Heissatopia

Pool day

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Thu, 11 Jun 2026 03:28:27 +0000

Today was Rachel's last full day at home, and it was finally sunny again (her time here has been so, so rainy), so we made her come swimming with us. We won't have time to go swimming (for fun) tomorrow between swim practice and picking Miriam up from YW camp and taking Rachel to the airport and going to our swim meet...so this was also Rachel's last visit to our pool.

Phoebe happily showed Rachel all her swimming skills and even agreed to go into the deep(er) end to work on her diving (though she is still refusing to enter the deep end, I think she'll be there in no time).

Zoë had a bit of a tiff with Benjamin in the deep end and decided that she was ready to go home, so she started walking around the pool wrapped up in her towel with her backpack on, urging everyone to please get out so we could go home (to be fair she'd been at the pool since 8:00 in the morning).

Then a horsefly flew by and that girl took off her towel and backpack so fast and bolted across the deck and into the pool—with her flip flops still on her feet. There was no way she was going to risk getting bitten!

Once she was back in she was good to play for a little bit longer. We played a fun game of keep away.

And then just as we were getting ready to go for real, Zoë's triplet friends showed up to play so...we stayed for a few more minutes so she could play with them. Benjamin had a friend that had stayed after swim practice as well, so he was also entertained. But in the end the children's empty stomachs were what called them home (empty in spite of eating an entire box of graham crackers, an entire bag of mini-bagels, a handful of string cheese, and a very large Tupperware container of apple slices while we were at the pool).

It's wild to think that this year's last-pool-picture will truly be the last pool picture (at this pool). Not that this is our last pool picture (we will be back at the pool tomorrow), but it is Rachel's last pool picture.

End of a era, truly.

Benjamin is 14!

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Thu, 11 Jun 2026 02:36:35 +0000

Benjamin turned 14 at Young Men's camp this year, so I sent him to camp with some hastily-made (at midnight), unfrosted (at his request) cupcakes to share with his friends (as you can see his friends were super pumped about this).

Once home, Benjamin requested that Rachel make him one last birthday cake—he requested a "nature" theme with rocks and vines. This is what Rachel came up with:

We've all been very busy around here so we were happy with anything! We had cake with/for lunch after stake conference on Sunday.

Poor Benjamin asked if he could request his birthday dinner for Sunday evening.

"You could," I said, "But we haven't gone shopping and we have no food in the house."

"Oh, well, I was going to request Panda Express."

"It's Sunday," I pointed out (we don't do restaurants on Sundays).

"Aw, man!"

My poor kids have been lamenting the lack of food in our house. It's not that we have no food. It's just that we're running out of things that we ordinarily have, which we're then not replenishing our supply of, and have been cobbling together very random meals from the freezer and pantry.

"We live in an ingredient house and we don't even have ingredients!" Rachel moaned the other day.

She's not wrong. Lucky for the kids, Sara Lewis brought us dinner on Monday and Andrew went shopping after dropping the kids off at swimming to grab a few staples, so we're all stocked up again.

And we did order Panda Express for dinner last night (the last time we had ordered Panda Express was 364 days ago, so I'm assuming it was once again for Benjamin's (slightly delayed) birthday dinner).

Anyway, Benjamin's favourite part of his cake was lighting the candles.

He blew them all out in a single breath (which he was pretty proud of):

Here's everyone anxiously awaiting a slice of cake (they were all pretty hungry/hangry by the time we got home from stake conference):

Poor Benjamin also forgot that he requested no birthday presents in the United States (because whatever he got would likely end up in our shipment...which is happening in eight days...and so he wouldn't see it again for several months). Instead he asked that we do presents for him after we move, which sounded fair.

Lucky for him, Auntie K sent him a cool fidget pen, which he opened when he came home from camp.

And then he said, "After cake are we going to do real presents?" (meaning family presents).

And I had to be like, "Oh, buddy...remember you said that...uh...you wanted to do presents in Qatar..."

"Oh, yeah!" he said.

"Yeah...so there are no presents...uh...so..."

"Oh, yeah. I forgot," he said.

I think he was a little disappointed, but it really does make good sense. Plus, he asked for Andrew to purchase some movie soundtrack (I think the Project Hail Mary one), which Andrew did (so that's like a gift) and since it's apparently The Year of the Pen, his friend Reed also gifted him a space pen (that can write in zero gravity, upside down, even under water). So he's feeling pretty okay about things.

I think the very best present of all, however, was that in the wee hours of the morning on his birthday (before leaving for camp the next morning) Miriam finally consented to stand back-to-back with him while we measured to see who was taller and...Benjamin was the clear winner.

Andrew even broke out the level for irrefutable proof.

Miriam has been avoiding this since she began to be suspicious about him overtaking her, but we were up far too late playing Hand and Foot and somehow managed to convince her to just do it and get it over with (it would soon be blatantly obvious that he had grown taller than her so denying it now wouldn't do her very much good anyway).

Speaking of Hand and Foot, we often abbreviate it to "H and F" or, more recently, simply to "limbs." I don't know why because the younger kids don't know how to play yet, anyway. We just abbreviate a lot of things—show titles, game names, and so forth—so that it's kind of like a code. We were talking about not needing to abbreviate this, however, because it's not something that the little kids know how to play, anyway.

"I do so know how to play Hand and Foot!" Phoebe said indignantly.

"Oh, do you?" I asked. "How do you play?"

"Well, isn't Hand and Foot that game we play where you get the mat out with the different coloured circles and we spin the spinner and put our hands and feet on the circles?"

She was definitely describing Twister, which we only play at Halloween (and which, yes, was put in a box to come to Qatar with us so that we can continue the tradition).

So she'll have to learn Hand and Foot later...

Happiest of birthdays to this 14-year-old boy, who has already outgrown his 16-year-old sister (and is growing in so many other wonderful ways)!

Rachel's mission pictures

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 01:26:48 +0000

This morning was so terribly rainy that swim practice was cancelled for both Alexander and Phoebe—if you can't see the bottom of the pool, that's cause to shut down the pool, and it was just that rainy.

Rachel and I had planned to go take her mission photos today as well, but that had to wait until after the rain had stopped because we wanted to take them at the temple. I'm not an exceptional photographer, but I have found that if I take several hundred photographs there are usually a handful of keepers...

We wanted to take a picture with a Vietnamese Book of Mormon, but they don't sell those at our distribution center and we forgot to order one early enough to take photos with it. She'll have plenty of opportunity for such photos in the future, I suppose.

For now we were just happy we got a good window of sunshine to take some pictures in this afternoon:

If you're interested in seeing more mission pictures, Andrew made a little website for them here.

Visit with Cairo friends

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 00:55:30 +0000

Last night we finally had Kevan and Sara Lewis over for dinner (and by that I mean that Sara offered to bring dinner to us)! They moved to the Atlanta area at the end of last summer but our plans kept falling through so we only managed to connect yesterday.

They are good, good friends from our time in Cairo. Somehow they trusted us to watch their five children while they were off traveling around the region for Kevan's work (it was during one such trip that "No Fair Day" was instituted). It is wild to me that those kids are mostly all in their 20s now!

Kevan and Sara are about a decade older than us, so they've always seemed like this little mirror into the future. I remember once Sara telling me that things (parenthood) gets so much better with older kids because they can do magical things like chores and dressing themselves—and she was right! That part of parenting has gotten easier.

When it's time to go to the pool, I just tell the kids that we're going. I don't have to wrangle them into swimsuits and then then wrestle them until they're covered in sunscreen because they mostly all know how to do that kind of thing for themselves so they just magically appear ready to go. It's pretty great!

Not that small kids aren't fun (they totally are)...they're just more hands-on work than big kids.

Last night Sara raved about how great being a grandma is, about how wonderful being an empty-nester is.

In ten years our first five kids will all be adults (we'll just be waiting on Phoebe), so it was good to see Kevan and Sara enjoying that phase of life, too! I'm sure that in ten years when all our kids are (mostly) grown, we'll also be fine.

Also! Keven and Sara just moved here from Abu Dhabi, where Kevan was the stake executive secretary (I think), so they travelled around the area quite a bit. Sara raved about the ward in Qatar, Kevan told us we need to drive through Saudi Arabia. We talked about old times, got all caught up on what all the kids (and grandkids!) are doing, told very many, very lame jokes, and somehow took zero pictures.

Our next (and last) visit before we move should be Sam's homecoming next month!

Bunk Bed Signatures

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 05:37:49 +0000

Approximately thirteen years ago, Miriam carved her name into the frame of the bunk bed.

Miriam on the fateful bed-carving day, 2013

She got a little bit of a lecture and hasn't carved her name into any bunk beds since (that I know of).

Miriam pointing at her carving, 2026

This bunk bed has been in our home since 2012—and it was a rather expensive housewarming gift from Grandma—so it felt like rather a big deal when Miriam carved her name into it after just one year of use! Now all of the kids have slept in it for multiple years and we're getting ready to say goodbye.

Over the years various children have taken the liberty to illicitly carve their name into the bed, first Benjamin...who who took advantage of the stair rails that so conveniently come in sets of three (almost asking for a three-letter word to be carved into them, right?)...

Zoë was next...and with a three-letter name her name, of course, ended up on those rails as well.

At some point Alexander wrote his name on the rail of the top bunk (which he took the opportunity to spruce up a bit today, scarring the wood a little deeper)...

When Rachel heard that Alexander had surreptitiously carved his name into the bed, too, she got a little bit jealous. She asked (typical first child behaviour) if she could also carve her name into the bed when she visited at Christmas...but we forgot to have her do it. So tonight was the night!

Rachel finally carved her name into the bed:

And then, of course, we had to let Phoebe carve her name into the bed, which she gleefully did.

She wanted to write her whole name in the bed (but we stopped her after Phoebe H.)

