Finding Help!

I'm at home right now. By myself. No kids.

I took the kids to Target earlier. All 4 of them. That is why they are not here and I am.

No, they are not still at Target, by themselves. They are at my mom's house. Because we went to Target, all 5 of us, and then, they needed to be dropped off at my mom's house. That's right. They *needed* to be dropped off.

What am I going to do in Poland on days like these? Simple. I won't be going to Target, by myself, with all 4 kids, ages 6 and under, because there is no Target in Krakow. Problem solved, yeah?

But there is a castle, a pretty cool one. And there are Aquariums. And there is an amazing zoo in a beautiful part of town and lots of parks and public squares... and I bet there will be days when I take all 4 of them to these places, alone, just as I do now, and when we leave I will feel like I need to drop them off somewhere... or else...

Funny thing. My mom, the woman who I called and asked if I could just swing by and drop off 4 more kids to add to her own 5, totaling 9 children in all that she is now responsible for, all between the ages of 16 months and 14...she, my mom, is the one that keeps asking me if I'm going to have "help" in Poland.

Help?  I don't have "help" now do I? I don't have a nanny or a cook, or a driver or a gardener (a gardener, a man/woman who's sole responsibility is to keep your "grounds" looking lovely...awesome), I don't have a personal assistant or a handy man. I unclog my own sinks and change my own diapers (well, not *my* diapers, you know, the kids diapers, heads out of the gutter people). I learn the fancy Polish recipes and slop that stuff into our family bowls every night, all on my own. I don't need no stinkin' help!

Oh my goodness gracious in heaven where the sun shines all day and never is there a frown I am such a liar. A big fat liar. I need help!

I need someone who I can call at the end of a Target trip and demand that they take my kids so that I don't throw them to the next pack of wolves that I see with the intention of those wolves raising them however they see fit, because I am done! Better yet, I need someone who stays home with my kids while I go to Target so I can buy myself one t-shirt, one frakkin' t-shirt!, that fits and that isn't stained so that I can leave the house in the morning not looking like a bag lady! (no offense to bag ladies)

So, the other day, Martin says to me... he says...

"In Poland, do you want a cook, a housekeeper, a nanny, or a personal assistant."

(pause)  (deep breath) (look around to make sure he's talking to me, no, no, 10pm, in our bedroom, no one else here really) (so, he is talking to me) (ok, is he serious? he looks serious. I think he might be serious) (ohmygoshdidhejustaskifiwantedacookoranannyoraPERSONALASSISTANT?!?!)

(compose yourself, Olivia, we're trying to have a civilization here)

My response.
"Well, Martin, I think it would make sense if we tried in the beginning to hire someone a couple days a week, a few hours at a time to help me run errands and assist me with going out to museums and places with the kids just in case something comes up and I don't know all the right words, or we get lost or something. So I guess someone like a personal assistant, who can also just watch the kids sometimes when I need a break, and who doesn't mind making them lunch some days or helping me do the laundry." Of course, I can do the cooking and the housework myself, I do it all now. So just someone to generally help with the other stuff. Know what I mean?

(pause) (deep breath) (what's he thinking?) (did he catch on that I just basically said that I wanted all of those things rolled into one person at my every beck and call? did he?! did he?!!)

 (come ON, say something....!!!)

Him.
"So you kind of just want someone around to help out generally and sort of be on call for a certain amount of time each week for "whatever." "

(YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!, exactly!!!!!)

Me.
"Yeah, something like that, you know, or whatever."

Him.
"Sounds good. We'll look into it as soon as we get there."


See what I did there?  Pure genius, right?

All of this to ensure that my children will be saved from the fate they would have endured today had my mother not answered the phone and said "yes" when I was more than ready to hand my children over to perfectly wild animals in order to remain in good standing with the law. *That's* how badly I need help some days.

P.S. Thank you to my mother who took the kids without a moment's notice and is probably feeding them right now even though you weren't planning on it. You are being awarded points in heaven. I am sure of it.

