Last weekend we were invited for dinner at a neighbor's house. One of the three children threw up soon after we arrived. We never even saw him but Nyla had played with him the previous day at the playground. We hesitantly stayed anyway. Nyla loved playing with Mo- who is a first grader and Bohdin played or rather associated with the fourth grade boy Ma-. Bohdin and Ma- were funny together because it seemed like the entire time they were just quizzing each other on what they knew. Ma- won the dinosaur round and Bohdin won the space round. At one point they began debating religion but we put an end to that. It's not a first date topic. I hope they spend more time together in the future. Both seem like introverts so it will probably take parental involvement to get them together. Neither seem the type to suggest it on their own.
As we were leaving the dad said we could come over any time. Nyla woke up the next morning and asked to go play with Mo-. When I told her it was too early, she reminded me that she was told any time. I made her wait until after lunch. Nyla had a lot of fun and they seemed to really hit it off.
Monday our stuff arrived and Nyla was sad that she couldn't go play with Mo-. Delivering the stuff took longer than I expected. I think it took over four hours. Unpacking has been a huge job and we are not even remotely done a week later. We do finally have a crazy packer story. There are always stories floating around about packers packing up the trash and other weird things. We unpacked a dead mouse. I would have been fine leaving that behind.
Tuesday morning Nyla said she didn't feel well and didn't want to go to school. I didn't believe her and sent her anyway. At lunchtime they called me to come pick her up because she had a fever. It was a long fever that lasted days. Buddy became sick on Wednesday I think and Cora became sick on Friday. I became sick yesterday. Bohdin has avoided it so far despite playing with Mo- outside for hours the day before she became sick. Nyla went back to school today despite a lingering cough. Buddy had to go to school today also despite feeling awful. It's certainly making the rounds around here. There were a lot less kids getting on the bus as the week went on.
Monday, January 28, 2013
Monday, January 21, 2013
New house
We live in Infantry Barracks which are old infantry barracks that have been converted into housing. Every building has eight units and most have two front entrances into the main building with four units coming off of the front entrace. I think there are 12 buildings total but I haven't counted. It could be more. Each unit is unique. There are some similarities between some of the units but they all differ and some radically. We have the same bedroom floorplan as many of the units around us but the rest of the space is quite different. Some have more closets, or foyers, or different kitchen layouts and sizes.
The above picture is taken from the hallway between the living room and dining room. I then turned around and took a picture looking into the dining room and kitchen.
This is the kitchen. I had two ladies from our building look inside and they commented on the small kitchen. It was actually the biggest kitchen of the units we were offered.
The hall between the dining room and living room has a giant closet. Buddy wanted to use it as an office but there are no electrical plugs. One of the kids called it a room.
This is looking down the hallway into the bedroom area. There are two bedrooms on each side and a bathroom on each side. The hallway is generously sized toward the end. Lots of people set up desks or bookcases in the hallway. We have lots of columns in our hallway so it will be harder for us to do that.
This is the smallest bedroom. The housing office sometimes calls this a study and sometimes calls it a bedroom. Since we have three kids they call this a bedroom. It is too narrow for a bed to fit across.
This is the big sunny bedroom which the kids will share. That's a queen sized air mattress in the corner.
The other sunny bedroom will be the kids play area.
The dark bedroom will be the master bedroom. It's at least as large as the large sunny bedroom. We initially were going to make this the kids room but I thought they would like the sunny one better because it has more light. The dark bedroom leads to the bigger bathroom and I wanted that.
This is the bigger bathroom. The other one is tiny.
There is a closet in the dining room that Bohdin has been using as a reading nook.
Another view of the living area but this time from the kitchen. That wall straight ahead shows the dimensions of the hall closet. The near door in the picture is the dining room closet. There is also a closet in the living room.
January pictures
Nyla lost her tooth just before bed on January 1st. She had a baby chew toy in her mouth and when Cora grabbed it the tooth came out with it. She was very excited because she wanted the money but when her tooth came out she decided to save it. It was about five days until she put it under her pillow. She was quite lucky that it wasn't lost.
Nyla likes to create things. I think this was a house of some sort decorated with flowers from my African violet. This is also the best picture we have of th nook area. We bought a used table and refinished it. It was nice to have seating after the rest of our stuff was gone.
The last picture of the kitchen. The camera battery died and I still regret not having charged it in December.
December pictures
Bohdin invented a game that involved crawling away from the air mattress before it fell on top of them. He was later sad that we wouldn't let him use it as a toy. He has destroyed air mattresses in the past by not using them as intended.
