Ha!

Ben and Rachel are playing some bizarre version of Peek-a-boo that involves scarves and lots of yelling about finding each other. Here's what I just heard from the bedroom:

"Daddy, find yourself!!!"

Yet another van update

I debated deleting the previous post, but I'm choosing to leave it up for now. In case anyone is curious and I didn't mention it before, the company is AAMCO. I'd stay away.

Ben called this morning to argue about the charges. The guy said he'd look into it and get back to us. He called back and said "he realized his techs could have done some things differently" and he'll drop the price by $250. That still puts us over where he quoted, but not unreasonably so. Ben did leave a message for head office though - he'd already left the message before the local guy got back to him. That's fine with me if head office gets into it. I'd have gone with Honda if I'd known that this guy would not be honorable.

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.

STUPID STUPID STUPID repair people. STUPID MORONS. You do NOT give a verbal estimate of $1600-2000 to rebuild a transmission, keep the van for a week and still not have it ready even though you know that the rental car is due back, and THEN announce that the PRE-TAX price will be $2381. Oh, and can I just add that their message stated that they were going ahead and doing the work? STUPID MORONS. Of course they're closed for the day so I can't do anything about it now. IDIOTS. Plus they said that they'd have the car ready for NOON tomorrow. Rental car is due back at 11. NOT IMPRESSED. IDIOTS. Oh, did I say that already? IDIOTS.

For the record, there is no way that Ben or I would have authorized them to do it for that much money. We spent $210 on the rental car. That's OVER $2700US (yeah, so that's $3300ish in Canadian dollars... the van's probably only worth $4 or 5K with the door damage).

I AM SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO ANGRY. Only 71 days until we return to a sane place where our mechanic would NEVER pull this kind of crap on this.

That's all.

Rachel and the Elephant Calendar

We got Rachel a 2007 elephant calendar and have started talking about different months and who has birthdays when. Rachel knows a lot of the dates, and she has made up birthdays for the elephants. Oddly enough, although Olly and Phil are twin brothers, they have birthdays in different months.

Sick-tember is the month that precedes October. I bet you didn't know that.
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Rachel and I walked to Wal-Mart today. Ok, I walked. Rachel rode in the stroller. It was about 50 minutes EACH way. Anyway, we went to look at the toys. Rachel saw a Dora folding patio chair and fell in love with it. "Could this be for my birthday?" she asked. Ha! We have already been told that Rachel requires a cake, balloons and cookies for her birthday. Little does she know that her actual birthday is during Passover this year.

Snow Day!

Yes, again. I'll post pictures later, because this time there is actually some snow. It's really pretty actually. I'm looking out my window at tree branches with a couple inches of snow on them.

Of course, this means no pre-school for Rachel. Bizarrely enough, UMKC is currently still showing as open.

*insert sarcasm here*

I just don't know what we'll do next year back in London when there is snow for more than 2 days in a row. However will we survive?

Discussions with an almost 3-year-old

Dad: "Rachel, it's time to get out of the bath now."

Rachel: "No! I'm going to stay in the bath forever!"

Dad: "Rachel, your time is up."

Rachel: "My time is down!"
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Oh, Rachel did have a nap for about 1 hour and 45 minutes, although she was kind of cranky for awhile after she got up. She also ate most of her dinner, including the "peasandcorn" which was apparently very good. Yay!

Van update

Oh joy, oh bliss. The engine light has been back on since Saturday night, so Ben took it in this morning to get it looked at. Why yes, our transmission needs to be replaced. How lovely. *insert adjectives of choice here*

The person at the dealership checked into it, and because it's a Canadian car, they need to order in the part. The only one they can get is a remanufactured transmission for, oh, $2900 before tax. Not sure if that included labour or not. I would hope so...

Crap. Crap. Crap. I do not even think our van is worth $2900US. Ok, it's probably worth $5K-ish right now. But still... we're basically screwed. We can't drive it 1500km north to get it fixed or sell it. We can't sell it here. We can't buy or lease a new car here.

I have to say, this is probably one of the first times in our married life where Ben and I are both just not seeing any good solutions. GRR.

I think I'll go have some chocolate now.

She has to sleep sometime, right?

When I started seriously potty training Rachel back at the end of October, I dropped "quiet time" and all pretense of napping because I didn't want the hassle of changing either wet sheets or pull-ups/underwear.