P.P.S. I am now going to "Post" this and go pick them up... because Martin says I have to.

It's like walking off the edge of a cliff.

Martin: Do you kind of wonder what it's going to be like when we get to my parent's house and set our bags down and realize what we've done?

Me: Yeah, I have, sort of like "well, this is it, we really did it."

Martin: Yeah. and then... "now what, what do we do now?"

Me: Yeah. It feels sort of like we're about to walk off the edge of a cliff.

In the mornings Martin gets up with the kids when he can leave a bit later for work, and lately I have just been laying there, thinking about the future, what it will be like. That first moment when we walk through the door and set down our stuff and realize it's for real.

 I'm always left breathless.

Not in a panic attack kind of way, or a someone punched me in the stomach kind of way, but in the kind of way you lose your breathe when you jump from a high height or you are at the first peak of a roller coaster ride.

I have these little moments of breathlessness all the time now. And it is the worst for me. And not in a "poor Olivia," kind of way or a "you, fool, why are you doing this to yourself?!," kind of way. Just a regular, "I'm 31 years old and this is all I have ever known and I'm leaving it, possibly for a really long time, possibly for as long as I live," kind of way.

It takes my breath away.

I feel very much like we are about to walk off the edge of a cliff. The only assurance I have is that I am not going to die.

Unless of course the plane crashes and then that's really Martin's fault for making me do all of this in the first place. I blame Martin.

Fasolka!

I made Fasolka. (Fasolka po Bretonsku is the correct name but Martin just calls it "Fasolka" and so shall I)

I was inspired when Martin brought this...

sorry, not the best picture 

... home from the store. This is actually a pretty good pre-made Fasolka. We have a "Polish" section at our fancy grocery store down the street and they carry a small selection of some really great products imported directly from Poland. Martin likes to buy as much stuff as budget-ly possible so the store will continue to stock it. This he bought for Friday when we want to avoid eating meat but don't want to have to cook. It is a meatless Fasolka.

Meatless?! Are you insane? This won't do at all. So I googled a good recipe. Couldn't really find one I liked until I checked over at Polish Mama on the Prairie's blog...she had a great one!

So, I whipped some up. Pretty simple really. Well, first I got all the kids in the car to go get the ingredients since I didn't have them all on hand. THEN I whipped some up...

Mmmmm...big ol' pot.

It was a big hit. Martin pronounced it perfectly delicious. High praise, indeed.

Fasolka, without going into too much detail, is actually a dish from Brittany that Poles love. Lima beans, meat, tomato paste, onion, and spices. That's it.  I added a bit more tomato paste than one small can, about a heaping tblsp more. And I didn't use "Marjoram" or "Vegeta" just salt, pepper, paprika, and oregano (which in the wild is called Marjoram). I used extra bacon (because it's delicious) and Polish sausage. I did not use any other ham but I did use Smalec (a tblsp of bacon drippings, just happened to have that lying around  ;) )

The best thing about this dish, it's kid-friendly, all the kids liked it. It's dairy and gluten free for those with sensitivities AND, leave out the meat and you have yourself a wonderful Lenten dish.

I love Fasolka.

Try it, you won't be disappointed!

Nuts and Bolts: Tickets!

The deed has been done. We have purchased the tickets! And the date is.................

July 11th!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!     7-11-12   9:45 a.m... Just in case anyone would like to wait outside security and wave to us as we take off our shoes.

Woohoo!

Finally!

One-way tickets to Poland, just about the best deal we have ever seen. Thank you, Holy Spirit!

Now to finish packing.

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Buying Tickets.
Oh, the frenzy.
A good deal here
A better deal there
Kids eat free
Kids cost less
Kids all share a life vest?
No thank you!
Next site...

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I just have a couple things to say about buying tickets. These are things I have learned over time although not necessarily special so you all probably have it all down by now. MARTIN has taught me some of these things. I would just put in my credit card number and hope all goes well. I have way too much faith in "the system" he has absolutely no faith in it and pretty much always assumes something will go wrong due to human or computer error. I call him a paranoid Pole, he calls me a naive America, we both have a glass of French wine and work it out. Even buying plane tickets can be a time of togetherness and relationship building, folks, never miss out out on an opportunity!

