Our Unoffical News

So, many of you have heard the unofficial news and I am sure some of you have heard bits and pieces, I thought I'd finally explain what is going on and what can very possible happen in the near future.
While we were in Belgium, Jared took an unexpected interview just for the heck of it. The job was for pretty much the same thing he was doing here in Idaho. He has all the qualifications for it except he doesn't speak Dutch. After the interview he talked to the manger who wanted to know how interested he was in moving to Belgium. He told them he would be interested and that he really liked it over there and would love to get his Master in their Nuclear Engineering program. So the manger told Jared to apply for all three job postings and if he didn't get the job (since the manger wasn't the one to make the call) then he, the manger, would hire him as a subcontractor. So either way, Jared has a job in Belgium.
So time to decide if we wanted to pursue this opportunity or not. Yes it would be a great business opportunity to work with a foreign reactor and yes Jared would easily be able to get his Masters in the program he is interested in. And yes what a great experience to enjoy Europe for awhile. But we have kids and one on the way. We can't speak Dutch. Everything is going to be different and so far from family and friends. And it is so liberal. We have been living in a bubble of conservatives for so long here in Idaho.
We prayed about it for while and went to the Temple and we both felt very good with the decision to pursue the opportunity and make the move to Belgium when it arrives. We have decided that we are going to sell everything we own in hopes to get a lot of our debt paid off. And make a fresh start in Belgium. We have looked at a few apartments online that looked affordable and nice. Jared plans to go for a month before we all go to set things up and get settled. That way he can figure out the Euro better and what we will be able to afford and where better to live. I and the kids are hoping to stay in California during this time to spend some more time with family before we make big move.
The job posting doesn't close until tomorrow so we won't get any official information until after the interview process is complete. We are thinking about mid-October. And if things go the way we plan, we will leave Idaho just before Thanksgiving. Enjoy Thanksgiving in CA and then Jared will be off to Belgium for the month of December and I and the kids will follow after Christmas. That is if we can handle Christmas without Daddy.
Until then we are getting the house ready to sell and creating all kinds of posting on Craig's list to sell some of the things we have. Last Friday was Jared's day off. He spent the weekend polishing up the floor and putting new baseboard in. It looks great. I am loving my front room. We decluttered the room leaving only the couch and a decorative table. Everything is seating in boxes in the garage while the bookshelves are waiting to sell. Why does your house always look its best just before you sell it? We are planning on tackling one room at a time and hopefully get the house listed soon before winter hits here in Idaho. We have had very nice weather but I know it can't last for much longer.

Look how pretty it looks. We had pulled up the carpet last May and have just now done something about it.

And the basboard looks great. We had to get the large stuff becasue that is what they had orginally and we needed to meet the paint. I didn't want to repaint.

Saturday Seth came to play with RJ. They had a fabulous time out back riding the Jeep around and playing in the ditch, both things we are going to miss.

The Super Hero RJ Show: episode 1

RJ's Learning Book

RJ loves writing or should I say telling stories for me to write down. He is really into making books. They of course are about four or five mini pages long and jump from plot to plot but the characters seem to stay the same. Well recently he became interested in "learning" books or an educational book. He really wants to learn everything. So he decided to write his own "learning" book. I thought it was very cute and wanted to share it. Because I am his mother, I might be the only one who loves it, but thought I'd share it anyway.

RJ's Learning Book
By: RJ Wight

Did you know you have to make peaches sometimes. When you want them in a can. And when you don't want them in a can, you don't have to make them. If you run out of peaches you can buy more. And if you run out of jars, you can buy those too.
When you have a cough you get medicine.
When you don't know how to write, you just ask a grown up to help. If you don't know what to do, you just ask a grown up if you're bored.
Did I mention put on clothes? If you put on clothes you have to take your jammies off first. Then put on your underwear.
Did I mention when I was younger? When you are younger you are baby and you can't talk. When you go to church you can wear a tie when you want to wear a tie.
Did I mention you can change your house too?
Do you have a word hunter like mine? You have to really love your toys.
And sometimes you have to move. But if you don't know French you have to move some where where you can learn French. (A little side note for those who don't know, we may be moving to Belgium and RJ and Savannah will be going to a European School where they will learn French.)

Did I mention, don't be bad. If you do you get a time out. Sometimes you cry when you get a time out. So if you don't want a time out, don't be bad.
You have to read the scriptures all the time. But don't throw a fit if you want to read the scriptures first. You have just have to wait your turn.
And if you wanted to go in the bath tub first and you didn't because your baby is taking a bath first, then it is OK.
I watched a movie once and some peas were bad and some were good. And the bad peas slapped people's fishes. And there was a guy named Jonah and he told the bad peas a message for everybody. Then Jonah told the king and he got sad. And then all the bad peas were good.
When your baby is asleep you can play board games because babies can mess up stuff. There is all kinds of board games you can buy at the stores. And sometimes you can't buy all of them because other people have to buy them too. And some book can be games, too.
You can read a story at quiet time. And you can take a nap at quiet time too. Shhh..listen to the stuff around you. Look at pictures and don't say a thing. Whisper in someone's ear if you have a question for them.
Use your imagination to drive your car to the car wash and anything else you can imagine.
The End

More photos from Boise Trip

We had some large thunder and rain storms while in Boise. We spent Saturday morning inside. However by lunch time the skies were clear. After lunch we took the kids on a walk down to a couple of park near by.

