Dessert in the Desert

We did it! In honor of G.G.'s birthday (Jan 24) we promised to write a new blog post every day for a month, and we did it! We tried to do this last year, but got interrupted by a revolution and our country's internet being disconnected from the world. To celebrate, we thought we'd share our dessert with you, dear reader. There's a new little restaurant just a five minute walk from our house. It's called Waffle Maker, and it has a Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream sign on the front window. Sounds like our kinda place, doesn't it?

The kids played chess and Uno while we waited. 

Okay, "played chess" wouldn't be a very accurate description of what they did, but they did wait patiently. Sort of.

And here it is: A waffle with marshmallows, powdered sugar and cookie dough ice cream! Health food.

 Sawyer's was a bit more traditional, with syrup on his. Oh yeah, and marshmallows.

Happy Birthday Again, G.G.! We love you! I can't promise we'll write every night from now on, but we'll try not to take any 4-month breaks like we did this fall, either.

Pharaohs in Training

School Days

It has been really good to get into a school routine over these last few weeks after our sporadic school schedule all fall. This year in science we're studying astronomy, and we are all three learning a ton. Today we studied the phases of the moon, and I made these cute little edible moon phases (that a friend found on pinterest) to help them review. They had to name the phase before they could eat it, and there was some lively discussion over who got to claim the full moon.

Sarah Claire is getting in on the learning fun, too! She loves to sing the "number song," and performs it for us multiple times each day. She also likes chapstick, as you'll see in the video. 

Lee Anna on Pianna

We had planned to post videos of all three kiddos tonight, but our internet connection is not cooperating, so you'll have to wait a day for the other two. For now, G.G., here's proof that Lee Anna has been practicing!

Student of the Week

Our little Lee Anna Belle is making her way through second grade. She finished her math book 2A last week, and wanted me to post a picture to show you all. This week she started working through book 2B. Today she got to a section on money, and we had to do a little review, since we never actually use any of those U.S. coins or bills. She picked it up pretty quickly, though.

She was also really excited about this--her first cursive handwriting lesson! She knew you would all want to see what a great job she did.

She is still learning her geography songs, and knows over half of the countries in the world, including all of Africa! And she's still a little reading machine. I love getting to be her teacher!

Guess Who's Figured Out How to Work the Camera!

(Just be glad I didn't include the hundreds of photos she took of household objects!)

Wedding Weekend!

We haven't yet posted about the big event that took place right after Christmas--my sister's wedding! We got into Pensacola about a week before the big day, so we got to be there for the whole week of preparations. I loved getting to be a part of it all! We took lots of pictures, of course. Here are some of my favorites:

The girls and I, all dressed up for the bridesmaids' luncheon

Sarah Claire with her Uncle Andy

It was right around this moment in the rehearsal that we decided to let Sarah Claire walk in with me, rather than with the other two kiddos. She was much happier with that arrangement.

We put a little song together to welcome Zach into the family.
It's too bad you can't hear it. It was a classic.

The beautiful bride and groom.

Playing around for just a minute before time to get dressed! 

The girls looked so sweet, and they loved that their dresses matched Aunt Claire's.  

"Whose idea was this 2:00 wedding, anyway? Don't they know that's nap time?"

"Are we done yet?"

My two little princesses

"Do you know 'The Wheels on the Bus'?"
Sarah Claire loved watching her Uncle Gary sing. 

Dancing with my baby girl

The new Mr. and Mrs. Helton

He may have hated having to wear that tux, but he sure looked adorable!

Somebody had fun at the chocolate fountain!

And this was the best shot we got of the five of us together. It was a special day, and I am so grateful we got to be there. Congratulations, Claire and Zach! We love you!

Getting Connected

After visiting the states in November and getting spoiled by fast internet speeds, we were determined to get something better in our house. So on Nov. 17—the day we got back—I went to the internet company we had been with before, and asked them to hook us up. They checked our number and said we had the wrong kind of wires (fiber optic instead of copper) so they couldn’t do it.

