Back in Minnesota, where we always started school after Labor Day, the girls’ birthday was always situated squarely in summertime, and we’d plan big backyard parties with all our friends and their kids. To be honest, the parties were usually more for us to hang out with our own friends and collectively celebrate keeping small humans alive for another year. We’d throw in a cake and a few decorations, but the majority of efforts went into adult beverage planning. Now all of a sudden the girls are old enough to have OPINIONS about how they want to celebrate their birthday (how dare they grow up like this?), and their birthday also happens to fall during teacher prep week at our school here in Chiang Mai. I started to stress about this, but then I remembered we’re in Thailand, and life is easy. I found a pool with a cafe (there are several here), and asked them if we could host a party there for 15 kids and 10 adults. I never thought to ask about renting out the whole pool for a private party, but when they told me we could have it for 3 hours for 2000baht (about 70 USD), it was a no brainer. We had pizzas delivered, and a bakery made custom cupcakes with 2 days’ notice (and delivered to the pool for free). We rolled up to the pool with a cooler of beer and juice and that was about it. The girls agreed it was the best party of their 8-year-old lives.

We have a teacher friend who’s side gig is working for a kitten rescue in Chiang Mai. Subsequently 90% of our friends have cute little foster kittens at any given time. Our kids are super jealous of this and have been asking for a pet for months. Nick and I haven’t been ready to take on the responsibility of keeping more things alive in our house (and his allergies have been a really convenient excuse), but for the girls’ bday, we decided to let the kids get some fish. We found someone giving away a tank with all the supplies, and then let them pick out fish at a local shop.

Things went really well for about 48 hours, at which point 2 of the smallest fish JUMPED to their deaths, horrifying our kids when they discovered it the next morning (like a reverse Christmas morning of sorts). Every couple of weeks after that, another one would kick the bucket. It was a good 3 month run.

As the start of school was getting closer, Brecken was cautiously optimistic that Nick would be his teacher. He tried to call Nick’s bluff everytime Nick told him it wasn’t up to him and that the school decides. Nick kept him wondering all summer, saying he had to wait to get his class list from Mr. Ben. He made a big production out of it. In the end, Brecken was more interested to know if his favorite buddies from K2 were in his class.

Obligatory first day of school (2nd first day of school in Thailand!) pic!

Brecken settled right into Mr. Nick’s class, and has loved every minute of it since.

By far, his favorite day so far has been Pirate Day (let’s be honest…it’s Nick’s favorite, too).

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Mr. Nick’s awesomeness doesn’t stop at 3pm. He’s been reading the Harry Potter series to the kids since the beginning of summer, complete with different voices for each character.

Nora and Bryn are in the same class together again this year, at their request. Their teacher lives in our neighborhood, and brings his toddler over on walks each evening to watch the big kids race around the street on their bikes, or to play with them inside. Nick often talks him into a beer, and they discuss their mutual love of pickling things. The girls think he’s great.

The girls were pumped to be back in school with their friends. The novelty of seeing them at break times and in passing throughout the day has not worn off for me. I love the little glimpses I get of their personalities in the wild.

I also get to watch them take standardized tests, which I find so crazy!

I also try to get over to ECC to have snack with Brecken (and Mr. Nick) several times a week. Brecken and Nora still run up to me with reckless abandon for hugs in school. Bryn does not, because she is already a teenager, but we’ve agreed on covert winks from a distance (*sob*).

School photos here are usually taken in white polos that are shared amongst kids on picture day. The school decided this wasn’t a COVID-friendly method this year (even though there is no COVID in Thailand), and asked families to purchase individual school polos for their kids. I wasn’t about to pony up any amount of baht for a WHITE collared shirt for my children, so they took their photo in mama’s polo.

School photos were being taken in the room next to my classroom (an exciting field trip from way over in the ECC building), so Mr. Nick’s K3 class stopped in for a little dance party in “Brecken’s Mom’s” room afterwards.

I’m in my 2nd year teaching in the AAP program at NIS, a sheltered English immersion program for kids who are not quite ready for the elementary mainstream. Last year I taught reading to all 3 AAP classes, but this year I made a push for self-contained classes in the program, and am now teaching the younger group for all subjects. It’s a delightful group of ten 6-8 year olds from China, Hong Kong, Japan, Thailand and France. Because many students (school-wide) were stuck abroad during COVID and had to quarantine upon returning to Thailand, my class wasn’t fully intact until November. We also send transfer-ready kids to the mainstream mid year, so the scenery in our program changes semi-frequently. But I have loved having the same kids all day this year.

My favorite part of my class this year (and definitely my students’ favorite) is our Makerspace! Students bring in the majority of the recyclables from home and we also collect donations schoolwide. Their creativity is endless, and the language learning that happens in that 30 minutes everyday is pretty amazing.

Here’s a cool video our PR department put together highlighting our makerspace!

Teachers are required to run a club 2x/year. Nora, Bryn and Ben got together and decided to sign up for my jigsaw puzzle club. The excitement these kids had every time they found a piece or finished a puzzle was so adorable.

In addition to clubs once a week, the girls played on the U10 basketball team for season 1 sports, and then decided to join DIFFERENT sports teams (from each other) for season 2. The scheduler/logisticator in me wanted to convince them to play the same sport, but then I remembered we’re in Thailand, and things are easy. All the kids’ after school activities are AT SCHOOL, where both Nick and I work, and live 3 minutes from. So I simma’d down and embraced their desire to pursue their own interests, even though it meant a slightly complicated (but not complicated in the grand scheme of things) after school schedule. Bryn chose soccer, and Nora chose track. Nick was coaching track again, so the AD let Brecken join, too. He was in heaven running with the big kids (and could beat most of them).

Let’s back up to season 1, when Nick agreed to coach U12 boys basketball, as long as his buddy Jona would be his co-coach. Jona agreed, and they started conspiring over beers about how they were going to coach this team of underdogs into an imaginary championship (even though neither of them had ever played competitive basketball). Just as they were spitballing name ideas for their inspirational Netflix special, Jona suffered a season-ending injury (before the season even began) while “dusting off his basketball legs” in the gym. Jona headed into surgery, and Nick headed into a solo season of coaching.

While our kids were VERY worried about Mila and Charlie’s dad, they were SUPER PUMPED to learn that Mila and Charlie were going to get to spend a few nights at our house.

The kids rolled out the red carpet for them, finding them clothes to wear, toothbrushes to use, and playing paper-rock-scissors to determine sleeping arrangements. Brecken designated himself Mila’s personal hair stylist the entire time, and decided she needed VERY FREQUENT hair combing. Mila was extremely patient with Brecken’s new hobby(/obsession).

We brought the whole crew to visit Jona post-surgery. They mostly wanted to push the buttons on his bed and eat snacks. Super fun trip.

Always game for a reason to get together and be ridiculous, our friends all decided to surprise Jona one night by showing up at his house with fake injuries.

Of course, Nick went with the “permanent heart-on.” He even asked the kids to color it, but they never finished it because they were so busy asking questions about what a permanent heart-on was.

So Nick stuck it out solo with the U12 boys crew, sweatin it out with them at outdoor practices.

He spent LOTS of time consulting via Marco Polo with his friend and National HS Basketball Coach of the Year, Dave Flom (whose nickname is now “National”).

Most interschool competitions were cancelled due to (nonexistent) COVID, but there was one friendly tournament at the end of the season. NIS’s U12 team was comprised of almost all 10 year olds (who had never played basketball), and it seemed like all the other schools had stacked their teams with 12yr 11mo olds with 5 o’clock shadows. Needless to say, they did not come out with a lot of (read: zero) W’s at the tournament, but they all learned that in 2 short years they might have some armpit hair, so it wasn’t a total loss.