Looking from the kitchen to the dining room.
Bohdin filled up balloons using the air mattress pump and then let the balloons fly.
It snowed twice in January. The first time it was just a dusting. The total accumulation can be seen above. That didn't stop Bohdin from making a snowman head that lasted days.
I don't know what Nyla was doing to Cora. I think it may have been a tissue blanket.
Nyla discovered she could cut out the center of a paper plate to make a hat. Cora was the recipient.
The second time we had a bit more snow. Bohdin played outside the most.
Friday, January 18, 2013
Servants
From January 15th
We spent the weekend in downtown Kansas City. Friday night we had barbecue. Saturday we went to the science museum which the kids really enjoyed. There were a lot of interesting things we hadn't seen at a science museum before. The mystery hotel section dealing with optical illusions was especially fun. The museum is large and we didn't come close to covering everything. Bohdin was upset we had to leave but Cora was getting tired.
Sunday we went to the art museum. Buddy and I split up so I had Bohdin and he had the girls. The kids just aren't art lovers yet. Bohdin wanted to tell me about the Mars Rover Curiosity instead of finding an interesting piece of art. When we were in the car neither child could tell me about any art at all.
Sunday night we had to head back up north so we would be closer to school. Nyla was really excited to go back to school and Bohdin was neutral. Bohdin missed one of the three recesses on Monday because he was too slow in his work. He had to type something on the Ipad but it took him a long time to decide what to type. I can imagine him missing lots of recess for that reason. He struggles with indecisiveness. He hasn't been tested yet for academic level so he is doing easy math and easy reading. That's bothering me more than I thought it would. I want him to be challenged academically.
When Nyla talks about her day it is usually what the people around her did. We hear about the boys who were acting up or the girl she played with. Last night she told us she overheard the servants talking at school. I told her there were no servants. She said they worked in the cafeteria and were servers but she liked to call them servants.
Before we took the kids to school Monday morning, Buddy recieced a phone call that two new houses were available. He said we would be there after dropping the kids off and stopping in at his work to report. We were in the office a bit over an hour after they called. The first set of keys were for the unit we had seen the week prior and the second set of keys were given to somebody else. We waited over an hour for the other.couple to bring the keys back but it was too late. They had chosen the unit we were supposed to look at. Buddy and I were mad. We were number one on the list. This couple had only arrived in town the previous day. In addition they hadn't even been assigned that neighborhood. When we expressed our displeasure they decided to let us look at the units that would come available at the end of the week and it would be ours. A nice lady took took us to see the six units. We saw a unit very similar to what the other couple had taken and didn't love it. We were able to choose the best floorplan of what was available. Besides needing to wait until Thursday everything worked out. We were able to get the larger interior unit that we wanted and will even have a pantry which seems to be extremely rare. Of the eight units we saw only two had a pantry and those two unitss were next to each other and almost identical. It also had a lot of closet space. The units are very different from each other which I find odd because the exteriors are all the same. We looked at two other units that were almost identical but one had a huge hall closet that the other did not. Thursday afternoon we can sign the lease and Monday our stuff will be delivered.
In the afternoon while waiting for school to let out, I drove around looking at the other neighborhoods. One of our initial neighborhood choices was a newer construction duplex. The neighborhood seemed bland but fine. I noticed somebody moving in and wanted to see the inside. The door was open and I found the owner who had no problem with me taking a quick tour. He told me he had just arrived the previous day. I couldn't believe that he already had a house and his belongings. I met two people who had received housing in no time while we will wait 10 days assuming all goes well. We don't seem to have good luck with military housing. It's our second experience with military housing and our previous experience was about the same. Now we are getting a better idea of how the system works. We haven't complained enough in the past.
We spent the weekend in downtown Kansas City. Friday night we had barbecue. Saturday we went to the science museum which the kids really enjoyed. There were a lot of interesting things we hadn't seen at a science museum before. The mystery hotel section dealing with optical illusions was especially fun. The museum is large and we didn't come close to covering everything. Bohdin was upset we had to leave but Cora was getting tired.
Sunday we went to the art museum. Buddy and I split up so I had Bohdin and he had the girls. The kids just aren't art lovers yet. Bohdin wanted to tell me about the Mars Rover Curiosity instead of finding an interesting piece of art. When we were in the car neither child could tell me about any art at all.
