Blog Hiatus

Hello, friends and family. I am feeling really overwhelmed with my life right now. I hate the fact that I have this blog out here in cyberspace that you all come and visit in hopes of seeing a glimpse into our lives here, and are repeatedly disappointed. It is just one more thing on my plate that I can't seem to keep up with, and to be fair to you, I am going to officially go on a hiatus. No more checking back to see if I've posted something only to see the same old 4th of July pictures. If I can handle it again, I will post and let you all know, but in the meantime, you won't find me here. I'm sorry. Please don't worry about me -- I'm fine. I just can't do it all, and I am going to stop trying. Maybe when some sleep issues and family issues are resolved. Until then . . .

4th Fun

We celebrated the 4th of July with many of the Americans living in Morocco. We were all invited to the kids' school for a day of Ultimate Frisbee, swimming, BBQ and friends. We had a great time!

Dog Tired

That's what I am. Although, why do we even use that expression? I mean, every dog I know gets like 20 hours of sleep a day. And when they are awake, their time is occupied with eating, playing, licking . . . uh, you get the picture. I do recognize that there are some very hard-working canines out there -- seeing eye dogs, fire dogs, sled dogs, etc. But the majority enjoy the aforementioned lifestyle.

I don't know any dogs who haven't slept more than two hours straight in the past three years. Who pace the house with a teething baby all night, or are awakened by the cries of a thirsty toddler. I'm not complaining about my life. I wouldn't trade my babies for all the sleep in the world. No, what I want to see changed is this inaccurate expression. I move that we change it to "mom tired." Definitely more appropriate!

Sorry for the ramblings. I really am tired. Morgan is still gone, and won't be back for another couple of weeks. He hasn't had a day off in over a month, so I know he is tired too. When he gets back, maybe he can take like two weeks off, and we can take turns sleeping!

Anywho, I have been working on my Morocco Monday posts, but they aren't ready quite yet. I am still taking pictures of the house, but I want everything to look perfect. I have some pictures out being framed right now, and we are getting new awnings on the outside, and I want to show you the house at its best. I am also working on pictures for a post about the kids' school. A friend requested a post on driving in Morocco, and I am going to do that as soon as Morgan gets back, because I need to be a passenger in the car while we're out in order to get the pictures and videos to do the post justice.

Some of you have asked some great questions, and I am not ignoring them. I am going to do a question and answer post soon, so send me your queries!

And I don't want to send you away empty-handed, so here are some pictures of my Moroccan monkeys:

Just look at this boy! I can't believe how fast he is growing!
This one's for you, Aunt Tracy! Check out Lydia's team name! Her coaches always tell me what a little athlete she is. Most of the trees in our yard are palm trees, which are not good for climbing. But we do have a very young fruit tree in the corner, and Liam is just the right size to not break it by climbing its branches. Hopefully it will grow at the same rate he grows!And my sweet baby. Look at that face! He melts my heart. I almost don't even mind being awoken every hour or so during the night by this face. Almost.

Morocco Monday -- The Grain Market

Don't worry, I haven't forgotten my little series on my house. I just thought I would take a break this week, since I have only managed to take pictures of my kitchen since the last installment.

How would you like to go on a field trip with me? I'm taking you to the local grain market this week.

Check out all of that wheat! They are bagging it all up and sewing the sacks closed.This woman was kind enough to let me take her picture. Moroccans don't always want their pictures taken. She is sifting the wheat by hand. There are lots of ladies doing this same thing throughout the market.

Many different vendors are set up throughout the market selling whole wheat, grains, rices, dried beans, seeds, all different types of flours, etc. This is where I go to get my bulk grains.

I hope you enjoyed your field trip to the grain market with Lydia's first grade class!

Morocco Monday: Our Moroccan Maison Part I

Yes, I know it is Tuesday, but I also knew that once I shared my excuse with you that I would be forgiven. You see, Morgan has been gone for two weeks, and came home for only one day before he had to head out again for the next month and a half. So I thought I would spend as much time with him as possible yesterday, knowing that you would all forgive me.

