Rowan's 4 month check-up

He's in good health and growing well! He was 26 inches long and 17 lbs 11 oz. Everyone who saw him today commented on how much he smiles. He really is a happy baby. Ellie came to his appointment with me and the doctor let her play on his computer in the exam room. I warned him, but he thought it was safe since it was logged out. Somehow the computer started talking as she pushed buttons.

I took the kids to get pictures taken at JCPenneys. Boy was it a mistake to go by myself! Waiting alone with two kids is NOT FUN! But the pictures turned out adorable an in 10 days I'll be able to share the code with all of you to see them online :)

Look at what Rowan can do...

Watch out, here he comes!



We had some family visit us this weekend, which was a blast. Ellie had us all busting up with her songs and monologues. She is quite the character! But she does have some kind of cold now and quite cranky. She really didn't sleep much last night (which left me with about 3 hours of sleep. Yuck!).

A couple of weekends ago we went to a pumpkin patch and corn maze with the girls I watch and their parents. The babies rode in carriers on the moms while the two girls had a blast. We brought a pumpkin home and we'll carve it soon. If we set it out now, the raccoon will eat it! Here's a couple pictures of the girls:

Videos of Rowan

Ok, I have not written a blog in a long, long time, but I promise one is coming. To tide you over, here are some new videos of Rowan. Sorry, no Ellie :(

Look what I made!

These are to hang on the wall in Rowan's room, and they match his room theme. I painted them all by hand! I did look at someone else's painted letters online to get an idea of what patterns to use, but I drew and painted them all myself. Now I have the motivation to get his room put together :)

Rowan started sucking his thumb. We'll see if it sticks, because Ellie sucked her thumb for a couple of weeks, but then dropped it. However, Ellie used pacifiers and Rowan doesn't. So, we'll see. He is still sleeping well. He usually sleeps about a 10 hour stretch, eats, and then sleeps for a couple more hours. A couple nights ago he slept for 12 hours straight! I swear this boy is turning out to be just like Bryson (sleeps well, super-mellow, sucks his thumb). Maybe Tara's baby girl will be just like Ellie.

Ellie is so stinkin' smart. The things she says just amaze me. Yesterday she was saying "juice, juice" over and over. Then she came up to me and says "Juice starts with J." We work with her on what sounds letters make and how words are spelled, but we never told her that one, she figured it out on her own. She'll be reading before she's 3; I just know it! The thing is, learning is fun for her. Oh, she's also very tricky. This is a conversation we had recently:

Ellie: I'm going to have trail mix when we get home

Me: Ooh, that sounds yummy

Ellie: I will share with you mommy

Me: Thanks Ellie! Will you give me a white chocolate chip?

Ellie: I won't. But you can have a raisin!

Me: Gee, thanks Ellie.

Ellie: Mommy, I will give you TWO raisins!

She's so nice to share the healthy part and keep the yummy part to herself.

Video

I just watched this video on a friend's myspace page, and it made me get all teary! I wanted to share with all of you.

My 100th post!

First of all, I would like to make a public apology for not being good at keeping in touch with people. I'm horrible at emails and phone calls, and I don't even blog as often as I should. So, sorry to everyone!

Rowan had his 2 month check-up yesterday. It was a couple weeks late with us moving and getting new insurance. Oh, by the way, we get great insurance with Jason being a graduate "employee." It's only thirty-something dollars a month for all four of us, and just about everything is free! So, the doctor billed Rowan as perfectly healthy - 12 1/2 lbs, 24 1/2 inches long. He's just about average in weight and head circumference, but above average in length. I thought he was above average chunky, but I guess not! Although he does wear 6-9 month clothes now. He still sleeps a good part of the day, and can usually only stay awake for about 1 1/2 hours at a time. And a 8-10 hour stretch at night, a quick feeding, and then another 3 hours or so! Boy, if we could be guaranteed that future babies would be as happy as Rowan and sleep as well, we might have a couple more!

Now Ellie, well I guess you could say she is a two-year-old. She definitely has her defiant moments, and it's getting worse with the influence of her new playmate. The two-year-old that I watch has quite the attitude, and Ellie is starting to imitate. I'm hoping that it's just a phase, but for now we are working on "talking nicely" around the house. I'm sick of hearing "Stop it mommy, I don't want to do that!" But 80% of the time, she is as sweet as can be. "Oh, thank you Daddy for making me these cheerios!" And no more shyness around strangers! She is quite outgoing with all of our neighbors. Whenever anyone asks her what her name is, she never says "Ellie," she always says "Elizabeth." I have no idea why, because we never call her Elizabeth. But it works, because everyone understands Elizabeth, but hardly anyone understands when she says Ellie.

Jason has had 2 weeks of classes so far and he likes them. His at-school schedule is great, being at the university for only about 6 hours total, since one of his classes is on-line. So he is here about half of the time I watch the other girls, which is good because the 3-month-old girl is not too keen on being away from mommy! There is a great bike path he takes that goes from our apartments, along the lake, to the university. Jason also found a group on campus that meets on Saturdays to practice Arabic, and our apartment community center has basketball on Sundays.

We have attended the same church for the past two weeks, and so far we like it. We put both kids in the nursery (yes, even Rowan *sniff*) and they seem to like it. The first time we went, Ellie walked right into her classroom, turned around and said, "Mommy, you're coming right back, right?" and when I said yes, she happily went off to play. Amazing!

Oh goodness, I have to go to bed! Rowan stays up late and Ellie wakes up early, which is not a good combination for me. If Rowan was our only, I could sleep in until 9 or 10, but Ellie likes to wake up with the sun.

Craigslist - our new favorite store

Snowsuit for Rowan - $5

Snowsuit for Ellie $5

Down jacket for Jason - $20

TV and stand (attached) - $50


Bike for Jason - $20

Newer bagless vacuum - $15

Bumbo seat for Rowan - $20

We are never moving again!

I am so sorry to disappoint all of you who are waiting for us to come back to Arizona. After everything we've been through and all the money we've spent getting our stuff here, we are staying right here in this apartment forever! Yes, our stuff finally came yesterday. I'll spare you all the details, but in short we had to rent a truck and haul everything into our apartment ourselves. This wasn't completely the fault of the moving company, but partly due to construction on the streets near our house. It was either move it ourselves, or pay them $500 extra to do it. After being fed up with the money and time it was taking, we refused to pay them more.

This decision was almost a disaster. What were we thinking? How were Jason and I going to move all our stuff into our apartment, and watch our kids at the same time? It worked alright at first; Rowan was asleep and Ellie was watching a movie. But really, I'm not very strong. Jason and I moved 4 huge boxes together and by the fourth one, my arms were giving out already. But...nice neighbors to the rescue! One woman sent her husband to help us, at the perfect time because Rowan woke up. One neighbor offered to watch Ellie. In no time, there were 3 other guys helping Jason unload the truck. To top it all off, the original couple invited us to dinner at their place after the truck was empty! We had a great time with them; they have two girls, ages 2 and 1.

Our stuff is finally here!! We are so extremely excited. I finally was able to rock Rowan to sleep this morning instead of walking him. And, we have things to sit on!

Well, we probably will move again. But this time we are selling/giving away all our furniture and just buying more when we get to the new place. We'll probably buy it from craigslist :)

Rowan "talking"

Rowan "talking"

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I have a job!

Well, it didn't take long, and I found a great job for me. When school starts, I will be watching the 2 girls that I posted about before. Since they are close in age with our kids, I'm hoping that they will be great friends. Both of the girls are sweet, although the oldest has a little teenager attitude sometimes. It's so hard not to laugh!

The temperature is coming back up, even thought it's still rainy, so don't worry about our kids being cold. Hey, I can always put them in their snowsuits! The church we visited on Sunday was okay; the service was pretty dull, but the people were super nice. One man even offered us an extra microwave that he had, and he delivered it to our house yesterday! I wish their services were better, but we'll check out more churches.

