Silence

Feb 262010
 

It’s hard to start something up again after such a long break. I have nine months of family pictures that need to be stored in this online journal. They are just sitting there on my hard drive, waiting to be put in chronological order. Plus, things have been happening! My baby is almost two and a half. He’s talking in complete sentences, most of the time. He says the most adorable things. He looks adorable, and he’s in this perfect in-between stage that makes staying home with him a delight.

True, Paul is a joy. The majority of the time, he is pleasant and laughing. Sometimes, he screams and throws a tantrum (especially on the increasingly frequent no nap days). It doesn’t bother me now, at this stage. I can understand what he says, and I know what he wants: I just can’t always give him what he wants.  This is so much better than the 18-month-old stage, when he screamed and I had no idea why.

So, why am I visiting this neglected blog once again tonight? Well, Ryan is stuck in Manhattan for the second unplanned night, thanks to NYC’s huge snow storm (20.9 inches in Central Park in the last two days). Yesterday, his afternoon flight was canceled. He changed his flight to this afternoon. This morning, that was canceled. He changed his flight to tomorrow morning. Do you see a pattern here?

(To keep things in perspective, this is only the second time in his nine and a half years of 85% traveling that he has been literally unable to get a flight home from where he is. The other time was 9/11. He was in the air and the plane was landed in Ohio. He rented a car and drove back to Chicago.)

But this weekend’s snowstorm is only the icing on the “we’re sick of this” cake. Ryan had told his boss earlier in the week that he is actively looking for a job. No, he didn’t quit, but he was explaining that there was a reason he did not want to stay in NYC on Friday, as they wanted him to. At any rate, the fact that he’s stuck there, and has to return again on Monday, really and truly sucks. Sorry for the strong language. It does.

We’ve been pondering and searching for another job since we returned to the USA in August 2008. Ryan had some promising interviews that fall, but nothing panned out. (Maybe you recall, but that was the fall that the economy suddenly tanked.) In 2009, Ryan kept looking. Then, this month and last, he’s been working on it in all his free time. It definitely time. For example, Saturday, he was up before dawn, searching and applying for jobs until after 8 p.m. I only wish there was something I could do to help. There have been some leads, so we’re hopeful something will pan out soon. But we’d appreciate any extra prayers that you can send our way.

I have cleaned the bathrooms. I’ve vacuumed and swept the floors. Maybe getting the house ready will speed my husband home!

I called this post “silence” because that is how I feel about my daily life sometimes, and that is why this blog has been silent for so many months. Most days, I go see my friends or they come here for play dates. And this morning my friend was kind enough to step up as a last minute babysitter so I could still go spend my two hours volunteering at the library. How I love that time of talking to adults! Every morning and every evening, I also talk to Ryan. I do get much-needed socialization in person. In fact, it’s just the right amount of out of the house time: I’m naturally an introvert so it becomes exhausting to me. I think two book clubs and a few plays dates a week is enough for me.

But I also spend some time most days responding and discussing books with other readers online via my book blog. That life is a complete non-baby life, and it really helps save my sanity: I know I can finish the day with some thought that doesn’t revolve around best potty training methods. (I guess that’s why I haven’t been blogging on this site: blogging four or five times a week at my books site is time-consuming enough, and this site would only be about more potty training pleas for help).

But the bottom line is, at the end of the day, our home is silent. The floorboards creak, the furnace turns on, my son mumbles in his sleep. But the main sound is silence.

This is why I’m praying that my husband can come home, and stay home. I long for his snores once the silence of night sets in. The silence is getting a bit loud.

Last Weekend

Jun 202009
 

I meant to write this over the last week but I never did!

We had another great weekend last week. Friday we went down to Naperville and visited with Mom and Dad, who’d recently returned from the zoo! Then we got Paul asleep and drove to Chicago. We got up at dawn to eat breakfast and get to Grant Park, where we joined a crowd for Chicago Cares.

Our Chicago Cares group was assigned to a school, where Ryan and I painted lockers for a few hours. I have to say, ours looked pretty good; the college-aged interns on our team were a bit sloppier. All the same, I’m sure that South Side school will be happy to have a bright school next year.

It was over by 3:30 and we drove back to Naperville. Paul and I took a quick swim in the pool and played with cousins Daniel and Jessica before we all headed home. On the way, we stopped at a Mexican restaurant. They had a live guitar duo which went around to all the tables, serenading (for a tip). When they came to our table, we said they should play something fast. Paul started dancing in the high chair and pretty soon that whole side of the restaurant was laughing and cheering for him. We took him out of the high chair and wow, does that kid like to dance! He was such a happy little boy to have all that attention.

