for us every time.

Annnnnd we did it!! We survived another trip around the world, this time under the gloom of COVID. We’re ever so delighted to be back and are honestly feeling the weight of chronic stress fall off as we relax and lean into this time. Again, we so appreciate your prayers as we journeyed.