Heissatopia

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!

Room rotation

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Tue, 19 May 2026 14:08:01 +0000

Yesterday we gave away all of our area rugs. We moved all the furniture and boxes that were on top, we rolled them up, and carried them outside so they can be picked up and moved to their next home.

Phoebe had been playing in the basement while we worked with Rachel and Miriam to do this task.

She came upstairs, walked into the music room, and said, "Huh. This room looks different for some reason. It looks bigger..."

"Yeah," Andrew said. "What happened to it?"

"Uhhhh..." Phoebe said. "You...rotated it?"

"We rotated the whole room?!" Andrew said with surprised. "Just picked it up and…"

"Wait a minute," Phoebe said. "The carpet is gone!"

"Bingo!" Andrew said.

The kids have been enjoying running and sliding across the room with their socks on. It's wildly unsafe. Last night Phoebe kept running about while we were trying to get through "family business" and "calendar" during family night.

"Phoebe—stop," Andrew said firmly, which incidentally happened to coordinate with the end of her momentum and (the deservingly natural consequence of) a hard plonk on her backside.

"Yeah, okay, okay..." she whimpered as she climbed onto my lap to sit still for a minute.

It's a good reminder of why we got the carpets in the first place...

Eurovision!

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Mon, 18 May 2026 01:58:22 +0000

When we found out that we'd be in Vienna for Eurovision we jumped through all the necessary hoops to get tickets. We had to apply to get in the lottery to have the chance to buy tickets at all? Something like that. All I know is that Patrick, Josie, and I all got through the first lottery round (Hadis did not) and then Patrick and I managed to buy a set of four tickets (the maximum number you could buy) while Josie did not. So Patrick sold/transferred his tickets to some friends and we used the tickets that I got.

All of our tickets were really bad, but not really, really bad, so we felt okay about them.

It helped (or hurt?) that they were only 15 euro each.

We attended on Tuesday afternoon. It was cold and drizzly.

The security for the event was...significant. Each ticket had to be designated for one person and one person only, and the name on the ticket had to match the name on whatever government ID you chose to present to prove your identity. We had to walk through metal detectors and get a pat down. We were allowed to bring only a few things that could fit in our pockets (no bags of any sort were allowed). We had to check our jackets at the counter. People who had brought umbrellas had to throw them away.

It was pretty intense (but that's the kind of world we live in).

Here we are, having all found our seats:

We arrive separately because Patrick and Hadis had been waiting for their friends to drop their things off at their apartment before walking over (there were lockers available nearer the venue, but Patrick's apartment was conveniently close and even more conveniently priced). So Josie and I headed over a few minutes before Patrick and Hadis and we were afraid we were going to miss the first number (Moldova!), which would have been rather unfortunate because we really wanted to see that one (we'd watched several YouTube videos beforehand and rather liked theirs). Fortunately, we made it through all the security and coat check lines with time to spare.

Our seats were not fabulous, as I mentioned. We had a pretty good view of behind the action ("We're going to see a lot of butts," Patrick quipped...and he was right). But it was actually pretty cool to see the tech crews hard at work from where we were sitting. I'm not sure I took pictures, but we could see everything waiting in the wings, as it were.

The stage seemed to be a screen of sorts and the staging lines would appear for each act and the crews would throw together the set in an amazingly coordinated way.

Many acts used fire or sparklers of some sort or another. We were close enough that we could feel the heat from these blasts of flame (so I wonder how hot it was for people sitting/standing closer):

Here are our hosts (Victoria Swarovski and Michael Ostrowski):

We saw the rehearsal for the first semi-final, so we watched Israel, Poland, Finland, Moldova, Serbia, Croatia, Greece, Lithuania, Sweden, Belgium, Estonia, Portugal, Montenegro, San Marino, and Georgia compete. We also got to watch Italy and Germany perform, though they don't technically compete since they are part of the "big four" and automatically qualify for the final round.

It was very cool to get to go, even if I didn't appreciate all of the music, and even if I wore my earplugs the whole entire time (I don't think I would have survived without them—we brought our own earplugs, but they also had big bins of earplugs that we could have asked for so I think everyone is well aware that the even is loud).

While we were cheering for Moldova to win (they ended up coming in 8th), we were happy with Bulgaria's victory as well. We actually saw Dara on the U-Bahn earlier in the week and were momentarily a little bit worried that she was being human trafficked...but then we realized that she was just a pop star with her entourage. The, uh, Eurovision lanyards (complete with photo ID) helped tip us off.

We couldn't quite place her. The language sounded rather Slavic, but I couldn't understand much of what was said, which was a little baffling. But Josie pulled up a list of performers and we quickly were able to identify her. So, that was kind of cool. Even if we didn't really meet her, we did stand in proximity to her, breathed her same air (gross), and watched her suddenly throw out a sequence of stomping dance steps (which was another tip-off that she was perhaps a performer and not just a girl being trafficked).

Patrick was literally minutes away from asking you whether that man (probably your manager) was bothering you before you threw out those dance steps. So...good thing we took a few more minutes to observe before intervening and asking if she wanted to be rescued, huh?

But, for real, Dara—if you're reading this, know that we've got your back. Because we were totally plotting ways to get you to safety. So, should you ever need help with anything...we've gotchu.

After the final act, we rushed out to grab our coats and then walked home and ordered pizza for dinner to get our energy back up to head out on the town in the evening...

Why are we like this in our family?

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sat, 16 May 2026 03:02:20 +0000

Jet lag to the west seems easier than jet lag to the east. I'm not sure whether it's because of the time of day that I travelled or simply because I'm coming home (without ever quite having settled into a schedule across the pond) but it was easier to fall back into the everyday happenings at home.

Thursday we had gardening club and then swim team. Here's Phoebe working in the garden in her swim suit and by "working" I mean eating a bunch of herbs that Miss Mim let her grab—here she's holding dill and stuffing parsley into her mouth.

We went swimming between gardening club and swim practice. Today Phoebe asked to swim before swim practice as well. Her practices haven't started yet so she feels a little left out when it comes to pool time. So we went swimming this afternoon (after doing a bunch of work around the house) and then sat around while the big kids had their practice.

Today was popsicle day. They handed out popsicles after each swim session and Phoebe ran up to get one each time. We have a child in each swim session, so that worked out to three popsicles for Phoebe! She was not sad about it and we've reached the glorious stage of life where all of our children can functionally eat a freeze-pop of this sort (I would call them "freezies"; others might call them "otter pops"; whatever you call them, Phoebe understands the art of pushing the ice to the top to eat and didn't even get sticky in the process).

My friend Heather was chatting to Phoebe while waiting for her kids to swim and Phoebe casually dropped the fact that she's, like, really good at scootering these days. She's just, like, really fast and stuff.

Heather was like, "Oh, wow! What colour is your scooter?"

"It's pink," Phoebe told her. "But I also have another one that's red."

And that's on her for being the youngest of six because she has hand-me-down toys from everyone. The pink scooter I bought for $5 for Miriam back when we lived in Durham and the red scooter I got from the Buy Nothing Group here when Alexander was ready for a scooter but Zoë was still into the pink scooter (these would be the "little kid" 3-wheeled scooters...I won't even mention our "big kid" 2-wheeled scooters). We have a lot of kid equipment floating about.

"Which scooter is faster?" Heather asked. "The pink one or the red one?"

Phoebe stared at her for a few seconds, clearly (low-key) offended.

"Ummm...I said that I was good at scootering..." she clarified.

"I see," Heather chuckled. "It isn't so much about the scooter as it is about your skill. I hear you, I hear you. She's like, 'Lady—an artist doesn't blame her tools. This is about me not the scooter.'"

Heather is hilarious.

I'm glad swim team is back on because we don't run in the same circles during the school year.

*****

To apply for our Qatari visas we've had to do a lot of document gathering.

Birth certificates for everyone. Our marriage license. Diplomas. Transcripts....

All original documents, too. They don't want photocopies. They want certified originals, but they also cautioned us not to send in our only copies, so we've been ordering duplicate documents and...it's been a bit of a hassle.

I had a long email chain with UGA's registrar about getting a special verification letter that had to include a long list of facts about each semester that I have attended. When I opened up my transcript that should have had the verification letter inside, all I found was a letter that read "Attached are the official school documents for Nancy Pearl Heiss"

There wasn't even a period at the end of the sentence.

So I sent a follow-up email to the registrar, explaining again what the letter needed to include verification that:

The degree information on record is accurate and authentic.
The University of Georgia is a public academic institution.

Additionally, the letter must also include the following details:

Degree type: Master’s
Major: Literacies and Children’s Literature
Date awarded: December 15, 2023
Duration of the program: 3 years, 4 months
Dates of study: August 2020–December 2023
Enrollment type: Full time
Mode of attendance: On-campus, face to face, with some courses taken remotely due to COVID restrictions
Primary location for all instruction, coursework, examinations: Athens, Georgia, USA

I explained that I was aware that the transcript technically includes a lot of that information already. Nonetheless they want this information stated in a letter as well. Why? I couldn't tell you.

It makes me feel a little bit like when I was trying to enroll my kids in school in Georgia but I couldn't use my vaccination records from Utah because they aren't on Georgia letterhead and, like, does that make it so that you can't read that they're fully vaccinated against chicken pox somehow? I hope not...and yet...I had to get all our records transferred to Georgia letterhead before the school would accept them.

This was an elementary school, mind you.

At least we're now dealing with a foreign country here and not just...another state within the same country, right? So we can have a little bit of grace and assume they just, yes, they actually would like you to point out where all the pertinent information is on the transcript.

It still feels redundant, but that's okay.

Anyway, I wrote and email to remind her of this and she had the audacity to write back to me, asking, "Did you read the letter fully that we provided? It does state that information other than the on campus part. This is the information we provide for all students. The company you are referring to is welcome to reach out to us via email if they have additional questions. Our verification letter and transcripts state everything we provide."

So I wrote back (a little snippy because the letter I had was ten words long):

I did read the letter in full (it was a quick read), but I am now wondering if I didn't receive the correct letter. Is it possible I received the wrong letter?

My letter reads: "Attached are the official school documents for Nancy Pearl Heiss" (and that is all).

I understand that most of what is required in the verification letter is on the transcript already, but the verification letter also needs to have the information I listed.

And she wrote back with a PDF of the letter she apparently sent to me, which did have all the information listed. So I wrote back to tell her that that was a beautiful letter but that...it was not in the envelope that I was given at the registrar's office...so if I could just get that letter printed out on UGA letterhead we would be all set.

And she was like, "Oh. My bad."

So that's what I went to go pick up when Rachel, Miriam, and I went to campus at the end of April.

I had also ordered an extra copy of my diploma since I had to notarize my diploma—right on the diploma—and fold it up and everything to mail it to the embassy. That was set to arrive on May 9.

Andrew waited to send in our documents until it arrived. Finally the day came.

I was in Europe still so he opened the package, which was addressed to me.

Inside, however, was a diploma addressed to some gal named Daniela [Redacted].