In an effort to groom some more talent for the school’s basketball teams, the elementary PE teacher (our friend Drew) decided to run a 3v3 basketball tournament at recess times. All the kids were super excited to make up team names play in the tournament. Nora and Bryn each recruited their own teams, but the way the bracket shook out, team Unicorn Sparkle never got to take on team Harry Potter in actual competition. Nora’s team got to play on pajama day, though, so that was fun.

We also recently found an awesome botanical garden where we can ride bikes, swim, explore…and there’s also a mini zoo!

Nick recently found a guy to make him a custom cornhole set. He had to explain what it was and give him all the dimensions, but Nick is now the proud owner of the first bags game in Thailand (probably not true).

To celebrate, we had a bags tournament.

I also managed to get my first dose of food poisoning in October. We think we traced it back to my favorite noodle stall at the weekly market near our house, but who knows! The pictures look worse than it was, and I’m PRETTY SURE I didn’t need to stay in the ICU like they insisted, but I wasn’t really in shape to argue I guess.

While I hung out in a hospital wing full of patients on life support, Nick and the kids continued on with their plans of heading to Doi Inthanon with the rest of the ECC staff and their families for some “professional development.” Doi Inthanon is the tallest peak in Thailand, and the kids couldn’t believe how COLD it was (it got down to like 60 I think). They’re barely Minnesotan anymore.

For our weeklong mid-semester break in October, we headed to Chiang Rai, a city about 4 hours northeast of Chiang Mai near the borders of Burma (Myanmar) and Laos. We scored an amazing deal on a homestay with the Dunnings. The owners (a Dutch guy, his Thai wife, and 2 kids) usually rent it out by room/bungalow, but due to (nonexistent) COVID, they were only renting out the whole property at a time. We had 4 bedrooms in the main house and 2 bungalows to choose from, plus full run of the grounds (which, to the kids’ delight, included a trampoline) and pool. The owners also ran their own little restaurant and we could get food cooked to order.

We found a really cute European cafe with a playground, and headed there for breakfast a couple times. It was still rainy season when we went, so we expected some rain, but temps were unseasonably cool. Didn’t bother us, though!

We also had an AMAZING meal on the river, at a restaurant that had a southern U.S. vibe (but also lots of delicious Thai food), and the first legit bloody mary we’d had in Thailand. They had a big grassy area the kids ran around on while the adults enjoyed a lazy meal, occasionally looking over our shoulders to make sure no one had fallen into the river.

We also visited a night market, where the kids had their favorite meal–roaming market dinner. Anytime we take them to a market, the amount of food they consume is mind blowing. The novelty of walking up to a stall and buying food themselves, then walking around with it until they find something else they want to eat, just never gets old.

While in Chiang Rai, we checked out the famous Wat Rong Khun (aka White Temple), which has a really interesting story (surprise–it’s not really a religious temple at all).

This place is usually packed with tourists…

There was so much more to see at the White Temple than just the white temple!

Of course, the kids’ favorite part were the golden bathrooms…

Brecken couldn’t believe his luck, that his week to bring home Adventure Penguin was our week in Chiang Rai. Adventure Penguin was treated to a first class sightseeing tour!

We also drove to a village on the Burmese border overlooking a beautiful valley. We’re pleased to report that Adventure Penguin did not fall into the valley.

To get to the village, we had to momentarily cross over the border into Myanmar.

Singha Park was also a big hit. It’s touted as an “agricultural amusement park,” and is a HUGE area that includes a tea plantation, restaurants, ziplining, a giant field where there is an annual hot air balloon festival, beautiful gardens, rock climbing…and these random cow statues.

Yes, they let a 5 and 6 year old ride a zipline together.

Our favorite Thai holiday, Loy Krathong, fell on Halloween (our favorite American holiday) this year. As usual, our school did an outstanding job celebrating both; one on Friday and one on Monday.

Nick and Brecken rode their dinosaurs into the night, as we went trick-or-treating in Ava’s neighborhood.

Here are some other things that brought us joy this fall:

Music lessons with Mr. Tristan!

It was a great fall. Our hearts ached for our friends and family back home facing so many pandemic-related challenges, and we were sad to have no visitors this year. But we were so grateful to be doing in-person teaching and learning and living and traveling with no restrictions in Thailand.

More about our holidays to come!

Cheers,

Sara

We love holidays in Chiang Mai. Thais are really good at celebrating, and nothing is off limits at school, whether it’s a Thai holiday, American holiday, Chinese holiday, religious holiday or secular holiday. The “American” holiday season in Chiang Mai is extra special to us because our expat friends, all of us far away from home, really come together and become each other’s family. This year our school decided to have a minimum day for students on the Friday of Thanksgiving week and host a huge Thanksgiving potluck for staff. It was amazing!

This was the first truly all-staff gathering we had experienced at NIS. The mae baans (cleaning staff), TAs and other support staff usually work tirelessly to make events at NIS happen, but do not often get the chance to enjoy the celebrations. The staff Thanksgiving included everyone, and was likely the first time we had really seen the FULL staff of our school in one place together. It was so cool. And as usual, teachers’ kids were welcomed; their rowdiness and messiness embraced.

We also had our second annual Friendsgiving with our expat fam. Once again, the google sign up doc for the potluck was everyone’s main focus for 2 weeks leading up to the event, with lots of witty banter and green-bean-casserole-recipe trash talking consuming our workdays.

We reveled in our school Christmas celebrations again, despite the annual Winter Carnival being cancelled due to covid. My class, along with the upper AAP class exchanged Secret Santa gifts again. I’m still so amazed at how joyful and gracious all the kids are during this event, no matter what gift they receive.

NIS’s Winter Carnival was pretty much our favorite event of the year last year, so when they announced it was cancelled, everyone was super bummed. But in true NIS fashion, the event planning team went to work planning a school-day event that would still capture the Christmas spirit for the kids, rebranding it “Winter Bright Fest.” Parents (except us lucky teacher-parents!) and outside vendors weren’t allowed, but elementary threw together an amazing assembly complete with carols, performances from the ECC kids, student talent showcase and 4th graders performing Christmas jokes during all the stage changes.

The middle and high school students and staff teamed up to make booths of all kinds–concessions, arts and crafts, games, trinket-sales…it was really impressive. The kids pretty much had a minimally-supervised, sugary, free-for-all. Brecken Claus was in heaven.

Nora and Bryn (and our fourth child, Ben) had been taking a Saturday dance class at school, and were working on a number for the Winter Carnival. Here’s their performance at the Winter Bright Fest!

Much to the girls’ chagrin, I also snuck this video of a rehearsal. I love how Ms. Carole’s energy transfers to the kids. She is their favorite!

Mr. Nick even brought his little Santas to carol outside my window!

I decided to organize Secret Santa for our group of friends this year, and hilarity ensued. At the last minute we decided to segregate the name-drawing by gender, which turned out to be a great decision, because girls>boys at gift-giving. Surreptitious gift deliveries made the week before winter break extra fun, and we all agreed that the person who received an AMERICAN SUB SANDWICH delivery won Christmas. Secret Santa identities were revealed at Mary and Jona’s Ugly Sweater Christmas party, where it was decided that actually, Nick’s sweater won Christmas.

Brecken decided to fully embrace his santa character from his class performance, and brought gifts (stuff from our house he wrapped up) for all the kids at the party

As usual, Mary was an over-the-top hostess, with kid food crafts and photobooths galore.

