It's official

Yesterday's early release at the Embassy and the flooding confirm it: it's rainy season.

I thought maybe it was early, then I realized that we got here late July last year, so maybe I just arrived late. Then someone on facebook said it is early. Hopefully it doesn't just carry through like this. I think I would have a hard time being stuck in the house if it's flooding all the time.

On a happier note: I had a great visit with my sister! She was here for almost three weeks. Mostly it was just us relaxing (somehow I let her leave having only had one massage - how did that happen?!), but we did some touristy things too.

We went to: Ft. Santiago in Intramuros, Divisoria (think local market/bazaar), and Greenhills (pearls!). We tried to see the sunset at the bay, but unfortunately I picked a bad spot for it. She saw parts of the Embassy, and the school. And we traveled!

It was my first time traveling in the Philippines without John and it was weird to go to a beach resort without him. I had to get my mind out of romantic vacation mode and into sister vacation mode. Unfortunately I didn't do a good job explaining myself at the spa and I accidentally booked us a romantic cooling wrap treatment. It dawned on me after we were both laying on the tables having ice cold green mix that looked like guacamole put on us. "They think we're a couple!" I said. My sister agreed. They did think that. Oh well, it was still fun.

We went to Mactan Island which is connected to Cebu Island which is South East of here. It only was about an hour and a half flight to get there. The resort picked us up and brought us back to the airport when it was time to go. We ventured out to a restaurant that Anthony Bourdain said had the best pork ever. I didn't think so, I'd had better at home, but it wasn't bad. The resort itself, Bluewater Maribago, was a bit above average. I'd had worse, I'd had better. We went on a Deal Grocer deal, and I'd return with kids on a Deal Grocer deal. There were a lot of families there, actually. But there's a Shangri-La down the road that offers a government rate...we'll probably do that with the kids instead.

We ate out a ton while she was here. It's hard to get out of that habit, but I'm working on it.

She says she had a good time, and I think I believe her. I really hope it was a memorable trip. And I really hope she got the rest she deserves after her super hard school year. We loved having her here.

Oh and Steph - you were included in Malachi's family picture the other day. Thought you'd like to know.

Travel Stories

The FS BRU that’s happening next week is about travel stories. We traveled a lot through the summer, and I mean a lot. And our kids are amazing.
My kids were in five countries, and 17 different U.S. States in less than 4 months. They traveled over five thousand miles while we dragged them on road trips from Dallas to Minneapolis, with stops in Kansas City, Missouri and Des Moines. And then just five weeks later we left Minneapolis and went to Falls Church, Virginia with stops in Chicago, Cleveland, Niagara Falls (Canadian side), New York City, and Philadelphia.

My kids went from their comfortable home in Costa Rica, to traveling all over the States with grace. Then they excelled at long distance travel when we flew from Dulles to Tokyo, Japan (13.5 hours) and were complimented when we arrived. They were amazing tourists in Japan, and then arrived in Manila after another 4.5 hour flight.

My kids were amazing. A.Maz.Ing. There’s no other way to put it.  It gives me a bit of a confidence boost thinking that they were amazing partly due to the fact that we’ve done good parenting. That makes me feel good. But they’re good people. And their personalities are good. I’m so lucky to have such happy and well behaved children. Did they have moments when they weren’t amazing? Yes, absolutely. But they were fewer and farther between then they should have been. And neither parent wanted to pull hair out.
My kids have always been great travelers. I have pictures of all the kids traveling throughout their lives. Unfortunately they’re on an external drive that I have, and the cord for it is missing. But I promise, I have proof that the kids are good travelers.
It’s a good thing, too, because John and I love to travel. We hope to pass that on to the kids.

Day 1 (randomness from day 1 at post)

(written on Wednesday 7/25/12 at 8:00 p.m.)

We arrived at our house today. Doing a rest stop and two days of leave in Tokyo first was a wonderful idea. Though we’re not over jet lag, we’ve made a lot of progress and the kids napped shortly after we came from the airport.

The house is big! It’s by far the biggest that we’ve ever lived in. There’s a hallway that runs from the front door to Malachi’s bedroom that is the longest hallway we’ve seen in a house. Almost all the rooms are big, and the one that isn’t big, is still sizable. The kitchen has room for a table and we’re thinking of having an island made to make up for the lack of counter space.