I keep forgetting to tell Tara to make her jealous - I can get cheese curds (squeeky cheese) with my WIC checks!

No moving truck yet :(

Well, no stuff for us yet. It's uncomfortable to be sitting on the floor all the time, but at least we all have beds of some sort. We bought a toaster oven since we threw out our old one, so we at least have something to cook with. It's amazing what all you can cook in a toaster oven! We've made burgers, biscuits, bratwurst, and corn on the cob, just to name a few examples. Our poor kids though. The high today was 61 degrees and it was raining all day. It still is actually. And none of us have warm clothes. The only kind of warm clothes the kids have are their pajamas, so that's what they wore when we went to the bank today. I'm pretty sure I was the only person with a tank top on when I went to the grocery store. And of course our umbrella is packed in our stuff. Hopefully we'll get to Walmart soon to buy another one, because it's supposed to rain until Thursday or Friday.

I've discovered craigslist.com! For those of you who haven't, it is a website where you can find stuff for sale in your own city, so you can go pick it up instead of having it shipped to you. We're picking up 2 snowsuits tomorrow, one for each kid. And they are only $5 each! I also found a potential new job on the website. Monday we are meeting a family in need of childcare while the wife teaching at the university. It would be about 12 hours a week, and they have 2 girls who are almost exactly the same age as our kids. Apparently the almost 3-year-old girl is quite a chatterbox, so it will be fun to see her together with our own little chatterbox! They also have a 3-month-old daughter. They would come to our apartment, so if the two babies are both fussy at once, Jason will be here most of the time to take Rowan. It's practically the perfect job for me! Hopefully it works out.

I've found a church for us to check out tomorrow morning. If we don't like it, then Jason can pick the next one :)

Just a quick hello from Rowan

In our new home

Well, we've finally made it. Yesterday afternoon we received the keys to our new apartment. It is much nicer than we expected! All the appliances seem newer and there is lots of closet space. We have 1 1/2 bathrooms, and there is a play area in front of our apartment with swings, a sand box, and lots of grass. There seem to be quite a few kids living nearby, and a lot of them seem to be close to Ellie's age. Ellie keeps begging to play outside! The temperature isn't too bad, especially at night.

Our stuff from the moving company isn't here yet, but at least we have somewhere to stay. Grandma Hoffman lent us a blow-up bed and some silverware, so at least we can eat and sleep :) I'll update more as I have time!

Does anyone still read this?

So sorry to everyone that I haven't written in a long, long time. We've been pretty busy with traveling, packing, and just entertaining two kids.

We're on our way to Wisconsin! I am currently sitting on the couch of our (really nice) hotel room in Albuquerque, day one of our drive. It went really well today, with two stops along the way. Both places we stopped at were great fun for Ellie; a rest area with grass to run around in and a fountain to splash in, and a McDonalds with the best kids area I've ever seen. Instead of it being a boring day in the car, I think Ellie actually enjoyed today. She even was able to swim at our hotel before going to bed. I don't think Rowan had as much fun, as he slept all day :) Hopefully the next couple of days will be just as good.

The most exciting news is that the Porters (Zane and Tara) are adding a baby girl to their family. My first niece!

My toddler is keeping me awake at night!

So, Rowan is sleeping well. I really hope he keeps this schedule; it's a great one! He is awake for 2 long stretches during the day, usually about 3 hours long. The other times he is sleeping, about 2 3-hour chunks in the afternoon/evening (with a feeding in between). Then he goes to sleep at night, anytime between 8 and 10pm, and sleeps for a good stretch, usually around 6 hours. He wakes up for a feeding, then sleeps again til about 7:30am. It's great! The only problem: Ellie hasn't been sleeping well. She's been waking up at least twice each night, so in between the two of them, I'm not getting the sleep I should be. She slept through last night though, so hopefully her restlessness is going away.

This time around I have a couple of new baby-gadgets that have been awesome. Thanks to Mindy for both of them! I love the Boppy pillow that she lent me (and oddly, so do a couple of my family members). It's not only great for nursing, but for propping up Rowan, using as a lower-back pillow, and using as a nap pillow (for myself). The other gadget is a swaddle blanket. Rowan sleeps great with it!

At his last dr appt on Monday, Rowan weighed 9 lb. 15 oz. Since he lost weight the first week, that means he gained 20 ounces in 10 days. That's double what most babies gain! No wonder he's already growing out of his 0-3 month clothes. Ellie has a check-up near the end of the month; it will be interesting to see how much she weighs. Her hair sure is getting long! If only I could convince Jason to let her get a haircut :)

We're planning on moving to Wisconsin near the beginning/middle of August. Instead of the last weekend in July, as we've told some people, we'll be going to Tucson the first weekend of August. The moving company will load up our stuff there, and then we'll begin our week-long drive to WI. (We're taking our time). We'll see how our newborn and toddler travel together!

One week old

Rowan is one week old today, so I thought I would update everyone on our family. We are settling in now, and Jason and I have a good nighttime routine worked out. I go to bed around 10pm until Rowan needs to be fed again, and sometimes I'm able to go back to bed. Jason usually stays with him 'til around 2am, and then I take over and sleep in the living room. Rowan has slept for 5 hours straight for the past two nights, so I've actually been able to sleep! He's also had a lot more awake time; for the first couple of days he slept constantly, now he is awake for an hour or two at a time.

Ellie loves her baby brother and doesn't show any jealousy yet. We'll see how she is once we leave all the family, and she doesn't get quite so much attention. She likes to hold him and give him hugs and kisses. She's also having fun with her cousin Bryson. Ellie hasn't had to share her toys before, so she is learning how. Luckily Bryson is so easy-going that he doesn't mind if Ellie snatches her favorites back from him.

Jason found some guys to play basketball with down near the lake, so he was able to have some fun this weekend. We'll probably be up in Kingman some this week to visit family; that will be fun for us.

Announcing...

Our baby boy is finally here! The labor and delivery was super-quick; by the time the nurses realized I was really in labor, he was just about coming out. The doctor barely arrived there in time to catch him! Here's the big guy:



Rowan Joshua Tatum, 9lbs even, 21 inches long.

June 25, 2007 3:50 am


Ellie loves her little brother; she loves to hold him and touch him. She is a little scared of his crying, but I know she'll get used to that soon!


Jason won the baby poll, by a lot. I guess he had that father's intuition.

Long-awaited update

Sorry it's been so long since my last blog; we haven't had much internet access since we've returned. Now that Jason's back (safe and sound), we have our laptop which picks up a wireless signal (most of the time) from our nearby church.

Not much going on here. I'm still pregnant :), and we've done a little bit of traveling. Ellie and I spent a week in Tucson visiting friends and took a quick trip up to Kingman to see some of Jason's family. Ellie sure loved playing with Uncle Jordan! She's also loving having family galore to shower her with attention. We have grandparents, great grandparents, great aunts and uncles, and lots of aunts all in town to entertain her. I'm starting to feel very uncomfortable all of the time now, so I think my traveling days are over until after this baby comes. We finally have health insurance here now, so the baby can come any day now (please!). Everything looks good at my doctor appointments, and my doctor seems to be very supportive of natural deliveries, which is something Jason and I really want.

We'll let you know when we have more news, but for now we are just hanging out and preparing for the baby to come.

We're baaack!

Just wanted to let everyone know that Ellie and I are back in Arizona! The flight was long, but really not too bad. Ellie was great and I was as comfortable as I could be. We just got in a day or two ago and we're still dealing with jetlag, but hopefully we should get back to normal soon. Thanks to all of you who were praying for us!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to all mothers out there! Especially to our mothers, who we will be seeing very soon!

Ellie's second year montage

Here is Ellie's second year! Don't buy a dvd of this from the company, if you want one, I can make you one of this and her first year. Just let me know!

Make photo slide shows at www.OneTrueMedia.com

We have a drought!