It was a great 24-hours overall. And then even Sunday was good: my primary learned the Father’s Day song very well. I’m hoping they still remember it tomorrow…

Update

Apr 272009
 

I haven’t updated this for another two weeks. My, time goes fast!

Nothing is happening in my life except these things (decide for yourself if they are exciting).

  • Our house is fully furnished and we almost have all the pictures on the walls. We also have just a few shelves to put up, and I want to add family photos in frames to those shelves. My color printer on the fritz, so I guess I should just pay to have them printed.
  • We have spent every Saturday for the past few weekends working in the yard. It looks bad, but it’s getting a little better. The house had been vacant for a long time, and while they must have had a yard service mowing the lawn, the planters were rather neglected. This weekend we got mulch and in the next few weeks, once Chicago stops frosting and I’m sure there won’t any more snow (when might that be?!), I may get some plants in the ground. Maybe then I’ll show pictures. I don’t like yard work at all at this point, and would love to have the money to hire someone else to make it pretty. I’d rather do an inside project in that time, of which I could choose from many.
  • I got my haircut. It looks bad. I didn’t get it straightened (I decided it was too expensive this month), and with all the humidity and rain we get in Chicago this time of year, it’s just horribly frizzy. Sigh. Maybe in two months I’ll get it straightened. I dislike it almost as much as I disliked my hair before I got it cut. (it had been 15 months since my last cut; it was time.)
  • I’ve gotten a cold every two weeks for the past three months, but thankfully, I don’t think it’s the swine flu.
  • Paul is finally starting to talk. It’s delightful to understand him! He’s also becoming a sporadic napper, meaning there are some days when he’s awake 12 hours and I don’t get a break. That’s not so delightful but we’re managing. Lots of visits to the library (where there is a train table).
  • Ryan is still traveling Monday mornings through Thursday nights. I’m so glad he doesn’t have to leave Sunday night! The few interviews he’s had have been of the “we’d-love-to-hire-you-but-can’t” sort, thanks to this crummy economy. We’re looking at options for the future and the long run looks promising, although it means he’ll be traveling for the foreseeable future. At least he has a great job!
  • I am the primary music leader. They have had substitutes for about three months, so they are delighted to have me. I love my calling.

I don’t update very often, and it’s good to look at this and remember that life is good. We’re so grateful for all the wonderful blessings the Lord has given us.

The Little Things

Sep 272008
 

There are so many little things that I’m enjoying about being back in the USA. Living in the USA is so much more comfortable!

  • Turning on red lights
  • Baggers at the grocery store (although I wonder how much we pay for their services in additional grocery store prices)
  • Long conveyer belts at the grocery store (long enough to fit all my groceries so I can completely unload my shopping cart)
  • Empty parking spaces in the parking lots so I don’t have to drive around and around looking for a spot
  • A garbage disposal in the kitchen sink
  • Netflix! How I love this service…
  • A library where I don’t have to pay to put a book on hold and where I can get any book in Chicagoland for free.
  • Grandparents and cousins to call on the phone when my day is their day

There are also little things I actually miss about Australia that I didn’t realize I’d miss:

  • Long-life milk. Why isn’t this an option in the USA? I loved storing a two weeks’ supply of milk in our pantry! Our fridge is so small, there is no space for a week’s supply of milk; I’m going to have to go to the store more than once a week after all…
  • My husband not traveling. He goes to New York City starting next week. Over the past year, I really liked having him home. But he’s had more than a month of vacation, and while the job search is well underway, these things take time, of course. I guess I’d hoped the new job would jump out at him in that one month and I wouldn’t have to watch him get on a plane again….

Oh, wait. That husband thing isn’t a little thing: it’s a big thing.

Random Thoughts

Aug 062008
 

Departure Pending

My husband’s boss has agreed to let him finish the project this month, as well as take two weeks’ vacation. We’re going to New Zealand in two weeks and returning to the USA at the end of the month. Hallelujah! It’s not that we don’t like it here; we’re just ready for the next stage. We’ve kind of been pulled back and forth since May. (I never thought I’d miss all of summer! We’re going from winter back in to autumn.)

Old Stuff

My husband has a shirt with a rip by the wrist. He wears it almost every week. I told him he needs to throw it out. Really, what will people think about me as his wife?! That I can’t keep my husband from being shabby? Then he pointed out that I keep my brown shoes.

My brown shoes were bought before my mission (in 2003). They were very nice for a few years, and I took pains to polish them regularly. However, polishing the shoes no longer does any good, as the leather has worn through. The company no longer makes that style, so I can’t replace them. They are very comfortable, so I still wear them nearly every day. I guess I never wondered what people think. They are just comfortable shoes to me.

Hmmm. Now I have a dilemma: My shoes or no more old shirt?

Medicinal Matters

My husband got ill for the third time in the 13 months we’ve been here. Of course, then both Paul and I got sick as well. My husband rarely gets ill in the USA. Why are there so many bugs here?