Sunday night we had to head back up north so we would be closer to school. Nyla was really excited to go back to school and Bohdin was neutral. Bohdin missed one of the three recesses on Monday because he was too slow in his work. He had to type something on the Ipad but it took him a long time to decide what to type. I can imagine him missing lots of recess for that reason. He struggles with indecisiveness. He hasn't been tested yet for academic level so he is doing easy math and easy reading. That's bothering me more than I thought it would. I want him to be challenged academically.
When Nyla talks about her day it is usually what the people around her did. We hear about the boys who were acting up or the girl she played with. Last night she told us she overheard the servants talking at school. I told her there were no servants. She said they worked in the cafeteria and were servers but she liked to call them servants.
Before we took the kids to school Monday morning, Buddy recieced a phone call that two new houses were available. He said we would be there after dropping the kids off and stopping in at his work to report. We were in the office a bit over an hour after they called. The first set of keys were for the unit we had seen the week prior and the second set of keys were given to somebody else. We waited over an hour for the other.couple to bring the keys back but it was too late. They had chosen the unit we were supposed to look at. Buddy and I were mad. We were number one on the list. This couple had only arrived in town the previous day. In addition they hadn't even been assigned that neighborhood. When we expressed our displeasure they decided to let us look at the units that would come available at the end of the week and it would be ours. A nice lady took took us to see the six units. We saw a unit very similar to what the other couple had taken and didn't love it. We were able to choose the best floorplan of what was available. Besides needing to wait until Thursday everything worked out. We were able to get the larger interior unit that we wanted and will even have a pantry which seems to be extremely rare. Of the eight units we saw only two had a pantry and those two unitss were next to each other and almost identical. It also had a lot of closet space. The units are very different from each other which I find odd because the exteriors are all the same. We looked at two other units that were almost identical but one had a huge hall closet that the other did not. Thursday afternoon we can sign the lease and Monday our stuff will be delivered.
In the afternoon while waiting for school to let out, I drove around looking at the other neighborhoods. One of our initial neighborhood choices was a newer construction duplex. The neighborhood seemed bland but fine. I noticed somebody moving in and wanted to see the inside. The door was open and I found the owner who had no problem with me taking a quick tour. He told me he had just arrived the previous day. I couldn't believe that he already had a house and his belongings. I met two people who had received housing in no time while we will wait 10 days assuming all goes well. We don't seem to have good luck with military housing. It's our second experience with military housing and our previous experience was about the same. Now we are getting a better idea of how the system works. We haven't complained enough in the past.
First Day of School
From January 12th
Friday was the first day of school for the kids. I chose Friday because it would give them a taste before getting into a long week. It was also an early release day as most Fridays will be.
I wasn't concerned about Nyla at all. I dropped her off first and said very little to her teacher. Nyla is highly adaptable and as long as she stays in a good mood everything will be fine.
A few weeks ago we realized the kids didn't know the Pledge of Allegiance. We started with Bohdin and told him that he would need to stand up and place his hands over his heart. We went over the words and he felt frustrated that he didn't memorize it immediately. We called Nyla over and went over the same thing with her. As we started reciting the pledge Nyla echoed us a half second off with most of it mumbled except for the last few words which were clear. We laughed and said she would do fine. Nyla does not have the perfection tendencies like Bohdin so just appearing to know it was good enough. She did awesome faking it.
I talked to Bohdin's teacber for several minutes because he is poorly suited for public school. I explained his perfectionism and how it would impact his time in the classroom. He buckles under time pressure. He has a tough time with handwriting. He does poorly with open ended questions. He deals with concrete. He doesn't like getting things wrong. That will come into play during writing assignments because he spells like a second grader but expresses himself at a higher level. It was really hard to leave and I cried once I left. The teacher found me at the end of the day and said he was just as I described. He cried a bit and balked at taking a practice spelling test. He struggled with the writing because he ran out of room and decided the best thing was to erase the entire thing and start over. He didn't like how poorly he did at kickball during recess. I know it will take him time to adjust. I just hope that they don't make school a negative experience. I have a lot of faith in this school and if they can't do it then nobody could at this point in his life. Buddy hopes he learns something but that might be asking for too much.
Friday was the first day of school for the kids. I chose Friday because it would give them a taste before getting into a long week. It was also an early release day as most Fridays will be.
I wasn't concerned about Nyla at all. I dropped her off first and said very little to her teacher. Nyla is highly adaptable and as long as she stays in a good mood everything will be fine.
