The Unexpected

I was getting ready to type this post when I looked down at my keyboard and saw this tiny little inch worm. It seriously was "inching" across the keyboard! I don't think that I have ever seen anything like it before. I scooped him up on an envelope and told Kenton to take him outside. He just came back in and said, "Don't worry, Mom! I put him where it was safe and dry!" I can't say that I was worried - I just wanted him out of MY house:)

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Speaking of dry it's been raining A LOT this past week. I read online where March is the end of the North East Monsoon season and generally is when the rain picks up again before becoming drier through the "summer" months.

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"North-East Monsoon Season - December to early March

Northeast winds prevail, sometimes reaching 20 km/h. Cloudy conditions in December and January with frequent afternoon showers. Spells of widespread moderate to heavy rain occur lasting from 1 to 3 days at a stretch. Relatively drier in February till early March. Also generally windy with wind speeds sometimes reaching 30 to 40 km/h in the months of January and February." www.app.nea.gov.sg

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I don't mind the rain so much as it's made for cooler days around here - the average high has been low 90's and today the highest temp recorded has been 82 degrees. When I went to pick the twins up from school there was a cool breeze blowing and a smell of cut grass was wafting on the breeze. It reminded me of Spring back home and made me lonesome for my tulips! I know that they are poking up through the ground right now - and the rabbits have probably gotten to them as I doubt our renters would know to put blood meal around them.

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Ryan was in Thailand last week (in Phuket) and this week is in Australia along the "Gold Coast" area. He's been presenting to different groups within the company and has started visiting with customers. His first Six Sigma class starts up the third week of March and that will be here in Singapore.

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Apparently the previous tenant didn't pay all his bills! We keep getting ominous looking envelopes in the mail that we suspect may be from bill collectors that are addressed to the same guy. Ryan said that a few weeks ago a bill collector showed up on our door step looking for him - Yikes! One day in the mail we received mail for THREE different families who must have lived here in the past. I don't know how the mail works here in Singapore - if people don't notify the PO of change of address or if they are not efficient at forwarding mail.

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I had the first of four scrapbooking classes last night with five other women. It was fun and I'm feeling motivated to start turning out pages - too bad my scrapbooking "things" are sitting exactly where I left them by the front door when I arrived home last night!

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Kaitlyn likes to roam around the house listening to "her" music and singing.
Twins doing their homework yesterday on the couch. They usually have reading to do and Kenton has spelling words once a week that he needs to correct.

Bok Choy, anyone?

This morning the Newcomer's group that I joined back in January took a field trip to the Little India wet market. The leader's son, Aaron, just graduated college as a chef so he met us there to educate us on all the local fruits and vegetables and how to cook them. Some day I would love to go back and look at the rest of the stalls as today we concentrated only on the produce - I will skip the meat stalls, though, as the smell is a little overwhelming! It was very interesting and I'm looking forward to trying some of the local produce.

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Egg noodles, anyone? These are used in stir fries. There were also bean sprouts (kind of hidden behind the lady on the left) and tofu. You can also purchase fried tofu - seems like that defeats some of the purpose of tofu but on the other hand anything fried tends to taste better!
This man was cutting up jack fruit. We all tried a piece and I wasn't too impressed. It's more of a melon-y flavor than sweet. We were told that it's better dried as the flavor is more concentrated so I'll try it that way first before I completely write it off. We also sampled some rose apple which was bland - not bad, though. The bright pink fruit behind the jack fruit is dragon fruit - it looks like a white kiwi inside but has a very bland flavor. Here is one of the fruit stalls - notice that there are a lot of recognizable fruits as well! There are mango's in the box by the lady with the pink shirt.

