A Final Post (for Now)

Hence the title, I plan on this being the last post on this blog for awhile. Considering I haven't added a post for about a year and a half, it's become clear to me that when I have free time, it feels too much like work to update this blog. But the true culprit in my lack of updating interest is Facebook. Around the time I stopped blogging, I started spending more time on FB, and over time pretty much everyone in my address book is now in my network. And since FB allows you to easily post a whole photo album with brief captions, that's really all I need to feel like I've updated the world. And we talk to our families enough anyway where everything on here would be old news by the time it posts.

And in truth, I've noticed as an expat, the first 6 months you live someplace, you think all these new things you're experiencing are pretty cool, and others must agree with you. But the longer you are an expat in a certain location, you start to forget what it is about your life that people might find interesting because those everyday things that are different about living in Malaysia become common and a bit mundane. I no longer think, "wow, it'd be so different in the U.S." or "someone back home might find that interesting". I'm now used to everything being in the local currency or thinking of my speed in the car in kilometers per hour, etc. This is what they say about reverse culture shock, when you eventually return to your home country. That to some degree, it's difficult to reacclimate, because "home" has become such a relative term, and home, to some degree, now feels like Malaysia.

But I feel compelled to say goodbye and give a basic update, if nothing else because the last blog on here was of such a different time and a fair amount has changed. First and foremost, we're no longer "Rusie Family 4". We've added a member. Samantha Kate Rusie joined us on February 23, 2009.

The first picture is in the hospital right after her birth. Harrison had recently turned 4, Sydney was 19 months. The remaining pictures are Samantha at 6 weeks (in her solo shot, taken earlier), Harrison at 4 1/2 and Sydney at 2. These were taken in May 2009.

If you've found this online and you are my friend, and you're on Facebook, give me a holler. If you're a stranger just perusing someone's blog, and are curious about living in Malaysia, you might find it interesting or informational. If you're a stranger and perusing this blog, with no interest in Malaysia, then that's just a bit creepy. Nonetheless, hope you enjoy and maybe I'll update this thing if there's another move or kid or something. Adios...

Beth's Retreat Picture

This picture above goes with the blog below about my retreat. I noticed the picture attached to an email after I published the blog. I'd point me out, but it's not too tough. I guess I could say I'm the Caucasian. Please read on...

Beth's Retreat

Hello all. I have no pictures to include in this particular blog but thought I'd send some information about the retreat I attended last weekend which I mentioned in my February blog. It was associated with a meditation class I had just completed. I knew very little information about what was going on besides paying my money. Like I knew I was meeting people at the center and bumming a ride but didn't know where we were going besides a resort 45 minutes outside of KL. It turned out it was in these lush tropical mountains called Genting Highlands, an area Andy took me to on my birthday. But instead of the more commercial section with casinos and such, we were at some lodge that was just the 25 people I was with, totally off by itself in the middle of nature.

I was the only foreigner. It was mainly Chinese Malaysians and 3 Malays. Basically what it consisted of was putting into practice the meditation techniques we has been taught. I did see the schedule ahead of time and felt a little daunted that everyday from 2p to 8p was simply meditation. I thought no way can I do that that long. In addition to that, the schedule included some yoga, some discussion, some lecture, some eating (fabulous Malaysian food) and the most important element during most of it, silence.

It was an amazing, liberating experience. Once there, I didn't feel daunted at all and welcomed the time in silence. The meditation technique is called Mindfulness, or Insight or Wisdom Meditation. It may all seem a little kooky since jetting off to a silent retreat isn't common in the U.S. (nor is it here) but the practice is actually gaining popularity, almost becoming trendy in the U.S. Some popular books that connect to the practice like The Power of Now are even on Oprah's Book Club and I think she has mindfulness webcasts on her website. So if Oprah's behind it, it's clearly gone mainstream. But the Buddha must feel somewhat ripped off because the concepts are directly lifted from Buddhist mental training that goes back 2,500 years. It's just gained popularity in a secular forum. In fact you'll hear and see the word "mindful" in a lot of book titles lately. But this secular forum is exactly what the teachers and directors of this center wanted to do, allow anyone to learn about this technique, not just Buddhists.