It seems that the water system for our house has been tampered with, and we now have no water. For some reason it is not connecting to our place. So, we came home from the Dead Sea with no water in our pipes. We've been given a temporary solution, a hose from a source outside, but needless to say, it is not very convenient. Added to this, I forgot to put our water bottle outside last week, so now we've run out of drinking water too. Crazy! Luckily the delivery men come tomorrow for the drinking water. Who knows when our other water will be fixed.

I forgot to mention that we were in two extremely minor fender-benders last week in taxis. The bumps were less even than going over a speed bump. But it was kind of crazy with them happening within a day of each other. Then yesterday I totally fell outside. I landed on my knees, extremely hard, but nothing else was hurt. I was holding Ellie, so luckily my neighbor was able to keep me from falling on my face or squishing Ellie (or the baby). All I have are bruised and scraped-up knees. Can you tell that God has been protecting us lately? :)

Update on the binky situation: Ellie had a rough time falling asleep that night (she even threw up from crying too much), but her nap the next day was ok. She finally put one of the other binkies in her mouth. When we went to the store that afternoon, we found some really cheap pacifiers (3 for $1.50) that she has accepted as a substitute. So, we should be fine now! Thank goodness.

We're back from the Dead...

The Dead Sea that is. It was a fun trip; we were able to see a lot of things. On Friday we took a minibus up to Madaba, a town about 45 minutes away from Amman. After checking into a hotel and taking a nap (well, Ellie slept while Jason and I watched 2 episodes from 24), we walked around the town of Madaba. It is a Christian town, known for it's many historical mosaics. Then we went back to the hotel for the night, where we swam briefly in the freezing swimming pool before settling in for the night.

Today we rented a taxi (and driver) to take us to Mt. Nebo (where Moses stood to view the promised land), Bethany (where Jesus is believed to have been baptized), and the Dead Sea. It was all fun and interesting, and a lot of walking (more than I thought). Ellie was exhausted by the time we got to the Dead Sea, so she only lasted a couple of minutes in the salty water before having a breakdown. She slept on the bus ride back home.

We had one casualty on our trip. During the scramble off the bus in Amman, we lost the one "good" binky that we had left. She used one in her mouth, and two in her hands as she slept, but now the one for her mouth is gone. She refuses to use the others in her mouth (they are bigger and made out of latex, not silicone), so now she is having a hard time going to sleep. She's been in bed for an hour now, with no sleep in sight. The biggest problem is that without that "cork" in her mouth, she is babbling like crazy. Some could say that this could be the opportunity to wean her from her pacifiers, but we don't want to! Not to mention that we would not pick this time to try to wean her anyways, too many changes going on right now. Hopefully we can find a suitable substitute at a store tomorrow. Where's Walmart when you need it?

Introducing...Ellie, the 2 year old!

Happy birthday Ellie! She had a great/busy day today. This morning we had a mommy & me class at the local bookstore. I made rice krispy treats to share with her friends for her birthday. Then, after her nap, we went to a place called the Fun Factory. It looks like a daycare; it has outdoor play equipment and sand, an indoor playground and trampoline, an art room, a toddler room, and a kitchen where they cook simple things together. Ellie had a blast painting and then cooking and decorating pancakes (and then eating of course). Then she played outside in the sand. After dinner, we had a birthday cake. Here are some pictures of her fun day:

Her beautiful smile:

Dancing at mommy & me class:

Painting at the Fun Factory:

Making pancakes:

Blowing out the birthday candles with Daddy:

Happy Birthday Jason!

Today Jason is 25, a quarter-century! We celebrated with blueberry pancakes this morning, and then a trip to the mall tonight. We went to the mall mainly to eat dinner at a favorite pizza place, and then brought dessert home. Definitely not the most exciting birthday ever, but I'm hoping it was a good day.

Okay, we are definitely going to the Dead Sea next weekend. Especially since it is the next-to-last weekend that Ellie and I will be here!

31 week belly pics

Here it is; the big belly. Actually, comparing it to my last picture 9 weeks ago, it doesn't look too much bigger. I guess I just popped pretty early. Nine more weeks to go til baby brother gets here!

Opinions, please!

We went grocery shopping today, because we were in desperate need of food. The little store on our street that we use for necessities during the week was closed for some reason this week, so we have been out of bread for a while. Our bread doesn’t last long, since it’s all freshly baked in Amman, not stocked with preservatives like in the states. I guess that’s one thing we’ll miss :) Guess what we found at the grocery store?? Generic Cinnamon Toast Crunch and Captain Crunch w/berries! It sounds weird to be so excited about, but American cereal is one thing I’ve really missed while here. There are some things available, but who wants to buy Special K with berries for $7 a box? There is an Egyptian brand of cereal that we usually buy that is about $1.50 a box, but it’s not as good as American. I have bran flakes just about every morning (with a spoonful of sugar of course). This cereal we found was only about $3 a box, so not too bad at all.

Last night we treated ourselves to an expensive, but delicious dinner. We ate at a restaurant called Houston’s, which is similar to…Chili’s, I guess. Ooh, the nachos we ordered as an appetizer were sooo good. The meal, which would have been around $20 in the states, was more like $35 here, but we needed that extra boost to make it until we come home.

Ok, I have a dilemma that I would love opinions about. Ellie has been waking up dry during naptime for a couple weeks now, and the last 5 nights her diapers have been completely dry in the morning! I'm afraid to let her go without a diaper though, because if she did wet the bed, it would be a huge hassle to try to clean her foam mattress. Here are my options (that I see anyway):

- use a new diaper every day
- reuse the diapers if they are dry (I do reuse them after nap for that night). One idea that I saw recently was to put her in undies and then a diaper, that way the diaper is clean and I just wash the undies
- let her go without a diaper

Using a diaper a day isn't too expensive, but it seems senseless to throw away a dry diaper. What do you think we should do?

Fluff stuff

I've ordered my first cloth diapers! I'm going with the cheaper route for the first couple of months, when he'll need his diaper changed so often. There are cloth diapers out there that are exactly like disposables as far as ease, but they are a bit more expensive. We'll be using prefolds/fitteds and covers, so two pieces instead of just the all-in-one diaper. But believe me, it looks sooo easy. And, they are so cute! All I have left is to buy some prefolds, at least for now. (I know a lot of people have no clue about the terminology I'm using, but I'm too excited not to share).

5 weeks to go

Happy Easter everyone! Ellie had a blast hunting down easter eggs, although it took her a good while to find the first egg and realize that she was supposed to pick it up. It was pretty funny watching her look everywhere but directly at the egg.

I've tried out a few new recipes lately. One that was super good was a recipe for chocolate chip peanut butter oatmeal cookies. They were soooo yummy. The best cookies I've ever had are Autumn's mom's chocolate chip peanut butter cookies, but these come in a close second. Then I tried cheese fondue (I've been craving the cheese fondue from Barley Brothers in Havasu). This was not such a success. It tasted fine (actually Jason loved it) but it was more like melted cheese than fondue. This may be because I did not use a fondue pot, so it cooled off and hardened. Tonight I used a new recipe for chicken enchiladas, and they were very easy and good. Not the best, but pretty good. I think my time here has helped me become more confident in my cooking skills, since I need to be inventive in my substitutions and cooking methods. No more strictly following the recipe for me! (All the above recipes are available if you click on the name of the foods.)

I went to the doctor today. The baby is still a perfect size for his age and everything looks good. I, however, have a urinary tract infection and low iron. Both of these results were surprising, since I have had no symptoms of a UTI and I eat plenty of iron-rich foods. My best guess is that I am not getting enough vitamin C to help absorb the iron. So, we walked over to the pharmacy this afternoon to get all my medications. The antibiotic I have is really weird; it's little granules that I put in a cup of water. The granules fizz up and I have to drink it (three times a day). Hopefully this is the last of my weird pregnancy symptoms!

Video of Ellie

Here is a video of Ellie that I took today. She's pretending to open birthday presents; it's really cute!

