Sunrise on the Water

And It's Official (Sort Of)

2012-01-28T16:38:00.004-05:00

Well, the orders are here. The official, hard copy, "they are really yours orders". That is, about as definite as things ever get in the Navy. We're still not absolutely sure he's going to be allowed to leave shore early, so that's a worry, but hopefully all will fall into place.

We got the orders we want, and while I worry we just signed ourselves up for an insanely hectic year, I'm cautiously optimistic that it will all be a grand adventure. Mostly, I just have to survive the next few months here trying not to let the little things (and people) get to me. Had an awesome powwow at the park with a couple friends who completely get what I am talking about, so I feel a little better for some reason.

Although, I did learn from one of them that we are soon going to have to pay for our flights back and forth from here. Supposedly, it will be a "minimal" cost, but when you have to multiply it by four, "minimal" has a way of growing into "painful". How grateful I am this is happening near the very end of our time here and not the beginning.

Running and I Have Had a Falling Out

2012-01-24T22:05:00.002-05:00

I've long loved to run. I've been very back and forth about it, but the last two years have been good. I've been dedicated, and have kept up running three or four times a week (minus some vacation time and an injury to my heel that slowed me down for a bit). We even picked up a basically free treadmill they were getting rid of here that has made it far easier for me to keep up since I prefer to run during mid-day when I've got kids to keep an eye on. I've lost most of the weight I need to lose (grr at that stubborn belly fat leftover from two pregnancies...), and I'm proud of myself for really sticking with it.

For the last few months, however, I've found myself slogging through every run. I'm watching the miles, slacking off on the speed, anything to get through it. Sometimes I'm only running twice a week because I am that disinterested. Sadly, it seems running just doesn't do it for me.

Maybe it's because I have never done a race. Doing one requires flying to the States, so that's a hassle, plus I have never been confident enough to do one myself. I don't know anyone else here that runs, so there's no partner to keep me going, either. Maybe that's it. Or maybe I've gotten everything out of it that I can right now. I dunno.

The biggest problem with this is I cannot fathom just quitting exercise of any form. I have to find something to take its place, something that I look forward to the way I used to look forward to my run. I am determined that that baby belly is not going to take up permanent residence in my gut. Plus, I'm just happier in general when I exercise regularly.

So, I finally broke down and bought the Zumba Wii 2 game I've been staring at since November. I have had a love for dance pretty much all my life, but have never really done anything with it, much to my sadness. Last summer, while visiting Oliver's family, my sisters-in-law invited me to attend a Zumba class with them. I'd never heard of it before, but figured why not. It was so much fun.

Unfortunately, aside from a brief period when someone with the DVDs "taught" a class here on base, there are no Zumba classes to go to. I always intended to start going when we moved back to the States, but with my running slump, I need something now.

I'm now in my first week of using the game, and I've found it to be a decent substitute. It's not in any way as fun or good as going to a live class, but it's definitely better than watching a DVD (at least for me). As a game, it's actually terrible, because the Wii is not sensitive enough to really know what you are doing. I'm screwing up half the steps, yet getting five stars for my technique just because I happened to shake at the right time (you wear a belt that holds the remote against your hip). I don't care about that, however, since I'm just doing it for the exercise.

I am definitely looking forward to getting the chance to attend a live class again, but hopefully this keeps me moving and shaking enough to not lose ground on my improved body shape.

Changes Are A-comin'....Sometime in the Future!

2012-01-20T21:28:00.001-05:00

Just maybe we've got some orders picked out. Oliver is hopeful we will see them in the next couple weeks giving him just enough time to reenlist with a bonus. The biggest complication is whether or not he'll be able to leave here early or not. Time will tell.

The big news for us, though, is that these orders will result in two moves by this time next year. Despite the craziness of that, and my worry that it will be difficult to find a place to live in for the six months or less we will be in the one duty station, I'm excited about this. It gives an opportunity to live somewhere I've always wanted to live, while still being on sea duty (with its extra pay), yet not deploying because they will be in the shipyard for a long overhaul of some sort.

Part of me thinks I'm crazy for saying yes to another shipyard period - by the end of the one we did in Washington, I was so disappointed that the first patrol ended up being only six weeks long! And, no, this had nothing to do with whether or not I wanted Oliver gone. Life really was that bad.

This, though, is not going to be quite the same situation. We'll be in a much better area, with more to do, and a profound improvement in the weather. We'll be making a better decision about whether or not to buy a second car (still don't want to do that, but we might have to so I don't go insane - if there's a good bus system, though, we'll totally give that route a try), and I'm not going to be pregnant or whacked out by an IUD. Plus, I'll be homeschooling, which will actually enable to me to get out more than if I were just shuttling them around to public school. I'm absurdly excited about that, and have already begun working on putting together a curriculum for them.

So, we're taking a leap of faith here, but I'm hopeful it will work out well. I'm definitely ready to move away from our island home. It's been a very enlightening, interesting couple of years, and I'm really glad we had the option to come, but all the hard things are kind of in my face lately. Sometimes, it's time to move on.

Back From Legoland and Other Stuff

2012-01-11T09:05:00.002-05:00

We've been back from our trip for a few days now. Wyatt is at school and Oliver back at work. Oscar and I are beginning some more serious reading lessons, and I'm happy to see he seems to be absorbing them. I do, however, have to deal with some complaining about how "boring" it all is before he will sit down. I'm using computer time as a reward (as in, he gets none until he has his lesson), and when we are doing it, he will ask to do more than I had planned on, so clearly he's enjoying them despite the drama.

Up until now, I've been teaching him rather informally, but we were reaching an impasse with that. So, I picked up the book, "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons". I looked at a lot of reading programs, but finally went with this one because of the good things I read in homeschooling forums plus the cheapness of it compared to the pricey, packaged curriculums that I also looked at. I figured if we didn't like it, I wasn't out of too much money.

We do like it so far, however. I'm going to be skipping through the first set of lessons much faster than one a day because he doesn't need the drilling in letter sounds that a true beginner would, but it does seem to be teaching him how to parse words and begin to sound them out. He was doing some of that spontaneously yesterday afternoon, which was very encouraging to me.

As for Legoland, well, it was in Wyatt's words, "better than Disney World". And for them, I'd tend to agree. The entire park was designed with the 12 and under set in mind. The roller coasters are some of the slowest I've seen, and there were very few rides that Oscar couldn't go on. I was disappointed that the Hero Factory section wasn't built yet, despite being on the map. Our kids are big Hero Factory fans, so that was a real bummer to find that out when we tried to find it.

However, there was plenty of other stuff to keep us busy the two days we were there. Here are a couple highlights:

At the font gate. It was cold that morning! We had to stop and pick up some warmer stuff to wear on the way. Oscar was completely upset that we were making him wear a coat for the first time in two years. We ended up paying a little more for Lightning McQueen one just so he'd stop freaking out and wear it. Luckily, the second day was warm enough to shed some layers.

There Duplo stations where at almost all the rides. Oscar wanted to stop and build at every single one. We let him do so a few times, but they were all the same and there was a lot of other things to see, so we had to keep him moving sometimes.

This was by far the fan favorite of the trip. There was an area where you could check out four tires, then go to some bins of LEGO and build your own racer. They had two different types of tracks to race them on. One that had let four or five people line up their cars, press a button for a countdown, then watch them race after the barrier dropped. There was also an extreme, near vertical track that allowed you to test the durability of your vehicle. We spent over two hours here the second day.

This ball place was so much fun. There were two levels, this upper one with guns you could shoot soft balls down on the people below, and down below there was a giant cannon and this thing that would make the balls pour into the air and rain down on everyone. The balls themselves were pretty nasty, and I was glad there was sanitizer at the entrance, but we all had fun playing in here.

Miniland rocked. Tons and tons of LEGO construction, most of it representing real places. This shuttle was part of the NASA section. They had a countdown, then smoke roared out of the bottom of the shuttle. This was a great place to go for a bit after the park's official closure.

Overall, we had a great time. It was kind of out of the way, and not really that close to Orlando. For us, driving from West Palm, we had to go through orange fields (including a factory that made the air smell like oranges) for not much else, which made the drive rather long and boring. Hopefully, the area will get more built up. There are several hotels right next to Legoland, but most of them are pretty skanky looking. It would have been nicer to stay nearby, but I'm glad we got a much nicer place 15min away.

Waiting Game

2011-12-28T13:05:00.002-05:00

I've been in a bit of a slump these last few days. I think I'll call it an "end-of-the-year/probably-moving-in-seven-months-but-don't-know-yet" slump. I still haven't seen those packages I was waiting for. I did end up making a claim with Amazon after the delivery date came and went. They nicely offered to send me replacements for the two boxes that didn't arrive. I had to make separate claims for them, however, and they have so far only sent me one shipment notification for one of the replacements. That was a week ago, so I'm not sure if that means it was never sent, or I just didn't get the email? So, still waiting for something, anything, to show up here.

I am trying to be patient about it. This is, after all, only the second issue I've had with something missing in the mail (and the first one had some real doubt as to if it was sent at all), and also the first issue I've ever had with Amazon, the company we use far more than any other here. So, I'm gritting my teeth and checking the mail every day. Hopefully, something shows up eventually.

On a brighter note, Christmas was fun. As usual, it's been exceptionally quiet around here. Anyone that can get out tends to do so. I kind of like that about this time of year. (Although, to be honest, if you just visited here, you'd probably think it was absurdly quiet all the time.)

We gave our boys lots of books and LEGO sets, so our house has been a mess of LEGO bricks the last few days. I typically enjoy building their sets and try to get to them first so I can do that, but by the end of the day, I was actually a little tired of it. I'm sure I'll get over that, though.

The funniest thing that happened was when Wyatt opened his gift his grandparents and aunt sent. It turns out they sent the exact same gift we still had for him under the tree: the big space shuttle set from LEGO. We looked at each other in shock, then let him open ours anyway. This was the thing he'd wanted most, and he didn't seem to care at all that he'd received two of them. He actually thought it was rather cool.

I did try to convince him that we should return ours so we can get him something else he might want, but he wasn't interested. I put it aside, anyway, so I could try to change his mind about it. Then, the next morning, while we were still sleeping, he pulled it out, opened it, and built the rocket himself. So, now we have plenty of spare parts, and if his brother wants to play, no fighting.

This situation does illustrate why I always tell people to get our kids LEGO when they ask. Because even if it's a repeat, our kids don't mind having two, and you can always build something else with the pieces.

Now that Christmas is over, we're all waiting for the big event - our trip to Legoland. We also rented Dolphin Tale to watch on Christmas Eve, and realized at the end that the dolphin with the missing tail, Winter, is actually at an aquarium about an hour and a half away from there. So, we're going to go visit her after our time at the part. I'm kind of excited about this.

Now, if only my stuff would come in the mail...

P.S. I'd like to thank Amazon for providing all the free wrapping paper. And the guys who packed all our stuff to move us here. Seriously, who needs to buy fancy paper when you are swimming in free paper that can be easily drawn on? Because it's not as if the kids care in the least what the paper looks like. They only want to see what's inside!

Boxes in the Mail - MIA

2011-12-16T22:28:00.001-05:00

Mail here is rather ~~maddening~~ odd at times. I can typically order something online, and it will arrive the next week after I receive the shipping notification. Unike most military addresses, ours has a much shorter route to take. It goes to Florida, then is sent to somewhere (I really have no idea where, and I'd love to know) where it gets put on our plane whenever possible and sent over.

This system works for the most part. Tracking packages, which most places don't do anyway because it's the USPS (still don't really understand why not), doesn't always help me much when I'm trying to figure out when it will get here. I can see it's made it to Florida, but then it can be any number of days before it makes it on the plane.

The biggest problem happens when there is a large load of mail. The things that don't fit get left behind for the next trip. Except, the next trip doesn't prioritize the mail that got left behind. I don't know how they decide what goes, but it happens sometimes that a package will get pushed aside and will sit there for a long time before it finally goes.

I'm dealing with a situation like that right now, and it's driving me crazy. I ordered four boxes to sort they boys' LEGO bricks over two weeks ago. Amazon broke the order into three shipments (there were a couple other things included in the order), one of which went out a couple days after the first two. As of today, I've received the last box that was shipped, plus everything that we've ordered since, including a book I ordered last weekend that came in this morning.

I totally get that it's Christmas and there's a ton of mail, but I find it weird that my fairly light packages are still not here, yet the 35 pound boxes of wheat and flour did. I wish there was some place to call, but there isn't. All I can do is sit here and wait, as patiently as I can manage.

I really hope they get here soon, though. I was really hoping to get it all done before the Christmas influx of new LEGO sets. Sigh...

LEGO Ideas Book Update

2011-12-12T15:19:00.002-05:00

So Wyatt's birthday is over and done with. We've had time to play with the LEGO Ideas Book a bit, and I'm happy to say it's been popular around here. The models depicted are of a huge variety, from tiny to fairly large (yet nothing that's so over the top you better have a basement full of bricks to build it). There aren't any instructions, but some of the models have different views that allow you to figure out easily how to build them. The rest is all about sparking your imagination.

I think the boys' favorite has centered on the spaceship section, which has a few pages of mini-ships to look at. They spent this last weekend building their own fleet of mini-ships. Here's a pic of Oscar continuing the work this afternoon while Wyatt is at school:

Incidentally, I am planning a post on our latest LEGO organization method, some of which you can see here. I'm still waiting for the other boxes to come in the mail so I can finish the sorting work, but I'm excited to finally get it set up in a way that will make it fun for all of us to build. At the moment, I hate it when they ask for help because it means spending hours digging through the pile to find the right bricks (and has anyone noticed how freaking loud LEGO bricks are when they hit against each other? I always feel a little deaf afterwards). After going through three or four different systems to this point, I think we may have finally found one that will last for a long time. We will see...

Vitacost Ten Dollar Coupon Code

2011-12-02T20:47:00.001-05:00

I picked up a code off someone else's blog that gives you a ten dollar coupon off an order at Vitacost. com. I'm getting desperate to find somewhere else I can order the peanut butter we like. The only kind I can get here are the standard brands, but we've been eating natural peanut butter (basically, just peanuts) for years. It's impossible to go back! I used to get it through Tropical Traditions, but they've been out for months. The only other site I've used, Nutsonline (which is an awesome company, by the way), has a pretty steep shipping charge for FPOs, so I'd prefer to do something else.

Enter Vitacost, a site I've admittedly never heard of. The coupon is good no matter what order size, and shipping is only 5 bucks (even for us far-flung sorts), so I think it's worth the risk. I ordered four jars, which with the coupon and including shipping, will end up costing twenty bucks. That's actually what I pay for it normally, but these jar sizes are four ounces larger. So, yay!

Hopefully, they don't take too long to get here. We're down to our last jar, and it's less than half full. Eek! I definitely put this off too long.

Here's my link for a coupon. If you use it, I get another coupon, too, so obviously I'd love it if you did!

LEGO Creator Creating

2011-11-30T15:43:00.001-05:00

After only three years of life with LEGO, we've amassed an impressive collection. The boys now have sets from about six different themes, plus a bunch of miscellaneous bricks to work from. I'm rather impressed at some of the stuff I've seen them build. Oscar, who is only four, built both of these this past week:

This one is a police station, complete with jail cell and storage rack. Unfortunately, I couldn't get a good angle on it, but it looked pretty good in person.

This one is an airplane with twin engines.

Wyatt has started to not only stare at all the pictures in the latest LEGO catalog, but to attempt to build some of the things he sees there. As a result, I picked up a copy of The LEGO Ideas Book for his birthday this month. It's supposed to be over 200 pages of LEGO creations, split into themes throughout the book. Considering how much they love the catalogs, I imagine it will get a lot of look value, but I'm also hoping it will inspire more building. (I just may get down there and come up with a few myself.)

I think out of all the sets we've tried out, Creator is my favorite. We only have two of them at the moment, a Log Cabin and 3-in-1 helicopter/boat, but they are both getting another set each for Christmas. The best part about Creator sets is that they use mostly standard bricks, with only the occasional special brick. That means they are more adaptable, and gives us more play value overall.

Trying to find something new to do yesterday with Oscar, I thought about this and wondered if we could use the directions you can find on the LEGO site for one of the Creator sets and build it ourselves. So, we went to the site and looked through the instruction list. We built a mini-dump truck together (unfortunately, I forgot to get a pic of it, but here is the original if you are curious what it looks like). Oliver helped us come up with a solution to the fender piece we don't seem to have, and we had to use some other colors, but it came out looking pretty good.

When Wyatt got home, he wanted to get in on it, so he picked out a set to try. I tried to steer him to the mini-models, but he wanted something more impressive. I wasn't sure he'd get all that far with it because it was so involved, but Oliver sat down with him and managed to crank it out with a few modifications. It was a riot of colors, so I sat down with it this morning and substituted pieces until it looks mostly red and black. Here's our end result:

The wheels fold up inside the plane, which is kind of awesome.

Here's the link to the original set to compare. It took a few hours to piece out and build, and I'm really surprised we had so many of the right type of pieces. Clearly, the five pounds of miscellaneous LEGO I bought off Ebay a few years ago has worked in our favor (we also raided some of their sets - I got some of the red stuff from their Lego City Fire Boat).

Yeah, Lego wins at our house, more than any toy by far.

Visitor from the Great Outdoors

2011-11-22T13:02:00.000-05:00

We had a visitor recently. The four legged variety. I opened the door to go outside one evening to find him clinging to the outer door at about eye level. I called the boys over so they could get a good look at him.

Yep, we had a frog on our door. It was about the size of my thumb. Our outer door is a little warped and doesn't close securely, so it was easy enough for him to get inside. Whether he'd find his way back out, however, was a question, so I nudged him to the outside of the door so he would hopefully find his way back home.

Sunny Saturday

2011-11-21T20:42:00.001-05:00

Okay, this post is a little behind. This actually happened last Sunday, but I have only now convinced myself to sit down and write this post.

Anyway, now that I have that out of the way! One of the rather cool things about living here is that sometimes we get to see the helicopters carry torpedoes overhead. They pick them up in the water after visiting submarines fire them on the range. It's a rather fun thing to see, and I've wanted to a get a picture of it. For the life me, though, I haven't succeeded. Every time, I've either not had my camera or it's been inaccessible - like the time we had just gotten back from a trip to the States and got off the bus just in time to see a helicopter land with one on the helicopter pad right behind us (I just could not get it out of my bag fast enough, grrr).

That all changed last Sunday, however. I saw a chopper take off with an empty basket while letting the boys jump around on rocks outside the dining hall where we'd just gotten done with breakfast. I rushed them home, then convinced them to go to the playground because I knew it would have to fly overhead on the return trip.

We were there for quite some time, longer than I thought we'd have to be, and I'd gotten up to tell them it was time to go when I finally saw it coming in, torpedo dangling below. I took a series of pics, and this is one of my favorites:

Oh, and just to be clear that living here, we've learned to make our own fun, I feel the need to share the following:

This is what the boys did while I was waiting for the chopper to pass overhead. There is a small skatepark to the side of the playground. I have yet to see a single person use it for its intended purpose, but the kids here have found all sorts of ways to amuse themselves on it. My boys like to bring a handful of their Hot Wheels cars with us whenever we go. They race them up and down it, and will send them shooting off the back end. Here, Oscar is climbing up the side to retrieve on that didn't make it down.

I am most impressed, however, with what some of the older kids came up with later that afternoon. They wet it down with a hose, slicked it up with shampoo, and turned it into a waterslide. (You can't really see in this picture, but there is a higher ramp right next to this one.) The place was swarming with kids for several hours, Wyatt included. It was a great way to spend a sunny afternoon.

Letter "B"

2011-11-14T20:56:00.001-05:00

We did the letter "B" today. The craft was one I found online, a bear bag puppet. I was absolutely sure I had some bags a friend had sent from Japan a few months ago. We don't have any real need of lunch bags here, so I stowed them somewhere with the idea that we could use them for crafting or some other future need.

However, for the life of me, I can't find them anymore. I'd already told Oscar we were going to do this, so I really needed to produce something. I decided against going to the store to look for a pack of lunch bags, partly because I didn't want to spend money on it, but also because the chances of actually finding some were rather slim.

Enter innovation! We get a lot of brown paper here. Amazon seems to pack most things in boxes with wads of brown paper in them. Since we frequent them more than most due to their FPO shipping policies, we are regularly swimming in the stuff. I decided to just make a paper bag.

I'm not going to post up a big tutorial because, well, I really don't have much to share. I just cut out something, trimmed it, folded it, and taped it up. It more or less looked like a paper bag, and it satisfied my youngest.

Here's our paper bag bear:

I folded it down like a lunch bag, so it opens at the mouth. I didn't make the top big enough, so it's kind of squished in the face, but, hey, it's a bear!