For the past two weeks or so, Rachel's wake-up time has been between 5-5:30am. It doesn't matter if she goes to bed at 5:30, 6, 6:30, 7, 7:30 or even 8pm. Trust me, we've tried. She's up by 5:30, ready to go for the day. Since she doesn't nap anymore, that means she's losing 1.5-3 hours of sleep per day by pulling this stunt.

Yesterday Rachel fell asleep in the car at 3pm, so we just ran random errands for an hour. She was still in bed by 6, but didn't fall asleep until closer to 8 since she kept coming out for potty, snack, etc. This morning she was up for the day at 5:15. Have I mentioned how much I despise Central time yet?

Anyhow, it's now 1:15 and I haven't heard anything in about 5 minutes from R's room. We talked off and on this morning about how she'd get to watch Backyardigans, have a snack, go potty and take a nap so she could stay up late to hang out with Daddy when he gets home. When naptime came, R pitched a fit and started yelling that she had to go potty (she'd just been). I was in and out a couple of times. It ended with me nailing a dark sheet to the wall over her blinds to make the room a bit darker. We'll see how long that lasts. For the record, packing tape wasn't strong enough and I couldn't find any thumbtacks!

After I tucked her in again, I left and she started yelling about how she wanted to "stay with YOU, Mommy!" and then the door-banging began again. So I went in and played the Mean Mommy card... I could feel bad that I yelled at her, but neither Ben nor myself are capable of being nice after all these mornings of 5am wake-ups. Ugh. So I yelled at her that it was naptime and she was going to stay in there. I did tuck her in, kiss her & tell her I loved her. I guess she knows I meant business, because it's still blissfully quiet.

Amusingly enough, while Rachel was yelling, she managed to get her bedroom door open. I don't think she actually noticed what she had done though, and I wasn't about to point it out!

Rachel makes the bed

Rachel is trying to help me make our bed. She did a great job of helping with the sheet and putting pillows on the bed. Then I asked her to put all of the socks on the bed so I could sort them out. Well, the little monkey is "hiding" them underneath the pillows and giggling wildly. That's my girl - if you can't see clutter, it isn't there!

Remind me again why I got up this morning.

Rachel and Ben went to the Honda dealership early this morning to deal with the "check engine" light that has been on for the past few days. Too bad the light went off as soon as Ben got there, so they couldn't confirm the problem. The suspected problem is the transmission - this is really not a big surprise since the car has 210,000km on it. However, we were told that we should NOT have it done in the US since the warranty won't be valid in Canada. This leads me to yet another rant. Either bear with me, or skip it.

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Where to begin? First, why are prices in Canadian stores marked up 30-40% from the same merchandise in the US even though the exchange rate has been below 20% the entire time we've been down here? Some stores are getting better, but it's still pathetic. Here's a list of places that it will annoy me to shop at in Canada once we move home:

Eddie Bauer
Old Navy
Gap
Children's Place
Gymboree

So it's not a long list. I admit that. However, I have Canadian store cards for Eddie Bauer & Children's Place, but I cannot get those same cards in the US. Apparently this is because the US cards are actually credit cards, and we all know how our excellent (seriously!) credit history wouldn't transfer down here. The banks won't even give us a student credit card. Nor can we purchase a cell phone with a contract, which is why we have a prepaid cell phone instead. 10 cents a minute is a bargain by Canadian standards, but it's a rip-off in the US where monthly plans regularly include hundreds of minutes, FREE long distance (oh, sit down - it's the land of opportunity, what did you expect?) and all kinds of cool calling features at no extra charge.

Let me continue my rant a little. We recently purchased appliances for our new house in London. We were hoping to buy appliances down here since prices are substantially cheaper. No go. Even though both countries have Maytag, Whirlpool & all the rest of them, the warranties aren't honoured unless they're in the country of origin of the sale.

While we're at it, Sears Canada and the US Sears are not the same. Not even close. Even though I can supposedly transfer my Canadian Sears card over here, I can't buy appliances and have the warranty honoured at home. Never mind that Sears exists in both countries.

Surprisingly, Costco seems to be the only company that is willing to take the cross-border plunge. We had our tires replaced in the fall at Costco down here, and the warranty IS honoured in Canada. Not that it'll do us much good if the transmission falls apart on the way home to get it replaced.

