Bali, Indonesia

The stress over the last while has been significant for Nathan and I. No matter how much I try to portray a front of keeping it together, my body betrays me. My hair is falling out by the fist full, acne has been a constant companion and other even less savory body rebellions. Due to our commuted time in Asia Nathan and I decided to take the family trip we'd hoped to make this year to Indonesia by ourselves. It was an intensely needed break. 

Nathan travels a lot for work. The upside is trips like this where we use miles for our flight, and points for our hotel. That left us only paying for the first two nights we spent inland in Ubud. Not a bad deal.

We enjoyed taking in the countryside on our drive in. We stopped to take pictures of some of the rice fields as the sun was getting ready to set, it was stunning. 

The thing about the clouds that make for a beautiful sunset is that sometimes they bring rain with them. In this case, the first torrential downpour of the rainy season. By the time we got to our bungalow we were soaked. A comedy of errors ensued, a river of water pouring down the wall inside our room, for example, out of food at dinner, and the grand finale, Nathan being badly shocked by the faucet handle on the soaker tub. 

 But the gorgeous view at breakfast washed all of the frustrations away...

That and when they changed our rooms to an even nicer one for our troubles. Way to take one for the team with that shock Nathan!  The outdoor reading bed and plunge pool were an unexpected bonus. 

We were there over a Hindu holiday so literally everyone was headed to the temple along with us. At this particular temple called Tampak Siring the people wash in the water, cleansing their bodies but symbolically cleansing their spirits. 

 Usually there are a handful of people in the water, but on a holiday their were crushes of people.

 But still neat to witness anyway.

 We had noticed people walking around with rice on their foreheads and wondered what part of their ritual it was. We met these nice girls and one asked if I would like to have this blessing. They use the Plumeria flower to flick the blessed water on you.

 You drink some of the water out of your palms, three times, before they put the rice and water mix on your forehead and the base of your neck. It was a beautiful blessing.

 I loved the colorful offering baskets stacked at the temple. All day we would see women walking down the streets with these balanced on their heads.

 Next we headed out to the rice terraces. I have had a burning curiosity about the specifics of farming rice since before I moved to Asia. It has only increased since so this was so cool to me, having my questions answered. I did not know that rice looks almost like wheat when the grains grow. How cool is that?

 The above picture is extra fun, if you notice my left foot, I almost got my wish to work in a rice patty! My foot slipped off the edge and plugged deep into the wet mud the rice was growing in. The rice worker who had offered to take our picture was mortified and insisted on washing my foot with bottled water. I mean, hey, I can take a little mud! But it was kind of him to help.

You can see here the rice on the right is lighter and ready to be harvested. It is harvested similarly to wheat. 

Terraced rice pattys are easily one of my favorite things we've seen in Asia. Amazing.

 The next day we made our way out to Kuta and the beach. Turns out this is the site of the 2002 terrorist bombing of a nightclub that killed hundreds of people. There is a large memorial at the site that took me by surprise. As did the increased security. To drive in to our hotel there was a bomb sniffing dog, the inside of the car checked, in the trunk, under the hood and under the car. Any time we went into the hotel we had to go through a metal detector and our bags were scanned. I appreciated the security but feel sad that it is deemed necessary. 

Without altering the picture in any way, this is the sunset we witnessed our first evening. We sat out on the beach and drank it in. We spent our time in Kuta mostly just relaxing and reading together, bartering with the locals in their market and eating good food. 

Not bad for our last trip exploring Asia. 

I'm Baaaack!

