Boiling Blood of Injustice

Never in my life have I had as many blood boiling, my veins are popping out of my head, I’m trying to remain outwardly calm, moments, than in this country. The combination of lack of communicating power both in the spoken word and the inability to listen and comprehend fully and the complete disregard for customer service is a recipe for me to lose it.

The first time this happened was when Brian and Megan came in 2006 and had their return tickets taken out of the ticket pack accidentally. The ticketing agent ripped out their tickets for their return flight when they were checking in to arrive in UB. When we learned this, we went to sort out the matter.

They told me that nothing could be done and because they didn’t have the tickets and since they didn’t have the tickets, there could be no refund and we would have to buy new tickets for thousands each! I was losing my mind that day… I left the building and then started sobbing and screaming at my poor husband who took the brunt of that lovely experience. God completely restored that situation and miraculously allowed us to find the tickets (they were stored at the airport- unbelievingly!) and they returned home. That was Air Market. I never ever used that company again.

Since then I have been a loyal AirTrans customer.

The blood boiling happened again this week.

Backstory: We are trying to get a refund for our return tickets. We arrived at LAX June 10 with a reservation, but no tickets. We were told we had to pay $8000 to get back here. This is a complete error on someone else’s part. We had been in contact with both our travel agent and Korean Air and both parties said we were ready to board- not so. So we paid for the LAX to Seoul flight with cash and the Seoul to UB flight in frequent flyer miles. We were told to go to our travel agent. The day after we arrived, we went to the travel agent. They said they would look into the matter.

This week when we arrived back we went into the travel agent, Air Trans. They said they had a refund. Peter had jumped out of the car and I was still searching for a parking place. By the time I parked and got back Peter came out with the refund. I am glad that we got anything at all, but then logic started to kick in and long division and I realized how little they are giving us per person and then I grabbed the refund from Peter and went in to do battle.

I arrived at the manager’s desk. She ignores me for 5 minutes while she continues to work with a coworker about someone who’s flying in from Hong Kong with their children. Finally, she looks up at me. I tell here I’m here about a refund. These are dreaded words here. I explain to her what happened, that one of her agents told us that we were all ready to go and that our ticket could be extended to June 10 without charge, she looks at me with one eye squinted shut and reels. I repeat my story in Mongolian. A grain of understanding is between us. I tell her that someone else is at fault and that the refund isn’t enough. She then gets me a print out and some other women joins us. We are speaking a hodge-podge of English and Mongolian.

It goes something like this, I say, “We are not at fault here we need to know what happened. There must be a record of who changed our reservation date on the computer.”

She hears, “bla blah bla, June 10^th bla blah blah computer.” She looks at me quizzically.

I repeat in Mongolian something like, “my husband called before the March (the expiration date) your people said, ‘ok, no problem June 10 ok.’ We did no wrong thing. I want more refund.” It sounds rawer than that and with some poor grammar thrown in because sentence structure is different here and I don’t have a great handle on it.

She understands me though. She begins to type and asks me who my husband talked with. Sadly, we don’t know. I say there has to be a record in your computer someone changed our reservation date.

Nope of course not, the records are sealed and it’s a different system than in March.

At this point my veins are popping out of my head and I can feel my pulse in my forehead. I am boiling hot and wish for a fan. I am SO upset. My problem is that I expected a different kind of outcome. I wanted them to say, “You’ve been a loyal customer to both our office and to Korean Air, for that reason, we will help you.” But of course when thousands of dollars are at stake, everyone wants to blame everyone else.

They tell me that Korean Air has the “sealed records” that Korean Air issued the refund. They do print out the accounting from Korean Air. This at least shows me that the travel agent gave us all that Korean Air gave them. I know now, though I am still angry, that there is nothing else to do here. It’s not as if this poor women is sitting on several thousand dollars or that she’s hidden it in her desk drawer.

But THEN I notice that we have been charged a fee!!! They took money from the already meager refund for “cancelation charge.” I am then LIVID. I barely contain my spite. I ask again in two languages why we had to pay a fee when we did no wrong that someone else is at fault. She tells me that it’s a cancelation charge from Korean Air. NOW KOREAN AIR WILL HEAR FROM ME!!! They didn’t lose a DIME from our family. We (and our extended family) paid for the same flight two times and they were most likely able to resell our seats since we changed our reservations!!! I am so so so so upset. But these women have done all they can for me. Much to their relief, I leave with my meager refund and a print out. I will never return as a customer and now Air Trans is also black listed. I guess it’s a good thing that we’re moving back to America, because those are the only travel agents in the country!