I’ve determined why: they don’t have proper medicine easily accessible. If you go to the supermarket, they have three small shelves. One the first row, every bottle says “All Natural Ingredients.” On the second and third rows, there is no such notice on the bottles. No matter, as soon as turn it over to look at the ingredients, you realize all three have Echinacea, Zinc, and Vitamin C. Nice things to take if you’re sick, but hardly a Cold and Flu remedy as the bottle proclaims. You’re still going to be coughing on your co-worker all week.

To get real medicine (the kind that actually suppresses your coughs, stops your nose from running, or makes your coughs productive; the kind with lots of chemicals in it), you have to go to the chemist (pharmacist), which might have them behind a special counter. You have to ask for them. And then it’s a very small bottle. If you want to have more, you must visit the doctor and get a prescription.

As for the doctors, General Practitioners are pretty useless. They should be call LPs, Limited Practitioners. Among other things, I was told I just had muscle cramps and it turned out to be gall stones. Yeah. GPs are worthless. (They are essentially free for Australian citizens under Medicare, so maybe socialized medicine is not such a good thing, huh?)

So why are there so many bugs in Australia, and why do we keep getting sick? When people get sick, they take natural ingredients, which do nothing to stop the sneezing and coughing. Bugs are spread, and more people get sick. That’s my philosophy.

If you like the natural route for medicine, you’d love Australia! That’s what it is. Personally, I like medicines that work when I’m ill.

Sniff.

Why I’m Still Here

Jun 272008
 

I’m still in Australia.

Why, you may ask? Good question. Here’s a rambling answer:

USA Client wanted Husband to do Said Project. Australia Client said if USA Client asked politely for Roll-Off (i.e., finding another person to do Husband’s job and sending Husband and family home), then Roll-Off would be in three weeks. Husband agreed to perform Long-Distance Telephone Consulting for Said Project during Roll-Off period. USA Client promptly neglected to ask Australia Client for Roll-Off. After one month of Husband performing Long-Distance Telephone Consulting for Said Project in early Australian hours of morning, Australia Client said to Husband, “No Roll-Off until USA Client asks for you,” and USA Client still didn’t ask Australia Client for stated Roll-Off. Why? Because Long-Distance Telephone Consulting is cheaper than Flying Husband to Virginia each week. So, Husband stopped awaking for 4 a.m. Long-Distance Telephone Consulting for Said Project. Now USA Client for Said Project says “Help, or we’ll find someone else,” Husband says, “Arrange Roll-Off from Australia Client or find someone else,” and Australia Client says “I won’t allow Roll-Off if USA Client doesn’t need you.” So Husband and family are waiting for someone’s mind to be made up. As soon as Said Mind is made up, Roll-Off will happen in about three weeks. Husband and family will then return to USA.

Clear as mud, huh?

Six Word Memoirs

Jun 062008
 

Can you write your memoir in six words?

Here are my attempts:

Redheaded girl married then birthed redheads.

Learned to read, Reid-ed, still reading.

[or, if you prefer]

Learned to read, Reid-ed, still Reid-ing.

What is yours?

Two Years

May 212008
 

I meant to post this yesterday, but didn’t get the chance. It’s written as if it still were May 20. Since it’s still May 20 in the USA, I guess I can still count it.

Two years ago, my 100-day engagement drew to a close. May 20, 2006 was such a perfect day for me: I had a pleasant breakfast with friends and family, a lovely wedding, and a perfect reception. It was the perfect beginning to our perfect marriage.

Don’t get me wrong: we’re not perfect. And life has its regular ups and downs. But I very happy now, two years later. I am looking forward to the next 48 years! I’ve decided we’re going to live to celebrate 50 years together. My husband tells me that it isn’t very long and I’m going to be very surprised when we actually are celebrating 50 years. We’ll see.

We celebrated by getting our temple recommends renewed. How wonderful that we can be worthy to enter that glorious building!

I am so grateful for my husband, who already believes I’m the woman I some day hope to be.

The Great Big Vegetable Challenge and What’s Your Vegetable?

Mar 262008
 

I have never liked vegetables. I don’t know why. Maybe I relied too much on bagged iceberg lettuce and ranch dressing in my college days and I got tired of it. I like fruit, however, and always enjoy fresh fruit. I have a sweet tooth, and the natural sweetness of fruit is my favorite.

My husband, on the other hand, prefers vegetables. If I set dinner on the table and I have forgotten the vegetable (which happens more often than I should admit), my husband will ask “Where are the vegetables?” and he’ll prepare something.

I could go a long time and not eat green.