I told Oscar he could color the body if he wanted, so he asked me to draw a shirt and an "orange badge like a post office guy". I drew this, not really knowing what he wanted, and he told me it looked like a police officer badge.

Oh, well. Bags, I can whip up. Drawings? Not so much.

Waffles For Lunch

2011-11-11T13:23:00.001-05:00

I once had a waffle maker. It was a pretty standard, non-stick, electric affair and worked fine. Then, a pin came out of one of the hinges. I couldn't see a way to fix it, so I just kept using it like that. When we moved overseas, we had to do some pretty heavy triage, and anything broken beyond repair that wasn't used much didn't make the cut. That included the waffle maker.

The thing is, though, my kids love waffles. I'm not industrious enough to indulge their love of them very often, but it was nice to be able to make them, especially since I detest the frozen kind and refuse to buy them. Since we moved here two years ago, the only waffles we've had are at the chow hall, where the quality is on par with the ones you can get at a free breakfast in a hotel (something we've had extensive experience with, heh - the best one was the place we stayed where they had watered down the waffle batter so much it that when it cooked, it turned into strings of cooked batter - it kind of looked like spaghetti when it was done).

So, I've trolled the internet occasionally looking for one I could like. I was hoping to find one that allowed you to pull the plates out to wash (the biggest reason I rarely used our waffle iron before), and had this one in my Amazon cart for months. It's pricey, though, so I hadn't been able to talk myself into buying it.

And, there's the issue of the non-stick stuff. I'm not sure whether it's killing us all or not, as some people claim, but I hate the stuff because it doesn't last. I've gotten rid of all the pans I once had, and use a combination of stainless, glass, and cast iron. I ran across something not long ago that mentioned a cast iron waffle maker, something I didn't even realize existed.

A couple weeks ago, I finally broke down and bought a Rome waffle maker. In all honestly, I could have probably found a better made one on Ebay (old stuff is always made better!), but when I couldn't really find anything as cheap as the one I got, once I factored in the shipping costs, I just decided to get it new. I'd maybe do it differently next time, but since I don't expect this one to ever break down on me, that may never happen.

Anyway, after a not-so-enjoyable cleaning (unseasoned cast iron is shipped with a wax coating that has to come off first - it's a pain to do) and seasoning (I did it twice to be sure), we had waffles for lunch today. I had made a hasty promise to the boys that we would do so, then I looked in my Bittman cookbook and realized the yeast waffles I wanted to try needed to sit overnight. Yeah, this was at about 1000 today...

Wyatt got indignant when I tried to push it off, so I caved and used a baking powder version from the same book. Here are our results:

I'd read that sticking on the batch is common, but apparently I'd done a good enough job seasoning it beforehand because I didn't have any problems. I did brush it with butter between waffles, though, just to be sure. I didn't want it to flow out the sides because there was nowhere for it to go but underneath the burner, so I put very little batter on the pan at first. This is actually my last waffle, and the closest it got to filling the iron. Surprisingly, you can put a lot more batter on these than it looks like. The waffles are also a lot fluffier than I thought they would be considering the thickness of the iron. I sort of thought we'd end up making pancakes with depressions in them, but that was totally not the case.

I think we found a winner. Cast iron takes a little more work to take care of (and you must preheat or you are doomed!), but the results are awesome. I've heard good waffles described as "crispy, with a creaminess inside", yet this was the first time I realized what the heck that meant. And my boys? They went through the first three waffles before they let me eat one. (They are also quite excited that we can take this camping with us; for some reason, waffles on a camping trip sounds like a seriously awesome thing to them.)

Letter "S"

2011-11-09T16:32:00.002-05:00

Today we did the letter "S". I'd originally planned on moving through the alphabet in order, but I'm teaching Oscar to read using the Bob books. The first book focuses on the short "A" sound, and "S" is one of the consonants used. Oscar can read that one confidently, so we moved on to book number two today.

I had planned on a starfish craft, but right after I told him what we were going to learn today, he asked if we were going to do a submarine project. (Clearly, submarines have a solid place in our lives.) So, I sat him down with the starfish, a fairly easy gluing project, while I rushed to find something we could related to submarines.

This is what we ended up with:

I traced a submarine onto some construction paper, had him color it in, then cut it out (that trailing piece of paper is because he had drawn a diver and got mad when I cut it off, so I reattached it). I then cut some portholes and taped tissue paper to the back to allow light to come through them. It's kind of tough to tell because of our filthy window. I tried to clean it a bit before we hung his project up, but to do it for real requires removing the screen and standing on a ladder outside because our trailer is up on blocks. Yeah, since we have less than a year left, I'm pretty unmotivated to go to all that trouble. Clearly, the previous occupant felt the same way.

Wyatt came home and immediately wanted to do one, too, so now we have two of them hanging up.

*You can find better instructions here, at an awesome blog I can tell I will be mining for further ideas as we go.

Doing School At Home

2011-11-07T16:14:00.000-05:00

We've finally decided once and for all that Wyatt will be homeschooled next year. Oscar isn't technically old enough to start next year, but since he's already beginning to read, I think we may just consider next year his kindergarten year.

My plan as of now is to use K12, assuming we get stationed in a state that provides it for free. That means that while I'll be doing most of the teaching, the books and planning will be handed to me. It does, however, follow the school year, which is a bit of a complication. Apparently, it takes at least a month to get registered, and you have to live in the state before you can do that. Since we are not sure when we are leaving here (could easily be as late as October), and I'm determined not to break up the family any earlier than necessary, it leaves us with a bit of a problem when it comes to school. We can start school the next semester, in January, but that runs the risk of having Wyatt fall behind.

So, I've had to start to seriously consider other options. (Something I really have to do, anyway, because we might not end up moving to a state that supports K12, and I'm not prepared to pay 5 grand per kid to do it.) I am really not the most dedicated, on top of things sort of person. I'm great with a schedule that has been imposed on me (I actually loved filling up my calendar in college with all my deadlines and tests - it was a big game to work my way through it all), but not so good at imposing one on myself. Clearly, that has to change if we are going to homeschool.

I decided that this year, when nothing is so intense or important, is probably the best way to start. Oscar walks up to me every day after Wyatt goes to school and asks, "What are we going to do today while Wyatt is gone?" That has typically meant I then sit down with him and build LEGO or or do a few puzzles.

This past weekend, however, I spent some time putting together some ideas. I've decided to turn our days into letter themed days. Oscar already knows most of his letters and their sounds from listening to us teach his brother, but I'd like to reinforce them and find out which ones he isn't so good at. Also, focusing on a letter has helped a lot in keeping things together.

Monday and Tuesday were "A" days. We made an ant eater and an ant hill complete with painted on ants:

I was a little surprised that he spent almost a half hour carefully coloring in the ant eater parts. Wyatt really didn't like coloring in anything when he was the same age, so I had thought he'd just breeze through it with a few scribbles. (In case you are curious where I got the template, you can find it here, along with plenty of other fun ideas for teaching letters.)

We also did a little handwriting, which I hadn't planned on introducing, but after I told him we were going to learn about the letter "A", he immediately started asking me how it goes as he attempted to draw it on a nearby piece of paper. I figured we'd go with it as long as he was interested, so I printed out some letter tracing pages and did that the second day.

The best thing about this is that Oscar is so very proud to show his dad and brother what he did at "school" while they were gone. Watching that, I am kicking myself for not doing this earlier. He told me today that he
"does school at home, right Mommy?" I answered, "Yes, you do.", already envisioning how things would go when both of them are home.

I'm getting excited about this. I've always loved teaching, but it's even more rewarding when it's your own kids doing the learning. This homeschooling thing seems like it just may end up being a good fit for our lifestyle in more ways than one.

Our Final Halloween in the Bahamas

2011-11-01T21:07:00.001-04:00

Well, this was our last Halloween here. This year found us experiencing some of the cloud bursts common to life here. Halfway through our trick or treating, Oliver had to run home for an umbrella when it started to rain on us. It wasn't a huge deal because it wasn't more than a shower and the night was warm, but it was still nice to have the umbrella. By the time we got home, the rain was gone and we were all feeling a little soggy.

Still, it was great fun as usual. Here are the boys sporting their costumes:

And no, this is not the best picture. The camera kept fogging up on me because of all the moisture in the, so I couldn't give it enough time to get a good focus. I just wiped and snapped and hoped for the best.

I'm not gonna lie, I'm pretty darn proud of Wyatt's costume. He had asked to be an Army guy about a month ago, but when I went online to see what a costume would cost me, I couldn't find anything decent for much less than fifty bucks. It sure changes things when you can't go to a store and search for stuff.

So, in light of that problem, and because there was no freaking way I was going to spend fifty bucks on a costume for him, I convinced him that it would be pretty cool if he went as a submariner. The utilities were replaced by the cammies a year or so ago, so I knew it would be no big deal if I cut one down and used all the patches.

I really haven't sewn much more than patches and small mending jobs for, um, twenty years now? So, I was a little scared I wouldn't be able to pull it off. However, my mother did a good job teaching me when I was a teenager how to sew, and much of it stuck with me. I liked sewing, but not the rules of patterns, and remember always asking her at every step (especially ironing -for some reason, I really hated ironing seams) if I could just skip that. Unsurprisingly, I only managed one full project, a sun dress I wore once because I outgrew it right after as it had taken me so long to finish it. I did make a lot of doll clothes, however, and made my own patterns so I had some experience that helped a bit here.

Since real clothing is different, however, I found a few tutorials online that showed me how to make patterns for both shirt and pants (since there isn't a fabric store to buy a pattern, either). I also looked at a blog that had clear instructions on how to cut down a man's shirt into a boy's. So, that spared me buttonholes and hemming on the bottom, but I had to figure out the collar since I wanted one that looked like the original and that isn't what she had done with hers. I had to do it twice, including cutting a second one, and it still isn't completely right, but it was close enough. I also made sure to iron all those seams, and, yes, it really is important to do that.

I learned a lot along the way, including how to use self-fabric as interfacing as I couldn't, once again, run to the store for that. I recycled buttons, belt loops, and some elastic I pulled out of an old pair of pants that were too worn out to pass on to anyone else. The only real cost in all of this was some thread.

I used all the old patches (the name one is blacked out in this pic, in case you are wondering why it looks a little weird), and we finished the costume out with Oliver's old command cap, some collar devices (wouldn't be worn normally, but it helped keep it down and made it look more military), one of Oliver's uniform belts, and a dog tag. The Navy guys we ran into during trick or treating all recognized it right off, which made it all the better.

As for Oscar, his was kind of a remake from one Wyatt wore back in Washington. He really wanted to be a firefighter, so we pulled out the rain gear I'd bought for Wyatt in WA (it's a fleece lined coat, so way too warm to wear here - we mostly just get wet when it rains and it's no big deal), used the pieces of a firefighter set we'd bought for Wyatt for that Halloween and they still play with, and then Oliver got creative and fashioned a fire extinguisher out of cardboard, the top of a spray bottle, tinfoil, and some printed off pictures to put on the side. He carried that instead of his pumpkin this year for treats. Sadly, this picture doesn't do it justice.

(I found it completely hilarious that after the kids kept calling it a "fire hydrant", we ran into an adult who immediately proclaimed it the same thing.)

While I don't know if I'll get get so involved in costume making again, I know we'll keep on creating costumes. It was so much more fun than just picking something and ordering it, which is what I did last year (although Oliver did build a train out of cardboard and our wagon for Oscar's get up).

Computer Smart Already

2011-10-22T00:25:00.002-04:00

Yesterday, the boys asked me if they could download a program from the LEGO site that allows you to create with virtual LEGO bricks. We used to have it on the computer we replaced, so I said okay. My older son clearly knew what he was doing (he's reading, after all), but I sat down and had a chat with him about how he must always, always ask before downloading anything on the computer. Thus far, he's been a pretty trustworthy kid, so I believed him when he promised to do just that. (We keep the computers in the living room so we can keep an eye on them for situations like this.)

Today, they sat down together, one on each computer, to play. Wyatt asked if he could download the program again because he was on the computer we hadn't put the program on before. I said yes, then went off to take care of something. I walked back in the room to see that Oscar was in the middle of downloading the program on the laptop that already had it.

Apparently, he wanted to play, too, but couldn't figure out how to load the program from the desktop. So, he opened up the browser, found the right page, and started it up himself. At four years old.

On the one hand, I appreciate that our kids are so tech savvy. I believe it will serve them well as they grow. It does, however, remind me that I am going to have a keep a close eye on them. No, they will not be allowed on Facebook for...well, possibly forever.

Daddy is Not an Office Worker

2011-10-17T21:35:00.000-04:00

Oscar was playing with his Lego guys today. He brought this one to me and started telling me all about how he was a boat guy (he'd been using him in Wyatt's aircraft carrier). I asked him what kind of shirt he was wearing, and he shrugged and just repeated what his job was supposed to be.

I thought it was kind of funny. When I was growing up, my father worked in an office. I would have considered this a "work shirt" if anyone had asked me that question when I was little. Oscar, however, rarely sees his dad wearing a tie. It's even rarer now that we get to attend church maybe twice a year. So, as was my first instinct, I can't ask him if it's a church shirt, either.

He does, however, have a pair of brown camo pants that he's quite proud of. Even though his dad wears blue cammies, every time he wears them, he tells us they are his "duty pants".

Clearly, we are raising a couple of military brats.

The Latest on Order Picking

2011-10-16T12:43:00.000-04:00

I thought the orders situation was on the back burner for a few months, due to several things. Then, a couple days ago, Oliver came home with a possible situation for us. Basically, if he agrees to move in July instead of October, and they can find someone to fill his billet then, we will be able to get orders to our top choice. He asked me what I thought, and I really didn't have to think at all - absolutely I am behind the plan!

The one bad thing is having to go back to a boat early; we're certainly not raring to do the deployment thing. However, we'd kind of like to, you know, have a grocery store to go to again. Little things like that. More importantly, leaving early will solve the school issue. The program I want to use to homeschool is through the public school - kind of like a charter school. So, they follow the school year, and the biggest catch is that you have to have residency to apply. So, we need to live there at least a month before school starts so we can apply and get all the paperwork done in time for the first semester. Otherwise, we have to start in January and do, I don't know, the rest of the time.

This has been a headache for us. The last thing I want to do is split us up when it's not necessary. As bad as a deployment can be, it's far worse when you know the only thing keeping you apart is a decision you made, even if it was for the best of reasons.

I'm just praying now that someone will want his orders.

Thinking About Moving

2011-10-11T19:28:00.000-04:00

Now that we're in this holding pattern of waiting for order picking (this should happen the beginning of the year), I cannot seem to settle down. Every day, I wander through the house picking out things I need to get rid of before we go, or trying to decide how best to packed things to make it easier for the movers (also, we found if you go out of your way to get things ready when they come, they do an awesome job with it - totally worth all the work we put into the last move!). I keep telling myself I really have three months before it's even remotely important to buckle down, but I keep obsessing over it.

In truth, though, the thing most on my mind is getting housing. We don't plan on living on base unless we get sent to Hawaii or something like that. We want control of our money this time, and I'm not too big on the trend in military housing to charge utilities on top of your entire BAH. That's crazy when you consider that by virtue of rank, you could be spending twice as much for your place than your neighbor with the exact same apartment. There is no accounting for that at all, and by the time we left WA, we were paying for our tiny two bedroom what we could have paid for an entire house out in town.

So, no more military housing for us. That does kind of leave me in a dilemma, though. I am realizing that the last time I really had to find a place to live was over ten years ago. I got it through an ad in the newspaper, albeit their online version. Clearly, this isn't really how people do that sort of thing these days.

I guess I will have to look at Craigslist? I have almost no experience with that as it's not exactly an option here. Or is a realtor a way to find a house to rent? Do realtors even deal with rentals? I kind of like the idea of going and seeing a couple places at once, but maybe you can only do that when you are looking to buy a place.

And buying a place is not what we're going to do. At least not yet. Hopefully in ten years, we'll know where we want to land and be ready to get something. We'll see. It's tough to imagine us as anything but wanderers.

P.S. Totally random, mostly unrelated fact: Apparently, if you had a VA loan, you can get a VA refinance. With interest rates so low now, not a bad idea to look into.

Growing Up

2011-10-09T22:25:00.000-04:00

Wyatt and I had a conversation the other day. We were sitting on the porch steps, and he started talking about a few concerns he had about some other kids in his class. I soon found myself in a back-and-forth exchange that, well, was rather grown-up for my six year old. I was so very excited to be having it.

I do enjoy being a mother, really. It's been an amazing journey. I'm not gonna lie, however - I find the baby years insanely difficult. I don't operate particularly well on no sleep, and I've never been particularly good at entertaining toddlers. Babies are adorable, and I have some very sweet memories of cuddling them close. I'm grateful for every minute we've shared, even if I have found myself suffering through many of them.

It's awesome, however, that they are growing up and becoming people. The best part of motherhood for me is watching them become someone. I'm eager to have a lot more conversations with my boys as they make choices and figure out where life is going to take them. I hope I can be a sounding board for them, that they will always know that I respect their thoughts, allow them to take risks, and don't expect them to follow a path I've decided on for them. I'm looking forward to the years ahead.

Wyatt and I driving a go-cart together this summer.

Final Year

2011-09-27T13:22:00.001-04:00

We are just days away from being a year out from the end of our time here. Which means Oliver can start looking at orders very soon. He's also going to be negotiating a reenlistment contract. I'm trying to ignore the pit of dread in my stomach.

Last time we did this, I was excited and thought it would be kind of fun to consider all the possibilities. Later, after slogging through months of uncertainty, a list of duty stations that included almost nothing we'd wanted, and then a budget impasse in Congress (sound familiar - clearly, that bunch will never learn) that left us with only three months to put together an international move, the excitement factor is definitely gone.

This time around, we have a list again, but it's a lot shorter due to submarine platforms, where I would like to weather deployments, and where the online homeschooling program I've decided to use with the boys is free (20 states have it available as part of the public school system - the cost otherwise is about 5k per child). Washington actually meets two of those criteria, and so I'm trying desperately to talk myself into being open to returning as I know it is going to be on the list. I'm hoping we won't have to, however. That would be really frustrating.

So, we shall see how it all turns out. Maybe we'll know by the end of the year. Or maybe they'll keep us hanging until June, like last time. Either way, it will be settled by this time next year. In the mean time, we'll try to make the most of our last year here.

Rice Krispies, Anyone?

2011-09-24T15:59:00.000-04:00

While planning dinner tonight, once again last minute (it's pretty tough to meal plan when you aren't sure what veggies the store will be carrying that week). I've got some pinto beans in the freezer, onions and potatoes, mushrooms (a rare treat around here!), and even some frozen corn (which is also pretty hit or miss). So, we're gonna have a bean and corn chowder tonight.

I went online to find a recipe for something to go with it, because I'm getting tired of biscuits, and I discovered this recipe for breadsticks. It looks good, takes only 40 min, and I'm excited to try them as soon as I get done typing this.

I did, however, make the mistake of spending some time looking at all the recipes. Sigh. It's sad to look at recipes, find one that looks awesome, and realize there is almost no chance of getting all the ingredients at the same time. I'm good at substitution, but some things you just can't change, nor would you want to. Like a decent cut of meat.

We eat almost no meat these days. Sometimes I buy it in Florida and trek it home, then we make it last for months (and we're talking about two small coolers, full - not a huge amount). Occasionally, I buy it in the store here, but it tends to be only ground turkey or ham because everything else is crazy expensive. In truth, I've never been a huge meat eater, and the less we eat of it, the less I want it, but sometimes, with the right dish, it's pretty good.

What's worse are the recipes that require fresh vegetables, however. Especially things that ask for fresh herbs (the bugs keep killing mine and the store doesn't sell them due to how our food is shipped in) or other slightly off the beaten path veggies like beets (my fam is probably happy about this, but I really love them). I finally had to just close out the blog and stop thinking about all the food I will have to wait to try until we move back to the States.

Ironically, we probably eat a lot better here than we did when we lived there. We've cut almost all processed food out of our diet. I'd been trying to do this before we moved, but coming here forced big changes just because of the cost of everything. Cereal was the best change, actually. For the life of me, I could not kick the cereal habit. It was just too easy, and we are not morning people. Plus, we could get it for two bucks at the commissary.

Then we moved here. There is no such thing as a sale or couponing here (not that I ever couponed, ha!). You pay the price or you don't buy it. Cold cereal is about five dollars a box. Eggs are less than two dollars for a dozen. Yeah, that one was a no-brainer. We now eat eggs and toast most morning, with pancakes, oatmeal, and muffins thrown into rotation. The best thing about it has been that I no longer have whining boys an hour after they eat. Turns out, cold cereal doesn't last too long. The other stuff gets them through to lunch. Definitely better for Wyatt because he's at school now.