He opened the box and found that, yes, he was holding the diploma of Daniela [Redacted].

I wrote to the registrar's office and explained the problem—we had received a package addressed to me but inside found a tube addressed instead to Daniela [Redacted].

"Did you happen to open the tube to see if the diploma was yours or Daniela's? It might still be yours inside," they wrote back.

So I sent them a picture of the diploma, which is 100% not my diploma.

And she was like, "Agreed, that's not your diploma..."

So they sent me another one and must have super rushed it because it arrived today.

The package was addressed to me, so we were off to a good start. I opened that an the tube inside had a big ol' sticker with my name on it—that's 2 for 2!

I peeled off the sticker, set it aside, and opened the tube.

The diploma inside also had my name on it—3 for 3!

But when I opened the diploma on my lap I some how snagged the sticker and it plastered itself to the (thankfully) back of the diploma. That two second mistake took about ten minutes of careful peeling to get it back off my brand new diploma. It still left sticky residue on the back, so I rubbed it with a dry cloth until the sticky stuff wasn't sticky anymore and the back was left just a little smudgy instead.

I couldn't believe I had come so close to ruining my brand new diploma! I mean, I am not sure that I intend to ever display my diploma anywhere anyway, but it's the principle of the thing!

Fortunately, Rachel and Miriam were around when I opened it so they provided an enthusiastic laugh track for me while I worked to remove the sticker. Such helpful girls!

*****

Andrew was in the bathroom when we heard a clatter and a high pitched, "Oh, no!!"

"What's wrong?" we hollered.

"Nothing brote!" he called out, using one of Alexander's toddler catch phrases (whenever he dropped anything he'd yell, "Nothing brote!" and it's stuck) to tell us that nothing terrible had happened.

But he emerged from the bathroom in tears with laughter.

Somehow when he went to put soap on his hand he knocked the dispenser off balance and it went shooting right off the counter, performing a perfect swan dive into the still-flushing toilet. He panicked and stuffed his hand down into the toilet along with the soap dispenser to grab it before it managed to get itself sucked into the U-bend (or whatever) and then just...

I mean, we all quickly empathized with the "Oh, no!!" he had let loose earlier.

Sometimes when people write me emails and ask things like, "Did you read our letter in its entirety?" I feel all sanctimonious, like, "Ma'am, I'm getting a doctorate degree in literac(ies) so, yes, I'm fully capable of reading a letter, thank you very much!"

And other times I look at how our household (headed by 1.5 PhD holders) runs and I think to myself, "You should definitely question both our sanity and skill level."

*****

Andrew ordered pizza for dinner while the rest of us were at the pool and after dinner I went for a walk with Rachel, Miriam, and Benjamin while the little kids played with friends and Andrew caught up on some work.

We were just walking down the hill when we encountered a strange thing: a car "stuck" perpendicular in the road, with another car approaching.

The approaching car wanted to go around the perpendicular car, but didn't feel like it had enough room. The perpendicular car waved it through. It inched forward and stopped. The perpendicular car backed up a bit. The car inched forward again before stopping. The perpendicular car backed up a bit more. The car inched forward some more. The perpendicular car backed up a bit more...a bit too rapidly...and there was a loud popping, crunching sound.

All four of us stopped and gasped.

The car that had wanted to go through pulled through, then kind of stopped to holler something at the perpendicular car before driving away.

The perpendicular car started inching forward.

We were sure it had hit the neighbour's mailbox (it had) but what we were completely surprised to find was that the mailbox had stood its ground. It was the car's rear window that had given way—it completely shattered.

Glass was everywhere.

Sure, the mailbox's door was hanging by one corner, and the brickwork around the border of the garden bed there was going to need some fixing up, but the car definitely was the one limping away from that fight.

It was a hatchback, so it largely missed the mailbox post and the box itself just went...right through the glass somehow.

There was a "student driver" sticker on the back of the car and that sticker was seriously doing a lot of work in this scenario.

We were just astounded that there were three occupants in the vehicle, all of whom are adults (summer sales people) and none of them realized they were about to slowly explode the back window somehow. I'm not sure who was teaching who or if the sticker was old but whatever the case there were three 20-somethings in that car all wondering what to do next.

I honestly didn't know either, but we did memorize the license plate so we can tell our neighbour if we need to because I'm not sure those kids (adults) are going to take the high road here. I'm not really sure what this neighbour's name is...we refer to him as "guy with the fluffy white dog," which isn't very official.

We'll check in on him nonetheless. Because we do talk with him when we walk by him. I just...don't remember his name.

*****

Oh, I forgot to write about getting gas on Thursday. Ugh.

Gas is so expensive these days.

And I hate getting gas under the best of circumstances. I don't know why we ever did away with full-service. And I was just so tired...and we were already running late to gardening club and...

Rachel said she'd pump for me if we got gas, so we went to the gas station on our way to gardening club.

The first pump I stopped at said "pay inside only" so we said "no thanks" and circled around to another one that allowed "pay at pump."

I got out with Rachel so I could wash the windows while she gassed up, but the squeegees and solution was available at request "inside only."

What is the world coming to?!

So I was like, "We will wash the windows another day, I guess..." and I looked over and saw Rachel had put the nozzle into my tank and pressed "premium."

Premium?! In this economy?!

"Rachel, what are you doing?" I asked before she could start pumping.

"I'm..."

"You pressed premium!" I said.

"Oh, no!" she said, pulling the nozzle back out. "Uhhhh... What do we do?"

"I...don't actually know."

"Just...get a little bit of premium and then start over?"

"I don't want to get any bit of premium!" I said. "I'll go inside and ask."

So I went inside to ask ("Hello, I have a stupid question...").

Turns out you simply...hang it up...and start over.

Rachel had figured that out just as I was coming back outside.

"Let's start again," she said.

"Here's my card," I said, holding my card out to her.

But it sling-shotted out of my hand and clattered all over the place, bouncing between the gas pump and the garbage can and the curb and the pole and the...

(Why are we like this in our family?!)

So, anyway, we eventually caught the card, paid for the cheapest gas, and I climbed back into the driver's seat...and promptly dropped my card between my seat and the middle console before I could put it away and had to dig around for it while the gas was pumping.

(Why are we like this in our family?!)

And then, of course, the pump stopped automatically at $67 and all the kids in the backseat chorused, "SIX SEVEN!"

(Why are we like this in our family?!)

*****

So, anyway, I don't know if jet lag is really getting to me or if this is just how we normally are...

Vienna's First District (and Better than an Iranian Restaurant)

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Fri, 15 May 2026 05:15:30 +0000

Patrick had a meeting with his advisor Monday afternoon, so we went into Vienna's First District in the morning. This worked out well because Josie and I still had valid 24-hour passes in the morning and because a tremendous thunderstorm rolled in later in the afternoon (completely shutting down all Eurovision activities for the evening).

Speaking of which, who's got two thumbs and accidentally planned a trip to Vienna during Eurovision and over Mother's Day?

It's me!

Really Josie and I were going off of cheap airfare, which meant that we had to fly as close to the end of the semester as possible, which meant that I flew out the day after my semester ended. That sounded good in theory as well...when we initially made these plans. It felt a little less good when I was in the middle of finishing up all my final projects.

And we actually managed to get tickets to see Eurovision live (well, a rehearsal anyway) so that's today's activities.

Anyway, the first district, or the Innere Stadt is the city centre, where all the administrative buildings and things are...and it's also where a big Eurovision village is set up, where the opening ceremonies were on Sunday, and...let's just say it's been bustling!

Andrew and I visited downtown Vienna in April of 2006 while on a 14-hour layover on our way to spend our summer in Jordan (also to secure cheap tickets, I'm sure). I only remembered that we'd shared some fries (and didn't understand how to validate our transport tickets), but apparently we had pizza and ice cream as well (good for us). That is to say, it's been a hot minute since I've been here (20 years, to be precise). A few things were familiar to me, but I was glad to have a knowledgable guide in Patrick.

I believe Patrick lives in the sixteenth district, which is actually much closer to the first district than you might assume—only the eighth district separates it from the first district. We left his apartment in the morning when Hadis needed to leave for work since we were all going the same direction.

Here's one of his streets with gardens filled with allium blossoms:

Across the street from this is a little street market (that goes on and on for blocks and blocks, so perhaps not so little).

Patrick said to pay attention to the crossing lights around Vienna, which were installed specifically for Eurovision in 2015 (the last time Austria hosted) to promote diversity and traffic safety. This one has two people crossing together:

Here you can see a large area cordoned off in the Rathausplatz for a live-streaming area, so that's the Rathaus in the background:

Here's a quick view of a fountain in the Volksgarten:

And a little tree-lined walkway:

Here's the parliament building:

And here's Hofburg Palace, the front balcony of which is infamous for being the location where Hitler stood and announced the annexation of Austria in 1938:

Debates continue about what to even do about the balcony. No one has been allowed onto it (except for Elie Wizel once to give a speech about how the balcony is "nothing," not a symbol, not anything, and how change has to come from below the balcony, never from the balcony) but some wonder if it shouldn't be reclaimed for noble purposes (not, like, world domination or anything like that). Still others think it should be opened for tours (I...am skeptical of that).

There isn't any sort of educational plaque near the balcony currently, so it's already open to be mis-interpreted (and valorized) by neo-Nazi groups. So..,anyway...perhaps something should be done. But what...is the question.

Patrick likes to brag that he attends Akademie der bildenden Künste Wien (the Academy for Fine Arts Vienna) while Hitler applied for and was rejected from the school...twice. So he's better than Hitler.

I told him that's a rather low bar he's set for himself.

Here's a famous statue of Archduke Charles from the courtyard:

It was created by Anton Dominik Fernkorn, who was the first sculptor to ever cast a bronze equestrian statue with only two points of contact (most have at least three).

Here's Josie photobombing a selfie I took in the Museum Quarter:

We eventually made our way to Stephensplatz, where St. Stephen's Cathedral is. The ground for this cathedral was broken in 1137, which somehow is mind-blowing to me, and it was completed in 1579. Sometimes we (meaning "my church") likes to marvel that the Salt Lake Temple took 40 years to complete, with ground being broken in 1853 and construction being completed in 1893. But I suppose that's nothing compared to the 400 years it took for St. Stephen's Cathedral to be completed (though technically the initial structure was completed in 1160 with an expansion taking the next 400 years). Wikipedia also notes that various reconstruction projects at St. Stephen's have been ongoing throughout history...which...can also be said of the Salt Lake Temple.

I first visited St. Stephen's in 2006 when Andrew and I had a layover in Vienna on our way to Amman, Jordan. We actually went inside that time!

Nancy in St. Stephen's Cathedral in 2006

2006

When we were there there was a bunch of scaffolding up and the outer walls were being cleaned, an effort that appears to have paid off well, even 20 years later (or perhaps it's had a few scrub downs since then). You can see how white the tower (spire?) on the left is in 2026 (below) compared to 2006 (above):

2026

Here's a picture of me and Patrick outside of St. Stephen's:

And a few more pictures just of the building, which is really such a wonder. The roof gets me every time—it's so intricate!

