April 23, 2010

  • The Newest Revelation

    I don’t think there is anything that hasn’t gone wrong with this apartment anymore.  A few days ago one of the two breakers in our electrical box kept tripping and putting us completely in the dark.  Then finally around bedtime on Wednesday night, it gave out and couldn’t be flipped back on.  So, our trip to BA on Thursday to try and clear up the name complications with my DNI(AR document) were thrown out the window and we waited around for the electrician Brian called to stop in.  He stopped in, said he’d be back in an hour, he was back in 3 or so and then found the short in one of the wires.  It was in the bathroom.  And so maybe there was a short in there from Tuesday when our upstairs neighbor turned on the waterpump to pump the water up to the tank on top of their place….and forgot about it and left to pick up their daughter from school.  The water was overflowing from the tank for about 20 minutes.  And we had water trickling into our bathroom from two holes….one’s a vent in the ceiling and the other a hole in the wall for electrical wiring purposes.   So, the guy came back today to get everything rewired and we are back in business with even an extra light working over the couch that hasn’t worked for like a year now.  Oh, but our tv doesn’t work, it apparently got fried from all that breaker flipping(there is a possibility of it getting fixed).  And all this really didn’t bother me…..and these may possibly be some reasons. 

    A. I don’t expect anything less from this place anymore…..everything has fallen apart in this apartment….except for the walls.  (And we are still looking and PRAYING to find a new place for us to rent.)
    B. God’s Grace 
    C. While the lights were out all morning, I was distracted by how much I hate how certain things are taught or not being taught to Malachi at school…..homework for a 6 year old should NEVER take 2 hours, and it isn’t even a language issue!!!!!!!!  It makes me want to home-school.  I really wish I fully understood the Philosophy of Education at this school.  Brian and I will meet with his teacher in the near future, but I have to get all my thoughts together first and then translate them into Spanish and then hope that we understand what all she’ll say back to us. BTW, his teacher is great….but everything is just different…and I wish I fully understood how it is different!!!
    D.  Maybe, just maybe God brought the excitement of a new revelation to me to distract me….we’ve discovered Brian is not an INFJ personality like we thought….he is in fact an ENFJ.  The guy is an extrovert.  And this new revelation makes me fall in love with him all over again.  I know, it sounds weird, but our team has been discussing each of our personalities for a few months now, and the INFJ just never really fit Brian, but I couldn’t exactly figure out why……and so through some discussing and talking and realizing Brian talks outloud about everything….his thoughts, his ideas….to himself, to me, to anyone who will listen…..and the guy meets people wherever we go, and influences and encourages people and empathizes with people and loves people and would help anyone who needed it if there is any possible way he can.  And so…..the restlessness I was having about him being an INFJ is finally at peace.  My relationship with him makes sense again…….and I’m thankful for this revelation and all the conversations and growth our relationship will have because of it.  

April 13, 2010

March 31, 2010

  • Put Back in Place

    Just had the best date I’ve had in awhile…….Brian and I outside, under the stars, sitting back-to-back on an old tire, listening to the crickets chirping and the breeze gently blowing the branches on the trees.  It made me think of the weeping willow tree rustling during breezy night walks around the island in WL, you know the tree by the dock across from the castle house?  I love nighttime walks on coolish breezy nights.  I just love sitting under the stars and smelling the nighttime air under the bright moonlit sky.  I love it.  It is a reminder that this world is bigger than me and my crazy thoughts and feelings. 