There is, however, one cereal I really miss. Rice Krispies. Not for breakfast, because we never ate it that way, but because sometimes I really want to make Rice Krispy treats. Which brings me back to that blog I linked. It had an interesting recipe for peanut butter chocolate Rice Krispy treats. That was pretty much the last recipe I looked at. Maybe I'll have to cram a box into our bags this Christmas when we take the boys to Legoland. We'll see.

Early Retirement....is actually possible!

2011-09-19T09:39:00.001-04:00

I'm sitting here waiting for the stock exchange to open. And I've been doing this for a couple of weeks now. I've got a shopping list of stocks, and prices that I'm willing to buy them at.

Why all the investing mania, you might ask? Well, when the stock market took it's latest fall back in August, I watched the news intently. I've been thinking about doing more than just dumping money into retirement accounts, where it mostly sits in index funds, for quite some time. I haven't, however been all that inspired to take the plunge and learn enough about it.

That all changed, though, when I ran across this blog. Basically, it's written by a guy named Jacob who saved 70-90% of his income for five years, became financially independent at 30, and quit his job for real at 33 when it was no longer fun for him. Now, he's not some millionaire, and, among other things, lives in an RV in order to keep his expenses down enough to live on his investment income, plus he doesn't have kids (and is married to a spouse who is still working and covers her own expenses), so I don't see his story as completely possible for us.

However, it really has got me thinking. The most helpful thing I got from his story is the idea that when planning for retirement, you can't spend all your time looking at your money and wondering how big it needs to be (does anyone else hate those calculators that tell you you are going to need a million bucks by the time you are 65?). Instead, you need to calculate how much it costs to live today, and then figure out how much you need in order to keep that standard of living. When I looked at it that way, I was surprised to realize we could easily save more than half Oliver's pay if we put our minds to it. And it wouldn't even hurt.

So, since I am well aware that most frivolous spending in our house comes from me, I'm refocusing, and sending all the extra money to a new, taxable account (since most of our retirement accounts are fully funded, and I want a better diversity of accounts in case we manage to meet our goal of retirement in our early 40's). I've got an investment strategy, after spending more than a week reading everything I could get my hands on about investing (and still reading, just not as avidly). I don't know how this will play out, but for us, this is just another step on a path we took long ago when we decided to only have one car because it would accelerate our debt payments. Then, we just kept it up when it was all paid off because we'd gotten used to it and now we were saving all that debt money.

There's now way we'll be able to do what Jacob did, due to having kids, being a one-income household, and past mistakes, but we've come up with a plan that is comfortable for us. The biggest surprise is for me is that it's actually possible to make early retirement happen, as evidenced not only by this blog, but all the other people who comment on it and share their stories. Crazy stuff. You should read it.

And now back to the stock exchange, which has finally started trading.

Has It Really Been Ten Years?

2011-09-12T10:19:00.001-04:00

I haven't been able to get myself to sit down and write this before now. Both the net and TV have been flooded with 9/11 stories and remembrances. Every time I see one, it's like being punched in the gut again. I'm blown away at long it's actually been since it happened. It still feels so recent to me.

And yet, it occurred to me while looking at my oldest that neither of my boys have any idea what happened that day. Neither of them were even born, and in fact I remember thinking how glad I was that I hadn't married or had kids yet because the world seemed like it was falling apart. A year later, I met Oliver.

The other reason I've hesitated? I know I don't really have anything new to add. My own reactions were personal and intense, but I didn't know anyone there. I mourned for our nation, but not for family or friends. I also think we're all flooded with this stuff and sometimes it's too much. So, if you want to quit reading, feel free. I am not going to care.

I was living in Rhode Island at the time, about two hours from New York City. I went to work that morning, and was sitting at my desk when the first plane hit. People started running around the office saying something about a building. I really didn't know what they were talking about, so I ignored it at first.

Eventually, curiosity got the better of me, and I joined the conversation. Before long, my boss had hooked up a TV in his office, and the rest of us crowded in there to watch. I saw the second plane hit, and watched the towers fall on live TV. I remember standing there after the South Tower fell, praying like mad that the North would stand long enough for everyone else in there to get out. I just could not believe that I was watching New York implode at the heart.

At lunch time, I left the office and found another, out of the normal, situation. I worked in a large shopping complex. Our offices were upstairs from retail stores, and there was a grocery store anchoring the place. It had a huge parking lot that was nearly always busy. That day, however, I was struck by the silence. Everyone was sitting still, and the only noise I could hear were car radios, tuned to news reports.

It was more of the same in the grocery store when I went to buy my food. I found myself walking around in a bit of a daze, picking stuff up and not really caring what I was looking at.

After returning to the office, I went back to the TV, as did nearly everyone else. It was like that for the rest of the week, and I'm amazed my boss tolerated it. He was a rather gruff type, and didn't like to see people standing around. But he let us watch, and I'm grateful.

The news coverage ran pretty much 24/7, it seemed. I didn't have cable at the time, but it didn't matter - the networks weren't playing anything else, including commercials. The first time I saw a commercial, I remember thinking it was really weird. It was also a sign that real life had to keep going.

I think one of the reasons it had such a large impact on me was how close geographically I was to it. I can remember evacuations of tall building in Providence, a city I spent a lot of time due to work. Logan International in Boston, where the planes came from, was an airport I occasionally flew out of. A lot of people who worked at the site in the days following the attacks came from our area, due to the proximity. Our office got together and pooled some money together to buy masks and things they had asked for to send on a truck that was heading to NYC to support the relief operation. It felt good to do something, even if that was so small.

I had one co-worker who seemed to come a little unglued over it all. She was the one who spearheaded the campaign to buy supplies, and I went with her to buy them. Soon after, though, she stopped showing up for work, or would come in late. I was in charge of tracking vacation and sick leave as part of my job, and when she came to ask me where she was at, she was shocked to realized that she'd been out so much. Soon after, she quit, and last I heard was planning on a new career as a fireman.

As for me, I tried to join the Air Force in early 2002. Granted, it was a career path I'd considered at 18, but had figured was out of the picture after I went to college instead. But 9/11 got me thinking, and I tried again. A past medical issue ultimately kept me out, which was disappointing, but I met Oliver soon after and ended up chasing the military life in another way.

I don't really have anything particularly profound to add (which is sort of why I hesitated), but I know I need to tell my story to my own children today. I know I have to find a way to explain to them what happened and why. I'm not ready to start that conversation yet, and am happy to indulge in their ignorance for a few more years. It will happen, however.

Maybe when we go back to the States, we'll take them there. I'd like to see the memorial. I flew over NY in early October to visit a friend in Seattle (I did not fly out of Logan). The ground was still smoking, and I could see the plumes of smoke hovering over the city. A year later, I visited with Oliver and some Navy friends of ours. We walked around the site, which was pretty much a giant construction site at that point. I don't even think I took any pictures because there wasn't much to see. We stood in front of a chain link fence keeping us out of the area, and talked about it. One of the guys we were with said this was the whole reason he was in the Navy. I understood what he was talking about.

I've been looking at pictures of the memorial online. It looks beautiful. My deepest hope is that we will remember - and try to build something else that is equally beautiful as we try to live with other people in our world. Sometimes, I wonder if that is even possible. I still have hope, however, that it might be someday.

Going Home (for real this time!)

2011-08-28T09:35:00.000-04:00

We're leaving for the airport in about twenty minutes. Oscar and I will be on that plane, then Oliver and Wyatt will follow a couple hours later. I'm really happy to be leaving, although we did manage to make the most of our enforced vacation. Hopefully, we won't have much trouble getting our lodging and food reimbursed. At least we had enough money to cover it.

Most of my fam is up in the Northeast, so I'm crossing my fingers for you all! Irene is all yours today. Good riddance, I say.

Going Home...Not Quite

2011-08-25T21:08:00.000-04:00

The good news is that Irene took a turn eastward that ended up sparing Andros the worst of it. Damage reports that I've heard have been positive, and they had lists up this evening for the first flights home tomorrow. We checked, and none of us are on them, which we kind of expected, so we're here for at least another day.

Most likely, we won't be able to go home until at least Sunday, although Oliver may be out of here earlier depending on how they decide his priority status is. He doesn't technically have anything he has to be back for until Wednesday, so I'm crossing my fingers that we will end up being able to return together. We'll see.

I'm feeling a lot better now, so I can handle that if it happens. I had a stomach bug during our trip off-island the last week, and hadn't quite gotten over it when we were ordered to evacuate. When I get stressed out, it all tends to sit in my stomach, so I think that layered on top of that and I pretty much quit eating for three days because I couldn't keep anything down. So glad to be done with that!

I don't know what kind of damage our trailer sustained, but I don't even care right now. I'm just relieved the worst case scenario was avoided, and we don't have to find ourselves a place to live in Florida while Oliver tries to fly back and forth every weekend to see us. That would have been pretty sad.

C-130 Pic

2011-08-24T17:08:00.000-04:00

This is someone else's photo (click on it to see where it came from), but I stumbled across this on the net today. I'll get mine up at some point. I don't know if this was our flight, but it could have been.

Update

2011-08-24T11:23:00.000-04:00

Well, we're in Florida now, waiting Irene out in West Palm Beach. The hurricane, which apparently is a Cat 3 now, as expected, is veering East a bit, and Florida is no longer worried about a direct hit, which is good news. They would have moved us if it was coming to us, but I'm relieved we won't have to do that. Once was enough.

As for getting out, that was a big process. Every thing seemed kind of disorganized. We got a call on Monday night that the boys and I were on the first C-130 flight and needed to show up at 0930 at the base theatre to register. No word on what we needed to bring, or anything else.

So, I dutifully showed up, sans luggage because I didn't want to walk it over (Oliver was working, and had the car, and wasn't able to get out to take us beforehand - it's not a long walk at all, takes maybe three minutes, but I'm still sick so I just left it because the flight wasn't supposed to be until 1100). When I got there, they began giving instructions and told us we had to have our evac form, which we would show as we went thought the line, culminating in checking in the luggage I didn't have with me. I knew nothing about the paperwork, nor who to ask about it.

So, I left the boys with a friend who was also supposed to be on the flight with her boys, ran home to get the luggage and call Oliver about the form. He told me he'd come pick me up with the bags, and tried to figure out what this form was. He didn't have any luck, but when we came back to the theatre with our bags, we finally saw someone in uniform (most of the people here are working for the civilian contractor, so they had their own forms and their own procedures for money etc. than we do). He had all the forms, so I picked up ours and sat down to wait while Oliver went back to work.

My friend and I decided to not get in line right away because it got huge almost instantly and we had four young kids between us. After about an hour, though, we noticed that new people kept coming in and getting in line. Clearly, it was not at all about who was supposedly on this first flight, and was turning into a bit of a free-for-all.

To make a long story short, after talking to someone handling the processing, we were able to just wait it out in our seats until the next C-130. The first one filled and left, and then they had a couple flights on our normal plane, which seats 19. They actually offered my friend and I seats on the AUTAC plane, but we wanted to fly on the C-130. We knew our boys would love it, and hey, these kinds of opportunities don't come around every day. For me, too, there was the hope that Oliver would be free to go and get out with us, which is what ended up happening.

It took about five hours, but we did get out on the second C-130, and Oliver went with us. He finished what he had to just in time. Considering how stressed out and ill I was feeling at that point, that was a huge blessing.

We took with us a suitcase, two duffel bags, and four backpacks, just under 150 pounds of baggage. Here's the curious thing about that - I am exceptionally aware right now of just what we need to restart our life if the worst case happened and everything we own was gone. Turns out, it's a whole lot less than you'd think. The digital age has made this so much easier, too - the desktop we had to leave behind, I dumped all the photos, home videos, and music onto my IPOD. What was left went onto a flash drive, and then I backed up Itunes onto a couple DVDs (since our desktop is where I always sync the IPOD). That stuff takes up no space to carry.

Then we have our binder with important docs, like birth certificates, and a couple folders with investment info, taxes, and other miscellaneous paperwork. The boys carried their prized, most loved possessions, including a gallon bag of LEGOs (a small fraction of what they own, but enough to keep them happy). There are other things, too, obviously, like clothing and passports, the camera, and a few books to keep us busy.

There are things we left behind that I will be sad to lose, but overall, they are very few. Everything else is replaceable, and it's insured. The car will actually be the biggest loss because we have to carry Banhamian insurance on it, and it only covers damage you might cause to someone or something. It's an 8 year old car, but we were hoping to hang onto it for while longer and use it as a commuter car for Oliver when we buy a new family car next year. That will be our most painful financial hit.

Maybe it's all the moving I've done in my adult life (our six years in Washington was the longest I'd lived anywhere since I was 18), but I am realizing just how not attached to things I am. Oliver is the same way. Ultimately, that's probably the biggest factor in our deciding to stay in the Navy - we are experience junkies, and we don't care about stuff. Owning a house sometimes seems appealing, but it also seems like a financial albatross and something that will kill our mobility. By staying in the Navy, we get to keep moving, and we get to do some crazy stuff, like board that C-130 and have a flying experience unlike any we've ever had before (I've got some good pics, but seem to have forgotten the cord for the camera, and our laptop weirdly has no card reader, so I'll have to upload them later). The retirement is pretty appealing on many levels, but after the latest attack on that, I am no longer positive it will still be there when we finish his twenty years. So, if we stay, we have to stay for other reasons.

Anyway, this is getting longer and longer. If you managed to keep reading, bravo to you! Clearly, I am just sitting in a hotel room with nothing to do but watch storm radar as Irene slowly advances through the islands. The waiting game is no fun.

2011-08-22T22:58:00.000-04:00

The ultimate irony? We're being evacuated to the Florida coast. Where Irene is also supposed to hit. Sigh.

I've never been so reluctant to leave home before. We're getting on a plane tomorrow morning and I don't know when we'll be back. Our lodging and food is supposed to be covered, but no one seems to know how much or if a car will be covered, too. Because we need a car. They are just flying us there and letting us out on our own. I'm not too thrilled about it all.

We've moved things around, put the things we can't take with us into closets and bathrooms without windows. As far as I can tell, the biggest danger is breaking windows, but there's no telling really. We're just praying things will be okay. It's all we have left to do at this point.

Sigh

2011-08-22T15:11:00.000-04:00

So, it's official: After one day, school is closing until further notice. And we're going to be evacuated in the next day or two. So much for returning home yesterday.

Hello Irene

2011-08-22T13:45:00.001-04:00

Well, Tropical Storm Emily was more like Fizzled-Out Emily when it reached us a couple weeks ago. Hurricane Irene, currently harrying the island of Hispaniola, looks a little more menacing, however. We've gone to a condition 4 today, so all the visitors have been kicked off. I'm watching my neighbors clean us their patio as I type this, as that's one more thing everyone has to do: secure anything loose outside. We don't have much to do in that area because we just spent five days in the West Palm Beach area and hadn't pulled much back out after stowing it for Emily.

Ironically, I'm once again feeling ill while I await word on whether or not we'll be evacuating this time. I picked up something on our trip, and am still trying to shake it. Wyatt started school this morning, and I was the only one able to drop him off as Oliver had duty. I dragged myself there with the boys, took some pictures of him giggling with his class while they waited for flag, and then dragged myself back home to collapse on the couch. Oscar's been all over this because he's been allowed to pretty much watch whatever he wants today. Hopefully, I'll be more myself tomorrow.

Thunderstorms and the Beach

2011-08-14T16:35:00.000-04:00

Thunderstorms are pretty much a way of life here in the summer time. They sweep in, the heavens pour, the lightning crashes, and then it's gone fifteen minutes later. I love them; Washington almost never had thunderstorms, but it wasn't until we moved here that I realized how much I missed them.

We had plans to spend some time at the beach this afternoon. As we were eating lunch, however, the sky began darkening and it rained. We decided to just wait it out, and left about an hour later. The beach was beautiful, the sand all hard-packed from the rain, and the sky filled with thunderclouds. No one else was there. If we lived anywhere else, I would have stayed home, but here, we can just fit in a visit between storms.

Unfortunately, I didn't bring a camera; I expected to be caught in a downpour and didn't want to risk it. I wish I had, though: the sky was beautiful, Wyatt found a live conch in the water, and we built a massive sand volcano that the boys used as a slide right before we left.

We swam a bit, and I'm excited to see Oscar is finally getting brave enough to get out there without me carrying him around. It's a lot more fun for me now.

While we were in the water, the thunderstorm that had been slowly sweeping across the sky made its rather loud appearance. When we saw the lightning streak across the sky, we knew it was time to go. As soon as we got home, the sky opened up. It was perfect timing.

Life on an island can be challenging, but we had one of those moments today when it's at its best.

Because Watching This Makes Me So Sad

2011-08-10T00:02:00.000-04:00

And as bad as things are in our country, at least our kids aren't dying like this. This is where our donation money is going this month.

Hanging With Emily

2011-08-06T11:44:00.001-04:00

Emily, or what's left of the storm, is hanging out over the Bahamas today. The rain started last night, and we woke up to it this morning. Most likely, it will rain all day and into the night. That's okay, though, because we really need the rain! This winter was far too dry, and we're still struggling to recover from it.

They're still watching it to see if it will reform, so good luck to all of you on the East Coast!

I'm actually surprised to see there's internet right now. The tower we rely on has been jury-rigged after the line was cut during construction. It's power source is now the house next door, and the cord has been run above-ground through a large pipe. Not the best set up, and it tends to go out every time it rains. It's nice to have it now, though, since it appears we won't be leaving the house today.

The bad news for us is that the leak above the stove seems to have reopened. We woke up to a puddle of water on the stovetop. I've got a couple pots catching it now, but I guess I won't be cooking anything that way until the rain stops. Fun times in an ancient trailor.

Update, and Where oh Where did Emily Go?

2011-08-05T21:18:00.001-04:00

I'm please to announce I'm finally on the mend. I went in yesterday and finally saw the doctor (he wasn't in the day before when I had the first reaction). He took one look at me and said to give me a shot of steroids, a tapering dosage of pills for the next 9 days, and off all antibiotics as my nose looks good and the one they gave me actually wouldn't touch staph anyway.

So, yay! Today I finally woke up feeling like myself (after being up half the night because the steroids really do keep you going - the boys were nice to let me sleep in to 9 this morning). I got back on the treadmill and ran three miles. I hadn't expected to do more than 1 or 1.5 since it's been about ten days since the last time I ran, but I kept up at a snail's pace. Took me 41min, but that's okay. I was running. I think it did me good, too, because the intense prickly feeling in my skin was much better afterwards - all that sweat maybe?

Figured I'd add a word about our dispensary, since I don't think I've ever talked about it. While I spent a lot of time freaking out that this would turn out to be something they'd have to send me to the States to treat due to their lack of facilities, I am very grateful for the ease of obtaining care here.

The dispensary is basically a long, rectangular building. You enter the middle of it and walk into a waiting room with a reception area attached. When you open the door at the rear of the room, you find yourself in a hallway that runs to either side of you. Exam rooms, a room for dental care, an X-ray room, the doctor's office, and a tiny room for pharmaceuticals lay on either side of the hallway. That's it. There is one doctor on staff, two nurses, and, for the Navy and Navy family members, a first class corpsman (who just made chief).

They have hours similar to basic working hours, M-F, and the doctor is on call at all other times. If you have a problem on the weekend, most people just go to the firehouse where there is a 24-hour dispatcher on duty who will page the doctor. Or, I've heard 911 works, although I don't have firsthand experience with that one.

For me, because I've had to go in there nearly every day this week, the best part is the lack of wait. The only thing I've ever had to make an appointment for was Wyatt's school physicals. Everything else is just a walk-in sort of thing. Typically, I can go in there and be back out, medicine in hand, withing 15min. One time I had to have a couple tests done, as well as an X-ray, and it took more like 20min. The times I had to bring the boys, I could leave them playing with toys in the waiting room while I saw who I needed to see because everything is so close. I totally could not do that in the States, nor would even a routine, scheduled appointment take any less than a half hour. What happened to me would have required a couple emergency room visits, which would have been a nightmare.

So, I'm really, exceptionally grateful that if this had to happen, it happened here. See, there are always upsides to every place!

Moving on to Emily, or what's left of here. She stalled out over the Dominican republic, and fell apart. It's been downgraded to not a Tropical storm, and is headed our way this weekend. It might regather at some point, but we'll not see much of that if it does.

So, much ado about nothing, not that I'm complaining. I really wasn't looking forward to dealing with an evacuation while I was so drugged up and everything seemed to be going haywire in my body. It would have been just me and the kids; Oliver is in a different priority for leaving. Kids go first, and the under 5 set first of them. So yeah, that would have been tough. I'm glad it's all worked out this way.

The Next State...?

2011-08-04T08:51:00.000-04:00

I was randomly surfing through some blogs and ran across a post where the woman described a meeting she'd had with someone new. Apparently, he was from New England, which she described as "the next state over from me" (she's from New York). I scratched my head when I read it. Does she not realize that New England refers to six states, and is a regional term?