I bet ya thought I was done. For good. Nah. I couldn't let my blog die on an ugly spider post! We've just had a difficult few months. Stress filled, limbo-land and so much drama I didn't even know where to start. So I just didn't. I spared everyone the gruesome play by play. And how nice is this? Now I can report our plans without months of "maybe's".
So here is the long and short of it: We are moving to Dallas Texas at the beginning of December. We are gonna catch our breath for a hot minute (or maybe 18 months or so) and then we plan on heading to South America, though it is still undetermined exactly where. Any advice on amazing places to live in S.A. are welcome!
So as you can imagine, previously things were stressful because of the unknown but recently switched to the equally evil, stress from the known-all-too-well. International moves are... involved.  And by all accounts, repatriating is a beast, so I'm super looking forward to moving home with the inevitable, "I somehow don't quite fit in anymore". But hopefully those feelings will be short lived.
Overall I swing wildly back and forth between being unbelievably excited to go home to America, to coming apart thinking of leaving Taiwan. In example, I'll be driving along day dreaming about what it might be like to walk into an American store and shop for my children for Christmas... endless possibilities! Then I'll gaze out at the gorgeous Asian, jungle covered mountains that I love so much and think, How can I leave? This has become home! Cue the waterworks.
I'm sure their will be a sappy, I love Taiwan! post somewhere in this blog's near future. But until then, here's to being back at blogging!

Uninvited House Guests

I have been putting off writing this post for over 4 years now. Largely for selfish reasons, like not wanting to deter would-be visitors. And also because for the first few years I was too traumatized to speak about it. Without weeping that is.
But as we begin our 5th and final year in Taiwan (future destination, currently unknown) I feel like it's time to stop protecting you and just have out with it: Taiwan is full of grotesque, overgrown, creepy pests. I suffer from PTSD from my countless surprise(!) encounters. Here are just a few examples of what we deal with.
Let's start off with a softball:

ANTS.
Cute little ants. Nothing too bad about those. Until you are sleeping with them, bathing with them, and casually eating them at every meal.

They come in waves throughout the year. A child drops any food on the floor and it will be covered black with ants in mere minutes. Nothing can be left in the sink, on the counters or floor or you will have an all-natural organic carpet of ants on every possible surface.
Boil noodles for dinner and a few ants will always bubble up on the top for good measure.
My favorite though is soaking in the tub. I open my eyes to see drowned ants floating all over in my bath water. I just close my eyes and pretend I'm having an exotic spa treatment involving pepper.


LIZARDS
At first I thought these little dudes were the good guys. They soundlessly scamper around the floors and ceilings feasting on, well in our house, probably the ants.

They leave a trail of little mouse-like droppings all over which is "fun" but what really gets me is that they will just up and die anywhere. You'll find a finger-sized corpse rotting in your pantry, for example.
My least favorite story happened when I opened a cupboard above my head to get a recipe book and something dropped on my upturned face, sliding down my neck and chest before I realized with horror it was a lizard in the latter stages of decomposition.
How Nathan kept me here after that incident? Two words: Dark Arts.


COCKROACHES
We're having fun now, aren't we? Cockroaches come in various sizes, but mostly large. They'll turn up anywhere, especially in places you don't seal up tight, a completely random example would be that $10 bag of chips your kid didn't bother to close properly. Cereal boxes in the States sometimes have surprises in them, well guess what? So do chip bags you leave open in Taiwan!

Fun cockroach story, I'm driving down the road one day, blessedly alone in the Odyssey. I am stopped at a stop light when I get this feeling I'm not alone anymore. I look over in the passenger seat and there is a cockroach the size of my pinky riding shotgun like it ain't no thang. I had to invite him to leave. Immediately. And by leave I mean die.

SPIDERS
And there it is. The giant dirty secret. Spiders. Arachnid-disgusting-us.
It has been well established on this very blog that in pre-Taiwan life I didn't hesitate to throw a shoebox over a spider I deemed "big" before using a life-line to phone a friend to come and do the dirty work. Well, survival can force you to face lot's of things you'd rather not.
It was a few months of living in Taiwan before we began encountering their brand of overgrown spiders. Do this exercise for me. Touch your pointer fingers together and your thumbs together and make a circle. That would be the size of an average spider. The kind we find in our house. The kind that eat the pinky sized cockroaches.

 In our last house they really liked Kohen's room. A 4yr old Kohen woke up with a big ol spider on the wall next to his head. He was thus scarred for life and too scared to go to bed in his room. Finally a genius friend of mine suggested a mosquito net over his bed and that thankfully helped. He drew a picture of his experiences in therapy KA.