Oh - are you wondering what we're going to do about the van? Good question! Right now, we're waiting. If the light comes back on, we need to call Honda and bring it right back in for a definite diagnosis. The estimate for repairs is about $2700 US. In my perfect world, we'll make it back to London without replacing the transmission, and Dave the mechanic will have a used transmission that'll do the job for a cheaper price! In the real world, is anyone else thinking that the van will just break down on the way home, say, in the middle of nowhere?

To add insult to injury (hahahahaha - you'll see why that's funny in a second), I got a lovely bill from the doctor today for $169. What for, you ask? Let's see.... I spent about 30 minutes in the doctor's office discussing my breathing problems, blowing air into a tube, and being told that yes, my asthma was flaring up. I was given a sample steroid inhaler that lasts for four weeks. Then the doctor requested that I follow up with her in 2 months. She also said that I'd need a prescription after the four weeks. However, she didn't give me a prescription at the initial visit, so I suppose that now I will have to pay again to go see her so that she can write me a prescription. Thank God that I will NEVER give birth in this country! (To all those of you who know my "never" history, I didn't SAY it so it doesn't count!)

God bless America indeed.

"I have to pee at Gap!"

I've spent a lot of time lately talking to Rachel about "safe" potties. We've talked up the terrible bookstore potty and made it into a bit of a joke. We talk a lot about which potties don't flush all by themselves. One thing I've worked hard on is telling Rachel that the potties at Gap are safe. Since there is a Gap store at the mall and down near UMKC, I figured that would cover us pretty well.

Yesterday was our crazy "parent switch" day, where Ben and I trade off who has Rachel. Rachel cheerfully peed at the Gap with Ben. Later in the afternoon, Ben dropped us off at a little mall with several stores including Target (which, by the way, has safe potties). About an hour into it, Rachel looked up at me and said frantically, "I have to pee at Gap!!"

It took a bit of convincing, but she finally accepted that peeing at TJ Maxx and Old Navy would be just as acceptable. In a twist of irony, Old Navy (Gap's "sister" store) did NOT have a safe potty. I quickly draped toilet paper over the sensor and then just hoped that Rachel would go quickly! She did, and all was well.

This is huge! Now we can go out anywhere!! New York, here we come!

Your daily morning laugh

In our outdoor parking lot, there are many cars. Some people park in the handicapped parking even though they do not have a sticker or license plate that allows them to do so.

There is one car that constantly parks in front of the fitness centre. Why, you ask? Because it is plugged in every morning. We suspect that this car (with Virginia license plates) has a block heater. Hehe. It's not an electric car, that's for sure.

Anyway, since when is Kansas cold enough to need a block heater for your car?

I forgot one!

Cheap shipping! What's not to like? Some may call me an e-bay addict, but I am proud to announce that I have made just over $450 in the past month on E-bay! Of course, after e-bay fees, paypal fees and shipping, it's not quite so much but it's still pretty good.

Today I mailed 5 (yes, FIVE) packages for a grand total of $14.41. One of the packages went to Canada. Another went to England. The other 3 were in the US. Isn't that crazy? I'd be willing to be that the same packages in Canada would have easily cost $25 or more to mail out.

So that's another thing I like about Kansas.

Things we don't like/won't miss about Kansas

I've got to be fair and cover both sides, right? ;)

1. Corn syrup in EVERYTHING! When you're cleaning up for Pesach and you discover that your supposedly pure vanilla extract has corn syrup in it, that's just wrong. After moving down here, we realized why there are natural food stores in abundance. They *need* them just to be able to eat food that's not full of additives and other junk!

2. The weather. Yes, I admit that it's been fun to wear shorts later in the fall and earlier in the spring than I ever will at home. I'm glad we didn't have to stay for a full summer though, because I think we seriously would melt in the heat. That, and Kansas gave me asthma (the doctor said so!). I don't like the variability in temperature from morning to evening either.