Sigh. This reminds me of the person I met in college who didn't know where Boston was. Although, I think that was a little worse.

Head Full of Sand

2011-08-03T19:00:00.000-04:00

This has been one of the longest weeks of my life. And just when I thought I was nearing the end, it got worse. You know those powerhouse antibiotics I've been taking? Well, I went back in to see the corpsman when I ran out. He thought it looked good, and sent me home with instructions to keep using ointment until it goes away completely. I though, hooray, and went home - whereupon the phone promptly rings. He's calling because he talked to the doctor, and he wants me on them for five more days.

So, I'm back on them. Until this morning, that is, when I went back to the dispensary because I was having an allergic reaction to them. Now I've got Benedryl in my system, plus a new antibiotic to try.

Sigh. Will this ever end? Worst case is I have to go to the States if it just won't clear up here. There's a limit to what they can treat here. I'm praying it'll clear up. What a pain that would be...

Anyway, as for Tropical Storm Emily, she's still a tropical storm, and while we've gone to condition 3, no one is talking evacuations of residents (although all the visitors had to leave). We'll see what happens, but we might not even have to take to our assigned shelter when it runs over us. I can live with that.

Yikes!!

2011-08-02T14:36:00.000-04:00

So, I went to the doctor today to get my last staph infection checkup, and while I was there tried to reschedule my son's physical for school. It was supposed to be yesterday, and I was feeling so poorly (hate these antibiotics!) that I completely spaced it. The nurse told me she didn't want to schedule for this week....because we might be evacuated. I stared at her in surprise, because I hadn't heard anything.

Turns out, Tropical storm Emily formed last night and is on a path to seep right through here. Unless it turns, we'll be out of here soon. Clearly, I must start packing...

Space 2

2011-07-31T17:52:00.000-04:00

I've been meaning to write this for awhile, and frankly it's amazing I'm doing it now. I've gotten pretty bad about planning posts and never getting down to doing it.

This week has also been a weird one. Somehow I contracted a staph infection in my nose, so besides dealing with that, I'm on powerhouse antibiotics that make me feel sick to my stomach all the time. The doctor said he's seen several cases, so I guess it's not uncommon here. Wyatt actually had an infected toe a few months back that required two rounds of antibiotics. Ah, the dark side of life in the tropics!

Anyway, moving back to the real purpose for this post: I asked Wyatt if he wanted to get up really early and watch the space shuttle come back. He got all excited about it, so I set the alarm. When I went in to get him at 0515 (after making sure it was actually going to land, as there is always a chance they will have to change it), he got up right away when I reminded him why I was waking him up. I didn't touch Oscar because he would have been a bear to deal with the rest of the day, and I knew a replay would be enough for him.

It was really nice snuggling on the couch with my six year old while we watched them track the progress of Atlantis through the sky. I'm absolutely not a morning person, and neither are my kids, but sometimes it's worth it to get up for something.

I did feel a little bit badly when Oscar got up later. Their room is right off the living room, and though I kept the TV low, he is easily disturbed and got up just after the shuttle landed. He got all sad that he missed it, so I promised him we'd find it on the internet for him to watch. Luckily, that mollified him.

As it turned out, though, I didn't have to do that because the NASA channel replayed it over and over again that day. How do I know this? Because it's all we watched all day. The boys whipped out their spaceship Legos and played in the living room. The space shuttle Legos didn't come with a whole fuel tank and launch pad set up, so Wyatt built his own out of Duplos.

It's been, what, a week since the landing? They still ask to watch the NASA channel, and are still playing space all the time. I hope they will have the opportunity to be involved in the space program if they are still interested in it as they grow up. Or at the very least, they are able to do something they care about or are good at.

I've found one of the toughest things about parenting for me is this whole schooling issue. We've been spoiled here with a tiny classroom and teacher that is able to teach the kids at their level. Wyatt's gone way beyond what he would have done in a typical kindergarten classroom because of that. After another year of that, I know we're going to have to look to more unconventional solutions for their schooling.

For now, though, we're all learning a whole lot about space.

Space!

2011-07-19T14:53:00.000-04:00

Our boys have been very into space lately. When we were in Orlando, we picked up a couple of the new LEGO space themed sets for them. So, now they have their own space shuttle, astronaut, and astronaut van. They've been getting a lot of play around here.

Interestingly enough, our first day in Orlando coincided with the launch of Atlantis. Unfortunately, we weren't paying attention and didn't realize that until after we were there. Because of our lack of planning, and the huge traffic jam to get over there, plus the cloud cover that nearly cancelled the flight (which would have made it much harder to watch much of the launch), we decided to just watch some coverage of it on TV before going on about our merry way.

The last few days, here at home, the boys have been obsessed with the NASA channel. I guess you can watch it on the net, too, but for some reason it's part of our cable package, along with all the overseas military channels (and I do mean all of them). Oliver's been rolling his eyes a bit at it because much of what you see is shots of mission control with no sound - not the most exciting thing to have on. We have, however, been able to see interviews with the astronauts both on the shuttle and in the space station, video from the launch from all angles, including one one attached to a rocket booster that followed it all the way to splash down, and shots of the astronauts floating around doing their jobs. The boys have been fascinated by it all, and astronaut is the vocation of choice this week. Today, we caught a special they made about the shuttle program, and it was really awesome, if a bit sad, to go over the last 30 years.

With all this space stuff, I figured it would be great if we could catch the landing on Thursday. So, I looked it up this afternoon. The time its scheduled to land? 0556 bright and early. Um, yeah, not sure about that...

Because You Just Never Know

2011-07-15T15:00:00.002-04:00

I haven't really gotten on here in awhile. I think about blogging a lot, and I even write posts in my head, but I almost never get past that. I'm hitting a bit of a low, and guess it will just take some time to refocus and get over it.

We just got back from an amazing week in Orlando. Probably one of the best vacations we've ever taken. We rented a little condo with three bedrooms for less than $100 bucks a night about 15min from Disney (for orientation, although we didn't go there for Disney World). We saw three movies between us (one Oliver saw while I spent the time at the LEGO store with the boys), went mini-golfing at an awesome pirate-themed place, did Go-Karts, ate ourselves sick at an authentic Brazilian Rodizio, and even managed to fit in a few very needed errands (we took a leaky tire and had it replaced - never flown on a plane with a tire before; good thing it was small). And then there was the visit to Sea World and a few other things thrown in. We weren't bumped once on the flights, and everything went pretty smoothly.

Then we returned, and I realized how much I didn't want to go back. Oliver looked at me and asked if we were done with this duty station, because he had some of the same feelings.

Sigh. It's complicated. In some ways, absolutely. I'm tired of crappy, draconian internet and the utter lack of anything outside of beach combing to do. I've struggled to find friends in what is a rather insular community. Surprisingly, being Navy has marked us even more here than in the States, something I didn't expect. I miss fresh food, and I'm so, so done with having to plan meals around the 4 or 5 things in the produce department (okay, who a I kidding here - it's a produce bin) actually nice enough to consider buying. I miss being able to go to Church (something we also were able to do in Orlando, the first time in a year). I want a library to visit, and a store where we can pick up in five minutes what can take hours to locate online.

But, I also know the grass isn't always greener on the other side, which is why I'm not quite done. When we leave, we welcome back deployment. We lose the weekends and holidays, the birthdays and anniversaries together. I lose the parenting partnership we've developed in the last year and a half, and will have to once again take up most of the family responsibilities. We'll lose having a beach in walking distance from our house and Oliver's work, and will no longer be able to count on having it to ourselves when we go. We'll have to leave behind the coconut palms right outside our living room window, and the silent streets the boys can ride their bikes on without fear.

So, it's never so simple, is it? I'm a girl who tends to want to move when things get difficult, but after a lifetime of doing that, I am aware that you tend to just trade one problem for another, although the trick is discovering which problems you can live with and which are unbearable. (Since I've yet to decide on that one, I suspect it is why I can't think of one place I'd like to settle down in.) We've had some really good times here. I've grown a lot in ways I didn't expect. I'm not going to be sad to leave, but I'm not anxious to go because I also realize I just might be wrong about that in the end. You just never know about a place.

Ten Year Plan

2011-06-25T16:14:00.001-04:00

Oliver and I had a long talk yesterday. We went through where we are at financially, where we want to be, what we want our future to look like, and how it all might play out. We've now mapped out a plan that will take us from now until retirement in about ten years.

It's been hard to plan until now. We've been so on the fence about sticking it out in the Navy. Now that we've decided on that, however, the rest is finally possible to debate.

Despite my penchant to do things last minute and my inability to schedule my days effectively, I like having a plan, goals to work toward. It's hard to do things without that. Sometimes it just feels like you're drifting and getting nowhere. The last time we really had any financial goals was back when we were married and facing down 30k of student loan and car loan debt (mostly mine). Two years later, the car was ours, and after another year, the loans were knocked out. We started saving for retirement and living small to save more, but it was more with the idea that we didn't know what was ahead and just wanted to be prepared.

Now, though, we've looked at what he's likely to make in retirement, what we'll have saved by then, and what we have to do now to make that all look better. He's got some career goals, I've got some goals of my own to focus on. Ultimately, my hope is that when his time in the military is done, he can have the freedom to choose whatever job he feels like without feeling locked into another job he doesn't love just to have the money it makes.

So, we'll see what happens. Obviously, there are plenty of things that could go wrong. But it's not worth stressing over those things. We'll just approach our plans again if we have to and adjust.

Just So I Don't Forget About It

2011-06-17T20:34:00.001-04:00

On Tuesday, I dropped Oliver off at work, then took the boys to the beach after they had eaten breakfast. I didn't take a camera, and maybe I should have. It was cloudy most of the time there (we've been getting a lot of rain lately, which is fabulous). The water was calmer than I've ever seen it, which meant almost no sand was being kicked up in the waves. There is often seaweed floating around, too, but I didn't see any that day. Just beautifully clear water.

We spent a lot of time tunneling through the sand, building sandcastles, and burying Wyatt per his request. Oliver showed up at lunch time to get a ride home (the building he works in is literally steps from the beach we typically swim at), but we weren't ready yet. So, he took off to find us all some lunch while the kids and I took to the water.

Wow, so much fun! We saw fish, both tiny ones and larger ones as big as my hand. They were white with darker stripes on them that looked kind of like seaweed. Against the white sand, they were almost invisible. We sat still for a long time letting them dart around us.

After splashing around for awhile after the fish watching, Wyatt caught sight of a huge orange starfish sitting quietly a few feet from shore. I was carrying Oscar, as he is both short and uneasy in the water, and he started freaking out when I got closer. Apparently, he saw the starfish as something dangerous. Considering all the things in the ocean that truly are dangerous, I was okay with this even as I assured him we were perfectly safe.

Oliver finally got back with some food. He had to go to the store, then home to assemble a picnic lunch as the one eatery on base was unaccountably closed. (They do that when they can't staff it, is my understanding. That seems to be happening just about every time we want to get something from there lately.) We finished up our perfect morning making sandwiches and trying to keep the boys from getting sand all over the food. Luckily, the wind was much quieter than it normally is.

Then, it was back home to clean up and listen to the huge thunderstorm that rolled in a few hours later. Curiously, it seems to rain here at about 1400 every day lately. Oliver told me one of the chiefs in his office had made a joke about it, so we started paying attention to it. He was totally right, and we now look at each other and laugh when the clouds blot out the sun once more around 1330.

The one bad thing? The internet went out during a huge clap of thunder. Who knows why, but it was another day before it was fixed. I'm crossing my fingers it will stay fixed for a good long while now.

Internet, Welcome Back!

2011-06-13T23:10:00.000-04:00

We got the internet back today, and I am so happy. Last Wednesday, someone somehow cut power to the wifi tower on our street. It took us a couple days to finally figure out who the right person was to call, and by the time it was actually looked into, it was Friday afternoon. Nothing happens here over the weekend. Nothing.

So, we had to wait out the weekend, then see how long it would be until it was repaired this week. Happily, it only took until this afternoon. Ironically, I was walking back from dragging both kids and our laptop to the playground so I could take care of some pressing business when I spied them finishing up the repair. Ah, well, it did get 'em out of the house (sometimes a huge feat - between the massive biting flies, the heat, and bright sun, they won't go out unless they have friends, we are entertaining them out there, there's running water involved, or we give them no option - or bribery; that sometimes works).

The net is my contact with the outside world. A few days of no internet has all of us pacing around this place. Luckily, I got a new book in the mail a few days before the net went out, so I had something to do when I'd otherwise be online. I am very sure, though, that we'll be ditching the cable when we move back to the States. There really is nothing on. I'm so glad I don't pay for it here.

House Buying

2011-06-06T21:12:00.000-04:00

Every time I turn around, there's another article online about house prices being depressed. I knew it would happen; I mean, at what point do houses get so unaffordable that everyone stops buying them? I had no idea the banks would end up being such a huge part of that problem, but the high prices made us not even consider buying when we lived in WA for fear of what would happen there. Plus, we are military. The last thing we have wanted is to complicate our lives with a house that could be a huge pain to sell last minute.

I have to admit, though, my resolve has wavered a bit looking at home prices today. Especially since we will be at our next duty station for five years. I brought the topic up with Oliver the other day, thinking he might be warmer to it because it was more me than him that said "No way" to buying before. He surprised me, though, by kicking the idea to the curb immediately.

I was a little disappointed at first, but I'm thinking now that he's on the right track. We will be better off if we rent a house that's less than our BAH. I'm determined to find a place we can paint, but otherwise, I don't mind living in someone else's house. Ultimately, I value mobility over staying put. And why on earth would I want to do anything more than call the landlord when something breaks while Oliver is out to sea? That is not a stress I want in my life.

So, no houses for us until retirement. And even then, we might pass if we can find something more interesting. Like a job overseas. One can always dream...

He Loves Me, This I Know

2011-06-04T22:36:00.000-04:00

I love getting flowers, and all those traditional expressions of love. There are no florists here, so it's been a long time. Yesterday, though, Oliver gave me something better. We were walking home from Wyatt's graduation, and I took one bite of the chocolate cupcake I'd picked up on the way out. It tasted strongly of mocha, which I detest, so I tossed it in a nearby garbage can and bemoaned my decision of what flavor to pick. Oliver told me I should go back and get another one (we are literally a five minute walk from where it was being held, and we'd only gone halfway home). I told him I'd thought about it, but I was too lazy to go back. On hearing that, he turned around without saying another word and walked back to get me a cupcake. I watched his departing back and realized once again how much I love that man.

One of the first things that attracted me to Oliver (other than his dashing good looks!) when I met him was his willingness to jump in and do things when someone needed help. He doesn't hem and haw over it, ignore it, or try to get out of it. When someone asks, he just does it. Even if that desire is as small as a cupcake for his wife.

I love that man.

Traveling About - Spouse, or No?

2011-06-02T11:09:00.001-04:00

I have a friend here who plans on spending most of the summer off-island. She's going to visit family, and travel around in between. The catch? Her husband won't be along for most of the trip because the Navy isn't so willing to hand out three months of leave. Hopefully, he'll join them for a few weeks along the way, but that's it.

Listening to her outline her trip for me, I was just a tiny bit jealous. I'd love to get off island for three months, and spending it traveling around? Even better. (Yes, we do like living here, but it's an island. There's a reason they coined the term "island fever".)

Leaving Oliver home, however, is not a happy plan for me. I'm very aware that we'll be back to a deploying command at the end of next year. Even though I could really use a break from here, I am not interested in a self-made break from my husband. So, I'm going to stay here, and we'll take a couple week long vacations this summer.

I'm also looking at it this way: when he starts deploying again, I'll be traveling with the kids on my own every time. I plan on taking a decent trip in the middle of every deployment, now that I'm over my fear of flying alone with them. Plus, they are a lot older now and much easier to take along. Having a trip in the middle of deployment helps so much in breaking it up. I wish I'd done it more in WA.

Eh...

2011-05-28T12:21:00.000-04:00

I keep coming here with the intent to post and never finish it. So, I'm just going to ramble a bit and get off when I'm bored. Or someone interrupts me and I have to help them.

Wyatt is almost done with school. He's only got three days of actual school left, due to Memorial Day this Monday. Then, beach party Friday morning and graduation ceremonies that evening. And, we're done! I'm pretty excited to have him home all summer. We've missed having him around.

In order to keep the boys busy, as well as prevent brain drain this summer, I've got some things planned. We've got a set of Lego Robotics to delve into, a package with the beginnings of a trip around the world (basically, it follows two kids as they visit ten different countries - we'll get a package a month with a new country, but I'm also going to take the world map and plan some activities that will introduce them to other countries not covered), origami from an awesome package sent by a friend in Japan, and some other things.

I am doing this also because I've challenged myself to see if I have it in me to homeschool the boys. I am pretty sure I won't be sending them to public school when we go back to the States for a lot of reasons I don't feel like getting into right now. So, the only options for us are finding a good charter school or a private school we can afford, or homeschooling. Homeschooling is kind of a last resort, but I still think it is potentially better than public school if I can pull it off effectively.

So, I have to find that out and summer here is a great opportunity for that because of the lack of resources. It will challenge me to really work at coming up with stuff, so when we return to the States and I have the ability to go to the library (although, there is a reading program run by the Navy we're going to participate in in July), put the boys in sports, get music lessons, etc., plus museums and all that, it will hopefully seem easier. We will see.

In other news, I had a medical issue this last week and ended up having a blood test, EKG, and chest x-rays all on the same doctor visit. It was interesting because our dispensary is tiny. One doctor, a corpsman, and two nurses, plus a receptionist, run it. I remember the first time I needed to take one of the boys there. I called to get an appointment, and was told to just come down if I had the time. Turns out, no one needs an appointment. It's more like an emergency room, although you never wait more than a few minutes before you can see someone. When I had my tests done, I sat there and waited for the results with the corpsman and nurse. It was a weird thing to watch my x-rays come up on the screen and sent to the doctor who was down the hall to take a look at!

And in case you wondered, I'm fine. Got a clean bill of health. Just some freak thing that happened. The nurse said my heart looked very healthy, so guess the running is paying off.

And that's about all I got. Have a great weekend all!

Fire and Drought

2011-05-21T22:27:00.000-04:00

It's odd to think about drought when you live on an island surrounded by water, but it happens. This has been a bad winter for us. Almost no rain, and everyone's "lawn" (mostly a collection of stiff grasses and weeds) is dead unless they water it. We have a nice little green circle going on our back yard because of the sprinkler I use to keep our garden alive.

This was more impressive a couple weeks ago - it was literally a green circle in all dead brown grass.

I remember our first winter here was full of freak, short lived thunder storms. I remember having to brave one for a dental appointment one time. I couldn't find the umbrella, so I bundled Oscar in the jogger with its weather shield, put rain coats on Wyatt and I, and then we ran as fast as Wyatt's five year old legs could manage. It's maybe a five minute walk, but we were soaked when we got there. I went inside long enough to find out the flight had been diverted due to high winds and the hygienist wasn't there yet. I walked back outside to sunshine.

This winter, though, nada. Every time we get a little shower, I pray it keeps raining for awhile, but it never does. The last couple days, it was all clouded over, and we even got some thunder, but the rain stayed away. I seriously could not have picked a more opposite place to live weather-wise from Washington State if I'd tried! I can fully appreciate a nice cloudy day here.

All this drought has lead to some problems, as you might expect. Andros has a lot of fresh water, and actually imports quite a bit of it to Nassau, so I'm not worried about that, but all the dry brush has meant a lot of fires. Every few days, I catch a whiff of smoke and know something is burning somewhere. About a week ago, I left to go pick up Wyatt and nearly choked on the smoke outside. There's very little in terms of fire fighting equipment in the communities here, so as long as homes aren't threatened, they let them burn.

We could really use some rain.

Hurricane Season is Almost Here

2011-05-12T14:29:00.000-04:00

I'm in the middle of project today. I've got to go through our emergency backpacks and cycle the food, plus figure out what else needs to be put in there. I never really prepped them adequately, so it's going to be a bit of a job. It does, however, need to be done. Hurricane season is nearly here.

Luckily, the Bahamas is rarely hit, but it happens enough that I know we need to be prepared. While there is a chance we will have to weather it here, most likely we would end up evacuated if it was going to be a direct hit. Or at least, the boys and I would be sent off-island. Oliver would probably have to stay through it.

So, keeping that in mind, I've had to prepare a little differently than I would have before. I've got two backpacks, one for me and one for the boys' things. I have a separate bag for Oliver. I'm packing not only food and the usual emergency things, but with the idea that we will be leaving. So, things like our rarely used laptop are being thrown in, and I'm going keep a list of what would have to be thrown in last minute so we aren't scrambling too much if an evac order is made. His is also heavier on things like a camp stove and fuel than our backpacks are because of the different circumstances we will face if things go bad.