After the overwhelming response (8 votes! Wahoo!) I got the impression that my readers want to hear about our new house. So here is Part I. I decided to do this in installments because it can be quite overwhelming to photographically capture our whole house in a state of cleanliness that I would want to publish on the internet (albeit for apparently only 8 readers). Yes, I have a maid, but she is only here two days a week, and Liam can undo most of her work in a matter of minutes.

What I am going to share with you is our front area, which is the more formal portion of the house. Please, enter:Upon entering this door, if you turn to your right you will see this:

This is an antiqued wooden door. We bought it recently at the souk (market), and I just love it. Artisans make these doors to look like authentic antique wooden doors from old houses. Side note: The embassy provides us with these houses, and also with all of the maintenance we need. A carpenter recenly came out and hung all of our pictures, including this ornamental door.

Also in the entryway, if you look up, you will see this:

It is a lamp that I bought for Morgan's birthday, all by myself. I got directions to the store from a friend, packed up Liam and Grayson, and went and bought it without any help!

From the entryway, you step down into this room:This is our "church room." When we have church at our house (another post) we set up the chairs in this room. It's a great room for that purpose because, facing the chairs is this:This is our music nook, and it makes for a great stand for our meetings.

If you are facing our music nook and then turn right, this room is what you will see. It is the formal living room. We have our books and TV in this room because our family room is very small, and we use that room as a playroom. You can't tell from the pictures, but our windows are tinted, which makes the house pretty dark a lot of the time. If this house belonged to me, that would be the first thing to change, because I love having lots of sunlight. But when it is warm enough, I open the windows, letting in fresh air and light.

Back to facing the music nook, if you turn to your left, this is what you see:
Our very Moroccan dining room. Yes, the walls and columns are completely covered in tile mosaic.
And the ceiling is intricately carved:This is an amazing room.

Stay tuned for the next installment of Morocco Monday: Our Moroccan Maison

Help!

Notice the new poll in my sidebar. I have so many things I want to tell you about, but I don't know where to start. Please vote on what you would like to hear in my next Morocco Monday post. Also, if you have any questions that you would like me to post about in the future, leave me a comment. Thanks!

Knock on Wood

Whenever we move to a new location we slowly but surely learn our way around and find all of the new places we will need to visit regularly. Usually, we start with the grocery store. Here, we shop mainly at two large stores called Marjane and Aswaak Asalam which are only about five minutes from our house. Occasionally we shop at the small embassy commissary for things that we feel we can't live without (like bacon). We found all of these places within the first few days here.

After that, we find the school. We visited the school on our first day here, and I will do a whole post on that another time. I adore the kids' new school!

Next, we usually find a pediatrician. That was easy here. We see a nurse practitioner at the embassy health unit like all of the other embassy families here. They can treat 80% of the problems, and usually only send people out for things like injuries.

After that, we usually find the library, but that wasn't an option here, at least until I learn to speak French better than I currently do. It's hard to believe that at one point I was able to read Le Petit Prince and Camus' L'etranger in french! Now, I can barely order lunch meat at the deli counter. But I am calling a tutor tomorrow!

It is a good idea to find a hospital, especially one with an emergency room. I have been meaning to do this for a couple of months, being the worrier that I am. I am on my own so much, and I like to be prepared for everything.

Well, I can now check that one off my list. The nearest ER has been found, visited, patronized . . . you get the picture. Liam caught his thumb in a heavy metal door on our house today. He cried and cried, and it started to really swell up. I gave him Tylenol, iced it and called the health unit. They suggested that I take him to the ER. Morgan is gone right now, and this was one of my worst fears.

On Sunday, some of my friends from church, knowing that Morgan would be gone all week, offered to help. I told them that I thought I had everything taken care of, but that I would definitely call if something came up. Then, I said it. I actually said "hopefully nothing will come up. Usually we have some sort of health problem when he is gone." I jinxed myself (and poor Liam)! But I said "knock on wood" right after, and I even knocked on real wood, not particle board! I knocked on wood!!