The principal (who is retiring this year), also hosted a happy hour for staff at a local restaurant!

We celebrated our family Christmas in Chiang Mai a week early since we were heading south to the beach!

Nick did his annual cookie baking/decorating with the kids,

and Brecken played mall Santa for all of us.

The kids spent weeks wrapping up gifts for Nick and me and excitedly adding them to the pile under the tree daily.

We finally ran out of gas for our outdoor Thai kitchen stove (1 year later!). The gas guy came to switch out our tank on Christmas day, so Nick and I decided that was our (12 USD) gift to each other this year. For those of you wondering, the romance is still alive and well over here! Love you, babe!

We cleaned up the Christmas shrapnel, and it was time to pack for our trip. As usual, the kids were in charge of packing their own stuff. Brecken deviated from the packing list just a tad.

We hopped a plane with Dunnings, and a 1.5hr plane trip and a 40 min drive from the airport later, we were at our sweet Airbnb in Phuket, 4 mins from the beach!

The kids got right to work on proper Christmas decorations, lest Santa think we did not have The Christmas Spirit, and decide not to stop at our pool villa.

Kamala Beach did not disappoint!

The guys decided they wanted to cook a big ol’ surf-n-turf spread for Christmas dinner. They had way too much fun picking up ingredients at the fresh seafood market.

Then it was time to put out cookies for Santa (yes, the kids packed the cookies they made in their suitcase)

watch Christmas movies,

and read Christmas stories.

The grown-ups stayed up late waiting for Santa, and partaking in some self-care (face masks for the girls, 4th meal for the guys).

And of course, Nick made Christmas morning bloodies.

As if we couldn’t be any more fortunate, our former babysitter, Anna, who had left Chiang Mai several months ago to take a nannying job in Phuket, was available and willing (and excited!) to babysit for us on her only night off. We got a kid-free night in Phuket, ya’ll!

Much like our time in Koh Lanta, Phuket was pretty empty. Being an even more popular tourist destination in Thailand than Lanta, the toll the lack of tourists was taking on the economy was very apparent. It was pretty sad. But it also meant we were able to afford to stay there for a week during peak season, and do some pretty cool stuff. Looking at the beautiful ocean everyday made us want to get out further in it, and we were able to get a killer deal on a private sunset cruise!

We sprang for some charcuterie (have we told you how expensive cheese is here?), and made a pretty sweet spread!

The kids had their own (read: less expensive) charcuterie.

The boat came with 2 crew members. Even though we brought all our own food and drinks, they wouldn’t let us lift a finger. They plated everything for us, cleaned every crumb as it fell, refilled our glasses anytime they got less than half full, and even followed our kids around to make sure no one fell overboard. It was pure luxury.

We RAN INTO our friends Jeshua and Chloe in Phuket (what are the odds??), so they joined us on the cruise, too!

We anchored for awhile to enjoy the sunset and float-drink, and the crew took the kids and a couple adults out on a motorized dinghy attached to the boat. The plan was to take them to a little island to play on the beach, but when they got there, there were some really hungry (i.e. aggressive) monkeys waiting for them, so they cut that side trip a little short.

All disappointment was quickly erased when the crew pulled out a tube to pull behind the dinghy!

We had only booked a one-way ticket to Phuket, thinking we might stay a little longer after Dunnings headed back to Chiang Mai, and hit up another island. We decided to check out Krabi, another very popular tourist destination. To be honest, neither Phuket nor Krabi were on my Thai bucket list due to their crowded, touristy reputations, but with international borders still closed, both were virtual ghost-towns. Bad for the economy, but good for those averse to touristy vacay destinations!

We hired a van, and made the 3 hour trip from Phuket to Krabi.

It was a really gorgeous drive, albeit carsickness-inducing.

We got another great deal on a resort, which seemed like might have been at 10% capacity (or less?).

Brecken also spotted a molted snake skin hanging on a tree outside our balcony, so Krabi is now his favorite place.

We ran into ANOTHER FRIEND from NIS at our resort (I still giggle at the fact we can “run into” people we know in Thailand…it’s so nuts!), and she recommended an amazing hilltop restaurant for sunset. It Did. Not. Disappoint.

We were only staying in Krabi for a couple days, so we pretty much chilled at the pool and beach and stayed within walking distance of our resort, but we did take a tuk-tuk out for ice cream one night. No one died.

We took a longtail boat to neighboring Railay Beach the morning before our flight left. It was gorgeous!

We got back to Chiang Mai just in time for New Years. We landed a sitter last minute and headed out for dinner with Dunnings-plus-Kris.

Kris is Scottish, and loves an excuse to wear his kilt.

Here are some other things that were mixed in around the holidays:

Brecken finally got to participate in Mr. Nick’s annual pattern fair.

He also continued to aggressively pull out teeth before they were ready, for the purpose of increasing his wealth.

Our besties from back home MAILED US FALL LEAVES FROM MINNESOTA, making us both cry. (Lisa & Kerry, you’re amazing).

Another 3 months went by, which meant it was time for another professionally-photographed event at the gym.

A bunch of your Christmas cards made it to Thailand!

Brecken got to ride on Mr. Kris’s motorbike. As you can see, Mr. Kris is an experienced motorbiking professional…who only occasionally forgets to put the kickstand up before driving.

Bryn honed her defense skills during U10 football this season.

There is more to tell about the rest of winter break, but it will come in another post!

Once again, we are ever aware of how blessed we are to be here, traveling in Thailand, gathering with friends, and teaching in person. The minor sacrifices we’ve had to make during this pandemic pale in comparison to what all of our friends and family back home have had to endure, and you all are constantly on our minds. We selfishly wish we could teleport all of you here. We miss everyone so much!

….on that note…we truly want to give ALL of you time to come visit us in Thailand once we’re all vaccinated and borders have opened up… so we’ve decided to stay another year! =) Our original 2 year contract is up in June, but we feel there is more to this adventure than will fit in the next 4 months. NIS was crazy enough to offer us another contract, so Chiang Mai will continue to be home for now!

Thanks to all of you who have supported us on this journey so far, celebrating our peaks, and sitting with us in the valleys, even from time zones 12-14 hours apart. Living abroad has brought us so much joy and newness and adventure, but the challenges are also real. So many of our friends and family who want us home yesterday have selflessly lended an ear and encouraged us to stay the course at many points along the way, and for that we are ever grateful.

Cheers,

Sara

Shortly after returning from our our amazing winter holiday in Phuket and Krabi in December, a second COVID wave hit Thailand. Thailand’s first “wave” at the beginning of the pandemic was reportedly about 4,000 cases. While we always doubted the accuracy of that number since very little testing was going on here, we always felt that the spread was being taken very seriously by the government and everyone living in Thailand, and that it was very much under control. Hospitals were never overrun, deaths were (reportedly) only in the double digits nation-wide, and strict precautions were in place everywhere–with no one ever questioning or contesting them. The country had several months with no new COVID cases, and while most things opened back up, the border remained closed to international travelers, mask-wearing is still mandatory in all public places, and many large-scale events have been cancelled. In other words, precautions continued, even without a single reported case for several months. The second wave started in a very localized area near Bangkok (quite far from us), and spread quickly throughout migrant workers in a large market. But as a handful of cases popped up in Chiang Mai, any precautions that had been relaxed were quickly tightened. Thai schools (which operate on a different calendar than international schools like ours) were already in session, and while the government never mandated school closures, so many parents kept their kids home from school, that many classrooms and schools were virtually empty, prompting them to close voluntarily. As our 3 week winter break was coming to an end, there were 1-2 cases reported in very close proximity to our campus.