Aaron is explaining to our group the different vegetables and what they are used for. One that I want to try soon is called baby bok choy. I will have to post a picture because I'm not sure how to describe it. You steam it and than add an oyster sauce and dried shallots (type of red onion) to the top. I had it at a hawker's center once and really liked it...now it's time to try making it myself!
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I'm not sure if I already posted about a provisioner so if I have please forgive me. I had a man call me last week who is known as a "provisioner." He calls each morning, except Sunday, and asks if there is anything you need. He can deliver anything you can buy in a supermarket to your home - usually before 6pm that same day. He has been a life saver to me as he can usually get hard to find items - like Pillsbury crescent rolls:) I haven't used him every day but there have been times when I haven't been able to make it to the grocery store so I've had him bring milk, oj, spices, Coke, beef bouillon, applesauce (which I can't find), and Kosher salt. I also found an online butcher the other day where I was able to order brisket - a cut of meat that is hard to find here. Most things from back home are available here - you just need to know how to find them! We have pork ribs in the slow cooker for supper tonight:) YUM! Add some real mashed potatoes, fresh green beans, and bakery bread and you have a good KC meal! Incidentally, slow cookers are very popular here - most likely because they save you from heating up the kitchen with the stove.
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This one is for Dad R - I can hear a thunder storm moving in:) Days that there is rain it's so humid that you find yourself taking a shower 3 times a day!

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One Last Note of Interest:

For those of you who have been following the news there have been several earthquakes in Indonesia (Sumatra, which is directly to the West of Singapore) this past week. It's possible that they are gearing up for another big one like the one in 2004 that caused the Indian Ocean tsunami. Singapore has been proclaimed by geologists as one of the safest places in the world, tectonically (safer, even, than Central Illinois should a big quake occur along the New Madrid fault line.) Since Singapore is a relatively young nation most high rise buildings have been built to withstand the tremors that we do feel from the bigger earthquakes. We haven't felt any of the past week's tremors.

If you are interested I posted a link below that will give you more information on Singapore and earthquakes.

http://app.nea.gov.sg/cms/htdocs/article.asp?pid=1199

Our Ship Has Come In

I've always wanted to say that:) Unfortunately our ship did not contain money BUT it did contain our life's belongings which is just as nice!

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WoW! What to say about move-in day? Let's see, Ethan's into everything, some boxes contain items from three different levels of our old place, I have a LONG list of things that we still need, Ethan's driving me crazy, we still don't have the promised patio furniture (I think that we're back to looking for it ourselves), the movers kind of dumped things out of boxes, and Ethan systematically broke glass on the marble floor.

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We are slowly getting unpacked - the kitchen is done, the laundry room and maid's room (storage room) are done, the dining area and living room are unpacked although not entirely put together, and I'm working on the office. The three bedrooms still need to be done but it's easy to just shut the door. I'm getting everything into closets and off the floor and than next week I'll work on organizing everything.

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We had an interesting experience the first night in the condo. After we went to bed we starting hearing a clicking noise - like the noise a barbed wire fence makes, or when you click two fingernails together. We turned on the lights and started rustling through all our clothes on the floor but the noise continued and we never saw anything. We went into the hallway next where we also heard the noise and figured out that it was coming from the floorboards. Our next thought was that we had some kind of pest living in the wood floors and were worried that our furniture would be next. There are a few of you who we called that first night that are going to laugh when you hear what we have learned that it was! Since the condo hadn't been lived in for awhile the noise was being produced by the wood floor because we had turned the air con on...:) Yep, it's from the air conditioning! I guess it was drying out the floor boards which had been recently varnished and causing them to shift and "click!" I'm just thankful that it wasn't the death-watch beetle...or geckos...or cockroaches!

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Anyway, today was another Singapore day but I'll save that for another post - some day I'll laugh but not today! Thank you to my friend who prayed for me at lunch:)

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Kaitlyn came home early from school with a 103 fever - stay tuned! Hopefully it is viral and will clear up soon. OH, YEAH! While I was picking her up from the nurse's office they were checking a class for lice...say a prayer that it avoids us!

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On Sunday we brought our first load over to our "new" place and Ethan kept climbing into the suitcases with the toys and playing:)

This is part of the kitchen. I will post a link to a podcast with a video tour once we've finished unpacking and everything is set up.

