Life at the moment

We have a huge dirt space in front of our house. There are about 15 kids who regularly play in this area. They love our toys to be sure! Ryan and the little boy are buddies - he likes to ride and Ryan insists on pushing (=

 

The pavement ends right next to our neighbors house so the dirt area is pretty safe for the kids.

 Two of the five kids who live next door

Tom has had to work almost three weeks solid to get the house put together. Things just take so much longer here! We're grateful he is SUCH a handyman!

Our new house has a room for a play room/guest room. What a blessing!

The girls next door LOVE the playroom (= We are learning the balance of letting them play with our toys and actually playing with Layla.

Our 5 year old!

This was Layla's best friend at school last year and she is in her class this year again. We are grateful they can keep their friendship going.

The sweet one on the right is also in Layla's class again this year. Her family was the subject of the post on the Outdoor Wedding this summer. These are the two friends we are focusing on for helping Layla stay connected at school.

Pictures

https://picasaweb.google.com/steph004/Layla5thBirthday?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCLvO7ePO_smOMQ&feat=directlink

Well I've tried everything I can to get the pictures to show but it won't work. Hopefully this link will work!

By the way, in the last week we've had TOm's car get attacked by dogs who chewed his bumper and pulled it off. Then, while it was in the repair shop, the guys lost control and the car sped backwards out of the shop, across the street and hit two other cars. So now the back bumper and one wheel panel has to be replaced.
crazy, no?


 

Happy 5th Birthday Layla!

Here are some pictures of our day! We had a great birthday with several celebrations.
I had pictures to show but they just won't appear for some reason. grrrr.
great day. great fun...time to clean up!

 

Thoughts on world craziness....

http://www.djiboutijones.com/2012/09/freedom-of-speech-and-sanctity-of.html

Rachel says it better than I can - such a perspective on what is happening in the Muslim/Arab world right now......

My Birthday

I have often complained to my parents that my September Birthday was at a terrible time....always a move or a trip or the start of school or SOMETHING to cause it to be overshadowed. This year was no different and included several rather unpleasant events like passports being with Tom 1.5 hours away when I needed to cross the border...cars breaking down AGAIN an hour away from home and several other things. One bright spot was finding a SUPER nice restaurant to have a birthday lunch! Tom and I were meeting at a mall to hand off the passports and this little gem was upstairs!
 



kids were happy to get out of the car with terrible AC and into the mall!



I LOVE LOVE LOVE these Moroccan lamps!

Rarely do you see second/third storey views out here. I don't know why. This NOT our town (= Far too clean and organized (=

 

The restaurant had water fountains! Ryan loves these.

And gorgeous Turkish plates that mommy want to take home in her purse.....

Here we are! I'm 39 today!

Very aggressive snuggling (=

The cake, candles and balloons were about 3 hours away - our original destination until the passport fiasco. It all ended well by nightfall.

My dear friend Vic even ventured out to make a Pineapple Upside Down cake for me! I usually make it for myself every year. I LOVE this cake!

Of course the kids were a bit more into the party atmosphere (= I did it largely for Layla who cannot imagine a birthday without gifts, cake, balloons etc etc. It was a fun time!

 

Ramadan 2012

This may look like a staged photo shoot, but her hair is blowing from the strategically placed AC vent (= This is a bag of generic "break your fast" take-away bundle available all over town from about 45 mins before the Iftar meal. It cost $3

The Coffee Shop on the left is where we bought the fried food in a bag...the store next door is my usual fruit stand...drive up, honk, give your list, get your fruit and veg, pay your food and STAY IN THE CAR WITH THE AC! While America may be cleaner, more convenient and more predictable, as a mom with young kids this is pure luxury!

Our first meal in our house! Tom was fasting for Ramadan as usual so we ate dinner at sundown with him to break his fast.

This is from the pink bag of food be bought for $3. Chock full of all sorts of fried stuff....we even found a WHOLE fried boiled egg!

Rotissere chicken, salad and homus...not traditional ramadan food but you can't beat it for a $5 meal for the whole family!

Just had to include the afternoon snuggle!



The malls on the other side of town are all decorated for Ramadan much like we do for Christmas. This prayer was so interesting!



 

Like the encouragement to "Be Devout"? So many parallels between the religions of Islam and Christianity. 

Goodbye house! sniff sniff sniff

Goodbye house .... our first place to really set up a home together! goodbye lovely yard we spent so much time in! I still remember peeking in the tiny hole in the gate before we had the key to the house. Goodbye to the big parties in the hosh!