New friends

Guess what Ellie and I did today?? We went to a toddler Mommy & Me class! The classes just started up at the bookstore we visit. It was sooo much fun! And Ellie was much more interactive than I thought she would be. She was fairly shy, but she never cried and she even ran off by herself sometimes. The class is for kids ages 1 1/2 - 4, but most kids were about 2. We sang songs, read a couple books, did a craft, ate a snack, and then had playtime. This is not a free service; it's actually pretty pricey, but it's worth the interaction that Ellie gets. We'll go once a week until we leave :)

I can't believe Ellie will be turning 2 in less than a month! We're tentatively planning on a birthday party in Lake Havasu after we get back, even though it will be a couple weeks past her birthday. We really want all our friends and family to come, especially since it may be the first time in almost a year that we have seen you! Jason probably won't be there :( but Ellie and I would love to see everyone. We don't have an exact day and time yet, but I'll be sure to post it here when we do.

We haven't gone to the Dead Sea yet, but hopefully soon. I'll be sure to post about it.

Potty-training

Ellie is fully potty-trained! She hasn't had an accident in quite a while (well, besides last week when she peed her pants downtown). She also wakes up dry after naps. This morning she was dancing around as I was getting her cereal (she's going through a phase where she eats the cereal dry and drinks milk out of a cup). Finally she said, "Have to go potty!" Boy oh boy did she pee for a long time! And...her diaper was completely dry! We're so excited! Our only problem now is using toilets when out and about, because for the most part, there aren't any! If there are bathrooms, it is usually a hole in the ground, and Ellie won't go in those. I don't blame her! So, if we go out for an extended period of time, then we'll still be using diapers. Oh, it will be so nice to not have two children in diapers!

Speaking of diapers, we have decided (well, I did and Jason is fine with it) to use cloth diapers with our new baby. We'll still use disposables we already have some, nothing against them, but we don't plan on buying any. There are several different reasons why we have chosen use this method, but a big one is simply cost.

We're thinking about going to the Dead Sea soon. It's so hit and miss with weather right now though. Some days it will get up to 70, now it's back to the 50's. I guess we'll just have to pick a weekend and go, hoping that it's warm enough!

7 weeks to go!

Okay, here are our adventures from the past week:

On Thursday we went to a park. Yes, we finally found a park! And it isn’t any normal park, it is a HUGE complex with 8 different playgrounds, a couple of soccer fields, and many basketball courts. It also has a café, plus a couple of carnival-type food stands. There is popcorn, corn on the cob, cotton candy, and things that are like churros but with honey instead of cinnamon and sugar. These carnival foods are soo cheap. Ellie has a great time there, and she is improving a lot on being afraid of other people. She is no longer afraid to climb on the playground if other kids are in the way. Ellie also loves to swing! Although she is terrified of the baby bucket-style seats, she loves swinging on the normal “big kid” swings. So, we’re planning on going to the park at least once a week from now on.

Ellie and I also found a small bookstore that is all children’s books. They have a little area with toys to play with and books that can be read. As desperate as we are to find things to do, we’ll be going there often just to play (although I’ll be buying a small book each time, or else I’d just feel weird!). I found a book there called “Broken Biscuits” that is currently Ellie’s favorite. It’s neat because it’s in English, but it’s based on Egyptian culture (the mom and daughter have to hurry to the village oven so they don’t miss out on their turn for the day). There are also some nice Arabic baby board books that we’ll be buying for our little guy.

On our way home from the bookstore last week, I was approached by a woman who was collecting things in our neighborhood. This has happened before, people coming to our door looking for “stuff” that they can have. Well, obviously I don’t speak fluent Arabic, but I caught the word for clothes and she kept pointing to Ellie, so I asked her if she wanted some of my daughter’s clothes. She said yes, so I told her to follow me back to my house. I had just gone through Ellie’s clothes and separated out all of the ones that are too small, intending to donate them somewhere here (so we have room for all the stuff sent to us!). At one point walking back the woman picked up Ellie, even though I told her not to, and Ellie freaked out (which is exactly why I told her not to). So, when we got to our house, I gave her the clothes and shoes, and then she asked me for some of “Baba’s” clothes (which is referring to Jason). I told her no, and she asked for some of my clothes. I told her no, then she gestured to Ellie’s toys. Finally, I put my hand on her shoulder and gently led her to the door said “No, sorry, there are none.” Ellie of course is crying hysterically this whole time; it was naptime and she was not happy to see someone taking her things. I’m sure we have some other stuff that I could have given her, but I did not want to go through our things with her standing right there, especially since Ellie was so upset by her. But she finally went away! And I was glad to help her out, even if she was so greedy :)

Ellie and I went on a nature walk this morning. Here are some pictures: (the cat next to Ellie is "our" cat that hangs around our house and plays with Ellie)

It's snowing!!!

Okay, after it being almost 80 degrees last week, today it snowed all day long! This picture was taken around 10:30am, but it's still snowing now at 4:45pm. How crazy is that? It was definitely a surprise for us. We are slightly jealous of all you Arizona people with your warm weather, but we're supposed to get into the 70s again next week.

Technical difficulties

Jason just took Ellie with him to the Fulbright office to pick up some mail. Do you know it's been months since she's gone out of the house without me? I'm happy for the free time, but I was a little sad watching grown-up Ellie marching down the street next to daddy. Man, I knew she would have some adjusting to do when we returned and she is not only with me all day, but I think I'll have an even harder time adjusting!

I thought I would fill you all in on the major appliances in our apartment. Here is a picture of our "washing machine." The left side is the "washer." I fill it up with water, add soap and clothes, and then it agitates the clothes for up to 15 minutes. Then, I drain out the water (into the nearby sink) and put all the clothes in the right side of the machine, the "spinner." This spins out all the excess water. Repeat this process two more times (to get all the soap out) and then the clothes are ready to hang for a day on the drying rack. Needless to say, washing clothes takes a bit more time than in the usual washer/dryer. Hey, I'm not complaining, as this is the first time we've even had a washer in our house. But, we will all be needing new socks, undies, and shirts when we get back, since this process is very rough on our clothes!

And then our stove. There are many problems with it, but I've managed to figure out how to deal with most of them. It runs off a (propane?) tank, not electric. So, when the tank runs out, we have to get a new one. This is not too much of a hassle (Autumn had it much rougher!) since a truck drives around the neighborhoods during the day with filled tanks. The truck plays music (much like the ice cream man) and if you hear him coming, you run out and flag him down. The first time ours ran out, it was no big deal. This time however, I was right in the middle of cooking dinner (chicken-fried chicken and mashed potatoes - yum!). What to do? It was already getting dark, so the trucks weren't running that we could see. So, here is a video of the solution that Jason so brilliantly thought of. It worked!

All about Ellie

Ellie has really been growing up lately. It's kind of sad to see her leaving babyhood behind, but luckily she's not our last baby!

Potty-training is pretty much accomplished, except for when she sleeps. We don't really ask her if she has to go anymore; we trust her to come to us, except for when we're leaving the house, then she must at least try. Today was a mini-milestone when after her nap she asked to go potty while she still had a diaper on.

Her vocab and conversation skills are incredibly advanced (I think). She speaks in complete sentences all the time, and knows when to say thank you, you're welcome, bless you, things like that. The other day our friends Alex and Kendra were here for lunch and they were cracking up at the things she would say. We all laughed at something and she said "What's so funny?" She is also very imaginitive and has conversations with her "friends" often. Here is a typical conversation that I've had with her recently:

Ellie: uh oh

Me: what's wrong Ellie?

Ellie: It's Benny the bull!

Me: what's wrong with Benny?

Ellie: He's stuck in the gooey geyser! (this is all from a Dora dvd)

Me: oh no, what can we do?

Ellie: We have to help him!

She goes through many Dora episodes this way, acting them out with her "friends."