March 29, 2010

  • She’s Back

    Nosy Neighbor Lady came back for a visit today, in the middle of my sweaty work-out, she knocked on my door.  This time all she did was hand me the vent that had fallen out of the hole that vents our heater.  Thank you neighbor lady.  And she certaintly isn’t the nosiest neighbor we’ve ever had. Here’s a throw back story for you, circa fall of 2000, we were living in North Beach, MD.  We had two new puppies, Moe and Curly.  And every morning I’d put them outside on chains to do their business…..on opposite ends of the yard so that they wouldn’t get all tied up.  Every morning I’d see an old man from somewhere down the street walking his cat.  Yes…his CAT!!  Every morning I’d leave and Brian would wake up a half hour later and bring the puppies inside and feed them.  So, one night we both got home from work and found a citation from the Calvert County Sheriff’s office saying we were being cited for animal mistreatment because our puppies were left outside too long and their was “proof” of them trying to get away because of bite-marks on a wooden post.  WHAT?????  Does the Calvert County Sheriff’s office have nothing else better to do?  Does my neighbor who walks his cat every morning giving us the evil eye have anything better to do with his time than to call about leaving our dogs outside for a half hour all by themselves!!!!!  Okay, so we never knew who really called, but come on, it had to be the crazy guy who walked his cat, no one else laid an eye on us while we lived there.  Oh, and the bite marks on the wooden post were WAY too high for any of our puppies to have made them.  It was from the previous tenants’ dog.  Crazy, nosy neighbors.  And that non-sense was brought to you because I don’t have much of anything else to write about.  Well, it would be good to mention that Malachi lost his first tooth on Friday.  He was so excited and adorable about it all.  Brian’s made up a hilarious story about the Tooth Fairy and of course, the boys believe it……for now.  And Elijah went to a birthday party on Saturday.  The family let Brian stay since we are new to all this…..and he got to chat with some other parents.  Then on Sunday a parent of one of the kids in Elijah’s class called, asking him to come over and play.  I’m not ready for this!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  We aleady had plans, so it was a no.  But, I don’t know when there will be a yes and I don’t know when I’ll/we’ll be ready to leave any of our kids at a birthday party without us.  Parenthood is SOOO difficult. 

March 19, 2010

  • I’m Dying for Lack of Creativity

    and spontaneity. So, I spontaneously went through some pictures I already have printed and started to scrapbook for Elijah’s book, for the first time in a year and a half. It’s very satisfying, but I NEED MORE THINGS TO CREATE!!!!!!! And I have to clean everything up and put it away. I’m still mentally rearranging and rearranging and rearranging our place to figure out a way I could have a creative space, but nothing has worked out yet…in my brain. I’ve recently been drooling over some knitting websites, I hope to some day dive into that. Honestly, whenever I see ANYTHING on ANY website that someone has made….I think I could do that. The death of not creating is very slow, and very painful, and draining, and discouraging and the lack of personal space to create is SOMETHING I have GOT to figure out. Because making two scrapbook pages isn’t gonna hold me over for another year and a half.

March 13, 2010

  • I Do, in fact, Live and Drive in Another Country

    Driving is crazy here.  The other day on the drive home from the boys’ school,  annoyingly, I stalled out several times because there were SO many motorbikes(sometimes w/2 adults and 1-2 kids), bicyclists(sometimes w/ 1 adult and 1-2 kids), horse drawn carts, cars going 5mph, buses, and pedestrians in/on the road and going from stopped to first gear is SO difficult for me.  I’m slowly getting the hang of it.  I’ve squealed my tires many times to AVOID stalling.  And the traffic circles here don’t work anything like the states, they are pure insanity, but I’m getting it.  And really every intersection without a stoplight is stopational, which I now really like because I hate stopping while driving a stick….as I’ve already mentioned it is way too easy for me to stall out.  You just slowdown, look both ways and gun it through the intersection.  This whole last year, as Brian has driven us everywhere, every trip in the car I close my eyes several times and take deep breaths to try and relieve my stress.  Now I’m the driver and incessantly tell my kids that they cannot talk AT ALL and Zekey doesn’t like to follow that rule.  But we’ve survived, and I lecture the boys everytime we stop about how they have to stay quiet and not play with the seatbelts or windows or ANYTHING that makes any kind of noise in the backseat.  Oh to have those days of separation in a minivan, it kept fights down to a minimum.  =)

    Brian flies out of Columbus on Monday and arrives on Tuesday.  We miss him, we’re ready to have him back. 

    Tonight, while eating dinner at 7:30pm—which is WAY too early by an Argentine’s clock—-there was a knock at our door.  I answered it and discreetly kept the door semi-closed, so as to not show that we were eating dinner and that all my boys were in their underwear, I had this conversation with a neighbor lady……translation included.

