Psalm 107 for floods

Hi, everyone! During the flood we read Psalm 107 and wrote our own story like it. Now we've edited it, and here it is:

Some found dirty water in their house
And they didn't know if they would get a sickness.
They missed their beds and toys and friends
And didn't know if their house would get totally flooded.
They might lose all their stuff and their home.
But they have faith in God.
They know if they lose all their things and their house
that God would give them what they need.
They have faith.
God kept the water from going too high
And gave them a nice dry place to stay
Where they could play with other friends
to wait in safety to see what God would do.
Thank you, God, for not making it flood in Bangkok
and keeping our Mission Headquarters dry.
Thank you, God, for keeping our rabbit safe
and thank you for keeping us safe on our travels to Bangkok,
And I pray that you will help people who have lost many things.
You helped us to let Daddy go to where it’s flooded
so Daddy could help by giving people the food they needed,
so they can know God is with them.
Thank you for Lopburi students who helped us clean our house,
so life could get back to normal and to do well in school.
Thank you for encouraging us.

Poems

Hi, everyone! And Happy Thanksgiving to American friends. This week we tried our hand at poetry. At our house, we tend towards the Shel Silverstein and Dennis Lee kind of poetry, so this is what we came up with:

The first effort, Mommy started the first two lines and the boys helped me finish:

Once there was a little knight
Who never got his math sums right
Until he practiced every day
And he remembered he should pray.
Now he is thankful every day
That he can add whatever you say.

Pete did his all by himself:
Once there was a funny bunny
She wrecked a town she thought was funny.
by Rainbow
(See pictures in earlier posts, as she still does what's in one of them!)

Nate got a little help rhyming at the end, but the beginning and ideas are all his:
Once there was a funny bunny
Who always hopped so funny.
She played and chewed
My toys for food.

There's a theme here. As you can see, our rabbit is as good as a baby for teaching patience and putting favourite toys away!

Rust

Hi, everyone! After the flood, Tim's science lessons with the boys are focussing on things we can observe after the flood, especially rust and fungus. Here's the report of their study of rust:

We wanted to see what causes rust. We put some screws and nails in different situations. Some nails and screws were beaten up. Some nails and screws were good. Some were dipped in oil. Then some of each kind were sprinkled with salt water, with normal water, no water, with salt water and put in the dark, or soaked in salt water.

The most rusty nails had been soaked in salt water or sprinkled with salt water and put in the dark. The nails sprinkled with normal water were not as rusty. The screws and nails dipped in oil did not rust as much. The nails and screws that were dry did not get rusted. All of the screws and nails that had been sprinkled with water had more rust on the bottom side, next to the plastic. This was all after only one week!

We thought it was interesting that it was so, so, so rusty after only one week! Why did the dark affect how rusty the nails got? We found out that salt made them rust faster, but with no water they did not rust. We also thought it was interesting that the nails and screws soaked in salt water rusted so much, because air is needed for rusting.

Hi, everyone! We've just had a very long time without new posts because we had a long school break... longer than expected. We had one week with other home schoolers in Bangkok, then 2 weeks of holiday, as it is the half-year school holiday time in Thailand... then we were called back to Tha Rua as it received the worst flooding in the memory of people here. I don't know if it made the news where you are, but little Tha Rua made Thai news as one of several places hit worst of all. We knew we had one of the best houses in town for our needs, but now we're also grateful we had one of the highest in town. It only flooded about 5" inside our house! For 2 weeks people coped with deep floods (many farmers are still waiting for floods to go down and have lost their crops) and we took our rabbit to stay with us in Bangkok. We stayed there most days, while Tim came up to help church members with flood relief and do what he could in our house.

Nate and Pete (with Mommy as secretary and editor) have written this report of advice based on their experiences, in case you ever find yourself in a flood:

The Big Flood in 2010

Nate and Pete Noble live in Tha Rua in the province of Ayutthaya, Thailand. This year, it was one of the places that flooded the most when the Pa Sak River overflowed. After our experience, we have some good advice.

If you know it’s going to flood you should make sandbags and you should make more than you need, because you never know how much you need and you can also give other people some too.

When it floods you need to take furniture upstairs to the second floor, and after the flood you have to clean up and maybe you have to revarnish the furniture you couldn’t take up, like we did. Nate got to varnish his own school desk, and Pete had to buy a new one.

When it flooded in Tha Rua, we went to the OMF Center, called the Bangkok Mission Home, because it was flooded almost up to our waists. The water is dirty and can have lots of germs and fungus.

Trucks won’t go in water that is higher than the exhaust pipe, so we had to leave our car at a cousin’s house that wasn’t flooded. Our father saw a truck with a pipe connected to the exhaust pipe pointed up so the man driving the truck could drive in a lot deeper water.

Where the water is really deep, like where our church is and where our friends who play on our soccer team live, it’s better to use a boat. It was cool the way the church made a walkway and a dock above the water out of benches. The dock was made of a bed. The boat we bought was about 2 ½ meters long. We got a chance to paddle the boat, and the captain said Nate paddled so fast that he just had to steer. Pete was looking for alligators and crocodiles. We didn’t see any, but several places some people did.

We bought emergency supplies for people. We bought life jackets, food, and cleaning supplies, which our father gave to other people. If you’re staying at your house during a flood, you will need food which doesn’t need to be cooked because you might not be able to use your stove or electricity. Sometimes the toilets don’t work any more.

Being in a flood can be scary and can be an adventure. Pray about it and ask God to look after everything.

This is Nate and Pete Noble signing off.