For the past week, she has had trouble sleeping, and I could not figure out why. Recently, I think I found the culprit. Her two-year molars are coming in on the bottom! She has one that has broken through, but the other side is still barely under the gums. I can't see any coming in on the top, but I'm assuming they're coming soon too. I was just thinking that I can't wait for teething to be done, but now we're starting all over!

All right, I think that's all the latest Ellie news. Here is a recent picture of her as a big girl.

It's a ... (take 2)

Hmm, I thought about teasing you all and making some way that you would have to wait or jump through hoops or something, but I guess that's too cruel.

So, the doctor was doing the ultrasound and showed me all the tiny body parts, and everything looks great. The baby was sucking on the hand; it was so cute. The doctor started putting the ultrasound thing away, and I said, can you tell if it's a boy or a girl? She replied, I already told you, I pointed it out to you. I must have missed it. I thought I might have seen the gender at one point, but I don't remember her talking about it. Maybe it's a culture thing and she didn't want to out-right name the parts?

So, we're excited to finally know. Now we can start thinking about names and planning room themes and everything. Don't ask us about the names though, because for one, we have no idea right now, plus we might decide to keep it a surprise :)

Oh wait, did I forget to tell you boy or girl? So sorry. It's a ... BOY!

Great news!

Jason just received word that he will be awarded the Advanced Opportunity Fellowship for his Ph.D. program! This is the same offer that was given to him last year, that was very difficult to pass on for the Fulbright. We were hoping that he would receive it again this year, but it wasn't guaranteed. This fellowship covers tuition, insurance for him, and a stipend that will cover most of our living expenses. And, it's pretty much guaranteed for the entire four years we are there!

Belly update

So, 23 weeks pregnant. Can you see the belly yet? :) Holy cow, I'm so much bigger than last time! Please excuse the messy hair. I can't believe I'm only a little more than halfway there. How big am I going to get this time?!?

Does it look like a boy belly or a girl belly?

Happy Birthday Bryson!!

My nephew Bryson is turning one today! It's so hard to believe that he's one, and Ellie is almost two! I know everyone says this, but kids really do grow up fast!

Ellie has been potty-training lately. She usually goes the whole morning, and then most of the afternoon. Sometimes we are lazy and don't take her diaper off after her nap, but most of the day she goes with just her undies (which are sooo adorable!). She definitely wears diapers when she sleeps though. I think sometimes she just holds everything in until she gets a diaper on; I'm hoping that as she gets used to going in the potty she'll do that less.

I must have been in a cooking mood today. For dinner I made homemade whole wheat flour tortillas and homemade refried beans. Those are two things that I love that are hard to find here, plus if we do find them, they are expensive. And I love homemade tortillas! I also made banana bread. Since we don't have a loaf pan, I made it in a round pan that used to be a saucepan. So, I guess it's more like banana cake. And it's a recipe I found that uses whole wheat flour and honey instead of white flour and sugar. It's really good though, I promise!

Jason started school again this past Sunday. On Tuesday he moved up an extra level! He skipped the entire level 6, since it was too easy for him. His teacher said that he was the best student in level 5. He probably wouldn't tell all of you this, but as his wife, I can brag :)

Happy Valentine's Day!!!

We send our love to all our friends and family! Ellie and I were busy this morning making creations for Jason. Here's the fruit of our labor:

I had never made powdered sugar before using regular sugar and a blender, but it worked fine today to make the frosting on these cookies.

And here is Ellie wishing everyone a Happy Valentine's Day!

So glad we don't curse!!

Ellie copies EVERYTHING I say. Luckily my vocab is at worst PG rated. But I've decided I need to try to bring it down to G. These are the not-so-nice things that Ellie has picked up. She says:

Oh jeez
Oh my goodness
Gosh
Jeez Louise

And then today, as I was cooking, I said "What the heck!" Guess who repeated?? So, I will be watching myself!

Packages!!

We went to the Fulbright office and post office yesterday, and we came home with mail from 3 people! Our 4-year-old friend Maggie drew me the cutest get well card that Ellie loves to look at, a lifegroup from Calvary sent us another box of yummy food, and Ellie's Grammy (Jason's mom) sent her a box of friends to play with. It was an exciting day! Here is a picture of Ellie with all her friends, old and new:

Petra - success or failure???

Well, we're back. Overall it was a nice trip. I was a little worried when we first climbed into the minibus and Ellie looked around at all the men and said "I don't like the bus." But, she soon fell asleep and didn't have any problems. Our hotel room was just fine, and the jacuzzi was amazing, although they charged us to use it! So, we only used it once. The town itself was pretty dead; I guess it isn't high tourist season right now.

The day after we arrived we went into Petra. The weather was cold, but we all bundled up against the chill. We set off walking, with Ellie walking much of the way, since she likes to be free. We walked quite a long way (almost 2 miles maybe?) before we reached the first real site. When we looked at our map and saw how little ground we had covered, I started to doubt that Ellie (and I if we had to carry her) would make it. We debated whether Ellie and I should go back right then, but I decided that maybe if Ellie and I rode a camel to the next part, we could make it. The camels looked like they loped along at a slow enough speed that it wouldn't be too jarring for me to be unsafe. However, after the first couple yards, I quickly saw that this wasn't the case. Plus, Ellie freaked out (she was already getting a bit cranky) over riding the camel. The camel ride actually scared me because I started getting Braxton-Hicks contractions. By then, Ellie was full-on crying and could not be consoled. So, Jason was able to convince someone to send a horse-drawn buggy to come and pick us up (at an extremely steep price of course!) and take us back to the beginning. The buggy ride was very bumpy as well, and I was having the contractions the whole way, and Ellie was screaming "Don't like the horse!" all the way back. Finally, Ellie and I made it back to the hotel, where Ellie took a long nap and I rested (the contractions went away completely). Jason, however, came all the way to the beginning with us and made sure we found a taxi, before he hiked all the way back in and further to see all the sites. What a trooper! He had a good time being able to hike around and see all the ancient monuments. Besides the botched trip into Petra, we had a good time seeing a new place.

One semi-sad anecdote to share: When we walked into our apartment, Jason and I felt a bit of relief to be back, but Ellie did not share our sentiments. As soon as Jason shut the front door, Ellie ran over to it and started crying "Our room!" (referring to our hotel room). I guess we didn't properly warn her that we were leaving our hotel permanently and coming back home. She was fine once she found her toys that she left behind.

On Vacation

Just to let you all know, we'll be away from the computer (most likely) for the next couple days. We're finally going to Petra, the number one tourist spot in Jordan. Wish us luck, as it is a lot of walking and hiking. I get out of breath easily now, and I'm sure Ellie will tire out quickly. So, we'll see how much sight-seeing we are actually able to do. Our hotel supposedly has a jacuzzi, so maybe we'll spend most of the time there (although I will have to be hopping in and out to make sure our baby doesn't get cooked!). Plus, I'm planning on using their Turkish bath once, if they are able to give a massage to someone with a big belly in the way. This is a link to the hotel we'll be staying at: http://www.amrapalace.com/index1.asp .

Miss Manners

Ellie is starting to do very well with her manners, when she wants to, of course. She knows she can pretty much get anything she wants, as long as it isn't dangerous, by grabbing our face with her little hands on our cheeks, putting her pleading face right up to ours, and saying "Please mommy or please daddy." She knows how to work us already! And if anyone in her vicinity sneezes, she immediately says, "Bless you." If we don't say "thank you" quickly enough to her, she'll beat us to the punch by saying "You're welcome."

Then again, miss proper can also be very unladylike. She is starting to potty-train (and doing very well!) so she talks a lot about her bodily functions. Everytime she "expels gas" she exclaims, "Toot, toot!" There's no more blaming our noises on Ellie, because she'll point out exactly who makes what noise. Anything crusty that comes off her cheek or eye or anywhere on her face is a "booger, yuck." I know she must have learned all of this from us, but did we really teach her this?

