The Quarantine Life

Departure day is always exciting and sad.  We had a wonderful summer and we were excited to head back to our home and to Matt, but goodbyes are so hard.  We took solace in our traditional last Tex-Mex meal at Mama Juanita's though!

International travel during Covid has never been fun but this particular part is especially annoying.  After we went through the process of checking in, Qatar airlines had to contact someone in Jakarta to verify our visas by email.  Even though we knew to expect this and arrived over 3 hours early for our flight, sitting around in the check in area for an hour was still excruciatingly slow. Thank goodness for our bacon cooler that doubled as a bench!

Goodbye, Houston! Thanks for a wonderful summer!

Hello, Jakarta! Ready to start year 5!

Let's Vaccine!

The process was so different at the airport since we were headed to quarantine instead of home. It was eerily quiet and we had to meet several different representatives to show our vaccines and hotel arrangements. Our driver met us but was only able to take our excess luggage home. But we were still happy to see his big smile as usual and tell him a quick hello! A taxi took us to quarantine.

We arrived at the Shangri-La and were ushered in a back door into a side room where we got our first PCR test and checked into the hotel.  Then we took the designated quarantine elevator to our connecting rooms for the week.  The exercise bike was a very welcome sight!

My room, where I hid out all day while the kids did school.

I had a 1,000 piece puzzle to occupy some time.

I also had a suitcase from home with some workout gear so I could stay active each day.

I also read two books and started my first adult paint by number.  It was surprisingly fun and satisfying!

The living room was such a wonderful area for us to eat and play.

It was also Ben's school area so it was his domain during the day. So nice for the kids to attend school during daylight hours again! And the jet lag was so much easier because of our crazy night schedule.

We found a lot of creative ways to pass the other hours during the day.  Hide and seek was pretty fun, until we'd used up all the hiding spots and they got too easy to find.  Then we started closing the curtains and playing in the dark...it was so much fun!

We also played with rubber darts a LOT.  Big hotel windows are perfect for suction darts!

Alex did his school in the boys' bedroom.  It was great having separate rooms for them to concentrate.

Our meals were delivered in the hallways three times a day.  Scheduling them was quite an issue because there was a 2-hour window for each meal and it took several days to convince everyone that we really needed our breakfast at 7am before school. We were alone on the floor for a few days until someone moved in directly across the hall.

Meals were pretty hit or miss.  Our only choice was Asian or Western, but we would have no idea what was arriving.  I did learn quickly that every meal would be loaded with carbs, though.  Tons of pasta, rice, potatoes, and bread.  Usually two meat options.  Some, like this one, were delicious.

Some meals were a little less appetizing! Thankfully we had PB&J and lots of snacks from Texas.

We did order room service twice just to get exactly what we wanted and enjoy something tasty.

I washed our one set of real silverware and our few plates in the sink every day.

I finished the puzzle on our last full day! Just in time to take it apart and pack it up.

Our view was beautiful at night and it was pretty fun just watching life happen below us all day.

We had PCR tests again on day 7 and got the results early on day 8.  Suddenly we were just regular hotel guests and were able to walk out and check out at the front desk. It felt weird after feeling like prisoners all week! But I have to say that our week was memorable and fun and I loved the time we spent together. 

We got home on Saturday and had a happy reunion with Matt. No better place to kick off another year than at Union, where our family of four still had to sit at two separate tables..ha!  Looking forward to another great year in Indonesia.

 

Back to School

Because of a major Covid outbreak and subsequent lockdown in Jakarta, the kids and I decided to spend an extra month in Houston. With no chance of school opening in person and not much to do in Jakarta, we voted to enjoy some more fun with our family in friends.  I was pretty happy to celebrate my birthday with Grammy and Grumpy (and Tommy) instead of in hotel quarantine!

We enjoyed church in person and had a great time at the Cidercade with Aunt Amanda...it was full of throwback and modern video games for one flat price.  Hours of fun!

Indoor putt-putt was fun as well and sure beat being out in the August heat.