Rather than going inside St. Stephen's, Patrick ducked us into some smaller chapels nearby (though technically the main nave is free, so we could have...I wonder if it was closed while they were setting up for whatever event they had going on).

There was this small—incense-filled—chapel tucked in a little alleyway:

Mozart once stayed in a little place out back, apparently:

I can't quite remember where it was though. Patrick led us through a maze of streets (I had a slight obsession of the door-within-a-door concept, which Patrick dubbed "door-ception"; I originally saw this at the fortress in Salzburg and thought it was a clever way to allow people through while not wasting the energy needed to let a whole carriage through but I see that it continues to be convenient today, allowing pedestrian traffic while closing areas off to cars).

...eventually leading us to his favourite little fresco of a cow wearing glasses and evidently playing backgammon:

He then took us to the Jesuit church, near some University of Vienna buildings where he once presented a paper. There was an organist rehearsing while we were visiting, which was a treat (even if the piece they were rehearsing was a little bit...odd).

Josie wanted to be sure we stopped by Judenplatz, so we made our way there next. Stopping by a bookstore, where no ice cream was allowed...

And the Artis International Cinema, where foreign films (including American ones) are screened in their native languages.

Josie was upset to see that a tour group had parked themselves near the monument in Judensplatz—and many were even sitting on the monument itself (outside of the frame in the picture below, though you can see a shadow on the lower left corner). You're not supposed to sit on the monument...

It's meant to be shelves filled with books (spines facing in) representing all the life stories we will never get to read of the "65,000 Viennese Jews who were murdered during the Nazi regime."

Very solemn place.

I will never understand how people could (and can) ever rationalize (even cheer) such...sickening...actions.

The solemnity of Judenplatz made our next stop all the weirder...because we decided we were hungry and should find some brunch...turned the corner and ended up at JP Pancakes (Drahtgasse 2, 1010 Wien, Austria), which was the pinkest, most fantastical little restaurant ever.

It was my first time having Japanese pancakes (which I guess are like a souffle—extremely fluffy pancakes). This particular restaurant was a popular stop. When we arrived there was a Eurovision participant busy eating and Instagramming (more of the latter and less of the former, judging by the state in which she left her plate). Patrick deduced that she was a back-up dancer for Bulgaria (it took a few days, and I assume quite a bit of watching Eurovision, to discover that).

After she left, the quintet from Portugal walked in and sat down to order pancakes (along with 5 companions—the staff just about fainted when they asked for ten to be seated all at once, but it seemed to work out well). Josie doesn't like this picture of her, but...behind her all all those Eurovision stars (or at least performers, I know Portugal was eliminated already—their song was lovely but not Eurovision enough).

The pancakes were delightful, I thought. Just the kind of thing to send a picture of to Andrew to make him jealous (so I did).

"Are those pancakes!?!?!!" he responded.

Indeed! I thought they tasted about as yummy as they looked. But perhaps I was just extra hungry because Patrick and Josie didn't seem quite as impressed.

I had an Apfelstrudel, which came with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on the side, a sprig of mint, and some delicious cinnamon-infused whipped cream.

Josie got pistachio raspberry (pistazien himbeere):

And Patrick got schokolade yuzu (maybe...if I remember correctly?) which was a white chocolate/citrus flavour, speckled with pomegranates and topped with mint (and in the background you can see his fancy glass of apple juice):

The walls were decorated with neon pink signs (with very interesting claims about their food):

Overall we were glad to have chosen such a swanky place for our brunch—it seemed to be where all the cool kids were going (or at least where the Portuguese Eurovision competitors chose to have their brunch as well—and they probably actually ate their lunch, unlike Miss Bulgaria).

We breezed by a few other places, like the oldest firehall (in Vienna? Not sure; it's still in service though it's also a museum):

A quick view of Votivkirche from the metro:

And a quick stop at the University of Vienna (where Hadis goes to school):

Here's the Libenberg monument out front:

Patrick said that the story goes that...any family that can work together to raise up a family member to wear the crown of laurels the angel is holding can become the new royal family and rule over Austria—the catch being that you'd have to gather all of your family to work together to reach the crown without arguing. We talked about that idea for a while and, well, it seems trickier than at first glance.

Would so-and-so work with so-and-so?

"What about [these relatives]?" Patrick asked (we have some very interesting characters in our extended family).

"I'm out!" Josie said flatly (but jokingly).

So...not as easy as it sounds to reach that crown (and the story probably isn't legally binding, anyway, so I don't actually recommend attempting to being the next ruling family of Austria this way).

Hadis's phone wakes her up with the weather report and so she warned us about thunderstorms in the afternoon. We could see storm clouds gathering behind the Rathaus here and mostly beat the storm home, but, boy, was it ever a doozy when it arrived!

Traffic signal near parliament

Here's a couple of things about the metro that Patrick shared...

1) "not" means emergency (or more like "need" or "distress"), which he thinks is funny when it is paired with things like "stop" or "brake" because to English ears it sounds like "zug notstop" would mean the train isn't stopping when really this is the emergency ("not") brake.

2) If you're looking for a newer, air-conditioned wagon, just look for a little _ beside the arrival time because that's what the _ indicates.

Anyway, we made it home mostly dry to the wonderful aroma of dinner being prepared. Hadis made sour chicken (morghe torsh) for us, which is a walnut-pomegranate dish. It was delicious!

Here's the rain pouring outside while lightning flashed and thunder boomed—all the outdoor Eurovision events had to be cancelled because the storm was too dangerous (and wet) to allow for outdoor anything:

Here's the beautiful table Hadis set:

And the most delicious tadig (which I really need to learn how to make):

I neglected to take any pictures of the actual meal, but here's a picture of Hadis and Patrick feeling satisfied after we'd all cleaned our plates):

It was a good, busy day out on the town! We had originally planned to go back out that evening to see the city at night...but...as I mentioned...the storm had other plans for us, so we just stayed in and enjoyed each other's company.

We played Phase 10 earlier in the trip (perhaps my first day there?) and while we were playing brought up the game UNO, which Hadis had never played. Josie and I saw it while we were at the grocery store one day so we grabbed it and broke it out on this rainy evening. It was lovely to get to just stay in and visit with Hadis and Patrick (rather than bustling about the city doing tourist-y stuff, though that was also fun).

(And if it wasn't clear from the title...because I'm not quite sure that I've managed to write into the title I decided on when I began...but it's late and I'm jet-lagged...Hadis's meal at home was better than going out, in my opinion. She's a wonderful cook!)

Vienna Central Cemetery

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Mon, 11 May 2026 17:40:00 +0000

On Sunday we went to Vienna's Central Cemetery, which was not very central according to Vienna residents in 1863 when the cemetery was established. In fact, it was so far removed from city life that hardly anyone cared to visit the graveyard at all...until city authorities began Ehrengräber (honorary graves) and even exhumed and reinterred famous people who died before the cemetery's opening (such as Beethoven and Schubert).

See—here's Beethoven (who died in 1827)...

And Schubert (who died in 1828)...

Both were transferred to the "famous musician section" in 1888.

And look! Here's Strauss (died in 1899, so legitimately buried here):

And Brahms (died 1897):

Visiting Europe always makes me think about how ridiculously prudish Americans are about the human body (there are censorship stories about bare bottoms being shown in children's books, for example). And yet, here's Brahms completely surrounded by...bare bottoms.

Walking around in the cemetery is a common Viennese pastime (which, for the record means an activity people engage in to pass the time, rather than activities people historically engaged in in the past—Alexander had a little mix-up about that when he was preparing a presentation on Qatari culture and explained how he came to understand the meaning of the word, which was very cute) and children here are certainly not shielded from seeing all the bare bottoms in the cemetery (or elsewhere).

Anyway, here's a look down one of the 1 km long paths from the center of the cemetery:

Here's the St. Charles Borromeo Cemetery Church in the middle of the cemetery:

Patrick wanted to show us some of the more modern graves in the cemetery...like this grave of Franz West, which resembles a...worm?

I found many of the older graves quite interesting, though we were confused about which tombs were marked for removal and which ones were allowed to continue. Some that seemed in good repair were marked for removal while others, such as this one, were not:

The red sticker indicates that the grave is slated for removal:

For lunch we got schnitzel bowls, which is a layer of fries, covered by a layer of chopped schnitzel, mixed with onion and pickle, and covered with what Patrick described as a "Big Mac" sauce. It was good!

Salzburg: The End (and an Iranian restaurant)

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Mon, 11 May 2026 12:47:00 +0000

We more or less just slept in on Saturday morning. We didn't have to check out of the hotel until 11:00 am, our train wasn't until 1:11 pm, and we didn't have much else on our Salzburg to-do list. It was nice to be unhurried in the morning.

We went to the Billa (grocery store) to get some breakfast pastries and then went for a walk to St. Sebastian's Cemetery, which was immediately so peaceful compared to the street outside.

There are some Mozarts buried here (but not the Mozart, who got a pauper's funeral in Vienna).

Here's a picture of the train station that we spent a few minutes waiting at. Patrick is very good at timing trains and things—it's been wonderful to just follow him around because he already knows all the stops he wants and if you happen to get ahead of him rather than trailing him, he'll offer you a discrete "go right" or "go left" as you approach the top of the stairs or escalator or whatever so you'll know which way to go, too. He's been a very helpful guide.

We thought this pigeon was funny because it insisted on carrying this leaf all around:

And here's just a view of the "family wagon," where the tables each have a different board game on top. I didn't actually see anyone using the games...but it's a fun idea nonetheless. We sat on the second floor of the train.

Back in Vienna, we headed out in the evening to go to a Persian restaurant Hadis likes called Apadana. I should have taken a picture of everyone together, but didn't...

I tried the Khakeshir-Sekanjabien, a sweet/sour drink with flixweed seeds, which absorb liquid and help you stay hydrated (kind of like chia seeds, but different).

I've never really heard of flixweed, but apparently it's common in Southern Alberta, so apparently we're missing out because I'm pretty sure this was my first time having it.

(Upon further research, I have definitely seen flixweed and have even opened up those pods to reveal the seeds. But I have never eaten them. Manitoba's agriculture website notes that flixweed is "highly competitive to desirable plant species"—if only we knew that it could also be a desirable plant! I mean, I understand that sometimes we might want to grow other things but we don't tend to use this plant at all when...we certainly could).

And here's my dish of Zereschk Polo, a chicken dish with berberis rice. Zereschk is berberis in Persian and it's another food that I've never had before, but it was very good—rather tangy little berries. It's another plant we have but don't often use in America—we call it Oregon grape, though that variety simply isn't considered very culinary. These red berries are Berberis vulgaris, whereas the Oregon grape is Berberis aquifolium.

You can see a salad of herbs on the table. Hadis said it's very common in Iran to just eat herbs with your meal—so there was, like, mint and cilantro along with some onion and radishes to eat between bites, which was quite refreshing.

We were glad Hadis was there to help us order! It was all very yummy!