But last night, the meal I was making just wouldn’t work. When my husband got home, the kitchen was still dinnerless. (He got home after eight so it’s kind of sad I hadn’t worked something out by then. I was starved.) He said, “Why don’t we just eat these greens?” I had a bag of rocket (known in the USA as arugula) in the fridge. Surprisingly, none of it was wilted (they usually don’t have very good greens here). I consented. But when my husband put the greens on our two plates, there were two huge piles. I tasted some. It wasn’t very good. (And then I had rocket breath — ha ha.)

“I can’t eat that much!” I protested. There’s nothing like a salad for someone who doesn’t like vegetables to begin with.

My husband wasn’t convinced. He pulled things out the fridge for our salads.

“Cut up the leftover steaks,” he began.

I cut up the steak and added it to the salad. Then, at his suggestion, I added olives, sun-dried tomatoes, and shaved Parmesan cheese.

In the meantime, he sliced some red onions, cooked them in balsamic vinegar, and piled them on our salads. He added mustard and olive oil to the remaining balsamic, whisked it into an emulsified sauce, and heated it with some black currant jam. (He’s so good!) He poured that over the salads.

He says that the dressing was too sweet, too much. I don’t know what to say, other than I ate every last piece of green on my plate: it was delicious!

I admit: I left some of the olives. I’ve never like olives. I ate most of them because I’ve been inspired by some food bloggers at The Great Big Vegetable Challenge in London. Here’s their story: Freddie, age seven, did not like vegetables. To cure him of his vegetable-phobia, his family is eating their way through an alphabet of vegetables, getting recipes from around the world and rating each vegetable recipe 1 to 10 (10 is best) on their blog. I think that if Freddie doesn’t like a vegetable in the end, he doesn’t have to eat it, but here’s the catch: he has to try it prepared in at least two different ways. Sometimes it’s the recipe that isn’t good. It seems to me that he’s always rating things from 6 to 10. That’s inspiring.

I can see how different preparations can make a difference: I don’t think I would have liked our rocket salad last night if I’d tried to eat it with Italian dressing and tomatoes, which is what I would have done. I would have eaten a few forkfuls before being disgusted and bored with the greens and going for desert. But the combination of the black currant balsamic dressing, the steak, and the other “goodies” made it very tasty. I was too full to eat ice cream.

I’m going to take the Great Big Vegetable Challenge in my approach to food: if I don’t like a food, that’s OK, but I have to try it a few different ways before I claim I don’t like it.

I’ve eaten mushrooms a number of ways (both raw and cooked), and I still don’t like them. Find me a “good” mushroom or a good mushroom recipe and I’ll try again.

So far, olives are OK, but not my favorite. My husband says we need to find “good” olives and then maybe I’ll like them more. I love a good olive oil — I’d even eat it by the spoonful — so if I could find an olive that tastes that fruity, maybe I could say I love them too.

On the average night, I simply prepare frozen vegetables for dinner. My default vegetable is broccoli: salt, pepper, butter, broccoli … mmm. My husband will always default to peas: “They are like little explosions of taste in your mouth!”

Note that I don’t consider potatoes a vegetable: I consider them a starch. (We have potatoes in some form every night.)

What’s your favorite vegetable?

Reid Family Picture

Feb 262008
 

At Christmas time, we decided to have a family portrait taken. Our son was just two months old. I found a morning session (10:30, when he’s usually happy!) at a photograph studio at the mall. That morning, I agonized over what to wear and what he should wear. He looked nice and he was happy. Even my husband, who hates having his picture taken, was happy to have his picture taken that day. We left at 9:50 or so. The mall was only about 10 minutes away, so that left plenty of time.

An hour later, we were still circling the parking lot. Every isle in the parking lot at the mall was full of dozens of cars: we were all driving down each isle, looking for an empty spot. I was pulling out my hair. My husband was clenching his teeth. Only Paul was oblivious to the situation: he was asleep.

We went home.

After Christmas, I called the same photography studio and scheduled another session a few weeks away. Paul would be three months old. It would be a nice picture.

It turned out I had surgery the day before. I wasn’t feeling very smiley, so we canceled that session.

Still no family picture.

You could say, “why don’t you set up the tripod and just take it yourself?” We’ve tried that. It takes a minute per shot and you have to take dozens and dozens of shots to get a good one. They just never look right. Besides, the lighting is off in a room; a studio would look better.

We were planning on coming to the States. In my research, I found that it is half as much for a photography session at a similar mall photography studio in the US. I started making calls. But we ended up running errands just about every day in Chicago. We didn’t have time to go to a studio. We went on to Utah: we couldn’t find a recommended studio and again we didn’t have time.

What did we do? We asked my husband’s brother, Alex, to take our family portrait. And they turned out great. Thank you so much!

Without further ado, here’s the final product (with a 4-month-old Paul), courtesy Alex.

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