Parents made it clear they were NOT interested in another bout of distance learning, so the school made the decision to extend the winter break 2 more weeks (for a total of 5 WEEKS). While the trade-off for this (reducing our 3 week burning season break to 1 week) was less than palatable, the upside was that January is one of the most beautiful weather months in Chiang Mai! So we took full advantage of our extra time off!

The first adventure was an overnight in a treehouse! We drove about 1.5 hours to this awesome little retreat with some friends, and we all immediately fell in love with the place.

The kids didn’t waste a minute, and got right to exploring. It was truly a wonderland. There were 9 treehouses, and maybe only 3 were occupied (including ours), and the kids had full run of the place.

The owners of the resort had included so many thoughtful touches for kids. The fishing nets were probably the biggest hit. No one caught anything, but that didn’t stop them from spending hours trying.

It was actually a little chilly while we were there! We had a bonfire (where no one was sweating profusely), and they even provided marshmallows. No graham crackers in Thailand, but we all had a moment of silence to remember what s’mores taste like.

There was an amazing scenic overlook just a half mile walk from the treehouses where we went to watch the sunset over the mountains.

When we got back to Chiang Mai, little Ben was thrilled to have his buddies back. There aren’t a lot of kids in our village, so when the Windschitls leave, the kid population goes down about 50%. I’m pretty sure Ben spent most of winter break in this position:

They got right down to business, planning their next big build.

…which turned out to be a semi-permanent homeless encampment teepee in our front yard.

Nick and the girls spent (what seemed like) hundreds of hours putting together this knock-off Frozen Lego set the girls got for Christmas. There was a lot of yelling and tears. Some from the girls even.

Brecken got a drone for Christmas, so Nick took him to some open fields to practice (since our village is full of power lines and houses with locked gates around all the yards–a bad combo for a 7 year old drone novice).

We also took some family hikes on trails we hadn’t explored yet in Chiang Mai.

I took some time during our extended break to update the curtains in our house. I’ve gotten used to a lot of the “interesting” interior decorating choices in most Thai houses, but I will never understand the curtains. They are VERY well made and of high quality, and are almost always double hung (probably for energy efficiency purposes?) and with weights in all the hems (can you tell I’m the daughter of a skilled seamstress with all this fancy curtain vocab?), but the colors and patterns… leave a lot to be desired. In the U.S., buying fabric for 10 curtain panels and having them custom made would have required us selling one of our children (so I’d have to think about it a little bit), but here I was able to roll up to the fabric market, get 26 meters of fabric for 220baht (about 30 yards of fabric for $70) and find a lady to sew them all for me for 500 baht (that’s $16…not per panel… total). I added some fringe with my advanced hot glue gun skills (because I did not inherit my mother’s sewing skills), and $100 later we had all new curtains in our house. I now love EVERYTHING about our downstairs, and the bright open space brings me so much joy!

We did have to save all the old curtains since we do rent this house…and I’m sure the landlord spent a pretty baht on these hideous things. Taking them all down, wrapping them up, and storing them was almost a 2 day project!

There’s a wood carving village a little south of town where you can buy amazing live edge furniture for amazingly cheap. We bought a few things there about a year ago, but I’ve been dreaming about a couple floating shelves in the kitchen. We had a guy custom make these, deliver and install them. For like a dollar.

A few months ago I decided I wanted to hang a light in the kids’ play nook. The walls in most Thai homes are concrete, so this was going to be a command-hook kind of operation. There are also very few electrical outlets in Thai homes, and strangely extension cords are not easy to find–it’s usually just power strips with with a 2, 3, or 5m cord on the end. Well, I only needed about 1 more foot of cord, there was already a powerstrip there, and I didn’t need a powerstrip plugged into a powerstrip. So I spliced that baby, added some electrical cord, taped ‘er back up, called Tom Hansen to double check my work, crossed my fingers, and hit the switch.

I’m pretty much a certified Thai electrician now.

Did you see that Tom Hansen-level cord management??

If we haven’t convinced you to move to Thailand yet (or if you just need a reason to hate us more), we also now have a mae baan 2 full days a week! For $15/day, she washes all Nick’s sweaty undies, cleans our house top to bottom, and cooks us a delicious Thai dinner, which is waiting on our table when we get home.

Nick spent some time catching up with family and friends during break. He’s so happy in this shot, I can only assume he was excitedly telling his dad about our awesome new curtains.

The girls were a little sad not to be going back to school right away.

Not Brecken.

He excitedly dumped out his backpack to pack it full of sleepover necessities when Mila invited ONLY HIM over (no Nora and Bryn).

During winter break we finally got around to getting a graduation shirt made for him for first day of school photos like Nora and Bryn’s (hashtag third child problems). The sizing information got a little lost in translation between me and the print shop, so let’s just hope Brecken gets the Saterstrom genes, and has the torso of a lumberjack by the time he’s 18.

Or maybe he’ll still be dressing to the beat of his own drum by the time he graduates high school, and he’ll just accessorize the hell out of that shirt.

Brecken continues to be his own person in a multitude of ways, including his pace for getting out the door in the mornings. Luckily, we live 30 seconds from school.

You may recall Brecken’s entrepreneurial escapades with the tooth fairy from our last post. We’re happy to report that he has moved onto less painful methods of making money. Unbeknownst to us, he was hawking the crafts and “inventions” he was making in Nick’s class to his classmates.

Apparently, Mr. Nick had told him he couldn’t sell it for 20 baht, that he should just give it to him because Aaron is his buddy. Brecken then asked why Mr. Nick sold pickles to his buddies instead of giving them to them for free, to which Mr. Nick had no good answer, but still told him the 20baht birdhouse sale was not allowed. Turns out Brecken then lowered the price to 10 baht, since Nick only told him he couldn’t sell it for 20 baht, but never said he couldn’t sell it for 10 baht, but then Aaron insisted on giving him 20 baht because he didn’t understand that 10 baht was a better deal than 20 baht. So in the end Brecken blamed Aaron for the reason the 20 baht birdhouse sale still went down.

We made him give it back.

In fitness news, our gym continues to take a minimum of 50 photographs per class and send them out to all members immediately after. So here’s a bunch of photos of us sweating profusely.

Out of exercise boredom, I also started dabbling in Fly Yoga. The instructor, Kru (teacher) May, is a bendy, ripped little Thai acrobat that makes everything look 800% easier than in really is. She also takes a minimum of 50 photos per class, all of which I may be smiling in, but don’t be fooled–I am not breathing in any of them.

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Once Nora, Bryn and Brecken saw my phone blowing up with photos from Kru May of me swinging from the ceiling, they couldn’t believe I had been sneaking away on Wednesday nights to PLAY IN THE RAINBOW HAMMOCKS WITHOUT THEM. How dare I pretend to be a butterfly mermaid and not invite them?! The injustice! Luckily, Kru May also has a Kids Fly Yoga class on Saturdays. Whew.

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At the end of each class, Kru May (naturally) goes for a grand finale photo op pose. It’s a total goat rodeo, but she somehow ends up pulling it off, with no concussions to date.

Our other favorite “May” is Ms. May the in-home mani-pedi lady. Every 3 weeks or so on our Friday hangouts with the Dunnings, she comes to one of our houses, we order pizza, and the ladies get our nails done while the guys hang out outside and our 5 kids run wild and largely unsupervised. Nora always creeps in shyly and asks if Ms. May has time to paint her nails, too. Ms. May always does, and for 50 baht ($1.50), she makes Nora feel super fancy and special.