A few weeks ago we realized the kids didn't know the Pledge of Allegiance. We started with Bohdin and told him that he would need to stand up and place his hands over his heart. We went over the words and he felt frustrated that he didn't memorize it immediately. We called Nyla over and went over the same thing with her. As we started reciting the pledge Nyla echoed us a half second off with most of it mumbled except for the last few words which were clear. We laughed and said she would do fine. Nyla does not have the perfection tendencies like Bohdin so just appearing to know it was good enough. She did awesome faking it.
I talked to Bohdin's teacber for several minutes because he is poorly suited for public school. I explained his perfectionism and how it would impact his time in the classroom. He buckles under time pressure. He has a tough time with handwriting. He does poorly with open ended questions. He deals with concrete. He doesn't like getting things wrong. That will come into play during writing assignments because he spells like a second grader but expresses himself at a higher level. It was really hard to leave and I cried once I left. The teacher found me at the end of the day and said he was just as I described. He cried a bit and balked at taking a practice spelling test. He struggled with the writing because he ran out of room and decided the best thing was to erase the entire thing and start over. He didn't like how poorly he did at kickball during recess. I know it will take him time to adjust. I just hope that they don't make school a negative experience. I have a lot of faith in this school and if they can't do it then nobody could at this point in his life. Buddy hopes he learns something but that might be asking for too much.
Moving
We are finally settled into our new house. I was unable to do blog posts from my phone or the kindle so I just emailed them to myself until the day came that I could use a computer again. Today is that day. I haven't found the camera cord yet but since the battery died long ago it doesn't really matter.
This is from January 7th.
In mid December we naively thought getting the house ready would take hardly any time. As time went on we were proved wrong. Toward the end we scrambled desperately with 13 hour work days. It wasn't quite enough. We kept pushing back the date of departure until we finally said Monday would absolutely be it. I left about noon with the kids while Buddy finished up. Once again we underestimated what was left and Buddy didn't start driving to St. Louis until 10pm. It was the hardest move we've had. That house is so big and it's impossible to get it completely clean and finished. By the time we left almost every room in the house had been painted, almost all of the doors and trim had been painted, and almost all of the electrical switches and outlets were replaced. The dark cave of a basement room finally had a light fixture and new carpet which turned it into a completely different room. Buddy killing the mold that had been under the carpet and sealing the concrete helped as well. We concealed the sump pump in the sump room which made it much nicer. The sump pump looked a little creepy because it was a barely covered hole in the ground with a pipe coming up almost to the ceiling. When we moved in there was a large exposed sump pump in the corner, a bare bulb in the ceiling, and an exposed waste pipe running across the ceiling. Now it would make a nice small guest room or office.
The list of things we accomplished in that last week is really long. The house is much nicer than it was one month ago. We are both so burned out on renovating and look forward to maintenance free living. Unfortunately the camera battery died after Buddy took three pictures. All we have are a couple of pictures from his phone.
We arrived in Kansas before noon on Tuesday to pick up the car which had been shipped. Our next stop was the housing office. Once again I naively thought housing would be ready. Naivety has been a trend recently. There was one unit available but somebody was ahead of us on the list. They gave us a key to look at it anyway. The key didn't work. The neighbors offered to give us a tour of.their place which was very nice and extremely helpful. She told me a bit about the different layouts. When we finally were able to see the empty unit we knew we could do better by waiting. It was very fortunate that we were able to see the neighbor's much bigger place. The first couple on the list ended up taking the empty one. They are going to have a fabulous porch but pay for it with extremely small bedrooms and a weird layout. More units will be available next week. There will be one on Monday and six on Thursday. I'm hoping the Monday unit is a good one. We are number one on the list so we have first dibs.
While we wait for housing we are at a hotel. We spent the first two nights at the Great Wolf Lodge but have now moved into something closer to post since the kids will start school tomorrow. The kids really enjoyed The Great Wolf Lodge. Nyla liked story time and the clock show. Bohdin liked Magiquest. After the first story time Nyla.went to the craft room and decorated a picture frame for the stuffed character that appears at story time. While Nyla created her present, Cora colored. She enjoys coloring and I had plenty of problems with her coloring in Kentucky. The night before we left I discovered her art on the upstairs hallway wall. I had to repaint three areas because of her. The lady in the craft room said Cora was very good at coloring for her age. I have to agree. She is certainly the best at coloring of my three kids by a long shot.
Cora finally hugged her first character. At the story time I attended Nyla coaxed Cora up then shoved her toward the bear or whatever she was. Cora gingerly hugged it much to Nyla's delight. When Nyla gave the present to the character that audience "ahhed". The next day a girl was in the craft room making a present for the character just like Nyla did. Nyla started a new thing.