A quick getting to know you guide to Taiwan spiders:
They are smart.
They are wily and faster than you want to imagine.
They are ginormous, conspicuous beasts.
They like to show up when Nathan is out of town.
Sometimes they are so big that when you take a picture? they have red-eye:

Come visit then? 
Hope to see you soon!

Take 2, Eye Surgery

This was not a relaxing summer, let's just start with that glaring fact. Being displaced for what ended up being 8 weeks was not ideal. We packed up and moved 7 times within those 8 weeks, and changed cars so many times I lost count but it was more than 10, that much I know (in 100+ degree weather as I'm sweating and cursing trying to get carseats and booster seats wrestled over and buckled in, kill.me.now.). We will be forever grateful for my sister's friend who heard of our plight and offered us their car without even knowing us. That is true Christianity people. And for Nathan's parents who took pity on us and lent us their car as well. Bless you! (A Thank You to everyone who helped us with rides, gathering our stuff from across the valley, letting us crash in your homes etc., we needed lot's of help this year.)

This was also the summer of redo's, which is fine if you are talking about an awesome massage or amazing food instead of root canals and surgeries. I had a root canal done soon after I arrived home. As a bonus I had some serious pain for weeks after. Then in an attempt to fix an old root canal the dentist spent forever trying to get into an overlooked canal but in the end had to send me on to an Endodontist, who finished the job over 2 long appointments. When I later went back to the dentist to put the crown on it didn't fit and he had to do another one. I bet I spent a solid weeks worth of summer vacay not-numb-enough with a drill squealing away in my head..

But enough about me. 

Ander's initial eye surgery left his eyes somewhere in between where it had been and where it needed to be. A few days before we were scheduled to head home we were told he needed a 2nd surgery. We extended our stay and headed back to the hospital.

 This time they got it right with the anesthesia and pain killers and the process of waking up was much better than the 1st time. The surgery was done on the outer muscles of the eye where they take out a section of muscle. It causes more swelling and usually more pain as well. This particular surgery typically takes longer to heal too.

We don't have graham crackers in Taiwan so after Ander had been resting at home post-surgery for quite a few hours, eyes still tightly closed, I asked him if he was hungry to which he nodded and said, "I want graham crackers." I was so surprised by his specific request! But Auntie Natalie came through and he devoured graham crackers and teddy grahams with his eyes closed.

 About 48 hours after the surgery he looked like he'd been beat up pretty good. Lot's of swelling, especially in his left eye. And his eyes pulled outwards a lot, and even though we'd been told to expect this, it was still distressing to see.

 As the swelling went down, sometimes his eyes looked pretty good, and sometimes one of them would wander off and do it's own thing...

And his left eye had this big bulge where the stitches were so when he turned his eye this big 'ol bulge would swing out, it was a stomach turner! But at his 2 week appointment he measured really good and we've been assured things are moving in the right direction. 

This was taken this morning while Ander experimented with blueberries in his ears as ear plugs, but his eyes look pretty darn good. When he is tired they seem to go out more often, so with jet lag factored in I'd say it's looking stellar. 

As difficult as this summer was logistically, we were so grateful to be in the States and have good care. 

Ander's Eye Surgery

Part of why Nathan and I were so worried about missing our connection on our way home this summer was because we didn't want to miss Ander's appointment with the eye specialist the next day, a Thursday. We were so grateful to make the appointment, even though we were all jet lagged. 

The Dr. was amazing (or maybe my acceptable standards have just really been lowered in Asia!) his staff was competent and they knew what they were talking about. Due to the nature of the recovery and how long they want to watch it, when it was decided that surgery was what needed to happen, it needed to happen right away to have time to keep tabs on him during the healing. I was so thankful that Nathan was there for it! The next morning, Friday, Ander had surgery for his non-accomodative Estropia, Strabismus, and Ambliopia.

