Now and Then

So I'm back.  I've been back.  Just finally feel like I'm really back because I have almost caught up with my life (sort of).  Last weekend was fantastic.  This time last week I was catching up with five beautiful, amazing women who all got to know a very different me than the me I was before I had a 3rd child, became a stay-at-home-mom and moved across the Atlantic Ocean.  It is hard to remember the me I was before, even for me and I have not always been sure that I like the new me, but I have grown on me. :) 

The First of our Girls' Nights In

I met each of these women in Belgium.  Two of them met my husband before they met me and one of them I first "met" via e-mail.  An e-mail that went sort of like "HELP!!! I really don't even know what or where Belgium is because I didn't really pay that much attention in World History or Geography.  Do they have diapers there?" 

She helped me A LOT.  She didn't laugh at me.  She had been there three years and stayed another two.  She had a baby there (one who is exactly four months older than Sarah) and she has two older children who went to local school there and who now are fluent in both English and Flemish.  She continued to be my friend as I went through a lot.  I felt like a crazy person so much of the time and I can only imagine what I looked like on the outside.  She also went through a lot in the time I knew her there and I really regret now that I wasn't in a position to really listen and be there for her.  I was barely staying afloat myself.  They moved away last summer leaving us with our dearly loved turtle (the one I almost buried alive).

                                                              A Glimpse of Her Martha Stewart Gift
Another one, moved to Belgium about 3 months before we did.  She had my husband over to her amazing home for Easter.  We did a lot of celebrating with these women and she has the Martha Stewart gift that I admire, but don't have.  She has two children and they were both in school the whole time they lived there.  We came very close to being neighbors, but we didn't know that until later.  We spent lots of time on the phone when we were living there while hers were in school and she tolerated the yelling, crying, whining in the background at my house.  She always gives the greatest gifts.  I have so many of those gifts as reminders of her in my home including a picture that she took of Hannah and I that my lovely sister-in-law printed and framed for us one Christmas.  They also moved away last summer.

And the friend who picked me up at the airport last weekend, the one who's mothering style of pure energy I admire so much, I met at church one Sunday.  I think she arrived around the same time we did.  Also with three kids and one just a month older than Sarah.  I was in a fog by the time I met her.  I can remember that fog and it makes me sad, but these friends are a huge part of the reason I got out of it.  She and I didn't get to talk on the phone as much or spend as much time together as I'd have liked to because of the similarities in our lives and the distance between our houses.  Different communes, different schools,  yet both managin naps, meals, kids and traveling husbands...hard.  But I have so many fond memories just the same.  Another move that happened last summer.

She's On the Far Left

The hostess of the weekend (her parents own the condo we stayed in) I met when she had just her son.  Her daughter was born in Belgium and she has quite a story about why it is not the best idea to have a baby on a Belgian holiday (or weekend?--can't remember the details now).  Pain medication was apparently hard to come by even for a post-surgical mom.  She handled it well and I heard her tell another mom very diplomatically about her experience--she's sweet like that.  Her family moved very quickly away in the spring of 2009.  She's been back the longest.  She is the youngest of our group of girls (under 30) and I'm sure is tired of being reminded of that. I admire her style, her adorableness and most of all how mature she is in her faith.

Part of the Many Gifts Put Together by Each of the Other Girls--at one point the hostess turned to me and said, "What did you bring?" as the others' seemed to pull endless surprises form their suitcases.  Ummmmm....just myself!  "Surprise!"

And our birthday girl (is she not so adorable?), a big reason we were together and celebrating this month, I met through the other girls.  I can't remember exactly when her family arrived, but she was also a mom I had a hard time connecting with as much as I'd have liked because: three young kids (younger than ours), different communes, different schools...But still so many great memories.  Her family technically is not back in The States yet.  She came home for surgery and chemo last year and her family is such a testimony to our amazing God.  They are still going through so much and she is still herself.  She is the one who first said best what I tried to say in the opening paragraph about how these ladies met a different me.  She also felt like we were all knowing a different her than before she moved to Belgium.  She's doing great--and it was wonderful to see her doing great and to really hear about her family and what they are going through and how they are making it each day.  They are still living in limbo and she is handling it so well. 

An Old Pic (And I actually had many occasions to have pics of her and her children, but this one I thought was best and not candid)