There is a ton of storage space here! Every bedroom has a closet, and the office/guest room has a large built-in. There’s a walk-in closet in the kitchen as well as a fun pantry in the wall that’s a bit mysterious. There are even two large closets in the hallway! There’s no lacking for space for my towels in this house!

There’s no crib! Oops. This is my fault. I meant to request from housing to have a crib in one of the rooms instead of a bed, and I forgot. This is going to be one of John’s jobs tomorrow. Hopefully they can fulfill this request quickly. Coen isn’t a huge fan of the tent that we have (soooo glad we have the tent!).

The laundry room is outside. This bothers me, but hopefully I won’t be doing much of my own laundry after a little bit. I’m going to call the internet company tomorrow and I’d love to have internet before the weekend.

I gave a very short list of groceries for the sponsor to buy, and I know for next time to make it a bit longer. During the boys’ naps John went out to get some things at a store that’s within walking distance. Though it wasn’t overwhelming for him, it was a bit much, and unfortunately the store he went to didn’t have fabric softener. Bummer.

Our sponsor had us over for dinner. His wife arrives tomorrow from R&R so it was just him and his college-aged daughter. Their nice people and about a 3 minute walk from our house. It’s nice to have Embassy families this close.

There’s good security in the village (gated community) that we live in. I doubted it when I saw pictures, but I don’t anymore.

I really like my house. Though I would be even happier if there was one more room (family room would be awesome), it’s so much space and we’re very happy with it.

The kids were ready for bed by 6:00 tonight. It made dinner a bit hard and frustrating. They were in bed before 8:00 and fell asleep very quickly.

Everyone is happy to be finally in one place for a while. Although, Simon has asked a few times today if we’re going to a train, or a plane. I don’t know if he gets that we’re home.

I love that we’re home. 

Better Mood

I’m excited for the next week. Our car was taken today. That was the last thing that needed to happen here. We leave on Saturday for our mini-vacation in Tokyo. John’s been planning a super fun time there, and has even gotten a babysitter for one night, so the parents can have a night out. This is super special to me, I miss having dates with him.

We found out that we’re going straight to our own house!! This is super exciting news. Thanks to the previous tenants leaving post early, they were able to do what was necessary before we arrive. Our sponsors live just one road over from us, so we’ll be walking over to their house for dinner that night. Learning these things makes the arrival more exciting for me.

Today and tomorrow John and I are trying to fill our time, and well…keep the kids occupied. Today we took the metro over to Ballston Mall and had Noodles & Co. for the last time. It’s not an especially amazing place to eat, but you know what? ALL of my kids eat there. That is not an easy thing to do! Because of that it’s high on our list of places that we will go to.

Tomorrow we’re going downtown to see some memorials. Ones that we didn’t make it to last time we lived here, and have only driven by this time. After naps we’ll be doing final Skype visits with people.

Right now, I’m in a good mood. Let’s see how we’re feeling on Sunday after our trip to Japan. 

NOT on Home Leave Anymore

We arrived at Oakwood last weekend. I'm digging the renovations, especially the washer/dryer unit in my  closet. Coming to Oakwood has been great, it was like coming home, and was the first time I'd felt like I was really in my own space since we left Costa Rica in April.

So far I've worked on unpacking the suitcases we dragged across 17 states. The day after I got a good handle on that, the UAB came. I've been dragging my feet with that, but I hope to get a lot accomplished today (while I keep the kids inside because it's going to be almost 100 degrees with 90% humidity). The worst is the clothing. I feel a need to wash every item, and it's not a small amount.

I'm a stay at home mom to three for the first time, and let me tell you...it's not easy. Luckily we're at Oakwood where they have a playground, and a tennis/basketball court, and a sand volleyball court, and a pool.

Home leave was...well...interesting. I guess I could say that overall it was good. I liked seeing family and friends, and the food was amazing (up 10-ish lbs amazing), but home leave wasn't easy. It's hard to have a family of five sharing a house with a family of four. It's hard to leave the place you call home and realize that you're not going back. It was hard on the kids to leave their friends, school, nanny, and house (Simon had a very hard time with this one). It was an adjustment to John and I to not have a nanny for the kids. We didn't go out as much as we're used to because there was no ease of asking the nanny to work a bit of overtime.