I found it incredibly easy to focus in that environment. I could hear hollar monkeys in the afternoons and locusts in the evenings, just about every bird or bug you could imagine (luckily no bugs bothered us). In the morning when the fog was still hanging over the trees, you felt like you were up in heaven, just breathtaking views. So if there's ever an environment for your mind to be clear, that was it. Three people shared a room which was no big deal since you were never in there except to sleep. We went to bed around 10p and were awakened by the bell at 5:30a. Coffee and tea was heavily consumed.

Although talking was limited, I made some connections during the discussion groups with some people there, who's numbers I got and who I'll most likely see at other classes or meditation sessions at the center. It felt good, once we could talk, to chat with local people, since otherwise I have no exposure to them. A man told me he couldn't tell if I was American, British or Australian since he has so little exposure to Westerners. Although some of the discussion was more connected to beliefs more inline with the Chinese, even if I couldn't really buy into them, it was so interesting to hear the types of things they believe in. I felt like I learned an immense amount about the people and myself as well. Just a great experience altogther.

And my husband deserves thanks for watching the children in my absence. He even dragged them both to a birthday party and I got good reports from a few different friends of what a good job he did. I had my spies in place. I missed Andy and the kids but I returned feeling incredibly refreshed and joyous. I hope I don't become what someone on the retreat labeled a "workshop-aholic" but I could definately see that in my future. I just hope I always live somewhere where I can attend them. In the U.S., they tend to be on the coasts or in Colorado.

But if anyone has interest in what this is about, a good book to read is "Wherever you Go, There You Are" by Jon Kabat-Zinn. He's considered the father of the modern mindfulness movement in the U.S. and has a stress reduction clinic associated with the University of Mass. that uses the technique for stress reduction, physical illness, mental illness, etc. To give a little background, the technique requires you to remember to be aware instead of letting your thoughts drift off to the past, the future or just fantasizing in general. Essentially controling your monkey mind. Then once you build the ability to remember to be aware, you inquire within to build overall self-awareness into why you think or feel the way you do, bringing more wisdom into your daily life. Personally I find it valuable. And it's lead me to alot of learning about myself and some pretty cool experiences here.

So that's it. Just thought I'd share it. Hope everyone's doing well.

Beth

March 2008

And on to March. Hello again from Rusie Family Four. I'm kind of impressed with myself for banging out this many blogs in a short period of time. Since I just published February's, not too much more to update about current happenings. Here's some more choice pics of the kids. Not sure what you think, but I think they look an awful lot alike in both these pictures. And I had three people in one day tell me how much Sydney looks like Andy (all at different places too). I'm swearing they both have my eyes but apparently when they have your husband's head, ears, nose and mouth, the eyes don't mean so much.


And I'm still working, all you family members, on the best way to show off more pictures. Will be in touch more about that. I try to encourage Harrison, and one day Sydney, to dance. I'm strongly considering entering Harrison in a ballet class that some friends' kids do if it switches to a better day for us. Here's a few pics from some Rusie dance parties











Anyway, on to March. March was kind of an eventful month for us like February. First, to recap a little Malaysian news, there was an election at the beginning of March for Parliment which was a pretty big deal. First, a little background. There has been one political party in power since Malaysia gained independence 50 years ago called the BN. It is basically the Malay party and Malays make up 60% of the population. A party needs a 2/3 majority in parliament in each state (there are about 12) to push through whatever policies they like, appoint all the ministers, etc. The BN has had a 2/3 majority since 1969. Many people are disgruntled with the policies of the BN as being unfair to non-Malay minorities, building Islam or religious differences into policies, and just your run of the mill corruption whenever one party gains too much power.