There was one friend only with us in spirit this time as her flight to Florida would have required a passport.  (She's still in Belgium).  A friend I am pretty sure I first met at my house when she was still waiting on her things to arrive from home (again foggy time in my life)--with two small children at the time and now with three.  We were the lucky ones to have the expectant big sister and brother sleep over at our house just a little over two years ago (doesn't seem like it is possible that it was two years ago!).  She is still living the expat life and going through the emotional roller coaster of life there.  Wondering what might be next, saying goodbye to friends over and over.  Still enjoying travel and family visits and blogging so we can keep up with it all. She inspires me through her blog not only as an expat, but as someone who cooks and bakes well and as a mom.  (Each of these ladies has taught me so much just by being who they are--I'm so thankful!)
We missed her and we talked about her constantly (in a good way).  She is a part of the memories and the life we all had there and we all talked about calling her, but a time difference of six hours is hard to manage when we considered the life of a busy mom, even on a weekend.  She gave us a task.  Homework.  And we did discuss what she asked us to (thoroughly), but no one really took notes.  What we discovered is that there is no one answer to the questions--we all have different ones.  I can answer for myself.  What I miss most about life in Belgium is the friends.  I missed a lot of them even when I was in Belgium because so many of them left before I did.  That part isn't different.  I still miss the same people and more people.  And even just a short four months after returning, I know that  I will miss those types of friendships.  The kind where we get very close very quickly because we're bonded over something that is hard and different.  Forming those types of friendships normally takes a lot longer and I'm not sure that in this community it is even possible.  I don't get to walk up to random people here in Michigan and say, "Oh you speak English?  Thank goodness!  We're best friends now".  I guess I could, but I'm thinking it wouldn't go over so well and would possibly result in a restraining order.
As far as what I like best about being back home...it seems to change constantly.  There was a little honeymoon phase where I was just happy to be "home", in my own familiar country.  I was giddy to shop at Target whenever I want to.  I still have those moments--like today when I took the girls to Starbucks for the first time ever and we enjoyed three drinks for less than the price I paid for my one drink from the only Starbucks in Brussels, at the airport.  Slowly a lot of things I was thrilled about have become routine again and I'm sure that when it has been four years and not four months, it will be even more that way. 
I feel like I have come back to the same place, but in such a different stage of life that nothing is really the same.  I was running on the proverbial treadmill of life over three years ago when we lived here, but it was a very different running than I'm doing now.  I'm a very different person and our family is a very different family.
Honestly, I don't miss the accessibility of travel in Europe yet,--most of the women I was with who have been back a year or more seem to really miss that part so maybe it will come?  Really though, I think that it is still so fresh in my mind how even though Paris was just "right there" and we could have just gone for a day, we didn't do that very much.  We were busy there with regular life too.  Our daddy traveled so much for his job that he wasn't exactly begging to also travel on the weekend or every school break.  It cost a lot.  The reality of our lives there is still pretty fresh.

Four of us & the 3 Babies here are 3 Big Girls Down Below

Two of Us Managing 8 Kids--Making Cards for the New Baby Sister (Just "Baby" until they were surprised at the hospital)

The New Year's Eve We All Made it Until 12 AM-And Were All Gone By  12:03

We Like to Celebrate Birthdays And Snuggle Each Other's Babies--Even When One Of Us Has to Stay Home with a Tummyache :(

Some Of Us Only Have a Picture of the Ice Bar in London With Our Eyes Closed Because Others Of Us Haven't Yet Shared Our Pictures, Ahem. :)

Not Babies Anymore--All Turning 4!

The reality of being here is slowly sinking in as well.  I can remember thinking about how there are so many places in this great big country of ours that I haven't visited yet and so many places I want to visit as a family.  Travel is no big deal.  A flight across the country is super easy compared to a travel across the ocean.  But... we're busy.  Weekends have quickly become full and life quickly became expensive.  Our daddy is still gone much of the time and needs some down time in his life.  For us, though, that's okay.  I like home and I like our lives.  We never say never about moving again.  It has been hard and emotional for all of us, but we never say never about doing the expat thing again either.  We've all changed and been through a lot, but we like the new us.

This post is a lot longer than I intended and there is so much more I left out.  The details of the weekend are very well documented in photos, but not on my camera and the share site we set up on Shutterfly will wait until the friend who has the pictures has time in her busy life to upload the ones that we didn't have time to transfer.  We wanted to make the best use of our time together and I think we did.  We laughed and talked and learned so much about each other.  We also learned that friendships like these pick up right where they left off no matter how much time has passed.  It was a beautiful celebration of friendship, a 40th birthday, husbands who did an awesome job of taking care of children (fruit roll up, hot dog and churro breakfasts included), and girlfriends.  Our last night together was very middle schoolesque--we took silly pictures of ourselves wearing facial masks & matching shirts, signed each other's "Pray For The Cure" Bibles, ate junk food and watched a lame movie.  We stayed up too late, drank a lot, got sunburned and did absolutely nothing productive in the days before.  We attempted to sleep in, but some how the sunshine shining in our eyes always won out and we were up drinking strong coffee and laughing just as early as we would have been if we'd been home (or earlier).  We wrote down recipes, book recommendations and websites.  There is also a list of quotes from the weekend floating around somewhere.  We learned so much from each other as moms and we made a commitment to be more intentional (the word of the weekend borrowed from our resident mom of a teen) about keeping in touch and doing this again. 

Sweet memories.  I'm blessed to know these women and to have shared the experiences we shared in another country that I hope I'll never forget. Even the hard ones.  Really.