We did discuss with her that this was a "special occasion" carving opportunity and that we don't ordinarily carve our name into furniture.

But isn't it wild how much parenting techniques change over the course of raising children?

Sorry, wee Miriam, for getting after you so about carving your name into the bed.

I think everyone else just got an eye roll...and yet they all have learned not to carve their name into furniture.

(Except, perhaps, for Phoebe, who may have learned the opposite lesson...but we've been doing a lot of unconventional things with furniture here lately, like throwing couches off decks and smashing organs to smithereens...so Phoebe will just have to file this away in the "exception to the rule" part of her brain).

Family pictures

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 05:08:28 +0000

Andrew's still "processing" the other pictures we took this afternoon, so I'm sure I'll share more later.

I'm still "processing" the fact that tonight may very well be the last night I'll ever have all my kids—as kids–under the same roof.

Taking a family picture was high on my list of priorities while Rachel was here, but not so high that we did it right away or anything...clearly. We basically left it until the last possible moment. This summer has been so busy!

Besides swim team, packing to move, and so many other things, it's been hard to squeeze in a moment.

We only just realized that Benjamin was at YM camp this week (he got home on Saturday) and then Miriam leaves for YW camp on Monday and doesn't get back until Rachel has left for the airport...so if we were going to take a family picture, it had to be this weekend.

We also happened to have stake conference this weekend, which meant we had a few extra meetings. But stake conference was lovely and we decided that since we were all dressed up already we'd just take our family pictures right there at the stake center.

This particular picture was the very first one we snapped.

Notice how everyone is looking at the camera and smiling?

Pretty impressive, if you ask me.

I don't think we've achieved that in all our years of taking our own family pictures (not on the first try, not ever).

Here's a picture of Rachel holding the flag of Vietnam while the rest of us cluster behind the flag of Qatar and wave goodbye to her. Times they are a-changin'!

Crunch time: Broken tiles, broken frames

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sun, 07 Jun 2026 06:00:00 +0000

Years ago my friend's family was getting ready to put their house on the market so they were fixing up a number of things around the house to make it more...marketable...as one (apparently) does.

I didn't really know about that part of moving because my parents had always rented (at least in my memory to that point) and renters aren't typically too big about changing out mismatched doorknobs or whatever.

My friend's mom told us that we shouldn't do what she was doing (frantically making improvements on her house so that the next owners could enjoy those changes) but should instead make the improvements for myself so that I get to enjoy them.

Cool advice, but perhaps not ultimately practical.

We've tried to make changes that we might be able to enjoy here, but mostly we just tried to keep up with the upkeep. I would say that we did get to enjoy the newly renovated basement (that was a good move) and the upstairs hallway bathroom has also been quite lovely.

Because remember that one time when the upstairs bathroom fell into the downstairs bathroom?

That was back in 2021—in case you're keep track—so quite literally five years ago.

We finished fixing the upstairs bathroom but have not touched the downstairs bathroom.

Except to install a $600 towel rack in 2023. We patched up that issue and painted the bathroom walls yellow and then I bought a shower curtain that I felt kind of tied in the yellow walls, purple cabinet, and blue (raw drywall) ceiling and we called it a day...for another three years.

Our realtor strongly advised us to fix that bathroom up before listing our house, so that's what we did this week! Because we know nothing about fixing things (see: $600 towel rack) we hired our favourite handyman and let him work his magic.

He actually laughed when he was our bathroom floor, which has been crumbling under our feet for the past seven years (and which has always been on our list of things to fix but which has always been bumped down on our list of priorities).

"Who decided to use wall tile on the floor?!" he asked.

Honestly, I have no idea because it was like that when we bought it! But its rate of deterioration sure does make sense now. Wall tiles and floor tiles are designed quite a bit differently (and while you can always use a floor tile on a wall, you cannot always use a wall tile on a floor).

He retiled the bathroom, finished drywalling the ceiling, installed a new ceiling fan, painted everything and...it's a whole new world in there! Not only does it feel strange to not have the tiles crunch beneath our feet anymore, but the floor is also about half an inch lower than it used to be so our internal gyroscopes are thrown off by the new floor and we feel a little bit like we're sinking into the floor when we walk into the bathroom.

At least we'll get to enjoy a nice tile floor for a few weeks before we let someone else enjoy it!

And speaking of floors and cracking tiles, I found a framed picture in the basement that had been broken—quite recently—while we were moving things around.

We had a hunch about who might have broken it.

This person really likes to stand on stuff. If something is on the floor they will go out of their way to stand on that item just because it's there. One of my most used phrases is: "That's not meant to hold the weight of a human!" So I probably should have known better than to leave a pile of picture frames on the floor...but sometimes you have to leave a picture frame sitting on the floor for a little while, you know?

These frames had been sitting on a box, but I wanted to take that box upstairs, so I put the picture frames down and...anyway...

I couldn't get anyone to admit to breaking the frame, so I took a picture of it to show at the dinner table while we were eating.

"I have never seen that picture in my life!" Alexander said (Zoë was equally adamant and Benjamin had barely been home). "I swear it wasn't me!"

"Okay," I said. "I just...wish whoever did this would have told a grown up because having broken glass around is dangerous."

"Well, it wasn't me," he said.

"I believe you," I said. "But do you know who could have done it?"

"I dunno—maybe Phoebe?"

"I have never seen that picture in my life," Phoebe mumbled into her chest, refusing to look me in the eye.

"Hmmmm..." I said. "Perhaps you've never seen it, but did you stand on it?"

She shook her head no.

"Well, I hope you didn't because it looks pretty sharp. Whoever broke this could have been hurt pretty badly. They should have told an adult so that adult could look at their feet and make sure there wasn't any broken glass stuck in their skin or anything."

Phoebe tucked her feet up underneath her on the bench.

"It wasn't me," she mumbled.

"Phoebe," I said. "No one cares about that picture frame. We have never displayed it in our house. We've always just had it sitting in the storage room gathering dust. I've been meaning to take the photos out of it for years! No one will be mad if you happened to break the frame—although I do wish you would stop standing on stuff—but we do want to make sure that you're okay. Did you break the frame?"

"I didn't mean to!" she protested guiltily.

"I'm sure you didn't mean to," I agreed. "But, again, I implore you to stop standing on stuff. Can I look at your feet?"

She had a number of superficial cuts on her foot, the silly goose.

At least she gave me the motivation I needed to take Andrew's graduation pictures out of those frames and move them to a photo album or something because I'm tired of hauling around that big ol' frame!

Zoë's birthday party (family edition)

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sat, 06 Jun 2026 04:06:45 +0000

Quick! Let's finish talking about Zoë's birthday before Benjamin comes home from YM camp and we finally celebrate his birthday!

Phoebe helped me wrap Zoë's birthday presents. We talked the whole time about how we wrap them so they can be a surprise. Why? Because it's fun to have a little surprise every now and again. But the present wrapper's job is very serious because the present wrapper knows what the surprises are and yet must keep that information to themselves.

Tricky, tricky business, but Phoebe swore she was up to the task.

We brought the presents out. Zoë opened the present from Phoebe first.

"It feels like a rock," Zoë guessed.

"It is a rock!" Phoebe said.

And it was a rock—a lovely shiny one that Phoebe had chosen from the front garden. Alexander wrote Zoë a lovely little note, which was truly a surprise, and then Zoë felt her other gifts.

"I wonder what this could be..." she said.

"It's a shirt," Phoebe said, then she revealed each present in turn before sitting back proudly. "Shirt, another shirt, a game called...giants...moving...something or other...I can't remember. But I think I remembered everything else."

"Oh, look..." Zoë said sarcastically, opening her last present. "A game called Giants Moving Tiny Furniture..."

"Phoebe," I said. "You can remember what you wrapped but you're not supposed to tell what they are to the person you wrapped them for!"

I suppose knowing in advance what you got doesn't really diminish the joy of having the thing (only of opening the thing). Oh, I also got Zoë a balance beam! I was going to just order one once we were in Qatar, but the more I looked into it the more complicated it seemed, so I ordered one here and then we'll just...put it in our shipment in a couple of weeks and see it whenever it gets to Qatar.

It'll be like getting a balance beam twice!

Zoë wanted pie for her birthday. We took pumpkin pie to her friend party (eventually, though it was a bit of an adventure getting it there). We saved a smorgasbord of pies to have at home!

Rachel made a key lime pie, a Carolina beach pie, and a cherry-berry-peach pie for her!

Here's Benjamin lighting the candles:

And for some reason acting like he's really bored of lighting candles even though he begged to do it (wait until she turns twelve, buddy—imagine how much more work that will be):

Here she is while we were singing to her:

And here she is with her pie—no teeth:

And teeth:

And here's Benjamin with a little frog that had plastered itself to the window on the front door and was croaking out a racket:

I fear it's a bit of a "summer of survival" for our family, so our birthday celebrations are rather low-key! Still, we're happy to have helped Zoë ring in her twelfth year. Big things for her in the future—a move half-way around the world and entering the Young Women program in January. Fun times!

Stings and things

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sat, 06 Jun 2026 02:52:15 +0000

Another swim meet is in the books!

Here's Alexander, doing very well on his breast stroke (he ended up in third place overall, which is pretty cool—I think he got third last week, too):

Zoë had a bit of a harder time this meet—her goggles kept coming off on her entries (which was tricky and difficult) and she had some hard events (a 100-IM and a 50-fly, for example), plus she moved up an age group and is on the smaller side of things this year. But I'm sure she'll find a good stride soon enough! It's good to be challenged.

She's all the way over in lane 5 of this picture:

Here's Phoebe watching the meet:

And enjoying some time sitting on Rachel's lap (this is our very last swim meet with Rachel):

It was our senior celebration night, so the kids had a lot of fun. The seniors always "throw" their free relay and get really silly, racing in dress-ups and breaking all the rules. Alexander was howling with laughter beside me, saying, "I think our coaches have lost their minds!" and calling out all their infractions (I was judging this event...and it was a real hoot). The little kids got to throw balls into the pool at the end and then they all jumped in a played.