(deep breath) Okay, I feel better now.

But everything worked out beautifully. I called my friends who live nearby, and their teenage son came over to take care of Braden and Lydia. Amina was leaving for the day, and offered to come with me and show me how to get there. She held Grayson while I tended to Liam. Liam was such a good boy during his x-rays, and he is fine -- no broken bones. And now I know how to get to the ER! Check.

Happy Birthday, Sweet Boy!

Make a Smilebox slideshow
I can't believe Grayson is already one year old! This year flew by.

Each moment with this little man is a treat. He has an infectious smile, an incredibly cute giggle, and the kind of personality that makes you just want to be with him.

The beginning of his life was marked by health scares that made us even more protective of him than we would normally be. Because of that, many things were set aside in favor of cuddling our sweet guy. Now, at one, we are not worried for his health, but out of habit (his or mine?) we still cuddle a lot. Like all night. But as you can see from the slideshow, they grow so fast, and he won't always want to be in my arms, so I am enjoying it while I can.

He has seen quite a bit for such a young man. When he was three months old we took our big trip to Paris. Later in the year we went on a trip to Garmisch, Germany, and then back to Paris (Disney!) for Thanksgiving. He traveled through Germany, France, and Spain and arrived in Morocco when he was nine months old. An American citizen, Grayson has never set foot on American soil.

At one, Grayson's preferred method of transportation is the "bum scoot." He loves Cheerios (at almost $6 per box at our little embassy commissary, I certainly hope he loves them!), yogurt, and nursing. He loves his Daddy, and lights up at the mere sound of his voice. He has just recently developed a love of anything on four wheels, and spends a lot of time rolling toy cars back and forth on the floor. He excitedly says "ball" whenever he sees one. He loves his bathtime, which he shares nightly with Liam. He currently has eight teeth, but two molars are cutting through, and two more look like they are getting ready to emerge.

Today we spent a quiet day at home playing, doing exercises (he is a little behind in development, and my friend, a physical therapist has been helping him catch up), napping (okay, he was the only one napping). We did his 12 month photo shoot this morning, but only one picture turned out, so I will try again tomorrow. I showed him this slide show this morning, and at exactly 8:02 a.m. (10:02 Germany time) I gave him his birth minute kisses. We had a little party with his brothers and sister tonight, and will celebrate again after Daddy gets home from his trip. Of course we had our traditional carrot cake. This time I made it with oat flour and it is really soft. And he got a new car -- his first very own car.

I am so grateful for my sweet guy! Happy Birthday, Grayson!

Morocco Monday

Life here is so different from anything I have ever experienced, and I want to share it all with you. So I had the idea to post something about the culture, food, lifestyle, etc. in Morocco every Monday.

Morocco is one of those countries that I knew existed, but never really gave much thought to before finding out we would be living here (much like Romania before I got my mission call). I'm ashamed to say that I probably couldn't have even pointed it out on a map! So every day so far has been an adventure, learning about the customs, tasting the new foods, seeing the beautiful architecture and colorful clothing. Everything is still so new, and I hope I can remember how it feels to be experiencing it all for the first time when it is all more familiar than Wal-Mart and Sonic to me (oh, how I miss my cranberry limeade slush).

There is so much to share, but if I pace myself, maybe it won't seem so overwhelming. So for this installment of Morocco Monday, I am going to introduce you to Couscous.

Perhaps you have eaten couscous before. It is a grain dish consisting of round granules made from semolina flour. It is a staple here, and when you refer to couscous in Morocco, it is much more than just the grain. It is meat (usually chicken or beef) and vegetables such as carrots, zucchini, turnips, cabbage and squash on a bed of steamed couscous. It is delicious! The kids first tried it at school (much like Friday pizza day in American school cafeterias, Friday is Couscous Day here). Then I had our maid, Amina, (yes, I said "maid" -- another post for another day. Patience, all will be revealed in time :)) make it for us, and we all love it!