The boys had a different first day of school this year. We were still in our Airbnb and they insisted on attending classes live, so school started at 7:30pm and run until 2:30am (middle school) and 3:00am (high school).  The first few days were rough but they started sleeping until 12-1pm and it got much easier.  Lunch/second dinner happened around 10:30pm-12am, then I would head to bed because I was still awake by 7:30am.  It wasn't perfect, but these determined boys made it work!  Here's to 8th and 10th grades and another unique school year!

The new school schedule didn't leave a lot of time for activities but at least things were pretty empty when we went! The boys loved rock climbing and continued to go twice a week.

I joined the YMCA and had a wonderful time working out in classes again.  I could hit the gym, buy groceries, and relax by the pool before the boys even woke up!

We had some last laughs with the Hesters and even made smores on the stove since the grill wasn't working!

One last cookie cake when our days were numbered. Why not celebrate a Tuesday?

We had a little more active fun, part of my requirement of our vampire schedule.  Again, we were about the only people at Top Golf in the middle of the day and we really enjoyed it.

On our last day at the rock wall, both boys conquered the bouldering overhang! They really developed some strength from all their work.

We started the sad work of clearing out the pantry and wrapping up our extra-long summer.  One happy chore was to make sure the ducks enjoyed all the rest of their oatmeal.

Fun with Friends

Matt was able to stay a full 3 weeks this year by doing some remote work and get his second vaccination.  Of course, the weeks flew past and all too soon it was time for him to head back...but not exactly when we expected.  Because of a visa mix up, he didn't leave on his scheduled flight and had to take an Uber back home.  But the good news for us was that we got a bonus night together! We found a great race track on Saturday morning and had some fun.

We also had time to get ribs at McKenzie's...definitely made this guy happy! Then we dropped him at the airport again and he started his long trip back.

On Sunday, the Dulaneys arrived and we had a much overdue reunion with one of our favorite couples! They are always so much fun and such wonderful people...we had a wonderful few days playing and laughing together.

We all went to the Armstrong's for dinner and had a wonderful evening with a rowdy game of dominoes.

We kept up our perfect streak on esape rooms! Couldn't have done it without these two.

A few days after they left, Hope and her boys came to town as well and we got a chance to catch up with part of another favorite family. Thank goodness this Airbnb had lots of sleeping space to accommodate all of our friends and family passing through...it was wonderful being able to stay in one place and enjoy our friends' visits! 

Both of the boys took rock climbing after school this past year, one of the few activities they were able to enjoy until the rock wall closed because the inspector couldn't fly in from Singapore.  We were very happy to find Climb Woodlands just around the corner and found a great air-conditioned place to work out some energy.

It's a small place and not too crowded, so we took advantage of the space many times over the summer.

It even has a ropes course, but it became less interesting as their endurance for climbing increased.

With Jakarta in the midst of its worst Covid outbreak to date, we decided to spend an extra month in Texas and enjoy all the freedoms.  Instead of packing up towards the end of July, we took our fully vaccinated selves to an Astros game with the Hesters!

The Saturday night game against the Texas Rangers was a full house.  At first, I was a little freaked out because we hadn't been around thousands of people in about 18 months, but then we relaxed and enjoyed how NORMAL it was to be at a baseball game!

Meanwhile at home, I started a 2,000 piece puzzle.

It was slow going by myself with a little help from Alex.

After a few hours with Grammy and Stacey helping, suddenly it looked possible!

We spent a night in Katy to catch up with old neighbors and friends.  My night out with the ladies!

And the next day we took Ryan and Presley to Typhoon Texas and the kids had a great time catching up and enjoying their favorite waterpark.

Farah invited me to play golf and I had my first round ever without a caddie! We had a lot of fun together, lost plenty of balls, and finished 9 holes in exactly 2 hours.  Not bad for two non-golfers who've only recently started playing.

We had a cheering squad and two willing drivers along with us as well.

After several more days of work, we finally finished the puzzle!

Well, almost...turns out it was only a 1,999 piece puzzle.  I spent so much time looking for this piece that was probably missing from the start.  It was a free-to-me puzzle, so I can't complain because the rest was tons of fun.

Alex solved the problem for us.