 The hospital staff was wonderful. It was such a treat to understand every word that was said!
We did hit a small speed bump, however, when we were brought back to see Ander in recovery and he had had to be sedated again. The head nurse was not happy that they had had to do that. She said for reasons we don't know the anesthesiologist sedated Ander but chose not to give him a pain reducer which they typically do. So when he woke up instead of it being a slow realization that his eyes hurt, it was sudden, crazy, bad pain. He had pink tears streaking his cheeks as he laid there in the hospital bed. Mama did not like.
They monitored his heart rate very closely and when he started to wake up again he was still hurting pretty good. The light was pretty unbearable, initially.

 He wasn't supposed to rub his eyes but the stitches that were in them really bugged him. He was such a good boy and had more self control than I would have had. We found that having him hold his blankie over his eyes helped soothe and calm him and keep out the light.

 At home Nathan came up with this clever idea. Ander didn't open his eyes enough for us to see anything until 8 hours or so after the surgery. We kept it dark and offered him ice cream to try and get him to eat.

 At 10pm he finally opened his eyes and had some ice cream. The inside corners of both eyes were quite red and tender, it was described to us as a bruise, and it's normal and to be expected. He really bounced back after the first 24 hours though. So strange to see his eyes more symmetrical, it almost didn't look like him!

The first post-op Dr.'s visit was positive. Everything is healing fine. These surgeries often need another surgery or possibly a third to do some tweaking on the muscles of the eye to get them centered, symmetrical and working together. His left eye is still pulling in some but it is much improved so far. We are still waiting for it to finish healing and for the muscles to settle into how they will work and function.
It was unexpected timing for the surgery and it consumed our first week or so in the states, but we are so grateful we were able to meet with great Dr.'s who have the expertise to help him. A major step in the right direction!

Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia 2013

At the end of April we got the sad news (I still contend that "devastating" wouldn't be too dramatic to say) that our friends and neighbors the Stathams would be moving. 

It didn't take us long to come up with a plan to have one last hurrah. Managing for all three couples on the lane to go to Sri Lanka last year was a bit of a miracle and we knew it couldn't happen again in such a short time. Instead we decided that the Chiles would go on a weekend getaway with the Stathams and I would hold down the lane and all 14 kids (I did have some help) and then Nathan and I would take a turn on a weekend getaway with the Stathams while Carrie held down the lane. 

My turn wasn't actually that difficult, our biggest challenge was on Mother's day getting 14 kids to church, through church and home again!

But pretty soon it was our turn to go and on a Friday morning after we got the kids on the bus we headed with our friends to the airport. 3 hours later we were in beautiful Kota Kinabalu Malaysia.

We stayed at the Shangri la and wow, it is the nicest place that Nathan and I have ever stayed. We felt spoiled! We were greeted our first evening with the most amazing sunset. I haven't changed any of the pictures at all, it was actually that vibrant and breathtaking, if you can believe it.

The next morning Nathan and Jeremiah hit the golf course bright and early. Brandie and I slept in a bit and then headed over to the spa. It was the best spa experience I've ever had. It was amazing. I felt so refreshed and relaxed after. 

 (Mt. Kota Kinabalu in the background)

 It was literally 72 hours of pure relaxation, cooling off in the pool, or reading a good book under an umbrella next to my favorite guy and our good friends. Each evening Nathan and I would go to our balcony and fill up the outdoor tub where we would read together while we watched the sun go down. It seemed like each sunset was trying to out do the last.

 The Shangri la has an Orang utan Preserve and Rehabilitation Center (I was surprised to discover Americans are some of the few who pronounce it "Ah rang a tang") on their land, so you can go and see them in their natural habitat during their feeding time. When two of them swung through the trees we could tell right away which one was 3 yrs old, it was totally Ander with fur! Right down to when he climbed over where we were all standing and decided it was a good time to pee.

 It was pretty fun to get to watch them for a while. They are fascinating creatures.