The best part of home leave was our road trip. We started in MN, spent two nights in Chicago seeing the sights and some friends, we spent a night in Cleveland and ate at an Iron Chef's restaurant (which I highly recommend. It's called B Spot and is a Michael Symon burger joint. super tasty), we did a night in Niagara falls and stayed in a hotel with a view of the falls, we did two nights in NYC and saw The Book of Mormon (hil-a-ri-ous) as well as doing a bus tour with the kids, and I caught up with a friend, we did two nights in Philly and saw the bell, went to the Please Touch Museum, and had Phillly Cheese Steaks, twice. We ended it here in Virginia, at what we're calling home.

After buying the car in Dallas, driving it to MN, and then VA and all the driving where we stayed going to see people and things, we put over 5,000 miles on the car. It was all worth it. Coen might not agree though - he's not a huge fan of road tripping.

The pictures from Home Leave are still on the card, but maybe after I finish unpacking the UAB I'll be able to work on those. We have some great pictures to share.

A month from now we'll have wheels up and we'll begin our journey in The Philippines. I can't wait to be settled in a place for a little while. The prospect of new work, new friends, a new house, and all the other great benefits of getting to post are all exciting.

Minnesota...The End

Things I did in my last couple of days (of course, in no particular order)...

One more trip to: Jimmy John's and Target

Trip to: Walgreens, USPS (Sent my Swap Box!), The Carver County Service Center, scary Thrift Store, TJ Maxx and Payless for Bogo

Afternoon and dinner at my dad's house

Met sister-in-law in Bloomington to go to the airport

Cried at security when they made me throw away the cold medicine for Simon

Great Flight to Atlanta with Simon napping a bit

Chick-fil-A in Atlanta and barely no delay

Not a horrible flight to San Jose with Simon sleeping as long as he could be comfortable

Met at the gate by John and Malachi with Malachi running to me yelling MOOMMYYYYY (Best arrival ever)

Easy time through immigration and customs

Stop at Taco Bell on the way home

Gifting items from myself and family members to John and Malachi

Sleep in my own bed

Since Friday I've seen some friends and spent some quality time with my family. Right now we're sitting in the living room watching Star Wars The Empire Strikes Back, having just eaten eggs and toast. I'm not sure we're not in the States sometimes. Well I guess we bring the States to Costa Rica anyway. 

Simon and I are still sick, but we're on the mend. Hopefully we won't pass it on to John and Malachi.

Minnesota So Far...again

More things I've done (again...no particular order):

• Watched: Date Night, All of the Twilight Saga movies and some special features
• Ate at Jimmy John's, First Course (Tapas)
• Spoken a little bit of Spanish
• Had my first dream in English and Spanish
• Comforted a sick baby
• Lazied around a large part of MLK day
• Gone to Target two more times (total of three so far, and spent surprisingly little money)
• Had my favorite orange rolls for breakfast with the family egg bake
• Saw family and friends that I haven't seen in at least a year and a half
• Took some cute pictures (that I can't get online because this computer doesn't have an SD slot)
• Played Scattegories Junior with Mom and Aunt Patty and lost by 1 point

Minnesota So Far

Things I've done (in no particular order):

Gone to a movie without Spanish subtitles
Spoken zero Spanish
Hung out with Mom, Sister, Dad, Aunt, Friends (hanging out with many more relatives and friends today)
Eaten at: Chick-fil-A, Chipotle, Papa Murphy's x2
Had my favorite family recipe/meal
Played Bananagrams and Five Crowns
Slept at least 7 1/2 hours the last two nights
Driven in MN winter, safely making it to all destinations, passing fatal accidents
Watched zero T.V. (can you believe that babe?!)
Comforted and fought to feed a teething baby
Introduced said baby and his grandpa (my dad)
1 full load of laundry that sits in the dryer waiting to be folded - HA!
Shopped at Target
Woke up before the sun rises (8:00 a.m. in a MN winter)
Taken a few pictures

It's been a great trip so far, and today we're having a party for my mom's 50th, tomorrow is her birthday filled with all kinds of fun activities.

Oh - I got my FS Swap partner. I can't wait to swap parts of our country!

15 degrees

Where I am it's 15 degrees outside. The high today will be 20. The high tomorrow will be 15. But at least tomorrow it'll be sunny. Today's forecast? More snow!