This picture is a little dark because of the windows in the background. The back wall is all windows and off to your right behind the screen are sliding glass doors leading out to a patio.

Another view of the living room. It's starting to look like home! We have a 2 hour free handyman service through our moving company that will come and hang pictures and my clock.

Boxes, boxes everywhere! This was the beginning of unloading us:) Here you are looking towards the front door on the right and the kitchen straight ahead. It's our eating area and the living room is directly behind me.

PS: I was having some trouble with formatting paragraphs so therefore the "*****" between paragraphs. Also my spell check isn't working so hopfuly i din't spel to much rong!! Better go save my things from ETHAN!

Wet Market Field Trip and Smelly Fish

Friday morning I was able to find a sitter for Ethan so I could go with Kaitlyn's class to a local wet market. These are usually found underneath HBD housing flats (or government housing) and are made up of a bunch of different stalls/stores selling a variety of things. They are known as wet markets because the floor around the meat will be wet from melting ice.

Kaitlyn and I were in a group together with one other mom, Kay, and Jessica. We had three goals for the trip: a scavenger hunt, buy a Chinese New Year decoration for the classroom, and buy a typical Singapore lunch from a hawker center.

Kay, Kaitlyn, and Jessica are waiting for us to order lunch.

The little orange trees or bushes (I can't quite figure out what they are) and the pussy willows you see symbolize prosperity - you will see these in arrangements in store windows and the orange bushes can be seen outside establishments to symbolize that they had a prosperous year and are hoping for another one. I'm guessing that they are displayed whether or not the previous year was prosperous:)
Kaitlyn is looking at decorations to buy. Each child brought $5.00 along - $2.50 for the decorations and $2.50 for lunch.
Kaitlyn is showing off her clipboard with the scavenger hunt. They were looking for CNY related items like the color gold, dragons, rats, fish, pussy willows, new clothes, etc.
You can even buy live fish for an aquarium at the wet markets!
The girls are going through a shop where they are selling CNY paraphenalia. I bought "hung bao" packets that you are to give to children with money inside to wish them prosperity in the new year.
More CNY decorations. As you can see from the signs they are inexpensive. I think that you are supposed to barter for them but I didn't. It was easier not too:)
Kaitlyn and Jessica try to find items for the scavenger hunt.
Behind Kaitlyn is one of the fish stalls. It's smelly and a little disturbing because the whole, entire fish, eyes and all are being sold! There are shrimp directly behind Kaitlyn.
Kaitlyn, Jessica, and Kay are ready to begin their adventure at the wet market! There is a bike shop directly behind them.
You can find inexpensive electrical items here at this store.

The girls are ready to eat their chicken rice - a distinct Singaporean meal that is mild enough for kids. I have had it twice - once I really liked it and this time I didn't so much. It all depends on how the chicken is prepared. The first time I had a vegtable, bok choy, I think that was really good. We didn't order the kids vegtables;) I had pepsi as they didn't have Coke and there is a big difference between the Pepsi made here and the Pepsi made in the US.
A hawker's center stall selling all kinds of food. They usually have pictures of each dish on the menu which is nice because you know exactly what you are ordering.
This is a fruit and vegtable stand. They have a much wider variety than the grocery stores and it's usually cheaper.
And We're done! The girls are in front of a fresh flowers stall - I didn't see prices but I've been told that they are VERY cheap - maybe 50cents a stalk. No excuses for the men to not bring home fresh flowers EVERY day:)


Below is a video of Kaitlyn and her classmates doing the annoying chicken dance that they learned in music class this week. Joan - ignore the temptation to break into song about now...=O Notice that most of the little girls are in dresses. I have seen very few little girls in shorts even at the school....a refreshing change over the US I have to say! Lately Kailtyn had been refusing her dresses and now I can tell her, "But it's what all the little girls are wearing!"

We are headed to China Town for an adventure this evening so be sure to check back in the next few days for more pictures and experiences! We've heard it's crazy to go this time of year but we figure what a better time to go and learn more.

