Is someone trying to tell me something?!?!?!

Well, no passport as yet and the Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland still seems to be spewing... I'm starting to wonder if there is a reason I shouldn't be flying in a week's time. It seems like things are getting really close to the cloth. All UK & Irish airspace is closed because of the volcanic ash and NATS look like they're not going to ease up the ban until it's safe to do so.

Honestly, I'd rather be grounded than take the risk of failing engines half way to the UK!

It's a little frustrating that this has happened and it's just a week before my scheduled trip. I have the trip schedule so well planned with connecting flights to London and back and train tickets booked to see friends etc. It would really be a pain if I had to change all the scheduled flights.

I did hear this morning that there is a slight chance that the volcano might be easing up. It would take a little while for the air to clear, and a fair amount of time for the airlines to get themselves sorted out, but I'm hoping that since I have a booked ticket it shouldn't cause much trouble if they are flying by then.

Fingers crossed on this one!

Hummmm

So, this week has been crazy busy but all in all, pretty uneventful.

My father-in-law had his foot surgery as planned on Monday, except everything was not as they expected so it was a little bigger of a surgery than they had hoped. His recovery time has increased from 2 weeks to 6 weeks - YIKES!

Get well soon Pops!

Humm, what else can I tell ya? Well, my passport saga is still ongoing. I called the embassy on Tuesday morning to see if it had arrived with the Monday batch, nope, it's not there. The lady suggested I go ahead and order the Emergency / Temporary passport. I was kind of frustrated that I had to pay more money just because their office in Dublin was on strike, but at least it would mean I could travel without changing flights etc. So, I sent off for that and am waiting for it to arrive. It should come in the next couple of days (hopefully).

Yesterday I took and passed my driving knowledge test. I need to get an Oregon drivers license so I thought I had better get on it. I have a little friendly bet with a friend of ours, Dave that I'll pass before him, so I'm hoping. I passed the knowledge test so I have that under my belt and just have to wait for the driven test. The earliest date I could get that would fit around my trip to the UK/Ireland was end of May.... I sure hope he doesn't beat me. He failed his knowledge test, and hasn't ever held a driving license..... fingers crossed guys!

After doing that at the DMV yesterday and bringing breakfast to my wonderful hubbie I headed to the Dr's and had my bloods drawn. Just a quick check up to see how my thyroid levels are doing before my trip.

I must say, now I've added the ctyomel to my daily meds I'm feeling miles better. It makes all the difference in the world. So, if you're having thyroid problems and are taking Synthroid (or generic) and just don't feel 'right' it might be worth considering getting a T3 supplement added to your meds.

Not much else to report I guess. The birds are still visiting us like their life depended on it. The grosbeaks every morning and their numbers are increasing rapidly! We still get the occasional crash into the house or window, I guess I can't really stop that.

The humming birds are still awesome. We have added another feeder too, so that brings us back up to three. They found that new one right away and instantly fell in love with it.
It's so much fun to watch them feed and it's interesting to see how territorial they get too about their "favourite" feeders... You get to see a real show sometimes.

Anyway, I guess I'll get off here and get some more of the things done that I'd like to before my trip. Not long now (if my passport would hurry up and get here that would be awesome).
I think tonight we're going to a friends house who is going to help us make a birthday gift for my parents, and we have a fun day planned for tomorrow.

The Newest Mr & Mrs Fast

Erik & Krista were married on Friday evening. They had a lovely ceremony at a friends property in Wilsonville.

HUGE congratulations to Mr & Mrs Erik Fast... and welcome to the family Krista, Kaylee and Gavin!

Bad timing for a strike!

Yesterday morning I woke up at 6.30 am and had a feeling I needed to call the embassy and find out how my passport application was going. It should have taken 4(ish) weeks, and it had already been that long. I was getting excited for my trip and was a little anxious that I didn't have a passport in my grubby little hands yet!

So, I got up, left them a voicemail and waited for my call back (I hate that they don't have people answering calls and that I always have to leave a message).

Anyway, about 2.15pm they called back and said that my passport was being held up in the backlog because of strike action taking place in Dublin.

• Firstly I didn't know my passport was being processed in Dublin
• Secondly - who was striking? What for? and why now?

Grrr - the lady on the phone was NOT the most helpful person I've ever talked to and she quickly got off the phone after mentioning something about a temporary passport.