There are minority political parties that represent the Indian and Chinese populations, a party that is more Islamic and another political party that is mainly Malay but is in opposition to the BN. So apparently these minority parties banded together during elections and BN lost their 2/3 majority which was considered a major blow. The BN still controls Kuala Lumpur, which is it's own state, but lost the state where the second largest city, Penang, is and an important state for industry and money outside of KL called Selangor.





So the opposition has to form a government in the states they won which some suspect could be difficult given the different agendas and beliefs of the parties in their coalition. And the BN has lost a lot of power around the country. We don't keep up on the politics here as much as we should, but I do think this development sounds promising. Any political party given unchecked power for a long period of time is bound to underrepresent minorities or have abuses. I believe in the U.S.'s system of checks and balances, although it doesn't stop shady stuff from happening all the time either.





Now off the current events and onto us. Although it's not like the States, there is the occasional concert going on. We went to a music festival here with some friends that included George Clinton and the P-Funk, John Legend, The Roots and Incubus. It rained and I was bummed we didn't get to see all of Incubus because we didn't stick it out until 2 a.m. but I must rave about The Roots. If anyone is looking for some Ipod downloads and likes hip hop, download some of their popular songs.





And one concert I had no desire to see but was bummed later that I missed was Harry Connick Jr. But we did happen to be at a brunch at the hotel where he was staying. I don't think I would have recognized him but friends of ours who were going to the show noticed him and we got all annoyingly fan-nish, hence the picture. He was better looking in person than here.

We took a last minute trip to Penang, an island on the western side of Malaysia. We had a nice time and got to eat some fantastic food. Penang is known for their hawker stalls (like street meat with Malaysian food). These hawker stalls are lined up together with plastic tables and chairs everywhere. We went to a seafood restaurant someone at Andy's work had recommended away from the tourist spots. The whole wall was lined up with huge tanks of fish, crabs and lobsters. We said to give us the three most popular dishes and felt like we were definately at a place only the locals frequent. It was a cool cultural experience but realized one of the most popular dishes was a lobster with cheese all over it that cost $80 US dollars once we got the bill. Whoops! We decided the ambiance was worth it since the lobster had already been devoured. But more on food later...

A huge perk to living here is with the weather and location, a beach vacation is a few hours drive or short flight away. I could get really used to this. We took this vacation without other families so it was just us with the kids in the pools mainly. Per my November blog, saw a few women in burkas again, again my assumption is that they're vacationing Middle Easterners. Harrison saw a woman at breakfast in a black burka and yells at the top of his lungs, "Mommy, it's Darth Vader". I don't know if you can be laughing hysterically and horribly mortified at the same time but I just hoped that A. she didn't hear him and/or B. she had no knowledge of American pop culture. After that, every time a woman in a burka walked by, I'd try to draw his attention to something else.

Since I'm so curious about the burka thing, I'll share another small tidbit. I was laying on a lawnchair with Sydney. There was a couple a few chairs down from me, the woman in a burka, the man in progressive clothes. Sydney was smiling at them, like she always does, and they were responding to her. So I looked over at them, smiling and trying to get Syd to wave and I noticed I was trying hard to focus on the woman (as a sort of recognition of her) and I had alot of trouble. I've never tried focusing on someone when I could only see their eyes. It was weird. You don't realize that's it's hard to look a woman in a burka in the eyes because you've never looked at someone in the eyes without seeing the rest of their face. OK, off the burka thing..moving on.

And what I want to know is, why is it that toddlers do all that they can to sabotage family pictures? When we had a photographer come take family pictures back in December, out of 125 pictures, there were 3 family shots that didn't show Harrison with one of these two faces.

These trips in February and March were great, but we're looking to do a beach vacation outside Malaysia at some point. The beaches here are OK but we've heard great things about Bali and Phuket, Thailand. Actually, since Andy and the guys took off to Indonesia at the beginning of April, some of us ladies have decided to do a girls' trip in Phuket at the beginning of June. And the flights are booked so it will definately happen so definately looking forward to that.