I've joined the ranks (Mom, don't read this)

Yep. I joined in the insane practice of walking when it's lightening out with an umbrella. Now, mind you, I had no other choice - but that didn't lessen the insaneness of it. I've been casually observing this practice from my window thinking, "NO way!" "Why would anyone with a brain hold onto a metal umbrella out in the open when it's lightening out!" Well, let me tell you I spent about 2 minutes on the phone to Ryan asking him to pray for me and about 15 minutes dashing from shelter to shelter praying hard that God would keep us safe! And I'm here to say that he did. And I hope that I never have to do that again!!

MRT

Ethan and I had a high adventure today! I took a taxi up to SAS this morning to meet with Kaitlyn's teacher and to go to the PTA new parent welcome. I paid about S$23 for the fare up there - now I had a problem - I didn't have enough cash to get home as I was expecting the fare to be S$20 or less each way. I couldn't find an ATM so I decided to find an alternate way home. You can use a credit card but there is an extra fee attached (of course!) Anyway, I ended up walking about 10 minutes to a bus stop which took me to the nearest MRT (Train/Subway) station. Ryan had bought me an EZLink card last week for that purpose. I found the correct train that would take me to Dhoby Ghaut where I would need to catch a second train. On the second train I was able to get off at Clark Quay and walk about 10 minutes home. I didn't time the ride but I'd say that total it's about 30 minutes (not counting walking and bus.) It was stressful for the first 10 minutes because Ethan was screaming - I knew that he had a bad diaper rash but there was NOTHING I could do about it right than - I felt so bad. Most people had looks on their faces like, "Oh Great!" A few were nice and smiled! I was feeling really self conscious between that and being the ONLY Caucasian aboard when a woman and two children boarded. They were really nice and wanted to know all about where I was from and Ethan. God knew when to send someone so I didn't feel like a complete outsider! The EZLink card is really easy to use - you swipe it over a reader when you board a bus and when you get off and when you enter a train station and when you leave at your last stop. Guess what my total fare home was? Around S$2.00!! It's a little longer but MUCH cheaper so guess what I'm using from now on when I can?

The Year Of The Rat...Coming Soon!

Tomorrow I'm going to post an explanation about the upcoming Chinese New Year. In the meantime here is what we have learned so far - this coming year will be the year of the Rat - according to the Chinese it's a good year to start a new job...YEA for us! You are also supposed to "spring clean" your home in preparation for CNY - a clean house, a clean beginning for the new year. You are not supposed to lose anything on the first day of the New Year - if you do, you are supposed to ignore the fact that you lost it and look for it some other time...this may prove to be a problem with the rate that Ethan loses his NUK every day! You also are not supposed to sweep your house on the seventh day as that means that you are sweeping away your good luck - I figure, hey! Any reason to get out of housework works for me! Also, CNY lasts for 14 days!! Singapore shuts down for the first three days with some business's re-opening on the fourth. This is going to completely impede our move in date, by the way! Ryan's boss told us that CNY is essentially a family reuniting time for the Chinese so there's not much in it for us...I'm seeing a four day VACATION ahead!! Maybe we'll go to Malaysia...;)

A Day On The Beach - But I Won't Rub It In:)

We went exploring this afternoon and found ourselves at East Coast Beach. It is more of a recreational park - we saw very few swimsuits. There are biking trails and walking trails. There are also roller blade rental shops all over the place along with many restaurants and little shops. We saw quite a few tents up and aren't sure if they are there for the day or if they actually camp there during the night. True to form I thought that camping sounded like fun while my better half wasn't so sure!

A view of the beach

Kenton got to work building a sand castle - notice the subtle advertising for McD's in the background. Considering that it is far from the adults in the family's favorite restaurant we find ourselves there quite often!
There were a few men flying kites along the beach. Since there is a constant coastal breeze this works well.
Ethan hops a ride on Daddy!
Okay, this next one made me laugh! Instead of a drive through on the beach they have a "Skate-Thru" You actually skate in there to a special counter and order and than skate back out!
The skyline you see in the background is downtown Singapore.
As Chinese New Year is approaching we are starting to see red Chinese lanterns everywhere. Tonight when we returned to our apartment there were fireworks going off - right in the middle of the city in between buildings. We've never seen anything quite like it. I'm guessing the Chinese New Year will bring a lot more displays of fireworks!