Hummm.... I was bummed. Nope, I was beyond bummed - I was heart broken. I have so looked forward to this trip, it's been entirely too long since I last saw most of my family and friends. I couldn't imagine postponing or cancelling at this stage.

After doing a LOT of research and calling several different official offices for advice and then piecing it together I put another call into the consulate in San Fran. This time I just left my name and phone number and said I needed advice on how to get back to Ireland. I hoped that by not mentioning I had a passport question I might get a different person call me back.

A little before 10am a lovely helpful lady called me back. She asked me lots of questions about my situation, dates of travel, immigration status etc and she said her best advice to me would be to wait. She said they get passports every Monday and that I should call on Tuesday 20th if I haven't received my passport before then. They can check if it came in the day before and if not I could get a temporary passport issued. They can do them there in the consulate office and mail them the same day they receive payment. It 'should' give me enough time to get it before travelling. I asked her if it would be safer to go ahead and order it now but she said they only issue them for last minute or emergency scenarios, so they would have to wait til the w/c 19th April anyway.

Irish passports have a huge backlog right now and they are expecting approximately a 12+ week delay on passports going through the Dublin office...

So we wait - it means we have to wait til the very last minute, but we wait and hope...

I'm going to still try and get everything done that we need to, and hope and pray that everything gets sorted out in time. I would hate to spend even more money on this passport (since I'm cheap) but if we have to then we will.

3 weeks and counting

OK, so last night it hit me that in three weeks right now I'll be sitting on a flight JFK bound! Yikes! I can't believe I only have 3 weeks to get all the stuff ready that I need to.

Ummm - I have grand plans for my sister's baby blankies and I haven't even cut the cloth. I've washed it all and it's ready, but I just need to get the sewing machine out and get started!

There's a long list of other things I need to do before then too, so I had better get my list started so I don't have to do any last minute panics or anything like that. I'm not really up for that right now!

I should also say that I am SO SUPER EXCITED that I get to go back and see family and friends. It's been entirely too long and I shouldn't really leave it that long again - EVER!

I don't think the boys know that Cory's coming too, so that will be a fun surprise for them when he shows up! :)

Anyway, I can hear the clock ticking saying I am almost out of time so I need to get busy today so I'll sign off here...

Tick tock.... tick tock.... tick tock.... tick tock...

Happy Easter

I hope you all had a very lovely Easter weekend. We had a fun and 'interesting' Easter Sunday.

We started our day by getting up early and making some things to take to lunch at Cory's parents house. I made Cornbread casserole and some Yorkshire puddings to go with lunch. After that we got ready and headed out to Church here in town. It was really busy, but was a fun service and the choir did a good job. The message Charlie gave was really good too, he's a good speaker. If you'd like to hear that or any of his other messages you can listen or download from the website which is here (f you click on audio archive then 'launch' you'll get the complete list).

After church we headed out to the farm and got the lunch ready to serve. It was so yummy! We had lamb, potatoes, yorkshires, hot cross buns, crab salad, cornbread casserole, jell-o salad, stuffed eggs (and the list goes on).

Cory's Grampa and aunt Donette came for lunch too, so it was good to be able to visit with each other and share stories. Cory's Grampa tells the best stories, he has had such a wonderful life - I could sit and listen to him all day.

After a little while Doug went out to check on the Momma cows that were down in the barn. A few moments later he called us and said two were really close to giving birth and that we should wrap up and come down there. So, we did exactly that. Thankfully I'd brought a change of clothes and there was some rubber boots in the garage that were perfect for me. So we bundled up and headed out.

We climbed up on top of the hay bales in the barn so we could watch over both cows and not spook them too much. One of them was really nervous about the whole thing and any little noise we made seemed to make her more anxious.

After about an hour the blonde gave birth to a pretty big calf. I could feel the pride well up inside me as I quietly cheered her on through the hole process, she did such a good job!

The other one was having a harder time of it and didn't seem to be making much progress. We decided to head up to the house and warm up. We were both blocks of ice!

The next time Doug checked on her she had given birth to the calf and it was healthy too. YAY!
One more was looking pretty close to giving birth last night, but news this morning was that there was 7 born last night! YIKES!

Anyway, that was pretty much our Easter in a nutshell. We came home and tucked into the Easter eggs that we had got from the British store in Lake Oswego. Cory's first ever one, and it seemed like it was a hit. Looks like that'll be another sure tradition in the Fast household from here on out!

More birds (photos)