Salzburg: Hohensalzburg Fortress and more

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Mon, 11 May 2026 12:06:00 +0000

We made our way up to the Petersfriedhof (cemetery) at the base of Festungsberg and debated whether and how we wanted to get up to Hohensalzburg Fortress.

Here you can see part of the Salzburg Cathedral at the end of the street:

And here's a sneak peek of the fortress location on top of Festungsberg, behind the cathedral, behind the Mirabell Gardens (I took this picture in the evening):

When Rachel and Miriam came out to visit Uncle Patrick with Auntie Josie, they all bravely took the stairs. We weren't sure our group was up for that on this particular day, but Josie felt it was important to go, so she pushed for us to take the funicular to the top of the mountain so we could tour the fortress.

This was a good call. We were up in less than a minute and had plenty of energy (or at least some energy) left to walk around once we were up there (again, we were doing this on very little sleep). But first, I suppose, I should share some pictures of the graveyard and area below the fortress.

Here is the Sphaera on the Kapitelplatz (there's a life-sized statue of a man on top):

Here's a gate into the cemetery:

And some of the beautiful graves inside. I rather liked how so many of the graves were covered with a flowerbed rather than simply...grass.

And here's a view of the fortress:

I think taking the stairs up would have been cool as well, but the funicular certainly was more fun (and less exhausting). From the top of the mountain you can look down below to see the square, the cathedral with the golden statue, and...the rest of Salzburg.

We climbed up to the fortress tower and enjoyed the views from up there:

This window promised a great view:

Patrick remembered the museums being subpar, but I thought they were pretty good for fortress museums. They shared the history of how Salzburg (salt city) became so wealthy through controlling the mining and sale of salt in the region (white gold, Salzburg tea...) as well as the use of the fortress as a prison and during wartime. Some rooms and corridors were left empty, but others had little displays. I thought it was worth it (especially with the combined ticket). The fortress ended up being my favourite part of Salzburg so I'm glad we convinced Patrick to go!

Here are some of the royal chambers, very ornate:

These fancy tiled stoves were in many residences that we saw in Salzburg (including in Mozart's homes, though his stoves were not quite this fancy):

I liked these door-within-a-door designs. I suppose if I had a door this big—big enough to allow a carriage through—it isn't a terrible idea to have a human-sized door to open as well. It takes far less energy. I almost wonder whether we need a cut-out like this on our garage door, like a little pet door, but for kids. My kids love to use the garage door to go outside (though they're usually also getting equipment out from the garage as well...and we already have a front door). Anyway, I thought it was cool:

I also liked these sundials on the sides of buildings...here's one:

And here's another:

And here's another view down an alleyway on our way back into town to find some lunch:

We ate at a little Mexican restaurant—The Burrito Factory—across the street from the AirBnB Rachel and Miriam stayed at when they visited Salzburg with Patrick and Josie (they also went to the Mexican restaurant, and enjoyed it so much that they decided to become repeat customers). It was surprisingly good (surprisingly because I didn't expect to be enjoying Mexican food in Austria), even if it was lacking in beans.

We crossed back over the Salzach river on the Mozartsteg, returning to our hotel for a nap before hitting up the quiet nightlife of Salzburg.

I suppose I should mention the name of our hotel in case I want to remember in the future—we stayed at the Plaza Inn. Josie was worried about it because it was so close to the train station, but it ended up being just fine!

When we were looking at what to do to enjoy an evening in Salzburg we found a post that suggested: just sleep. There isn't a lot going on. Most of the shops and things are closed. But the gardens were still open for us to enjoy, so we went on a little walk.

Here we are, back at the Mirabell gardens, this time in the evening! It actually was fairly booming with activity. Everyone seemed to have purchased a bottle of wine to enjoy (we skipped that part) and there were college students blasting music through the square.

This tunnel gave us access to a playground where families were still playing with their kids:

We sat at the top of a hill and talked on a bench for awhile as the sun went down:

And here's a view as we were leaving the gardens to go back to our hotel—with everybody:

And just me:

This sign was consistently confusing because it's not like the pedestrian pathway ended—it kept going.

I looked it up and it simply means that the footpath dedicated to pedestrians-only was ending (and merging in with, in this case, a bike path as well). But it definitely looks like the sign forbids further walking, at least to my eyes. But that would be indicated by a picture of a pedestrian in a white circle with a red border (and usually only on roadways would that be seen).

Oh, wait! I remember—before we went back to our hotel we went out to dinner. Hadis suggested Asian food and found a place online called "Happy Asia" that had good ratings from what she could see, so she went ahead and made a reservation for us. While we were out walking we passed a pho place that Josie was intrigued by, but decided to head to "Happy Asia" instead.

We got there and were so embarrassed that we'd made a reservation. Our server came out of "Way to India," our food came out of "Happy Asia" and apparently they owned the "City Pizza" place next door because that's where our utensils came from.

The food was bad.

At that point we should have just gone to "Way to India" because clearly the owners of this trio of establishments was from India, and that menu was very specialized (with a rather short menu) while the menu at the Asian restaurant was long (we do not know what the menu at the pizza place was like). Patrick said they probably actually knew how to make whatever was on the Indian menu and were...doing their best with the rest.

I got the fried rice "with vegetables" and Josie got fried rice with chicken so that we could split (we both had a hankering for vegetables). Unfortunately, it didn't seem like I got any extra vegetables aside from the ones already in the fried rice. And the chicken was suspiciously like schnitzel...

But we survived and we didn't starve. And it was really quite funny (given all the other...much nicer...restaurants that we passed by on the way...Hadis was embarrassed, but she didn't need to be—we've all been there, done that).

Here's a picture of the "hot drinks" (heiße Getränke) offered at the restaurant we ate at (picture taken because "Heiss"):

And here are some pigeons for Phoebe:

Salzburg: from the Sound of Music to Mozart (and a little bit of Mother's Day)

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sun, 10 May 2026 22:50:00 +0000

We stayed up way too late on Thursday night and then could hardly sleep because we knew we had to wake up early on Friday morning to catch the train to Salzburg. Optimistically we had told ourselves that we could sleep on the train, but we didn't really do that, either. The views were beautiful—I was surprised by how much countryside there was (that is, there was much less urban sprawl than I would have expected).

Fortunately, it's a fairly short trip. When we arrived and found our hotel (to ask if we could store our bags while we walked around) the receptionist offered to see if she had any rooms available right then (though our check-in time wasn't until much later in the day). As it turned out she did have two rooms available, so we checked in and had a quick little rest before hitting the town.

Hotels in Salzburg charge a tax to guests that allow them a Guest Mobility Ticket, which lets them use the buses, trams, and metro in the city. It was very nice to be able to hop on and off transport as we wanted/needed to!

Our first stop was Mirabell Gardens—which the von Trapp children and Maria danced around in The Sound of Music). Here's a selfie Hadis took of our group:

And here is a picture Hadis took of just Josie, me, and Patrick:

This more serious garden leads to the Zwerglgarten (the dwarf garden). There are twelve dwarves for each month, so they can be some kind of strange zodiac, but there are some missing, and many others, so we simply picked one for everyone in the family.

These two fencing dwarves we decided were Benjamin and Andrew:

Specifically, we thought this was Benjamin:

And this was Andrew:

This tree-climber we thought would be Alexander:

Here's Zoë:

Rachel...maybe...I don't know (the older girls were difficult to place):

Miriam (again, difficult to place):

And Phoebe—with a tongue stuck out, ready to lick anything and everything:

From the gardens we made our way to Mozart's residence, which is a rather short and subpar experience.

Josie couldn't remember which museum was worth visiting—Mozart's residence or Mozart's birthplace. It's definitely Mozart's birthplace! Josie and I ended up going to both (and I can confirm that Mozart's birthplace is the museum to visit if you need to choose between the two...if you decide to do both museums, be sure to ask for the combined ticket).

We walked across the Salzach on the Marko-Feingold-Steg:

Past some pretty streets:

And stumbled into Mozarts Geburtshaus—bright yellow, can't miss it!

Inside is this cute Playmobil Mozart:

...as well as many artifacts from Mozart's life (and/or about Mozart).

This unfinished painting of Mozart was done by his brother-in-law. It was also displayed at his residence (but no pictures were allowed there), which made me think that they were both replicas. And, indeed, it seems the original is kept in the Mozarteum in Salzburg—so I imagine that many things in there are replicas rather than originals.

This is not a terrible thing, really, considering what sometimes seems to be the lax security at European museums...and that one time Auntie K bumped into a display case at BYU's dinosaur museum, causing the skeleton to collapse. She was so worried about it, but the employee at the museum assured her that it was simply a 3-D printed replica.

I thought my kids would appreciate this little medical kit from the Mozart household:

One favourite medicine was black powder, "a dramatic laxative whose main active ingredients were extracted from plants. However, it was enriched with additional ingredients such as finely ground earth worms, frogs' hearts, or antler tips." I'm not sure that I've ever seen the words "enriched with" and "earth worms" in such...close succession...but there we are. The sign also told us that most of the medicines, honestly, did have a laxative effect due to the belief that illnesses needed to be flushed from the body.

Ah, the 1700s—such a glorious time to be alive!

We tried to find the letter from Mozart to Nannerl, wherein he calls her horse-faced, but alas we could not. Still, it was fun to go through and read some of his musings and...to think about how awful the life of a child prodigy must have been (probably would have been little better now, honestly).

We've got a full day ahead of us tomorrow, so I'll leave off here and cover the fortress and other things later...

I did get to speak with the kids today. Alexander has been begging to play the same trivia game we played at Rosie and Austin's house in December. It's Uncle Patrick's game, so he set it up so that we could play. We had a fun time, even if some of the trivia questions felt impossible sometimes. Phoebe had her own controller and twice she managed to randomly click on the correct answer when we were just about to perish, thereby saving our whole group!

It was fun to get to see my kids for Mother's Day.

It's been fun to be with my siblings as well. Patrick and Josie have been spoiling me—zero people have climbed into bed to kick me this whole time! That alone is quite a treat!

But I am looking forward to getting back home for some wonderful little-kid snuggles (and to pack up and/or get rid of everything we own).

Qatar (with the details)

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sun, 10 May 2026 00:05:00 +0000

We have been waiting a long time to share the news that we got this job!

Andrew was offered the position on March 8 (the day we spoke in church, clearly pining to get the job and move, though we had not yet heard when we gave the talks) and then going through the negotiation process and waiting period, finally hearing back...the middle of the afternoon on Thursday (May 7)?

My timing is fuzzy on that because I'm here (in Austria) and Andrew is there (in Georgia), but we are very excited everything is finally finalized.

Andrew has been working on making little flags of all the places we've (collectively) lived (he hasn't lived in Russia, I haven't lived in Italy). He actually started with the Qatari flag as...a way to...soothe his anxieties about offers being rescinded (we've had interesting luck in that department)...to manifest his desires.

To share the news, he posted this picture with the Qatari flag on top:

Big personal/professional update:

We've been hoping/trying to get back to the Middle East since we left in 2010 and we're finally headed back!