Here's the thing, though - emergency preparedness overwhelms me a tad. Not because I'm scared about whatever may come and this makes me think about it, but because it just seems like this huge job that I can't wrap my head around. There are a million different lists about what you should have, and they are all a little bit different. Then there are issues like, how can I possibly pack my kid's favorite toys when they are constantly used?

I'm determined to make myself finish, though. We got lucky last year and only moved to a condition 4 once, which basically meant we had to pick up outside things and stow them. The hurricane completely missed us in the end. Who knows how it will play out this year. I'd prefer to be overprepared than caught scrambling.

Separation Anxiety....Really?

2011-05-07T12:29:00.001-04:00

I caught a show a few days ago on TLC that had a spouse redesigning a house while his wife and kid was put up in a hotel for three weeks. Was kind of fun to see his take on what he thought she'd like, but I really eye-rolled when they kept bawling over how they were going to be apart for three weeks. Really, three whole weeks? Do people actually get that worked up about such a short time apart? Three weeks strikes me as a little vacation where you get to do your own thing for a bit.

Clearly, my military lifestyle has changed my outlook on many things.

P.S. I feel the need to add that my marriage has always been about time apart, starting with right after we were engaged, so I have never not had that part of my life (until we moved here, however, but the damage has been done!). So, I just don't have the same perspective at all.

In an unrelated note, I spent some time perusing creative kids' bunk beds today. I've always wanted to do our kids' room up fancy, but have yet to live somewhere where that was possible (we might have done so in WA, but by the time Oscar showed up, we really didn't have any real time living there to make it worth it). So, when we return to the States, it will be a great time to do so. We'll be wherever we land for five years, so I can see doing it then. And they are both old enough to have opinions on what they want. I've got a whole space theme worked out in my head, complete with a black magnetic wall with glow in the dark star magnets, and a space shuttle bed, but we'll see if they agree by the time we move.

2011-05-02T12:53:00.001-04:00

Osama Bin Laden is dead, ya'll. And it was the Navy Seals that took him down. Hooah!

Car Rental Return Woes

2011-04-28T11:51:00.001-04:00

Update: I just heard back from AVIS and they have a record of someone else renting the car we had the same day we returned it. So, they should refund our money soon. I'm really glad I caught that charge, and relieved it was so easy to resolve!

We spent nearly a week in Florida a couple weeks ago. We had a rental car through AVIS for the whole time we were there. I returned it on time, even spent extra on a hotel that had a shuttle that would take me to the AUTEC terminal the next morning so I wouldn't have to keep it any extra time. Everything seemed fine, and I saw the guy who returned it check our odometer and tell me all was well.

Fast forward to this week, when I noticed a charge on our credit card account that was more than we'd initially paid for our rental (we booked it through Priceline, which is SO much cheaper than anything else we've tried) from AVIS. So, I sent an email disputing the charge. They came back and told me that we'd supposedly returned the car four days late, so we were being charged for the extra days plus late fees.

Wow. I was a little blown away by that. We've rented a lot of cars since we've moved here and this is the first problem we've had. The return was exactly like all the others, too. I don't really blame AVIS in particular since we've used them before with no ill effects, but clearly some paperwork was not done or filled out incorrectly. I'm waiting for them to get back to me about it, but we've been debating how to prove we returned it on time. We didn't fly commercially, so don't have a plane ticket to prove we left the area, but Oliver thinks he can get a letter from his command stating we returned the day we did. Clearly, we have no need of a rental if we weren't even in the country, right?

Anyway, just thought I'd pass this on with a tip - if you are renting a car, make sure they actually returned it for you. Otherwise, they will sock you with big charges. This is kind of aggravating, too, because car rental companies almost never give you anything when you return your car. They just look at the paperwork, check the odometer, and send you on your way. I guess I can't let that be it next time...

Vacationing With Kids....Or Just Dumping Them With a Sitter?

2011-04-27T14:22:00.000-04:00

So, originally we were going to go on a cruise this year. I had hoped for something that hopped a bunch of islands around us. When I went to go price them out, however, I discovered most cruise lines don't run Caribbean cruises during the summer due to the hurricane season.

I certainly can't fault them for that decision, but now we have to come up with something else. I've been digging around, looking at "family friendly" resorts and such. It seems, though, that everything I come up with that's labeled "family friendly" prominently describes its babysitting services and kids' clubs. It's difficult to come up with vacation ideas that assume you are going to actually take the kids along with you.

Call me crazy, but I've always defined "family friendly" as something the entire family could enjoy together. If I really wanted a trip where Oliver and I could just go off and do everything alone, I'd just send the kids to my in-laws where I imagine they would have a better (and much cheaper) time.

Who knows what we're going to do. It might just end up being a park hop in Florida. I suspect we will never reach the end of those. At least I am completely aware that the children can cheerfully tag along with us if we do that.

Vacation!

2011-04-22T23:12:00.001-04:00

Wyatt's spring break is all of next week. We've talked it over extensively, and have determined that this week will be spent on a Caribbean vacation complete with vacant, white sand beaches, plenty of peace and quiet, and a quaint little place steps from shopping and eateries.

Okay, you can start laughing now.

And, yes, I really do love it here that much, despite the desperate need every three or four months to go somewhere else.

2011-04-19T16:56:00.002-04:00

Yikes. I think it's clear another ipod will be joining our house sometime in the future. And I'm in app-heaven. I've spent all afternoon digging through them, and the first thing Wyatt asked me when he got home from school was whether he could play with the ipod. Yeah, if he can drag it away from his daddy first....

Music?

2011-04-19T13:42:00.002-04:00

For my birthday this year, my fab hubby let me pick out any ipod I wanted while we were in Florida last week. He actually bought me the MP3 player I've been running with back when Wyatt was a baby. It's been giving me trouble recently, so I've been talking about getting an ipod for awhile. I just couldn't rationalize the expense.

So, I'm thrilled. We picked it up at Patrick Air Force base, which saved us a big chunk of tax money. I am now the proud owner of an ipod touch.

At this point, I'm not really sure who around here is more excited about it. I downloaded some free games and the boys are all over them - the biggest one included. Clearly, this is going to be a fun toy when we are stuck somewhere. I especially look forward to having it around in the airport where free wifi is easy to find. Because you can also go online with it, which is awesome.

We travel so much, this will be fabulous to look up stuff. Like on this last trip where we accidentally left behind the folder with all the addresses and directions for the hotels and places we were planning on going. Oops. Whoever decided free wifi was a must at places like McDonald's and Dunkin' Donuts is a genius. Or rather, a serious life saver. We'd gotten a place through Priceline for our first night in West Palm, but it was a place we'd never stayed at before so not only did I not remember the name of it, I didn't know where it was at all. We had to stop at the first place with wifi (McDonald's to get it over with - the boys love it, but not us so much) to figure it out. Our laptop is not exactly small, so it'll be nice not to have to haul it out for stuff like that.

Anyway, the real purpose of this post isn't to brag about my ipod. I'm living in a bit of a music vaccuum. The only radio station we get is out of Nassau, and we can't seem to pick it up inside the house. So, we only listen to it for the fifteen second drives to the beach or the rare trip out of the gate. It mostly plays America music, and you forget it isn't coming from the States until the DJ comes on with his Bahamian accent. Pretty much all music on the web is blocked for us because we live internationally, which is a bummer. Really, unless I'm willing to troll YouTube for random music videos, I am a little out of it when it comes to what's new in the music world these days.

So, what do you listen to? Any great new artists? Any songs I just have to check out? I'm especially looking for good workout music. What I have is really getting old.

P.S. Oliver's birthday is only weeks away from mine, so I told him to pick out a GPS for my present to him. He's wanted one for years, and he was pretty happy with it. As for me, well, I have always been a map girl so I wasn't interested in the whole GPS thing. I think I get now why they are so popular, ha. I don't think we'll ever travel again without it - at least not if we need to drive anywhere.

And you thought we were only headed to Florida.

2011-04-18T10:17:00.001-04:00

P.S. Space ice cream is so not the same thing!

Nassau - Part 1

2011-04-10T13:53:00.002-04:00

For once, I'm gonna get pic heavy, so this one is going to be a two parter. I had the opportunity to go along with Wyatt on his school field trip to Nassau yesterday, and I'm so glad we were able to go! There were 9 kids on the trip, 3 teachers, and 4 parents. I'm glad there weren't any bumping issues because I would not have allowed Wyatt to go without me. If he were 12 or something, sure, but not at 6.

Anyway, here are some of the highlights, because pictures make this much easier:

Here is a shot taken inside the tour bus that met us at the airport. Notice what looks like a large armrest on the side of the right hand seats? They were actually folding seats that filled the aisle. Thankfully, we had no need of them. I shudder to think what trouble that would have been in an accident.

Oh, and the seats themselves were covered in clear plastic. They got pretty sweaty sitting on that afternoon.

Someone said a James Bond movie used this house with the pink wall surrounding it to film around. Maybe someone a little more into James Bond will recognize it?

Cruise ships in the distance.

Our first destination: Hotel Atlantis. Rumor has it it costs $500 to spend a night here. I don't doubt that after having been inside, although we didn't see what the rooms themselves looked like.

Nothing like a waterfall on the outside of your hotel!

Inside the main lobby. The kids were really impressed with this, although I couldn't get a decent picture of it due to the lighting. You'll have to be satisfied with this sketchy picture of one of the murals up on the walls surrounding the huge dome.

Okay, since clearly we weren't there to admire the expensive hotel, here is the first shot of why we came: Atlantis has a whole aquarium going on inside it. This was a walkway with tanks on either side and above us (which is what the picture is of) full of lobsters. It made me hungry.

Terrible picture, but these are Lionfish. They are poisonous, and a nuisance in Bahamian waters. Apparently, their flesh tastes good, however, so they are training Bahamian chefs to prepare them. It's tricky because not only do they have avoid being poisoned by them, they have to make sure their customers aren't, either. I haven't made up my mind as to whether I will try them or not.

This is a "one-man submarine" from Atlantis. There were a lot of things like this along our tour. What got me was how seriously our guide talked about them. Halfway through, I had to stop and decide whether she was telling the truth, she was that good. Hopefully, the kids don't think this stuff is real, haha.

We saw both Manta and Sting Rays, and this picture should give you a good idea of how large these suckers can get. Our tour guide told us they had one that outgrew their tank. Yikes...

Our tour guide also seemed to know which was male and female by looking at their underside as they swam past. Wyatt latched onto that and kept trying to figure it out for himself. Me? Yeah, I still have no clue.

Here is how they start out. These baby Sting Rays get their own area to grow before they are put in with the rest of the sea life.

We saw a lot of very large fish. I think this is a Barracuda, but I'm not positive.

We stopped at this long, low tank full of sea life we could touch. See that horseshoe crab in the bottom right? I remember finding those all over the shore when my family would go to Cape Cod every summer. We'd bring home empty shells, but this is the first time I've held one that was alive. Wyatt was freaked out about all it's legs and didn't want to touch it, but he was willing to handle this starfish. It's upside down because he didn't want to touch its feet.

After the tamer stuff, we got to see the predator tank. From underground. They built a tunnel that runs underneath it, and we got to stare at sharks as they swam overhead. Here Wyatt gets close to one of them.

There were a number of Sawsharks hanging out on the bottom of the tank. This one nicely decided to swim right over us after we had spent a few minutes staring at them. He looks like he has a face underneath him.

We spent some time topside, too. Here is a shot of the bridge that separates the swimming pool from the shark tank. How's that for vacation excitement?

We walked past this pool of sea turtles. The kids were counting and got up to nine before we had to hurry on so we'd have time for lunch. This was probably my favorite part.

We caught these two seagulls hanging out. I had to take a picture because I rarely see seagulls on Andros. These two also look different from the ones I remember growing up. They have black wings.

Finally, we were taken to Earth & Fire, a clay studio in the hotel. They sell various clay forms you can paint with ceramic paint. Depending on what you chose, you can cure it at home in your oven (which is what the kids did), or have it fired in their ovens to make a food-safe product. It's not cheap, so it was pretty nice that this was included as part of the tour.

Here, Wyatt wields a hair dryer to help set his paint enough to take his dolphin home.

To be continued...

Plans and Pay

2011-04-07T14:30:00.001-04:00

We've got big plans coming up. We haven't ventured out of our island home since Christmas, and I think we're all getting a little stir-crazy. So, Oliver has some leave papers in play, and we're making plans. It's gonna be a Florida road trip, and I'm really looking forward to it. We pretty much never drive here, so spending some time in the car weirdly sounds appealing.

The boys have made a few requests, and since the closest place to get me a new ID card (the real reason we have to go) is in Orlando, we've got a nice list going. Hopefully, we'll get around to most or all of it. Some of the highlights include a trip to the LEGO store at Downtown Disney, a day at Cape Canaveral, riding Thomas at a railroad museum that is happily hosting a Thomas' day out event every weekend this month, and hitting up a few Man vs. Food restaurants.

All of this comes, though, as we are staring at the news and wondering if Congress will ever get off their butts and work together to prevent a government shut down. If that happens, pay will stop. The trip to Canaveral will also probably have to be scrapped as it will likely be closed. We are luckily not paying a mortgage or have any debt, and this trip is coming from money we have in savings, so the loss of pay for awhile (he will get back pay when it is all worked out) won't really hurt us. I feel, though, for all the people who are going to be very negatively affected by this. I certainly hope no one in Congress, as well as the President, are going to be getting pay, either. Considering this mess is a complete and utter failure on their part to grow up and behave like adults, they should be paying the highest price. Sadly, I doubt that will be the case.

I read somewhere that Donald Trump is considering a run for President next year. Not that long ago I would have said no way, but now? Why the hell not. Maybe he'll fire some idiots. One can always hope.

Some Things I'd Prefer They Not Teach My Kids

2011-04-01T18:44:00.001-04:00

We've had a couple incidents around here that have got me rolling my eyes at the people who think that teaching my very young kids about health is a good idea. Wyatt came home from school today and immediately started going on about how bread and tortillas (tortillas?) have sugar in them and can rot his teeth out. Apparently, he watched some video about dental health or something along those lines at school.

As for Oscar, he caught some healthy eating message in between cartoons on PBS the other day that had him running around the house singing, "Don't supersize me!" over and over again. It was basically all about telling kids to say no to extra servings.

I do understand that there's a real obesity issue going on, and I also know these health spots are aimed at teaching kids better habits. Let's face it, though, the child running through the house singing, "Don't supersize me!" weighs all of 30 pounds dripping wet. He barely eats his dinner, which we are considering renaming "breakfast" just because the word "dinner" seems to send him fleeing for his life. Encouraging him to push his food away is really not helpful. Trust me, he's got that one down already.

And teaching my kid that tortillas and bread have excess sugars in them? As an adult, I understand where they were going with this, but Wyatt had no idea. He mostly just got the message that these two things were somehow unhealthy for him. At six, he's not ready to understand glucose. If they really wanted to harp on something, soda and candy would have been much better candidates.

Maybe I'm wrong, but the roots of childhood obesity seem to lay in the responsible adults in these kids' lives, not whether or not the school or TV infomercials are laying out the right message about health. My kids are a healthy weight because of several factors, the prime factor being that I work hard to provide healthy food for them and limit the junk around here. I do terrible things like make them eat soup, don't let Wyatt buy chips at school for snack, and only occasionally provide sweets, most of which have been made at home. Soda is something we only get when we eat out, which is not too often these days. Otherwise, it's water or milk, with juice for breakfast only.

My point is, the real education needs to happen with the parents, not the kids. I've discovered that almost none of these "healthy" messages that we've seen on TV are effective for my kids. Most times, they pick up on something odd and run with it, while the main message goes right over their heads. (Hence the refrain of "Don't supersize me!" in our home now - I will laugh if he ever asks me to sing it to him for his bedtime song.)

Ultimately, I'm responsible for my children's weight. If they don't get enough exercise or will only eat pizza all day (pizza that I would, of course, have to be providing for them), that's all on me. They have no medical condition that affects their weight. Only a world full of junk. My job is to teach them to navigate it. No one else is ever going to be able to do this more effectively.

MMB Post

2011-03-23T14:27:00.002-04:00

I'm behind, but this was my post back on the 11th.

Facing The Wall?

2011-03-23T11:44:00.000-04:00

A while back, we had a visit from some Navy higher-ups, and things have improved around here since then. Our COLA doubled, and MWR has made a much greater effort to get new rec equipment here. (Looking forward to the paintball stuff!)

The best news for me, though (outside of the much needed COLA), was that they were going to find us some new gym equipment. The gym here is in serious need of some TLC. Half the cardio equipment is either broken or nearly there, and it's all jammed into this tiny room with some useless TVs (due to placement) high up on the wall. The rest of the gym is full of ancient weight machines that do seem mostly functional, and free weights. Clearly, whoever designed it initially (if I can use the word "design" here) was more into weight lifting than cardio.

Anyway, I spend a fair amount of time in there during the summer when it's way too hot to run outside. When I heard MWR was going to send new equipment, I was excited. (Well, okay, new to us - it actually was all used at some point at another base, but is a far cry better than the barely-working stuff they've had in there.)

This Monday, Oliver had to go help lug it all in there as the machines arrived on the barge this past weekend. I went to run later that afternoon and got a taste of the new treadmills. While they aren't technically new, they look pretty new compared to the crap we've been using in there. The one I used may actually be new, and reminds me of the nice ones they had in the gym back in WA.

So, good news there. The bad news? They used to face the doorway, which was awkward and I have whacked my knee before trying to get around the other machines. So, they turned them to face the wall, where a horribly done mural of a killer whale in the ocean is pasted. I appreciate the ease of getting onto them, but it hasn't helped the tedious nature of a treadmill by sticking an ugly mural five inches from my face. Oliver did say the plan was to get flat screens across that wall to replace the TVs that are so high up you can't watch them without falling off your machine, so hopefully this will not be an issue anymore.

Japan

2011-03-20T22:52:00.002-04:00

They are in the middle of a voluntary evacuation of hundreds of military families from Japan's mainland. Some of them are coming from the base we would have been at if we'd gotten our wish and headed to Japan 18 months ago. I'm a little weirded out by it. I mean, on the one hand, I'm grateful we aren't in the middle of that mess, and I know it's easy to say, hey, we were blessed or whatever. But are we really any more important than anyone else who was there? I dunno - I suspect this is the foundation of survivor's guilt, although obviously my own situation isn't quite that...

Anyway, I am praying for this nuclear situation to find a resolution. As horrible as the tsunami was, it's this problem that has me most on edge. Japan isn't exactly a backwards, newbie-on-the-tech-scene kind of country. Clearly, no matter how safe you make it, nuclear power has some very real risks that come with the benefits.

I've read articles calling, once again, for countries to ban it. I think it's far too late for that sort of thing, and nuclear power is here to stay. I wonder, though, where the next meltdown will occur. Who will pay the highest price for this revolutionary, yet horribly unsafe energy source?

And, yes, this is coming from a military wife whose husband spent over six years hiding nuclear warheads in the pacific ocean. Which is why I understand this isn't so simplistic as just banning it. No one's giving it up now. I am proud of my husband for doing his job; I feel very strongly that it's necessary to hopefully keep the balance of power so no one feels confident enough to shoot off their nukes.

But will we learn from this mess in Japan? Will we think long and hard about nuclear power and the risks it entails? Will we work harder to ensure that anyone living near a reactor is properly evacuated, given iodine, kept informed, etc. in case of disaster? Will we put enough money into developing worst case scenarios and resources? Will we work on building better back up generators? Or will everyone in the world just think, hey, wasn't in my backyard - the Japanese must be doing something wrong.

All I have to say to that is, think about Katrina. Consider what would have happened if there'd been a reactor in the path of that storm.

Don't even get me started on Libya...

God Made Everything, Except...

2011-03-15T09:08:00.000-04:00

Tonight, right after saying prayer before eating dinner, Wyatt looked up at us and commented, "God made everything, right? Except traffic lights."

We started laughing, but I will admit, he has a point. Why would God make something that causes so many people to curse Him when they are sitting at one?

Let There Be Milk

2011-03-08T10:46:00.000-05:00

I'm hoping they will unload the barge today. I know it finally arrived here yesterday, but when Oliver went to see if they had milk at the store right before closing, there was a sign up that apologized that nothing had been offloaded as of yet. We've been nursing our last half gallon, but ran out last night, so it was toast and bananas (grown here on Andros - so much better than the stuff you can buy in the States!) for breakfast today.

In truth, I'm kind of getting used to the shortages, so I'm not really peeved about it. We have powdered and canned milk as a back up for cooking, and it's not going to kill us to not drink it for awhile. Lack of choice is definitely not the same as no food at all.