I STORM out of the office. I cannot remember what color our borrowed car is, at this point, I can barely calm myself down enough to scan the horizon. I see Peter waving madly from inside the car because my eyes are blinded by white rage.

I step into the street, then I pulled myself together knowing that UB motorists do not yield for pedestrians and the last thing that Peter needs is to see me run down and killed. Then all the silly refunded tugricks (money) in my greedy little hand would have flown up into the sky in a wonderful cloud of green, purple and orange. All of the cars would have screeched to a halt, and the drivers and passengers would jump out to chase the money as it swirled in the wind; and no would have not cared that I was dead and bleeding on the street.

Ok, vivid imagination. (I wish you could see the images that this little paragraph made in my mind. I am laughing out loud as I write, at my demise on the corner of the city square!)

I safely cross the street and hop into the car. The children and Peter are spared my wrath because the phone rings. I go from screaming injustice, to sweetly saying, “hello.” Now Peter laughs out loud. The phone call is enough to calm me down. Then we arrived at our “sale” the large truck has arrived with all of our stuff and people are arriving to buy it. I hop out of the car and greet everyone and begin to organize the liquidation of our earthly possessions here in Mongolia. What a wonderful day! J

I wrote this last Sunday

Seize the day

We have gone through the house and we have to use everything up or give everything away. We have little “treats” that we use for special occasions. Things like: ranch dressing packets, seasoning packets, sprinkles, chocolate, maple extract for making syrup, and molasses. NO SAVING! We’ll have sprinkles every day. Today is Father’s day and we’re having sprinkles on our waffles.

Last night I made a roast with an onion soup packet on it. Yes, I know that stuff is not healthy; but let me tell you, it makes the “free range” and freshly butchered old cow taste a lot better.

It makes these three weeks of change, transition and goodbyes a little more fun!

I want to take a minute to thank my amazing husband. It has been a rough year: finding out our daughter has a serious problem that’s going to affect her long term, living in America waiting to see what would happen and wondering if we could come back to our life here, looking for new work, working on cars and living on a tight budget. It has been a crazy year. With each of these huge changes there has been an amazing amount of burden and tension. Never have we had more “discussions.” Each of these changes is huge and high on the stress list and we have learned we process things at different speeds and in different ways.

But we have come through the fire stronger and surer of our marriage and love. There is no one else I’d rather have battled through life with, but my Peter.

As we wrap up our time here, I must brag about his accomplishments here. He is AMAZING! He built me cabinets, closets, rewired the house and the dryer (it has 2 plugs now a 110V and a 220V), painted the interior of the house, (he has to do all the trim work because I only have enough attention to be the roller!) installed new window frames, installed all the carpet upstairs and down, installed our water pump and put in a drain (3 times), repaired the car with nothing but a book and the tenacity to not give up. When I wanted a gazebo, he built it. He cut each board with a circular saw and put up my garden fence. When I wanted to paint the walls (again) he did it. When I wanted more cabinets and a tile countertop and the kitchen walls repaired and wall papered. He did it. When I was pregnant with Sierra, I was afraid to live here with a baby in just a log cabin with no insulation. Guess what? He went to UB, bought the stuff and he, Megan and Brian put it up. Our house is the warmest in the winter and the coolest in the summer! We have the best house in Sukhbaatar! When we arrived with our baby, there were no baby supplies to be found. Guess who built Weston’s high chair? Peter! Who carried all the stuff I wanted across both oceans and heaved heavy bags in airports worldwide? Peter! Who did all of this while teaching school, learning a language, doing church work in Mongolian and being a wonderful father? Peter! Thank you, thank you, thank you. I love you to bits!

I wrote this last Sunday

Seize the day

We have gone through the house and we have to use everything up or give everything away. We have little “treats” that we use for special occasions. Things like: ranch dressing packets, seasoning packets, sprinkles, chocolate, maple extract for making syrup, and molasses. NO SAVING! We’ll have sprinkles every day. Today is Father’s day and we’re having sprinkles on our waffles.