We were out late, late, late! Here are the kids posing by the sign at the end of the evening:

And here's Phoebe posing by the sign in the morning when we arrived at the pool for fun Friday:

Zoë was thrilled to have been mentioned three times during Fun Friday. First she was selected as swimmer of the week for her age group (for having a good attitude and trying harder events—like the IM) and then her joke was selected as the winner for this week (she won a Chick-Fil-A gift card) and then she was given an honourable mention for the candy guessing game (there were 31 candies in the jar and she guessed 32, but the person who won guessed 30 because they didn't go over).

Phoebe was also excited to be chosen as swimmer of the week. Her coach is Tenley and she told everyone that Phoebe came to practices with a wonderful attitude this week and said yes to everything, even though the water was cold, and even kicked the whole 25 yards across the pool (with a kick board)! She's on the far right, below:

We talked to her about having "Yes!" days at swimming, instead of polite "no, thank you" days because we're at swim practice to try hard and new things.

(Plus Daddy told her that if she didn't say yes to her coach she wouldn't get to have any screen time in the afternoons after swim practice).

Lo and behold, trying hard pays off! She's made great progress and is looking forward to swimming with Tenley next week.

In addition to both being selected as swimmers of the week, Zoë and Phoebe also both got stung by bees this week!

On Wednesday, I thought I had gathered up all the kids and their things so we could head home from River Station pool (the RS of JBRS), but I guess I only grabbed Alexander's and Phoebe's things. When we went by the tennis court (where she was playing baseball with her friends) to tell Zoë we were ready to go, she finished taking her turn at bat and then skipped off to the pool to grab her things...but showed up at the van a few minutes later completely empty handed (and looking a little shell-shocked).

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"I think I just got stung!" she said through gritted teeth.

Sure enough, she'd been stung by something when she'd hastily grabbed her pile of things.

We found some sting relief pads in the first aid kit, which Zoë held on her finger while I shook out her stuff. Then we headed home to get some ice on it (she had a piano lesson in the afternoon, which was a little rough, but her teacher was understanding about it).

Then today we were at the Jones Bridge pool (the JB part of JBRS), Phoebe had decided she was finished swimming and was sunbathing beside the pool. I wasn't paying a ton of attention to her because she wasn't in the water, and was just chatting with my friend, but then she ran up to me screaming about her leg. She honestly had no idea what had happened to her, but after a quick inspection it was pretty clear she had been stung by something.

My hypothesis is that some sting-wielding creature landed on her leg, which felt tickle-y...and when she reached back to scratched that itch...well...*sting* Phoebe's theory is that she sat on a dead bee that "had its butt stinger-side up." Who knows who is right?

We didn't have any sting relief in the first aid kit at this pool, but my friend had an emergency stash of Oreos in her pool bag (which definitely helped) and I texted home to ask people to have an ice pack ready for her when we pulled up. She was met with a full-service care crew!

She iced her leg for a long time and is feeling much better!

We finally have our pack-out date (June 18) so while the little kids snuggled on the couch, keeping ice packs on Phoebe, while having some screen time, the rest of us were packing and packing and packing.

So we went to Cook Out for dinner since we haven't been for a long time and Rachel wanted to go while she was out here.

Over all I'm a little sad about Rachel's visit home. We had company the first week. And then I went to Europe. And then Rachel went to Florida. And then Benjamin went to YM camp. And then Miriam will be at YW camp next week. I feel like we've hardly all been home at once—there's just too much going on!

But that's okay. We'll get through it.

I wanted to take a picture of the girls with their signs when we got home, mostly because I had missed getting a picture of Phoebe with her sign at Fun Friday. So, here's Zoë with her sign:

And here's Phoebe with her sign (she's checking with her finger to verify that she is, in fact, smiling...which she's not doing, but she is baring her teeth, so that should count, right?):

And here she is finally looking at me:

And here she is realizing that she'd disturbed an ant's nest and her shoes were rather rapidly being flooded with angry ants (doh!):

"I'm having quite the day!" she wailed as I carried her down the driveway (after ripping her shoes off her feet and hurling them across the cul-de-sac, wiping all the ants off her legs, etc.).

"You are having quite the day!" I agreed.

Poor thing.

She was rather willing to go to bed, which was a nice treat.

Granted, she did get up at 6:00 this morning (which was far too early for me after getting home from the swim meet at 11:00 last night), so her day was also rather long. She was so nice, though, because when she got up at 6:00 and I told her that I wasn't ready to get up yet, she decided to read to herself until someone was ready to get up with her.

So she went back to her own room, turned on her reading lamp, and read stories to herself!

Simply amazing!

So many reasons to be proud of these girls today!

(Below are the pictures we got from Ms. Julie)

Birthday Buddies

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 15:48:18 +0000

Our family has (in my opinion) a surprising number of birthday buddies!

Growing up, my grandfathers (my mom's dad and my dad's dad) shared a birthday (September 8) so I was used to the idea of sharing birthdays. And then, of course, they also shared that day with my grandpa's twin sister (on account of being twins).

Later, my brother David and Andrew's Grandpa Frank would share a birthday (they're not related, but they're on my mental calendar together).

Then my sister Kelli had twins, so they share a birthday.

All of that doesn't feel too cluttered or unusual. But then...

Our cousin Carter was born on our cousin Kayl's birthday
Alexander was born on Auntie K's birthday
Ethan was born on Naanii's birthday
And just recently Chloe was born on Benjamin's birthday!

Those last four feel particularly funny to me because whereas before all the shared birthdays had been either through marriage (in-laws with the same birthdays) or twinship (sharing a womb), all of a sudden we have a spate of blood relatives sharing birthdays through random happenstance!

Of course, my extended family is ginormous and there are lots of birthday buddies when we start counting, like, second cousins and things. But among first cousins? We didn't have so many people overlapping!

Here's a picture of Benjamin in the wee hours of his birthday (he stayed up late playing Hand and Foot and then left for scout camp in the morning, so we haven't really celebrated his birthday yet, although I did send him to camp with cupcakes).

And here's my brother David holding his third baby, Chloe, who was born in the afternoon on Benjamin's birthday!

What a wonderful birthday present!

Rachel's mission call!

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Tue, 02 Jun 2026 03:36:11 +0000

At 4:00 this afternoon (2:00 MST), we were in the process of chucking our couch off our second storey deck (for not the first time—that thing is sturdy) when Rachel suddenly exclaimed, "I got my mission call! My mission call is here! I have an email with my mission call in it! What do I do?! Guys! What do I do?!"

"Well, first I guess we'll finish pushing this couch off the deck that we have balanced on the railing and then you'll open your mission call."

Listen...

I have tried to give these couches away on multiple occasions on multiple platforms. No one wants them. They're a little scratched up (thanks, Waffles) and definitely not trendy. Our local Goodwill didn't want them. So they were destined for the landfill one way or another.

We could have kept them to sit on for the next little while, but Andrew started this project with Miriam and Benjamin while I was in a meeting and by the time I came out they had already taken a saw and crowbar to it and were working on the first deck-chuck. So we were pretty committed to the destruction path at that point.

He figures that this way we can sneak bits of the couch into the garbage can every week and save on the cost of disposing it.

Anyway, we threw the couch off the balcony for the second time and then gathered around to watch Rachel open her mission call. She didn't want a big to-do about it (and even told me that if came while she was in Florida—she drove down to Florida for Corbin's mission farewell...he's off to Argentina soon—that she would just open it there and text me about it so I guess we're lucky it arrived the day after she got home from Florida), but we did take a minute to have everyone make a quick guess about where she might go.

Zoë: Tanzania or France

Alexander: Utah
Miriam: Berlin

Benjamin: Stockholm

Dad: Pennsylvania

Mom: Spanish Speaking or Canada

Phoebe: California

Phoebe was (h)annoyed* at being called inside to listen to Rachel open her boring mission call (you can hear her saying, "Are you almost finished so we can go back outside?" at around 18 seconds into the video). She had guessed California only because someone mentioned that Grandpa had mentioned and Arabic-speaking mission in California—that sounded like a fine guess to her! (Could we get a move on things already?)

Rachel has been studying Arabic at BYU, studied Spanish in high school, and marked down that she was willing to learn a foreign language and leave her home country (a surprising number of missionary applicants are not willing to do those things, I'm learning...). She didn't particularly want to serve a "local" mission, but had made her peace with it—I've had cousins who've served in Utah and Washington. Two of her roommates are going to Canada—one British Columbia, the other Manitoba. There's nothing wrong with local missions, but Rachel wanted a bit of an adventure (since the rest of us are heading off on an adventure without her).

And she'll be getting one! Here she is screaming about the location:

And here's a video of her reading her call (she read the preamble** to herself and only told us the location, which I'll put below the video in case you want to watch it and hear the news straight from Rachel's own mouth):

She was absolutely floored by her call.

She was happy and scared and excited and overwhelmed.

She'll be headed to the Vietnam Hanoi mission in mid-September and will serve for 18 months.

After everyone was recovered from the shock of Rachel's mission call—so far away, so soon, so exciting! We got ready to run to Target.

Benjamin has Young Men's camp this week and his shoes are...not adequate for romping around the woods, so we needed to get him some shoes rather quickly.

Andrew suggested that on the way to Target, the big kids and I go out to eat at the new Vietnamese restaurant down the street...while he fed the little ones at home because they don't have refined palates (and he claims to not like Vietnamese food—he has the soapy Coriander gene).

So that's what we did! Here's Rachel in front of Wonderpho:

We rarely go out to eat but managed to fumble our way through ordering. We mostly ate off the appetizer tray, sharing some spring rolls, egg rolls, and bánh mì (sandwiches), along with two "kid" bowls of pho. That was really plenty for us!