Sometimes my pedis don’t last very long, because I’ve started kicking things really hard.

The girls have also been really into having solo Facetime breakfasts with the grandparents. They set up their little tables the night before, complete with Do Not Disturb signs on the door. They did not approve of these photos.

In medical news, Thailand just updated its list of diseases that would prevent foreigners from being granted a work permit renewal. This is the COMPLETE LIST, folks. You can have anything except these 7:

Brecken had an eventful month on the medical front. In late January he got some minor road rash on his hip from a biking mishap. The next day, Nick noticed there was a tick inside the wound (gag). He pulled it out…minus the head apparently.

A month later, the bite still hadn’t fully healed.

We showed this picture to a doctor during one of our own visits, who calmly told us the tick head was still in Brecken’s body and we could bring him in next week to have it removed. NEXT WEEK?!

So Brecken hung out one more week with a tick head EMBEDDED IN HIS FLESH, at which point we nonchalantly snuck him into the dermatologist for some minor tick removal surgery, which he was not super jazzed about, but did really well.

They used a biopsy punch (*shudder*) to cut out this cylinder of flesh with the tick head inside it, then stitched up the hole.

I then bought him all the ice cream in Thailand. The End.

We headed back to school a million days later, on January 25th. Nick’s annual Kindergarten Teddy Bear Parade had to be postponed, but that didn’t mean Brecken spent less time working on his float. He had been training for this event for 2 years, ever since Nora and Bryn got to build floats for their teddy bears and parade them around in their jammies at school. His float (teddy bear tank) took shape over the course of 4+ weeks, and mom and dad were NOT allowed to help, offer tips, or regulate tape or hot glue (over)usage.

When it was time to tuck their teddy bears in the night before the parade for the teddy bear sleepover, Brecken insisted on building a fort in the classroom for the bears to sleep in, and brought in blankets and clamps from home for proper fort construction.

As usual, the 100th day of school, Valentine’s Day and Lunar New Year were pretty much on the same day. The teddy bear shrapnel was barely cleaned up before it was time for 3 more celebrations!

The Chinese parents on the PTSA got together and made 6000 dumplings from scratch for students and staff!

100th Day of School has always been my favorite classroom celebration! (Lots of kids absent because of Chinese New year though!)

This year I roped in Nora and Bryn’s class for some 100th day relay races. It’s been almost 2 full years, and the novelty of teaching at the same school as my kids hasn’t worn off. I absolutely love it.

Check out the twin facial expressions here!

I continue to love my little class. We do lots of stuff, but STEM is definitely ALL of our jams, and gets the most photos.

Nora and Bryn’s class recently got to start using the science lab with Ms. Fowsia, the nicest Indian woman you will ever meet in your life, and who also has an Indian food side hustle and cooks us different dishes every Monday. The kids are obsessed with her chicken biriyani, and now also her science lab.

The middle school put on a big Pi Day fair for ECC and elementary students, complete with games, prizes and random swag.

The spring concert also just went down last week. Nora and Bryn’s grade performed “The Bear Necessities” with a special cameo from Nick.

Nora and Bryn’s Saturday dance class also performed at the concert. It’s still so crazy to see them confidently performing on a stage when it seems like just yesterday we sat through 3 consecutive preschool performances where they both sat in their teachers’ laps offstage.

To see their dance, you can scroll to the 1:00:00 mark. (I think you have to click “watch on Facebook”–I can’t embed Facebook posts anymore I guess).

Nick recently indoctrinated our Thailand friends into the ways of The Midwest Meat Raffle with an adults-only meat raffle party hosted at our house. He went all out, hunting down some high quality meat (not easy), commissioning our kids (plus Ben & Kaneune) to make tickets, and sending out YouTube meat raffle training videos to invitees in advance.

It was a big hit, and since he was on a roll, he hosted a bloody mary bar and egg bake brunch a couple weeks later.

Because we’re killing it as parents, we also took our kids to this outdoor bar and let them play on the escalator for a couple hours so we could drink in peace.

But first we gave them some baht and let them forage at the street market for dinner.

We also brought Ben along because our kids bother us less when he’s around he’s super sweet and a great influence on our kids.

In other culinary adventures, the Thai food court at our local mall got a facelift, and I thought this picture of Bryn dining solo while the rest of us figure out what we want to eat was pretty funny.

Nick and his teaching partner Kris also went out for RED ANT LARVAE, a very seasonal delicacy apparently.(PASS).

Nick had his first Thai foot massage (I know–he’s been missing out these last 2 years), and giggled like a child the whole time.

We’ve upped the ante on family game nights and recently taught our kids the Hansen Family Bloodshed Game of Spoons, because we felt like there wasn’t quite enough sibling fighting going on.

This game, which we got from grama and grampa, is clearly a Beer Pong grooming tool for children.

This guy walks his ladders all over our area of town. I’m not sure if he ever sells any?

Nick finished out his third season of coaching at NIS (2 seasons of track and field, 1 of basketball).

So now we find ourselves in the middle of Chiang Mai’s burning season. We got a decent dose of it last year, but spent the majority of it “stuck” in paradise down south during the first COVID wave. This year we’re getting the full experience, and….. we’re pretty over it. Our school has made plans to install better air purification systems in the near future, including air purified spaces for kids to play, but in the meantime it’s been a lot of indoor lunches and recesses.

Like most expats in Chiang Mai, we love everything about living here, except the burning season. It’s really easy to forget about it the rest of the year when it’s not smoky, but when it’s here, it’s all consuming. We feel pretty fortunate to not have our daily lives restricted by COVID, but these last couple of months have reminded us of the restrictions our friends back home have been dealing with for over a year. COVID and burning season are no doubt different animals, but similar in that it’s always on our minds. In the course of a couple of really high AQI weeks, over 31,000 people were admitted to Thai hospitals with respiratory issues. Needless to say, we don’t mess around when it comes to taking precautions, especially with our kids. There are infographics floating around that equate the daily AQI with a number of cigarettes smoked that are frankly terrifying. The memory of the girls’ preemie start to life and the fragility of their tiny lungs will probably never leave us, and however long we’re here, we’ll always be committed to migrating south to better air during the burning season.

On a lighter note, our tuktuk driver who became our personal supply fetcher when we were locked down on Koh Lanta last year still sends me daily greetings and occasional selfies, just in case we start forgetting him.

Hamid will be thrilled to know we’re headed back to Koh Lanta in a bit, after a little stint on Koh Samui. Can’t wait to get down there and suck in some clean air!

Happy Easter to all!

Cheers,

Sara

It was a red/purple zone day back in early April when we happily jumped on a plane to Koh Samui. Our school had cut our 3 week smoke break down to 2 weeks as a result of the extra week of winter break that was tacked on due to a mini COVID wave. But the air quality had been in the purple and even brown zone (an air quality index color we’re pretty sure was invented for Chiang Mai smokey season), and so we decided to take an extra week of health leave and get out of dodge.

We rented a villa on the beach that shared a pool with a few other villas, but all of them were empty, so we had the place to ourselves!

The balcony had an outdoor bathtub, which the kids thought was amazing.

This was the view when we woke up in the morning. I loved waking up to super tall palm trees!

This was Nick’s view in the mornings. So hot.

Samui was VERY shut down, and as an island that relies almost 100% on tourism, it was really sad to see. There were a couple of beach restaurants within walking distance of our villa that were still open, though!

There was even a massage lady who still had her shack open on the beach next to one of the restaurants, and I had one of the best Thai massages I’ve ever had. Nora wants to do EVERYTHING mommy does lately, so she sat patiently during my massage, and the massage lady even gave her a little mini session.