In August, I'll be leaving GSU and heading to Georgetown University in Qatar as an assistant professor in international politics and quantitative methods. My research on international nonprofits, civil society, and global politics & policy is all continuing, and I'll still be teaching social science-y data science classes—just from Doha now.

I'm excited to move and get started, but I'm going to miss GSU! PMAP has been such a neat department and I've had a blast with the incredible students and faculty here.

(now we have to figure out an international move with 5 kids amidst *waves* all this *ends wave*)

Qatar without the details

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sat, 09 May 2026 23:50:00 +0000

Once upon a time...way back in August...Andrew saw a posting for a job in Qatar.

It was perfect for him, almost as if they had written the job description with his CV sitting in front of them. He asked if he should apply, and I said that he definitely should. So he did.

And life went on...and on...and on...

We began to assume we simply wouldn't be hearing back about his application, but they reached out on November 10 for a zoom interview. Andrew responded in a great hurry, saying:

(Hi! I just submitted form. All possible dates/times work great for me so I arbitrarily chose three, but if needed, the other times are also fine too. Thanks!)

He came upstairs and faceplanted onto the bed.

"I just submitted form!" he mumble-screamed into the mattress.

"What?" I asked.

"I. Just. Submitted. Form," he repeated and then showed me the email he had sent (which left out the "the" that a native speaker would have used).

"I'm sure it will be fine..." I said (gracefully not pointing out that he used both also and too in the same sentence, which is completely redundant—he didn't need to worry about that, too!).

His zoom interview went great as far as he could tell.

No one said anything about his typo.

We were optimistic, but still heard nothing.

Life went on...and on...and on...and on...and we kept joking about that typo.

Finally, the Sunday after Christmas (December 28) we got word that they would like to fly him out for an in-person interview—in early January, no less!

We hadn't yet told the kids that he had even applied, but this was the point we agreed that we would tell the kids about the possibility of a move. We didn't want to tell them too early and have them get their hopes up for nothing but didn't want to tell them too late in the process and have them feel like their opinion on the matter meant nothing.

It's kind of a big move and it can take some time to wrap one's head around something like this.

We told Rachel and Miriam late at night on the evening of the 28th, sitting on a blow-up mattress in the room that was to become Dean's nursery (because we had driven up to visit Rosie and Austin in Tennessee that afternoon). They were quite excited by the idea so we told the rest of the kids when we were all piled into the van for our drive home.

I was expecting someone to protest or cry or at least announce that they didn't want to move.

To my surprise all of the kids were immediately on board with moving halfway around the world.

"Even though we have to say goodbye to all our friends and leave behind the cat and..."

It was like I was trying to make them feel emotional about it, but while they agreed that those things might be difficult it would be well worth it for the experience, the change, the opportunity.

Huh. And I had been so ready to manage emotions.

Andrew was rather frantically trying to coordinate plans to head out to Qatar while we were hiking Sweetwater Creek in January (on January 1, to celebrate the new year).

There ended up being a problem with whatever date he was initially assigned, so his interview was moved to February, which was nice because it gave him more time to prepare his presentations and things.

Andrew left for Qatar on February 9, had an amazing time, loved the city, loved the campus, loved everyone he met, felt the interview went swimmingly, and returned home late on February 13. He didn't bring back any souvenirs, but he did bring back the little toiletries kit he got on the airplane and Phoebe immediately adopted the tiny tube of toothpaste he got. She carried it around for weeks and insisted on using her "Doha toothpaste" every time she brushed her teeth until it finally was empty (and sometimes even then).

We were all very excited about the prospect of moving to Qatar, but Andrew insisted that we should imagine it was all just a dream. There was no reason to get our hopes up only to have them be dashed. We were perfectly fine where we were. Life was good. This was just a weird...dream.

So that's the premise we operated under, knowing full well that we were all hoping it would actually happen.

Life went on...and on...and on...and then...

On February 28 Israel and the US began bombed Iran...and Iran retaliated by bombing its gulf neighbours (including Qatar)...and it started to feel a little scary.

Just days before we had been talking with Andrew's dad and he asked us what—if anything—would persuade us to refuse the position, should we be offered it.

"Nothing," we said.

The job was literally perfect for Andrew.

Ballistic warfare, however, had not been on our radar, so I admit that March was a bit of a frenzy.

We were following the news like it was our full time job and were rather grateful things seemed to be cooling down when Andrew was offered the job. It's been a bit of an emotional rollercoaster since then...with some days feeling better than others. And the fact that the Straight of Hormuz remains "closed" has been an issue for us as well.

But we've begun purging our belongings with gusto and trying to prepare physically and emotionally for an international move (into a peripheral conflict zone).

This semester was certainly a busy one so I am unsure how much more blogging I could have managed (and part of the reason it was so busy was because I was trying to finish my coursework prior to moving overseas, for ease of finishing this degree), but this was a big secret to keep for so long. It was very much on my mind, so thinking of other things to write about (and writing about them in a normal way) felt difficult to do. So much of our thinking and doing has revolved around this impending move.

Andrew just signed our final contract earlier this week (on...Thursday night for me...while just sitting down to eat the bandari Hadis made for dinner, which we quickly dubbed our celebratory meal) so now it's 100% official and we're telling people about it (we still have a little bit of trauma from that one time we were offered a position only to have them painfully rescind the offer).

I'm glad the cat is out of the bag now, though, so I can start sharing some stories from our preparations...

***April 6***

For family night we went over our QATAR plan, talking to the kids about how over the next few months we would need to be:

Quest-seeking
Attentive
Thoughtful
Adaptable
Relinquishing/Relishing

Dad mentioned that we may end up living in multiple separate locations once we say goodbye to our current house. Sitting on Andrew's lap, Phoebe's listened with uneasy attention.

"We'll probably spend some time in a hotel, and then we'll move to temporary housing while we look for a place to rent."

All of this information went over Phoebe's head. She was still stuck parsing out "separate locations."

"But not me!" she said, tearing up.

"What do you mean not you?" Dad asked, giving her a squeeze. "Of course you!"

"But...I can't live in my own house!" she whimpered, clearly flustered. "I'm only four!"

"What?!" I said. "Phoebe, no! It's okay. We won't each get our own house! We will move to separate locations together! First to a hotel, then to a temporary home, and then to our more-permanent home...but always together."

"Oh, together," she said, wiping tears out of her eyes and taking a deep, shaky breath. "Together is okay."

***April 18***

We devoted Saturday afternoon to an intense relish/relinquish session. We talked about how to make these decisions and set the kids to work but they kept bringing us items to tell us about whether and why they'd decided to relinquish or relish it. This made things pretty slow going. So the kids each got two bins and sorted things into the bins after deciding whether they'd rather relish the item (bin #1) or relinquish the item (bin #2).

We set a timer to check in with the kids at certain intervals.

During one such meeting, Andrew said, "How is the relinquishing going?"

"Pretty good!" Benjamin, Zoë, and Alexander reported.

"Well," Phoebe gushed, "I am doing a lot of relishing."

It is easier for some than others to give up material goods.

***April 19***

I was talking with my mom and told her the relishing/relinquishing story. Phoebe came in with an armful of plastic horses and announced that Zoë had put them in her relinquish bin so Phoebe picked them out to put in her relish bin, once again noting that she would like to relish everything.

"I'm relishing everything!" she said.

And, honestly, I probably would have rescued those horses myself! They're ones we got in a bin of toys when we first moved to Egypt and we've been carrying them all around the world for years. I see no reason we should stop now...

***April 22***

Andrew had to get his fingerprinted for a criminal background check, so he left in the middle of the day to do that. Phoebe wanted to know where he had been and what he was doing, so he explained that he had gone to get his fingerprints taken. And then he decided to also explain that the rest of the family would have their fingerprints taken upon our arrival in Qatar.

Phoebe was not pleased to hear this. She curled up on my lap and looked at her fingers, slowly stroking her fingertips with her thumbs.

"Will it hurt?" she whispered.

"Will what hurt?" I asked.

"When they..." she gulped, then bravely continued. "When they take my fingerprints?"

"Oh, sweetie, no!" I said, giving her a squeeze. "It won't hurt a bit!"

Andrew explained how in these modern times they simply scan your fingertips on, like, a glass screen, but we broke out the ink pads to show Phoebe how they used to "take" fingerprints in the old days.

Dip. Press. Done.

She...got really excited about taking fingerprints after she understood that it was literally no big deal (and involved no surgical procedures).

She will be far less excited about the extra immunizations she'll have to get (we haven't told her about those yet).

Here's Phoebe and Alexander exploring their fingerprints (shortly before I had to run Zoë to gymnastics—Alexander went first because Phoebe was still a little too scared):

Here they are looking at their fingerprints with a magnifying glass:

Taking fingerprints was a lot more fun than Phoebe anticipated:

One fingerprint turned into many fingerprints, which turned into whole handprints...

It's not scary at all!

(Side note: I had to have my fingerprints taken when I entered Austria as well!)

***April 28***

Another FHE lesson about resilience. We read "Moving" from The Friend and talked about how we're about to start reading Exodus in the Bible (we are...rather behind in our "official" reading, but are totally rocking our memorized scriptures).

We talked about (but didn't quite yet) make a top-ten, bottom-ten list, as kind of prompted by the State Department's curriculum on adjusting to international moves.

Phoebe immediately knew what she wouldn't miss about living in Georgia:

"All the tornadoes!" she exclaimed. "I hate them! Because sometimes we have to go sleep in the basement and the tornadoes are just like...vacuum, vacuum, vacuum..."

Apparently "vacuum, vacuum. vacuum" is the noise a tornado makes (and this sound effect must be accompanied by your hand making a twirling motion in the air).

For the record, she is afraid of tornadoes, yes, but also vacuums (still) so it doubly makes sense for her to pair vacuums with tornadoes.

For favourites, Alexander said we wouldn't have a favourite restaurant because we hardly ever go out to dinner. That's true.

Phoebe said picking her favourite restaurant was easy.

"It's the McDonald's we stopped at in Tennessee on the way to see Oaklyn and Ireland! The food was so good and—guess what!—they even gave me a toy!"

"That is so cool," Rachel said facetiously. "And definitely unique to that specific McDonald's location. I don't know of any other restaurant that gives out toys with their meals."

"I know, right?!" Phoebe said, preserving her enthusiasm.

So...restaurants aren't making our top-ten list.

But there are other places that are!

The pool, probably. A few parks. We'll see what we come up with...

***And that's all for now, folks***

But I have permission to blog freely, so expect much more in the future!

Georgia > Turkey > Austria

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Thu, 07 May 2026 19:41:00 +0000

I survived the semester!

I turned in all my final papers!

...and then I hopped on a plane to join Josie in visiting Patrick and Hadis in Austria!

I flew on Turkish airlines, which boasts ample legroom, but which did not feel ample (perhaps because the man I sat next to was rather large and kept blowing his nose...on his blanket...and perhaps because the seat in front of me was broken and stuck in a recline). It wasn't an unpleasant flight, though! I finished a book (Looking for Palestine) and watched a movie (Nuremberg) and slept.