The restaurant kindly brought out some small bowls so that we could more easily share the pho. Here's Miriam with a dish:

Zoë was having a hard time with her chopsticks...

...but she managed:

Rachel is a huge fan of barbecue sauce, so she rather liked the bánh mì (which I assume had plenty of hoisin sauce on it...which I just learned should also have been added to the pho broth—we had a huge bottle sitting at the table). Rachel and I were fans of all the sauces—the peanut sauce, whatever was on the bánh mì...all good.

Because it was a special occasion we even got dessert—coconut avocado ice cream! The avocado was much stronger than I was expecting, but it was good. Here in North America, we usually think of avocados as a savoury food, but many cultures categorize it as a dessert fruit.

Zoë and I were excited to recognize the word "bơ" on the menu. We knew that meant avocado because we just happen to be reading A Two-Placed Heart by Doan Phuong Nguyen right now and while her nickname is "bơm" (apple, sounds like "pomme" because it's borrowed from French...there's a lot of French influence in Vietnam thanks to good ol' colonization, anywho...), her little sister's nickname is "bơ" (avocado, sounds like "buh").

Here's Zoë considering whether she liked it (she liked it better with the coconut cream mixed in):

And here's Benjamin and Miriam with their ice cream:

It was a good experience! Rachel will come back an expert in Vietnamese cuisine, I'm sure, and then she can help us confidently order off the menu the next time we go to a Vietnamese restaurant with her.

Now in addition to getting ready to move our family of seven to the other side of the world, we're also trying to prepare our freshly-minted adult daughter to an entirely different other side of the world!

(none of this is remotely stressful; we're fine)

((please send help...or at least prayers))

Rachel is intrigued about this mission because proselytizing is technically illegal in Vietnam, except under very strict conditions. So she's excited to find out what she'll be doing there.

She'll start out doing some home-based training at my mom's house (Josie and my mom are already planning on practicing some Vietnamese with her!) and then she'll move into the MTC for about six weeks before heading to Vietnam (if everything goes smoothly with her visa process).

I think she'll miss recreational reading the most, but with such intense language training...perhaps she'll miss it less than I think she will. She's a little worried about the heat, but...we all are...so we've both been researching lightweight dresses to wear in either Qatar or Vietnam (dresses are much breezier than pants are).

She'll be on a bike, it seems—she was told she'll need to buy a helmet and bike lock when she's in-country. And she knows she'll need a good raincoat.

There's lots to do! One way or the other we'll get it all done.

(Good thing Alexander planned an FHE lesson to remind us all to put our shoulder to the wheel!)

* This was Zoë's clever pun about Rachel's mission call that she immediately came up with.

** You are hereby called to serve as a missionary of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

You have been recommended as one worthy to represent the Lord as a minister of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. You will be an official representative of the Church. As such, you will be expected to honor the covenants you have made with Heavenly Father, keep the commandments, maintain the highest standards of conduct, and follow the righteous counsel of your mission president. As you devote your time and attention to serving the Lord, leaving behind all other personal affairs, you will be blessed with increased knowledge and testimony of Jesus Christ and his restored gospel.

Your purpose will be to invite others to come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and His Atonement, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end. As you serve with all your heart, might, mind, and strength, the Lord will lead you to those who will hear His message. They, too, can then have the opportunity to receive sacred ordinances and make covenants with Heavenly Father.

You are assigned to labour in the Vietnam Hanoi Mission and will prepare to preach the gospel in the Vietnamese language. You will begin your missionary training on Wednesday, September 16, 2026, after being set apart by your stake president. Please see the Missionary Portal for additional information on your training experience. It is anticipated that you will serve for a period of 18 months.

Our Heavenly Father will reward you for the goodness of your life. Greater blessings and more joy than you have yet experienced await you as you humbly and prayerfully serve the Lord in this labor of love among His children. We place our confidence in you and pray that they Lord will help you become an effective missionary.

Cypress knees

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Tue, 02 Jun 2026 01:46:10 +0000

I'm just waiting for the rest of the photos from my phone to synch with my computer so I can share the day's actual exciting news. In the meantime, here's a photo of a mushroom growing beside the knobby knee of a bald cypress.

It's one of my favourite trees here in the south because aside from being very pretty it's rather unique. It's a deciduous conifer and loses its needles every fall (it was rather alarming the first time I saw a little grove of these around a pond all seemingly "die"). They put out little pneumatophores—these knee-like projections—that are thought to either be used to bring air to drowning roots or anchor the trees better.

This particular patch of knees was growing inside the playground at the park near the pool (where Phoebe and I were killing time while waiting for Benjamin to get out of his practice).

(C)Rafty Kids

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Mon, 01 Jun 2026 05:24:05 +0000

After many months of planning and research and milk jug collecting, Benjamin and his friends got together this afternoon to build a raft. And I'm so happy for them!

They're making plans for its maiden voyage in the lake near J's house—they've got lifejackets and everything. And, like I said, I'm just so happy for them.

Erik Erikson theorized about the stages of human development from birth to death. Infants might wonder, "Can I trust the world?" while adolescents wonder who they are and what they might become. People around my age are often curious about how they can make a difference in the world, while those in my parents' generation might wax reflective or introspective, wondering whether they have made any difference at all.

Kalervo Oberg theorized about culture shock and the four stages people usually go through as they adjust to a new place: Honeymoon, negotiation, adjustment, adaptation.

Then there are the stages of grief, theorized by Kübler-Ross: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance.

I find myself wondering what theory can be used to describe the process of saying goodbye to your current home, knowing you're about to embark on a new chapter of life in a new place. It could be akin to grieving, it isn't yet culture shock, and while it isn't a universal stage in human development I do wonder whether it can trigger a person to (temporarily) move into more introspective ways of thinking.

Social sciences are messy and nothing can ever be adequately described. For example, I recently noticed how Eurocentric (and Christian-centric) Holmes and Rahe's original Social Readjustment Rating Scale is. Whereas newer (more discerning) renditions of the Holmes-Rahe Life Stress Inventory might include "major holidays" as something that could contribute to someone's overall level of stress, their original paper specifically lists only "Christmas" (as if major holidays outside of Christmas couldn't even hold a candle to that day). Putting "major holidays" is better than simply "Christmas" but...it makes me wonder what else our own biases (or inexperience or over-generalizing) blind us to.

We're always working on describing things...and yet can never fully capture what it means to be human or the way humans are (probably because humans are always changing and, honestly, no one deals with anything in the very same, predictable way because life is at once horrifyingly mundane and unique. This is frustrating and fascinating.

Anyway, I've been wondering whether getting old is the only time people reflect on lives and wonder whether they've lived it well enough? I'm not so sure, Mr. Erikson. I think moving (and many other situations) can cause a person to think about life quite deeply.

Miriam noted that moving has had her reflecting a lot on her time here, and ultimately she's feeling sad about not being sadder than she is to leave. I am with her in that regard—I too feel a little bit sad about not being sadder about leaving here.

Rather than dwell on the frustrations behind those particular emotions, however, I wanted to take a minute to just be grateful for the families in our ward (all homeschool families, now that I think about it) who are as nutty as we are—who agreed to let some spare corner of their house become a collection place for used milk jugs (for many, many moons), who are making sure we all fit this adventure in between our summer swim team engagements (we're all swim families, now that I think about it...just on multiple teams), and who are willing to just let these kids be kids.

This project was certainly an exercise in these kids making sure they're living life to the fullest.

We interrupt this post with a brief announcement: I wrote some beautiful reflections on how thankful I was for these kids and their families...which probably even tied into all my review on psych theory. Unfortunately my computer then ate it all up because it decided I wasn't logged into my account and wouldn't even let me take a minute to copy everything I had written...so that was a real bummer.. Suffice it to say: I'm proud of these kids for having had an idea and for then making it happen.
The rest of this post was written after they took it out on the water (and after I recovered from feeling frustrated that half my post disappeared).

I didn't get to see them launch their raft because they did all the construction at J's house (due it its proximity to the lake) and then took it out to the lake together (again because of her proximity to the lake—it's technically a half mile walk from her house, but her mom lowered all the seats in the van and gave the raft a ride to the lake and made the kids walk, which was certainly easier than their original plan...which was to carry the raft to the lake).

Here's Benjamin looking absolutely gleeful that the raft actually floated (with four people on it, no less, here getting an extra boost courtesy of their friend C):

This represents the bulk of our youth group

They had such a great time. The raft sustained minimal damage and the kids are in talks about whether to dismantle and scrap the project or whether to repair and fine tune things for another go on the lake.

Summer's only just begun, so I know where my vote lies...

Swim meet #1

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Fri, 29 May 2026 05:04:41 +0000

Today was sunny enough that we stayed after morning practice to swim for a bit longer, partly so that I could make Phoebe do some things. When I asked her how futures went (I was in the parking lot giving things away to my friends...) she said that it went very well, that she was very "nice" and just said, "No, thank you!" when she was asked to float on her back.

So we had to practice back floats, obviously.

Because these sweet little coaches are like, "The little lady said no thank you," whereas I am like an auctioneer: "Can you hold a back float for five seconds? One, two, three, four five! Five bid. Five. Do I hear ten seconds? Ten..."

What I mean is...the back float is happening whether you really want to or not.

Because I'm a meanie.

Anyway, she held her back float for ten seconds today.

But we had to get home to move a bunk bed frame, two mattresses, two desks, two monitors, an office chair, some weighted blankets, and a bunch of stuff...into a friend's truck so they can redo their boys' rooms. Win-win.

We're getting rather tired of moving furniture over here but...we're nearing the finish line.

