Two nights ago we got a phone call from a very happy Lucy telling us that her grandson had been born. He’s very small, just 1.5 kilos (about 3 lbs), but she said he’s moving around and he looks good. She called us before her daughter was even out of recovery from surgery, but we’re assuming that now that the baby is here, she will be up and around and able to leave the hospital in a few days.
We’re hoping that baby boy gains weight quickly and can come home from the hospital soon!
It’s been hard to blog lately because not a lot in Muscat is blog-worthy. It’s not like getting my hair highlighted or driving around in the Jeep or going out to dinner is particularly interesting here. Now if I were doing these things in Egypt I’m sure I would have some story about the hair salon having a two headed cat sitting at the front door, or while driving around in the Jeep we could have been driving behind a moped carrying seven abaya-wearing grandmas, all hanging off the handlebars, and dinner out would be more than “yummy food, too expensive.”
Cause how many times can I say that it’s HOT here (it was 110 in the shade earlier today and so wet it felt like my clothes were going to slide off my body), or talk about how Camille doesn’t sleep, or that it’s HOT here? Don’t get me wrong, Muscat is a beautiful place, we just don’t have any interesting stories to tell. Josh and I were talking over coffee the other night and we decided that if he were here for a job, we’d probably really enjoy it. But because we’re here for 1 year with the task of becoming immersed in the Arabic culture and language, we keep searching for something that doesn’t exist. Or just isn’t accessible the way it was in Egypt.
We haven’t been able to find anything that defines Oman — other than the fact that they all drive nice cars and most of them don’t work. We also haven’t been able to break in and feel connected with Arabic people here. At all. We love it here, but it has been frustrating for Josh to feel like he’s not getting the same quality of experience that he was getting in Cairo. He had people he spoke Arabic with every day there and here? He talks to the Omani guy at the Starbucks near our house, the one at the mall, and there are a couple of people at the embassy who will speak with him when he goes to check the mail.
But we’ll keep looking and trying to worm our way in. Josh started going to the Arabic service at church a few weeks ago and is happy he has at least one good Arabic language exposure per week now. I think once the boys start school they will feel like they have a purpose and goals to work toward. But for now it feels a little bit like we’re on vacation. Boo hoo, right?
The house is clean, Josh and the baby are napping and I’m going through recent pictures.
Then we went home and started her on piano lessons. She’s got to practice so when we get Rock Band 3 with the keyboard, she’ll be able to play along with her brothers. She’s already mastered the drums and vocals (she just needs to stop slobbering on the mike), so we’re moving her to piano. She’s quite the prodigy.
When we received our household goods recently we unpacked a whole bunch of things that would have been useful 5 or 6 months ago and now are just taking up space. Like this baby seat.
Just to clarify, I was not present when these pictures were taken. I don’t think I’d still be snapping photos as my baby falls face-first onto the tile floor. :cough: Josh :cough:
But it doesn’t seem to have phased her at all. She’s a tough little cookie.
From today, playing with my camera:
From tonight, testing out her the skill she learned today:
*turn the volume down at the beginning or you’ll be blasted by my piercing “baby voice.”
It’s like we’re back in college. Staying up all night doing stupid stuff and then dragging ourselves out of bed at 10:30 in the morning. Well, I’m dragging. Josh seems to do better on less sleep than I do. Of course, he naps and I don’t so I figure it all evens out. It was pretty much the same way in college. He could make it to chapel no matter how late we were up playing cards, whereas I barely made it to my 10:15 class.
And how are we living the college life with 4 kids? Well for starters, it’s almost midnight and Josh just came down from putting the kids to bed. Yes, the baby too. She took a 30 minute nap this morning and an hour nap this afternoon and was still cruising around at 11pm like it was no big deal. So when am I supposed to watch all my tv shows if the baby stays up until midnight? That’s why you’ll find us watching Roswell at 2 am (season one was great, season two, not so much) and eating cereal for breakfast at noon.
Last night especially felt like a college night since we put the baby to bed at 9 (no afternoon nap), put a movie on for the kids and went to the Marine House. The Marine House is where the Marines live (I know, rocket science, huh?), but on Wednesday nights (our “Friday”) they open it up to embassy people and the ground floor is a bar/hangout. Josh and I played pool, our friend was DJ-ing, some people were drinking a little, other were drinking a lot. It felt a lot like Thursday nights at Zelo’s or any of the other State Street bars that we used to frequent. Except that no girls were crying, there weren’t any fights, and everyone was well over 21.
The magic lasted until 11 when Calvin called to say that Camille had woken up and had no intention of going back to sleep (totally normal for her). Calvin reassured us that she was fine and was just hanging out watching a movie with the rest of them, so we didn’t have to rush home. Not wanting to press our luck, we headed home at midnight, put everyone to bed and then watched TV on Netflix for the next several hours.
Yep, just like college — except that now we don’t have to worry about the RA catching us hanging out together after midnight.