Last night I made a roast with an onion soup packet on it. Yes, I know that stuff is not healthy; but let me tell you, it makes the “free range” and freshly butchered old cow taste a lot better.

It makes these three weeks of change, transition and goodbyes a little more fun!

I want to take a minute to thank my amazing husband. It has been a rough year: finding out our daughter has a serious problem that’s going to affect her long term, living in America waiting to see what would happen and wondering if we could come back to our life here, looking for new work, working on cars and living on a tight budget. It has been a crazy year. With each of these huge changes there has been an amazing amount of burden and tension. Never have we had more “discussions.” Each of these changes is huge and high on the stress list and we have learned we process things at different speeds and in different ways.

But we have come through the fire stronger and surer of our marriage and love. There is no one else I’d rather have battled through life with, but my Peter.

As we wrap up our time here, I must brag about his accomplishments here. He is AMAZING! He built me cabinets, closets, rewired the house and the dryer (it has 2 plugs now a 110V and a 220V), painted the interior of the house, (he has to do all the trim work because I only have enough attention to be the roller!) installed new window frames, installed all the carpet upstairs and down, installed our water pump and put in a drain (3 times), repaired the car with nothing but a book and the tenacity to not give up. When I wanted a gazebo, he built it. He cut each board with a circular saw and put up my garden fence. When I wanted to paint the walls (again) he did it. When I wanted more cabinets and a tile countertop and the kitchen walls repaired and wall papered. He did it. When I was pregnant with Sierra, I was afraid to live here with a baby in just a log cabin with no insulation. Guess what? He went to UB, bought the stuff and he, Megan and Brian put it up. Our house is the warmest in the winter and the coolest in the summer! We have the best house in Sukhbaatar! When we arrived with our baby, there were no baby supplies to be found. Guess who built Weston’s high chair? Peter! Who carried all the stuff I wanted across both oceans and heaved heavy bags in airports worldwide? Peter! Who did all of this while teaching school, learning a language, doing church work in Mongolian and being a wonderful father? Peter! Thank you, thank you, thank you. I love you to bits!

I wrote this last Saturday

I like P90X. I’m surprised that I’ve enjoyed “hitting play every day.” This week I modified many moves to keep my joints safe and raise my strength level gradually. I really enjoyed it. Plyometrics and the strength DVDs are so hard, but doable. What makes it more possible than other workouts is that it’s a program so all I do is turn it on and do it! All I need is my computer, some bands, a yoga mat and good shoes.

There is a countdown at the bottom of the screen. It counts down the hour and the seconds for the exercise I’m doing. It’s strangely motivating. It’s great to think, “I have 8 more seconds, don’t give up!” and then I’m able to finish strong.

Tonight I did the DVD, Kenpo. It’s a lot of kicking and punching. It is the most fun. It’s hard if you “bring it” but it also adds a full range of motion and fluidity to the movements and feels good.

So I worked out 5 of 7 days this week and completed week one! 11 more to go! At week 3, I’m going to order some new equipment, a HR monitor and a pull up bar! Yep, my goal is one pull up! I’ve never done one in my whole life. At 34, I think it’s time. I will use the HR monitor to check that I’m working to capacity and not doggin’ it.

Things here are going fine. We were able to go through the whole house in one LONG day. We emptied out every closet, drawer, and every nook and cranny. We made the call whether it stayed her to be sold/ given away, or if it made the cut and went into the suitcase. By the end of the day we had 4 return suitcases that weighed 50 each. Pretty good- That even included my king sized bedding and kitchen aid and sewing machine. We don’t have that much to bring home, so I splurged and packed it all. I think we’ll pack a couple more with the remainder of the kid’s toys and scooters.

All the giveaway stuff is in the attic in bins. Today I started to lay it out like a garage sale and realized that it would be easier to just give stuff to families according to their needs. It was so fun. It was like Santa Clause. Peter and I went through all the stuff again and made a bag for every man, women and child we know. Baby clothes, rattles, bottles and blankets to babies, toys and 2T clothes to toddlers, make up and art supplies to teenage girls. Sweaters and cooking things to women. Warm gloves, hats and clothes to the men. To the more needy families, pillows, bedding, shoes for each. School age kids got school supplies in bulk. A doctor was given lots of medicine. An American bound teenager got a track suit and lots of CDs. It was way more fun than a garage sale. We were able to find meaningful things for each person and family. Now we will deliver them to people’s homes.