The afternoon was sunny-ish, with a chance of thunderstorm. The cloud cover was very welcome when it rolled in and covered the sun. And it didn't ever thunder, so that was lovely.

Here's Phoebe standing in the splash zone:

Here's Benjamin (bright yellow cap) getting ready to dive in during a relay:

Here's Zoë diving in (lane 1, by the wall):

And here's Alexander (just entering the water over his little relay buddy):

The kids all did well and each got more than one "best time" this evening!

Benjamin was particularly proud because he has been wanting to get a sub-30 time for his 50 yard freestyle and finally did! He got 30.91 at our mock meet last week and this week he got 29.88! He was pretty excited about that!

He was also quite proud about his IM (individual medley, where he swims a lap of butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke, and freestyle in the same event).

According to the time keepers, he got third place overall (though I was watching very closely...on account of...I'm a stroke and turn judge...and I swear he came in second place, just barely...but it's fine). Whatever the case, he took off about 17 seconds from his previous time...and did so without goggles (because they fell off when he dove in)!

It was a pretty good evening!

While we were sweltering in the sunshine before it was swallowed up in clouds, Andrew checked the weather and said, "Hey—it's one degree hotter here than it is in Doha!"

"See?" I said. "We're going to be fine..."

"Of course, it's like 2:00 in the morning there..." he pointed out. "Today's high was...113°F. So...that's hot."

"That's hot, yeah."

"They don't drop below triple digits for the rest of the week."

"For the rest of..."

"Until like the end of October."

It'll be fine.

Future Barracuda!

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Thu, 28 May 2026 05:02:39 +0000

Phoebe had her first day of "futures" on Tuesday this week (and then thought we moved to Doha on Wednesday—what a waste that would have been)!

She was very excited, but she's also been rather nervous about the pool. It's still not bathtub-warm (her favourite pool temperature) and she also forgot how to swim between the end of pool season in September and the beginning of pool season this year. And, of course, I wasn't able to take her much the first half of the month since I was out of town. So she didn't feel very well prepared.

Here she is ready to meet her coach:

From my observations (far away from the action, as requested by those in charge), she was a bit of a stinker and didn't want to try very many things. But her coach told her she did great. So that's what Phoebe's been clinging to. But she didn't do great. She was an absolute stinker.

In all fairness...I was a stinker of a kid (so I know one when I see one).

I cried through many a swim lesson in my day (often because I was cold or because I didn't like my instructor or whatever).

I'm sure Phoebe will warm up to things as the summer progresses—the water will get warmer and she'll "remember" how to swim (and then improve upon her skills).

Today she wanted to go to the pool in the afternoon when the kids went for their practice (it was thunder-storming when we left but then stopped by the time we arrived, so that was fortuitous). We were there for an hour and a half and she mostly just cried the first hour and refused to do anything.

And then I went the tough-love route and forced her into the deep end (disclaimer: I am...or was for several years...a certified water-safety instructor and have taught hundreds of kids how to swim, so I feel very confident about my ability to wrangle an uncooperative toddler in the deep end of a pool without a floatation device...if you're an amateur perhaps don't try this at home...also she was sitting on the deck crying anyway so it's not like pulling her into the pool made things much worse, temper-tantrum-wise). I helped her kick across the deep end on her tummy and on her back (while she blubbered about how unjust life was—even though the water was incredibly warm today, thanks to all the warm rain we've gotten) and then I asked her if she wanted to continue her lesson in the deep end or shallow end.

The choice was hers!

We were absolutely going to have a swim lesson together...but she would get to choose the depth of the water, and that was all.

She chose shallow, so we went to the shallow end and then she actually tried the things I asked her to do (probably because she fully believed I'd haul her back to the deep end if she didn't cooperate). And, lo, she soon magically "remembered" how to swim and was suddenly diving down to rest her belly on the bottom and jumping in from the deck and floating—even on her back—and doing beautiful streamline glides and some rather splashy rainbow arms (that we'll work on).

Ultimately she felt quite proud about what she accomplished and then didn't want to leave when all the kids had finished their practice sessions (after spending the first hour we were there crying on the deck, begging to go home).

Hopefully tomorrow's "futures" lesson will go a bit smoother—we may even get some sunshine so the kids can feel warm out of the water as well as in!

Totally unrelated...here's a picture of Benjamin with a frog that was plastered to the window of our front door. He got a little tour of the house since he was so curious about it, and then he was returned outside:

Zoë's birthday party (friends edition!)

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Thu, 28 May 2026 04:32:46 +0000

I have been simply awful about birthday parties the past...several years.

How bad, you might be asking. Quite terrible, honestly.

I don't think I've thrown a party since January 2018 for Miriam's 8th birthday party when she invited two friends over for a party (or, at least, two friends who came). And when did Miriam turn 8?

October 2017.

But Alexander was born just a few weeks before Miriam turned 8. Postpartum was...rough...and Alexander was going through all his breathing issue stuff...and I was not ready for a birthday party just a couple of weeks later. But we did throw a shindig for their combined baptism/blessing celebration so that almost counts (with a small "sorry I missed your birthday" party four months later).

Anyway...I...uhhhh...haven't thrown a party since.

I just...somehow couldn't. It was like the birthday party planning part of my brain just completely fell out of my head.

Oh, we still had family celebrations. But a friend party? In this economy?

I'm not really blaming the economy here...it's a meme. But maybe the economy did contribute to my inability to let loose and have fun a little bit. Who is to say, really?

If I had to put my finger on it, I'd say some major contributors to my lack of ability to pull off a party was a combination of (1) a global pandemic, (2) grad school, and (3) another baby. At the very least.

Add in kids getting older and engaging in more extracurriculars (swimming every day) and, I mean, we're plum worn out as parents.

When Zoë was 9 she wanted a Harry Potter birthday (and just now I am realizing that 9 was not last year but the year before) so I went so far as to gather decorations and she went so far as to make a blueprint of the cake she wanted. Her guest list was extravagant. We were going to do this!

But then we didn't? For some reason (a wedding, perhaps, and the start of swim season, and a beach trip and...I dunno...there are always a million reasons why, right?). Also, her birthday was on the mock meet day!

Since she wanted a Harry Potter birthday party, though, we decided it would be so fun(ny) to throw her a 9-and-three-quarters party! She could celebrate her birthday in February (I'm good at February birthdays)...but we missed that as well. So then we thought—May! We'll just throw her a Harry Potter party for her 10th birthday.

Ha! Again, I just couldn't.

So I was quite determined to throw her a party this year—because 11 is the year kids get their letters for Hogwarts!

But do you all remember what's been going on this month? Here's a recap:

finals due May 4
depart for Europe May 5
home from Europe May 13
swim season begins...May 12...missed that one!
spring recital May 16
Rachel goes through the temple May 20
Mock meet May 21
Zoë's birthday May 23

How in the world have I only been home from Europe for two weeks? It feels like a million years ago. I have been gifting furniture left and right, cleaning and organizing and packing, getting carloads of stuff to take to Goodwill...running to the airport to convince border control that we're lovely, normal people (they actually bought it—can you believe it?!)...and so forth. It's been...a whirlwind.

And then my friend texted and was like, "Hey—kinda last minute, but we want to have a birthday party for Kate. We're just going to play games in the church gym, really low key."

And I was like, "That sounds great! We have to clean the church that morning so we'll be there already. Ugh—but that's Zoë's actual birthday. I need to throw her a party this year. Maybe we'll just follow your lead and throw a gym game party for her next weekend or something."

Gym game parties have been all the rage among our group of friends lately.

And my friend texted back and said, "Why don't we just celebrate them together? Throw a joint party? Not even kidding. I'd have to run it by Kate, but I don't see why she wouldn't want to..."

So she ran it by Kate and I ran it by Zoë and both girls agreed that would be fine (so long as they finally got their party—Kate had her birthday last month and has been waiting for a party, but her family is going through some transitions as well (adding a teenage foster child) and so Kate's party became less of a priority and I mean...these things happen, okay? Sometimes they happen for a decade...)).

Between my friend and I we cobbled together enough guests and food to have a good time!

I scored a billion cupcakes from the Buy Nothing Group (BNG) and we were all so busy doing things that I wasn't even sure I'd be able to pick them up (because they had to be picked up right then). But someone from the BNG commented under my comment saying I would love them for this joint party (but didn't know if I could pick them up right then) to say that she wasn't doing anything and could swing by the school to pick them up and deliver them to me (because we've been gifting so many things on the BNG and she wanted to show her gratitude).

Another Buy Nothing Group miracle!

(I'm really going to miss our Buy Nothing Group, I think).

Later that night we carefully removed all the graduation decorations and redecorated them.

Rachel also made pie, which was what Zoë really wanted for her birthday treat. Funny enough, the pie didn't even make it in the van to come to church with us!

I had written a very precise list of things to grab in the morning and it was very nearly useful!

We did grab many of the things. Someone grabbed the watermelon, a cutting board, and knife...and then checked that off. Someone grabbed the decorations and then checked that off. Someone grabbed the cupcakes and then check that off.

Benjamin saw that we had everything on the list checked off except for pie...so he checked it off.

And then I looked at the list and declared us ready for take off.

Except that no one actually grabbed the pie.

Benjamin had simply assumed that someone had because it was the last thing on the list!

It wasn't a huge deal because Andrew had some time to run out to get it while we were playing games. But...it was pretty funny that my list failed so spectacularly.

Anyway, here's Zoë scootering around while waiting for guests to arrive:

Not much was Harry Potter themed, aside from the decorations, but that's okay.

Another thing you should know about Zoë is that she had the audacity to be born Memorial Day weekend. Of all the gall!

She was specifically told not to!

Our neighbours, who were our designated people-to-call-to-watch-our-kids-while-we-went-to-the-hospital, told her to not come that weekend because they were going out of town (and she wasn't due for a couple of weeks).

But she came anyway, on the Saturday before Memorial Day.