I also took a couple of cooking classes in March. I don't think I've ever talked about food that much on any of the blogs. But we consider ourselves in heaven when it comes to food. The best way to describe Malaysian food is a mixture between Indian and Asian, very similar to Thai food. The two most popular dishes, one is a rice dish, the other a noodle dish. The rice dish, Nasi Lemak, is coconut rice with a curry paste that you mix together and the noodle dish, curry laksa, is like a soup with noodles in it with a coconut milk and curry flavor too. Andy thinks curry laksa tastes like Skyline Chili if anyone's familiar.

Everything is very spicy. Andy can normally always hang. Sometimes I can, sometimes I can't. I love Nasi Lemak, I think because the rice tempers the spice but normally I steer clear of curry laksa. I ordered it once at a cafe restaurant in a mall thinking it would be tame. I couldn't do more than 5 bites. But then the mall wasn't in a tourist or expat spot of town. When we decide a western breakfast sounds too bland, we'll go to these small Malaysian outdoor type cafes that are similiar to the hawker stall/plastic chairs set-up you see in Penang and get Nasi Lemak Harrison loves the coconut rice. We also love a Indian inspired dish called roti chani (like a thin crepe) which you dip in dahl. Harrison calls it a pancake. A dish called Beef Rendang is also very popular, as well as various types of curry in general.

I'm going to throw in some random pics into this food conversation, like this one, my Amazing Spidermen:

Food is a very big deal in this country. When Andy eats with his co-workers, he's shocked at all the food these itty bitty Malaysian women can put down. And there are so many restaurants here of all kinds, you wonder how they could all stay in business. The food is amazing, but you do have to watch it. Malaysian food isn't the healthiest of options. Lots of fried things or coconut milk just begging to clog your arteries. And every meal has rice somewhere so those less used to processing so much starch everyday are going to see it appear somewhere on their body. We even have our own rice cooker, an appliance here as popular as a toaster back home.

For anyone with a Cooking Light subscription, last month's issue had a section on Malaysian food. In the U.S., you would probably have to go to Asian grocery stores for some of the ingredients and it might be pricey, but it is so good. We wish everyone who's reading this could come visit us so we could take you out to experience the food. Harrison and BFF, Kai, below.

Since food is such a huge part of the experience here, I felt I had to get in a few cooking classes. I attended an Indian cooking class and a Malaysian cooking class with some friends at the end of March. It was so interesting to learn all the different herbs and spices that are used in both types of cooking, everything has such strong flavor. The Malaysian cooking class involved us mashing fresh herbs and chilis with a mortar and pestel. So although it doesn't sound practical to devote 2 hours to cooking a dinner with kids needing attention, the class was so entertaining and educational. And it's also hard to justify the time and expense cooking a Malaysian meal when I can go down the street and have the same amazing meal for the equivalent of one US dollar.

In case any of you women are curious, you may wonder what it's like to cook or grocery shop here. I can find way more ingredients than I could in Mexico, ironically given the distance from the U.S. I shop at a grocery store heavily skewed to expats. But there's still a lot of random things I can't find as easily or that you would have to visit three different stores to find and who has the time for that. For example, was trying to make a pasta salad and couldn't find cheese tortellini or sun-dried tomatoes at my usual grocery store so said screw it. Many of the recipes in my Cooking Light either have ingredients too hard to find or too expensive to justify. That's another thing. I may be able to find a lot of comfort things from home, but you have to really want it based on the price. Like I just can't justify paying $8 US dollars for a box of Cheerios. Everytime I pay my weekly grocery bill, I'm shocked at the total. But then the Malaysian ringgit is three times the US dollar so it always sounds shockingly high but even dividing by 3, I'm still shelling out way more here than I would in the U.S.