Brecken had no time for massages.

A few really cool areas were open on the island, but there were very few tourists to be seen. We happily enjoyed the empty beaches and restaurants.

There was one restaurant we had heard about that put on a nightly fire show on the beach. We found out it was open, and we’re pretty sure every other visitor on the island was there (and it still wasn’t packed!). But it was so fun–the kids about lost their minds.

We had also heard about a resort that you could just go to for the day, and word on the street was that it had a KIDS CLUB (read: free babysitting), so we checked it out. Kids club was closed, but it still didn’t suck.

We did some other light sightseeing on the island, including this temple with the best view ever (and bells…)

But we spent a good deal of time in our peaceful villa. As is custom on our holidays here, the kids spent most of the time naked, Lord of the Flies style.

They were always whooped at the end of the day (you know, from so much sun, swimming, and free nakedness), so they’d belly up to the bar for dinner and a movie and then crash hard.

We found a European bakery on the island that made all of us swoon. The kids were in chocolate/pastry heaven.

After a week on Samui, we had plans to head back to Koh Lanta, which only a year earlier had ended up being our home for 3 months during smokey season and Thailand’s first COVID wave. Some friends were meeting us this time, and we all rented a huge house together. To get from Koh Samui (gulf side) to Koh Lanta (Andaman Sea side), we had to first take a one hour ferry to Surat Thani, and then hire a driver to take us across the mainland, and then on another shorter ferry to Koh Lanta.

Brecken woke up not feeling well and started puking just before we had to get into our RENTAL car to head to the FERRY, and then get in a PRIVATE VAN for 3.5 hours. We smuggled the poor guy on to the ferry with his sand-castle-bucket-turned-puke-bucket and tried not to draw attention to ourselves amongst all the COVID-paranoid passengers.

While we waited a day for our friends to arrive so we could all check into our baller mansion, we stayed in a little bungalow on the beach, where we slept in twin beds, 7 dwarves style.

It was so great to get back to our favorite beach! Samui was nice, but Koh Lanta will always be the best.

I mean, where do we get the right to stay in a place like this?!

Funcle Taylor arranged a private snorkeling trip for all of us to Koh Ha, a set of 5 islands about an hour boat ride away from Koh Lanta. It was magical.

We had so much fun returning to the island that took care of us through our first smokey season, our first online learning stint, and our first wave of COVID here in Thailand, and this time sharing it with some of our favorite Chiang Mai friends!

Just before getting to Koh Lanta, another COVID wave was hitting Thailand. School was going to switch to online, and we were kind of hoping to get stuck on the island again, but our school was hoping to return to in-person learning rather quickly, so they summoned everyone back from their holidays before flights became scarce/grounded. We were bummed, but made the best of it.

While last year’s online learning was made more bearable because we had a pool and beach to distract us, we have to admit it was logistically easier this time around, since we all had our own devices and spaces.

Mr. Nick got a kick out of Brecken watching Mr. Nick’s videos.

I completely forgot about (American) Mother’s Day, since we were knee deep in online learning madness, and it’s not exactly advertised in Thailand, but Nick is a champ, and not only remembered, but made it super special.

Stuff was pretty shut down in Chiang Mai, and school just kept extending online learning one week at a time, hoping for the government to ease restrictions for international schools (since Thai schools were on summer holiday, and we were the only ones in session). It was a LOT of together time, and there were behavior plans, tears, yelling, and apologies.

But there was also lots of quality time, too.

There was some fun sprinkled in amongst the shutdown. Mila turned 6, and Brecken spent 2 weeks making her a castle, complete with turrets, gold paint, a fluffy rug, wall art, and more treasures inside. Only the best for his betrothed.

Mila’s parents are the coolest, and hired a pair of face painters for the party, who went way beyond faces.

They even humored Nick with some bday party ink.

Pools were closed, so we had to get creative in the 100+ degree heat.

The kids’ best neighborhood buddy, Ben, moved away (8 min drive…but still), so we had a little goodbye party for him. Nick and I might have been the saddest of all. Ben is the sweetest kid, finds joy in everything, and the kids’ creativity and imaginations are boundless when they’re all together.

I also turned FORTY during the 3rd wave of COVID/2nd online learning stint. Restaurants were closed, and social gatherings limited, so Nick hired a chef from a fancy restaurant to make a 5 course meal for 10 of our closest friends. It was amazing!

He went all out on ridiculous decorations, and our friend Jordan hosted it at her house (even though Taylor was out of town in the U.S!).

The chef, who grows a lot of what he cooks on his own farm, brought a staff of about 5 people. Upon arrival, Jordan’s oven went out, and they calmly pivoted and reworked everything using the grill! To buy himself some time I’m sure, he served dessert first “because you’re 40 years old and you can eat dessert first if you goddamn please.” Genius.

Then a big storm came through and the power went out. The meal still went off without a hitch. Total professionals!

Because Nick is ridiculous, he also had a lifesize cutout of me made, and passed it around to all our friends the week before so they could take photos with “Young Sara.”

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It was a no-kids party, but I happily bought myself another cake the next day, and we celebrated at home with them, too.

Nick took them to Mr. DIY, a store in Thailand that sells super cheap everything, and let them choose gifts. I got some… interesting stuff.

I also got a PACKAGE IN THE MAIL! This never happens, mostly because mail has been somewhat unreliable during COVID times here, and oftentimes people get heavily taxed on packages shipped from overseas, so we’ve advised people against mailing us anything. But our awesome friends Lisa and Kerry decided to go for it, it made it, and we were all treated to some ‘Merican stuff!!

We’ve also gotten a few packages since! It seems packages are arriving within 3-4 weeks of being shipped, and as long as we have them sent to school, we haven’t been taxed!

The happy ending to this year’s online learning was that we got to end the year in person! The international schools in Chiang Mai appealed to the government to let us all go back for the last 1.5 weeks of the school year, and it worked! Unfortunately many of our students (especially my class of mostly Chinese students) had returned to their home countries during online learning, so some of us had pretty small classes.

By the last 4 days of school, I was down to 2 students!

It was a fun, laidback end to the school year, which we all needed. I had time to visit Brecken (and Mr. Nick’s) class quite a bit to participate in all the fun end of year activities in K3.

And Brecken got to have in-person graduation! I’m not sure who was more excited–Brecken, or Mr. Nick.

I also had fun planning lots of “playdates” with other classes, so my tiny class of 2 could have some fun. Naturally, I invited Nora and Bryn’s class a lot. =)

So that ended our second year teaching overseas. Even though we had to end both years with about 9 weeks of online learning, we’ve also had a lot of “normal” mixed in, which we wouldn’t have necessarily had in the states. So challenges aside, we are grateful!

Summer started with a stray cat that adopted us. “Lady” was not allowed into the house, but that didn’t stop her (or our kids) from believing that she belonged here.

Nick and I are NOT cat people, but it brought the kids so much joy, we ended up buying them a big bag of cat food. The rest was all the kids.

Brecken’s birthday was technically June 4th, but pools were all still closed, and he had his heart set on a pool party. So we held out a month, and as soon as pools opened, we had a dual party at a water park with his April birthday buddy who also had to postpone his party. A good time was had by all.

Brecken is still obsessed with rocks and gems, and one of his classmates got him this set that made him pretty freakin happy.

He’s also still quite the builder, and mommy was getting tired of sharing her tools, so Brecken got his own toolset, which he immediately had to use to put together his new bike from China, which came in 100 pieces.