First of all, never take anything for granted and always follow up. Keep all your paperwork and confirmation numbers. I know this seems obvious but I tend to just rely on everything being in my email Inbox. Once, we were on our way to Poland and we bought our tickets with "points" through two separate airlines and one of the airlines was supposed to mail us our ticket through USPS. It never came. We kept following up. It never came. Finally a week before we were supposed to leave Martin tracked down the original guy who had taken our order over the phone and he says, "oh, yeah, that's been sitting in my outbox ready to be shipped and got covered by some papers. I'll overnight it." It got to us the day before we left. These things *do* happen.

Check first about how much they charge for extra bags. It used to be that you could take 2 bags for an international trip for free. Most airlines now charge a fee for that second bag. If you are taking more than 2 bags it can get pricey. If one ticket is cheaper but then they charge for extra bags and another airline doesn't then it might be a better deal to buy the more expensive ticket and get the bags for free. Who knows? Worth checkin' out.

Speaking of "points"... we have a credit card that gives us sky miles for any airline, for any date. The only catch is that you have to use Expedia to actually purchase the tickets. (This has never been a problem except for once when Martin found much better tickets on another site that just didn't show up on Expedia at all. There was nothing we could do about it.) We use this credit card for EVERYTHING. For the points. If we were traveling in the U.S. a lot I would probably get a Southwest Airlines card or something similar but since we travel to Europe more than anywhere else we have found this to be the best way to go. It usually allows us to get one whole ticket for "free." I strongly suggest going this route if you plan on traveling as your big family expense.

Request bulkhead seating or the very back of the plane. I really need to and will very soon, write an entire post on traveling with children. It must be done. Especially after reading this article. For the record, Martin and I have never actually had the bulkhead seating on the long leg of the trip. It is almost impossible to get this seating it seems. We will be calling today, in fact, to request it. The biggest downside is that it makes it harder to watch the in-flight films, an upside, if you have a very small child, some airlines do have folding down bassinets in this area. Felek once slept across two folded down tray tables, never knew the difference. If we can't get bulkhead then the very back of the plane, near the bathrooms and away from the majority of other people, is the next best thing. This is usually where we travel. It works out fine. The very last seats don't recline (this is where the kids sit) but there is extra leg room back there, I'm not sure why. It's louder, because that's where the engines are (drowns out the screams) and it's also very "hummy" for the infant set who fall asleep easily in the car and other places with lots of white noise. (also, if you're really lucky and there are extra seats they will usually be at the back of the plane since they fill in the plane in numerical order...extra seats will be at the back, extra seats means that the lap child becomes "sleeping on the extra seat child". So luxurious!)  I am now treading on my "traveling with children" post and will stop here. Just sayin', request these two types of seats if you have lots of young children. The small percentage of people traveling to Europe which actually fall into this category will thank me later. All the rest of you, keeping fighting the good fight at getting those aisle seats and exit rows. I am with you in spirit.

If your child is under two they do not pay for a full price ticket. But they still need a ticket, and you still have to pay something. We only had to pay 27 bucks this time around for Kacio. 27 dollars! Can you believe that!? So awesome. The cheapest we've ever gotten for a "lap child" is 100 dollars and that came with no food or snack. Anyway, don't forget to check them all in and get that "lap child" ticket, which they generally staple to an adult ticket so don't throw the adult one away thinking you don't need it anymore. Almost did this once. Wouldn't have been great.

Other than the actual traveling part this is all I can think of to mention about buying tickets. It's really not that difficult. Good luck!

Nuts and Bolts: Documents Part 2

If you read our first Documents post you'll know that we were trying to decide whether or not to get Visas and which documents to get translated and what we'd need. Etc. We decided to just get to Poland and worry about extra documents like Passports for the kids and a Visa for me when we got there. Easy enough.
But we still got all our documents like Wedding/Birth certificates translated here. Mainly because we would like to get those other documents as fast as possible and not wait for the translations to be done in Poland, which I've heard is much cheaper.