Jeremy (Jared's brother) and Makale: Ok, you are going to think of us as awful parents. But RJ can be very timid about things, and has a hard time trying things that look scary, even if we offer to help him. Savannah is our brave one with very little fears. So there was this little rock wall at the park. Any time I see a rock wall I try to get RJ to climb it. He always refuses. But Daddy was there this time and we kind of made him climb it. He screamed the whole time. I know we are awful! But by trying to get him to do this things I am hoping he will realize that it isn't that bad and will eventually try things on his own. So far no success. But here he is screaming his head off while we support him as he climbs the playground rock wall.

And her is Savannah doing it as she sings.

RJ making an ugly mad face at me for making him climb the wall.

Savannah is really into balancing on anything that looks like a balance beam. We hope to get her in gymnastics when she is three or four.

Fall is on its way. Savannah had fun picking up all the pretty leaves.

There is a nice little pond near by. RJ saw a fish jump out and he kept trying to look for more. Jared and Jeremy were going to take RJ fishing that night but another storm blew in.

Finding puddles, what more could a two year old ask for.

Makale kept making all these crazy "moves" and Savannah kept trying to copy him. It was a good laugh.

Looking for worms to go fishing. RJ wouldn't touch them.

But Savannah did.

Since a storm blew in, Jeremy and Jared took RJ to Boondocks to play arcade games instead of going fishing. Savannah and Makale took their naps and then enjoyed Nemo while crunching on carrots with ranch.

Trip to Bosie

Last weekend we went to Boise to visit Jared's brother, Jeremy , Lisa, & Makale. We enjoyed our visit . Jared has some more photos from his camera that I'll have to post later. But here are a few that I took. RJ and Savannah loved all the new toys. Makale wasn't too happy that he had to share his toys.

They have this cute little table just perfect for the kids. It has been on my list to get one but haven't yet. RJ and Savannah loved eating their meals here.

Makale and Savannah playing trains.

This is a favorite photo from the weekend. Savannah loves playing with ice in her cup. Here she was picking up the ice and throwing it back into her cup and then she would laugh at the splash it made. I think Makale was just laughing at how silly Savannah was.

This week's photos.

On Saturday we got together with some friends in St. Anthony for a BBQ. It was very enjoyable. It was nice to have some steak, especially for Jared, since there isn't much of that in Europe. We spent the evening chatting and tasting different types of Belgium chocolate, some better then other. Like the tobacco flavor, still can't believe Ben tired it. And then there was some weird flavor we all tried but couldn't pin down what flavor it was. But it was fun and the kids all enjoyed playing together.

Here are some of the kids eating cookies. (they didn't get the chocolate but they enjoyed the large chocolate chip cookies instead.) Savannah (2), Amber (4), RJ (4), Adam (6), Emily (2).


Today the kids spent most of the day in their jammies while I did some canning.
Here is Savannah showing off her tongue.

RJ spent the morning making signs for all the doors. This one says Backyard.

So yes it is that time of year where the farms from Utah come up and sell their yummy peaches by the box. I bought two box this year. We ate the half of the first box, oh they were good. And then I canned the rest. We had some peach jam left from last year so I just did one batch of jam. And canned the rest. I had just barely enough jars. It was perfect. Next week I am going to try and can some of the tomatoes from our garden. We got a ton.

Day 7 & 8 - Last day

Thursday, Sept. 4th

Jared worked today and I spent the morning walking around the facility. There are several apartments and small villas along the river that runs through the campus here on the facility. Across the river is a nice walking/bike trail . I spent that morning out walk along it and then met up with Jared for lunch in the cafeteria. In the afternoon I took a nap and played on the computer while Jared took an unexpected job interview. Yes that is right, we are contemplating a move to Belgium. No decisions have been made yet. That night we headed into town for dinner. We ate at a nice restaurant then the night before and the waitress spoke English, thankfully. I got a steak with a very good cream sauce. We finished dinner off by sharing a Belgium Waffle for dessert. Very yummy!