Nathan and I decided we were celebrating his finishing teaching early morning Seminary this year. I can't believe we did it! Well, mostly him, but it was definitely a team effort and balance. It's incredible what this man successfully juggled this year. I literally could not tell you how he pulled it all off.

We were so grateful to just have a few hours alone this trip. To have a conversation from start to finish uninterrupted by children. It was wonderful to reconnect. It was a blessing to be able to go. By now it's becoming clear to even me that I am in denial our friends are moving, as that was actually the whole reason for our trip! 

It was a wonderful weekend full of laughter and relaxing with great friends... and 3 unbelievable sunsets.

Father & Sons 2013

Last year the Father and Sons campout ended up taking place in our yard rather naturally after it had been rained out. Of course once the decision was made to cancel the campout, it quit raining and everyone decided to just throw up tents at our place instead. It was cool how it came together. 

It was little less cool this year when it was planned to take place in our yard. Mainly because someone making decisions is not a fan of camping and this would ensure that they could go home and sleep in their own beds.  

Nevertheless! There was a great turn out and everyone had an awesome time. 

I had to lean way out of the bathroom window to try and get a picture of the tent city that popped up in our yard. There was probably 6-9 tents but a lot more dads and sons came and hung out before heading home to their own beds. There was a nice little bon fire and they had a delicious dutch oven dinner (tasting it was the best benefit of hosting, yay!) and little boys running around unreasonably dirty considering they weren't actually in the wilderness.

 A few of the survivors the morning after.

Nathan was a bit busy and didn't manage many pictures, but sometimes you just gotta live in the moment. Ander may have been brought inside to his own bed around midnight but Nathan woke him up and brought him out for a delicious breakfast with his brother and Dad.
The tent city was broken down and our yard completely back in order by 10am. I was impressed.
I love when Nathan gets to spend time with his boys!

Mothers Day 2013

I'd like to open with a bit of honesty. Some mother's days are not good days. There have been a few where I wanted to stand up and rebuke the overly sappy and exaggerated things being said about "perfect moms" from the pulpit. I want to boo them like the old lady in Princess Bride.  

But alas, this Mother's day was a great one. No booing required. 

It started out with Nathan rolling over in bed and saying, "If you could have anything for breakfast what would it be?" I don't love traditional American breakfast foods (okay, I do heart bacon) so I was being a little cheeky when I replied Dahl Makani, my favorite Indian food. Without hesitating he said, "Okay." and hopped up to go get my breakfast. I couldn't believe it. Anticipating that I would rather have left overs than breakfast food he had bought my favorite food on Friday and hidden it in the fridge. It was the best start to a great day. He had totally surprised me.

I loved my "Happy Matures Day" mint plant grown by Aly. Matures day might be more fitting, huh?

My Mother's Day picture with my favorite little people in the world. They even kind of, almost, nearly cooperated taking the picture. See? A great day!

Snail Trail

I love my kids playing together outside. Love, love, love it. They all went on a snail hunt the other night and because we've had a deluge of rain recently there were a plethora of giant snails climbing all over. It was a great night for a snail hunt.
I was, however, less excited about the evolution from snail hunt to "snail massages".

Landslide on our Mountain

Over the last 12 hours we've had a torrential down pour, not terribly uncommon this time of year. But this morning Nathan drove past this very spot on his way down the mountain, and when he came back a few minutes later, this mini land slide is what he found. 

It doesn't seem too scary, until you see the taxi underneath the wreckage of broken trees and foliage. 

 Nathan said the man in the blue shirt is the taxi driver, so it appears he was unhurt.

 But from the looks of it, I'd say today is his lucky day. Wow.

Put Her There!

We live in a world where contracts are made to be broken. Americans are so litigious that it is hard to think any other way but defensively. Long gone are the days of "My word is my bond". Anymore, a good strong handshake is merely a formality and never an actual binding contract. 

Or is it?

The other day I was waiting at a light. The light turned green and traffic started moving along slowly with me at the back. All was well until a car parked on the side of the road suddenly pulled out and hit me. 