So, since I last wrote we have officially obtained our translated documents! They are in our special documents drawer and they are all translated. I know it was done well because I can't read a lick of it. Of course, the first thing we did after receiving them was decide that we need more.

There is this thing called an Apostille. Even though our documents have been translated into Polish there is still no way for the Polish government to know that they are in fact legal documents and not just some forgeries that I had someone translate to try and hoodwink the local Polish officials. An Apostille is a document obtained from the Secretary of State (Texas Secretary of State, not Hilary Clinton) that states that the documents in hand are actually legal and official and information stated therein is correct and true. This is a form that ALSO must be officially translated, stapled to the translated documents and then a seal is affixed over the staple to prove that the Apostille is talking of the documents it is stapled with and no documents have been added or removed during this entire time, again, to discourage any hood winking.

Did you follow all that?

And seriously, there is nowhere, no website, where we can find a direct and definitive answer as to whether or not we need the Apostille. It used to be that countries that were in a certain group, including the U.S. and Poland, did not need extra documents. The official state/country seal was enough for international documentation but I think it has gotten stricter in the last 10 years, for obvious reasons. Our translator says that it can all depend on the local public official in Krakow and what he personally will want to see and if you get someone who is a stickler for the rules or is just having a bad day he will want to see every document that has ever followed you home, all in Polish, and demand that it have an Apostille. Better safe than sorry. And of course, there is no way I can tell just by the instructions,( they are worded, in my opinion, fairly oddly), as to whether or not I need one application per document or just one application for the whole set of documents. I will be sending in one application per document, just in case. You can give me your opinion on that if you like.

It is cheaper to get all of these translations done in Poland. If you are really strapped for cash and trying to move somewhere where you need translations I would suggest getting quotes from someone in the country where you will be traveling and compare prices. Our translator lives right near Martin's parents and came highly recommended so we were happy to pay extra for me to be able to communicate with her and to have everything we needed right when we step off the plane, because goodness knows, we will need as many things done in advance as possible.

As far as boring and dry posts go, this one is right up there with the one I posted just an hour ago.
 Double whammy.
You're welcome.

Documents yet to come...
- I.D.L..better known as International Driver's License...eek, friends...eek (you have to take a test and everything. boooooo.)
- Vaccination records for the kids (don't really have to do anything with these except collect them from the Pedi. but I have to remember to do that, and sometimes that is the biggest hurdle, kwim?)
- Martin has a list for the car stuff...a post I am not looking forward to writing... but it must be done...to quote a favorite book around here..."oh, what a mess." (including why we haven't bought our plane tickets yet... you read that right...grrr...)

On a more personal note (and to see if you even made this far down the page... congratulations!): I am starting this thing called the "no-poo" shampoo or something silly like that. Apparently it's just where you don't shampoo your hair except every once in a while with Baking Soda and then a Vinegar rinse. Except, if it's possible to do something wrong even though what you're doing is doing nothing then I think I'm doing it wrong. I get conflicting info. on the best way to "wash" your hair with the Baking Soda and so far all I have is a huge grease ball of hair on my head. It's pretty gross at this point. I started last Friday. They say it starts to get better after about a week or two...we'll see.  I also tried this thing where you wash your face with honey. Miserable failure. Again, I could be doing it wrong. After about 3 days there was a noticeable outbreak of what looked like clogged pores on both my cheeks and bees were following me whenever I went outside. I have never had a more delicious face washing session, though. For my own personal safety and vanity I switched back to the chemical-y stuff. I might try again in the future. I am only one woman.

 Anyone out there have success with either of these types of things? Imagine if you never had to buy shampoo ever again and instead could use readily available household products? And the children as well? Awesome, right? And then I could start making my own body/hand soap and our family would be set!
I hope this works.

I have no way of knowing for sure, but I think this cartoon was created by a man with the last name McCracken. 