After landing in Istanbul, I had time for a quick jog through the airport, hopping in line to board my flight to Vienna just in time. So here is my one picture from Turkey:

Going through customs was a breeze! I actually stopped to use the WC instead of rushing through customs because I figure that I'm usually happier to stand in a line when I'm comfortable than when I'm uncomfortable. But then by the time I got to customs almost everyone had already gone through and the workers minding the kiosks were more than happy to give me step-by-step instructions to get through the system. And the border patrol agent had very few questions for me.

Wandering down the hall towards the luggage carousels I found a sweet little girl, crying her head off, and limping down the hall with one of her shoes half off.

I wasn't quite sure what to do about that, so I jogged up around the corner and encountered a woman with a baby strapped to her chest, carrying a couple of bags, who was barking in Russian, "Hurry up!"

"A little girl?" I asked. "Her shoe..."

"I know!" the woman said, the little girl just limping into view. "But what can I do? My arms are full!"

"Can I help her?" I asked. "Maybe she'll be faster..."

"If you want!" the woman snapped.

So I ran back to the little girl and told her I was going to help her.

"Push, push," I coaxed (in English this time because apparently I don't know the word for push in Russian—it's Толкать! apparently) and her foot slipped into her shoe. I redid the velcro while she sniffed and told her "Хорошо. Молодец."

And...I just think it's rather nice to not have to travel with my arms overflowing with kids and stuff.

That said, I did travel with a rather large suitcase that was like 70% full of treats for Uncle Patrick.

The kids (jealously?) called it the "Suitcase of Candy," knowing it was sitting in my room full of treats for a few weeks before I left...

Patrick and Josie both met me at the airport, which was very nice of them because I was very tired and I don't think I could have navigated the various buses and trains we had to take to get to Patrick's apartment on my own. Plus they could help me lug around the Suitcase of Candy.

I found this particular sign on the bus rather amusing:

"Please don't journey out of your skin," meaning, roughly, "Don't fly off the handle!" or, simply, "Don't lose your temper."

We didn't do much in the evening. Patrick made some dinner for us. And we watched a show. And then we went to bed. In the morning I got to enjoy the famous view from Patrick's living room window and we got ready to head to Klosterneuburg.

Patrick has done a significant amount of research at the library in the Abbey at Klosterneuburg, so he gave us a little tour there.

He pulled out some fun books to look at, like this choral book:

This lovely illuminated volume:

Here I am holding a rather large volume of parchment:

Patrick showed us where some repairs had been done to the parchment. The pages will often have holes in them from the preparation process—if the animal skin gets nicked anywhere it will leave a hole, which can then just be stitched up (if you want) or you can just leave the hole and write around it. Below you see both methods were used in the book, with the text beautifully flowing around the imperfections:

His friend at the desk recommended he pull this book with illuminated wooden covers, the back panel featuring what she described as "ugly Jesus":

It was such a beautiful library (and so fun to get a backstage tour of the library with such a knowledgable expert...even if my jet-lagged, end-of-the-semester brain wasn't fully absorbing everything he said):

It was such a joy to be surrounded by such beautiful books:

Imagine getting to work at a desk like this:

With a view like this:

Even the books in the slightly-less-opulent rooms were impressive!

I loved seeing this little book snake holding the place of some book conservator away from their desk:

And here's a display of book latches that was on the wall:

Patrick also took us over to the chapel:

Which was, of course, also beautiful:

And he showed us the original foundations of Austria's oldest Gothic structure, which the sign tells us was "erected as the palace chapel of Duke Leopold VI of Austria, probably by Burgundian laborers before 1222 on top of a chapel from the era of Leopold III. Famed for its splendid furnishings, including white and red marble, it was profaned in 1786 and demolished in 1799."

And here are the wooden cobblestones we came across:

Patrick wanted to take us to the monastery's winery...or whatever it's called...to get some fresh juice. We passed a maypole (because it's May).

And this very old fountain:

It was a fun little outing (perfect for a jet-laggy day).

Here's a view of the Spittelau incinerator from the train station, which is certainly whimsical:

We came home to rest and found Hadis making some delicious Iranian food for us. We played "Phase 10" and snacked. And now...I'm blogging...we did some laundry (Josie has been here a few more days than I have)...and we're getting ready for a late dinner so we can get to bed.

Here's a sweet sign Phoebe wrote for me. It says, "I miss mom luve Phoebe."

Andrew helped her spell "miss" but she did the rest on her own. She's a sweet little thing!

Pool-ar Plunge 2026

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sat, 02 May 2026 21:21:00 +0000

We did it! We made it to May!

Phoebe has been asking "When's it gonna be May?" since the pool closed at the end of September.

The kids have been taking about the upcoming summer swim season nonstop all winter.

But we did it! We're finally here!

So here's our First Day of the Pool Season picture for 2026:

This year Miriam opted to stay home and nap. So Corbin stood in for her (he came up from Florida to visit Rachel (and her roommate Hailey, who happened to be in Georgia for her cousin's wedding this week), having also just finished up his first year at BYU). Phoebe is kind of blocking Rachel's face, but I had to keep her little "peace sign" fingers in there. Here's one with Rachel's face:

It was, once again, rather chilly this year. We were really looking forward to the pool opening the last couple of weeks of April because it was so dry and so hot, but then a storm system moved in and it rained nonstop for like five days and cooled everything down and, well, May 1st wasn't looking too hot.

Like, literally.

It was pretty chilly.

My little girlies wimped out pretty fast (big talking from me—I got in up to my waist to make Phoebe happy). Here they are shivering together:

The boys and Rachel and Corbin were surprisingly committed to sticking it out in the deep end. They played some games, went off the diving board, and filled all the time we had before we had to run Benjamin over to the other pool for his swim team practice.

By the time I get back from Austria (because—surprise!—I'm going to Austria) I think the weather should be a lot more pool-friendly.

Here are our polar plunge posts from the past: 2021, 2023, 2024, and 2025.

Here's a picture from 2021:

Apparently I neglected this tradition in 2022, but here's a picture of the last(ish) day at the pool:

Me, having jumped in fully clothed to retrieve Alexander from the deep(ish) end in 2023:

Without my too-cool-for-pools teenagers in 2024 (a nice, warm start to the pool season):

And all my kiddos last year:

We're looking forward to spending a lot of time at the pool this summer!

Dean's Blessing and Tennessee Skies

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sat, 02 May 2026 20:51:00 +0000

Our main reason for driving up to Tennessee last weekend was because Dean was blessed last Sunday! It was so nice to be able to be there (and for Andrew to participate in the blessing circle).

We unfortunately missed our opportunity to get a lovely little family picture, arriving too late to manage to get one before church, and then...well...Dean "decorated" his blessing outfit shortly after the event, sending lovely newborn-yellow poop right up his back in the middle of the sacrament.

Rosie took him out to change him and—to her dismay—discovered that she'd left his emergency onesie at home on the kitchen counter...so he went through the rest of the services wearing only his diaper.

But it was still lovely to get to be there with Rosie's family. We filled every possible inch on a row, fitting rather snuggly with Halee and Jeffery, Rosie and her three kids, and us with our six kids (Austin was up on the stand).

Here's Andrew and Rachel having some contemplative time after church:

And, I'm not sure why but all these pictures seemed to go together... The sky outside Rosie's front door is always so beautiful!

Below you can see Phoebe and Oaklyn on scooters (we got smart and brought Phoebe's scooter with us for this visit), Alexander running along with Flynn, and Zoë and Ireland on the motorized scooter:

Here's the sky before we left for the church party the night before:

And here's a picture I snapped of the stormy skies we had as we passed through...the Cumberland Plateau?...maybe...? There was so much construction going on and then it started pouring... All the possible drivers in the car (me, Rachel, Miriam) were all very glad that Andrew was driving!

And here's a view of all six of my kids piled into the back of the van:

It was a good, quick trip!

More Tennessee Pictures

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sat, 02 May 2026 20:40:00 +0000

Here are a few more pictures of the kids playing together....

Benjamin built this rather elaborate fort for the little girls to hang out in:

And Oaklyn loved having Benjamin push her around in her Cozy Coupe!

Zoë preferred giving the girls rides on the motorized scooter:

When it wasn't our turn to have snuggle time with Dean, Flynn was always willing to fill lonely laps:

And here are the little kids all colouring together:

So many piggyback rides

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sat, 02 May 2026 20:27:00 +0000

Admittedly, this first picture isn't a piggyback ride. It's a picture of Andrew diffusing a temper tantrum. These three little girl cousins—ages 3, 4, and 5—have a lot of fun when they get together, but emotions can sometimes run a little high:

But there were so many piggyback rides going on at Rosie's house last weekend! Usually it was Alexander with Oaklyn on his back and Zoë with Ireland on hers:

Oaklyn and Ireland (but mostly Oaklyn) really enjoy wrestling so they were constantly instigating wrestling matches with Zoë and Alexander.

Even Rachel was roped into a few piggyback rides.

Poor Benjamin was instructed to not engage in roughhousing with the children since he is prone to forgetting his increasingly hulking stature (and sometimes sisters get stitches). Our trip was so very short this time that we didn't want to have to spend any percent of it in the urgent care. Benjamin was very respectful of the boundaries we set with him. Hopefully we can find a happy medium for him so that he can enjoy himself a bit more but also not get the kids (and himself) too riled up.

We lugged our roller coaster up to Tennessee with us (squishing into our clown-car van with all eight of us) and Ireland and Oaklyn were very happy to set it up in their playroom after church on Sunday!

Here's Phoebe going (backwards):

And Oaklyn:

And Ireland:

We'll miss this little roller coaster, but it had a good run at our house and we're glad it will continue to live a happy little life at Rosie's house.

(Besides, the last time we came a certain someone *cough*Benjamin*cough* popped one of the girls' new-from-their-Christmas-stocking "NeeDoh" cubes and sat on their little toddler bike and broke it. I ordered a replacement "NeeDoh" cube—they used to be like $5, like just back in January, and now they're often more like $20–40 for some reason, so I was glad he popped it then! And I figure the roller coaster is a fine replacement for the toddler bike...)

Phoebe, sweet Phoebe

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Fri, 01 May 2026 15:33:00 +0000

This morning, Phoebe brought me a paper that said: "Phoebe, sweet Phoebe."

Technically it said:

PHOEBE
SOET
PHOEBE

I asked her how she figured out how to spell sweet (so-eet) and she said that she just said it over and over again until it came into her brain. I believe we call that "sounding it out."

I asked her why she chose to write what she did.

"Is it because you're a sweetie?"

"No," she told me. "It's because I'm a very good helper!"

"That's excellent!" I said. "Because I happen to need a very good helper to unload the dishwasher."

Unloading the dishwasher is her daily chore, and she is well aware of this fact (but often chooses to ignore said fact).

"Will you be my sweet little helper and unload the dishwasher?" I asked.

