I think the drive from Farragut to the farm felt like it took longer than the whole flight from Australia. I couldn’t wait to get home and see everyone!! We pulled in the driveway and saw the whole fam (minus Em who was helping get the horses ready at the Iowa state Fair) sitting on the deck – perfect. The whole day was great fun. I am pretty sure Ty is going to put Dewey the kitten in his suitcase, or bring a frog home. Lily and Bandit got reacquainted. Felt almost surreal to be there after being gone for so long. Grandma-grandma made the trek over. She is still, and probably always will be, the toughest woman I know. We had a yummy meal – thank you to everyone who brought food!! Our contribution was a package of Tim Tams – they were a hit! Such a good time.

Bonfire.
And Emily showed up!!!! I wasn’t expecting her to be able to make it. When the beautiful full moon appeared in the sky, we all headed out to the pond. A bonfire was lit, several fish were caught, beer was consumed, s’mores were cooked (but Ty didn’t like the “krangle” which was his newly invented word for burnt marshmallow), guitars were played. This is the type of thing I miss most about being away. So glad Mother Nature cooperated and gave us perfect weather.

Lily was in the house with Nana and Papa, and unfortunately when I dropped in for a minute, she had woken up very unhappy. I stayed in and got her calmed down, and got Ty to bed. Around midnight Ty woke me up and said his legs hurt. He had mentioned the other day that his bones hurt – figure it must be growing pains. He was miserable. Antsy, crying, couldn’t relax. We have him some Panadol (Tylenol) and made him drink a lot of water. It took a while but he finally calmed down. Poor munchkin. We ended up taking Lily to the doctor in the morning – mild double eat infection and an upper respiratory infection. Meds and a nebulizer (which she HATED), and she was on the road to recovery.

Fair!
I don’t know if you know this or not, but I LOVE the Iowa State Fair. I don’t know if I have ever missed a year. The food, the friends, the people watching, the everything. It is fantastic. On the way there we sang “our state fair is a great state fair! Don’t miss it! Don’t even be late!” My niece, Brianna, is showing sheep, and my sister, Emily (and pretty much my whole family) were also helping some friends with their draft horses. Ty got to ride in the truck and trailer with nana and papa, and then he spent the entire day helping. He unloaded the trailer, fed the sheep, and helped with the horses. He even got to ride in the wagon with Murari – pretty much the highlight of his day. Well, that, or the time a nice man paid Ty a dollar for sweeping up the sawdust out of the aisle. He wants to buy a special treat today. He ate corn dogs, drank lemonade, and enjoyed an ice cream cone. He didn’t stop until we got in the car around 11:00 PM.

We were excited to be able to spend the day with some other friends and family, as well. The Gee’s, the Conaway’s, and Bubba all came. Jessi and Mark joined the fun. Lily was such a trooper.

I am writing this next section on Monday morning, so the rest of the week might come out as a blurred mess. We had the most awesome time. Where to begin??? Probably more about the fair. Ty is definitely my son. He loves the fair, the barns, the milkshakes, the lemonades, getting dirty and nobody cares (in fact is preferred), walking 12,000 miles and not complaining, taking it all in. Lily was a trooper as well. She seemed to thoroughly enjoy being there. I don’t think she cried once in the 3 days we were there. Well, 3 days with Jay and I, 4 days for Lily, 5 days for Ty.

The highlight of the fair, hands down, was when Ty got to ride in the mare cart in the show arena with Ray-ray. Ty had spent the first 2 days in the horse barn, helping any way he possibly could, carrying tack, sweeping the aisles, non stop. I was a very proud mama, watching my little man step up to the plate and work. Nobody had to twist his arm, or offer him bribes, he just worked. He saw that everyone else was busy, and he didn’t question it, just jumped right in and helped wherever he could. As I was falling into bed at midnight after day 2, my sister, Emily, sent me a text and Said that Ray wanted Ty to ride in the cart with him the next day. He just needed a suit coat and dark jeans. When we woke the next morning, we didn’t tell Ty – I wanted Ray and Bean to be able to tell him. Brooke and I spent the entire hour long drive to Des Moines working the phones, calling every place that might have a little boys suit coat. We lucked out and found one on clearance at Von Maur, so after a quick stop (and a chipotle burrito – couldn’t pass that up), we arrived at the fairgrounds. Ty couldn’t wait to get there – and he didn’t even know what was going to happen. He was walking ahead of us, in his cowboy clothes, strutting along, swinging his arm, hop in his step. Such a confident little man.

Ray and Bean told him the news, and yep, he was excited. The show wasn’t until 5 or so, but as soon as they started getting the horses ready, he wanted to put his show suit on. Jay took him into an empty horse stall and got him ready. When that stall door slid open and he walked out, everyone oohed and ahhhed – even random people walking by that we didn’t know. Man, he looked handsome. And when he put on his Australian hat, Lordy. I couldn’t handle the cuteness.

Show Time!
I don’t think Ty knew exactly what to expect in the arena. That cart went FAST! When they first entered the arena, Ty had a look of terror on his face, but after a couple rounds, he relaxed and I could tell he was having the time of his life. I was taking pictures and videos and a lady came running up to me and asked who was in the cart with Ray. I told her it was my son, Ty Shearer. She ran back to the announcer booth and came on the loudspeaker. “Riding with Raymond is Ty Shearer. He is certainly the cutest driver we have had in the arena today.” Word.

Ray – I know you didn’t have to do that for Ty, so thank you for giving him that memory. I know he will never forget it. Ever. That is permanently ingrained in his 4 year old brain. Thank you for allowing him to help, showing him the ropes, and without realizing it, teaching him that hard work and good behavior pays off. Jay and I can talk to him about that stuff until we are blue in the face, but you showed him a valuable life lesson. Forever grateful for that.

