After our our delayed flight in Japan gave us the "opportunity" to spend the night and day there, we finally made our way to Houston. Our dear friends the Furni offered to watch our jet lagged kids while we house hunted in Dallas, because they love us. We took Ander with us because, well, we love them.
We lost a day house hunting but over the next few days we were able to find a lovely house not even a block away from the elementary school(!). Next on the list was to gather our chicks up so we headed to Houston and then we were able to spend a day with our friends back in Dallas.
The next couple of days were spent running errands...
(photo creds go to Kennedy)
Not wanting our children to spend hours (I'm talking double digits) on the iPad we let them work on their "problem solving skills" and "interpersonal skills" for large chunks of time while Nathan and I left the car to wander a car lot. Those were long days for everyone. Eventually we found what we needed, and it was in the nick of time before we had to pack up and go to Boise for our first Christmas there in about 6 years.
In case you're wondering what it looks like to live in a small space and then try and do the laundry/organize/pack all in the same small place? Umm, something like this:
(I'd like to title this picture "Erin's personal hell")
But the next day when our 2 short little flights had us to Boise by early afternoon, we were all in awe of how slick the travel was. Glorious! Punctual! Short!
We arrived in frigid Boise (about 26 F/ -5 C.) and all of my kids were ecstatic to see snow, even if it was the dirty weeks old mounds left about. Ander had a cruel shock when he excitedly shoved his hands into snow for the first time and got two big fist fulls. It took about 3 seconds before he was crying in pain from the cold. Ouch! And there were other signs that they were novices, like when I found Kohen warming his hands in the exhaust of the rental car. We had some teaching to do!
Nathan's sister Tara met us at their parent's house with head to toe snow clothes for all 5 of the kids that she had gathered for us (she is my hero!). We were teaching the kids how to put on the clothes so they'd know the best tricks, when it suddenly started SNOWING. We couldn't believe it.
It was a Christmas miracle! It was like heaven sent that snow just for my kiddos. What a great memory. It was the perfect way to start off our Christmas vacation.
5 comments:
Hi Erin,
Enjoyed reading about your repatriation adventures. Oh the fun! I too have children (and dogs) that have been shocked by the coldness of snow--Zach told me "it didn't LOOK cold in the pictures!"
It appears you are moving to Houston--which may mean we will encounter one another at some point! We live in lovely NW Arkansas (Zion-someday?) but we lived in Austin before we moved overseas, and have family in SA, and we try to go to TX at least once a year. So hopefully we can met up for lunch or something sometime!
Oh, and you didn't have to go all the way to Boise for snow--we've had plenty of the white stuff here this year!
On a more serious note, you may want to password protect your blog--there are some creepy people out there; Sarah(my daughter) has some stalker guy making comments about her kids on her blog. Until you password it, ANYONE can see it…just a thought.
Welcome back to the US of A.
Julie
Loved this post! So fun to see the photos behind the chaos! Some of the best christmas memories this year! So glad you are back within the same time zones! I told my girls we can actually face time them much more often now!
tara
haha "opportunity". What a great post... honest about the pain of constant travel, but still fun. I see you also got a Costco lunch in there somehow. That is a good look.
Katie Bell
Loved to see your kids and the snow! Next year it is our turn... unfortunately I don't know anyone who is going to have hand-me-down winter clothes for my kids - - Aidan? Quinn? :-)
So glad you have moved out of your "personal hell" space and into your new house by now. Send pics!!!
Love and hugs to all from us here at 'home'!
Carrie
I'm so glad you're keeping all of us who love you up to date via your blog! It's giving me flashbacks to our experience. It is such a stressful, busy, and loooong process! Good thing you are superwoman, because I can't imagine having to stay in such a small space, buy a car, move internationally (and ALL that entails), and everything else with five children!! You guys are awesome.
It's pretty funny all the little things we don't think about that are new to our expat kids. Enjoy repatriation and all the fun--and funny--experiences that go along with it!
I must say, I like that we are back in the same country. Yet we are still too far away! If you ever want to visit the east coast, we'd be thrilled to have you all stay with us!
Hope you're enjoying being back and that settling in is going smooth!!!
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