About potty-training again. Today we received a new potty seat for Ellie (thanks to the Harkins family). It is a Dora the explorer seat, which is Ellie's favorite character right now (well, Elmo is still in the running). We have one Dora dvd that she asks to watch over and over again, and we often let her because it is so cute to watch her dance with Dora and Boots. (Yesterday she was twisting from side to side shouting "We did it, we did it, lo hicimos") Anyway, she was very excited about the seat, but was very apprehensive of peeing on Dora. Once I convinced her that Dora wanted to see Ellie pee and poop, then she was able to relax. I'm amazed at how well she's doing with this, hopefully it will continue!

It's a....

baby! We went to my doctor's appt today, hoping to find out if the baby is a boy or a girl. The doctor really tried, but she couldn't get the "money shot." So, we don't know yet. But, the baby looks really healthy, and that's what matters most, right? Right?!? I know, we're disappointed too. Hopefully next month this baby will cooperate. I am just not patient enough for this!

We're planning on another bus trip next week, going to Petra. In October we had plans to go, but they never happened, so we're trying again. We're running out of new adventures in Amman, so this should be a lot of fun for us. We just hope it's not too cold.

Sorry we don't have much news to report. It's just normal life as usual here in Amman.

Ellie's First Year

So, I guess I'm being a little nostalgic with this new baby coming, thinking about Ellie growing up. So, here is a photo montage of Ellie's first year (bring on the kleenex!)

Make an online slide show at onetruemedia.com

Another hospital trip

This time it wasn't for Ellie!

I've had a cold for about a week, and yesterday I figured out that it had turned into a sinus infection. When researching it online, I discovered that this is common in pregnancies. Who knew? So, yesterday I had some pretty bad pain in my cheek area; right under the cheekbone is one sinus cavity. I wanted to wait until today to find a doctor, since yesterday everywhere was closed. Last night however, my sinus infection turned into an ear infection, with extreme pain in my left ear. Then, around 5am, my eardrum burst! So, after a night of hardly any sleep, I woke up Jason around 7am and we went to the emergency room. Luckily an ear,nose, and throat doctor was coming in soon, so we waited there for him. He cleaned out my ears (SOOOO painful in the bad one) and prescribed antibiotics and pain killers, both safe for the baby. He also prescribed a nasal spray, which he and the pharmacist assured me was perfectly safe. However, when I came home I read the info about the spray and it says this, "Otrivin should be avoided during pregnancy...the medicine should be administered only if the potential benefit justifies the potential risk to the fetus." So, I won't be taking it. I don't think the potential risk is worth a less-stuffy nose.

Can I nominate Jason for the husband-of-the-year award? When I came out around 1:30am, not able to sleep in the bed, he set out to make a comfortable place for me to sleep. He made this contraption for our bed:





UPDATED: Today I feel better, my ear doesn't really hurt, I just have a lot of pressure in my sinus area. The antibiotics are making me sick, but I just took one with a lot of food, so hopefully that one will stay down. And in other news, tonight Ellie tried to secretly change her own poopy diaper. You can imagine the mess that made! Actually, she did a pretty good job, she just couldn't quite wipe everything off herself. Sorry, no pictures for that :)

My very first french braid attempt!!

You can learn anything online!!

Back to school

School again for Jason. He's had a really nice (and unexpected) break since Christmas, but he had to go back today. Fortunately he only has two weeks left of this semester, then he has another 2 week break. Hopefully we'll be able to travel a little bit within Jordan during that time.

I'm feeling a lot better as far as morning sickness. I have an episode every once in a while, but for the most part it has gone away. And I'm pretty sure I've felt the baby moving around a couple times! I was starting to get worried because at the last ultrasound (about 2 weeks ago) the baby WOULD NOT MOVE, even when the doctor poked at him/her. I was reprimanded for not eating enough, so I was starting to worry that my morning sickness had caused some sort of permanent damage. I know logically that it didn't, but it's hard not to worry about everything! Since getting over the sickness, I've started cooking good dinners again. Jason's excited about that!

Recently we took Ellie to this place that is like a mini-carnival for little kids. There are about 6 small rides (ones that pretty much go around in a circle) and tons of those toys like in front of Walmart that you put quarters into. But Ellie's favorite part was the bumper cars that she went on with Daddy. Now she stands at the front door every day and asks for the bumper cars.

Ellie is also her own biggest fan. All day she walks around saying "Ellie's beautiful, Ellie's gorgeous, Ellie's adorable, Ellie's cute, Ellie's awesome." And each time she says one, we have to repeat it before she'll move on to the next one. She also tells herself "Good job" a lot and today after I gave her a cup of tea (basically warm whole milk with a couple spoonfuls of my tea in it) she kept saying "Good drinking" every time she took a drink. She was very proud to be drinking out of a cup without a lid!

I have some pictures that I'll have to upload soon!

Happy New Year!!

I hope everyone's celebrations were fun. I woke up last night to the sound of fireworks; I couldn't even stay up late enough (not that I really tried).

Here is a video of us reading the Christmas Story. This video is only the first half, but if you only have time for one (they are almost 5 min. each) then watch the second one instead. If you want to see the beginning of the story first watch this one:


This second video starts in the middle of the story, so that people who don't want to watch everything can at least watch some. We have more, but it takes about an hour to upload each one, so I'm only doing one a day. This one is the cutest though:

It's snowing!!

Or at least it was. It snowed enough for it to coat the ground for about half an hour, and then it melted. It was fun to watch though. We're hoping it will snow enough at least once while we're here so we can build a snowman.

We had a lot of fun in Aqaba. It was colder than we hoped, but not as cold as in Amman. We were still able to snorkel a bit the first day we were there, the second day it was really windy. It was nice just not having a schedule, although our every day life is pretty laidback anyway. And the food was great! Our last night there we went to a seafood restaurant. Jason had some decent fish and I ordered a calamari stew, and it was soooo good. It's probably the first thing I've eaten since becoming pregnant that I really enjoyed. The hotel also had a decent breakfast each morning, which was really nice. The only downside to our trip was coming home. Our bus ride back to Amman was not comfortable at all!

We want to see pictures of everyone's Christmas celebration! We had a very short one of our own; I'll try to put up pictures soon.

My belly popped!

Well, it didn't explode, but it's finally popped out enough that you can tell that I'm pregnant and not just thick around the middle. I didn't even realize this because since it's winter I've been wearing sweaters and such. Today I wore a tighter shirt and I could totally tell!



We've been having these very nasty looking bugs in our place. They seriously look dangerous, so I looked them up online. They are called house centipedes and look like this (about 2 inches long)->

Apparently they rarely bite and if they do it's like a bee sting. The sites I went on say they are very beneficial and not to kill them, but there is no way I'm letting those things stay in our house!! I don't care how beneficial they are, they are disgusting!! Whatsthatbug.com says they are the most common asked about bug, but I have never seen one before. Do they exist in Arizona? Has anyone else ever seen one?

In other news, Ellie is becoming my clone. She is such a little mother to all her toys. Today I saw her lick her finger and wipe off her baby's face! I didn't realize I did that so much! She is always giving her babies a "dider(diaper) change" and today she picked up something fragile and said "Don't touch that, gentle." Every time she goes into the kitchen she warns herself "hot, doooon't touch" while pointing to the stove. And whenever she thinks about climbing up on the table she says "Ellie be a good girl, noooo table" Whenever we get into a taxi now she starts saying "Yameen, shamel" Which means "right, left." I guess she's picked up on us giving directions to the driver. Maybe she can take over someday soon! :)

Packages!!

I picked up three packages at the post office today. Thanks grandparents!! Ellie is LOVING everything we received. She has all her clothes in a pile; it took a lot of talking to convince her that she didn't want to wear everything at once. So, she is only wearing: a shirt, tights, undies, pants, one of my new bras, a huge shirt of mine, and her new hot-pink tennies. I would say she is wearing at least 8 different shades of pink. She immediately introduced her new baby doll to her old one, and they are very good friends now (poor doggie has been abandoned). I am currently listening to a Christmas cd and eating goldfish crackers (yea!!).