And we had to call our backup-backup-backup babysitters (who are awesome, but literally everyone we knew seemed to be going out of town for Memorial Day and these dear friends lived a little farther away than what was convenient and I thought I was going to die...or have this baby on the living room floor...by the time they arrived) and then she was born and we called to say she'd arrived and the babysitters said, "That's so, so great! Congratulations! And also...we locked ourselves and all your children out of the house so if you have a spare minute could you please...come back to let us into the house?"

Her birthday once again fell on the Saturday before Memorial Day and I just...Americans take Memorial Day way more seriously than I do. Like, everyone always seems to have Plans for the weekend and I'm always like, "There's a holiday...?"

So, unfortunately for Zoë (and Kate), we had a hard time finding anyone available to attend the party.

Kate landed on one boy from her school class. Zoë landed on one boy from the swim team.

But between Kate's family and ours we really padded the numbers.

Here are people playing "Helicopter" (which is essentially "Four Corners"):

We also played Barnacle, a specific version of the game "Captain's Coming" or "Ships and Sailors" or "Starboard." Someone is chosen to give commands—barnacle makes everyone fall to the floor or cling to the wall, lighthouse makes everyone group into three with two making an arch with their arms and the third spinning around inside, x-number in a boat makes everyone scramble to sit in groups of x-number, captain's coming makes one person get on their hands and knees and another put their foot on their back and salute...and so forth. It's an elimination game, so here are some pictures of the last few kids standing:

...or not standing:

Here's Phoebe getting a hug from Alex after being eliminated from some game or other:

Here they are playing Land/Sea/Air:

They also played a pin the scar on the One Piece character (I'm not familiar enough with One Piece to know which character, but the kids were rather entertaining while playing—Christine made them get super dizzy before unleashing them blindly).

Here are the kids scoping out the food table:

Here's Zoë and Kate being sung to after lunch:

No candles because...open flames aren't allowed in the church building...but that's okay because we had more pie later!

Here's Zoë with a pumpkin pie (we are still trying to use up the pumpkin we have stashed in the freezer):

And here's a view of the cupcakes (those blue cupcakes made people look like they'd been eating Smurfs):

I am so glad that Christine suggested we just celebrate these girls together because I don't know how I would have pulled off a whole party on my own this year (or...any year in the past decade...apparently).

We were happy Zoë managed to sneak in a Georgia birthday party! Lucky girl!

Oh, Mister Sun (heavy on the mist part)

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Wed, 27 May 2026 20:35:03 +0000

This afternoon we got a break from the rainy, rainy, rainy weather we've been having the last week (and a half and then some) and actually saw the sun for a few hot minutes (a complaint I'm sure I won't be making once we're in Doha)!

I should have just followed my children's request and headed to the pool right then, but since I know the kids wanted to try for this afternoon's swim practice I thought we would just wait for that (they only close half the pool for afternoon practices, so I can still take Phoebe to enjoy the pool as well).

Of course, now it's thundering...so who knows if we'll even make it to practice.

Here's a glimpse of yesterday evening's downpour:

We will miss all this rain and greenery for sure! But we will also have more predictable pool days...so...

Global Entry

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Wed, 27 May 2026 17:20:15 +0000

The kids had their interviews for the Global Entry cards this morning. The younger three missed their swim practices, so we'll be heading to the pool for afternoon practices. But we made it home just in time for Benjamin to make his practice!

Phoebe had a surprisingly difficult time leaving this morning. She cried about a specific Duplo set that she loves and was upset generally that we told the kids to choose a book to read in the car—how would she ever choose one?

Then, as we were driving down the road she goes, "I didn't know we were moving today!"

"Oh, we're not moving today!" we reassured her. "We're just doing an interview at the airport."

"Oh, just an interview..." she echoed, but I'm not sure she really understood what that meant because when we turned into the airport and saw the big "Welcome to the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport" sign above the road (which was dividing into a spaghetti bowl of lanes going this way and that) and air traffic towers and airplane hangars and so forth, she gasped and said, "Wow! So this is Doha!? It's so big!"

Again we had to remind her that we were only going to the airport today, that Doha was much farther away (we'd have to actually get on a plane for that trip and it would take many hours, not just one).

"Who knew that planes were so big!!?!" she wondered next. "They look so small in the sky!"

It has been a long time since any of the kids last flew (aside from Miriam and Rachel). They are going to have so much fun on our trip, I'm sure. Just this short outing to the airport had them all gasping in wonder.

When we approached the escalator, Alexander and Phoebe completely froze. I had to force them onto it and then when it was time to step off, Alexander did a tremendous leap from several stairs above because he was afraid of the teeth at the bottom (with good reason, but the leap was a bit much).

Anyway, here are the kids waiting for their interviews:

The interviews were really quite simple (they didn't even take anyone's fingerprints!).

Mostly they just looked at the passports, looked at the kids, took photos for their IDs, and just...assumed the children weren't fugitives on the run from the law, I guess.

The official who took Phoebe, Alexander, and Zoë back with Andrew was a little more jovial than the other one working our case. He told the kids that these IDs were very serious (and they kind of are—they're official government-issued IDs) and that the holders of these cards were obligated to follow the law, listen to their parents, eat their vegetables, go to bed nicely, do all their chores...

"Brush their teeth..." I joked from the other cubicle (where I was going through the same process with Miriam, Benjamin, and a less jovial (but not unkind) official).

"And of course brush their teeth!" the officer added.

So once these ID cards arrive in the mail we should have no more behaviour issues at our house, which is well worth the effort of getting them, I think! (Other benefits include TSA pre-check and expedited customs lines).

On our way back to the parking lot, Phoebe wanted to get on the escalator all by herself.

This time we were smarter and didn't have me wrangling both of the little kids, who were quivering like little lost bunnies. Andrew had taken the lead on our way in (since he knew where to go and we were running just a smidgeon late) and the rest of us were running after him (though to her credit, Miriam grabbed hold of Alexander after we got off the escalator when she saw how far behind we had fallen).

This time Andrew took Phoebe and I took Alexander. Both were somewhat jumpy, but a little more confident about the escalator and Phoebe did let go of Andrew's hand to step on the escalator all by herself.

Then she stopped on the walkway to the parking garage to ask some questions about what she could see from up there—a roof over a pedestrian waiting area, some plane tails, and so forth.

"Okay, let's go," Andrew said.

And Phoebe's hand shot out like lightning, grabbing for my sleeve but ending up with a good pinching fistful of my arm.

"Yikes! She's really as nervous as a cornered rabbit!" I exclaimed. "Phoebe—we're not going to leave without you!"

"Doha is just so big!" she said, as I coaxed her to release her grip on my arm and hold my hand instead.

"This is the airport, not Doha," I reminded her.

"I forgot."

"Clearly."

She is happy to be home in Peachtree Corners.

We promised her that she would know when our official moving day arrived. We would have many, many suitcases with us—with her very favourite things inside—and then we'd get to go on one of the big, big planes and fly for a long, long time and then we'd land in a hot, hot place, and that would be Doha. And it will probably feel big (even though it's about half the size of Atlanta).

One bed down

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sun, 24 May 2026 03:36:55 +0000

I have no idea how much stuff to move with us to Qatar.

I know how much weight we're allowed now, but I have no idea how much stuff that is.

Nor do I really know how to prioritize what we take out with us on the plane versus what we ship out to arrive months later versus what we send to Utah to help our grown kids set up house versus what we just get rid of altogether.

We're trying to get that all ironed out, though...and it's overwhelming.

By the end of every day I'm suffering from decision overload, which perhaps is an indicator that we simply have too much stuff. So perhaps it's a good thing that we're getting rid of a lot of things.

Mostly I'm using the Buy Nothing Group (BNG) because I trust it more.

It's a private group. You have to ask to join, your profile must be real, and you have to answer a few questions "proving" you live where you say you do.

It's a sort of community. Everything is freely given (and I have benefited from a lot of "gives" in the time we've lived here) and people are generally respectful and are either prompt about picking things up or it's all just so flexible that it doesn't even matter (so [whatever item] sits on my porch for a week until [whoever] remembers to stop by and grab it—we'll survive).

We've given away dressers, couches, a table, most of our shelves, an InstantPot, our area rugs...

There are few items, however, that we've chosen to sell for various reasons. Today we finally sold Benjamin's loft bed, which we originally got from the BNG. Now, technically you're not supposed to resell anything that you get from the BNG but we listed the bed on the BNG and no one asked for it. So then we rationalized that because we bought a mattress to go with the bed (and since we only purchased this mattress in August of last year...before even applying for this job) we could list the mattress for sale (loft bed free with purchase).

And we found a buyer on Facebook Market Place.

That place...

*shudders*

...is awful. I won't even tell you about trying to sell our TV (it is not going well).

But we finally found a buyer for the bed/mattress! And they wanted to meet today. So we set a rendezvous point and drove down there at the appointed time.

Oh, but they had to borrow a truck and it wasn't there yet. So...perhaps they'd drive over in their car to just see what might fit.

I said that would be fine. The bed actually broke down smaller than I remembered. We'd probably be able to fit a fair amount of the bed in their car.

Oh, but they live 50 minutes away.

Fine. We can kill time for 50 minutes.

Oh, but traffic is bad (to their credit, it is Atlanta). And even though we've been waiting for half an hour and they should have been twenty minutes away, they tell me that they'll text me when they're twenty minutes away.

Fine. We'll sit around for a few more minutes...which turned into a full hour. Andrew took a nap. When he woke up we decided we'd just go home and come back when they text. We leave the parking lot.

And then she texts to say they are eight minutes away.

We turn around and go back to the parking lot.

All this time, it's threatening to rain...but not raining...and that's probably good because we have to move an entire bed frame and mattress from one car to the other.

*Two hours later* she finally arrives. She hops out of her car. She pops the trunk...