"No, thanks," she said, skipping away.

(Now I know that conventional parenting wisdom is to be very direct—don't ask a question if it isn't a question, that sort of thing. But I am Canadian and being indirect is a Way of Life which "can involve using subtle hints or vague phrasing that conveys a message without causing tension or confrontation," such as issuing a command through a question—because only a monster* would issue a command in imperative form. I have had to explain this cultural quirk to my children because, um, a Canadian child raised in Canada would never (or rarely) understand a command-as-question as actual deference to their preference (it rhymes, so it must be true) and would understand it as more of a...mandatory request).

* this is hyperbole

So, anyway, I'm not quite sure what she meant by being a very good helper. But we were awfully proud of her writing.

"It looks like you did some good writing time," Andrew remarked.

"Thanks," she said. "But I'm not going to write the date at the top of the page like the big kids do."

"Why not?" Andrew said.

"Because I don't want to. It's hard."

"But today is May 1st! That's exciting! Surely you can figure out how to spell May!"

"Hmmmm...M...." she said. "May, May, May. A... May, May, May. Y!"

"That's right! M-A-Y spells May! Go write it down!"

"Okay!"

So she ran off to go write May down on her paper. When she had done that I told her she could write a little one after May and that would say May 1st!

"Or," she said. "I could just write first! Let's see...F...R...S...T! First!"

Here she is drawing a picture for her swim coach at the bottom of her page:

She is wearing a swimsuit—changed directly into it from pyjamas...because it's May. And May means the pool is open. So even though it's only 18°C right now (that's cold here, okay? 64°F) she woke up determined to go to the pool.

Also, her first day of swimming isn't until after Memorial Day.

But she drew a picture for her coach at the bottom of the page (and then was frustrated that her picture was somehow upside down, as if she wasn't in charge of the whole process).

Vanil (no-laa)

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Fri, 01 May 2026 02:49:00 +0000

Vanilla is a word that will always make me a little bit angry.

When I was in grade five we had individualized spelling lists (I've told this story before) of misspelled words that were pulled from our writing. I tended to write a lot and also wasn't afraid to use words that I wasn't quite sure of the spelling for, so I had some rather tricky words on my spelling list. Or perhaps I simply felt the words were tricky because they were words that I clearly already found to be tricky (having misspelled them in the first place).

I had this one friend who would purposely write as little as possible and very slowly and carefully so as to select only the words which she knew she knew how to spell. In that way she avoided spelling tests in the first place.

Clever? Perhaps.

But I couldn't write that way. I wrote furiously, passionately, filling page after page with copious script, using the most lavish words I could think of. I wrote some very purple passages, I'm sure, and I had a spelling list as extensive as my little vocabulary could muster.

I took risks. I spelled a lot of things wrong.

Where my friend would write "yummy" I would try out "delicious" or "scrumptious" and...I'd probably leave out an i or something. Onto the list it would go!

And that's fine.

I just then had to learn how to spell those words, which, again, was fine. It's not like it's outlandish to have to learn how to properly spell scrumptious. I was fine.

But I also was forever telling stories about words.

I still do, even though the point of this story is that I got in trouble for making up stories about words.

For example, Rachel said that she took a test on Duolingo to skip some of the earlier Arabic lessons, which is fine because she just took Arabic 101 at BYU and did quite well. However, now she feels like she's behind in vocabulary for Duolingo.

"They just keep expecting me to know all these words that I don't know!" she said. "Like hotel. We never talked about hotels in Arabic class!"

"Oh, hotel is easy!" I assured her. "It's funduq. فندق. Because ducks always have fun at the hotel."

I can't even help it. That's just the way my brain works.

I once wrote an entire paper about folk etymologies and how making up stories about words can help with vocabulary development for one of my linguistics classes at BYU—I believe it was actually an etymology course with Cynthia Hallen. I don't remember precisely all the connections I drew in that paper but I distinctly remember connecting 'tie' (the noun) in Russian (галстук) to "gallows" in English.

Morbid? Absolutely.

But effective because I will never forget the word for 'tie' as long as I live.

And somehow that feels important.

Anyway, I started doing this when I was very young.

Together = to get her, as in "we are going to get her together."

People = pee-ople (I say it like that in my head...still).

Beautiful = b-e-a-U-tiful (I also say it like that in my head...still).

So that's what I would do for these spelling tests. And I taught one of my best friends (Kayley) this trick as well. So we'd get together with both of our lists and would create stories to help us remember how to spell them.

"The pen is mightier than the s-word," we would joke for sword.

Because swearing is bad, obviously, so we wouldn't be using the s-word.

A sword? Perhaps. The s-word? No.

One time one of my words was vanilla and we made up a story about a man, Mr. Illa (the second—to remember that double L), who drove an ice cream van (or truck, if you will, but for our purposes...it was a van...and even though we typically call them ice cream trucks in North America—not so elsewhere in the world—you have to admit that they are often suspiciously van-shaped).

It was a good story.

Anyway, you might be wondering how a teacher administers individual spelling tests to every student in a classroom. Easy—Mrs. Bienert would have us split up into pairs and administer the tests to each other. So I would read off my partner's spelling words and my partner would read mine. And that's how it would go.

My story-writing friend and I would typically pair up together (to get her) and we would use part of our stories to give "context" to our words.

"Vanilla," my friend would say. "As in Mr. Illa, The Second, drove an ice cream van and served vanilla ice cream."

And I would write down vanilla as simple as that! And we'd move on to the next word.

Well, another friend...perhaps frenemy?...overheard our sentences and decided there were far too many hints in the sentences. So she told Mrs. Bienert that we were cheating.

Mrs. Bienert was very disappointed in us.

Why she was so very disappointed before hearing our side of the story is beyond me. Had I not proven myself to be a rather trustworthy person in her class? Alas...Mrs. Bienert was the sort of teacher who...was very quick to punish. It was like she had been waiting the whole school year to get the chance to lower my "discipline score" (I always had a perfect discipline score...which again should have given me some social capital or something but evidently not).

"So-and-so tells me you were cheating during the spelling test," she accused.

"I...don't think so," I said.

"She said you were giving each other the answers."

"Not really," I said, and I explained our whole method.

We would study together during the week, writing the words out as we were supposed to, but also creating convoluted stories to go with the words that helped us remember how to spell them, and we would use those stories (typically truncated versions of those stories) as the sentences we were allowed to (and supposed to) offer our partners during the test.

Mrs. Bienert thought for a minute.

"Well," she finally said. "Ask yourself this—do the other students have that benefit?"

And just like that I was a cheater.

For...being creative? Golly—like it's my fault the rest of the students are dunces!

Kidding. But also not kidding.

Kayley and I were banned from partnering up during spelling tests for the rest of the school year (and had a few more punishments to boot). I think she even told us we weren't allowed to make up stories about words anymore...which...sure...okay...that makes sense.

I was mortified and furious.

And I kept making up stories secretly (because I'm a rebel) and rather loathed Mrs. Bienert for the rest of the year. But her husband, Mr. Bienert, was great!

Small town—both of them teachers, complete opposites.

Anywho...vanilla.

The word makes me shudder.

But it sure tastes great, doesn't it?

Last Thursday, Phoebe and I made a cake just before bedtime, with the intention of having it ready for Rachel when she came home with Andrew after his evening course. Her plane landed around the same time his class let out, and he was right down there by the airport, so it worked out very well. Hard to believe Rachel has been here for a full week—it's been wild! We went up to Tennessee almost immediately upon her arrival and then were home for like two days before her friend Corbin drove up from Florida and then he'll leave and I'll leave for Austria and...it's quite a whirlwind and I feel like I've hardly seen her (but also she's fallen right back into home like she's never been gone, so that's lovely).

Phoebe was sad that she wasn't going to be awake when the cake finished baking, but she was very excited to help make it. She loves baking with anyone who will let her.

(I evidently cannot stay on topic today—apologies for another tangent!)

Rachel made cookies earlier this week and Phoebe wanted to help, but Rachel didn't want to let her help because she knows how...enthusiastic...of a helper Phoebe can be.

"What if I just help you by licking everything off when you're done using it?" Phoebe offered graciously (after hearing a dreaded 'no').

"That...sounds like a great idea," Rachel agreed.

"Great! I'll get an apron!" Phoebe said.

"What for?!" Rachel asked.

"To be a helper!" Phoebe exclaimed.

"You don't need to put an apron on to lick a spoon."

"Helpers always need aprons."

"Whatever."

So Phoebe wore an apron around the house while Rachel mixed up some cookie dough and, when it came time, she licked the spoon.

*****

And now! The moment you've all been waiting for! The story that actually inspired this post!

Phoebe and I made a cake for Rachel's arrival last week. And Phoebe got to actually help measure and dump and mix, which she was thrilled about (even if she didn't get to see the cake when it came out of the oven).

"Can I put in the vanil?" she asked me. "I really want to put in the vanil. I love putting in vanil. It's such a good flavour. Don't you just love vanil? I do. Can I put in the vanil?"

"Sure," I said, pouring some into a measuring spoon for her. "But...why do you keep calling it vanil?"

"Because," she explained. "I don't want to put no into your head."

'No' in Arabic is laa (لا).

So if she said vanil-لا, it might make me say...no. And we couldn't be having that, so vanil it was!

Silly goose!

Infantilizing and Brachiating

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Fri, 01 May 2026 01:55:00 +0000

Rachel held Dean for a quite a while at the ward party. He is, as I've mentioned, a rather chill baby and is happy in most any position (as long as he is being held at all times, if you please). So for a while Rachel was walking around with him held vertically, like this:

Granted—this picture is not at the ward party. This picture is from Rosie's house. But you get the picture, right? Dean was held upright, vertically, perpendicular to the ground.

As chill as he is, Dean does start to get heavy after a while, so Rachel timidly started moving him to lie down in her arms, horizontally.

"I just...can I just...put him more like this?" she asked no one in particular,

"Of course..." I said.

"It just...I dunno....feels sorta rude...somehow..." she said.

"Rude?" I asked.

"I dunno!" she said. "I feel like I'm infantilizing him or something!"

"There are times when infantilizing someone is acceptable," Andrew said. "Such as when they're literally an infant..."

To make up for infantilizing him, Rachel took Dean on a stroll around the playground and read all the signs aloud to him. They came across the word "brachiating," which is apparently a good activity for children and monkeys to engage in, and which Rachel thought would make an excellent first word for Dean.

"Can you say brachiate?" she cooed at Dean. "Bra-chi-ate. Braaaaaachiate... Don't say 'mama'—that's dumb. Everybody can say 'mama.' Say brachiate. Brachiate."

"Ahhh!" Dean cooed at her (he's just started cooing at people when they talk to him and it is adorable).

"That's right—brachiate."

He'll be the smartest baby on the block in no time!

Meeting Dean

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Wed, 29 Apr 2026 01:03:00 +0000

We finally got up to Tennessee to meet our newest cousin Dean! It was a whirlwind trip—and kind of chaotic with the Nashville Marathon, which Austin ran with his sister Hallee—but we were so happy to get to visit with Rosie and her family and to be there for Dean's blessing.