He also got to take a trip to his first Thai lumberyard. We came home with several boards, which Brecken immediately asked to be cut into several smaller pieces so he could build a bookshelf for Bryn. In case you’re wondering, it takes a parent roughly 15 minutes to cut through a 1×6 with a hacksaw. Brecken has already started his 2021 Christmas list, and it includes a circular saw and table saw.

On our way home, we saw that one of our neighbors was having a tree cut down, and the trunk was chopped up into pieces ready to be hauled away. We asked if we could take them, and then hauled them down the road to our place. Brecken decided he wanted to turn a couple into a workbench, and another one into a chair. We asked the workers if they would come over with their chainsaw when they were done. Not only did this guy happily roll up on his motorbike (driving with one hand and holding the chainsaw with the other), he carved the logs exactly how Brecken wanted them, and then refused to accept any money. I love Thailand. Also, Brecken has now added a third saw to his Christmas list.

So the 3rd wave of COVID in Thailand subsided, things opened up for a bit, and we’ve had some fun. The COVID story isn’t over here, though, and the waves keep coming. Bangkok has been hit especially hard, causing a lot of travel restrictions and precautionary measures in Chiang Mai, Thailand’s second largest city. More on that and the rest of summer in another post!

Cheers!

Sara

After the awesome in-person learning end to the school year in June, we were all pumped for a summer of normalcy. Chiang Mai had just let us go back to IN PERSON SCHOOL after 8 weeks of online learning; surely everything was fine now.

It started off like a pretty normal summer. We went to the dentist, because we’re the funnest parents ever, and winter and summer breaks always start with a field trip to the dentist!

We hiked.

We went to this super fun 3D art museum.

Nick and the girls made a giant batch of salsa.

We worked out, and the gym took lots of pictures of us.

Nick and a friend brought our collective 6 kids, ages 1-8, fishing. The size of the fish in this lake would make one question if perhaps it might be a nuclear waste reservoir, but they were all happy to wrestle these (radioactive?) beasts out of the water.

Even the torrential downpour didn’t dampen the joy.

Nick had a couple golf outings, where he may have sweat a bit.

And I made sure to eat All The Mango Sticky Rice before mango season was over.

We decided to host a 4th of July party for all our expat friends. Another COVID wave was lurking in Bangkok, and Chiang Mai was preemptively amping up restrictions. We didn’t realize social gatherings were banned until the day of the party, so we quick whipped up some cookies and delivered them to all the neighbors as a “Happy4thOfJulyInAmericaPleaseDon’tCallTheCopsOnOurPartyKthanks” gesture.

Nick made all party attendees commit to a bags tournament with a 100 baht buy-in. Then he promptly won the tournament and kept all our friends’ money.

Brecken has taken up skateboarding, and we found this AMAZING skatepark in a warehouse not too far away where you can skate for FREE. They also offer private lessons. He’s hooked.

Bryn is still plucking away at guitar.

Nora is also still playing piano. We keep dreaming of the day they’ll agree to play a duet, but so far it’s a hard pass for both.

We happened upon this bike track in town (also empty). Pretty sure it’s just for little kids on striders, but we threw them out there on their big kid bikes anyway.

Nick celebrated (the 4th anniversary of) his 40th birthday last month! We went to his favorite restaurant for lunch; the only place in town that has a dessert with BOTH PEANUT BUTTER AND CHOCOLATE IN IT. So good.

Then a couple days later, we stopped at Thai Costco, bought as much food and beer as our little Nissan Altima would hold (man, sometimes we really miss the HO), and headed a half hour south to our Airbnb CASTLE.

I know, right.

We invited a bunch of friends and their kids, and celebrated King (princess?) Nick!

After we tucked the kids into their shwanky quarters for the night and drew all the velvet curtains, we turned that fancy marble dining table into Nick’s Birthday Flip Cup Table. Just like back in my kickball days, I dominated everyone. Still got it!

There was also some Royal Beer Pong.

A couple of weeks before the party, our friend Ava (teacher friend slash realtor) told us about a house in her village that recently went up for rent. As you might recall, Ava found us our first house 2 years ago when we moved to Thailand, and it happened to be right behind hers! We loved having Ava as our neighbor and our kids became good friends with her daughter Anya. We loved our house, loved our village and loved our awesome neighbors! Then Ava up and MOVED while we were marooned on Koh Lanta last year (rude!) to the next neighborhood over, and promptly recruited a bunch of families with kids to also move there. We had 2 kids left in our tiny village–both great friends of our kids’, but one went to Thai school, so was kind of on an opposite schedule when it came to school breaks, and the other one ended up moving to another village earlier this summer. Ava has been showing us houses in her village ever since she moved there, but they have all been too small for us. So when a bigger one came up, our ears perked up. We checked it out, loved it…and then someone else rented it before us (sob). We were super bummed. And so was Ava. So much so, that she went and knocked on another guy’s door in the hood, because she noticed he didn’t stay at the house much, and asked him if he’d be interested in renting it out. He said yes! So he moved out, rented us his place, and we now live roughly 1km away from our old house, in a village with a pool (that’s right across the street!), lots of more space for the kids to ride their bikes, and a ton of kids to play with!

While we waited anxiously for 3 weeks before we could move in, we tried to keep busy with whatever was still open in Chiang Mai and the surrounding area. Hotels and Airbnbs have been a STEAL, so we checked out this awesome place in Chiang Dao for a night, about an hour away. Again, we were the only people there.

It also had a bathtub, a rare find around here, so the kids took 3 baths in about 18 hours.

Also while passing the time til we could move, we said goodbye to our friend Drew, who was moving back to the states. Something super sad about living abroad is that people leave. A lot.

Drew was our kids’ PE teacher this year, and he was damn good at it. He’s also my personal plant guru, and I’m certain all my houseplants will die (faster) deaths now that he’s gone.

Then it was finally time to pack up and move! The kids were super helpful packing up their own stuff. We didn’t have to pack THAT well, since we were only moving 3 minutes away, and were moving everything in several back-and-forth trips with our friends’ pickup truck.

Since being in Thailand, I’ve accumulated some live edge wood furniture that I’m slightly obsessed with. It’s made in a local woodcarving village just south of town, it’s absolutely GORGEOUS, and grotesquely cheap. I know we’ll never be able to take it with us when we return to the States, so my only prerequisite for moving was that we were able to fit it all in the new house. Including these floating shelves. I hired these guys to remove, patch the wall, and reinstall these babies in our new house. Seemed simple enough, but 2 days later they were still wrestling away. Bless them.

It was an ugly move–6 back and forth trips in a borrowed pick up truck with stuff haphazardly stacked in the back and kids riding on our laps and/or buried under boxes.

We also didn’t have many boxes, so we did some quick unpacking between trips so we could reuse boxes. Super low budget move, folks.

We did hire movers for a few larger things. Two guys in flipflops showed up in their truck, and managed to wrangle everything in 2 trips, in a torrential downpour, while still removing their shoes every time they walked across a threshold. I love Thailand.

Remember 2 years ago, when we arrived in Thailand with only this much stuff? Yeah, we don’t either.

The new house came with a VACUUM, which none of us had used in 2 full years. I was lukewarm on it, but Brecken clearly inhereted his Grampa Hansen’s genes, and pulls it out for all minor cleanup jobs (and then vacuums every nook and cranny of the house).

The house was pretty much a blank slate, which is not usual in Thai rentals. Almost all are fully furnished. This made us a little nervous, since we had acquired SOME furniture in the last 2 years, but nothing essential like beds or wardrobes (no closets in Thai houses). But Ava came to the rescue and convinced the owner to give us a furniture allowance so we could pick out our own stuff!