But...I get to see family! My dad gets to meet my son for the first time today (in about three hours), and I will hopefully see some old friends while I'm here. I'm only going to be here for about six more days and then I return to a (hopefully) sunny Costa Rica. So I've decided that I can do this. It doesn't matter that my toes feel like they're going to fall off...because they won't. And I somehow made it here in between snow storms amidst people that had been waiting four days to fly. The only delay I had was one hour from Atlanta to Minneapolis. I could easily deal with that...we missed rush hour on the highway because of it!

I'm really very happy to be here but I must go find my slippers.

Check Up

John, Malachi and I headed over to my OB's office yesterday to check on the baby, the previously mentioned placenta issue, and of course to find out the sex.

My OB lets the other Dr's in the practice to most of the ultrasounds (apparently they're better at it), so I met one of the other Dr's and she did our ultrasound. I was only 15 weeks 5 days, and he wasn't cooperating as much as she would've liked but we did get glimpses of HIS "stuff" if you will a couple of times. We laughed as we realized that we would have three boys in the house. Malachi was mad - he wanted a sister. I assured him that a little brother is way more likely to rough house than a little sister. I think that helped a little.

The rest of the ultrasound went well. The placenta is in a great position - couldn't be better actually. And the check up with my Dr went well. I didn't have any questions - it's my third, I feel pretty confident right now. He did my vitals and checked the heartbeat for himself. The one odd thing this check up...I've lost more weight. I lost about a pound in the last month, making it a loss of about 7 1/2 lbs. How I lost weight over the holidays and with barely exercising I have no idea! If I continue to lose weight, I'll have to eat more and I don't know how that will be possible! However, this month, I'm supposed to do business (eat like I was) as usual. I got a DVD of the whole ultrasound, and I'll see if I can somehow get the file online.

It seems the boys are getting sick. All three of them have some kind of congestion. John's well enough to be at work, and the boys seem fine right now, we'll see how it progresses. I really hope if Simon has a sinus thing it goes away in time for the flight next week.

What flight, you ask? Well...I'm going home! I'm going to visit my family and celebrate my mother's birthday. I can't wait to go to MN, and I can't wait for food. FOOD! Good (but really probably bad) food. With the cold weather, staying inside and sitting around all the time, and all the eating I'm going to do, I imagine I'll gain a bit of weight in the States.

Vacation Post #2

The 29 hour vacation that I had from 1:00 pm yesterday to 6:00 pm today will end up being a three post series. Why? Because today's drive home was even more adventurous than yesterday's drive there. So it deserves a post of its own. So today I'll tell you about our stay at the hotel.

When checking out the hotel I thought it looked really nice from the pictures. I was super excited to go with the girls, spend a night and have two hours in the spa. Since we got to the hotel last night at 6:00 and that's when the spa closes we couldn't make reservations then. So we enjoyed the dinner buffet on the restaurant's patio. We listed to the river and the animals and laughed, happy to be out of the car. My friend, A, had to finish a paper for school, so she sat in the lobby using their internet to do that. I was reading a book she brought (because I didn't think about it) on the couch with her until I was falling asleep. So I went to the room and read for a very short time and fell asleep.

This morning you heard a little bit about. I spent about an hour writing that blog, and after that A and I went to the heart shaped hot tub for a little bit while S got ready. The three of us had breakfast and A and I went to the room while to rinse/dry off and then we met S at the spa. They were fully booked, can we come back tomorrow.

Nope. A and S were leaving tonight for Panama and we were checking out of the hotel at noon. It had to be today. They said they needed three hours for the package we bought. They were awesome and managed to squeeze us in.

At the spa, I had a 30 minute massage, a steam bath, mud application on arms and legs, paraffin wax on my hands and feet, and a facial. It ended up being three and a half hours for me, my friends didn't do the steam and one didn't do the mud.

Check out for the hotel was at 12:00 and I was done in the spa at 12:40. I rushed to the room in the rain (because the umbrellas were in the room, where they were forgotten). A was waiting at the door for me with a message from the front desk. They were going to charge us a fee if we wait to check out after 1:00 pm. It was kind of ridiculous since they had A TON of open rooms.

We made it to the front desk right before 1:00 and checked out. We went to the restaurant for the lunch that was in the package. I had their nachos - they were tasty. The other food was just so, so.