Ethan is experiencing the sand for the first time! If it works I'm uploading a video of him walking in the sand for the first time.
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This was the look on his face when we put him down on the sand for the first time! Not the twins' reactions! If I think of it sometime I will post the pictures of them in the sand - they held their feet out of it!!
Taking a break to watch all the ships coming into the harbor. Singapore is a huge shipping port.
Little shops were set up at various places selling everything from underwear (yes, underwear) to towels, to beach toys, to sunglasses and purses.

This was taken on the walking trail a little ways off the beach. If you get away from the touristy area this is what you find.
This is one of the many bike and roller blade rental shops that we saw. It was funny to watch people - they all share the same trail and I saw one little girl on a bike suddenly turn around and a man roller blading behind her had to do some quick maneuvering to keep from colliding! Good thing that it wasn't me on the skates or it wouldn't have ended so well:) This video is mostly for the grandparents...This is the easiest way to get videos to them. Ethan made two friends today which you will see...One was Ronald McDonald - he kept walking over to him and smiling up at him. The other was a little boy who earlier at the "race track" was playing peek-a-boo with him!

I was able to find a place to print photos last evening. Kaitlyn needed two pictures for school today - one when she was a baby and one from now. Thankfully I have a lot of pictures on our computer or she may not have had any baby pictures for the project.

Slowly but surely I'm finding most of what I need. I don't know if I mentioned the other day that I finally found a store that carries office supplies - it was tucked inside a book store and I NEVER would have looked there! I also found a bigger grocery store in that same mall - more choices, same prices. I found a box of Lucky Charms as a surprise for the twins - they are stale but the kids don't seem to mind! I was pleasantly surprised today when we opened a box of Wheatables from the same store that they are still fresh! That's a plus over here where the humidity is usually 70% or higher. The average rain fall for January is 7.8 inches - compare that to an average of 1.2 for Kansas city in the same month!

Kenton is home from school sick this morning and as you can see Ethan's thrilled that his buddy is home! I can't keep him away from Kenton so I'm praying that he doesn't get sick as well! He never sits on the couch when he's home by himself:) As you can see, Kenton is mad at me because I won't let him eat! That's the hardest part of the flu, I think!

Kenton's been into drawing Bengal Tigers lately:) Thought I'd share some of his recent art work! I like how they are smiling - are they looking at me thinking, "Lunch!"???


The video is from Ryan's recent trip to Macau up by China. He was there for the Adhesive Group's annual business meeting. He said that he was 6 stories up in the hotel and the water from the fountain was at least eye level with him at times! It is set to music which you may not be able to hear. He said that Macau was a lot like Las Vegas - just the China version. I think that he'll post his experiences for us sometime over the weekend:)

School Update

I'm happy to report that both twins are doing well so far with school. They both slipped into the new routine and school without any trouble and told me ALL about it when they arrived home today! There was a moment of brief panic when I realized that I didn't know exactly where they were to be dropped off and I saw buses flying by EVERYwhere. I learned that is what the helper on the bus is for...she spotted me standing on a corner looking around frantically and brought the twins safely to me:) We made it inside right before a Singapore Soaker hit!! (Complete with lightening and thunder:)

Yuuummmm! - Oh and Brian's back!

