half back

half (or 2/3!) of the bazemores are now safely back in the US of A... yay! after lots of packing, goodbyes, and about 24 hours of travel with my dear friend & travel partner, carly, it's good to be here.
this week i'll be visiting with friends, getting cell phones, seeing a baby doc, filling a few gaps in our summer housing, & doing a some things at the office.
mike is still wrapping things up in chiang mai, doing a GREAT job packing & selling & giving away our things (everything that needs to be is SOLD, as far as i know!!!! thanks, God - and thanks for your prayers, friends!). he meets me in fort lauderdale (where my parents are) in a week.
oh -- and i just noticed baby B is moving farther & farther to the right up above... getting closer!

we'll miss you Ginger!

no, Ginger is not coming back with us... sigh... but we found her a great home with the youth workers at a local church -- she'll have a huge yard & lots of visitors to meet & play with.

building homes

This is a picture from a previous CCC Tsunami relief trip of the homes Mike helped build this past week. Mike was able to help finish & hand over keys to 7 homes just like these... as the team leader put it, to 7 families "no longer living under the trees."

my man

just had to sneak this one in here... isn't he handsome? glad he's home :).

may 7

mike got back safely over the weekend with all kinds of neat stories about his time down south... look forward to sharing about those soon!

can't believe i am going to be back in the states in like 11 days!!?? even more incredible when i think these next 11 days will include a trip to bangkok to meet carly, a trip down phuket & back then sightseeing & shopping in chiang mai with her, packing the rest of my stuff & most of the house, 2 goodbye parties, the long flight home, & who knows what else...
guess you can pray for energy.

i get into orlando May 18...
mike gets into Fort Lauderdale on May 27th (we'll stay with my parents for a bit down there).

looking forward to seeing all of you US residents soon!

last night with small group girls

i'm going to miss these ladies....

thursdays we get together with these gals & their husbands (except koshara who is a LOVELY single gal) to eat, laugh, and talk about the important (and not so important :) things in life.

left to right... evie, michelle, lonna, & koshara (missed you jen, elissa, marisa, & nancy!)

had one last chic night together...

great conversation & fabulous food, as always! lonna made her out-of-this-world homemade bread, evie brought tasty meats & cheeses, michelle fruit & a super salad, koshara chocolate cake, & i tried a new french onion soup recipe on them.

they are as fun as they look!

saying goodbye

we've been doing a lot of it lately... it's so strange to visit with friends & realize that it's the last time you'll see them -- if not forever, for a very long time.


here I am with some girlfriends & their babies... i met Khun M through our work here in Chiang Mai -- she worked in the office we used to share. Christy & I met through mutual friends... Mike & her husband used to work together in Orlando. Both are busy with babies these days, as you can see!


here we are with the Rutledges & their growing & extended family... you can read about their story & ministry here.

yummy dinner

During her visit our sis-in-love, Mindy, very slyly got us a gift certificate for dinner at one of most amazing places in Chiang Mai, the Chedi. Before last week, we'd only heard about eating dinner there! (Though they do have a very reasonable High Tea which I have had the delight to experience!)
Here we are, drinking in the atmosphere & about to eat an incredible meal. I had the 2nd best steak of my life (the best was one Mike cooked over a campfire at Moss Park when we went camping with Matt & Deb) & Mike had a really nice duck curry.... thanks Mark & Mindy!!



In their lovely open air lobby...
Looking preggo, huh?

these days...

mike called the other night absolutely ecstatic..."we got to put on some roofs & even hand over keys!!!"

since before we moved here, he has been wanting to go down south to help with tsunami relief work done by our ministry... something always came up - recording trips, visitors, pollution crisis (when he didn't want to leave me alone at the guest house in hua hin)... so this trip came up, & we were both really excited for him to go.

Campus Crusade is one of the last groups to be doing work in areas devastated by this disaster.... most organizations have pulled out, but small groups from Crusade continue to go down to help rebuild what the waves destroyed... as Mike was saying, they are still finishing up homes in some areas & able to give house keys to displaced people who will finally have a permanent place to live so many months later.

so tonight mike is on some little island with a few other guys from the ministry, sleeping in a wooden structure on stilts that they hope "doesn't fall down"... i hope so, too!

meanwhile, i'm sorting through 18 months of accumulated life things, trying to decide what comes home, and what to give away... kind of sad when i think about how little so many people have... really close to nothing... and i am worried about fitting all our things into 4 large suitcases.

glad we can do a little something to help, though.