We squared away at the front desk one more time and then after ripping up the credit card approval, I walked out. I was super relaxed and full of good nachos.

Then the real adventure began...

Are We There Yet?

The story of how a two hour drive took five.

I felt like a chicken with her head cut off yesterday morning. But I was at the Embassy so I couldn´t run around. The girls that are visiting us and I decided the previous night that we´d see if we can get a deal for the three of us that was offering a deal for two at a hotel/spa a couple of hours north of where I live.

I started at the Travel Agency (Carlson Wagonlit location down the hall from my office) and asked the nice ladies if I could do what I wanted. They made a call to the hotel and directed her to another person to call. She told me she´d make the call and let me know. I had breakfast with a friend in her office who offered me one of her extra croissants. The wonderful woman from Carlson popped her head in and said that we could do it for $10 less than what I was asking for - woot!

I told her I needed to find babysitters before I made the reservation, so I thanked my friend for breakfast and went on my way. I stopped at the office next to mine and asked someone if her daughter could babysit that afternoon and this afternoon. She couldn´t get a hold of her, so I tried other options. Most of the teenagers and visiting college students were either out of town with their parents or with out. And then I remembered my neighbor. She´s become a friend and has an 18 month old of her own. She owns a store at the mall, but usually goes just in the evening.

Problem: I don´t have her phone number. So I ask my friend who shared breakfast who just happens to be from Spain to call my maid for me and ask her to have my neighbor call me at my desk. The message is passed on but she doesn´t call. So my maid goes to my neighbor and asks for the phone number. I call her to find out she was making pancakes. I feel a little bad, but am too excited for spa (two hours in the spa actually) to care too much (sorry A).

She says she can watch the kids that day and her maid will do it the next. Yes!! I make the reservation and wait at the Embassy for another half hour for Carlson to give me the voucher for the room.

Head home, pack, feed Simon, print out directions from Google, take kids over to neighbors house, get everything in the car - go! Get 15 minutes out and turn around because I forgot my purse. UGH!

I should´ve seen this as the bad omen it was.

We were going to San Jose first to buy bus tickets for the girls because the company doesn´t take credit cards and they´re leaving for Panama Friday night. We drive around for about an hour looking for the place because the book apparently doesn´t have the location right and the nice woman at the hotel we stopped at wasn´t quite sure either apparently.

So we finally give up and decide to go to the hotel. I think I´m supposed to turn left at the road and I don´t see any signs saying I can´t but people are honking at me (including a semi as it drives by - scary!!) so I move forward. And am very glad I didn´t turn because it turns out I was already on the road I wanted to be on. So we´re driving and we miss our turn. Because the signs don´t have road numbers on them - just what town they lead to. I´m not scared yet because we´re still on the Pan American Highway and I can just turn back if I need to. But eventually we need to turn off, so we get off the highway because we think this road will take us where we need to go. At this point my friend has pulled out her Costa Rica book and finds a map that´s not ideal but is great because I failed to bring one with me.

We stop at a restaurant and I ask in my broken Spanish if we´re at the place I think we are, and we are! Then I ask how to get to a different place and he tells me - and I understand!!

We get back on the highway and head for Naranja. We get excited to see a sign for Naranja that says it´s in 10 km. Great!

Miss that turn.

Stop at a mall ask a nice bank security guard for directions to Zarcero, he provides them. We then ask nice police men to verify and we get basically the same directions. I eat a Taco Bell double decker because in the excitement I´ve eaten very little and am shaking from hunger.

We find Zarcero after asking a nice girl on the side of the road where it was. I thought we´d passed it, because there´s so way it would take this long to get there. Nope. Go to the intersection, take a right and we´ll be there in 15 minutes. Awesome!

I have to mention that for a while we´d been climbing the mountains so driving was very slow going and it took a couple of minutes to go one kilometer. And then all of a sudden we´re in Zarcero - yay!! So according to my friend´s map we the next big town is Ciudad Quesada, which just happens to be very, very close to our hotel. With out needing to stop for directions we head there (there was a sign that said Ciudad Quesada 27 km so we stayed on the road we were already on and prepared for a 15 mile drive). The drive was beautiful if not a little scary and slow.

Finally we arrive in a very nice town and know we´ve made it to Quesada. We see signs for every town but the one we want - argh! At the next intersection while we´re still trying to decide which way to go I spot a sign for our hotel - salvation!!!!