Phoebe has been so very excited about meeting Dean...and then spent most of her time playing with Oaklyn and Ireland. But that post isn't about that. It's all about Dean!

Here's Phoebe with Dean (he has two sisters right around Phoebe's age and has learned to be a little nervous around kids that size):

And Alex with Dean:

And Zoë with Dean:

There are rumblings about shipping Zoë up to Tennessee for a week sometime this summer to be a mother's helper.

We'll see if it comes to fruition—it would make Zoë so happy (and would hopefully give Rosie some breathing room because—man, alive!—three kids five and under is hard...can confirm).

Let's see...who's next? Benjamin!

And here's Miriam looking on with some longing while Rosie took a turn holding Dean:

He fell asleep with his hand on his chin like that, which we all thought was funny (he likes to sleep with his eyes open sometimes). Here's Miriam getting a turn:

And here's Rachel with Dean:

I was lucky to get to hold sleeping Dean a few times—he likes contact naps over solo naps and has the Third Child Schedule down pat (which is...there is no real schedule because he's at the mercy of all the schedules of the rest of the family: school drop off, school pick up, doctor appointments, speech therapy, play dates, and so forth).

He's a super chill baby! My babies all had severe reflux so they were screamers and terribly, terribly spitty. Dean is not a screamer and does not spit up. I don't really even know what to do with a baby like that!

Here I am holding Dean the way I used to pace the floors with my GERD-y babies (pitched backwards away from me rather than nestled against my shoulder, which always seemed to make them spit up more):

He didn't mind it. But, honestly, it doesn't matter what position you put him in—all of his milk stays inside!

It's like the deluxe baby model (while my kids were like fussy, leaky knock-offs)!

He's seriously a dream baby (though still exhausting for his parents).

Finally, here's Andrew with Dean:

And...here's Andrew introducing Dean to Cheetos at the ward party we went to (Rosie and Austin's ward boundaries were just changed so it's a brand new ward and Austin was called into the bishopric—the poor guy was hobbling around post-marathon trying his best to talk with everyone).

Dean wasn't so sure about that Cheeto. Or perhaps he was wary of Andrew. We'll never know.

And here we are together just before leaving:

More to come! After I finish my final paper(s)! I have two left...

Graduate Awards and Recognitions Event

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Sat, 25 Apr 2026 02:26:00 +0000

This past December I was awarded the Carol J. Fisher Award for Excellence in Research (in memory of Hugh Agee) and today was our awards banquet so I got to receive the award there. I'm two years into this program now, which means I've spent about five years in the department as a graduate student...with a few more years to go before I'm finished!

Rachel arrived home last night so she and Miriam drove into Athens with me (for me). We spent a few minutes walking around the botanical gardens before the awards banquet since we were a little bit early.

We saw some beautiful flowers, like these foxglove...

...and three snakes. This has been a very snake-y time in my life. They just seem to be everywhere. We saw two rat snakes and one that was probably either a garter snake or a ribbon snake (it had beautiful yellow stripes running down its body). I didn't catch a picture of that one, but here's a rat snake on the steps.

And some more pretty flowers:

Here are some pictures with some of the wonderful faculty I've worked with extensively.

Dr. Misha Cahnmann-Taylor, who has helped me learn so much about poetry and arts-based research:

Dr. Jenn Graff, my master's advisor and PhD advisor:

And Dr. Katie Sciurba, who has been a wonderful writing mentor:

I've been working with Jenn and Katie (and Xenia, but she's up in Pennsylvania) as the editorial assistant for the Journal of Children's Literature this past year.

And here are some of my fellow PhD students—Lu and Ashley (1st years) and Shriya (2nd year)

Shriya's interests in children's literature align quite closely with mine so we've taken several classes together. She's wonderful!

I also met (but did not take a picture with) the distinguished alumni winner, Dr. Stephanie Tolliver. She has published extensively and they mentioned that she has a family as well. So I had to talk to her about how she balances academic work and motherhood (this is a topic I will never get tired of because it's a topic I'm always trying to figure out). She mentioned that Dr. Heidi Hadley (also a UGA alumna and once a Mormon) had five kids so I should ask her.

"Oh, I have!" I said. "I talked with her at LRA in December and she asked me whether my kids were feral yet because...that's how she balanced her motherhood and academia."

And, the thing is, I think perhaps they might be a bit feral.

Rachel flew in last night and we stayed up too late talking. And then Phoebe woke up (as she's prone to do). Rachel volunteered to put her back to bed, so they went upstairs together and then Rachel came back down and said that she laid down beside Phoebe for a minute and Phoebe...pulled a brick out from under her pillow.

"We are lying on my brick," Phoebe said. Then lifting the brick into the air above Rachel's face and seeing Rachel kind of cower away, said, "Don't worry. It's not that heavy."

So...apparently my four-year-old is sleeping with a brick.

And that's how well I'm balancing motherhood and academia.

I was even the one to tuck her in initially last night because Andrew was (a) teaching an evening class and then (b) picking Rachel up from the airport.

I don't remember seeing a brick in her bed...but apparently it was there.

Anyway...

After the awards ceremony we had a few errands to run on campus. I had to return some keys and make a stop at the registrar's office. Altogether those errands cost us about 10,000 steps (including hundreds of stairs) so that was fun.

We also stopped by the plant science building to look at my poster from my graduate teaching seminar (which is required before you can be a teaching assistant). We had the entire semester to work on this project and I couldn't get my group to do anything until Saturday last week (it was due on Monday). I finally was like, "Guys—look! I wrote an introduction, I wrote a conclusion, I wrote a section discussing one activity. All you have to do is write about 175 words describing one of three other activities and we can turn it in!"

And they finally got their stuff to me.

It was a headache.

So I figured I deserved a picture with it.

Here are Miriam, me, and Rachel at "The Arch":

"The Arch was built in the 1850s and originally served as part of a larger iron fence securing the campus. It is considered to be the gateway between the University of Georgia and the city of Athens. The Arch's three pillars stand for Wisdom, Justice, and Moderation which is the state motto of Georgia" (source). Somehow my daughters knew (thought I did not know until they told me) that it's tradition to avoid walking through the arch until graduation.

I've never walked through it, though I have walked by it several times (that's the Holmes-Hunter building behind me, where one of my classes was this semester) and from watching pedestrian traffic around the arch it seems to be true—students walk around the arch rather than walking through it.

The Red&Black reports:

As a freshman, Daniel H. Redfearn was reportedly “so moved by the symbolic meaning of the Arch that he vowed to never pass through it until he had his diploma in hand,” said Steve Armour, a University Archivist of the Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library.

However, according to Darby Miller, a senior marketing major from Arkansas and tour leader of the visitors center, walking around the Arch at that time wasn’t as easy as it is today.

“The fence on north campus actually used to go up to the Arch so not only was he walking around it, he was hopping over the fence,” Miller said.

I thought about taking a picture with it today (since I did graduate once...) but there were so many students graduating this year taking pictures that I figured I'd let them have their moment. We did snap this one as we were walking away (Holmes-Hunter is also where the registrar's office is, which is why we were up at the arch...1.3 miles away from Aderhold, where I dropped off my keys...which is about half a mile from the parking lot...).

Here we are at Herty Fountain:

Miriam kept sticking her head up between Rachel and me...which then would block whatever was behind us. First the arch, then the fountain. I think I meant for her to be on my other side, but she kept going between me and Rachel or, here, on the other side of Rachel.

I'm lucky to have had these sidekicks—and brave chauffeurs—with me on campus the past couple of years! They've both finished up some brilliant (and tricky) semesters of their own and did great!

A.C.T. now!

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Wed, 22 Apr 2026 03:42:00 +0000

Today was my last full day of classes (I technically still have a class on Thursday but it's not a full day), which means I have no readings left to do. On the one hand that's nice because now I can just focus on getting my writing projects finished. On the other hand it's kind of unfortunate because I don't have a "productive" way to put off the writing that I need to do (and, um, it's kind of a lot of writing).

So instead I'm writing this!

This morning, Miriam and I were walking from the parking lot up to Aderhold and she was saying how relieved she was that she didn't have anything to worry about (just rubbing in the fact that her semester was over, I guess, while mine is so painfully lingering).

"Except for my ACT score..." she said with a pout, then screamed, "I GOT MY ACT SCORE!"

Because at that exact moment she got an email telling her that her ACT score was in.

Sometimes it feels like we live in a sitcom.

"What?" I said. "No way!

"Yes!" she said.

"Well, are you going to check?!"

"It's going to take me forever to log in, but yes!"

We kept walking while she logged into the system (places to go, stairs to climb).

"I got a _____!" she gasped. "I can't believe it! I got a ____!"

"You got a _____!?!" I said. "That's amazing!"

I won't share her score here because that's not really my news. Let's just say it was higher than she had hoped.

She scored better than I did, but not quite as good as her dad.

She got the same composite score as Rachel (though their marks for individual sections differ).

And she's over the moon about it.

She was so worried she'd have to take it again (because she was very worried about the math section), but since she's happy with her score, there's no need. It's almost like a couple years of high school math and taking a college-level math class...helped improve her score.

To be fair, she last took it as a rising sophomore, which is pretty early to be taking it.

And we only had her take it then because according to Georgia law, I have to have the kids take a standardized test every three years. As I was deciding which test to purchase for her I thought to myself, "Why not just have her take the ACT?"

It fulfills the standardized test requirement, gives her a taste of what taking the ACT is like, and was about the same price as any other test I could have had her do.

So, anyway, turns out you learn a lot between the end of your freshman year and the beginning of your senior year. Go figure!

There's a snake in my...wall!

noreply@blogger.com (Nancy) — Tue, 21 Apr 2026 05:38:00 +0000

A big ol' rat snake periodically uses our back porch as its shedding grounds. Sometimes we see it around and sometimes we only find its ecdysis. Today we were...lucky...enough to find both.

Andrew texted me while I was in a meeting to tell me that...there was a big ol' rat snake slithering up the side yard. The kids encountered it on their way to the trampoline.

By the time I got out of my meeting it had taken refuge in the bush beside our garage...and Benjamin had found its long ecdysis on the back porch. As you can see, it's at least three feet long!

If it's the same snake as before, it's grown quite a bit the past few years because these kiddos have grown a significant amount since 2021 when this picture was taken (it was also around in 2020 and some other times as well):

Alexander, Benjamin, and Zoë with a snake ecdysis in 2021

And there's the snake, peeking its head out of the grass:

I was like, "Hey, Benjamin—why don't you run and shut the garage door so it doesn't get into the garage?"

And Benjamin was like, "Good idea!"

And the snake was like, "Bet!"

So Benjamin closed the garage door and then this snake (little stinker!) stuck its nose under that little crack between the siding and the ground and just...slurped right into the wall of the garage like a little black spaghetti noodle.

Benjamin tried to grab it, but it just...slid faster...right out of his grip.

So, anyways...I have a snake in my wall...apparently.