    Neighbor Lady:  Whatever happend to your dog last night?
    Me:  We don’t have a dog.
    Neighbor Lady:  Yeah, but I heard him crying all night.
    Me:  We’ve never had a dog.  We don’t have any animals.
    Neighbor Lady:  I heard him crying all night, right in there, in your gate.
    Me:  We don’t have a dog.  Our neighbors upstairs have a dog (whom I didn’t hear at all last night.)
    Neighbor Lady:  But I saw a dog under your gate. 
    Me:  We don’t have a dog. 
    Neighbor Lady:  Okay, well I’m sorry to bother you, I just wanted to make sure the dog was okay.

    Bye-bye neighbor lady, who looks under my gate and when we first moved here, watched us pull up to our house(with our whole family) as she was looking in our gate and knocking on our door to make sure the baby that was crying in our house was not taken from it’s Mama.  Oh my goodness.  Bye-bye neighbor lady. 

March 9, 2010

  • I dropped  the boys off  and picked them up at school…..it all went well.  Before we left, Malachi said, “Mama, you are gonna drive us to school today.  We’ll make sure to be quiet while you drive.”  And for the most part they were quiet.  Zekey started something with Elijah, but we got it settled pretty quickly. 

    Yesterday, we almost fully completed the steps to getting our in-country documents.  Everything was turned in and in process….except the new guy mis-typed my name.  He put in my married name and he was supposed to use my maiden name….yes, I’m Tara Susan Denise Fallin again…..so WEIRD to sign that again.  And so I have to make an appointment to go back to some other office and change it and then possibly go back to Migraciones to make sure it is changed and in process.  UGH!!!!  But, the rest of our family is in process. 

    Brian’s flight made it to Columbus. His sister and nieces were skipping school today and meeting him in Columbus to shop for a shirt and tie(those are in storage in MD) and grab some lunch and then head to the viewing.  I’m so glad he gets to see them….and sad we don’t get to.  =(

    And just reading all the various posts about the lives afftected by Dr. Plaster, it is amazing how much God used this one man to shepherd, encourage and lead so many lives.  There are countless numbers of men he’s met with through the years….counseling them through their disillusioned lives and leading those men to be leaders of truth.  And I love that this man did practical shepherding….like physically teaching these men to baptize.  Something he did with Brian and evidently did with many young men.  Many of you may not know the tale of Brian’s life, but God used Dave Plaster to save Brian from the miry pit, Brian’s sophomore year of college was leading down a dark path of throwing in the towel on Christ and life as he knew it. And through some orchestrated events only done by God,  Dave and Brian met every Wednesday night for 4 years.  This man’s life has changed the course of our family forever.  He married Brian and I 10 and 1/2 years ago and Elijah’s middle name is David after Dr. Plaster. He will be missed by so many. 

March 7, 2010

  • Just sticking to the facts……

    Today I drove to Wal-mart ALL BY MYSELF.  I only stalled out once and had complete independence.

    Tomorrow we go back to Buenos Aires to try and get our identifications.  We’re hoping it works.

    Tomorrow night Brian flies back to the states to arrive into Columbus on Tuesday.  He’ll be in the states for  the week to go to all of Dave Plaster’s viewings and memorials.  He wanted to leave a week ago, but couldn’t because of trying to do this paperwork in B.A.  I really wish we could have all gone to say goodbye to the man whom God used so mightily in Brian’s life. 

March 5, 2010

  • Third Times a Charm, right?

    On Wednesday, we went back to B.A. to turn in our paperwork to get our DNIs (our in-country IDs).  First, we stopped at the mall and ate some Subway (yeah, can you believe it????) and then went to the building of Migraciones.  We waited and waited, but just figured everyone was on their lunch break, since there were no attendants sitting behind the desks and no numbers were being taken.  Then the attendants all gathered in a circle and got back to their desks and a flury of numbers flashed on the number sign.  We got up to the desk and was told their system was down and we’d have to come back on Monday.  So, we’ll take our third trip on Monday.  Maybe we’ll pass by the Starbucks again.  We had frappucinnos this last time….yummy. 

    Today Elijah told me that while at school, when his teacher asks him a question and he doesn’t understand her, he says, “QUE?”  (with much expression and volume…LOL)……which means “WHAT?”