It has an arrow pointing to the right and says 15 minutes, 7 km this way. So we turn, and we drive - about six or seven miles! I decide not to freak out until 10 miles, but I don´t need to because the hotel shows up on the left side. And there was much rejoicing!

At one point during the drive I say "this drive is a blog entry all of it´s own" and my friend looks over and replies "you should call it Are We There Yet?" We both laugh, she was great at keeping the mood light when the drive was scary either because of the crazy twists and turns or the fear that we were hopelessly lost.

So today I´ve been up since before four. Parly because I feel asleep before 8:30 and partly because someone used the bathroom this morning and shined the light into our room. Oh well. I´m not all that tired. But I should probably go get dressed for breakfast and get ready for a spa experience and then another awesome ride home!

John - I so appreciate your driving here now, and I appreciate any future driving you´ll most definitely do. ;)

Exhausted

I've been regretting this part of my return to home. On Monday night and Tuesday morning/afternoon I didn't feel like doing anything, so I didn't do anything - including the blog. We (Malachi and I) were in Dallas for almost five days and we were pretty busy. Most of it was just hanging out with friends - we both had a great time doing that. I'll try to make this summary quick.

Thursday: Malachi was an angel the whole day of travel (about 8 hours from door to door). I kept him pretty occupied with books and snacks and his toys on the first flight. We got in to Memphis a little early and had time for bathroom breaks and some phone calls. I made Malachi sleep on the next flight and tried to sleep but couldn't get comfortable so I read. We got to Dallas, got the rental car and headed to our friend's (wonderful Don and Rosanne) house. Another friend, Danielle, was there with her kids, one of them being one of Malachi's best friends. Then another friend of mine, Ginger, joined us after a little bit. They wanted to be there to support me because they had some bad news. They had to change the time and day of the shower due to a funeral for the father of a friend of ours. I certainly understood and wasn't nearly as disappointed as they thought I would be. We had a great time of playing catch up. Loved it!

Friday: Rosanne let me sleep in an hour while she and Malachi hung out. We didn't have any plans until 11, so we spent the morning chillaxin. At 11 we met a friend at Chick-fil-A. We don't have CFA here, so we were both very excited to have it! It was a lot of fun to catch up with Sam and hear about their new adventures. I meant to make plans for Friday and I did try, but it didn't work out. We ended up just hanging out at Rosanne's house. Danielle and her kids came over again so they played while we did more resting. I was still exhausted from the previous day of travels.

Saturday: John left DC at about 6am to come to Dallas for the weekend. We had breakfast plans in Dallas with our friend Holly. I was so excited to see her. After we got back "home" from breakfast we left to go back to Dallas to get a couple of friends, Cassie and Sarah, for a mini-shower because they couldn't make it to the re-scheduled one. We met another friend, Cassi (yes that's right, at the table sat Cassie, Cassi, Sarah and Sara), coming from Austin at a Mexican restaurant. That just happened to be the restaurant that John and his friend Chris had gone to. They had been there for just a few minutes when we walked in and went to our own table. We all said hi and then went back to our separate tables. The girls had a great time playing catch up and eating delicious Mexican food. The boys did to as far as I can tell. After lunch I brought Sarah home and met John, Chris, Holly (yes they're married) and their one month old son Stephen at Starbucks. We sat with them for at least an hour just talking and hanging out. It was a lot of fun, and Stephen was awesome. He just laid there in his mama's arms sleeping the whole time. Afterwards John and I passed a little time waiting for another time of hanging out with some friends. Eventually we made our way over to Cassie and Jason's house. Cassie, Cassi, Jason, Sarah, Ival, Isaac, John, and I spent a few hours that night catching up and having a great time. People started getting tired (three pregnant ladies!) so we left around 8:30. John and I put Malachi to bed right away and hung out with Don and Rosanne for almost three hours talking. More catching up!

