One of Carter’s birthday presents was the surprise of many musical cards. The best part about them is Camille is fascinated by these “books” that play music and will sit and listen and open and close them over and over again. Anything that keeps her out of the toilet is a present to me.
Author: Robin Chartier
goal setting
Since things have settled down a bit, this week I’m going to try and go back through our Turkey photos and put together some blog posts about parts 3 and 4 of our trip. I know I left everyone hanging with the cave hotel and Cappadocia, but it was such an amazing place that I didn’t want to throw up some photos without explaining what you were seeing. And I haven’t even looked through my many, MANY photos to delete the ones that are out of focus, show me with my mouth open, or are duplicates of the same thing.
I always end up poring over 10 of the same photo trying to figure out which one has the most people actually looking at the camera. Of course it always ends up being the one where I’m smiling so hard I look like a flock of crows has landed around my eyes. The ones where I look like I’m in a ANTM photo shoot? Everyone else has fingers in their noses, hands covering their eyes, or is in mid-yawn.
So that’s why there may be a small lull in posting. Along with organizing and writing my Turkey stories and photo editing, this week I have back to school night for Calvin, the women’s fellowship group at church, a wives coffee (an official one for embassy spouses, not the drop in at Starbucks kind), and a party at the Ambassador’s house. And the kids start Awana and have rugby, but those are both on Josh, not me.
So maybe things haven’t settled down that much.
exercise
I don’t really like to exercise. It makes me feel like I’m trying too hard to be one of those “Real Housewives of Muscat” or something. I didn’t mind running as much when I was training for the half marathon, probably because I was running out of fear: “I better get my butt moving or I’m going to be hurting come November when I’m trying to get up that long hill in PG.” Plus, I used to run to Starbucks and get an iced latte to drink on the way home, so I was running for something.
But I’m not one of those people who feels SO MUCH BETTER after a workout. Usually I’m just extra hungry and tired and want to lie on the couch and do nothing for the next hour. Except eat chocolate and watch TV.
This morning I got up and put on my workout clothes since I have the kids all in school, Lucy to watch the baby and clean my house, and a paid-for gym membership. I really have no excuses left. Today I decided to live on the edge and go running outside at 8:30 in the morning. In a previous life I wouldn’t have thought my body capable of doing much more than rolling over an extra large pillow at that time of morning, but around here 8:30 is late. And hot. (95 and tropical)
I ended up running 2 miles around the neighborhood and only had one car honk and one group of workers call out a cadence, “one, two, three, four . . .” Not much different than America. I came home feeling like I ran 20 miles because I was DRIPPING with humidity — not sweat. (I hate feeling sweaty. “Humidity” sounds nicer). It looked like I decided to go swimming in a long sleeved t-shirt.
After my shower and breakfast I got really tired so I crawled in bed for a little bit and was about to fall asleep when Camille woke up from her nap. And then my headache kicked in. Now that I don’t have access to my awesome Monterey chiropractor, exercise usually leads to a headache which leads to me drinking a soda along with my Motrin. I don’t know if it’s the placebo effect or if the caffeine/sugar really does make the Motrin work better, but that’s what works for me. Then when I went to the grocery store to buy my Dr Pepper, I stumbled upon the dark chocolate Tim-Tams. After all that, I figure my net gain for the day is -2. I think I would have been better off sitting on the couch.
Exercise: the slippery slope to naps, sodas, and cookies.
***In case you’ve never had a Tim-Tam, you should try them at least once. They are these Australian chocolate sandwich cookies covered in dark chocolate. (They have others, but why bother with anything but dark chocolate?) You can get them at Target during the winter months. According to the website they’ll be available again starting in October. http://www.ilovetimtamcookies.com/
This is a Tim-Tam.
She’s also a Tim-Tam fan.
Mother’s Little Helper
Yesterday morning was “sleep in” day. Or at least it was for Josh and me. When we woke up around 7:45 we found Caleb and Camille in our bedroom playing with the train on the floor. Brilliant. Caleb was even dressed in his PE uniform because he thought it was a school day.
When we told Caleb that he didn’t have school since it was “Saturday” and he could go downstairs to have breakfast he said, “Oh! Camille and I already had breakfast.”
Say what now?
“Yeah, Camille woke me up a long time ago. She leaned over the edge of her crib and pulled my hair to wake me up. Then we played for a little while and then we went downstairs and ate yogurt. Then we played downstairs for a while and then we came up here.”
I can just see it now. Caleb staggering from the weight of carrying a baby that weighs half of his body weight, fumbling with the baby gate, blindly walking down two sets of marble stairs, lifting her in and out of the high chair, feeding her . . . any number of things could have gone horribly wrong in that scenario. Add in unsupervised play with a baby that loves to poke at electrical outlets and put things in her mouth and it seems like a miracle that they both came out of it unscathed.
Of course, I didn’t say any of that. “Thanks for being such a good big brother. I bet she loved that. Next time just ask me before you take her downstairs or feed her, OK?”
Caleb has always been one to see a need and act on it. A real do-er. I better make sure he knows that he’s not allowed to give her a bath until she can at least get in and out of the tub by herself.
***I’m surprised they didn’t break out the ice shaver and have sno-cones for breakfast
Chicken every Wednesday
I didn’t have anything in mind for dinner tonight so Lucy suggested I get a chicken and she would cook it in white wine. “It’s very nice, Madame.” Hmm, chicken in white wine sounds very nice. So off I went to the store in search of a chicken, celery, and parsley.
The difficult ingredient to get, the white wine, comes from a small stash that Josh bought from the embassy soon after we arrived. Yes, we can only buy alcohol at the embassy. There are a few unmarked stores around town that sell alcohol (when I say “unmarked” I mean the glass on the windows is covered with brown paper and there is no signage — they look abandoned), but you need a special permit saying you aren’t Muslim to in order to buy alcohol there.
Anyway, back to the chicken. I brought the groceries home to Lucy and she chopped away, cut the whole chicken into pieces like a professional and then worked her magic. She had things browning and simmering and when it was done the whole house smelled like something I wanted to eat. She left the pot on the stove to cool so I could put it in the fridge to heat up for dinner.
Before I put it away I had to try it, you know, to make sure it was good. Then I had to try some more and Camille needed a few bites and before you knew it we were huddled around the pot like a couple of hobos around a campfire. The white wine with the mushrooms and the chopped parsley and onions and celery . . . I think I’m going to have to make this a regular fixture on our menu. It’s a foodie version of heroin. I hope I left enough for everyone else for dinner tonight.
***Josh and I managed to polish off the rest of the Meth Chicken by 4:33. I guess we’ll have to figure out “plan B” for dinner.