We Found A Preschool

We looked at two preschools today for the boys. One was a local preschool, which was nice and very structured. It was a 5 days a week program. I just couldn't put Caleb (let alone Levi) in school 5 days a week from 9am-3pm. That's like real school! I'm not ready for that and neither is he.

So, we checked out one of the more affordable international preschools and really liked it. We got a very quick tour and some information to take home, which I was thankful for because I wasn't feeling well (more on that later). Caleb and Levi will be able to attend the same school, so I'm very thankful for that! I wasn't sure how I was going to manage getting them to different schools without a car. I'd lose my mind for sure!

Caleb's tuition is included as part of our "expat package" because he's school age here. For Levi to go we'll be paying about 4 times what we paid in the States for Caleb to go last year and that's still very reasonable by Singapore's international preschool standards!

So, I've had a stomach virus this week. It's been awful. For three days I only managed to choke down 6 saltine crackers, 1/4 piece of toast, 4 bites of Rice Krispies cereal, and 5 grapes. I drank enough 100 Plus (the closest thing to Gatorade here) to keep me just barely hydrated. I was finally feeling hungry this evening and knew my weak stomach could not stand the smell of local food, so we headed to Chili's. We had the skillet queso and it was awesome! I needed a little taste of home for my sick tummy. My stomach shrank quite a bit this week, so I only could eat about 1/4 of the chicken breast I ordered, but now we have leftovers. I lost 6 pounds in 2 days, so that makes my total since we've arrived here at 16 pounds lost. Not the best way to lose weight, but I'll take what I can get!

We drove to Chili's tonight! I cannot tell you the pleasure I had at taking the elevator down to the carpark in the basement of our building, driving to Chili's in the mall (of course it's in a mall!), parking in the basement, and riding the escalator up. Very little walking. No waiting. And NO sweating! It was glorious!! We definitely took our cars for granted in Texas.

My mom sent me a package that arrived today. It included Bounce dryer sheets, decaf family size tea bags, a Bible study workbook I wanted, some CDs for the kids, and a few other things. Everything smells like Bounce! Our whole apartment smells dryer sheet fresh. I'm hoping it didn't soak into the tea bags too much. One thing I don't want is April Fresh tea. :-)


Our first family outing in the car...

Chili's! Yummy!!
Check out these steak prices! They fly everything in from the US...

We get the keys to our place on Saturday and our stuff arrives on Monday, so we're really close to not living out of suitcases!!

Prices in Singapore

I took this picture tonight at Cold Storage because I still can't believe Haagen-Dazs costs this much! S$15.65 for a PINT (US $11.18)! I refuse to pay those prices (until I'm really desperate), so we buy the local store brand for about S$5 for 1.5 Liters. A much better deal. :-)

4th of July Weekend and Things On our To Do List

I'll start with the pictures. These first few are of our new place. It was previously the show flat, so this is not our furniture...

Looking from the dining room into the living room...at the far end are the bedrooms.
Entry "hallway" and bedroom doors...(the lady in the pink skirt is our realtor, Ann)

Jack and Jill bath between the boys rooms...there's a shower behind the doors

Master bedroom (you should see the built-in closets...quite big for here in Singapore! Not walk-in or anything, but a whole wall of closet space w/ a built-in light.)

The pool (office/gym/lounge area is in the two-story building).

Our unit is on the 4th floor and we asked them to install plexiglass on the iron railing on the balcony so our children cannot climb up on it! There are locks to the balcony with keys, so the keys will be hidden from the kids for sure! My mom was so concerned about us living in a high-rise building w/ our boys who like to climb! (So was I!)

I'll post new pictures once our stuff arrives and we're unpacked.

Here's Caleb upset because there were too many kids playing on the bouncy house at the 4th of July celebration.

There were people everywhere at the American Association's 4th Celebration...can you spot Justin in the background? This picture doesn't do justice to the thousands of people at this place!

This is as far as Caleb would get in to the bouncy castle. The other kids were running into him and knocking him down, and he kept getting upset. Plus it was really hot and humid!

We've had a great holiday weekend...although the 4th of July is obviously not a holiday here in Singapore!

I started the weekend by getting a pedicure with my friend, Andrea. It was much-needed (the pedicure and the girl time!). It was a tiny place with only two chairs, so it was just the two of us. I mostly understood what the girl was saying to me, and definitely understood when she asked if I wanted to add the scrub as part of my pedicure and that it would be an extra $20. Ummm...no thanks!

We had a BBQ Saturday at lunch with the other expats from Justin's company here at our temporary housing (where almost everyone is still living). We ordered meat from a butcher that Andrea had heard of, and it was SO yummy! Even with very few seasonings on hand (salt and pepper), the steaks/hamburgers/kebas was really good. We'll definitely be ordering from that butcher again, and they deliver, which is ALWAYS a plus! Andrea also got the number for the "Chicken Man," who delivers chicken breasts to your house at a really great price. Once he's delivered to you, you can just text him your future orders (or SMS him as it's called here). Cool, huh? I'm definitely finding all the places who will deliver instead of dragging the kids everywhere.