There is a ginormous thunderclap and a veritable deluge starts raining down on us.

We transfer the bed anyway.

It is raining so hard we can hardly see. We're working blind. We are stomping through puddles. We are soaked through to the skin. But we get all the bed parts into her car and then roll the mattress up into thirds and stuff that puppy into the backseat before we retreat into our vehicles and text about payment.

Did I meet her in a parking lot because I didn't want her to know where I live because for all I know she could be an axe murderer? Absolutely.

Do I care if she peels off without paying me for that bed? I mean...a little...but honestly not much. The bed is gone, right? And I'm out of the rain.

Plus by this time I have her phone number, I have her name, I have her city of residence, and I know that she's a public school teacher. So I pretty much trust her to pay me.

And she eventually does (it took us a minute to communicate about $ apps we both have).

So we are now down one bed, but up in funds to get a new bed once in Doha.

Here we are feeling very, very wet (literally not a dry spot on us) and wishing we could have also gotten rid of our television, which we've carted off to meet people with twice and have been ghosted both times...it's great because we just love uninstalling and reinstalling our car seats (said no one ever):

We drove home in the downpour, hydroplaning for a little bit at one point, huge puddles everywhere, lots of thunder and lightning. Rather scary storm, to be honest—the power even went out on the kids at home for a minute.

We pulled into the driveway and...it immediately stopped raining, the sun burst through the clouds, and we burst out laughing because we had just had such an awfully wet time moving that bed!!

(I should also mention that the only reason we got rid of Benjamin's bed so "early" (is this early?) is because he decided to start sleeping on his floor so he could "be acclimated" by the time we got rid of his bed. So, uh, why are we keeping the bed then, right?)

And then there were three

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sat, 23 May 2026 17:00:27 +0000

First there was the Raccoon Wrecker.

Then there was the Copper Popper.

Today...the Chipmunk Masher.

That is to say, Andrew ran over a chipmunk on our way to clean the church building this morning.

Miriam is feeling a lot better about her snake incident.

Snakes, Hawks, and Coyotes

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Fri, 22 May 2026 23:41:40 +0000

Moving can be a stressful time of life (see here, here, here)—an international move perhaps even more so—because moving can cause a cascade of stressful events (not only are you changing houses, but also schools, friends, culture, language, etc). It's a lot to handle.

So sometimes emotions run high.

This is normal.

But there are things you can do to cope with those emotions, to help your body lower stress hormones, and feel like you're able to keep on keeping on. The annoying thing about the things you can do to help your body lower stress hormones is that all the things you might need to do to lower your stress hormones feel so annoying. So they can be hard to do.

Miriam had a difficult morning, so I suggested she try a few things, like write down some thoughts in her journal—not just about what she was worried about, but things she was grateful for, or looking forward to, or just...silly, funny, delightful things that have happened.

Because it's literally good for you to do this.

I can't remember what else I suggested, but there were other things.

I do know that she ended up curling up in a weepy ball on her bed.

So I let her stay like that for a while (because, honestly, a good snooze typically helps me get out of a funk) and then invited her to go for a walk with me.

Because exercise is annoyingly good at helping you release stress hormones.

"Come for a walk with me!" I said. "Get some sunshine, some vitamin D, fresh air; generate some endorphins; appreciate nature...come on...it will be fun!"

Readers, this walk was a mental health fail.

You see, Miriam ran over what she thought was a stick on her way home from the pool this morning (she gracious took Benjamin to his practice; Andrew took the early morning crew before then). But on our walk we discovered that it was not a stick.

It was a danger noodle.

And though this copperhead's guts were smeared across the pavement, the snake was still alive and wriggling about.

Miriam felt awful about this.

"I killed a snake!" she wailed.

"Technically, it's not dead yet," Rachel so helpfully pointed out.

"I'm actively killing a snake," Miriam wailed, amending her initial wail. "Look at it!"

"You're not doing anything," Rachel said. "It's succumbing to its injuries."

"That I inflicted!"

"It's a poisonous snake," I said (lucky for Miriam, it's legal to kill venomous snakes in Georgia because they're considered a nuisance; it's illegal to kill non-venomous snakes). "We don't want them around anyway."

"But why did I have to be the one to kill it?!"

I killed a raccoon once—in front of its whole family!—and I still feel badly about it, so it might take Miriam some time to get over killing this snake.

Honestly, it would have been better to have just smashed it to smithereens.* And we would have tried to put it out of its misery when we saw it...had we any tools at our disposal...and if it wasn't still all venomous and everything.

We weren't about to get close to it!

Getting bit by a copperhead is not on my Georgia bucket list.

So then Miriam was crying about the snake in addition to everything else .

Our mental health walk was going well...

Luckily we still had more walk to take. We ended up seeing Bob (our neighbourhood hawk) stalking a bird over toward its nest. It landed on a fence nearby and stared into the tree.

"What are you doing, Bob?" I asked in a warning tone.

"Are we about to witness another murder?" Rachel asked (referring to that one time a few years ago when we saw Bob attack a squirrel's nest).

"There's literally a free snake just down the road," I said, pointing. "I know you scavenge in addition to hunt..."

It seems Bob was more interested in a game of chase...

...because an angry mockingbird erupted from the nest and chased that hawk away and then landed in a tree and sang a triumphal-sounding song.

And in case you didn't get enough of our metropolitan wildlife, here's a video of our local coyote pack. I couldn't actually see them, but they were clearly hanging out around the house somewhere late one evening...

* It is now gone without a trace so some scavenger or other seems to have nabbed it.

Life moves pretty fast: Swim meet countdown

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Fri, 22 May 2026 18:06:07 +0000

The summer swim season has officially begun!

We had our mock meet last night, which means we only have five weeks of swimming left the season (minus the county competition). Swim meets have always marked the passing of summer, but this year their passing (which hasn't even truly begun because we, uh, haven't had an official swim meet yet) feels a bit more ominous because it's also more or less counting down the time we have left here in Georgia.

We. Have. So. Much. To. Do.

But last night we just sat for a few hours and watched the kids swim.

Our competition pool (which isn't our pool but is a pool within our cooperative swim team...we take turns practicing at our pool ad at this pool) got a new deck addition this summer, which is nice because the past couple of years they haven't allowed us to put children on that side of the pool so we had to clump all the kids on the other side of the deck and put the other team out on the parking lot...and neither place was particularly suited for this purpose.

We're glad we don't have to do that anymore. The new deck is much nicer. And "I'm kind of liking the jail situation we have going on," Miss Julie, our team manager, joked.

We call the area the kids hang out the "bull pen" anyway, and it honestly is rather helpful having it be an actual pen rather than having the kids sprawl out all over whatever nook or cranny of the deck they can find!

I watched the first have of the meet and officiated the second half of the meet. Here are the kids each doing their freestyle events...

Alex:

Zoë:

Benjamin:

See how nicely he's breathing into his shoulder there, Alexander? That's what we want to see (rather than lifting your whole head out of the water to breathe)!

Here's Alexander doing his backstroke (bright yellow cap):

By the time Zoë had a turn at backstroke it had started pouring, but she did awesome—was quite far ahead of everyone else in her heat):

Here's Phoebe enjoying the rain:

Fortunately it didn't thunder (and it really only rained for a little while) so the meet could continue. Last year we got rained (thundered) out on multiple occasions so we're hopeful this year's meet days can be a little clearer...

Here's Zoë diving in during a relay:

And here's Benjamin competing the fly leg of a medley relay:

He asked me how his timing was, breathing-wise...so I will say that from the pictures I have it looks like he's breathing a bit late. He should be breathing what his hands are just exiting the water and his head should be ready to dive back down as his arms sweep over his head.

See how this swimmer (from Wikipedia) is breathing while his arms are back instead of while they're coming forward? This is the way.

But Benjamin is much improved from last year (thanks year-round swimming), so I'm sure he'll just keep getting better with time!

Here's a frog that was waiting to greet us when we came home last night:

Atlanta Georgia Temple

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Thu, 21 May 2026 02:21:08 +0000

Rachel began working on her mission papers shortly before the semester ended. She had decided to maybe go on a mission...in December. After talking about the pros and cons for a long time she decided that she should finish and submit her papers. But then after having made the decision to, yes, go...she felt like waiting until December was silly.

Waiting is the worst.

So she decided to put her availability date in August (after the summer term ends). That doesn't mean she'll leave in August (she could still leave in December for all we know), but it does at least mean she won't have to wait to know when she'll be leaving and can make plans accordingly.

She submitted her papers on Monday (after going to the doctor for the third time in a week because the doctor/nurse couldn't figure out how to fill out the form properly) and she went through the temple this morning!

You can read more about the endowment ceremony here, if you're interested!

It was a beautiful morning and everyone was so nice—I think everyone mentioned Darla to us! She worked at the temple for years and is good friends with everyone she comes across. So all the temple workers were thrilled to see Rachel coming through!

Usually they don't know who is coming through, necessarily. I mean, we show our temple recommends at the desk, but then we're rather anonymous inside so the temple workers don't know we're Darla's family. But when you go through the temple for the first time you get somewhat of a royal treatment—a private locker with your name on the door, a name tag telling everyone you're there for the first time, and so on. So they all knew Rachel was coming and who exactly she was.

It was fun to have so many people excited for her, especially since our guest list was...rather sparse.

Just me and Andrew.

But that's okay! It was a beautiful morning to spend at the temple together!

A beautiful and rather bright morning!

We're excited to see where Rachel gets called—we'll all be heading off on new adventures the next little while!

Spring Recital

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Thu, 21 May 2026 01:59:22 +0000

Zoë and Miriam had their last spring recital with Ms. Deb's studio on Saturday. It's been so wonderful to be part of the studio for so long, not only to see our own kids improving, but to see the progress the other students have been making. The tiny girls that Miriam used to help teach have all grown into beautiful little pianists (and Zoë's good friends with them since she also used to be in the group lesson with them).