I had quite an ordeal at the post office; including a lot of tears. I don't know if it was because I got three packages at once, but I was told that because the combined "worth" of the packages was $400, I had to pay 160JD to customs. That's over $220! I told him that was too much, so he said, ok, I'll reduce it to 75JD. I told the man that I couldn't pay that, so he sent me to the manager. I went to the manager, said I didn't have that money, but he just sent me to the cashier (maybe he thought I could pay with credit card?). So, I took the outside stairs, and stood there bawling for about 10 minutes. I was just so frustrated and discouraged after being so excited to get the packages. I'm sure the pregnancy hormones played a part as well! Finally, I was able to pull myself together (I thought) enough to go back to the manager and explain that I couldn't pay that much. As I started talking, I burst into tears again. I don't know if he took pity on me, or if he just wanted to get rid of me, but he asked "How much do you have?" I told him I had 50JD, and he said, ok, 41JD. So he led me somewhere else, and all the men in this room know me from picking up previous packages. They were all like, "Don't cry, what's wrong?" By this time I was kind of hyperventilating (mom knows how I cry!), but I was trying to stop. These guys were all so nice to me, and one of them found out that I live in the same neighborhood as him, so he said "Ok, 27JD." By this time, I was so embarrased to be dragged all over the post office crying. I ended up paying about $45 instead of the original $220. It was definitely worth getting all the fun stuff! I don't know what the rules are when sending packages, but if people could put a VERY LOW estimate on the worth, that would probably help. I know the estimates on these packages were right-on, because we receive a lot of nice things. I guess if this happens again, I'll just turn on the tears again :)

Christmas pictures

All is well

So, not much going on here. I'm still sick, Jason's still going to classes, and Ellie's still very cute. Jason's been playing basketball and soccer with some classmates after school on Thursdays, which is very fun for him. I've been doing pretty well at keeping my food down, but I don't eat very much. I can't wait until this part is done so I can eat like a pregnant woman!!

Ellie is very particular about how she does things now. She knows each routine and everything has to go exactly that way. For example, every morning she must have cereal with milk in a certain bowl with a certain spoon. She must push up her sleeves, wear her bib, and have baby and doggie "watch me eat." After the cereal is gone, I have to help her get all the milk. At night, when she goes to bed, she has to put on her "night-night jacket" (footie pajamas), get a drink, get a hug and kiss from me, have her doggie and binkies, and then Jason reads her a couple stories. She also makes her opinion well-known. Very often I'll be singing a little song under my breath and Ellie will say "Mommy, no sing." I didn't think I was that bad! But, she is still very sweet. Today I told her I couldn't do something because my tummy hurt and she looked at me for a second and then started kissing my tummy (that's what we do to all her owies). It was so cute!

One negative, one positive

So, today I've decided that if I say something negative, I should always follow it with something positive. A better way to look at things, if you will. For example:

- Ellie, you got paint all over the table, the plate, yourself, and my pants! Oh look, some ended up on the ornament, good job baby!

- Jason, our checking account is dying a slow death. Luckily, all our payments are directly taken out, so we don't have to watch!

- This "morning sickness" is leaving me with nothing to eat besides saltines, popcorn, and sometimes refried beans. But, I have finally lost those pesky 15 lbs. leftover from being pregnant with Ellie!

- We aren't able to be with family during the holidays, but people are sending us fun packages!!

It's December! :)

So, I don't know if people have heard or noticed the new ticker at the top of the page, but...we're expecting another baby! I'm due June 25th, and we'll be back in plenty of time to have the baby in Havasu. I found a doctor I really like here, and she has an ultrasound machine in her office, so I saw the tiny little heart flickering. I have been super-sick for about a month, but I've felt a little better the last couple days. I can't wait until I can eat more than orange juice and saltines! But, all this yuckiness will be worth it. Yea for more Tatums!!

Ellie and I have been working hard at decorating the house with Christmas crafts. When we're finished, I'll post a picture. We're painting, gluing, glittering, and even cutting. Ellie has some new plastic scissors, and she opens and closes them pretty well. She just can't quite get the paper in there by herself. But, we'll practice!

We've decided to travel down to the Red Sea for Christmas, Jason has a day off and we're making a long weekend out of it. It should be a lot of fun and relaxing, snorkeling and swimming at the beach. It's a four hour bus ride to the bottom of Jordan, so it's not too bad of a trip. So, even if we can't be with family, we should have some fun!

New best friends

Ellie has learned how to "smile" for the camara. That goofy grin isn't mine, right? It must be Jason's :) Ellie now does everything with her baby or her doggie. She sleeps with her doggie and sometimes brings him out to play. Her baby (which we took the voice box out of!) gets fed and gets drinks from Ellie. It's a little sad that she doesn't have human playmates yet, so she has to create her own. Hey, at least she has imagination!!

Our new favorite treat is popcorn that we make on the stove. Ellie loves the "noisy popcorn" and laughs as it pops. I don't butter it, so it is a healthy and fun snack.

On Thursday (tomorrow) the Fulbright office is having a Thanksgiving potluck. I can't wait to eat turkey!! It won't be the same as being with all of you, but at least we are able to celebrate (that means stuff ourselves)! We're going to start making Christmas decorations soon; Ellie and I went out yesterday to collect pinecones.

Stomach flu :(

Things are okay with us; Jason just got over the stomach flu. He was totally out of it for a couple days, but we're hoping that Ellie and I didn't catch it. If we don't have any symptoms yet, and he's been over it for a day, we shouldn't get it, right??? I really hope not; Ellie barfing is the worst. I hope Jason doesn't catch anything else from his classmates! It's kind of funny; Jason stayed home from school yesterday to recuperate, but it turned out that it was a holiday and there were no classes anyway. I'm trying to explain to him that now he can stay home today too since he was willing to miss a day, but he's not convinced. Oh well.

We had a major plumbing problem last week, a flood! Not just any flood, but a flood of sewer water. Some pipes or something were blocked and whenever we used a lot of water it would seep up out of the drain in the floor of our "laundry room." I'm not sure if I mentioned this, but we hadn't met our landlords yet because they've been out of the country. Well, they returned last week, and I guess their water is connected to ours, so when they used their water, our office completely flooded. Luckily they are really nice and took care of it right away, but I was left to clean up the disaster area. (Well, I left a little for Jason.) It was disgusting, but at least it shouldn't happen again.

I wasn't able to sign up for the next session of Arabic classes, so I guess I'll have to wait until January. Oh well, it saves us some money, and it's nice to be home at night.

Ellie loves to watch this (and I admit, I do too. I'm a little embarrassed)

Backstreet Boys singing with Elmo

Ellie coloring

"I wuv you"

Tonight after Ellie took her bath, she ran excitedly over to me (completely naked of course), hugged me really tight around the neck, and said very clearly "I wuv you!" Oh my gosh!! Jason and I just stared at each other, shocked. Of course, I got all teary eyed and was like "Did she just say I love you?" I am so surprised, this is definitely the first time she has said this, and usually I say to her "Mommy loves Ellie," not "I love you." We couldn't get her to say it again, but hopefully she will pleasantly surprise us again soon!

Squitos, squitos

Ramadan is over! We just finished out the holiday celebrated after Ramadan, it is kind of like their Christmas (giving gifts, seeing family, etc.) Jason had a break from school, but we decided not to go to Petra. Ellie's been kind of sick, and we just wanted to rest at home. We've been pretty creative in inventing games for us to play in the house. Ellie loves to hide from us (running away and hiding in a corner when we ask her to come) so we introduced her to the game of hide and seek. After having her hide with Jason the first time, we realized that she is too little to hide, so she was a seeker with one of us each time. It was really funny for us to hide in very obvious places and watch her find us.