3. No Tim Horton's. Also, what's with bagel shops closing by 7 or 8pm? That's crazy!

4. Differences in pronunciation and comprehension. I am so tired of making myself say "restroom" instead of "washroom" or "tennis shoes" instead of "running shoes." (Ok, I say running shoes anyway.) Roof should not rhyme with woof. Ornery has two r's in it and should be pronounced accordingly. Out should not sound like ow with a "t" on the end. Uh-huh is not a substitute for thank you in my not-so-humble opinion. Nor do I see how huh-uh can mean no. But I digress. I'm not meaning to insult my friendly neighboUrs to the south... just pointing out that we don't all speak the same English and it can get frustrating every once in awhile trying to figure out what's actually being said! "You want that sacked?" "You want that in a sack?" (For those not in the know, "sacked" means fired and "in the sack" means in bed. At least, that's what those terms mean in Canada. In Kansas, sack means bag. Who knew?)

5. Grocery shopping. For the first 6 months we were down here, people must have thought I was insane. I'd walk up and down the grocery aisles talking out loud to myself. I'd say things like, "What!? How can they not have this? I don't get it!" Oh wait. I still do that. Here's my list of foods we can't get here, or at least not by these names:

Kraft Dinner - gotta be KD! (ok, ok, I know they have Kraft Mac & Cheese... but NO-ONE at home calls it that!)
Nanaimo bars
Milk in bags instead of jugs
Boneless skinless chicken breasts without rib meat (I don't even want to know...)
Lactantia margarine
Schneider's & Shopsy's hot dogs
President's Choice products
MARBLE cheese - I just can't make myself call it co-jack or colby/jack, at least not with a straight face
Minigo yogurts - you know, the kind without tons of sugar and crap in it

I'm sure there are lots of other things that I'm not thinking of right now... It is weird to see tons of advertising on packaging rather than French/English labelling. Then again, at least Murphy's Law of always picking up a package and looking at the French first doesn't apply!

6. I will NOT miss having to explain where London is!! I once told someone that I was from London and they said, "OH! That explains your accent!" Yeah, I have a British accent. Can you hear me laughing now?

7. Guns. There should not have to be "no guns allowed" signs on the doors of almost every public place, especially at places like Toys'R'Us. Enough said.

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I think that we're just ready to go home. When we left London, we weren't sure that we'd ever go back. Spending the summer there last year showed us that it's home. Despite the problems we had there (and likely will have again!), it's home. We might not have Olive Garden or Panera. We might not have sunshine 300 days of the year. We might not have a free kids' petting zoo and awesome sales at the malls. We might not have 20,000 Jewish people and a dozen synagogues to choose from. We might not be able to wear shorts in March, and the schools won't close down every time it snows.... but it's HOME!

I'd like to end this blog entry by saying, "There's no place like home!" ;)

Things we will miss about Kansas

Just for fun, here's our list:

1. Beth Shalom - Both the shul and the pre-school have been fantastic. Rachel has thrived and learned so much there, and we have felt very welcome. We've had opportunities to learn and get involved, and we've tried to take advantage of as much as we can while we're here.

2. CHEAP SHOPPING - Stop laughing at me! Where else could you get men's t-shirts for $1.97???!?! And come on, Old Navy sometimes has adult clothing items for $0.97! That is seriously unreal. Not to mention my bargains for Rachel... I cannot get over how much cheaper clothes are down here. I think that my American friends will have to be shipping me many "gifts" (to avoid customs, hehe!) over the years to come.

3. Friends we've made here - Ok, Laura & Stefanie, don't complain that you're #3 on this list. It's not in order of importance. Really. I promise! When we moved down to KC, we didn't "know" anyone, but I knew Laura & Stefanie from my parenting board online, and I had met Laura back when Ben auditioned. It's been fun watching our kids play together. I don't know what Rachel will do without her jumping-on-the-bed buddies. ;)

4. Being able to cross Stateline Rd. every day and saying to Ben, "I don't think we're in Kansas anymore." Plus Missouri has the funniest state motto ever - "Missouri: The Show Me State!"

5. Snow days! Since the end of November, Ben has had FOUR full snow days, and two half snow days. The ubiqitous "they" say that laughter is good for you. Well, I'd say that we owe a big thank you to the Kansas and Missouri school powers-that-be for making us literally fall over on the floor laughing hysterically as we checked the school closings any time there was a dusting of snow and the temperature dared to fall below 32F (0C). Lines such as, "Ben, there is NO way that you don't have school today" would be followed by collapsing on the floor in sheer mirth and shock combined. Our personal favourite is still the time last year when the schools were closed because ***drum roll please*** it was COLD. Yes, folks, down here in Kansas, frigid temperatures are considered a good enough reason to close the schools. To be fair, people here don't dress for the cold. They don't wear coats outside from the car to the mall in sub-zero (C) weather. Um, ok.