I discovered tonight that if you take Australian beef and add salt, pepper, onion, lots of cream of chicken soup and sour cream you hide the taste of the beef:) I suppose that also defeats the purpose of eating meat but it worked for me! The twins kept saying, "This tastes like Kansas!" I also found out today why it tastes different. I met someone from Australia today while the kids were swimming that told me the beef is grass fed instead of grain fed...she actually doesn't like the taste of grain fed beef...imagine that! :)

One thing this woman also clued me in on which I had already seen to some extent is how the Asians will stop in the street to touch and talk to your baby. She said they especially like little boys. BUT, it's not okay to do the same to their children! She said that sometimes you need to ask them to back off. She also said that they have ended up in a lot of pictures with Asians as they seem to think that we are something to take a picture with - like a scenic view! So different than back home! Can you imagine walking up to someone who looks different than you saying, "Can we have our picture taken with you?" Puts you on celebrity status, I suppose!

I got a "hand phone" yesterday evening so now I can call Ryan when I'm out and about and I'm lost! It's cheaper than the US even though they charge extra for caller ID and voice mail. I've already got about 5 people in my address book:)

What I have to say next will only mean something to those of you who were at our wedding when I almost married "Brian"! The flowers we received the other day were addressed to "Brian and Becky" and our Realtor sent an e-mail earlier to "Brian" - So I've concluded that it must have been "Brian" that I moved over here with! He has popped up every once in awhile during our (almost) 10 years of marriage!!

Saturday, 5 January

Here are a few things that we found interesting that we haven't seen in the US.

In our kitchen above the sink is a drying rack for dishes. I think that this is because of limited space. Some of the apartments today that we looked at had them and some had them in other forms.
This is a washing machine and a dryer all in one little machine. Thankfully the apartments have provided an owners manual or I'm sure that I would end up drying my clothes first and than getting them washed!!
This is one of the views from our apartment. It's overlooking the Singapore River and a park area. It's an old area of town that used to be a canning district and ships would bring supplies up and down the river. Now it's a unique shopping and dining area and there are daily boat rides up and down the river for a historical tour.

We went apartment hunting today with all three kids. I don't think that we'll be doing that again soon. The place we are staying provides "professional minders" which basically are babysitters. They come right to your apartment to babysit so I think that we'll hire one for next week. I could have done that today but I felt it was too soon after arriving here to leave the kids with someone they don't know.

There is a grocery store right here by the apartment that's within walking distance. The kitchen is small so we'll be making 4 -5 trips a week to get what we need. It's called "Cold Storage" and you can find a lot of the same things that you can in the US. I haven't really put it to the test by looking for ingredients for a recipe yet:)

Yesterday and today started off cloudy with the sun coming out around 9:00am. It stayed sunny until about 3pm when it rains until about 5 or 6 pm. Our realtor told us that this is usual Singapore weather! Right now it's POURING rain - only one little clap of thunder so far! I'm hoping for a good thunder storm or two!

Well, Ethan is taking a nap and I'm thinking about joining him - we're still working on the time difference:)

New Poll!

Be sure to check out the new poll to the right and vote!

Pictures are still forth coming of E's Birthday parties (yes, he had two!) as soon as I can get the camera unpacked from the car. It's buried deep, deep inside the trunk so it's any body's guess as to when that might be!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving and were reminded of how blessed we are! It was nice to be with family and it's nice to be home again:)

We met with the moving company today and set dates for the movers to come. They will start packing us up on Monday, December 17th and end on Wednesday, December 19th. The twins have school up until the 20th of December so we'll head to Illinois sometime on that Friday or Saturday. It depends on how long it takes to do a final cleaning of the house. Our official move date is January 2nd. Our flight leaves at noon on that day.

The rest of this week will be busy with getting the house decorated for Christmas and getting cookies made for an exchange this weekend. I have to have my final spreadsheet of all that we own done by this Wed and start packing our belongings that will head into storage. Plus, the Christmas letter needs to be written and our list updated:)