The waterpark was fine. The best part was the extremely low crowds. I think there were six other families in the entire resort. There were times when we would be the only ones in the waterpark. We never had to wait for anything. There were three.tube slides and two body slides. Buddy and I took turns going with Bohdin. Nyla tried two of the tube slides but was traumatized when she went down the dark slide. I had mixed up the two and sent her and Buddy on the wrong one. I knew she wouldn't like the dark one and I meant to have her avoid it. Bohdin kept trying to convince her to do a body slide with him but she was firm in her refusal. I tried to explain to Bohdin that he would have been too scared to do those slides as a six year old and she just needed more time. Bohdin wasn't scared of any of it. He even did the dark one repeatedly.
This is from January 7th.
In mid December we naively thought getting the house ready would take hardly any time. As time went on we were proved wrong. Toward the end we scrambled desperately with 13 hour work days. It wasn't quite enough. We kept pushing back the date of departure until we finally said Monday would absolutely be it. I left about noon with the kids while Buddy finished up. Once again we underestimated what was left and Buddy didn't start driving to St. Louis until 10pm. It was the hardest move we've had. That house is so big and it's impossible to get it completely clean and finished. By the time we left almost every room in the house had been painted, almost all of the doors and trim had been painted, and almost all of the electrical switches and outlets were replaced. The dark cave of a basement room finally had a light fixture and new carpet which turned it into a completely different room. Buddy killing the mold that had been under the carpet and sealing the concrete helped as well. We concealed the sump pump in the sump room which made it much nicer. The sump pump looked a little creepy because it was a barely covered hole in the ground with a pipe coming up almost to the ceiling. When we moved in there was a large exposed sump pump in the corner, a bare bulb in the ceiling, and an exposed waste pipe running across the ceiling. Now it would make a nice small guest room or office.
The list of things we accomplished in that last week is really long. The house is much nicer than it was one month ago. We are both so burned out on renovating and look forward to maintenance free living. Unfortunately the camera battery died after Buddy took three pictures. All we have are a couple of pictures from his phone.
We arrived in Kansas before noon on Tuesday to pick up the car which had been shipped. Our next stop was the housing office. Once again I naively thought housing would be ready. Naivety has been a trend recently. There was one unit available but somebody was ahead of us on the list. They gave us a key to look at it anyway. The key didn't work. The neighbors offered to give us a tour of.their place which was very nice and extremely helpful. She told me a bit about the different layouts. When we finally were able to see the empty unit we knew we could do better by waiting. It was very fortunate that we were able to see the neighbor's much bigger place. The first couple on the list ended up taking the empty one. They are going to have a fabulous porch but pay for it with extremely small bedrooms and a weird layout. More units will be available next week. There will be one on Monday and six on Thursday. I'm hoping the Monday unit is a good one. We are number one on the list so we have first dibs.
While we wait for housing we are at a hotel. We spent the first two nights at the Great Wolf Lodge but have now moved into something closer to post since the kids will start school tomorrow. The kids really enjoyed The Great Wolf Lodge. Nyla liked story time and the clock show. Bohdin liked Magiquest. After the first story time Nyla.went to the craft room and decorated a picture frame for the stuffed character that appears at story time. While Nyla created her present, Cora colored. She enjoys coloring and I had plenty of problems with her coloring in Kentucky. The night before we left I discovered her art on the upstairs hallway wall. I had to repaint three areas because of her. The lady in the craft room said Cora was very good at coloring for her age. I have to agree. She is certainly the best at coloring of my three kids by a long shot.
Cora finally hugged her first character. At the story time I attended Nyla coaxed Cora up then shoved her toward the bear or whatever she was. Cora gingerly hugged it much to Nyla's delight. When Nyla gave the present to the character that audience "ahhed". The next day a girl was in the craft room making a present for the character just like Nyla did. Nyla started a new thing.
The waterpark was fine. The best part was the extremely low crowds. I think there were six other families in the entire resort. There were times when we would be the only ones in the waterpark. We never had to wait for anything. There were three.tube slides and two body slides. Buddy and I took turns going with Bohdin. Nyla tried two of the tube slides but was traumatized when she went down the dark slide. I had mixed up the two and sent her and Buddy on the wrong one. I knew she wouldn't like the dark one and I meant to have her avoid it. Bohdin kept trying to convince her to do a body slide with him but she was firm in her refusal. I tried to explain to Bohdin that he would have been too scared to do those slides as a six year old and she just needed more time. Bohdin wasn't scared of any of it. He even did the dark one repeatedly.