Annoyed, more than anything, I took a deep breath and got out of my van. 

The Chinese man was already out of his car shooting rapid fire Mandarin my way until I turned my head and from behind my black hair emerged my white face and he instantly stopped short and put his hands up in the air, turning away from me like, "You have got to be kidding me!" 

I walked around to check for damage, just paint transfer and a minor scratch, no big deal. I look at his car, a little body damage. He starts speaking very urgently to me again and then says his first English words to me, "Ok? Ok?" Like, it's fine, let's just call it good and go.

Umm no. Not ok. 

I understand quite a bit more Chinese than I can speak. What I was not hearing in his rants were any of the familiar apologetic phrases that I expected to hear from someone who was so clearly in the wrong. So did that mean he didn't think it was his fault? We can't just drive away without him at least admitting wrong doing! But I was now late for an appointment and not in the mood to do the song and dance with the Foreign Police.

So I did what I think most people would do. I grabbed my phone and started taking pictures. I got the scene, the damage on my car and his car, followed by his license plate. 

He starts getting more agitated. 

In Mandarin he is asking each and every passerby on the street if they speak English. 

About this time, a friend of mine had pulled over and come up and a worker tending nearby greenery also comes over and says in surprisingly good English, "He wants you to delete the pictures before you leave." I replied, "I am not going to erase the pictures, I will keep them so he can't say I did this."

Understanding seemed to dawn on our impromptu translator, he turned to the man who had hit me and explained the problem.  All of a sudden he got it and began saying to me, "Sorry. Sorry." finally apologizing. 

The translator then told me we must shake hands. What? Hmm... Awkward......but okay.

And that is how my friend got an official, totally-wouldn't-hold-up-in-court picture of us shaking hands. 

The funny thing is, as I drove away I thought, that handshake actually did make me feel better. The damage to my car was so minor and body work is very cheap. I just wanted him to say, Hey, I  am so sorry about that. It was an accident. 

 Sometimes it is refreshing to live in a place where an apology and a handshake can still make everything right. 

PS- I still laugh until I'm crying when I look at this picture... I love this quirky little country.

PPS- I feel pretty confident I could've taken this guy, if it'd come to that. 

Enablers

For the most part, Scarlett's big brother Ander has taught her everything she knows...

 But this was all her.
When I went to investigate a strange tinking sound I found Scarlett precariously perched on top of the piano. She was throwing the little decorative rocks and was pretty dang pleased with herself. Not dissuaded at all by my sudden appearance, she was reaching for another rock when I snapped the pic.

 Scarlett has recently turned into her big brothers protege'. He has bequeathed his vast wealth of knowledge to his quick-study baby sister. 

Sure, they laugh and wrestle and play pirates, with Ander fitting Scarlett with a too big pirate hat and trying to help her get a make-shift sword to stay in the elastic band of her pants. But he also teaches her how to climb up on the counters, leverage her weight to open the fridge, and climb in the pantry to retrieve snacks. And should she need assistance, he is of course always there to offer her a boost.

                                         

Mei Mei is pretty proud of her new skill set, proven as she gleefully scatters the napkin pile off the table for the millionth time. And be warned, if there are any liquids on the surface she has scaled, she will empty them all on the floor before you ever realize she was even on the counter. 

It was actually in a pretty quiet moment that I had the epiphany that I was in the grips of some serious toddler tyranny.
They both love the same blanket which is fine, we have several. But I've noticed my two self soothers put their fingers in their mouth whenever they have a blanket. I've tried really hard lately to keep the blankets in their beds to help minimize the fingers in the mouth. But they've taken to sneaking them whenever possible.
The other night I witnessed Scarlett, the girl who is so stingy with her words, bring out two blankets she'd scavenged up, casually handing one to her brother saying, "here doh" before she crawled up on the couch beside him and they both assumed the position.
It dawned on me then: they are totally enabling each other.

I absolutely love that they are buds, I really do. I'm just not sure it's worth the knowledge transfer that is  going on. The only thing trickier than one Ander is two!