I know there were lots of people in the barn those days, watching over him, teaching him new things, being patient with his gazillion questions. I can’t thank all of you enough. Pretty sure we are going to have to get a draft horse or two when we move back to the states…

Other fair fun.
Pictures say a million words.

Special treatment with the Budweiser Clydesdales.

Bathy Wathy Time!

Got some cuddles in with Court and Jeremy’s sweet babe!

Quad Cities.
We drove to the Quad Cities on Thursday morning and (yay!!!) got to see Ann, Will, Belle, and Elle. I think Ty could spend a week at Will’s house. Those two boys are likely going to cause some trouble someday. I overheard them standing out by the beans, talking about combines. Ann ran us all over the countryside snapping pictures that I am sure are going to turn out awesome. We sat by the pool for about a half hour (not long enough) before we had to head to the hotel. Quick trip, but so glad we got to see the Steward’s.

Bowling.
We got checked in, rushed to change, and headed down to the bowling alley. The next 4 hours are kind of a blur – many of our great friends and their kids stopped by to chat. It was so good to see everyone. So good. Ty and Jana jumped right back into their crazy fun play (after a gigantic hug), so many new babies. Lots of things have changed in a year, but at the same time lots of things have stayed the same. I don’t know if everyone else felt like this, but it seemed almost like we had never left and were just hanging out with friends that we just saw the other day. Mark of true friends. I was so busy that I didn’t even take a single picture (nuts!). Such a good time.

When we got back to the hotel room, Ty finally decided he was hungry – he had been way too busy playing to eat. So we ordered room service before crashing.

Corporate.
Ty and Lily got a special treat by having Miss Lindsay watch them Friday morning at the hotel while Jay and I went to corporate for some meetings. Miss Lindsay has been a blessing for us for 4 years, and I am so glad they got to spend some uninterrupted time together.

As Jay and I were getting our visitor badges, we ran into some old coworkers/friends. That was how the whole day went. Wherever we went, we saw familiar faces and got caught up with lots of people. So nice being back at Corporate. Our meetings went really well. It is so nice to be able to talk to people about our careers/experience/challenges/opportunities in person. Walking into the Treasury department felt like going home. It was hard not to set up camp in my old cubicle and get a deal done. I also got to meet a few new people that I work with at my new job. So glad we made the trip over.

The plan was to rush back to the farm after our meetings, but we decided to stay one more night. I needed to stop and breathe a minute after go-go-going for 2 weeks. And I needed some chill time with friends. We killed an hour or so at the hotel pool. The Bach’s whipped up an amazing meal with like zero notice, and the Blint’s joined us for dinner, drinks, and dessert – which Ty somehow turned into his 5th birthday celebration. No, his birthday is not until may. And yes, of course Rachel had awesome birthday candles. It was a beautiful evening, perfect weather for sitting on the patio, awesome time.

Home.
On our way out of town, we drove through our neighborhood. It was pretty quiet, didn’t get to see as many people as we had hoped, but the house is still standing. It looks just about like how we left it. Big thank you to Mr. Paul and Mike for taking such good care of the place. We did get to stop and see Gary. He was quite surprised to see us. We had a nice chat before hitting the road again.

On the way home, we dropped Ty off with Papa and Aunt Brookie do they could go to the fair one more time. Nana watched Lily, and Jay and I went to Paton to have dinner with Mark and Jessi. Ok, whoa. Paton, IA. Population like 200 or something, and they have an awesome restaurant/bar. Such a nice thing Mr. Bauer is doing for that community – and the communities surrounding it. We had a great time, started to make some plans for their trip down under in November, lots of laughs.

Sunday Funday.
Our last day at the farm was perfect. Jess, Brianna, Emmy, Brooke, mom, Steven, and the 4 of us just hung out. All day. Hair was “done”, cat naps were taken, ham balls were eaten, skotcharoos were made and devoured. Grandma grandma made a surprise visit. Yes, she is 88. Yes, she still drives. My grandma is tougher than your grandma. Chores were done, mule rides, malts were drank, and Ty learned how to drive Papa’s lawn mower. What took my mother 2 years to figure out how to drive, took my son 2 minutes to work out in his brain. So much fun.

Prep!
In all of the excitement of the last week, I can’t believe that I almost forgot to share our exciting news! After 8 months of fortnightly phone calls to my new best friend Mary at St Stephens admission office, Ty has been given a spot at big kid school! He still has to pass an interview (lord knows what they will ask and how Ty will respond), but barring any major disasters, in January Ty will be in the Prep 2015 class at St Stephens College (not really a college like we are used to in the states). This was our top choice, and I am so thankful to have this major unknown figured out. Yay!! We still need to work out before/after/vacation school care, but we have the big problem solved!!

Goodbyes.
So saying goodbye sucked. Ugh. I really dislike it. The choking back the tears, the quickly running off and looking away so that we don’t all see each other’s red eyes and tears, so not fun. But this time felt a little different than a year ago. This time I know what lies ahead of us, it isn’t a huge unknown that we are venturing off to. We have several visitors lined up to come see us down under, and are trying to convince several others to come down as well. And honestly, the first year has flown by. We should be back home sometime between August and December 2015, all subject to change of course, but at least we have a rough idea. Time will go by fast, I am sure.

I am sure that I forgot to include heaps of stories and details about the past week. I think it would be impossible to include every bit of awesomeness that we just experienced. To everyone that adjusted their schedules to make time to see us, drove out of their way, entertained our children…thank you for making our “vacation” home so perfect.

We have a few more days to spend some quality time with Memaw and Papa and the gang in Farragut before catching a plane on Thursday. Looking forward to the week ahead!