It has been getting cold here!! The temperature drops pretty low at night and it's rained a couple of times recently. We are excited to see snow here, but also nervous about getting around town with the snow. Since the city is built over many extreme hills, I'm worried about cars slipping all over the road. We are hoping that the cold will kill the mosquitos that keep sneaking into our house. I routinely check Ellie's room and our bedroom before going to sleep each night; I must say I am a little obsessed with killing each little bloodsucker. Is it bad when your toddler walks around the house banging on things and slapping the walls saying "squitos, squitos?" I wonder where she picked that up :)

Small video of Ellie, cute, but trial run so not good quality

Video of nephew Bryson... so cute!

Posted By:Tara

Get this video and more at MySpace.com

Everyone see Ellie's little age chart on the top of the page?

The iftar (dinner with Fulbright people) was fun. None of the VIP's showed up, but it was good food and a night out without Ellie. There was a huge buffet including appetizers, main course, and dessert. It was nice to get dressed up and head out for the night. The best part is that Ellie loved being with Alex and Kendra. She didn't mind at all that we were gone! Ellie has started to call me "mom" a lot. I have no idea where it came from, except maybe from one of her books. Isn't she too young to be calling me "mom?" Every time she does, I repeat whatever she said with "mommy" instead of "mom." I don't want her to give up on "mommy" so soon! Pretty soon she'll be calling me "Kirsten."

My first session of Arabic classes are now over. We had to take an oral test last night to prove to the teacher if we are ready for the next level. I was surprised to realize that I knew every single word she tested me on. I guess all my practice with taxi drivers and Ellie's preschool teachers is paying off. The next session doesn't begin for a couple weeks, so I have a break for now. Jason also has a break soon, for 5 days or so, so we are thinking about going to visit Petra. This is an ancient city from 6th century B.C. created by Nabataean Arabs, a nomadic tribe. They carved many of their buildings into the surrounding sandstone, so they are supposed to be very beautiful. It is the number one tourist destination in Jordan, so we figured we better go while we are here! It will be nice to see something besides Amman.

The little chatterbox

Well, Ellie went back to school. And she seems to enjoy it more each day. She has gone three days so far, and the last day she was not upset at all when I came to pick her up. This was definitely a good decision, even though she already has a runny nose. Hopefully she will not catch anything too serious from the other kids. She has a new favorite word; it is "beautiful." Ellie walks around saying "Ellie bee-uful" all day, every once in a while throwing in "mommy bee-uful" or "picture bee-uful." The last time she was painting I said her picture was beautiful, and she grasped that word quickly. She has two other "word games" that she likes to play. One is pointing out who owns what around the house/taxi/street. It goes like this: "Mommy's chair" (point), "Daddy's chair" (point), "his seatbelt" (point to the taxi driver). She makes sure she has everything covered before she will stop. The other game is naming who she knows and saying whether they are a boy or a girl. "Mommy girl, Daddy boy, Ellie girl," etc. Then there is the occasional "Daddy girl...noooo, Daddy boy." As you can probably tell, she really likes to talk.

There are 9 days left of Ramadan. Tomorrow Jason and I are going to an "Iftar," which is the big party-type meal when they break their fast. This one is hosted by the Fulbright office and held at a really nice restaurant in town. Some very important people will be there, including His Royal Highness Prince Hassan bin Talal
and the American ambassador to Jordan. I am excited to be able to go and will let you all know what it is like.

School Days

The entire family goes to school now. Ellie started today at a nearby nursery. I dropped her off while I went grocery shopping, so it was a short trial visit. She went quite willingly, didn't care when I kissed her goodbye. However, once I returned she saw me and her little lower lip started to quiver and she burst into tears. They said she did cry while I was gone, but I'm sure that will get better with time. We'll see if she goes willingly tomorrow :) The school is within walking distance (about 20-25 minutes) but when I return home after picking her up, I will take a taxi because it is all uphill. Jason is good with the hills, but I have some trouble pushing Ellie's stroller up the steep ones. It is only 50 JD (about $75) a month for Ellie's school, which is extremely cheap. Even though she won't even be attending half of the time, it is still worth it for that price.

I have about one week left of my arabic classes, but the plan is to take the next level after that (and the next one after that). Jason was paid $50 today to take an arabic test from the US Department of Defense. All of the students in his classes who spoke English fluently were given this opportunity. There is the possibility of more tests in the future. They told him that the tests were trial Arabic placement exams, but I think they are looking for future employees! Wouldn't that be funny. I hope the government doesn't hunt me down for posting this :)

Update on packages

We have received a couple of letters so far (thanks Autumn!), and we have one package waiting for us at the parcel post office. I need to clarify the address for anyone planning on sending us a package.

No one in Amman gets regular mail sent to their house. Everyone has a post office box that they pick mail up at, and if they have a package they get a slip saying to go pick it up at the parcel office. Only places like UPS, FEDEX, etc. bring mail directly to houses. So, any mail through the regular post office needs to go to this address:

Jason and Kirsten Tatum
c/o Fulbright
PO Box 850215
Amman 11185, Jordan

Please put both of our names so either of us can pick it up. Thanks!

(be sure to read the posting under this one, it is new as well)

Friends!

Ellie and I have been looking at nurseries in our neighborhood, so that Ellie can make some friends. I've just gone in a couple and let Ellie play for a little bit; both times she did not want to leave! In the first one I put her down, she walked right over to some kids and started playing, and she didn't look back at me once. I could have left her and she wouldn't have cared! Thankfully they are extremely cheap here, no more than $100 a month, so hopefully we'll find a good one that Ellie can go to a couple of hours a day. She will love it!

The Thompsons came over today and played cards with Jason and I. It was so good to hang out with them! Ellie always talks about them ("nra" and "Alec") so she was excited to see them too. We played spades (which Jason and I won in a close race to the finish) and golf, which Kendra dominated.

I attempted my first baking trial, and it turned out well. Our gas oven only has two settings, heat on top or heat on bottom. You can't designate what temperature you want, so I was pretty skeptical about baking with it. But, I made some (healthy) oatmeal/date/banana cookies that tasted really good. They were so good that I doubled the recipe today to snack on while we played cards, and they are already gone! We have been eating a lot of dates here, since they are plentiful and not too expensive. They are one of Ellie's favorite snacks.

I will try to post more often; I have received hints to do so, or else people think something happened to us :) It's just hard to think of what to write when we don't really do too much!

One month down...

It's hard for us to believe we have been here for a month already. Only eight more to go :) We are enjoying our time here, but this is definitely not a permanent move! Although there are many American things here (we had Popeye's chicken for dinner last night), we miss being in America. We truly are lucky to have all that we do!

Our Arabic-learning is going well. Of course Jason already had it mostly down, but I am proud of my mini-conversations that I have with shopkeepers, taxi drivers, etc. And once in a while I can teach Jason a word that he doesn't know. I'm really enjoying getting to know my classmates as well. One girl in my class picks me up and takes me home, which is awesome, since I don't have to hunt down taxis and hope they know where my class meets. Jason has been taking the bus to his classes, which is very cheap and easy, but I am wary of taking the bus by myself (as a foreign woman), especially since my class is at night. Also, I have to leave for my class right when the fasting ends for the day, so the streets are almost completely empty. Everyone is eating! I wouldn't be able to find a taxi or bus if I wanted to.

We need to find Ellie some friends. I really think she is getting lonely and too attached to us. Last night she had trouble sleeping, so I had to sleep in her bed with her. Hopefully we can find some kids soon! She sees some once a week when we meet with some American friends, but it would be nice to find kids her age that she can play with. There's only so much painting and reading books with mommy and daddy that a toddler can take!

We started a water delivery service yesterday, and it is great! They deliver 19 liter bottles (like the 5 gallon ones) once a week. Jason drinks more water than anyone I have ever lived with (even Nichole!) so we were having to buy a ton of 1.5 liter bottles a week. It was getting too difficult to go to the store that often and lug them home, not to mention the empty bottles filling the dumps. This way is easier and actually cheaper, so it works out really well.