I am, however, getting a good picture of why the buy local campaigns matter. We get most of our food from the States, which gets a lot of it from other countries. When the resupply barge, which comes weekly, is delayed by bad weather (like it was this week - the winds here have been crazy), everything gets dicey.
Add to that early frosts in different countries, including California (as has been reported recently to us), and you get a situation here where not too much choice becomes almost no choice.

Like the complete lack of fresh vegetables lately. I used to count on getting a decent salad at the chow hall, which is pretty much the only reason I enjoy eating there occasionally. The last time we went, though, all they had was lettuce, some sad looking cucumbers, and canned fruit. There wasn't even a potato bar with diced onions, tomatoes, and peppers, which I often use on my salad. The store has had about five kinds of "fresh" vegetables, most of which look like they are going to rot by the time you get them home.

So, I'm really, really grateful for the stuff we've been able to buy that was grown here. There is a big initiative in the Bahamas right now to grow a garden because so much of what they eat is imported. A place like this is much more susceptible to food supply disruptions because of how our food gets here. I hope they are successful at encouraging more local food production. I haven't had a lot of success in our garden the last six months or so, but I just put some more seeds in the ground and am crossing my fingers over them. Wyatt is also in a gardening class once a week after school, and they are growing vegetables in four raised beds next to the school building. It's really awesome sometimes the opportunities that can come from moving around. Gaining new perspectives is by far the reason I can't wrap my head around the idea of ever settling down.

The Guilt Factor, and Why It Had To Go

2011-03-07T14:25:00.000-05:00

Lately, I feel like I've had my eyes opened to a lot of things about myself and the way I live my life. I don't know if it's all the unscheduled time, or the lack of church to attend, or all this uncertainty about what our lives will look like after we leave here, but this last month or so has been one of many deep conversations and even deeper thoughts running through my head. Today, I finally feel like I have a grip on a lot of it, so I'm ready to type it out. Some of you will probably disagree with me, but that's totally okay with me. I can handle disagreement. I'm a big girl, and realize not everyone's world view lines up with mine.

Anyway.

Having been raised the way I was, and with religion as a huge part of it, I think one of the not so great legacies is that I've learned that life is about doing what you have to so you don't feel guilty all the time. It's about what you are supposed to do, not what you want to do. There are so many penalties and fear of your salvation. My parents were masters of the guilt trip, too - they added in a lot of other issues that have made it all magnified for me.

This last year and a half, where all my time is now pretty much my own and I can order it how I will, has lead to a lot of issues for me. I keep wandering around, besieged by guilt that I often can't even place. I'd have good days and I'd have bad ones, but in the end, I felt like I was spinning in circles, avoiding anything that seemed like it "had" to be done.

So, I decided about a month ago that I was getting off the guilt train. I was going to stop feeling guilty period. The first few weeks, quite honestly, I just played video games or surfed the web in between taking care of the family. The house got to be a huge wreck and I didn't really care.

Except, I did on some level. After spending so much time just doing whatever dumb thing I wanted, I realized that my life wasn't just about fun stuff. I have a lot of things I want out of life, and none of them include amusing myself on the computer. And I don't want my main motivator to be guilt anymore. Because it's a terrible motivator, and when I respond to it, I don't feel fulfilled in the end because there is always something more to feel guilty about. I want to live my life focusing on the things that I want out of it, not the fear of what will happen if I don't do all these things that other people say are important.

After having this mind shift, I realized that this week was the first in my life that I actually felt the desire to keep the house clean and didn't mind doing the work required to make that happen. Why? Because I have realized that living in a clean house matters a lot more to me than I thought it did. Because it isn't about what other people think about our house, it's what we who live here think. In that same vein, I'm done apologizing because I didn't do the dishes last night or the living room floor is full of toys when someone happens to drop by. Our life is what we want it to be, not a show piece for others.

I cannot deny the role that religion has played in this. I was raised Mormon, and have stuck with it during my adult life because at heart I believe it is true. However, I think the absolute worst thing about my own religion, and religions in general, is the role guilt always plays in everything. It's always the little edge they stick in there to get people to do stuff. "This calling came straight from God, so you can't say no." Your salvation always seems to be hanging on the edge of whether or not you do every little, tiny thing exactly right, even though people will give lip service to how it doesn't matter if you're perfect.

I've seen the worst of this lately on a few Mormon leaning blogs (although I've seen similar things on other religious blogs, it just didn't affect me the same way because I don't belong to those faiths) that have come up with religious-leaning products to sell to their readers. The selling point is that whatever it is will help your family or you come to Christ in amazing ways. The implied message is that whatever you are doing now isn't enough, and if you don't buy this, you will be poorer for it. I'm so turned off by that kind of marketing. Feel free to explain what you are selling to me, but I don't want to hear about how amazing it will be in my life because you have no way of knowing that. None.

I should say I'm still pretty religious, and I'm going to attend the Mormon church again when we return to the States. I am not, however, going to let anyone guilt trip me into doing things. If a calling really, truly does not fit into my life at that point in time, I'm going to say no. And I'm not going to obsess over it. Sometimes, people don't know what is going on in your life. And if my visiting teaching list is next to impossible for me to accomplish, or I'm having issues with my partner, I'm going to ask for a change.

I don't know why we have always been expected to just take it and go with it because it's such a random slapping together of people. Doesn't it make a little more sense if we give the people putting together these assignments a little more input? Like, when I never had a car and couldn't visit anyone off base without much drama with my husband's command or by making my companion do all the driving? That whole thing was stupid, and the end result was me not doing much at all, when I should have spoken up and asked for change. But there was the unspoken message that you don't do that because it's not right. Except, that makes no freaking sense...

And now that this is starting to shift into something else, I am going to finish up by saying I feel better today, better than I have in a long, long time about my life and the direction it's going. I think sometimes we are afraid to just focus on what we want because we've been taught that these bigger goals someone else set are more important than our own. We've got all these things to check off along the way, instead of trying to forge our own path. I don't think that is really what the core of the gospel is about, but somehow that's the message that often comes across. Like when I lived in Utah and it seemed everyone was checking out what their neighbor was doing to see if they were still living on the straight and narrow.

Then there is the fear that if we just do what we want, we'll go tripping off in the sunset, sinning freely along the way. I don't really feel any great desire to break the covenants I've made or the things I've come to believe strongly in. I want to attend church again, and I would like a calling. I am, however, going to do those things because I want to, not because I feel like I have to. The beautiful thing about consequences is that we get to choose them. If I'm without a husband and don't feel like braving sacrament meeting with my two kids while someone whispers behind me how annoyed they are because my boys are loud (true story), I'll stay home and not fret about it. I'll accept the consequence that maybe I'll miss out on something, or maybe my kids will get the wrong message. Or, I'll take them and try to ignore the people around me because I'm trying to teach my sons something about how important church is even when we are tired and feel forgotten by those there. Either way, it's my choice to make, and not something to freak out about over and over again. I regret how many times I've done that.

I'm not going to wrap this up well because my three year old needs me to spend time with him playing Duplos. And I want to make him happy more than I want to give this blog post a nice, clean conclusion. I do need to stress, though, that I feel more in control of my life now that I ever have. I get to choose how to feel, where to go, and what I want out of life. And guilt, well, I'm done with that for good.

Is Anyone Out There Unaware We Have a Military?

2011-02-23T16:07:00.001-05:00

Ha, look at that, two posts in one day. In one hour no less. After I wrote my last post, though, I went over to Navy Times to look at the latest newsfeeds. This article caught my attention. Apparently, the Air Force, Army, and National Guard are all quite invested (as in, millions of dollars) in sponsoring NASCAR race teams. Recently, attention has been drawn to this due to the crazy deficits, and all the cutting going on in such things as veterans services and Medicaid. Spending so much on race cars seems a little silly and an easy target.

Except, apparently a majority of congressmen and women in the House didn't agree, and shot down a vote to ban this kind of thing. I guess they agree with Lt. Gen. Benjamin C. Freakley, who said in defense of these programs, "I have to make some form of investment to make the American people aware of their Army..."

Oh, really. I didn't realize there were actually people out there who didn't know we had an army. This has got to be one of the most pithy excuses for money wasted I've read yet.

Random Stuff, Cuz I'm All Out of Well Written Stuff

2011-02-23T15:42:00.002-05:00

Yeah, mental diarrhea, this post is it. Because if I don't resort to this, I will never post again. Really. I think one of the major problems I have with blogging is that I keep approaching it like an essay. It's got to be put together, polished, have a point. And pictures, well, of course you should somehow manage a picture. So when I sit down to write, it suddenly seems like a chore, something best put off until I can't avoid it. Which is why I never post since this is clearly not an essential part of my life, like making sure my child is wearing pants (ah, the kid just ran past without them again! This is what I get for cloth diapering - they were just so darn cute I never wanted to cover them up, and now he thinks life is much better that way; problem is, three is not a good age to be doing this anymore).

Anyway.

I don't think my three year old is ever going to potty train. Seriously. Somehow he went from being absurdly precocious on the potty on his second birthday to going through four pairs of undies a day. All while never missing a single poop, and never doing much more than making them too wet to wear. Oh, and did I mention that he almost never has an accident when we travel or are at someone else's house? Even long flights where they tell us no, it's too turbulent to take your kid to the bathroom. What the heck?

We no longer blame it on a bladder problem and instead think it's a laziness/don't want to leave what I'm doing issue. Or maybe a "drive my parents crazy" issue. How to solve it though? Apparently, nothing works. And we've tried them all, trust me. We're currently taking away a Thomas train every time he has an accident, then giving one back when he keeps them dry. Like everything else, this worked for awhile. This afternoon, after his second incident, I told him I was taking three trains because I was so annoyed. He helped me put them in time out, actually getting angry at me not because I took them, but because he couldn't choose them and out them in time out himself...

Clearly, he's winning this war.

When we moved here, the bugs were horrendous. We'd go to the beach and be attacked by these huge, biting flies. You'd slap them, but it was really only enough to stun them, so you had to be quick and bury them in the sand if you didn't want them flying off and to attack someone else.

Then there were the mosquitoes. And the tiny flies called noseeums because, really, you never saw them, just felt the little bloodsuckers eating you. I actually thought when we first got off the plane that the air felt different, more tingly. Um, nope. Just tiny flies whose bites sort of felt like getting hit with blowing sand or something.

After a year here, this seems to be a non-issue. Weirdly, we are no longer bothered by most of these bugs. I still hear visitors and some residents complain, though, so I'm not sure if it means our bodies are adapting and somehow repelling them. Or, we just got lucky and they all fly the other direction. Maybe a Doctor fly survived being buried in sand and warned them. Honestly, I don't care what worked as long as it keeps working. I was getting a little tired of having to talk our kids into going outside because they spent the first six months here afraid of the bugs. (Aren't I raising boys here??!!)

Unfortunately for Wyatt, however, we did discover a new bug issue recently. During a rousing game of hide and seek outside, he decided to hide under our back steps. A few seconds later, he came flying around the corner screaming his head off about how much it hurt. Turns out, there was a five inch long hornets nest under there. Thankfully, it was on the side he didn't enter from so he never touched it, but he still ended up with four stings from the episode. Two on the butt. I'll spare you the photos because I didn't take any (hey, I'm not that bad at this mothering thing), but suffice it to say it was a very long evening. At least I now know that my mother's remedy of a baking soda paste works pretty well on bee stings.

I did get a picture of the hive, but it's still on my camera. If anyone has an actual interest in seeing it, I'll force myself to get it on here. Otherwise, I'll just leave it there to whip out when we retell Wyatt's friends the dramatic story of his bee stings. Because they've all heard it. Actually, we can just take them outside and point it out because pest control's idea of getting rid of a hive is to just spray it down. They don't actually remove it. Or at least, they didn't get rid of ours. Now I am just going to have to keep checking it to make sure a nice family of yellow jackets doesn't move into the nicely built, yet abandoned by death, home. Wait, do they even have yellow jackets here?

Finally, to show you I do still believe in pictures, if not the kind I have to take and upload and edit first, here's a pic of what we plan to order for Wyatt to keep him somewhat occupied this summer:

Except I made the mistake of looking it up while he was home after he'd been told he couldn't do the Lego Mindstorms (a set where you build robots and program them) after-school class starting up this week. They set the age at 8 and up, but forgot to tell anyone until we'd all signed up our too-young kids for it and got them all excited.

So, clearly, he was upset about it, and I was trying to mollify him. At first I thought I'd just see if they would give us one of the Mindstorms kits to do at home, but after looking it up online, I discovered they have a more entry level robotics set aimed right at Wyatt's age. It's also cheaper than the Mindstorms, thank heavens. It's still going to set us back a couple hundred with shipping, but considering the lack of anything for him to do here this summer, it's totally worth it. Not to mention that teaching your six year old the basics of programming is pretty awesome. After I figure out how to do it myself, that is.

Unfortunately, he is so incredibly excited about doing it he asks me four times a day if I've ordered it yet. He has no real concept of how far it is till summer vacation, so it's been tough to explain the time frame. I finally told him that we'd order it about the time he took his big class trip to Nassau in April (yeah, I'm so going on that one - how cool that my kindergartner is going to take a plane for a class day-trip). That is a little bit more concrete to him because he has to wait for that to happen. Hopefully, that stops all the begging.

Oh, did I mention my kids have grown a ridiculous amount since moving here? In the last year, Wyatt has put on 3 inches, and Oscar has shot up 3 1/2. Eesh. No wonder I've had to spend so much time rotating clothes. Most of Oscar's outgrown stuff is getting dumped in the charity bin on base to be used for needy families here on the island. Kids' stuff is really hard to come by here, so I'm happy it can go to a good home. I really don't need to lug around outgrown clothes on the faint thought that we might, someday, have another kid.

With all this growing, Wyatt is only about an inch away from being able to ride all the rides at amusement parks. Maybe now his dad will stop asking me to go on roller coasters with him. That would be awesome.

Valentine's Day Surprise

2011-02-14T19:15:00.000-05:00

This afternoon when school let out, I took the boys to a Valentine's Day party for the youngest kids on base. It was fun, and there was a kid-size bouncy house for them to play with. I ended up staying later than I'd planned so they could run around the playground with their friends. By the time we got home, it was pushing 1730.

I'd mixed up some pizza dough before leaving, and knew it was sitting in the fridge waiting for me. I was dreading facing it when I walked to see Oliver setting the table. Turns out, he'd gone to the store, picked up stuff for a stir fry, and it was ready and waiting for us to eat when we got there.

Totally the best Valentine's Day present ever! I can't remember the last time I came home from something to dinner on the table. That is typically my job, and Oliver is not at all comfortable in the kitchen. The total unexpectedness of it was the cherry on the top. I think I made out in the husband department.

MMB Post

2011-02-11T19:21:00.000-05:00

I may be lousy at blogging here lately, but I am keeping up with my once a month posts at MMB. Here's my latest!

Zumba!!

2011-02-11T00:24:00.002-05:00

They started a Zumba class here last week. I happened to see the paper advertising an introductory class on the day it was being held. I'd already gone running that day, so I wasn't too excited about getting all sweaty and tired again. I skipped it, but hoped they would do it again. I found out on Tuesday while working a food stand at a football game (raising money for the school) that it is going to be a twice a week class now. Mondays and Thursdays in the evening.

So, I went tonight. It's pretty much a woman who has the DVDs and knows the steps guilding us through it while we watch the video. I found it a lot harder to follow than the class I went to this summer with a live instructor, but it was okay. Still fun to do. I'm going to try to get to it at least once a week to break up the running. Especially since I came home with my stomach aching. I don't get much core work done running, and that's where the baby making wreaked serious havoc, so this is very good.

I have to admit, I thought it was kind of funny at the end of it that everyone was going on about tired they were, and how they were going to go home and take a nice long bath. Me? I went to the gym and ran a mile at a fast pace (for me) because I was feeling that good. Exercise is awesome.

Check Those Expiration Dates

2011-02-03T18:21:00.000-05:00

I'm not entirely sure why, but apparently the store here can sell anything past its expiration date if it wants. Typically, I know I am buying something like that when it goes on sale. This is the only thing that ever goes on sale, so I'm completely out of the habit of waiting for things to go on sale. Mostly, if it's cheap and I'm not planning on using it right away, I steer clear.

This afternoon, Oscar and I went to the store on a mission to pick up some new batteries for a toy walkie talkie that was dying. I was also after milk and a couple other things. When we made it to the check out counter, he asked me for an ice cream out of the cold case next to the counter. It's rare I buy any of the individual ice creams, but since it was warm out, and Oliver was home giving Wyatt his first lesson on how to ride a bike without the training wheels (eesh, that is going to take awhile...), I decided why not and picked up enough for everyone.

Seven bucks later, we returned home with them and our other purchases. When I started opening them for the kids, though, I realized the brownie chunks on top (it was an upside-down sundae) looked a tad old. Flipping over the carton, I read the date: September 2010.

Evidently, not everything old goes on sale. Sometimes, it just sits around until some ~~careless~~ unsuspecting soul walks by and picks it up. I really need to get better about checking dates on everything, not just dairy.

Vacation Plans this Summer

2011-01-29T19:36:00.000-05:00

We are talking pretty seriously about taking a cruise this summer. We need to get out, as Wyatt is sure to be a little stir crazy with no more school to attend. We also want to take a little more advantage of the area we live in. Plus, we went on a cruise soon after we were married and loved it. That one was only 4 days long, so we are looking at doing one that is at least a week and hits up some of the different island countries around us (the Bahamas not on that list, hopefully).

Hopefully, Oliver's leave dates jive with the cruise company we prefer. We'll see. At least we have a much greater chance of that happening living here.

Been MIA

2011-01-18T21:30:00.000-05:00

I know I haven't posted much lately. I've thought about it, but can't bring myself to sit down. Too much going through me head right now. Nothing bad, but deep thoughts.

Oliver is taking the chief test this week for the first time. We aren't expecting big things, and actually would prefer he not get picked up right away, anyway. He made rank so fast, there's plenty of time for it. Being first class is kind of a sweet spot in the Navy - enough pay to be comfortable, he's now allowed to retire, yet not so much responsibility at work that he has to stay late over and over again. There are always tradeoffs to everything.

My mother bought Wyatt a sandcastle kit for Christmas. It's funny, because a few years ago, she sent him a snowman kit that we made use for a couple winters. He's been raring to use it ever since we got back, and we finally obliged this weekend. I'm sad I forgot to grab the camera; Oliver built a pretty elaborate castle compound, and I managed a bug, complete with sea shell mandibles (Wyatt brought home a book all about ants from school, so he was excited that he recognized what they were).

I don't think I'll ever get used to spending time at the beach in January. I will, however, always remember these times as good ones.

MMB Post

2011-01-07T18:34:00.000-05:00

Two Sides to Every Story, Even From a Cigarette

My latest post on MMB.

Great to Be Back

2011-01-05T21:01:00.000-05:00

We just spent a week in the Northeast. It was fun, our kids met their cousins and they seemed to like them a lot, and I reconnected with siblings I haven't seen in far too long. We also got to go skiing, and Wyatt realized his dream of building a snowman and having a snowball fight.

It was freezing, though. Literally. When our plane landed today, I was so happy to be home. Happier than I think I've been on any other trip we've taken. Not because this trip was bad, because it certainly wasn't, but because I have never before appreciated so much the niceness of living in a place where you can wear shorts in January.

Wow, it's good to be home!

Random Stuff, Christmas Edition

2010-12-23T12:21:00.001-05:00

I can't seem to get myself to post on here lately. It's not really a time thing; the island has, if that's even possible, slowed down even more due to the silence on the range. Also, everyone that wanted to and was able to has gotten on a plane for the States. Christmas seems to be the big holiday to escape. We prefer to celebrate it at home, because it's a bit of a complicated holiday to do at someone else's house now that we have kids. New Year's, though, is more fun with other people so I'm glad we are taking the second leave. Also, this should mean (crossing my fingers) that we won't have to fight so many people getting on the plane ourselves. We will see.

So, just a few random thoughts in this post. After being so horribly sick, I finally went running this past weekend after nearly two weeks off. What we had settled into our lungs, and Oliver was actually on antibiotics to help clear up the infection, so I was afraid to run for awhile, thinking it might make it all worse. I was so happy to find I could manage a mile and a half without coughing at all.

I've since gone out again, and nearly stepped on a snake. They have little ones here that often look like sticks when you don't look too closely. I don't believe they are poisonous, but I still had no interest in disturbing its sleep in the middle of the road. So, I took a fly leap mid-stride and managed to clear it. The snake didn't even move.

Going back to the illness, I went to the "mall" yesterday (where most of the places you'd go to get things done, like the post office, pay offices, barber shop, etc. are) to go cash a check. As I was walking away, I passed a couple people who were talking. I heard a woman say she, "wanted to give you a Chirstmas hug, but I've got the bug" to a man. He didn't ask her what she was referring to, but shrugged and reliplied he'd already had it.

