No training wheels!

I have to report, our experience post-balance bike, is that balance was much much better on the bike with pedals. He was very insecure at first, and we wondered, but given a gentle slope and the encouragement of older brother on his bike, we think we've clicked, just in time for our trip to Cape Cod where we're staying near the big long bike path. It felt a lot shorter learning time than for big brother, who didn't have the balance bike.

Re-learning the buses

We had quite an intimate relationship with the buses, when we first arrived here, before school and work started. They have cut 'our' bus route to one every 2 hours, which makes them considerably less useful, but today we took a bus into town, because I realised, I need to relearn the buses...
Very different without a pram! We made our first foray into the boys sharing a light backpack between them and taking it in turns to carry.
There are a few tweaks required (ie, don't sit at bus stop for 30 mins, pack more food, think up somewhere to hang while we wait for the next bus, take bread for ducks at dock, take passports to enter statehouse), but it is a start. It was lovely to be in town again, but a little frustrating, as the boys don't do browsing in shops so well just yet. So close but so far!!
Watch this space for the attempt at the library next week.

More boxes...

This is our lounge room at the moment, in the thick of the Summer holidays/vacation. All empty boxes (and there were a few lying around!) have been pressed into service to make a sort of very organic cubby house. As I took this photo, there was a small boy rooting through his car collection inside. The plan is to recycle as boxes get destroyed, but because we're coming up to another birthday, there are boxes arriving most days, as we work out birthday presents. Another one was added this morning, I can't tell where. But it was very exciting.
Before it was a cubby house, these were all the wall of a fort, that gradually moved until most of the loungeroom was fort. But the cubby house involves the kitchen, dragged up from the basement, the new coffee table, and a dark spot where the torches are used, as well as a container of cars and two steps that used to be used in the bathrooms, so I think it is going to last longer than the wall of the fort.

The White House

The front lobby with piano

The lovely paintings in the red room

The dining room

Hubby did research and discovered we could apply to visit the White House! Not all, just the ground floor with the official rooms. We applied three months ahead,  It was quite a stretch, security wise, no bags, waterbottles, toilets, anything - we decided to drive and pay for parking so we'd have food and water for before and after! We were able to take photos though, as of 2015.
We're glad we did it, but maybe not again? It felt good to have made the effort, but at the same time, it was an empty, beautiful, sterile set of rooms. Vaguely familiar because we've seen various photos in the media of official meetings and functions.
Mr 4's favourite bit was apparently the bit where we stood on the mat and the dog sniffed us...(before going in, everyone passes through a room where a dog sniffs you, not sure what for)
Mr 6 wobbles between the chandeliers in general, and the blue room.
My favourite bit was all the beautiful paintings on the walls - there were some really nice landscapes of different bits of America.

Egyptian Art

Soo... pre-lunch, when I am having my hangry session in the kitchen, trying to put together sandwiches for everyone without losing my cool, Mr 6 decides he needs to do Art.
I made many many speeches about what I was doing, and why I was doing it, and why it was unreasonable to expect me to drop everything and help with something that he had started on his own, and now expected me to drop everything and help with, and how I was hungry, and needed to eat [very badly], and we could look at it after lunch. And eventually got through, probably because I said I'd look after lunch.
And after lunch we had a very constructive half and hour, and succeeded in making a poster of an Egyptian person as per the picture in the book, for dad to be surprised by when he came home. I am particularly proud of the head, that I drew freestyle. (while looking at the picture in the book).

Australian Liquorice

Hooray! Darrell Lea Liquorice has made it to America, even better, to Trader Joes!! It is a bit chunkier and softer than the stuff I remember in the brown paper bags, but it is made in Australia, and tastes great. I think I'm banned from doing the grocery shop for a while, because I came home with that, as well as 500g of chocolate from Belgium.

Things I will miss about America

I wrote this in September last year. But most of it still stands.

Here is a mid term list of things I will miss when we go home:
Maple syrup (real and cheap)
Bagels
Berries (and pick your own farms)
Farm peaches
Access to Smithsonian Museums
Snow (in the street! outside your front door! Making summer worthwhile!)
Easy access to Ikea
LLBean
Free/cheap parking (even at the airport)
College sport
So much to see, without travelling very far! And the country isn't trying to kill you!
Competition in the supermarket industry
Clear delineated seasons, and activities
The space (in this particular area...)

Things I won't miss
Having to sign my life away every time we see a certain medical professional - two pages, initial every paragraph, sign at the bottom...all just to acknowledge that I'm going to pay them.
The underlying tension of existence - having to have enough healthcare, having to save for kids college, school not being the simple, put them in the primary school down the road choice. The pressure to get ahead because the future seems uncertain. Combined with a huge consumer culture that sells you everything and anything. Except contentment, it seems.
Having to pay employer taxes for employing a babysitter (and get an employer number, and withhold federal taxes... all complicated.)
Pavements being intermittent and optional. So you can walk some places, but other places you can walk halfway there and then the pavement runs out.

Things in Australia that I miss
Being able to walk up the road to a friends house (several friends houses, actually). Mostly here, we have to drive.
Understanding the contents of an ingredients list
Understanding all the cultural references that pop up (I have to take notes then walk away and Google some things sometimes)
The smell of eucalyptus trees
Good beaches within driving distance
Proper bread (not soft, not sweet, not with molasses in it...)