The kids put all their own stuff away. They were seriously great little movers.

Nora & Bryn lucked out with these awesome built-ins in their room! We allowed them each 2 drawers and 2 shelves, and then promptly filled the rest with our own crap.

We also have a bunch of fruit trees in our yard! We have 3 different kinds of lime trees, an avocado tree, a mango tree, a papaya tree, a noina (custard apple) tree, and a bunch of thai chili plants. We’re pretty pumped.

And…there’s a BATHTUB!! We may never shower again.

Did we mention the pool is ACROSS THE STREET from our house?

Nevermind that Chiang Mai ordered all pools closed again 2 days after we moved in (insert sobbing emoji here).

But the kids have had no trouble finding entertainment in the village. Brecken discovered this pile of discarded concrete planters and construction material and is now gone for hours a day, while we sit at home and ignore the fact that there are probably snakes and scorpions living in it.

Our kitchen counters are legit child-sized (30 inches high..we’re serious), and Nora and her new neighborhood friend have made 2 batches of zucchini bread in the last 2 weeks.

We frequently end up with all the kids at one of the neighborhood houses for dinner. The host will throw something together and everyone will bring random stuff. It’s a delightful feeding frenzy.

Our move coincided very closely with the opening ceremonies of the Tokyo Olympics. Nick and I LOVE the olympics, and always do it up for the opening ceremonies. Since our house was still in moving shambles, we invited ourselves over to our friends Jordan and Taylor’s house (not big Olympics people), and told them we were having an opening ceremonies party. We instructed Taylor to order a shit ton of sushi (because, Tokyo), fire up the VPN, and login to our parents’ cable. Boom–instant opening ceremonies party.

Jordan is heavily involved in kitten rescue, and at any given time has about 5-7 adorable kittens in her house. They’re like party favors. (Seriously–Mary & Jona went home with a couple last year).

More celebrations were on deck. Nora and Bryn turned NINE, along with Kueanoon, our former neighbor, and their birthday triplet (same year, month and day!). Ben’s birthday is the day before. So we had a quadruple birthday party at an outdoor restaurant!

Seriously… stop growing, please.

This place was awesome–they had a playground, animals, giant swings….and SOFT GRASS! I just wanted to roll around in it. And once again, our group was the only ones there.

I absolutely love having kid birthday parties in Thailand. We literally rolled up to this place with NOTHING. A few days before, we just told them we were coming, ordered a bunch of Thai food off their menu, and had some cupcakes delivered from a bakery. They took care of everything, and we just enjoyed ourselves. Magical.

The girls got a bunch of books, which they immediately started devouring.

Nora has been asking for a makeup set for months, much to my chagrin. I tried to point her in other, more exciting and age-appropriate birthday gift directions, but she held strong. I’m not ready for this, people.

We also stayed overnight at this minigolf resort with some friends. It was pretty awesome. Pool, minigolf, really good restaurant, and free bikes to use. And of course, we were the only ones there.

Our friends Jeshua and Chloe have taken us on some pretty awesome culinary adventures lately. Chloe is Chinese, and took us for some (semi) authentic Chinese food at this restaurant that clearly during non-COVID times is super packed (it’s HUGE). But alas, we had it to ourselves, and they even let Nick steal the mic from the dinnertime entertainment (a singer they obviously hired just for our party) and sing karaoke on their giant stage. He was in heaven.

They also took us to a hot pot restaurant that was super entertaining. We ordered an obscene amount of raw meat and seafood using an iPad, which was then delivered to the table by a robot (but unloaded to our table by about 4 human servers dedicated to our table). We had 4 different soups to cook the meat and seafood in, and I’m embarrassed to say I think we finished the obscene amount of meat. There was also a traditional Chinese face changing performer and a noodle dancer guy. Most fun I’ve had at dinner in a long time!

When Chloe booked the reservation she told them it was Nick’s birthday (even though it was long past) just to make sure we got the full fanfare. I’d say it worked.

And we forgot to take pics, but Jeshua and Chloe also arranged breakfast for us all at Shangri-La Hotel. We took no pictures, but it was hands down the fanciest place we’ve been in Chiang Mai. Due to COVID, they changed their buffet to an order-all-you-can-eat off the ala carte menu, and let’s just say they definitely lost money on us.

The vaccination scene in Thailand, and more specifically Chiang Mai, has been dire to say the least. Countless online signups have been sent out, as well as promises for foreigners, teachers, etc to be vaccinated “soon.” We had clicked on so many links and given our information on so many websites/signups that we had lost count, and more importantly, hope. But, such is Thailand, and a completely unadvertised opportunity came available, and we decided to try our luck getting in line at a foreigners-over-60 queue, and somehow managed to get ourselves a first dose of Sinovac, the Chinese vaccine.

The catch was that the second dose would be Astra Zeneca, a combo the Thai government came up with as an answer to the rapidly-spreading Delta variant, against which Sinovac alone was proving ineffective. While the research related to a Sinovac-Astra Zeneca combo wasn’t super solid, we were hearing that getting an ineffective vaccine was better than getting no vaccine, as it would quickly become a matter of freedom in Thailand, whether or not it would protect us from getting/spreading/dying from COVID. So we pulled up our sleeves and went for it.

As of school year start for international schools (beginning of August), Chiang Mai still had a ban on in-person learning. So our school decided to delay the start of the school year 3 weeks in order to (hopefully) avoid online learning. They adjusted the school calendar, taking away our fall break, 1 week of winter break, and 1 week of smokey season break, and crossed their fingers. As of now, it looks like we’ll still be starting the school year online anyway, which is a HUGE bummer, but one we realize the whole world has dealt with at one point or another the last 2 years.

So we’ve been keeping ourselves busy with stuff like…

Thai! We’ve continued our weekly lessons with Kru Joe, and have recently upped the ante with READING AND WRITING. Not for the faint of heart, folks.

The kids have embraced rainy season and created a snail shelter in our driveway.

Nick has discovered our new neighborhood market, where you can get a roady on tap.

Lots of stuff is closed, but Kru May is still holding Fly Yoga classes.

So here we are, in Thailand’s 4th (5th?) wave of COVID. The first wave in Thailand was about 4000 cases country-wide. This latest wave is roughly 20,000 cases PER DAY (mostly in Bangkok). Since the current vaccination rate is so extremely low (about 6%), and no solid information on when more vaccines will be available, there are many unknowns about the length of this wave. This has gravely impacted enrollment at our school. About half of our students come from China, Japan or Korea, and many of them returned to their home countries for the summer. It is now extremely difficult to get back into the country, and specifically into Chiang Mai, since all domestic flights are grounded. Since I teach in the AAP department (structured English immersion for students coming from out of country), we knew our numbers would be super low.

Yesterday we found out that they had to eliminate my position and dissolve the AAP program due to no enrollment.

Obviously this sucks, there’s no way around it. COVID is The Worst. But opportunity is already beginning to grow out of this loss. Nick has always dreamed of opening his own preschool/kindergarten, and we’ve always talked about how amazing his program would be. We asked the school if they would allow me to take Nick’s ECC position at the school so he could pursue something else, and they graciously agreed. While he won’t be opening a full fledged school in Thailand during COVID, he now has the space to start with a mini program, an in-person learning pod of sorts. Lots of logistics to work out, but it’s starting to feel like there was a purpose in all of this. Would we have taken that leap had we not been pushed? Maybe not.

So, we pivot a bit. And continue to be grateful for our health, a great school for our kids, and a supportive community of friends here in Thailand. We would love your prayers as we navigate this new path!

Cheers,

Sara