Amina made couscous for us again today, and she showed me how to prepare the grain. I had bought a couscoussiere, a traditional steaming pot for couscous, but didn't know how to use it. It surprised me to learn just how involved it is to make. I had assumed it was similar to making rice, but it is not. It involves moistening the granules, rubbing oil around in them, then steaming. Then you remove it from the couscoussiere, and knead some more water in, and then steam again.

You don't serve couscous on individual plates with forks. It is eaten from a communal dish with your hands (Braden is in heaven when we eat this!), or maybe a spoon, if you prefer. You use your spoon to pour a little bit of the broth from the vegetables and meat onto your coucous, and it makes it easier to pick up and swallow.

Couscous is just one of the delicious new foods we have experienced here, and just like our beloved Romanian dishes that we still make years after returning from Romania, it is going to be a part of our family life from now on.

I'm Baaaaack!

Wow, I think that's the longest blog break I have ever taken! I was seriously beginning to wonder if maybe I should just leave up that Halloween template for a few more months until it was October again. I also began to worry that if I did, indeed post something after so long that I would send one of my devoted readers into a life-threatening state of shock. I considered giving up the blog entirely, but the subtle (and not-so-subtle) hints from family and friends requesting an update did the trick. So here I am -- back in the game!

There is just too much to write about to give you a full run-down of the last few months (a daunting task, that no doubt contributed to my avoidance of the blog), so I am just going to start out by getting my feet wet again.

This is the best/worst/only picture of the kids on Easter. Notice their matching outfits that I was so excited about. Also, notice the expression on Liam's face. It says it all, and is the reason there is only one picture. Oh well. I will try and get a better portrait of them when there is better light and Liam is not so tired.

Compare that picture to this one, taken at Christmastime when we were still in Germany:

They have grown so much in such a short period of time.

Okay, these have nothing to do with the above photos, but I thought you might like to see our monkeys feeding the monkeys. We visited the village of Azru with our friend, Sofiane, and fed the wild monkeys in the cedar forest.

Until next time!

We are here! We are here! We are here! We are here!

After a stressful pack-out, cleaning our house from top to bottom, busy week of outprocessing, sad good-byes and four harrowing days of driving we have finally arrived in Rabat.

This has probably been our most stressful move for many reasons. First, we were only allowed to bring 4500 pounds (for those of you who have no idea how much your possessions weigh -- count yourselves lucky. In the military we are obsessed with the weight of our belongings because we have to pay for any weight over the limit we are given. 4500 pounds is not much, especially for 6 people). The movers estimated that each crate they filled with boxes would weigh approximately 1000 pounds, and when they started filling the fifth crate, we asked them to hold off. They insisted on filling all of the crates they brought with them, and sure enough, we went over our limit by 500 pounds. Normally, preparing for a move is a lot of work, but when you have to go through everything you own and decide whether it is coming with you, going into storage for the duration of your next assignment, or given away, it is even crazier.


After we were completely moved out of our house, we moved into a hotel for ten days, during which time we payed final utility bills, outprocessed from base and school, went through our things to prepare for packing up our car, etc.

Then, the big day arrived. On Sunday, January 18th, we loaded up our two cars and started our trek from Germany to Morocco. Yes, we drove. I can hardly believe we did it, myself! Because we took two cars, we both had to drive all day long each day. We decided to take it slow, and planned to only travel 6 or 7 driving hours each day. Anyone with children knows that that would equal out to approximately 10 to 12 hours on the road each day. Once you add stops for food, potty breaks, diaper changes, nursing the baby, naps for exhausted drivers who didn't sleep well the night before and the fact that I don't always drive the actual speed limit (I really don't like to go 130 kph on curvy roads when the wind is whipping my car around), you have the recipe for a really long day. Morgan had reserved hotel rooms at each of our stops along the way. Here is the run-down:

Day 1: We started in Rodenbach, Germany and drove all the way through France. Our GPS took us on an interesting detour right along the outside of a beautiful medieval walled city. We stopped near Marseilles for the night around 1 a.m. We had rented a small apartment. In the morning we were amazed at how much warmer it was than in Germany, and there were palm trees.