As for cooking, I must admit, it's much easier if you have help to do your prep cook stuff. I have our helper do all the chopping, etc. She leaves the house right before I start cooking. I must admit I miss my crockpot. I haven't seen an equivalent appliance here and any U.S. appliance with a motor or that heats up can't be used here even with an electrical transformer. I think I've mentioned that all the appliances here are small. So we have this teeny, tiny oven in what they call the "dry kitchen" which is the kitchen up front that's supposed to be more on show. Although we should feel lucky because some people don't have an oven at all. Asian dishes never require an oven. They don't eat casseroles. We have a gas stovetop that they call a hob here in the "wet kitchen", the one in the back that literally has a drain in the floor. This is where the maid's room is. The concept is the maid does her thing in the wet kitchen, usually with a door separating it from the dry kitchen, which is the kitchen guests would see. The houses, as well as everything else here, is set-up with the assumption of a maid, since it is so common.

I would love to suggest that you all try out a Malaysian restaurant but realize cities in the parts of the U.S. might not have one. A friend of mine said the word "Penang" seems to always be in the title of Malaysian restaurants in the States so if you see that in a title, you know you'll be eating Malaysian food. Or if that doesn't arise, you can eat Thai one night, Indian the next, and you've come close enough to what we experience.

As much as I'd love to talk forever about food, I think I've exhausted the subject and will move on to Harrison's Easter Egg Hunt with his school at the end of March. It was a field trip to a local park. Although the park is awesome and the most famous in KL, we had never been there. Probably because we got there at 9:30a and it was already hot as he$@. By the end of the day, Harrison was literally dripping in sweat. But it was a blast since he was with all his school chums and I'm good friends with a lot of the Moms. Here's a few pics. Also the shirt Harrison is wearing is very Malaysian. The design on the front is batik which is a type of painting done with wax and dyes on fabric that Malaysia is well known for. Dig on the hat.

Here's Harrison with the bulk of his class. He and formerly mentioned BFF, Kai, are the two boys striking poses on the left side.

This next pic cracks me up, again with BFF. Harrison looks like some old retired guy to me in this hat. No offense to the grandpas.

That about covers March. As for upcoming plans, besides my girls' trip to Thailand the first week of June, we've finally nailed down our home leave back to the U.S. We'll be somewhere in Indiana or Ohio June 13 - July 23, a nice long visit. We hope you are all well and hopefully we can catch up in person when we're back.

Rusie Family 4

February 2008

Hello all! We're back with some more commentary and pictures recapping our lives here. We hope everyone is doing well and those of you who have suffered through snow recently, that your temperatures are rising.

First, an update as to what we're up to this first week of April. Andy's birthday was the 2nd and he's currently on an Indonesian island across from Singapore with a bunch of guys playing golf for the weekend. I just spoke to him before starting this blog and I think his body will start convulsing after this trip given all the golf the guys have squeezed in in such a short amount of time. He said the golf course has ocean views, water is crystal clear, sand like powder. Yes, he's a bastard. So I guess just permission to go was a bit of a birthday gift but we're planning to celebrate his birthday later this month with an evening at a nice hotel in town, without the kids, with the added ability to sleep in. Anyone else with small children knows this is a huge luxury.

Speaking of kiddos, here they are. Harrison is doing great. He loves all his friends at school, has a little gang of them he calls "the boyz". I've been writing down the hilarious things he says so that I won't forget them and I'll throw some in here and there. He's pretty well potty trained (except at nighttime). You'll notice a few butt pictures to follow which I attribute to the diaper freedom. He also loves all his little activities. His drama teacher told me she thinks he'll be an actor one day because he's the most animated in the class. What kid wouldn't want to pretend they're the "big, bad wolf" for an hour. In the following pictures, he's channeling his inner T-rex.


