10 Things I Learned in April

Something about the strangeness of this season made me dust off the old blog and wrote a "Ten Things I Learned In April" post. Enjoy!

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I learned that "100's & 1000's" is Australian for "sprinkles."

I learned that homeschooling is doable. Though if I didn't have a husband jumping in for significant chunks, I would possibly die or go insane.

I learned that my first grader doesn't know what pennies and dimes are. Everyday, Grace was breezing through the math portion of her homeschool morning until we got to the page where her American workbook not-helpfully-for-expat-kids used pennies and dimes to explain the concept of ones and tens. Grace was just confused until I pulled out a 10 baht and 1 baht coin and explained it that way.

I learned why the label "model minority" is harmful to Asian-Americans. Shout out to episode 72 on anti-Asian racism during the pandemic on one of my favorite podcasts "The New Activist." So much goodness all over this podcast.

I learned that going to immigration is indeed boring and exhausting. Picture being at the DMV from 7am to 2pm. That's what going to immigration is like. This time around though, we were hopeful that it would be somewhat fun since we've been stuck in our house/neighborhood for weeks. Nope. Exhausting. And I spilled Khao Soi on my dress. Buuut, we walked away with the six month visas we were needing, yay!

I learned that all three of my kids are still capable of getting sick even while under quarantine. Cora got a blistering rash on the back of her fingers from contact with a rove beetle which later got infected and necessitated a trip to the dermatologist. A couple weeks later, Grace mysteriously threw up. A couple days later, Isaiah threw up too. Impressive getting sick skills, children! (Update: and then in early May, Cora threw up, and then Isaiah threw up again, and then I was sick for a couple days with what I'll just call "the opposite of throw up.")

I learned how to make orange marmalade. It was REAL good. Though I suppose it doesn't look so good after all that talk about throwing up.

I learned that a large (3x2 meters!) inflatable pool provides HOURS of entertainment for my kids. Happy kids, happy parents!

I learned about the wonders of slow television. When the days are just so long, we turn on slow tv and leave it playing in the background of our day. So far, we've ridden a train for eight hours over the mountains in Norway, hiked for an hour through a forest in Sweden, followed indigenous Sami women on a two hour reindeer sleigh journey above the arctic circle in wintertime (it ends with the Northern lights!)

I learned that I can cut my husband's hair. And not just some ugly hack job. It actually looks good.