We will still invite over families to a meal and to pick out more stuff, but a huge bulk of stuff will be gone and meaningfully given.

Will you pray that the bigger stuff sells? We sent out an email and are trying to sell our car, libraries, kitchen stuff, appliances and treadmill. We could really use the money to settle in America. We’ll also post some pictures at the market in town and try to sell our couches, cabinets and some furniture.

Mongolia Day 4-8

Well I must say it's a blur!
Since I wrote last we were able to have a meal with some dear friends. They lived in Sukhbaatar with us for a year and they live in a different remote location now. They happened to be coming to UB, so we delayed a day so that we could see them and spend and evening together. It was wonderful. They have another new baby, #5. Whew! We had chicken at a Korean fast food place and then we walked back to the apartment for and let the kids play while we chatted until 10pm. It was wonderful.

The day after we took a taxi up here to SB. We all rode in the back seat of a toyota corrolla for 5 hours. It is a beautiful trip in the summer. We had PJB sandwiches. I was surprised to find a fresh salad with cucumbers and tomatoes and hard boiled eggs! Score! My new diet has been surprisingly easy to follow.

We arrive and there is no electricity at the house. We find a screw drivers and Peter starts taking the plyboard off the windows. A friend made us a pizza and a salad and we have a nice dinner.

Days 4-7
LOTS AND LOTS of decision making. We have gone through everything in the whole house. We put it in the trash, give away, sell or take to the USA piles. There is even a pile of things that we have named "useful garbage!" Since we have to burn our trash, we don't burn things that others could scavange and use. It feels crazy to have this catagory in my mind, but it is hard to burn up things that could be used in by someone that is needy enough to scavange. :) Things like hot water pitchers that don't heat, but that can still be used as a pitcher. Clothes that are too messed up to give away...

We had a big argument, no I mean dissussion, ha ha, about how to go about this. Peter wanted to invite people over and just open the cupboards and closets for them to find what they wanted. I couldn't imagine saying, "just go through the whole house!" So since I was the louder and more emotional and unbending one, we did it my way! We sorted through items room by room and then agreed to put everything that we were giving away upstairs. USA stuff directly into suitcases, trash directly burned and "useful garbage" in the garage to be taken to the dump.

We accomplished this in two days. Then I went upstairs.... whoa, what a lot of stuff! But honestly not as much as I thought we had. I began laying out a garage sale type of thing. Soon I realized that this was not going to go well. Then we decided to bag up things that we knew our friends needed. We have a whole room full of bags labeled with each person's name. It was so fun. It was like being Santa to decide what to give each person and family.

We also ran into all the new Peace Corp people. They train the whole new group up here every summer. So we stopped and invited them over. They chose gobs of stuff to take with them to help them get through their harrowing next two years. :)

Then today I organized the remainder of the stuff into bins. Adult clothes, kids clothes, kitchen, organizational supplies, medicine, holiday stuff, baby stuff, DVD/CDs, towels sheets, baby stuff...

The baby stuff was the hardest to go through for me. I chose a few special outfits to save and then just binned a baby girl/boy box.

Tonight we had Terri and her kids over for dinner. She was able to take 3 bins of stuff and it was great to see Weston's kindergarten curriculum and some nice clothes go to her family.

We also are trying to sell some things. The email went out to foreigners in Mongolia today and I got lots of replies. I sold the bed, bedding, stove, freezer, table, water filter, small appliances, maternity clothes, tent, baby stuff, ... YA. we made about $600 today! :) Will you pray for a buyer for our big items, treadmill, car, the wood stove and dryer? Thanks. We need to sell the big things to make it worth it to hire a truck and bring the rest of these small things down to UB.

Tomorrow I'll post pictures in the community. We have very worn couches, chairs, desks, water barrels, washer, small furniture that I'm selling for super cheap so that Mongolians will enjoy the item and the price. :) It will be good to get it gone though.

All I have left is the garage. I found gobs of stuff in there, almost buried in the dirt! Not really but it's major dirty and I need to wipe it down and get rid of it too.

This week we'll start inviting friends over. We'll give them the bags of things we chose for them as gifts, have a meal and let them go through stuff upstairs as well. I hope this part is done by the beginning of next week. I'm tired of thinking about all this STUFF.