Goodbye house with our crazy and elaborate arab tile and furniture. Goodbye crazy door that wouldn't shut or wouldn't open depending on the weather. Goodbye to all the times with people that have visited and hung out with us!

Goodbye kids' room where you both came home from the hospital. Goodbye gorgeous windows that let in the light. Goodbye all the "firsts" that happend here like learning how to crawl and walk and talk! Goodbye to the birdies in the windows!

Goodbye crazy blue bathroom that was so slick when wet with sharp tile edges that freaked out mommy every time. Good bye all those fun bathtimes when the kids were so tiny! Goodbye to the horrible water pressure!

And goodbye lovely pink kitchen, goodbye to all the times at the table with a cup of tea and the window open with the fantastic winter breeze. Goodbye also to the horrid flies every January and February. Goodbye to learning how to feed kids and learning how to cook with the food that was available. Goodbye to all the good times in this kitchen with friends and family. The Thanksgiving, Easter and Christmast dinners and breakfasts and so on.

          Goodbye to our great neighbors across the street and the farm behind us with the goat and the cow and the chicken and the football pitch with many noises late into the night! We miss you and were so grateful for all that God did with us and for us. We also love our new house and are grateful for the provision of a bit more room to fit our life so full of people.

New House New Bugs and New friends

As you know, we;ve just moved house. It quickly became apparent that though we've moved less than a mile away, we have a whole new world of bugs. One of them bites and it hurts like the dickens. Poor Layla. The other two, sadly, we think are some kind of termite. It would have been FABULOUS to know this BEFORE we moved in so we could spray the horribly effective and toxic stuff before we moved in. sigh.
Vic and I can trade houses - she needs her house sprayed as well.

On the upside, I've mentioned that there are 10 little girls who roam the sands in front of our house and about as many boys. Of course the boys stay away because they know our little one is only 2. The girls however.... are around all the time. We are learning how to manage this. I've decided to allow only 2 at a time because any more than that overwhelms Layla.

She sort of ignores them now. They play on their own in the playroom, but they will all draw together. Anyway. I'm just being very chill about it all and letting her to do what she wants. She only has gotten onto an arab ramadan schedule this last two weeks so she hasn't even SEEN her friends from school most of the summer. We tried at the beginning but they didn't wake up until 1130 or so and by that point Layla was almost ready for lunch and a nap! Not so great. Now, however, she stays up until about 10 or 1030pm and wakes up about 930am. Glorious.

Anyway. Do keep thinking of us as we transition and now as we head off to Africa for some much needed family time in the mountains where it is HALF the temperature we are currently at. Here it is 120, there it is 65 degrees. yikes.

Simply must post these.....

          Daddy came back from a trip this morning and brought a dress back for Layla. Sadly, Ryan doesn't want to take it off!
We've realized that while he is a very happy and smiley boy, most of is pictures just have his mouth wide open and hollering (=

It is a bit scary how much he looks like a girl! He has learned how to pose from his sister of course!!

Moving during Ramadan

Sweaty, dark and loud.
It is 115 degrees at 2am. Tom and I are alone in the old house which is a very echoey tile shell at this point. It is too hot to move during the day and fairly decent at 2am when there is a breeze.

It took us almost 7 days to move out of our place - the truck wasn't big enough when we did our big move on Sunday but we had many kind friends help us on three different days when we filled cars and then one small truck.

Our new place is freshly painted and looks awesome and full. I know everyone says this, but WHERE did all this stuff go in our old place?!? Granted, my two huge storage cabinets are sitting empty still and my pantry shell that held all manner of DIY things and random house things is now in the kids' playroom for toys. I keep turning over strategies on what to do first to make the biggest impact. Tonight (meaning at 1130pm) I decided it was arranging the plants on the front steps and moving out the massive purple throne chair that was left here by the previous two families.

I have no idea where this chair came from, but it is HUGE. Our house helper wanted it in her room (help yourself!!!) but we could not squeeze it through the door. So I'm going to try and move it from our main room and put it outside on the front step partly as a conversation piece, partly as a place to dump bags or children while getting in or out of the house, and partly as a place to sit and have a cup of coffee outside whenever that sounds appealing again.I will take a picture of it once it is in place.

Each chunk of time I have to work I ask myself what will give the most impact or I end up just doing totally random tasks the whole time. When that happens I feel like it is pushing sand uphill. Lots of moving about with very very little effect.

Must go find a place to put something away now.