Although he loves his little school, I'm hoping he can go to a preschool program at the international school in our area. The problem with his preschool is that kids just go there as they wait to get accepted into various international schools. So he'll befriend kids that will keep moving on. Many of his friends will move on for sure come August, some to this school, his best friend to the Japanese school. But if I have him in the international school, most likely his environment and the kids would remain the same, except for expat kids that move out of KL. Just trying to add as much consistency to his little life as possible.


Even in a Chef outfit, still channeling the inner T-rex. As for Syd, she's flying by the milestones. Just started crawling, or scooting more accurately, this past week. I'm totally unprepared. No true babyproofing yet or anything. But she's getting across the room in seconds so gonna have to get on that. She's imitating alot like waving or clapping and is busting out some ma-ma's and da-da's that appear to be to the appropriate people. No teeth yet though. As Harrison so eloquently put it, "Sydney can't talk, Mommy, she doesnt' have any teeth yet".

I continue to do my thing. I haven't attended the Buddhist Center for awhile because I was having trouble with the Geshe's English. I do meditation training one night a week and figured that and my Saturday tap class are all I want to commit at the moment that eats into "family time". I have a retreat through this class I'm doing in a few weekends which should be interesting. It's at some resort in a forest outside of KL. I'm the only expat so it's me and a bunch of Chinese Malaysians. So on Andy's weekend away he plays golf and on mine I get to not talk for 48 hours. Actually sounds kind of nice. I could stand to shut up for awhile. I'm also getting some yoga in once a week at a class taught by a friend.

Now to recap our February. Where I left off on the last post, we were about to have a holiday for Chinese New Year. Chinese New Year is the biggest holiday celebrated by the Chinese and is celebrated wherever there is a sizable Chinese population. Since 30% of the population here are Chinese, it's huge. All the malls are decorated in red and gold. Chinese lanterns are hanging everywhere (actually Harrison insists that these lanterns are jellyfish due to the resemblance). It's celebrated on the first day of the lunar month on the Chinese calendar and ends on the 15th although employers typically give just a few days off. Unfortunately we didn't get invited to any Chinese Malaysians house but we did get to see a lion dance outside the house of a Chinese family who lives a few houses down.



This ceremony is performed in front of people's homes or places of business to bless it. The mythology behind it is a beast would attack villagers and the villagers summoned a lion spirit to defend them and wound the beast. The following year, the lion spirit was guarding the Emperor's palace so the villagers had to create a lion statue which was enough to keep the beast away. So this Lion Dance is a traditional Chinese ritual to evict any bad spirits and protect the home from any future visits. This dance is accompanied with music that can only be described as loud "pot and pan" banging. The music has this annoyingly loud quality to also scare away the bad spirits.

In the above picture, you might notice the orange scraps on the ground. They are peels off mandarin oranges that are arranged in a Chinese character symbolizing good luck and happiness for the New Year. Mandarin oranges are everywhere during this time and I ate more fresh mandarin oranges in that week than I'll ever eat. And I discovered they're really good. They sell them by the crate and everyone gives them out. Andy got some at work. Harrison got some at school at his Chinese New Year party.

Speaking of which, I think he looks pretty handsome in his outfit. Every year is assigned a different animal, an animal that you "are" based on the year you were born, much like our horoscope by month. 2008 is the year of The Rat which is actually a good year to be born because it's the first animal of the 12 animal cycle. People actually plan pregnancies based on the baby being born in a "rat" year so this Chinese New Year was a bigger deal than others. Chinese are extremely superstitous so they take their zodiac signs very seriously as well.

This is a sidebar but thought I'd mention some of these superstitions. They believe very strongly in ghosts. A man Andy knows told him he had to hire a special "exorcist" to bless his office when some collegues were convinced it was haunted, simply to get people to calm down. People discuss ghosts very seriously as if there's no doubt to their existence, which Andy and I think is kind of cool given my love of scary movies and his love of haunting shows. Also, you'll never see "4's" anywhere. Similiar to the bad luck feelings we have for the number 13. But the difference is that 13 is one number, whereas 4 is repeated constantly as you count. So for example, our address should be 64, but it's 62A to avoid any 4's. All the malls have various floors called lower ground, ground, upper ground, all these different ways to have the 1st floor be higher so that you never reach a 4th floor. Same with the building Harrison's school is in. His school is on the 3rd floor, next floor is 3A, next floor is 5, then 13, 13A, then 15.