How come we need so much STUFF?! I wish we didn't need so much stuff and that things didn't define us so much, but you know it does. That is why my bags are full of baby clothes for a baby I don't have, children's books the kids love to hear and I love to read, my bedding I splurged for in 2009 and don't want to leave behind, pictures, I'm even bringing my kitchen aid because it's worth it! :)

Well I better get out of cyber land and get back out to my cabin and be real "Tundra Mom" in the time I have left.

Night all. Have a great day!

Mongolia Wrap up Trip Day 1-3

I haven't been able to blog much here. We have been agonizing about our future plans and now that the news is out that we are leaving Mongolia to get help for Sierra, I feel that I can write again.

Making that decision has been a real struggle. We are still sure of our call to come here in 2005 and are glad to have been used of God in Mongolia for the last 6 years. We are thankful that there is a church here now. We had wanted to help with the church formation/discipleship stage of this ministry, but know that we cannot risk Sierra's speech and development.

Our dear girl has improved, but it very much at the phonic level. Meaning that she can properly produce sounds but not words. Everyone agrees our place is back in the US for now. We are looking forward to a great role with ReachGlobal and will share details asap.

For now, I want to use my blog here to remember this time of goodbyes in Mongolia.

Day one: Arrival in Mongolia. I can understand some of the plane announcements in Mongolian. We arrive and headed to the restroom with the kids. I notice the hand soap in an empty beer bottle on the sink. I smile. The simplicity is great after a year in complicated America. :)

We negotiate a cab and they load our bags. Sierra begins to scream as we enter the cab. She doesn't want a driver in with our family. :) We drive towards UB and smell the familiar coal smoke air. We are strangely comforted that we are home. Arriving at our guest apartment, ASCOM, we head up the flights of stairs with the HEAVY bags that I packed full of low-calorie canned veggies and high protein snacks. :) Peter is so happy with me! He loves the way I always travel light. LOL

We pass out after being awake 30 hours.

Day 2: We start the day at 3 am with PBJ sandwiches for the kids. They are wide awake and hungry. Gotta love jet lag. We are up for so long before we're able to make noise in the apartment. We plan the day, did summer school, read and prayed and took off. We walk 3 miles to our favorite Indian food cafe. YUMMO I love love love it. I could eat it everyday. I mix my Madrasi with a cucumber and tomato salad avoiding the wonderful rice and naan bread. I have one bite of each and thoroughly enjoy my spicy meal. We sit on pillows on the ground in a tent. fun.

We head to the state department store to get pictures for Sierra's new passport. Can you believe hers expires already? Her passport has a picture of her 2 days old. At the photographer, she starts screaming and screaming when the woman wants to take her picture. After 15 minutes of talking, disciplining and bribing to no avail. I ask the women to just take the picture.

It is the most horrible picture EVER. Her eyes are red, drool is running down her face and her mouth is contorted. We start laughing like mad when it's developed. She looks like a crazy person. Although she deserved to have that picture on her passport until she's ten, LOL, we knew she'd kill us for putting that on a legal document and she would be so embarrassed later! So since we don't want to scar her for life, we take a picture with our own camera. We should have thought of that 20 minutes ago, I blame jet lag entirely. We got it developed and it is very cute! :)

We got a taxi and drive home. We had a wonderful dinner with our friends the Sprengers. They are so amazing.

Day 3: We wake up and I begin P90X. Yes, this is crazy, but I need a focal point for the next 30-50 days of transition. I need a stable that will be the same world wide. I need a healthy output for all this stress. I got this for free from a friend. Opportunity knocked and I opened the door. I shred my body for 75 minutes. I am amazed I can even do the program, but I CAN! Thank you Lord. We did summer school again, this time starting the day at 4:30.

I think that homeschooling can work. I am drilling our family rule into the children- two words. NO COMPLAINING. It's working. Weston is challenging himself and begging for school. Today he read for 30 minutes when I only asked him for 10. Could that CAVA program really work for us?

We eat- the food that loaded the bags, is already a blessing. Yest I did bring a big block of frozen low-fat cheese. It makes eggs so much nicer. Peter smiles. I thank him again for carrying my insanity, but now he is truly thankful. We had nice USA powdered milk with our french pressed coffee.