Saturday night we headed to the Terror Club (named after a British ship, the HMS Terror) for the American Association's 4th of July celebration. They had bouncy houses/castles/slides, face painting, hot dogs, balloon animals, etc. It was SO hot and there were SO many people that we didn't enjoy ourselves very much. Caleb wouldn't even lay on the bouncy things because there were tons of kids on each one...they were regulating how many kids were on there. We also waited in line for an hour and 15 minutes for a nasty hot dog. Then a balloon popped and Caleb thought it was fireworks and he started freaking out! We hadn't told him there would be fireworks because we were trying to test the waters and see if his fear of fireworks was still there. Apparently, it is. So, we promptly left before the fireworks began.

This morning we tried church #4. :-) It was great! The pastor and his wife are from South Africa, so we loved listening to their accent. It was a wonderful church with very authentic worship and great Bible teaching. We haven't made a decision yet on which church we'll attend on a regular basis, but this one seems to be a great fit for our whole family.

The next thing on our list is preschools for Caleb. It's quite an undertaking to find a preschool that is close to where we'll be living, or at least close to a bus stop w/ a short walk after the bus. Sometime this next week Justin and I will be visiting preschools to find the best fit for Caleb. There is a Christian preschool close to where we'll be living, so I hope that one will work (I'm afraid they have a long waiting list, though). Levi is too young to attend there, but I hope to find a good place for him to attend a couple of days a week as well. I love that they will be going to school with children from other countries!

We now have a car, so I'm hoping that will help in getting to some places and with trips to the grocery store! Justin will have it at work most of the time, but if I need it he can ride with someone else.

And next week we move to our permanent place! We'll get the keys on Saturday and then the movers will bring our sea shipment and unload it on Monday. We are SO excited to not live out of suitcases anymore! And we're excited to sleep in our OWN beds!!! Asian beds are really hard.

That's it for now!

Were You Wondering, Too?

A friend emailed me recently and said something to the effect of, "Your blog sounds like you're doing great, but how are you really doing?" (Thanks, Lisa!) I emailed back and told her that was definitely an email from someone who's lived on the other side of the world before, and someone who also currently lives away from her family. :-)

So, in case you were wondering how I'm really doing, too, here it is.

I'm actually doing well. :-) I do have a tendency to protect my family from any sadness and hard times I might feel by not going into tremendous detail, especially when they are so far away and can't do a thing about it!

I do have moments/sections of days that are really sad. I miss my family so much. I miss my friends so much. I miss loading my kids in the car, driving to Target, strapping them both in a basket, and walking around getting the things I need. And knowing where those things are in the store.

I'm tired of carrying Levi on my back everywhere we go (unless Justin's with us, then he does it). I'm tired of going to the grocery store and only being able to get as much as I can carry with a child on my back and chasing after a straying 3-year-old.

We're finally moving out of that stage where it feels like a vacation. We've been here for 3 1/2 weeks now, so the reality of it all is starting to sink in.

But, overall, I'm really glad to be here. Honestly. I'm in a very healthy place emotionally and mentally, which is what I prayed for so often last Spring when I wasn't. And what so many people have been praying for me!

Do I wish I could call my mom 4 times a day and ask her any number of questions and tell her random things the boys are doing? Yes! Do I wish I was going to be there when my sister goes into labor sometime in the next few weeks? Of course! Do I wish I could go get Sonic Jr. Candy Sundaes and go hang out with my friend, Kim, and her sweet kids? You betcha!

But that's where we're at right now, and I'm okay with that. God has really blessed us and given us friends here already that care about us and are going through this experience at the same time. We definitely feel protected and loved. And we are!

So, thanks for all your concern, spoken or not. I'm sure things will get harder in some ways and easier in others. There will still be sad times about things I'm missing back home, and there will be special things we'll experience here that never would have been possible there.

And did you know that you can fly from Houston to Singapore for under $700. It's true. :-)

Come see us! We have a guest room that we'd love to fill anytime!

Outings and Our Crazy Kids!

Blogger is putting the pictures in backwards order, so these are all messed up as to when we did stuff. But, here's what we've been doing lately.

Levi playing in the fountain at Clark Quay. We ate at "The Tent" Mongolian restaurant with our friends, The Stunz's. It was so yummy! Our kids adore their kids who are 18, 16, and 10. And they've been babysitting for us, which we so appreciate. There are so many things here that it's just easier if the kids are not with us, like shopping for tvs!
Caleb picked out his own outfit...could you tell? He wears his Batman cape that Mimi made for him ALL.THE.TIME. He got A LOT of attention with this get-up, so he eventually ditched the hat. The cape stayed on, though!

Sign in the MRT station. Don't jump on the tracks, people!

After church this morning, we headed to Holland Village for lunch. There was a group of kids there and one girl stopped and told us they were playing a game and asked if they could take a picture with our cute kids. She called them cute, so we couldn't refuse. I wouldn't let them leave until I had a picture, too. The kids didn't know what to think!

There's a koi pond here where we're staying, and one of the guys let the boys feed the fish the other day. The fed the fish and then threw big rocks at them. No matter how many times they get in trouble for that, they keep doing it.

