Somusing

Today we saw, among many other things, the Hunger Wall in Prague. It looks pretty good for being 650 years old! I will post pictures tomorrow, I hope. In the meantime, Zed uploaded a few more .

I'm drinking herbal tea and waiting for the split pea soup to finish cooking, so I'm grabbing a few minutes to post. I want to write something really long and descriptive, but maybe it's better to do brief posts more frequently, anyway. The walls of our apartments are hung with many pictures of Prague and the Czech countryside -- drawings, paintings, etc. I think they're lovely, and I hope to spend a little time looking at all of them more closely. Below are two pictures in the kitchen, and I love the plants on either side, especially the vine. And yes, they are real. There are a lot of plants in the apartment, some of them quite large, all of them very healthy, and I hope I'm not supposed to take care of them. I'm going to ask. I'm not great at taking care of plants. From Europe 2013 Next is the view from our entryway (and also the kitchen, but only from one side of the kitchen): The Břevnov Monastery, founded in 993 AD. Jon and a few kids went to ...

I don't think I can stay awake long enough to do more than link to Seth's and Phin's blog posts and Zed's pictures about our journey that started early Tuesday morning and ended this afternoon in Prague. We are here. It's amazing that we had three uneventful and successful flights and nobody got lost! But I'm oh, so tired. Phin's blog post Seth's blog post Zed's Tumblr (possibly exclusively for photos) Going to sleep now.

Transferring money to a stranger's bank account can be a pain. Especially in another country. Even more so in another currency. Wire transfers are the standard way to do this, but: Some U.S. banks won't do outgoing wire transfers at all. One of our checking accounts is in this category. Outgoing domestic wires within the U.S. typically cost $15 each. Many U.S. banks won't do outgoing international wire transfers at all. Two other banks we've used are in this category. Outgoing foreign wires denominated in U.S. dollars typically cost $32 each. Most U.S. banks won't do outgoing international wire transfers denominated in a foreign currency. Only one bank we use will do this. Outgoing foreign wires denominated in a foreign currency cost us $47 each. In the U.S., most banks accept incoming domestic wires and none that we've used charge a fee for that. Thank you! But some banks we've worked with won't allow an incoming foreign wire at all. Bank...

Here's a photo of our house while we were packing up our personal stuff last week, getting the house ready to be a vacation rental. It looked a bit better when we finally left. We spent a day in Idaho Falls with Jon's parents and have been in Layton at my sister Ivy's house for the past couple of days. On Saturday, we saw BYU's production of Phantom of the Opera, in which my brother Ethan played first trumpet in the pit orchestra. It was great fun and at the end, Mira said, "I loved that so much!" even though about two thirds of the way through, she was moaning, "When is this going to be over?" (It's going to be delightful to travel with her.) Then spent some very pleasant hours with our friends the Ausbornes. Today we went to church in Layton with Ivy's family and I kept thinking that next week we'll be experiencing church in Czech! We finished the Pimsleur lessons yesterday (there are 30 of them) -- Mám rád Prahu! -- but I'...

Today I'm going through my clothes, packing some away, getting rid of some, and considering a too-large pile to bring on our year-long Field Trip. I've been mentally preparing for this for days and also expounding to the kids on how they should approach the packing. "Think versatility!" I say. And someone usually says, "What's versatility?" just to bug me. Or Phin says, "Your mom thinks versatility." (That's his latest joke, putting "Your mom" at the beginning of every sentence someone says. Isn't he so funny?) The other words I'm thinking are "practical" and "comfortable" and "minimal." I think it actually helps me to get these words into my head, so I can be merciless in my choices. I've convinced myself that even if we can't quite manage to travel with only carry-on luggage , we will be happier if we limit our checked luggage as much as possible. The idea of the eight of us drag...

Here's a five-minute video in Czech (with English subtitles) if you're interested in hearing the language we're trying to learn. It's a man's short but moving story about growing up Jewish in a town called Mukacevo: I can't understand much of it, but I hear the numbers and a few other words. I'll keep trying! :)