Around Chinese New Year, Andy and I had a date day/night and I got to see one of my first sightseeing stops, The Batu Caves. I mentioned this place in a previous blog as the site of a Hindu festival called Thaipusam. It's basically the biggest Hindu shrine in the area, built into an old cave, about 20 minutes from our house. Here's little, tiny Andy in front of big, gold Lord Murugan, a Hindu deity that guards the cave. Behind him you can see the 250 steps to get up into the caves. And this is why I've never seen it. Can you imagine hoofing kids up 250 steps. Don't think so.

I'm not entirely sure what this guy is up to but I think the fire he has at the bottom step allows people to cleanse their feet before going up the stairs. You may notice that the women walking up on the left have removed their shoes. If memory serves, I think they prayed over the small fire and held their feet above the fire for a second or two. We later saw this guy performing a ceremony with other similarly dressed men within the cave but I couldn't get in close enough to get a picture. Since we went on our own, we didn't have a tour guide to tell us exactly what was going on, but it was cool to be able to go there by ourselves and hang out as long as we wanted. Since we were there a week or two after the festival, there was a lot of trash inside the cave, but this brought out the monkeys in full force. I think Andy literally got 10 solid monkey pictures but here's a small sample.

And this is me at one of the shrines within the cave. I believe after this stop, we got massages. Ya know, tired legs and all. ;) I haven't mentioned those yet but we get them all the time. They're not as dirt cheap as they are in Thailand, but still cheap enough to average a couple massages a month. So instead of dinner and a movie date nights, we do dinner and massages. Most of the U.S. movies in the theaters here kind of suck anyway.

Moving right along, midway through February we went on our first vacation outside of KL. We drove 3 hours to the eastern coast of Malaysia to stay at a Club Med with a couple other families for a long weekend. It was a nice break and rather low key. Here's a few pics from the trip:

This one I had to add. I'm sure taunting monkeys while naked is certainly frowned upon here.

Here is Harrison with buddies Easton and Emma.

These pics were in the hotel room but finally one with me and the kids. The one of Syd I had to add. She just looks like a little doll to me in the picture. Yes, I know I should have broken Harrison of his pacifier at bedtime addiction but I have yet to do it.

About a week after vacation, the American Association had their Annual Ball. I was actually jazzed to go because it's not often we women have an excuse to totally deck out. I busted my butt finding a dress, shoes and jewelry the week prior, then came down with a terrible cold that day. I took the approach of "drinking your cold into oblivion" which agreed with me that night, didn't agree with me the next day. Hopefully you think we clean up nice.

We also consider ourselves lucky to have made some great friends here who we're pictured with below, some of whom are currently on the golf trip with Andy.

We had a very fun night and were actually able to dance, one of my all-time favorite things to do. Therefore a blog would not be complete without the following addition of video. Although the video is pretty dark, you may recognize my husband as the man on the left. And for anyone familiar with The Rusie Shuffle, as it's affectionately referred to, please note the off-beat clapping. Harrison's sense of rhythm might come from my side, not sure.

I'm going to end this installment with a field trip we took with Harrison's preschool to a small air force museum. The kids got to sit on and in the planes, pretend to drive them, every boy in his class, including Harrison, was in heaven.

The boy on the right of Harrison is Kai, Harrison's current BFF, and official member of "the boyz". Not so sure if kid on his left is a member.

So we hope you're all enjoying your entrance into Spring. And although much of our life is fairly mundane and could be taking place in the middle of Kansas (no offense to those living in the middle of Kansas), hopefully you're enjoying the blog.

-Rusie Family 4