Time Savers for a Five Year Old

Homeschool is cracking me up today. Jacob was doing handwriting and adjusted the task to save time. Because Jack is sooooo much faster to write than Jacob. In his defense he did think it made the word say Jake.

Return to the South

This week I returned to Texas for a week after living three years living outside of the USA and nearly nine years since I was last in Texas.  Monday morning I was reminded that I had returned to the "South" by how friendly the hotel staff was and by their accents.

As I approached the breakfast area in the hotel Monday morning I was very quickly greeted by one of the hotel employees with a very cheerful good morning greeting from across the room with some sort of question about how I was doing that day.  The "strength" of the greeting sort of took me by surprise because it has been a while since I have received that sort of greeting.  I responded in kind and then proceeded to select my breakfast.  I saw her give similar greetings as other people entered the lobby.  Shortly after I sat down and started eating the same lady came to me and asked me how my breakfast was.  Most other places the people may greet you, but there is just something about the way the Texans greet each other--she was very friendly and made sure I knew she was there to help me out.

The best part was when I attempted to get some orange juice from the juice machine.  Only water came out.  I asked the lady if the juice machine was working.  She immediately came over and tested the machine.  When she saw the water come out she declared as only a Texan can, "It didn' get done yet!"  It was at that point I realized I had returned to the South.

This Is The Place

Ben went to scout camp today and had a great time! The rest of us went to "This Is The Place" Monument and Village. It is WAY better than when I was a kid! We spent 4 hrs there and the kids had a blast in the village panning for gold, riding the train and the pony and touring all the old houses and seeing the people make things. Awesome day.

Ashlyn Thinks I'm a Cow?

Laying in bed this lazy morning. Ashlyn is in her pack and play crib in the closet next to me with the door arranged just right so she can't see me. Out of no where she says, "Mooo!! Mommy say, 'Moo.' " Then went back to sleep again.

Jet Lag Curse

I'm jet lagged. It's 2:45 am. Kids fell asleep at 9:30 pm. They will most undoubtably awake at 7:00 am because I couldn't sleep.

I opened solitare on my phone just now in an effort to kill some more time and got a funny surprise. There was a game already started so I just picked up wher I left off last time I played. When I checked my stats (my goal is to be under about 105 moves per game) I saw that it took me 465 moves to win this game. I was terribly confused until I remembered that I had taught Madison to play it a few days ago. I feel much better about myself now.

What Was That?

Jan 25, 2014

We had lunch today at a play place for a birthday party. I told the kids it was quesadillas for lunch. Served them up and had one myself though just a nibble. It tasted perfectly fine but later I found potent was pizza. That's REALLY sad when a person cannot tell the difference between a pizza and a quesadilla. Time to up the quality. Kinda hilarious if you ask me. I'm sure a part of it just lost in culture between what an American and a Singaporean would expect. 

FHE Pillowcase Sack Races and a New Couch

March 30, 2014

Last night was a hilarious night of Fanily Home Evening sack races. Ashlyn liked to pull her pillowcase up over her head so she couldn't see anything and then try to jump and walk.

After we finished we had some Twizzlers  from the special candy shop here in Singapore. And since mom gave away the kids couch this weekend they had to use the new couch I told Ben he could make with fun foam floor blocks. 

He decorated it all himself though and we live what he's done with it. 

We love the assigned seating.

Ben's First Pimple

April 8, 2014

The first pimple he got turned out to be a big one!

That left a mark.

Mover Come in about 30 hrs

May 30, 2014

We are all frazzled. Rough day. Lots of tears. Ben broke and was screaming that it was all our fault and we have all the power and he has absolutely no control of anything he ever gets to do. He's been lying and hiding stuff and freaking out. Jacob has had a fever for two plus days now. Maddie's ears are broken and she never hears a darn thing we say. Mom has a short fuse. Dad seems to keep working and ignores everything going on.

Ben needs a break so he's in the back yard playing with Ashlyn and she's living it. She follows his every move. He gets a drink, she gets a drink. He runs left she runs left. He is in happy heaven. It's past bedtime but this needs to happen now. It is beautiful to hear so much giggling again in our house even if I know it will all come apart when I say it's time to brush teeth at least they have this happy memory and moment together.

Mother's Day Merlion

May 13, 2014

My wonderful friend Gina and her sweet boyfriend Peter gave me this today for Mother's Day. Peter is such a great artist. He did amazing art work on the kids goodbye geckos and asked what I wanted him to do for me. I laughed and said a Merlion would be awesome but I wasn't getting a stuffed gecko for my friends to sign when I left. This absolutely made me day! I can't wait to frame it and hang it in my new home in Saudi Arabia.

Strollers

May 13, 2014

I used to think moms that pushed four year olds in strollers were stupid. I came from America. My kids have to walk at three years old. So those moms ought to get those kids up and make them walk. It's good for them I think. 

Now I see differently - a walking world of concrete and buses and taxis and trains and waiting in ques for all the aforementioned things. Then there are the rain storms and carrying all your groceries to feed your family home in heavy plastic bags every day. It makes a lot more sense. You can't physically carry a 30 lb chubby, angry, exhausted preschooler along with everything else you have in hand. You don't have time to negotiate with an illogical, cranky, hungry four year old. You don't have the emotional energy to pick up a tantruming child or drag them behind you every day of the week. This Singapore life is exhausting. I thank The Lord for our car. It makes my life so much better than it could be. 

Gaining perspective here has been a gorgeous thing. My standards don't fit in another world and culture. It's only my place to be open and adapt and learn that there are probably good, solid reasons for some of the weirdness I see at first glance. Their lives are very, very different than mine. I've had to do what they do a time or two with kids and buses and now I get it. Hats off to the diligent moms of Singapore who are still pushing their four and five year olds in strollers. You are awesome.

Jacob Packing

I found this gem in Jacobs school stuff as we cleaned out this morning so we could pack suitcases. He is planning to pack a suitcase to go to Saudi Arabia and will bring along: sunglasses, iPad, phone and a jacket.

Single Mom Fail

Ben needed to do something for the family for two months for Cub Scout credit. Two months was good. Started right as Brian left to Saudi for two months. Brian is the smoothie man around here so every Friday Ben was to out what fruit he wanted on the shopping list. Sunday dinner we were to have smoothies. I checked in with him yesterday to see how it was going. He says he made the apple kind this week and we took it all over to the friends the other week and he made a double batch and then the day of this and that. We figured about four times in eight weeks. What about the other weeks? "Well

those were just really bad days and we were always in trouble and you were too tired so we didn't do it."