Day 2: We drove halfway through Spain. We had never been to Spain before, and it was interesting to see the landscape change. It reminded us of New Mexico, actually, because of the vegetation and architecture. I wish we had been keeping track, because we must have seen at least a dozen beautiful castle ruins along the way.

During this stretch, I almost got us killed when I quickly had to pull off on the shoulder to try and remove a Dorito from Grayson's airways. He was fine, but it was scary at the time. I am very strict about what I let my babies eat, and don't even start feeding them rice cereal until they are six months old at least. Then, a month or two later, I start them on vegetables, but always wait three days in between new varieties. But Liam is such a big helper, and loves to feed his baby brother, so Grayson has now sampled Ritz crackers, Goldfish crackers, and Doritos (that I know of). In this case, he was eating chips, and wanted to share, and I panicked when I heard the baby choking. But we survived!

We stopped for the night in Valencia where we stayed in a very interesting hotel that reminded me of a dorm room. The room service was good, though, and I got to sample some authentic Spanish tortilla (Spanish omelette with potatoes in it).

Day 3: We drove the rest of the way through Spain. We got lost early in the day, taking a scary detour through the city of Valencia. Because of that, our GPS ended up taking us on a different route than originally planned. It was a long travel day as we wound our way through snowy mountain passes. I was so relieved to finally arrive at our hotel that night in Algeciras, Spain.

Day 4: Algeciras is a port city, right on the coast of the Straits of Gibraltar. I remember learning about the Straits of Gibraltar in elementary school geography lessons, but never imagined I would actually cross them! First thing in the morning, we drove our cars onto a ferry. I had never travelled by ferry before, and didn't know what to expect. We drove onto the ferry and were directed to something like an underground parking garage. We locked up our cars and went up to the deck, which was an enclosed area with comfortable seats, a restaurant area, gift shop, and completely lined with windows. The actual ferry trip only lasted less than an hour. Toward the end of the trip, we went back to our cars and prepared to disembark. We arrived in a little village that is still part of Spain, but on the other side of the straits. From there we went through customs, which took about an hour, and then started our journey to Rabat.

The roads in Morocco were much less-travelled than the autoroutes throughout Europe. People avoid the autoroutes because they don't want to pay the tolls. What struck me, though, is how much foot traffic there was along the highways. People were walking along the sides and in the medians. At one point I even had to slam on my brakes because some sheep were grazing at the side of the road, and one of them started to run down the hill toward the highway.

When we arrived in Rabat, we went straight to a beautiful hotel called the Villa Mandarine, where we stayed for a week and a half. It is built on an old orange grove, and it is stunning. Under other circumstances (like without a two-year-old who tried to swim in the fountain) I would have loved to stay there. The embassy had actually found us a house before we got here, but it fell through. I was really looking forward to being able to just drive up to our house and move right in, especially after the very stressful move. So we were disappointed to have to stay in a hotel, but grateful that it was such a nice location.

On Saturday, we moved into a temporary house. It has four bedrooms, a dining room, living room, family room, garage and small yard. It really is nice, but we qualify for a larger house with a bigger garden, so we are only staying here for a few weeks until the house they have for us is ready. Like all of the houses here, it is completely enclosed by a gate, so I am relieved to not worry as much about Liam running into the street. I am also happy to be able to do laundry here without having to load up the car and take it to a laundromat or a friend's house. I haven't been able to do that in almost a month. Last night I cooked my first meal in almost a month as well. It was nice to be able to do that again after such a long break.

Life here is really good, and I think we are going to be very happy. I look forward to being able to post more now that things are starting to settle down a bit. I have so much to tell you about school, church, trips, driving in Rabat, and life in general here. I am unable to post pictures with the internet connection I have right now, but I will add some to this post when I can.

I want to thank everyone who was so helpful to us in Germany as we were leaving, in Morocco as we were arriving, and everyone who prayed for our safety. We are so grateful for all of the people who love us and are concerned for us. We are looking forward to this new chapter in our lives and hope to be able to share it with you through this blog.