Tis the season for....Stomach flu:(

Our home is becoming more and more cleaned out as the time to move gets closer and closer. We took a load of things home the last trip back and now Mom and Dad are taking the twins' bunk beds, the John Deere Gator, and odds and ends from our garage back to Illinois. We are going to get a new bed for the twins but we haven't decided what would be the best yet. We are considering a bunk bed with a trundle in case all three kiddos need to sleep in the same room for awhile...they do anyway...or a twin over a double. We went shopping on Friday evening for storage shelves and baskets as storage will be an issue over there. We also bought an area rug for Kaitlyn's room since none of the condos there have carpeting. Most people use area rugs but they are SO expensive there compared to here. This next week I am going to try to finish cleaning out every closet, under every bed, and the storage room so when the movers come we can tell them exactly what's going. After Thanksgiving we'll rent a storage unit and start putting things into storage that we aren't taking with us. It's such an ordeal to move 2 adults plus 3 children. I have a spreadsheet that says what toys, clothes, etc are going with us on the plane, which ones will be air shipment, which ones will be sea pack, which ones are going into storage, and which ones we are donating:)

We enjoyed a nice weekend with Dad, Mom, and Rachel. They leave tomorrow morning. Hopefully we didn't give them a present of the stomach flu. Ethan had it first early last week, than Kaitlyn on Thurs, and finally Kenton this morning. I've been washing my hands so much that they are raw!

The weather has been gorgeous - although a little more sunshine would have been nice. We were in the 70's today and tonight it still feels nice...maybe I'll stick K & K in bed and head on a walk. They are getting to stay up late since A. Rachel is here...

Pumpkin Patch Field Trip and Other Things

Well, I survived my first field trip with a group of Kindergartners!! It was an ear splitting good time - listening to a whole bus load of 5 year olds sing nursery rhymes over and over and OVER isn't exactly my idea of a way to spend my morning! BUT, it was fun to spend the time with the twins and see how they are with their friends at school:)

Kaitlyn hit the slides with two of her friends - over and over again. Are you starting to see a theme here?!?

We rode a hay rack out to the pumpkin patch where we had our pick of tiny pumpkins to take home with us. Here is Kaitlyn with the one that she picked out.

Here is Kenton with HIS tiny, little pumpkin!

Kaitlyn decided to jump in with the boys and make a scarecrow.

Here is Mrs. Wiley's Kindergarten class - Fall 2007

Onto the "other" things. I thought that I'd write a quick update on Singapore. We've been keeping really busy doing all the little things that come along with such a move. I scheduled Hepatitis A vaccines for us next week along with our usual flu shots. That is really the only recommendation for shots that we haven't already gotten. I'm going to see if they will speed up Ethan's schedule as Indonesia has reported cases of Polio. We have interviewed two rental management companies for our home and now are making the final decision of which one to go with. Both want to start showing the house beginning of November to potential renters so we've been cleaning out and cleaning up. We've been filling out paperwork to get work passes and dependent passes for Singapore. We are waiting official word from the Singapore American School on whether the twins are in for the Spring semester or not. If they aren't we have a choice of a private Christian school or homeschooling until next Fall when they could for sure get in. We have the moving company coming in the middle of November to tell us what will fit in a 40 foot container and what the transit times are for our things. We also get a 650 lb air shipment of things that we will need immediately. I have gone through the house and made a very detailed spread sheet of what's staying, going, being stored, or donated. This way we know exactly what to tell the movers and we have a detailed shipping list in case something gets lost or damaged. We have started stocking up on things like our favorite soaps, diapers, summer clothes, printer paper, etc. to send over in our shipment. I have quite an extensive list of things to get in case they don't have it there, thanks to Lynn:) I am ordering a really good stroller since we'll be doing a lot of walking...We've also picked out area rugs to send since they are considerably cheaper here. All the condos have marble floors and I want to have cozy rugs:) We're also starting to collect medical records to take with us as well. There is SO much planning that goes into a move like this that it can be overwhelming at times! Than, we take a step back, a deep breath, and say a prayer that God will work out the small details along with the big ones...and so far He has!!

We have our first Parent/Teacher conference tomorrow and than we are heading back to Illinois for the weekend. Ryan's going to spend time in Peoria helping Grandma Joos get a few things done and I'm going to help the twins make a REAL pumpkin pie:) Should be fun! We're heading to Elgin for the weekend and than we are home until Thanksgiving while our families come and visit US:)