Friday, Sept. 5th
We got up at 3am (7pm thursday night in Idaho) and drove to Brussels. I had a flight at 6am which took me to Amsterdam. They weren't took happy that my passport hadn't been stamped in Paris proving when I arrived in Europe. But they thankfully stamped my passport (my first stamp) and let me continue on my way. I had a 2 hour lay over before getting on the biggest plane I have ever seen to Houston Texas. I don't know the different types of planes but this one is one of the largest. It was a double decker plane. It was huge! Once I land in Texas I was so excited to be back in the states with people who understood me. The first sign I saw was a sign for the Restrooms and it said Banos underneath it. I got excited that I could read and understand both languages. It is funny what little things can excite us. I had a 5 hour lay over in Houston. I tired to take a few power naps and read the last book in the Twilight series. I then flew to Salt Lake getting in a 8:30. I had been up and traveling for over 24 hours. I stayed the night at my Aunt and Uncle's home in Salt Lake and then took a shuttle full of college kids to Idaho the next morning. I guess school was starting on Monday, I thought it had already started, but the shuttle was full. I started feeling old since I was the only one married with kids. But anyways, I made it home around noon on Saturday and was welcomed with by two huge hugs and little kisses. Jared had to stay for another week. But he is home now and we are enjoying being together as a family again.

Day 6- Mol

Wednesday, Sept. 3rd

We drove over t0 Mol Wednesday where Jared had to get back to work. I stayed in the room most of the afternoon sleeping. I was so tired from the long enjoyable week we had. That night we went into town for dinner. There weren’t very many things opened. We couldn’t find the places that were recommended to us. And I was getting sick again so we headed into a near by restaurant. Bad choice. The people didn’t speck any English. I should have been safe and ordered a hamburger. I could read that on the menu easily. But spaghetti sounded good. Unfortunately there were five different types of spaghetti and I couldn’t read Dutch to see what I was getting. I tired to talk to the waitress to order just plain tomato sauce spaghetti but she didn’t seem to understand anything I was saying. So I went with the Fruitti De Mara. Thinking tomato is a fruit. Well it turned out I ordered Fruit of the Sea. I HATE seafood! Luckily Jared ordered a pizza, so we switched.

Day 5- Brugge & The English Channel (my favorite day)

Tuesday, September 2nd

The breakfast at the Bed & Breakfast was good. They eat meat and chesses with their pastries here in Belgium. It looked good and Jared loved it. It was like a sandwich which my soft stomach couldn’t handle much of for breakfast. I stuck with a croissant and a bowl of cold cereal. But the croissant was delicious.

We had rain showers off and on for most of the day. But it didn’t stop us from exploring some of Belgium. We spent the day walking around Brugge. It was a beautiful old city. We first toured a chocolate museum, which was very interesting.

A large chocolate egg and these hat down below are all made out of chocolate too.

Look at all that yummy chocolate!

After the museum we looked for lunch. I was on the verge of getting sick again which meant I needed to eat something fast. We stopped at the first little deli we saw. And I had the best ham sandwich I have had in a long time. The cheese in this sandwich was amazingly good and the bread was to die for. I am still craving another sandwich from that little deli. We then sat down in a nice restaurant for a cup of hot chocolate that I had been craving since we were in the chocolate museum. It was very rich and creamy but not at all too sweet. After our bellies were warm we walked to the top of the bell tower for an amazing view of the city. The stairs widening up to the top of the tower were very narrow and there is only a rope in the middle to hold onto. Jared had done this once before and he said he had gone on a busy Saturday and it was very crowded as he tired to get up and down the stairs. I was glad it wasn’t a crowded day when we went. I couldn’t even imagine. The bell tower we climbed up.The view 0f Brugge from the top of the towerAfterwards we took a river boat ride around the town seeing some amazing old building. One of which dated back to the 8^th century! I’m not sure if we got a picture of it. Our guide was really good and explained stuff in three different languages on after the other. We learned some interesting things. Like the tax on windows back in the day. The richer you were the more windows you had. If you didn’t have the money you had to remove a window and we saw many houses whose windows were bricked in.

Look how low some of the bridges were.

The greenery in Belgium is so pretty.

Can you see the dog sitting in the window. Our guide says he is always there watching the river boats pass.

I love this picture.

After the river tour we did some shopping. We got a lot of chocolates. Brugge is the well known chocolate area. Then it was time for dinner. I tired some rabbit. I don’t know if I can look at a rabbit the same anymore after eating one. The city started dying down at the time, very unlike Paris where it just started picking up. But we still went in search of a church that had a famous statue from Michelangelo. Unfortunately the church was closed, like everything else, when we made it there.

It started pouring down rain and we got drenched trying to find the parking garage. Luckily Jared had some sense of direction because I was totally turned around and probably would have never found the parking garage.

The night was still young and we were only a half hour from the English Channel so we made the way up that direction. It had stopped raining when we made it to the water. It was a very clean beach and the water was very warm. I didn’t go swimming or anything but I went out on a rock to touch the water. Jared didn’t warn me as I bent down that a wave was heading my direction and the bottom half of me got drenched. So we decided to end the day. I really didn’t want to walk around in soggy shoes.