We hop in yet another cab. We drive a LONG way to register. We fill out gobs paperwork for the recovering communist need for this many pictures, stamps and papers. We divide and conquer. He fills out the paper work. I wait in the foregners line. We wait and wait. We have a number. There are 47 people ahead of us. But this is ASIA--- no one is obeying the rules. I use my old basketball stills to block and box out the cutters... :) I get to the front of the line. She asks, "Where's your number?" I hand her the number and she says that I have to wait. I rudely tell her that no one else is giving her a number. She grudgingly takes my paperwork and Peter gently takes over. We joke that she probably wrote a note on my passport to fine me at the airport or something. We recall the Seinfeld where Elaine get's the word "difficult" written on her medical chart. I'm sure my passport says, "DIFFICULT!" HA HA--- that is for you T.

We hop in our cab, he's been waiting. We pay 40 dollars to the taxi to arrive at a cafe. We eat in a hurry. We hop in another cab.

We direct him to the Embassy to get Sierra's passport. We are sworn in and she is cleared to get a renewal. We walk along the river. We see a group of boys splashing in filthy water in the wash. Weston begins to yell, "it's too dirty. They shouldn't swim in that water." At the same time Sierra starts yelling one of her favorite words, "Poo Pool.... I want poo" She wants to swim in the same filthy water that is giving our son a panic. We have to instruct Weston that these boys swim there because that is the only time they'll get to swim and they are happy to see water after seeing ice for all those months and to remember to think and be polite before screaming at others. AND we coax Sierra away, while she screams and cries because she wants to swim in the mud puddle. :)

Ah the joys of parenting international kids!

continued thoughts on educating the children

So anyhow, I have been at a loss about what to do with the children next year.

I'm feeling extreme pressure about Sierra's growth in the coming year. This is her last year before kindergarten and I feel I have to give her every chance to excel. However that is going to have to include the state services for her speech and the special education side of the public school system. I am not thrilled with the options that I have heard about; because if I send her to public preschool so that she can get the speech therapy, her education and environment will suffer. This area of the state is not renown for its schools! ;)

However financially continuing to pay for private therapy and school are not an option.... so my search had begun.

With Weston, I'm not thrilled with the idea of sending him to school from 8am-3pm. I think he would self combust. In addition to those long hours, his homework is very time consuming. By the time it's completed, I am dismayed that he has no time to be a kid. So I am looking for options for him as well.

I have been wrestling with the idea of homeschooling, but i need A LOT of support to feel successful in that venture and I need accountability to do an excellent job.

Well yesterday all of this thought came together. I was talking with the speech therapist about my ideas and learned that they have some students that receive their speech therapy there and it is paid through the state and the special ed program!

How? Their mothers homeschool them through the charter public school, called CAVA!! Since the school has no brick and mortar location, the state refers these students to existing speech therapists, and one of them is Lucid, the apraxia specialist!!!!

This makes it possible for Sierra to continue at the specialist on the state's dime!!!!

So I came home and looked into the school and guess what I found!? The CAVA charter school has adopted the K12 curriculum that Bill Bennett helped develop, that I really like!!! Click here for the webpage, if you want to see more.

I called the number and got an incredibly helpful women who explained the system to me. If I decide to enroll the children, they will be in the public school system. I will be their "learning coach" and they will school at home. They will be assigned a teacher who does the planning, grading, attendance, and report cards. She/He will be available by phone or email whenever I need help. If Weston or Sierra needs help and I am not able to teach them, she will arrange a meeting at the library to go over the lesson with them.

In addition to all of this support, the state gives me all the curriculum, art supplies, science materials, musical equipment, etc and possibly even a computer for the children's educational needs. Everything is delivered to my door!

Sierra would be arranged into the Special Education system, would be tested through the state and her IEP (instructional education plan) would be organized and she would be able to utilize California's special ed system, but I would have a say where she would get her services, and could choose a specialist! YES!

However, she is not five before December 2nd, so she cannot be enrolled in kindergarten. I thought all this thought and effort had been dashed on the rocks. Until this blessed women told me, "You can enroll her in kindergarten the day after her fifth birthday." December 16th she could start CAVA at home with me and begin the special education journey from the safety of our home and our continual care and planning of her therapy and education-- FOR FREE!

So ya, I'm a little stoked by this option. I am a little afraid too, because homeschooling these monkeys is a HUGE commitment, but that is what I'm here to do. Oh, the joys and fears of motherhood!

So we'll see....