Sunday: Church day! We were so excited to go to church and hear our Pastor speak. Malachi enjoyed his time at church with his old friends and so did we. I cried through out church because I missed it so much. After church we had lunch at our favorite after lunch spot with some friends. We went to Target for a short time then made our way over to my shower. The ladies had put together an awesome shower and I had a great time. I was so blessed by those who put together my shower and by all who came. John and I went from the shower to visit our friends Raul and Valerie. We hung out with them for a little bit and then went to dinner at one of our favorite BBQ places. I dropped John off at the airport so he could do homework and went do Don and Rosanne's. They were having a home group meeting so Malachi and I went to my room and I started packing. They finished their meeting and I went to visit with people I still hadn't seen. I stayed up to watch the Cowboys beat Philly.

Monday: I woke up excited to return home. Being excited for my return home made the morning happen kind of slowly. Ginger and her daughter came over for our last morning. Malachi and Rachel played nicely while the adults stayed in the living room and talked. Malachi and I left at 10 for the airport. I had to return the car, ride the bus, check the car seat, get through security and get us some food by 12:00 and I made it. Malachi had a pretty rough day this time. He was completely exhausted by this time from the lack of naps and the super busy-ness that this weekend was. Happily for me we got on the second plane and he fell asleep during the safety announcements. He slept almost the whole flight. It caused a bit of soreness for me, but it was a great break too. John met us at the airport and I was so happy to see him! Even though he came to Dallas, the time spent apart sucked.

Tuesday: Woke up with John and wished him a Happy Anniversary. We were celebrating 8 years of marriage on Tuesday. He gave me an awesome card - seriously hilarious. Then he handed me a second one. It was a gift card for a pregnancy massage, I'm very, very excited for it. Unfortunately I had forgotten to get him a card and I didn't know he was getting me a present so I didn't get him one. I was totally being lame. John went to work that morning and I tried to rest while doing things to get ready for the night throughout the day. Showering, doing hair, make-up and packing were almost all done by the time John got home from work. At 4:30 our friend came over to stay with Malachi that night.

We made our way to the hotel where I pulled out the pregnancy and anniversary cards and got us an upgrade to a Jr. King Suite. It was like a regular hotel room, but bigger. The size was great. We had some time to kill before going to dinner so we sat down to enjoy some TV and there was a knock on the door. The gentleman who checked us in and gave the suite to us sent up some champagne and chocolate covered strawberries with raspberry dipping sauce. It was delicious. I toasted our anniversary with him with a sip of champagne. We took a taxi to our restaurant and ended up there half an hour early, but they were very accommodating and sat us right away. When I made the reservation I told them it was our anniversary and I'd like a view of the capital. They were quite good at fulfilling this request. Unfortunately there was a large tree between us and the capital and I could only see white spots through the tree. I guess in a couple of months when all of the leaves are gone it'll be visible. Dinner was delicious! I've really been into potatoes lately so I think my favorite part of the dinner was the Yukon Gold Potato Puree. I totally over ate on the Puree. Then we ordered a very decadent chocolate dessert. Then our waiter brought us over another dessert, he said it was for the baby. We will totaly recommend this restaurant to anyone who wants a good steak dinner.

After dinner we made our way back to our apartment complex to a goodbye party for a friend. I didn't think I could make it through a movie so we decided to do this. She's moving to London on Monday, and I didn't want to miss saying good bye to her. We stayed for about 20 minutes before I started wilting. We headed back to the hotel and went almost immediately to bed. We got to sleep until 8am the next morning! That's not a huge deal, but we got 9 hours of sleep. It was awesome! We had breakfast at the buffet at the hotel and checked out. We made our way over to the Spy Museum. We had a ton of fun there! I also recommend this to anyone visiting the area. After that we headed home. We had a very fun time celebrating our 8 years together.

Ok, so this is probably the length of a short story. Hope it didn't put you to sleep.

Tres Horas

Last night I only got three hours of sleep. I have this horrible, horrible habit to stay up when I have something really exciting going on the next day. Luckily until I get to Dallas I only have to do about 10 minutes of driving. John can do the rest.

Malachi and I are both super, super excited to see our friends this weekend. We've been talking about going to church and all the friends he gets to see. I hope some of those friends come to the baby shower on Saturday so he can see them more than once. I really miss having those friends for him and I really miss the connections that I built in Dallas. I've made a few friends here, but non that have the connection that I have so with many wonderful women in Dallas.