Sell it or give it...garage sale? Donate?

Real quick.

Garage sale of all our stuff...pros and cons?
Anyone have any strong ideas about this?

I have already given lots of stuff away but I still have tons, including clothes and shoes. I was thinking of donating a lot of it to local maternity shelters and Gabriel Projects but at the same time, garage sales are also geared towards people on a budget. The difference is they aren't completely free. But as the same time we could also use the money.

The problem with garage sales is that this stuff has to sit around my house until we're ready to do one. Or maybe I can go ahead and have a mini-one  with the stuff I have to sell now and just host another one later?

I just don't know. I am inclined to just give it away because it's easier...but there could be money to be made...we do have home-school materials still to purchase...but then again some people could really benefit from them being free.....

Sorting/packing/crying

Martin and I decided to give the kids to my mom for the day and  overnight. I know a lot of you, myself included at this point, are wondering why I'm at home typing on the computer right now. I *should* be at some fancy hotel sipping pink drinks by a pool (yes, it is that warm here...during WINTER). But no, we are here, at home, doing "chores." 

Martin tried to get me to leave this morning, "call up one of your lady friends" (where, from my bridge club?) and "go get a facial or something." (Oh, Martin, a woman's life is so simple isn't it? ;)

He  very kindly offered these things and I said no. I know that if I do these things instead of what I need to be doing I will regret it later. Like on Monday when all of these bins...

Boys and girls, Maternity/Post-partum, by size and gender.

...are still sitting in our room calling out to me to go through and sort and give away/pack up/distribute.

That's a lot of bins, ya'll. 14 in fact. And when, pray tell, during the week, am I going to get that done? Having the kids gone is just about the only way to get any real work done around here unless the other parent (aka Martin) is willing to not work on the lawn so he can watch the kids while I work on aforementioned bins. But when your lawn is producing something like this...

Lovely, Martin. Lovely. (that's a weed by the way)

... you know that BOTH of you should probably be working at the same time, at the same house, doing something productive. (we *are* trying to sell the house to real people, who will live here, NOT scientists hoping to raise baby dinosaurs)

I'm sitting here, listening to some of our favorite music (something else I rarely do because children are very loud), distributing all these clothes into three categories.
1)  clothes to take this trip ...everything 18M+
2 ) clothes/items to take when/if we are pregnant again that will be left in storage in America...everything
     0-18M+ and all maternity/post-partum clothes
3) clothes to give away


My babies are getting so big and are still so little at the same time and I have to choose which of their clothes to give away?! Already?!  Are you kidding me? It was so much easier knowing they were up there in the attic, even if they weren't being used, at least they were still *mine.*  I am going to be a mess when I finally have to give them all away for good.  Even harder is realizing, again, and again, that we have to do all of this because we're moving so far away. I would gladly cart these things a little farther to the other side of town, perhaps even to another state...but across the ocean? Just not possible.

To celebrate our day of freedom Martin and I went out to eat lunch. Mexican food. Really good. Over my large, ice-filled, as-many-free-refills-as-I-want-Dr. Pepper I was reminded just how far we really are moving. It has been much easier to see how small the world is since having met and married Martin and traveled so often to the other side of it. It really is very small, the world. And not, at the same time. So many things will be exactly the same, *exactly* the same. People, in all the best and most fundamental ways, are exactly the same, anywhere you go. You know? And that's good. And it will help. But there are so many things that are also so different. Other-worldly, literally like a completely different planet, and it may as well be, in terms of ability to visit back and forth. It's going to be lonely and strange, at first.

It will begin to really sink in more and more as the day draws nearer. Just 4 months.

These clothes I am sorting *are* making me a bit sad. They remind me of the past 6 years and all we've accomplished and the memories. But I am also excited to think of them meeting me in Poland and reminding me of our time here. And seeing Kacio wear them will somehow link me to my home, not just our house, but my home, Texas.
 And the music can come. And that will remind me too, of the past 31 years, and my home. And I know I'll smile. Or cry, like I'm doing now. Sigh.