lest you think it all glamorous....

These are just ordinary pictures of the house where our son and daughter-in-law's family is living. It can be adventurous to live in a different country every couple of years and have opportunities not available to most people. I want to open your minds to some of the aspects of this life you may not have thought about. The house they are living in is huge, especially by Lithuanian standards. The ceilings on the main floor are 11 1/2 feet high! The house is rented furnished so the furnishings are also higher quality than most Lithuanians could afford. The catch is- none of it belongs to our son. When he retires from the foreign service, he will own their car and personal goods. That's what Russ and I had back in 1970 when we got married. James
and Susanne will have to purchase a home and all of their furnishings at a time when their contemporaries will probably have their home, complete with furnishings and lawn mowers, etc., all paid off. In addition, they feel awkward here inviting anyone from church over because their dwelling is far above what anyone in the ward here could afford. They would appear to be much more wealthy than they really are. It's difficult for James to visit ward members in their homes and see that their standard of life is so different. Even by American standards, this home would be very expensive- but it doesn't belong to James.

The pictures of their food storage are to show what things they stock up on that they can't get here. When you live in different countries it's rare to have access to foods that your family is accustomed to eating. Although their kids are far more adventurous in their eating habits than most American kids would be, they try to have available items that the kids are familiar with and like. They buy cases of cereal when they are in the US and have them shipped with their personal goods when they move to a new post. The down side of that is that sometimes the cereal can pass the expiration date before they eat it all. When they lived in Amman, Jordan, the embassy compound included a small commissary where Susanne could purchase some familiar foods, although the quality was sometimes lower after shipping or freezing or whatever happened in the process of getting it to Jordan, and the prices were sometimes high due to the nature of the effort involved in getting it there. There is no commissary here at the embassy. The nearest one is in Helsinki and they can order limited items from there about once a month- with some specialty items available at holiday times. Susanne is remarkable in her ability to provide food and clothing and other necessary items for her family in all kinds of places. She has learned enough Lithuanian to survive but not enough to carry on extended conversations. So with the aid of a city map, whatever hints she can glean from other English speakers at the embassy, church, or school, and her own abilities of observation, she manages to find stores to buy the kids new socks or places to purchase wheat to grind to make her family bread and pancakes. About the only food items that are easy to purchase anywhere here are potatoes, bread (mostly rye), mushrooms, yogurt (in more forms than I never knew existed!), butter, milk, and eggs. Certain spices and other items she has to just do without if she runs out of what she has. She tries to read the ingredients, in Lithuanian, Russian, or occasionally German, English, or French, on unfamiliar items in the stores and makes the best decisions she can.