I just though it was funny that in a place as small as this, we don't have to ask what kind of bug it is. We just know because it has gone through everyone in some fashion. As Oliver said jokingly to me, curse those range users who come here with their germs!

Actually, this also reminds me of what someone said to us when we first got here. They give you yellow, temporary badges for the first few weeks, which is also the same color visitors get. A guy Oliver works with told him to be sure to get our permanent badges ASAP because the yellow ones marked us as plague carriers. We had a good laugh over it at the time, but now I know exactly what he was talking about!

Now we're two days from Christmas, and it still doesn't feel like it. The complete and utter lack of snow is a telling issue, but more than that is the fact that we are still wearing t shirts and shorts, as I have grown up with many non-white Christmases. We took the boys for a walk around the neighborhood to see the houses that were decked out with lights last night. It made it feel a tad more Christmasy, but still, we didn't even bring jackets. I was glad for my long pants, though.

I remember having the same problem last year. This year, we did manage to go to more of the Christmas stuff they did, like the carnival where they set up booths that looked kind of like shops. There was a "Woodshop" filled with free kits from Home Depot for the kids to pick one and build it right there. There was also a "Bakery" where they could decorate a couple cookies with icing and various decorating choices. There were other things, too, but those were our favorites.

They also did a live nativity, and a short community sing-along after. It made me miss singing; there isn't even a church here to sing at. I really couldn't manage to be in the ward choir when I lived in Washington due to having two very small kids and no husband most Sundays, but I'll have to make time for it when we move back to the States. I do love singing.

Well, that's about it for the moment. I did get my ornament from the Mrs.' ornament swap, so I hope to get my act together and actually post a pic of it, but we will see. Getting my act together doesn't seem to be happening much lately. Merry Christmas (if I don't post again before it)!

Reality Check

2010-12-14T17:44:00.000-05:00

I went outside today to spend some time taking care of my plants. They've been sorely neglected during this last week of sickness. I haven't done more than throw a little water their way. So, I had some stuff to take care of.

I was dragging the hose out and directing the water where it was needed, trying to avoid getting wet myself, when I had a bit of a reality check over how cold (or not) it really is. Despite my best efforts, some water got on my hands, and I winced, bracing for a very cold intrusion.

Here's the thing, though; the water was warm. Add to that the fact that I was even growing anything at all, and not worried about frost, and it was clear to me that my body is a whole lot more sensitive to this cold than it used to be. My guess is it's in the mid '50s at night, considering the temperature inside is about 60 to 64 in the morning when we get up. This is early fall weather where I grew up.

I remember running outside last year, thinking it was the perfect weather for it. I also didn't think I would have any use for the long yoga pants I used to run in. I think I'll be pulling those out as soon as I'm healthy enough to run again.

Oh, and did I tell you we were taking a trip right after Christmas to the Northeast? While I hope for snow for our boys' sake, and we are strongly considering a ski trip, we are going to be freezing!!

Attacked with the Flu...Or so it seems

2010-12-12T19:54:00.000-05:00

Ugh, we have been sick, people, so sick! And I've had a very bad attitude about it because we hardly ever get sick. This one, though, was pretty nasty. Four days running, and it's still hanging around. It seems to be all over the base. At one point, about a quarter of the school was out sick. This being such a small school, it was pretty noticeable. One little girl in Wyatt's class actually missed the entire week. He only missed Friday, and that was mostly because we were too sick to take him. Although, he was hit hard later in the day, so it was a good thing we kept him home.

I'm just really grateful that I had a husband around. We've been tag-teaming it, and have mostly been able to keep everyone taken care of. I can't remember the last time that happened.

I can tell I'm on the mend as I actually spent two hours cleaning up the wreck of our house (really, just getting the worst of it done), and actually made a meal that didn't consist of pasta in some form. Hopefully, this week will be much better and we'll be able to catch up on stuff. None of which will include shopping as that has all been done by now. And if it hasn't been bought, it won't be as there's little guarantee we'll get it in time for Christmas. There's a pretty big backlog of mail in Florida, from what I've heard, so now I'm mostly just hoping that the aircraft carrier we got Wyatt, the very last thing to get here, will come in time. We shall see.

Here's hoping this post finds all of you in much better health!

P.S. My suspicions about the flu shot being less than effective have been confirmed. I'm not positive this is the flu, but the symptoms are very much the same. The boys and I did not have shots, but Oliver had to because he's military. He's just as sick as we are. I will continue to follow our policy of not getting shots.

Brrrrr!

2010-12-07T08:25:00.000-05:00

So, we have discovered recently that one of the downsides to having moved to our much larger trailer is that it doesn't have any heat. I was very grateful last year that we did have heat, as it got chilly at night. For the most part, we only ran it until about 1000, then sometimes switched back to the air conditioner when the sun started beating through our windows (yeah, the weirdness of living in a tropical environment). I am much happier living in the new place, but the lack of heat is a real bummer. A year of living here has made our blood thinner, I think. Plus, Washington was never really that bad; I actually got rid of all my sweaters while living there because it never got cold enough for them.

This morning, I became aware that we were going to have to do something about our missing heat. The thermostat read 66, and our boys were up at 0530, a whole hour earlier than is normal for them. Our room was pretty cold, and we had used an extra blanket on our bed, but our kids tend to kick off their blankets as they sleep. I haven't bought blanket sleepers for them in forever, so I can't really bundle them up like that, either. Oscar and I are actually bundled up on the couch watching cartoons because the house feels chilly. I even turned the oven on in an attempt to take some of the chilliness off.

In some ways, it's a nice change from the extreme heat of summer, but I really think we need something other than the oven to warm up the house. So, I just ordered a space heater. I was afraid it would be hard to find someone to ship one here, but Amazon had a bunch of them to choose from. I picked up an oil circulated one because it's safe enough to use in the boys room without supervision. I hope it works; if it does, I'm getting another one for our room. Then, we can move them to the living area, which is sort of like one big room with a wall in the center. That should be enough to kill the chill in the morning before the sun gets going.

Excuse Me?

2010-12-03T21:05:00.000-05:00

So, we took a shopping trip to the States this week. Despite the usual travel hassles, we got most of what we needed to do there done. One of our first stops was Whole Foods, so we'd have time to get our Rubbermaid container packed and shipped off at the post office the next morning. All four of us went in, and things were going well until Wyatt decided he needed to use the bathroom. Oliver took him, leaving me with Oscar who was sitting in the cart.

No problem, right? Well, that was true until we walked over to the spice aisle. Oscar watched me pick out a couple bottles of vanilla extract and apparently decided he would help me out. I glanced over to see him toss a bottle of peppermint extract into the cart. I handed it back to him and told him to return it. He did, but somehow managed to knock something else off the shelf that promptly shattered on the floor. I pulled him back immediately and reprimanded him for it, then looked around for a store employee to tell about the mess.

It was maybe 30 seconds later that I caught sight of a couple people chatting near a couple of swinging doors. I was just about to make my way over to them when a woman swept past me and told them that "someone broke something" and pointed it out. I stayed to be sure it was going to be taken care of, then turned around to see Oliver returning.

I was in the middle of telling him what had happened when the woman who had swept past me earlier walked up and asked if it was my kid that broke the bottle (she'd been standing in the aisle when it happened and clearly knew it was). When I said yes, she proceeded to tell me I should have told someone, and when I said I'd been looking for someone which is why I hadn't walked away, she said, and I quote, "Those people were standing there for ten minutes" (exaggerate much, lady?). Then she said something about how I should have used the experience to teach my kid better behavior, then stormed off when I didn't give her the answer she wanted. (I'm still not sure what she was getting at - I needed to make my three year old clean it up? He already knew he'd done something wrong. I didn't let him think it was perfectly okay to break stuff in stores.)

The whole thing left me a little baffled. I mean, I get that my kid did something he shouldn't, but since when is it some random stranger's job to give me parenting lessons? I cannot see myself getting in someone's face just because I perceive they are not teaching their kids correctly. And, really, what does she know about me or my kids, or even what actually lead to the incident? (We had a discussion with Wyatt the next day about how he needs to not point out every person he sees smoking and inform us they are doing some bad - loudly - as people have the right to their own choices. Oliver pointed out that he didn't want his son growing up into some person that would tell other people in the grocery store how to parent their kids. I thought it was hilarious, but obviously, you had to be there!)

Anyway, all this leads to the real issue I have facing me, one which she had no idea about (ignorance makes us such experts, doesn't it): after a year living on an island with no traffic, a store the size of a Seven Eleven where all the people inside smile at whatever antic my boys do, no real restaurants to eat out at, and almost no experience having to deal with crowds or people they don't know, my boys are a little on the wild side. It's frustrating to me (and this is why I found that whole exchange so upsetting) because they were actually pretty easy to take into public before we moved here. We'd worked a lot with them, teaching them how to behave, and were proud of how we could take them to nearly any place and have a decent time as long as we didn't overstay their ability to keep it together.

Now, though, they have adapted to a completely different lifestyle. What works here doesn't work so well in civilization. This is especially true for Oscar, who barely remembers his time in the States. There's unfortunately not much I can do about it. I can't really train them here to react to situations they aren't exposed to. It's too abstract for them. Mostly we just try to keep them close and head off problems when they arise (Oliver actually ended up taking both boys to sit on a bench outside Whole Foods after that incident with the crazy lady and a more minor one later with Wyatt). It's not perfect, but I don't see what else I can do.

On the plus side, they have adapted to life here very well, and we don't really have any problems here. Hopefully that means that when we move back, we'll have an adjustment period, and then they'll relearn how to act amongst people again. Here's hoping we don't run into any more people who feel the need to lecture others on how to do things. (Can I tell you how much I am dreading doing sacrament meeting again with these two? /shudder)

Overdue Thanksgiving Post

2010-11-29T22:46:00.001-05:00

I've been thinking some deep thoughts this week, hence the lack of posting. We've also had the whole family home most of the week, with Wyatt's Thanksgiving vacation over tomorrow. It's been fabulous having everyone around, and blogging hasn't been high on my list of things to do. I thought I'd catch up with a couple things tonight, and maybe write something longer later this week.

I had a couple posts on MMB this week. You can find them here:

Our Marriage Begat a Fabulous Cake
Changing Perspectives

We had a great Thanksgiving. Once again, it was spent doing something entirely different. I think our lifestyle is not particularly conducive to building traditions. Or maybe our tradition is to do something new every year. Can that even be a tradition? Who knows, but we went swimming this year at the Blue Hole. Having spent most of my life in a much colder climate, the idea of swimming outside in something unheated was completely foreign to me. Until this year. The water was perfect, although we were a little afraid it would be cold when we got there. We had the place to ourselves for the most part, although a couple tour groups came through near the end of our stay.

We followed our swimming with another first: Thanksgiving in the dining hall. Curious, yes, but it was actually pretty good. And they had fresh strawberries. And kiwis. And real mashed potatoes. Oh, and I didn't have to do any of the work. Doing a turkey would have meant no Blue Hole trip, and since this is one of the rare times the dining hall has really good fare, we figured it would be silly not to go. It was somewhat weird to to sit in a mess hall setup and eat our Thanksgiving meal on trays (they did decorate the place, at least), but we saw friends and it was better than just doing our own thing at home.

The only downside was the dessert, which seemed a rather lame selection of formerly frozen, boxed pies. I ended up with vanilla ice cream and strawberries, a treat I miss very much, so all was well on that front. The next day, I made eggnog ice cream out of the last of our eggnog, and it was amazing, so I don't think anyone ended up feeling sad about the lame dessert.

Finally, I wanted to add a short list of some of the things I've been thankful over the last year:

A year spent together. Even on duty nights, Oliver is home. The only nights I've had to sleep alone were a couple weeks he was on midwatch, but since he was home during the day, it wasn't even close to the same as the boat schedule we've endured most of our married life.
Wyatt is finally adjusting to school, and loving it. He's made friends and is learning a lot. With a couple exceptions, he's doing mostly first grade work, and we are going to consider skipping him a grade when we return to the States.
I'm so grateful for how much I've grown as a person. I've been faced with a lot of challenges this year that I did not expect, and would not have had if we hadn't moved here. It's been an incredible opportunity to learn more about myself, my marriage, my role as a mother, and a lot of other things too numerous to mention here.
I'm grateful we are finally feeling comfortable here. We had a rough start, most of which I have not spent time dwelling on in this blog, but suffice it to say that it took some serious adjusting over the first eight or so months. Some of it was expected, some of it not so much. It's okay now, though, and I appreciate that more than I can express.
Finally, I am grateful for the opportunity to move into a double-wide trailer. It's pretty much the best housing you can hope for here, and while we wavered a bit as to if we wanted to do all the work of moving, it was completely worth it. We no longer feel all crammed in, and I have finally lost that weird sense of vacation living that I could not shake in the much smaller trailer with it's thin walls.

Happy Thanksgiving to one and all! I hope yours was as enjoyable as ours!

Food is Awesome

2010-11-20T23:26:00.000-05:00

As you probably already know by my last post, living here has given me a healthy appreciation for being able to feed my family. Every time I find a new solution to it, I am so excited. Tonight, though, is probably the happiest I've been in awhile over it.

I was reading some random blog tonight and decided to look up a site they talked about as a source for coconut oil. I really can't buy coconut oil here, so what we do have we buy in the States. I figured they wouldn't actually ship to us, or it would be expensive, but figured a look costs nothing but time.

Hello, I feel like I hit a gold mine! Not only do they ship to APO/FPO (and even DPOs), but they do it for FREE! I actually started looking for some tribute to the military page or something because there was no explanation for it. They do charge shipping for all other orders, so that made it even odder. But, completely, incredibly awesome.

So, I just spent $150 on a huge order of stuff I'd been waiting to buy when we go to the States in a couple of weeks. They had a 15% off coupon, plus some specials on things we needed, so that cut the price quite a bit. Because I ordered it online using our FPO address, I also didn't have to pay tax, which means it pretty much beats any price I'd get at Whole Foods, which is where I was buying most of what I ordered. This also means less stuff we have to manage when we go. Less time shopping, more time having fun. I'm all for that one.

As an added bonus, this is a website that specializes in organics and other items that are high on the healthy list. I'm a bit of a health food freak, and intensely picky about what food I buy for our family, something that has only gotten worse with time. Feeding us was actually the biggest issue I worried about when we decided to come here after what I'd heard of the place.

Surprisingly, I think we are actually eating a lot healthier now. Between the lack of restaurant options (we were so bad about eating out in Washington!), ridiculously expensive meat that has lead us to eating more vegetarian, and high-priced processed goods (we had a $4.99 bag of Tostito's corn chips today for a snack), not to mention all the things like ice cream I now make from scratch just because we can't buy anything we like here, our meals are a lot more basic. I'm guessing that has been a huge factor in our weight loss, besides the running. Which is good, because I'm not one to diet. I so have no ability to control myself like that.

If you're interested, here's the link to their site. I'm not getting anything out of this post except an opportunity to share my excitement. When we go back to the States, I'm so going to buy some grass-fed beef, too. I never realized I could order something like that. I looked for it in Washington but never found it in the stores near us.

Surprise!

2010-11-19T22:36:00.000-05:00

I walked into the store today hoping there would be some new produce. The barge came in yesterday, and there was some stuff, but not a lot when I went on Thursday. So, I returned today soon after it opened at lunchtime. The produce case looked exactly the same, and I was looking at it sadly when a guy passing by told me a shipment of produce had just arrived from Nassau so I should come back later.

I greatly appreciate tips like this! As I was walking out the door, I actually saw the truck pull up and the first boxes come out of it. I saw one that looked like asparagus, so I did a little happy dance on the way home. I've never seen them stock fresh asparagus. It's amazing how excited you can get about produce when it's hard to come by.

Anyway, to make a long story short, our afternoon got busy, and I didn't get another chance to go back until after 1700. The produce had been stocked, and I came home with bananas, squash, lettuce, tomatoes that didn't look scary (a rarity - I can't wait until my plants start producing!), and a few other things.

The bad news? No asparagus. And to make matters worse, I found a single spear underneath something else, so I had been right about it. Too bad other people beat me to it. Also, there were no potatoes again. This is a real bummer because it most likely means no mashed potatoes for Thanksgiving. I wish I'd been on top of this and bought some a few weeks ago. Ah, well, such is life.

The very good news at the end of this, though, is that while I was walking down the freezer/refrigerated food aisle (yes, there is only one short aisle for both types of food), I happened across some eggnog. There were only about six or seven half gallons left, and I grabbed two of them. One for right away, and one to save for Thanksgiving morning.

I am so excited about this find! We somehow missed the eggnog last year, although I heard rumors that it had been stocked at one point. It's been two years without it, and I have missed it! Hopefully, we don't clean through it so fast I can't make eggnog bread with it.

Media Problems When You Leave the US

2010-11-19T00:11:00.000-05:00

It's great to live outside the country. Even when what you call home is a rather large island with hardly any people on it. It's a once-in-a-lifetime chance to see things in a way you'd never thought possible. It's also an opportunity to realize that every movie studio, video game maker, and TV purveyor is intent on making your life miserable.

To get some idea of what I'm talking about, here is a list of things we are prevented from doing because our IP address is foreign:

Watch TV online - unless you are talking about YouTube, which is a terrible way to try to catch shows you missed. So, no Army wives for me anymore. I'm sure Oliver is relieved.
Use the wireless feature on your game console. I had blamed our tightly controlled internet for this one, but I actually don't think it's their fault anymore. I'm fairly certain that Nintendo has made it impossible for us to network our Wii here. Not a killer situation, but annoying.
Netflix, well, that's the real story here...

See, I decided to sign up for a free trial. I've seen people here picking up their red envelopes in the post office, so I figured it was worth a try to see how fast the mail is. Because our mail comes in on the same plane we use, it's only slightly slower than when we were in the U.S. So, I thought maybe it'd be worth it.

Except, I've since discovered that while packages (pretty much all we deal with for the most part) go directly to Florida to be sorted and sent to our plane, letters for some idiot reason go to New York City first. So, the DVD I mailed last Thursday to a place in Florida has only today been received and a new one sent out. A new one that will head north before it returns south. Um, yeah, that means, if we are lucky, we'll be getting about 3 DVDs a month.

In truth, I expected something like that, which is why I had yet to sign up for it. We were actually hoping to use the instant watching feature with an occasional DVD as a bonus. Then we could get some TV shows and movies that we can't watch easily right now (and we both hate watching TV as TV - the commercials are too irritating - it's not on much in our house).

Turns out, however, that Netflix also blocks access to people outside the country. This annoys me greatly because I have a U.S. address, and I'm a U.S. citizen. Since I'm clearly the person using the account, why can we not have permission to watch this stuff? These distribution laws are maddening.

Yeah, that Netflix account? Totally being canceled as soon as this month is up.

Have Kids, Will Travel

2010-11-18T05:20:00.014-05:00

Wyatt has been telling me lately that he'd like to move. I was baffled the first time, and then worried that he was unhappy about something. But, he seems like he likes it here, and I know he's very much enjoying school and having all these kids to play with.

Then, last night he asked me if he had school the next morning. I told him yes, and he started getting upset. I asked him why, because I know he is having fun in school, and the complaining about it has gone down a huge amount in the last few weeks.

His answer? "I want to go on a trip. Trips are more fun than school."

Clearly, the traveling gene is being passed on to our eldest. I think it might also be in our youngest because he started clamoring to go on a plane after listening to this conversation. Luckily for them, traveling is one of our favorite things to do. And lucky for us, they travel well. Sometimes, this parenting thing totally works.

Free Canning Jars

2010-11-17T22:02:00.000-05:00

I think I've found the perfect canning jars. And they are totally free. Well, okay, I'm still having to buy them, but since they come filled with sauce, the jar is a bonus, otherwise destined for the garbage as they don't recycle here. Instead, I'm learning how many things can be recycled at home, something I think is probably better for the earth than trucking it off to some factory to be reformed into something.

I don't have big plans to can or anything, but since making pickles, I've been flirting with the idea of buying canning jars. I'm using glass jars more and more for things, nearly all of them recycled from other things I've bought. This is working for the most part, but I'm getting tired of the random lid sizes. Lose a lid and it's nearly impossible to replace. Also, it can be difficult to find the right lid when there is only one that will fit correctly. Ordering jars over the internet, however, is an expensive proposition. It also wouldn't be too easy to bring very many back on the plane.

Unwittingly, however, Oliver solved my problem a few weeks ago when he brought home some pasta sauce I'd requested. There aren't too many choices at the store - I think they stock all of four brands of pasta sauce. I have tried most of them, as they don't carry what I used to buy, and Bertolli has been the best tasting brand available to us. This Classico stuff is tolerable, thankfully, because I want the jars. Take a look at them:

These Classico jars, though, are fantastic. They are decently sized, and take a normal sized canning lid. I also like that they are square shaped, and pretty heavy duty. They sit side by side a lot better than round jars. As you can see, I'm already using them to hold beans.