Our family on top of Vivo, Singapore's largest mall. Not a great picture, but the only one we have of all of us so far. Caleb wouldn't stop moving, so he's blurry. Notice the cape. Again.

Singapore is having its River Festival right now. Justin and I had a date the other night (YAY for date nights!), and we walked down by the river. They had a strange float parade going on that we didn't exactly understand. All the lights were pretty, though. And there was a cool breeze, too, so that was nice and unexpected here.

So, that's what we've been up to. We're so ready to move to our permanent place and have our own furniture and belongings. Today I was scrubbing crayon off the wall here with laundry stain remover. It worked really well, but we need to get out of this place before the boys destroy everything!

And, lastly, here's how a conversation with Levi goes lately. He's really picking up sentences...using two and three words together. But he's also asking lots of questions.

Me: Levi (calling to him)

Levi: Wha? (what?)

Me: Come here

Levi: Why?

:-)

Random, Unconnected Thoughts

Sunday we ventured out to church again. It was about a 15-minute taxi ride, which was MUCH better than the sweaty, long walk we had to church the last time! This one started at 9am, then at 10:30 had a fellowship break (snacks, drinks), and resumed for the Lord's Supper at 11:00. The break was too much for the kids...they thought it was over and they became very hyper. They had been good until that point.

When we went back into the service for the Lord's Supper, someone was up front reading a Scripture passage and Caleb took off from our seats at the back of the auditorium, ran up the side aisle, up onto the stage, jumped off, continued running across the front, then ran down another aisle. All this time Justin is chasing him to no avail. Caleb finally came back where we were sitting and was headed up for another round when I was able to reach out and grab his shirt to stop him. Justin and I were mortified!



We went to a waterpark recently called Wild Wild Wet, and it was "Transformer Day," apparently, because this guy was walking around. Caleb saw him and ran around the corner. But this was as close as he'd get.

Levi's learning to ask questions. His favorites, which he repeats all.day.long are:

What?

Where'd it go?

Why?

Really. Another why child. Caleb asks enough questions for 5 kids, and now Levi's asking questions, too. Pretty much all day long I answer the same questions over and over and over.

We got to see my friend, Bui, at church on Sunday. She and her family were on vacation in Singapore (from Thailand). I hadn't seen her in almost 8 years, so a lot had changed in my life since then! We're hoping to make it to Thailand in October, so we'll get to see her again!

Blogger isn't letting me upload any more pictures right now (and for the past 2 days), so this will have to do.

Oh, I wish you could have seen me

I got my workout in for the day. Just a little while ago the boys and I returned from lunch and the grocery store. I had Levi strapped to the front of me in the carrier, two grocery bags in one hand, and holding Caleb's hand with the other. And then it started raining.

It was a LONG walk from the grocery store to the MRT, then from the MRT to our apartment. Needless to say I was soaked with sweat (and a little rain, too), and my arms are still shaking from carrying almost 30 pounds of Levi and two heavy grocery bags. Probably should have taken a taxi home! (My husband would be proud of me for trying to be thrifty.) :-) I've already lost 8 pounds since we got here from all the walking and sweating, so maybe today will help a little more!

We're going to a Mongolian BBQ place for dinner (SO yummy...surprise, Justin!), and Caleb has been asking for a week to go to the restaurant with the fountain you can play in. Better remember to bring a change of clothes for them!

I'm wondering if my friend, Andrea, who just arrived in Singapore this morning has realized why I only wear mascara and lip gloss now. The rest just sweats right off my face. Plus, the heat and sweating gives you a nice "glow" and "rosy" cheeks naturally. At least that's what I tell myself.

Bad News & Good News

The bad news is that I dropped my camera tonight and it's not working. I'm hoping it's able to be fixed. *fingers crossed*

The good news is that when I signed up for cell service here in Singapore I got a really expensive phone for a not-so-expensive price (about 1/4 of the original price). That phone has a great camera and I'm able to upload from my phone to the computer. Ah, technology is great.

Here we are walking to dinner, and Caleb is giving his "face." It's pretty common these days. I love age 3.

"Singapore Litter Free" :-) It IS clean!

Here's where we're headed for dinner...The Newton Food Centre, aka "The Newton Hawker"

Here we are. This is one of the nicer food centers, and, therefore, more expensive. Our dinner was S$29 for three plates of food and 4 bottles of water. Not too bad, but expensive for local food.

Our yummy food..chicken fried rice, sweet & sour chicken, and fried buns (not pictured). Levi LOVES rice. Caleb is our picky eater and won't try anything that looks "suspicious." Once he takes a bite, he almost always likes it. Getting him to take a bite is hard work.
This is the stall where our food came from. What you can't see inside that little cage are live crabs. Fresh seafood, indeed!

And just for fun...Caleb asleep with his sock monkey. I was testing out the flash on my camera. :-)

Levi in the Baby Hawk baby carrier at the train station. I really need to get a Beco or Ergo Baby Carrier because this one ties on instead of snaps on and it's hard to get it right.