Homeward Bound, Almost

Well, I've been pretty quiet on here since my last post.  Not a lot of exciting stuff has been happening.  I am now, finally and officially, in the 2nd trimester.  And, praise God, it's being kind to me!  I have a little more energy and am less sick.  My doctor is weaning me off of my nausea medication, so let's hope this continues to go well.  I'm down to one pill every 2 days.  So far, so good.  In the first 14 weeks of pregnancy I lost 18 pounds (which dramatically slowed down with medication!).

We leave Singapore in 3 weeks and 3 days.  Here is our schedule from now until then:

Friday: fly to Sydney, Australia
Saturday: Sydney
Sunday: drive to the Blue Mountains
Tuesday: drive back to Sydney, fly to Melbourne
Wednesday: drive the Great Ocean Road to Warnambuhl
Thursday: drive back to Melbourne
Friday: fly to Christchurch, New Zealand
Saturday-Wednesday: drive around the south island of New Zealand
Thursday: fly from Christchurch to Sydney
Friday: fly back to Singapore
Saturday-Sunday: finish sorting/purging our belongings
Monday-Tuesday: movers pack us up
Wednesday: follow-up day for movers, if needed; run around town disconnecting services
Thursday: clean apartment
Friday: hand over apartment to management company
Saturday: 7am, fly to Houston

We're going to be a little busy in the next 3 weeks, but it will be a great family time we will always remember.  It'll be good to be busy because all this leaving business is starting to get real for me and I'm starting to get emotional about it.  I'd like to put that off as long as possible.  :-)

I borrowed a book from my friend, Andrea, called Homeward Bound: A Spouse's Guide to Repatriation.  (You might assume that because we are moving "home," that there wouldn't be any culture shock or issues to deal with.  In that case, you'd be wrong.  We've lived almost 3 years of our lives in another country, and we are not the same people who left Texas in 2009.  Our kids don't remember living in Texas.  We definitely will have some stuff to deal with. *smile*)  One of the things it suggested is that we drive around town and let the kids say goodbye to all our favorite places, to give them closure on this part of our lives.  So, we'll be doing that our last couple of days here.

Today is my "see ya later" party (since the next 3 weeks will be pretty hectic!), and while I'm looking forward to spending time with my friends, I don't like saying goodbye.  Does anyone?

Another chapter is closing for us, and I wonder what our next chapter will look like...