The biggest issue? I only have three jars at the moment. I guess we'll be having spaghetti a little more often now.

Finally. the End

2010-11-15T21:44:00.001-05:00

Of the Halloween candy, that is. I breathed a sigh of relief when Oscar mournfully told me the last of the candy was gone one morning this past weekend. We started out regulating it, but finally gave up and let them have at it just to get it over with. The only rule we really stuck to was no candy between when Wyatt got home from school and dinner. Otherwise, whatever.

I'm pleased to report they still showed some restraint. It took over a week after we more or less gave them free rein with it. Oscar did ask me today when he was going to get more. He wasn't too happy when I told him he'd have to wait a year. I'd say that was good news for me, though!

Shutterfly and the Free Cards

2010-11-14T19:07:00.000-05:00

Curiously enough, I had a passing thought a few weeks ago about actually doing Christmas cards this year. You know, something really Bahamian and summery looking. To explain how weird that was, you have to realize that I have sent Christmas cards exactly once in my adult life. (I'm not counting the year I did a ten minute video about our year that combined pictures and home video clips set to music - was much fun, but I haven't been able to get myself to do it again.) The year I sent cards was also the year that we had a freak snowstorm in November a few years ago when we lived in Washington. We built a snowman, and while doing so, took this great picture of Wyatt sitting on top of the largest ball. He was about two years old, and it was a fantastically sunny day, so the picture came out looking really good. I saw it and immediately thought, "Hey, Christmas card material!"

So, my thought this year, while unusual, was also probably not going to be acted on. Until I ran across Shutterfly's blogger promotion. Go here if you want to see for yourself, but I'll explain briefly. Basically, I will get a code for 50 free holiday cards (shipping not included) if I write up a post using their guidelines. If you follow the above link, you can apply to do the same, assuming you have a blog yourself.

So, in the interest of getting some free cards so my relatives can actually see what our kids look like these days, I'm taking the time to write up a post. Also, I am doing this because I like Shutterfly. It's been my site of choice for photos for a long time, and I appreciate that they will ship out here for a reasonable price. At this point in my life, that is the hallmark of a good business. I have no idea if they are the best, but I tend to stick with what works, so I keep going back to them.

Oh, before I talk about Christmas cards, I'm adding a link to their photo books. I made one after our trip to Hawaii a few years ago because they sent me a code for a free one. I ended up spending some money on it because I made it twice as long as the code allowed, but it came out pretty nice. The boys still occasionally ask us to read it to them like it was a story book.

Okay, on to Christmas cards. This first one reminds me a lot of the one I sent out last time:

It was a flat card, and I made sure to leave a space on it to add a personal message before I mailed it. I always hate getting preprinted Christmas cards in the mail. I mean, if I'm going to get a card from someone I know, I'd much prefer they actually wrote something to me, even if it's just a two liner. Even one of those Christmas letters is better than a generic, "Have a Merry Christmas! Love, person-you-know".

Actually, looking at this again, I don't think I'll be using this card. Not much space on it, although there is always the back, I guess. However, since I don't like how pen often makes marks on the front, too, when you write, I think I'm going to go with something like this:

Or maybe this one instead:

I think the main question will be whether to go simple or photo-happy. Considering the huge amount of pictures on my hard drive, most taken just this year because I made backups and wiped the old computer before we moved, I suspect I will end up with the photo-overload card. Also, that gives me more fodder for conversation when I fill them out. Decisions, decisions...

Well, while I go ponder that, I'll leave you with one last link. One of the more interesting thing about photo sites is that you can always find different things to have your photos printed on. I checked out Shutterfly's photo gift page just to see if they had anything new, and found this. It's a little pricey, but I'm seriously thinking about it. My kids would be completely thrilled to have a gigantic decal of themselves on the wall, although the idea of it is making me laugh out loud.

Actually, now that I think about it, this would have been a great gift for them while their daddy was deploying. A pic of the the three of them, life-size. Ah, well, something to consider if we end up heading back to a boat in two years.

Unexpected....Cactus?

2010-11-13T12:50:00.019-05:00

Near Halloween, Wyatt's school did a parade on their way from the school to the theatre, where they held a Halloween party for the kids. They called it a "zombie parade", and some of the teachers and a lot of the kids were in some kind of zombie getup. Some of them, Wyatt included, wore their Halloween costumes. They did it right after we brought him back to school after lunch. Oliver hung around a bit so he could see them walk by, and the three of us went to the corner of our street to wait for it.

There is a sidewalk on our street, one of the few in the housing areas. Because most of the trailers on our side are scheduled for demolition, they are empty and very overgrown. I've never walked down the sidewalk at the very end because of this, plus we typically just cut over from the back side of our trailer. That day, though, we waited on the sidewalk amongst the plant life going crazy. I was surprised to see this cactus growing there:

I have seen a lot of strange plants here, but cactus? Not so much. I'm curious if it's native or if someone brought it here. The thing is huge, too. Taller than Oscar, and about as wide as I can spread my arms. Just goes to show, you never know what you'll find living here!

Water Troubles (Yet Again)

2010-11-12T11:54:00.001-05:00

The water here has been a little suspect in our home. Oliver heard from some people at work that it may not be the healthiest thing in the world. He kind of freaked me out when he came home and told me this a couple months ago. I mean, we've lived here for a year now, and due to the hot climate are drinking a lot more water than we used to. To switch to bottled water would be ridiculously expensive, not to mention all the plastic waste that would engender. So, I decided not to do anything different. I hadn't, after all, seen any real evidence that it was making us or anyone else sick. A rumor is as likely to be untrue as it is to be true, so it wasn't much to go on.

Then, a few weeks ago, after all that crazy rain we had, our water started smelling a little bit like sewage. It was awful; at one point, I washed out a frosting decorating bag and the smell left behind was enough to make me feel ill. So, we pulled out our stored water and stopped drinking from the tap for awhile.

The stink only lasted a couple days, but that was long enough for me. I went online, did some research, and ordered a water filter for the kitchen. I got one that is a bit more powerful than your typical faucet filter (we did have a Brita filter back in Washington because the water there tasted awful). It hooks up to our faucet, with the filter unit sitting on the counter. They also had one that would have fit into our sprayer hole and been a separate faucet, but I didn't want to mess with the plumbing here. It's ancient and temperamental, like just about everything else.

Here's a very unprofessional pic of our set up:

And a closeup of the faucet connector:

Also, because the water in our new place smells very strongly of chlorine (when it doesn't smell of sewage, ha), I also bought a shower filter. From what I've read in the past, it's possible to aspirate a lot of chlorine in the shower, so I figured it was time to stop worrying about that, too.

Here's a pic of that one:

The shower wand was part of it, with the filter unit being the big white thing hanging behind it. Supposedly, this is also going to keep our shower from getting so much soap scum because it's softening the water. We've only used it a couple of weeks so I don't know for sure if this is the case, but so far, so good in the soap scum department. For a lazy cleaner like me, this is a good thing.

We picked these up from Aquasana, in case you were curious. I don't know if they are the best, but they had good reviews and were in my price range, so that's why I went with them. Also, they will ship to us for free, which is a huge plus. That is not so easy to find these days.

Happy Veteran's Day

2010-11-11T15:46:00.001-05:00

Typically, we'd got to a parade today, but there isn't one here. They did do a small ceremony this morning, although I didn't go because Oliver needed to go into work afterward as they are in the middle of a huge exercise right now.

Plus, I was a little lazy and didn't feel like getting the kids moving. Now that Wyatt is in school, that morning routine is getting old. I am all over staying home longer and letting them run around in pjs for awhile. No one in this house is a morning person, and it very much shows when we are forced to be.

We did watch a little TV last night, though, and saw a commercial for Outback. Apparently, military people can get a free bloomin' onion today. Bummer we are no where near an Outback! Oliver did get a free breakfast, though. There is actually a tiny veteran's organization called the China Post here. They put together a nice meal for the Navy members here.

I was chafing a bit at our island status today. When we get a free day like this, that is typically when I bemoan our marooned state. What we really wanted to do was go somewhere fun, but, yeah, not too many choices here. We did end up at the beach, though, and that was fun. The water was freezing! I didn't swim, but everyone else did for awhile. Then, Oliver pounced on me and gave me a big hug, so I ended up wet, anyway.

The weather is shifting. It's a lot cooler, and I'm finally wearing long pants every so often. I've also started to run outside again, which is a hugely nice change. The treadmill was getting exceptionally monotonous. I think we're getting acclimated to living here. When we moved here last year at about this time, it seemed warm and we were definitely swimming when we went to the beach. Now, after spending a summer with blazingly hot weather, it's almost chilly out, even though we're still seeing 80 degree weather. It's going to be very weird to move back to a cooler place.

Jam Time

2010-11-10T14:20:00.001-05:00

A couple weeks ago, I finally got around to making jam. I had two, 24 oz tubs of strawberries in our freezer that we'd bought last minute to keep some meat cold on a flight back home. We aren't allowed to use ice, so I typically buy those frozen juice cartons to tuck in there with the cold stuff. If it thaws some, it's no big deal to refreeze it, and they are small and light enough that they don't affect the weight allowance too much. That day, though, we'd gone to a different store than normal and discovered they only have juice cartons in the refrigerator case. So, I grabbed the strawberries instead, then we rushed to the airport.

Problem is, we really don't use an entire tub of strawberries on anything. So, they sat in our freezer for a couple of months unused. Then we ran out of jam. I only buy jam in the States because everything here is sweetened with corn syrup. Not only do I find it unhealthy, but no one likes to eat the stuff now that we've lost the taste for it. I can get frozen fruit here, even if it's a little on the expensive side ($3.95 for a 12 oz package is what I paid yesterday for some blueberries). Then, I remembered the tubs of strawberries.

To make a long story short, I thawed them, added two cups of raw sugar (the recipe I was using called for twice that amount, but the strawberries already had sugar in them so I was guessing on how much to use), squeezed a fresh lemon into it, and boiled it down into some jam. Here was the end result:

I reused the jam jars I had from buying jam from someone here, then put the rest into the freezer containers stacked next to them. They are sitting upside down here because I'd read that leaving them upside down for a half hour or so after filling the jars keeps them mold-free much longer. Who knows if that's true, but I tried it anyway.

In terms of mold, I needn't have worried. Two weeks later, we're going through the third jar. Wyatt has declared it "the best jam ever", and keeps telling me I need to make more when we are done with this stuff. Peanut and butter sandwiches are suddenly back in vogue. I should have done this months ago when they stopped eating them! They are so much easier to make than ham and cheese.

I'm glad the jam was a hit. Unfortunately, the pickles weren't as big a hit. Oscar really likes them, and I think they are okay, but neither Wyatt or Oliver will eat them. Can you tell who the picky eaters in the house are?

Daylight Savings Snafu

2010-11-07T19:42:00.000-05:00

I was committed to helping set up for a fundraiser for our the parent/teacher committee (basically the PTA, but we don't call it that) this morning. We decided to walk over there as a family so Oliver could help out, too, and the boys could maybe see their friends and run off some steam. I was really stressed out about forgetting to go because I haven't been all that on top of things lately. The boys had an awful night, and I even ended up on the couch for a few hours because they were both in our bed, so Oliver let me sleep in some this morning. I made myself get up in time, and we dragged ourselves there, bat and ball in two because we were going to be right next to the ball field.

Except, no one was there. I paced about a bit, confused as to what was going on. There had been a little confusion about when to meet when the scheduling was being worked out, so I thought maybe someone was running late or I hadn't understood it correctly. We ended up doing some batting practice with the boys for the next forty minutes before finally giving up and going home.

I was baffled about it until about 1400 when I looked at the clock and it suddenly struck me: today was daylight savings. So, I was the one off, not anyone else. I felt pretty stupid about missing the whole thing, and immediately emailed the other members of the leadership to apologize.

This whole not going to church thing can mess us up. I've never once been late or early to church because of a daylight savings switch, but apparently I can completely forget about it when I don't have something regularly scheduled on my Sundays. Oliver and I talked about it this evening and decided it was highly likely we wouldn't have figured out anything was wrong until tomorrow if this event hadn't been scheduled for today. Since he drops Wyatt off at school, and often doesn't stay now that Wyatt is acclimated to school and we are comfortable he knows where he needs to go, that might have meant he would have been standing there by himself for awhile (unless he thought to just walk back home again).

So, I'm grateful I had something I was supposed to do today, even if I didn't actually make it there on time. I'm mad at myself for not doing what I'd promised to do, but I would have felt even worse if it had left my kid in a lurch.

Running and I

2010-11-05T20:01:00.001-04:00

This week has not been a particularly great one. Wacky schedule, poisonwood attack, allergies in the small ones...and I've been sitting on my butt for most of it. I haven't run in about ten days, and wasn't going to do so today, either. But then I mentioned to Oliver, right before I should start dinner, that I was dragging around all day and hadn't been running in forever. He told me to just go. I almost didn't, but I'm glad I took his advice.

Four miles later, I think I've realized just how much running has become not something just to get back in shape with, but something that keeps me sane. I felt a million times better when I got back. Even that familiar ache in my legs is making me smile right now.

It's a good feeling to finally move past "exercising to get into shape" to "running for fun". I mean, I've always enjoyed running, but starting out was painful. Especially after having gone through two pregnancies without working all that hard in between. I think it took three months before I started saying, okay, I am feeling good. Now, nearly a year later, what a difference!

I hope this means this is going to be something I always fight to make time for. It's too easy to get lazy about exercise, especially if it seems like work. Today, I ran because it felt good and I didn't think even once about how my stomach is never going to be the same after having kids. I better get some sleep tonight; my running shoes and I have a date tomorrow. I'm going to break that five mile mark if it kills me.

P.S. Dinner was pizza from the only eatery on base (other than the galley). We took a chance because the place has been improving over the last few months. It used to be you would order a sandwich, then wait over twenty minutes with no one in sight for it to be made. The pizza has been particularly terrible, which is why we haven't ordered one since a month or two after we moved here. So, due to the improving menu and better options, and my sudden craving for Hawaiian pizza and wings (ironically, all this not eating meat has made me snag some when I can), we ordered some tonight.

The verdict? While the toppings have improved, they are still using the same dough, which is basically a circle of frozen pizza dough that looks like one of those poorly done boxed pizzas. There is no crust formed on the edges, and the bottom is clearly not cooked with cornmeal, which makes a huge difference. It's kind of a like a cracker dough, really. Nasty. I don't think we'll be trying it again.

Carved Pumpkin, Meet the Tropics

2010-11-02T15:32:00.005-04:00

This is what happens when you carve a pumpkin in the tropics and leave it outside:

We carved this pumpkin on Saturday, and Oliver kicked it off the walk this morning because it was caving in on itself. It's actually been sitting on our counter for over a week before we carved it. I wanted to wait because I knew it wouldn't last long. Even I was surprised at how quick it collapsed, though. I think the one we did last year stuck around just a tad bit longer.

Halloween was really fun. The way they do it here is set a couple hours for trick or treating. Bahamians that work on the base are allowed to bring their kids on to participate. Last year, it seemed most of them were without costumes, but this year, I saw most of the Bahamian kids in some kind of costume. There also seemed to be more of them than Americans.

We don't really do the whole traditional knock on a door to get candy routine here. Instead, most people sit outside their houses, some with rather elaborate Halloween displays, and some with their neighbors, making it a one stop for several different buckets of candy. Some were handing candy out from golf carts, and a few were dressed up in costume trying to scare people. Hardly anyone said trick or treat because of how mobs of kids just walked right up and the adults passed it all out with a few comments about how cute everyone looked. One house we went to had a chair with looked like a fake gorilla sitting in it. I turned to my right only to find the gorilla right in my face. I started laughing, which was probably not what he was going for, but it was because the mood was not really a fright night, but a fun block party.

For the most part, we didn't do homemade this year when it came to costumes. The boys have been longing for some dress-up clothes, Wyatt especially, so I decided to buy a couple Melissa and Doug costumes for them. I bought a Police Officer Costume for Wyatt, and Oscar was styling in a Train Engineer Costume. They are in the playroom now for daily play.

The one homemade thing we did, though, was mostly Oliver's handiwork. Since Oscar wanted to be a "passenger", Oliver built him a train out of cardboard and our wagon. He decorated it with construction paper as paint is not easy to come by here. I think it came out fantastic, and by the attention we got walking around with it, I think others did, too. We had to pose for a few pictures along the way.

All in all, a really fun holiday for us this year. The boys came home with full pumpkins, and now we have to deal with sugar overload, eek. We buy candy very rarely, so this is the most they will see all year.

Oh, one last note about the candy: Last year, we got ours in the States because we had an opportunity to do so before Halloween. This year, we stayed put all month, so we were forced to pick up a couple bags in the store. There were about eight different candy bags to pick from, and I found it funny how many times I recognized the kind of candy we had bought in our boys' buckets. It was clear who had bought stuff in the States and who hadn't. Not something I would have ever figured out before moving here.

Also, I don't think I will ever get used to sweating while trick or treating. It's kind of weird.

Doctor, Doctor

2010-11-02T00:02:00.001-04:00

Pic came from Wikipedia.

This morning, I had to take a trip to the dispensary. I also had to bring along both Wyatt and Oscar. We've had a ton of rain the last few weeks, and it seems to have brought some nasty allergic reactions in the boys from something that's growing out there. Or maybe mold in the trailer, as the doc said all of them have issues with it. We have been lucky so far, and that was by far the most wet weather we've had in the year we've lived here, so hopefully this will just run it's course and we won't see any more problems.

As for me, though, I had a bit of a run in with what I believe is poison wood. I'm not positive how, but am guessing we had a sapling or something growing amongst the weeds I pulled this last week. It started on my hands and one arm, but has traveled over my chest, to the other arm, and up my neck. I woke up with one eyelid swolled this weeken, which is what finally told me I needed to go get something to counteract it. Hence the trip to the doctor, with the little boys because they've been complaining of various things that I figured needed to be looked at, too.

I'm now hyped up on streroids and trying desperately not to scratch. Ugh; poison wood makes poison ivy look like a cake walk. At least, for me. I'm only mildly allergic to poison ivy, and have had only one small case of it despite growing up in an area where it was very common. So, I'm not being patient with this. Just gritting my teeth and wishing it would go away. I haven't been running in a week because it's too painful to wear a sports bra. And I am a girl who needs a sports bra.

Ah, well, this is one of the drawbacks of living in a tropical environment. On the plus side, we can see a doctor with about a five minute wait. Plus get our meds before we leave fifteen minutes later (although this trip took just a bit longer because he was seeing all three of us). I very much hope we don't have an issue that requires us to go to the States (we can only get emergent and very basic care here) because then we'll have to go to the VA. Yikes, not my idea of a fun time, especially with kids. I'm actually planning on not getting anymore shots for Oscar until we return to the States. He will get them, and not all at once when we get back as I'm sure they'll try to tell us, but I don't want to take him to the VA.

(All you people that think government healthcare is the answer to our problems, take a look at the VA. Sure, maybe Canada, et al as it in the bag, but our government doesn't know what it's doing at all. Despite the cost, I look forward to having a civilian doctor again some day - or at least an active duty hospital, which we liked in Washington.)

Marching to My Own Beat

2010-10-30T20:31:00.003-04:00

Because Halloween falls on a Sunday this year, I keep running across debates on other Mormon blogs about whether or not it's okay to trick or treat. We are absolutely going to go. I don't feel any qualms about it, either. Sure, it's a Sunday, and yes, I understand the need to keep it holy. I also know that there is no to-do or to-don't list out there, despite what people sometimes think.

This all has me thinking about how caught up in the details we all get as Mormons. I mean, I love my religion, but it seems sometimes that it's about all the little tiny details, not the big picture. The thing is, there's no way to fit everyone into a neat little box and assume all the rules fit beautifully. We're all different, with different backgrounds. There are some important, big picture kinds of issues, and then there are the smaller things we choose that get us there. Unfortunately, sometimes the way we get there is the focus, hence all the discussions about silly things like whether or not to celebrate Halloween.

I don't think, though, that God put us here to be carbon copies of each other. Sometimes, I feel very out of step with the people I associate with. I've felt this way ever since I was young, coming from a very messed up home situation. I've beat myself up over it, tried to conform at times, and at others, just rebelled in a spectacular fashion. I think I've finally come to the realization, however, that I am who I am and it's okay. I'm a little different, and sometimes I don't do things the way the mainstream does, but I love my God, and I love my religion, and I appreciate greatly that what is right for me is right for me. And it's totally okay that someone else has a different path. What matters is that we all get there.

*Okay, so I got right to it. I guess I just needed a post to break the water.