We will also miss lines on the weather channel such as, "Some wickedly cold temperatures are moving in from Canada" - of course, these temperatures would be in the teens/20s F which is around -15ish in C. Last year we actually heard the weather lady say that the temperature would be "frigid" since it was "only" going to be in the low 40s (3-5C). Hehe.

6. Olive Garden. Oh wait, we don't go there that much anymore. I will really miss Panera though. Panera has good bagels, soup, cookies, muffins, sandwiches, salads... yeah, pretty much everything except donuts. Americans just don't do donuts. Tonight for dinner Rachel requested a "cinnamon crunch bagel please" - I had to explain to her that those were only at Panera.

7. The sunshine. Supposedly parts of Kansas have over 300 days of sunshine every year. I can hear the collective gasp of our friends & family back home. I look at the London forecast online from time to time, and I usually see this:

cloud-cloud-cloud-cloud-snow-snow-cloud-snow etc.

Here, I wake up in the morning and it's almost always sunny. That makes a huge difference in coping with winter. It's also hilariously deceptive at times, like the past few weeks when it's actually been fairly cold but it seems like it should be warmer since the sun is shining.
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Is it sad that I can't think of any more things that we will miss? I'll come back and add them if I do!

Shabbat Dinner with Rachel

We try to have dinner together every Friday night. Being professional musicians, this often means a super-early dinner so that we can eat before one or both of us have to go out to a concert. This past Friday, Ben had an orchestra concert so we had dinner around 5:15pm. This worked out well since Rachel goes to bed around 6 anyway!

After the candles were lit and the blessing had been said, Ben went to lift the kiddush cup to bless the wine. Well, before he could do it, Rachel lifted her cup of grape juice, said the entire blessing (in Hebrew!) and drank her juice. We were both rather surprised since she likes to play "Shabbat" during the week with her playset, but we've never heard her try it all by herself "for real" at the dinner table.

We're also starting to hear her sing along more in shul with everyone. It's very cute. Of course, this makes Sunday mornings increasingly difficult as far as putting her in the nursery is concerned. This morning she pitched a fit and wanted to stay in our rehearsal in the church sanctuary with us. I can see her point. To her, it's a double standard. I imagine that her thought process goes something like this:

"On Saturday mornings I dress up and go to shul with Mommy & Daddy. I stay in the long service and I'm quiet. I sing and I march with my Torah. Then I get snacks and we go home. It's fun. On Sunday mornings I dress up and go to church with Mommy & Daddy. For some weird reason, they try to drop me off in the nursery for 3 hours to play with the other kids instead of staying in the service. I don't get it. And where are the good snacks?"

Anyway, I realized today that we only have 10 more Sundays where we need to take Rachel to our church gig. We actually only have 11 more Sundays at the church! That brings me to another post...

Happy Groundhog Day!

Rachel: "I don't see the groundhogs. They're not outside and they're not in our apartment."

We then explained to her about Wiarton Willie and Punxatawney Phil. We decided to tell her that the groundhogs were in Pennsylvania and it's too far for them to walk to Kansas. She thinks this is pretty funny.... plus she could actually see PA on her US map puzzle.

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We've been talking a lot with Rachel about our new house in London. We recently decided to switch which bedroom would be hers, so I have been showing her the floor plan. Now she will point out her room, her closet, her bathroom (complete with HER toilet and HER bathtub!), and pretty much every other room in the house. She denies that there is a backyard because it's not on the house plan. Hehe.

When I explained that we would have a backyard for sure, Rachel told me that there would be Backyardigans in our backyard! I warned her that there might not be, but she remains firmly convinced that they will be there.

Only 89 days until we leave...

Aw....

For a number of reasons, it has been a long week around here. Here's a conversation I overheard this morning:

Rachel: "We should do something to make Mom happy."

Dad: "What do you think we should do?"

Rachel: "Let's go SHOPPING!!!!"

That's my girl! ;)