Our first flight leaves at 11:30 this morning. We have a connection in Memphis and arrive in Dallas at 3:50pm. I'm checking his car seat (for free, yay!) so after getting that from baggage claim and getting the car I rented I figure that I wont get to my friends house that I'm staying at until about 6:00. I think we'll just have dinner with them and chill there tonight. I have a feeling I'm going to be even more exhausted than I am now. I also expect to have some soreness.

GAH! I'm so excited!!!! I'm leaving my apartment in a little over an hour, so I guess I better be getting ready. :) See you later Dallas!!

tidbits

Because my life is so crazy with out being crazy (where does the time go? what do I actually do with my time?) my blog entries tend to be long, especially when I wait a week to update. So I decided that this time, I'm going to forgo the details and do tidbits.

Shots - Malachi and I have been perfectly fine over the last week. Neither of us have shown any signs of flu or colds even. I'm hoping this means that the H1N1 vaccine will work for us, but we'll see. We have the rest of the season to make sure we don't get it. John and I are trying to be wise about where we go with Malachi with out going over board with it.

Foreign Service Life - John's schedule changed effective yesterday. He now works 8-2 instead of 10-4. That means on admin days (sporadic Wednesdays when they have half days) he's off at 10 instead of 12. It was so awesome yesterday when he got home before I put Malachi down for his nap. Mom and dad had some extra child-free time during the day, it was almost like a weekend day. Tomorrow just happens to be an admin day and we're going to go downtown to the building affectionately known as Main State and go to the Passport Office to go get pictures taken and apply for passports. Malachi and I can't apply for Diplomatic Passports yet because we don't have travel orders yet but we all need our regular passports (for all non official travel) because Malachi's never been out of country and mind and John's expired last year or earlier this year. It feels like forever since we've been out of country!

Travel (in country) - Malachi and I are leaving for Dallas in less than 48 hours woohoo!! I'm so excited to go "home." I'm even more excited that John's joining us on Saturday to see some of his friends and so that we can go to FOJ as a family on Sunday morning. He got a late flight on Sunday night so it gives us all of Sunday together too. Unfortunately since our trips are short, I'm having a very, very hard time figuring out how to spend my time. John has a ride from the airport and is going to hang out with one of his best friends for brunch. Funny (short) story: I'm going to breakfast with said friend's wife earlier that day. That breakfast, my shower, and church on Sunday are my only set plans. So if you're a good friend expect a call or an email today or tomorrow to plan something during my time there.

Pregnancy - 25 Weeks today! This is the first day of my last trimester and the pregnancy is going pretty well! I have some aches and pains here and there but I push through them. I've been having a hard time the last couple of weeks not over doing it. I know that will be a huge issue this weekend in Dallas, but I'll try to get rest. John has been amazing to me the last few weeks. He's taking care of Malachi so much and cooking so much, it's awesome. He's been such a good husband, such a blessing to me.



Halloween - We had a great time this year! This was Malachi's first year to go trick-or-treating for real. His Pirate costume was a big hit. He got a ton of candy in about an hour and a half of 'treating and he's been very nicely sharing with mommy and daddy. John and I had a lot of fun as parents watching him do things that we did as kids. Next year we'll be at the embassy doing embassy parties and embassy style trick-or-treating which is different at different embassies/consolates.



How'd I do? I think I might have gotten into to much detail on some of those, but oh well. I think the format breaks it up enough to make it easier to read.

2 1/2 Hours...

...until our flight to MN. We're very excited to see home. John hasn't been home since our trip in March last year. I had the short trip in April, but it was just that - short.

John and Malachi are transfering tools from our old tool box to our new one. Apparently the old one was a gift to my father-in-law from my hubby and brother-in-law when they were kids. It's definitely time for a new one. Since the tool box needs to be moved by the moving company in a week, we figured it would be nice to have one that closed. :)

Tomorrow and Tuesday morning we're going through all of the things that we left in MN (in the in-laws attic) when we moved to Dallas. When moving down here we planned to come down for two years to do Christ For The Nations and then move back to MN. We thought we'd be getting our stuff from them after school ended.God had a different plan though. We've been down here for almost six years. We've enjoyed Texas so much, call Texas home, and call ourselves Texans. There's really nothing like the great State of Texas. TEXAS!

We hope to see some of our dear friends in MN that we miss, hopefully they'll be around and available to hang out with. I get to see my family and some family friends on Friday night. Saturday morning we come back home!

Whew! Seems like I've experienced my trip before I experienced it.