It's been fun! Miriam at least will continue zoom lessons with Ms. Deb...until we find an organ teacher for her in Doha (which I'm doubtful we'll be able to do) or until she leaves for college). I'm sure we'll be able to find a local piano teacher for Zoë.

Zoë played Allegro by Alexander Reinagle and Hurry Scurry by Robert Vandall:

Miriam played Unter der Linden Grüne (3 variations, by Jan Sweelinck), which is really an organ piece, but she and Ms. Deb worked to adapt it to piano so Miriam could play it at the recital (since there isn't an organ in the recital hall).

She also played Premiére Arabesque (by Claude Debussy), which I just love hearing her play! I had recorded her on my own phone, but Malek Jandali stopped me on the way out to send me a video he took on his phone (which he thinks is better than the one he saw me take) and to tell me how excited he is that we're moving to Qatar and how willing he is to help Miriam get set up there musically.

He wrote a symphony titled Desert Rose, dedicated to the people and history of Qatar (and the architecture of the desert rose and the national museum of Qatar). He does quite a bit of work in Qatar so he had a lot of advice for us!

Schönbrunn in the morning and Vienna at night (and the trip home)

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Thu, 21 May 2026 01:34:50 +0000

On Tuesday morning (May 12), Patrick took me out to visit Schönbrunn Palace, the Habsburg family's summer residence (in view of their winter residence, the Hofburg). It is large (but only about a third of the size of Versailles). We didn't get tickets to any of the exclusive tours, but the grounds are free to wander through—we even saw a handful of joggers enjoying the paths.

It was so chilly—after such a warm week, it felt rather jarring to suddenly be so cold and I was underprepared for it (but Patrick and Hadis lent me things to keep me warm).

The palace itself is huge. The servant's quarters are...equally large (if not as impressive).

Patrick didn't really want to be in any pictures this day, but you can see him standing on the far right of this picture

The gardens were big (and just starting to be decked with flowers).

At the top of the hill you can see the Gloriette, which "serve[s] as both a focal point and a lookout point for the garden, it was used as a dining hall and festival hall as well as a breakfast room for emperor Franz Joseph I" though today it is a working cafe. Patrick was telling me that it was a play room for the royal children and although I can't find much about that, it seems like there are many wonderful places for children to enjoy at Schönbrunn—there's an entire zoo, hedge mazes, fountains, you name it!

(I did find that "The area called Meidlinger Vertiefung ..to the west of the palace was turned into a play area and drill ground for the children of the Habsburgs in the 19th century," so perhaps that's what Patrick was thinking of, though I'm sure children also frolicked up on the hill as well...and the temptation to send kids on a twenty minute walk away from the house to play is so real).

Patrick and I hiked up to the Gloriette rather briskly and it felt so good! We had done a long day of sightseeing just the day before and I had been quite exhausted by it. My feet were sore. My hips were sore. My back was sore. But that probably has more to do with my posture than anything (apparently the typical "museum walk" that people do is bad for your body).

We actually got our most steps on Tuesday (none of these step amounts are particularly impressive, but this was meant to be a relaxing vacation, so they're just fine) and I felt great!

Thursday 7,240
Friday 16,905

Saturday 10,161

Sunday 10,095

Monday 12,455
Tuesday 19,229

I think I lot of that has to do with our more brisk pace, which put my body into better (and less tiring) posture. I had never really considered the phenomenon of "museum legs" (though I do recognize that walking through museums is exhausting), so it was interesting to read a bit about it and to consider how to avoid getting that kind of exhaustion in the future (being mindful of your posture while standing to look at things, as well as in how you move those next few steps). I'll have to explore this more...

Anyway, here's a view at the bottom with the Gloriette behind me:

And here's a view looking down at the palace from the steps of the Gloriette.

Part of the reason we walked so quickly was because—as you can perhaps see—we risking a downpour with every minute we lingered. And...we also had to get back home to attend Eurovision!

[Insert Eurovision here.]

In the evening we got ready to see Vienna at night. Hadis wanted us to see the light show at the Musuem of Change. It was a good night to go as well—since it was the opening night of Eurovision, everyone seemed to be on the Rathausplatz watching the live stream. There was hardly anyone at the light show!

Patrick seemed a bit miffed that it was all "generated in real time by artificial intelligence" and didn't want to spend too much time there, though I found it quite mesmerizing. While I feel a bit...grumbly...about artificial "intelligence" myself...

...it felt like watching an old-school screensaver. It was very soothing.

At least, it was mostly soothing. Hadis wanted to arrive right in time for the 9:00 showing to begin and we walked into the courtyard just a minute or two prior to 9:00. We sat around waiting for the show to begin and then *BONG* the clock struck (which made us all—or at least me—jump...so that was the less soothing bit) and then the smoke machines started. This allowed the lasers to project in the sky above us, which was pretty cool.

Nature-themed pictures kind of melted into each other followed by dancing light shows.

Here I am wearing Patrick's jacket over my own jacket and Hadi's scarf over that—it was very chilly!

From the museum we walked down to Stephansplatz...all the restaurants had turned on the heaters at the outdoor seating...it was that chilly:

Again, we lucked out with all the crowds over at the Eurovision village and had Stephansplatz mostly to ourselves!

Hadis, Patrick, Josie, and me

Josie and me

Patrick and Hadis

Here we are once again at Hofburg:

Looking across the lawn (and across the rose gardens and across the road and across...) we could see the Rathaus all lit up for Eurovision:

To the right is the Leopoldine Wing of the Hofburg Imperial Palace, which is the residence (or at least workplace?) of Austria's president. When the Austrian flag is flying, that means he's in the building.

Here's another view of that same wing (again, everybody was a Eurovision):

This is the The Swiss Gate (Schweizertor) and was built in the 1550s.

And here is Michaelerplatz...

...which features a display of the excavated ruins of a Roman camp (active from about 100 to 400 AD).

Here's another view of the Eurovision set up:

We headed over to view Votivkirche, which is the home of an apparently stunning light show called Light of Creation. We just looked at the outside (because tickets can be a bit pricey). There's a decent view from Schottentor station, which Uncle Patrick likes.

But I preferred the view from the lawn outside of the church. We stopped at McDonald's for everyone (except for me) to get hot chocolate and then sat on a bench and watched the light of the "Infinity of Light," a temporary art installation by Billi Thanner (running from December 16, 2025 to August 1, 2026):

It changes colour in various patterns and is also quite mesmerizing to watch.

Here's everyone watching it:

We headed home after this to beat the Eurovision traffic and to try to get to bed early so we could get up and make our way to the airport the next morning. My flight was several hours earlier than Josie's, but she opted to come to the airport at the same time, which made sense, really because Patrick so kindly escorted us there and by the time he made it home after getting me to the airport it would have been time to turn around and take Josie.

Still, it made for an awfully long wait for her!

Here we are in the train station on the way to the airport—our last sibling picture for a while:

I made it through security quite quickly and then sat alone by my gate for a while until a group of boisterous Russians showed up:

We had to bus out to our plane and then walk up stairs to board:

The flight from Austria to Turkey was full, but short. I managed to make it off the plane, to the restroom (!!), and through extra passport security, all at a brisk walk (no running involved this time—what luxury). Here I am waiting to board:

Whereas the transatlantic flight to Istanbul was full of screaming babies (and I say this with all the patience of a mother who has taken multiple babies on multiple transatlantic flights—this flight was full of screaming children, like, there were just so many upset children on the flight), children were sparse on the flight from Istanbul to Atlanta.

And none of them were particularly upset (I think being upset is a little contagious sometimes), so there wasn't a constant background noise of SCREAMING for twelve hours, which was lovely.

(Again, I don't blame the parents because...babies are gonna baby...but it was a lot of screaming).

So, no screaming on the way home.

And my section of the plane was very sparsely populated. Most rows in the middle row (where I was) had only two passengers per row, with everyone having an aisle seat and no one having to sit in the middle.

I was happy with this because it meant that no one was man-spreading into my space, or blowing their nose on their in-flight blanket, or spilling an entire cup of coffee all over my lap/seat, or snoring right next to me and falling onto my shoulder in their sleep.

(I swear the full-grown man I was sitting next to on the flight out to Austria took more patience to deal with than all the screaming babies on the plane(t)! And then the seat in front of me was broken and stuck in reclined position right up against my knees the whole flight...it was awful).

The flight home was wonderful.

Still rather long, but...so much better than the flight out.

I breezed through immigration, relatively speaking. I mean, it was a long line, but it was fine.

And then I had to wait to do my "universal entry" interview, which was also a breeze. I'm sure my I-just-stepped-off-a-transatlantic-flight mugshot will look super cute on my ID card (and if not super cute it will at least be super authentic to my just-stepped-off-a-transatlantic-flight self).

And then I grabbed my bag and headed out into the main airport where Andrew was waiting to pick me up (MARTA is going through some major renovations ahead of the World Cup, so we nope'd out of that option).

The kids were all mostly still up when I got home (only Phoebe—and perhaps Alex? my memory of the evening is fuzzy—had been put to bed). They were excited when I opened the reverse Candy Suitcase.

Whereas my suitcase had been full of American goodies to take to Uncle Patrick before my departure, it was now full of European (and Iranian) goodies that had been sent home to delight the children—and they were delighted!

Here are the kids (the next morning, with various states of chipmunk cheeks, having already been stuffing their faces with goodies) with some walnut cookies from Iran:

It still feels rather silly for me to have taken this trip to Europe so soon before moving to Qatar, but in my defense Josie and I planned our trip before Andrew got this job!

We're looking forward to being a little smidge closer to Patrick and Hadis on the other side of the world—it makes it a little easier to plan trips to visit each other!