So the next day I went to Vodafone, the mobile phone people who also do DSL. I asked them about it, and at first glance the guy thought they could, but they needed two weeks to run the tests or something. Well, after ten days I started trying to call them back, but no one seemed to know yet. Finally, several weeks later, I talked to someone who knew, and he said the same thing—can’t do it now. But, he said if I go to the phone company, they can change the wires and then we can hook up DSL. So I went to the phone company Central Office in our neighborhood. The customer service lady there said I had to go to the other “Central Office” over by the satellite station. So the next day I went there. The guy there told me I really needed to go to “Central #2” and gave some vague directions to it. I've been living in this neighborhood for 6 years and never even heard of Central #2! But I wandered around and asked some people and found it. It said "Central #4" on the sign, but the security guy told me it was really #2. This place was amazingly calm and peaceful—probably because no customers know it’s there. Well, the guy there took down my address and phone number, then called the service guy who works in our neighborhood. He told him the phone number, and the guy told him that none of the numbers that start with our prefix can connect to DSL. So our whole neighborhood is out. And that meant he couldn’t just come change the wires at my house.

Then I went back to Vodafone, because their website offers a wireless router that we can connect to our USB modem and share with the whole flat (and the Vonage phone). But the Vodafone store didn’t have any routers today. I asked if the other store might have them and she said “No, but you can call customer service on 888 and maybe they can help.”

I came home and told Beth we’re pretty much stuck like this for now. Then the phone repairman called me back with another possible solution. He said all we have to do is get the phone number for this house changed, and then they can connect it. (Why didn’t someone else suggest this???) The catch is that I can’t get it changed—the landlord will have to do that. I asked the landlord if he would get the number changed. We were afraid it might involve everyone in the building changing, and I didn’t think they’re going to go for that.

It's been three months now since this saga started. The landlord has been working on getting the number changed. He's called me twice in the past two weeks to tell me he was at the phone company signing the papers. I'd imagine he's been sent from one office to another more than once in this process, too. 

So, next time you talk to us on a bad connection, remember we’re working on it. But we’re still in the 3^rd World working on 1^st World problems. 

Our Little Ham

Our little Spare Bear* has become quite the entertainer around our house. She is at a fun age, with more and more personality showing up all the time. I wanted to have these stories recorded so that she can come back to them herself one day and see what a ham she was!

From Where??
We had this conversation one day recently, as I was giving her a glass of milk.
Me: Do you know where milk comes from?
Sarah Claire: Yes.
Me: Where?
Sarah Claire: The fridgerator.

After that, we started working on the whole "milk from cows" idea. So a few days later at bedtime, when we came to a barn scene in one of her picture books, I brought it up again.
Me: (pointing to the cow) So what do we get from cows?
SC: (thinking hard)
Me: Milk, right?
SC: Yes, milk...(thinking again)...(now pointing to a camel)...And what do we get from camels?
Me: (laughing) I don't know. What do you think we get from camels?
SC: Juice!


We may have to visit a dairy farm or something for this one to sink in!

Who are you calling big??

Another night at bedtime, she and I were snuggling and talking about our family.

Me: You have a sweet big sister, don't you?

SC: Yeah.

Me: You have a big sister and a big brother.

SC: Yeah, I have a big sister and a big brother and a big daddy and a big mama and a big Jason and a big Beth!

Kinda Like Simba

One day a few weeks ago, we were all enjoying a bowl of soup for lunch, when Sarah Claire suddenly declared, "I'm kinda like Simba." We had no idea what she was talking about, but she quickly demonstrated with her soup. There is a scene in The Lion King where Simba tries to eat bugs for the first time. He takes a bite, and then makes a face a lot like I probably would make if I had just eaten bugs. So that's what Sarah Claire is doing in the video below.

* Her Daddy coined the nickname "Spare Bear" shortly after her birth. He figured we already had a Mama Bear and Papa Bear and Sister Bear and Brother Bear, so she could be our spare!

Valentine's Photos

Here are the pictures from Valentine's morning. 

Scroll down to read about it in yesterday's post.