theif!

Recently, Lydia has been yelling and screaming about a robber in our midst....a pacifier robber! Lo and behold, unaware (or perhaps fully aware), Lydia has been pulling out her own pacifier at the moment where she is juuuuust falling to sleep. Of course, this causes plenty of grief, and a lot of trips to her crib to help her out...sometimes successfully, and sometimes she will directly pull it out again, and scream for help, "Who stole my pacifier!!!" And yet, here she lays, with the aforementioned pacifier in her hand. Ha. Poor sweet little girl.

(Afternote:  this trend has happened so many times with 5 kids, and let me tell you, that is its own nightmare, seeking a lost pacifier in the middle of the night to the tune of a screaming baby.  You know what i mean?)

It all started around 9:30 am this morning. Knock knock knock. It's our neighbors with a bowl of pudding for us! We have been Zgougou-fied! (No, Lydia did not partake of the zgougou, but she was a good actor!) I thought that I know a lot about living in the Arab world, but this one is a new one for me...and it's called Zgougou. Apparently it is specific to the country we are living in, and although it might look like chocolate pudding, it is NOT. Think: nuts from a pine tree that are the base ingredient of the brown bottom layer, and cream and "orange blossom water" that make up the white middle layer, and finally all sorts of nuts, sprinkles, you name it on top. It's not too bad, although there is a definite importance in quality here. We got zgougou-ed twice today, one bowl was rich and creamy, and the other was watery and overwhelmed with "flower blossom water." Another funny aspect of this holiday...everyone makes the same zgougou, and then they all go around and give each other a bowl of zgougou...kind of lacking in variety, but maybe they all do what we did and compare...I can just see it now,"my mom's zougou is better than your mom's zgougou!"

bottle...

We are soon going on a fairly long trip, and I doubt there will be a place to nurse Lydia on the bus.

My local friends have said, "we would NEVER nurse in public!!" and have either suggested feeding Lydia with a bottle or just avoiding any long trips until she is past the nursing stage.

So we had a test run in the house here...Lydia has just woken up from a nap, happy and hungry. Just the way she should be.She snacked a bit on the bottle, and then decided that she would rather have the real thing, thank you very much. At one point, she smelled the "real milk" and grabbed for it and starting making sucking motions...so i snuck the bottle in her mouth and she hungrily started sucking....until she realized she was tricked!

The following video is not for the weak at heart. (Don't worry, she won and I fed her "the real thing" soon after.)

We're not done with a bottle yet, Lydia...and for now the score is: Lydia 1, Bottle 0.

a day in my life...

What is a typical day like out here? Well, I look outside off our rickety balcony and hope that the view is sunny....like this. If it's a sunny day, that means that Lydia and I can go out!
Next comes the crucial step of "bundling." This means that I put way too much clothes on Lydia and then top it off with way too many blankets...people here are a very worried about the destructive effects of the light breeze and the fresh spring air on a small baby. As you can see, Lydia is a bit worried about that too. But usually she is very very warm, which only contributes to making her fall asleep in her stroller as soon as we hit the road. We usually do a couple rounds in our park, let's just say it's not huge. There is usually at least a couple ladies who want to sneak a peek of our daughter in her stroller and exclaim over her blue eyes and give her a kiss...sometimes we will talk with them for a bit. Next, we have the challenge of finding a suitable place to sit. As you can see I have snuck a photo of a very common although in my mind very strange sight: Arab couples dating and even holding hands OR kissing! in the park. Usually I am out making the rounds with some friends who studied arabic with me, but this time we have Daniel as our specimen. For you cat lovers out there, this is a common sight when we're out and about. Street cats can tear one of those bags of garbage up on a second if they know there are some good leftovers inside. And then we get home, and hopefully the little girl of ours falls sounnnnnd asleep like thisThat is our exciting day. Oh yeah, throw in the sleep/eat/play/poop routine with Lydia and cooking, cleaning, visiting, helping with Arabic homework, etc...and then you have a real full day.

Mary-Hall's handiwork

Although I have to admit that Lydia still prefers gnawing on that little rubber duck, she seems to have a certain thing for birds... which is why i have hope that she will come to lovethis handmade (duck, pigeon, chicken?) from Mary-Hall... and with our freeeeezing apartment, the blanket is fantastic too! Here's my cheesiness for the day: You warm not only my heart but my baby too. Ha. Thanks, Mary-Hall, for the package!

Lydia is into something new, half squeal, half screech...but it sure is cute! (it's hard to capture, because she usually ends up getting mesmerized by the blinking of the camera when it's filming her...)

4 Months Old!

Congratulations Lydia, you just hit the 4 months mark!

Among her list of abilities now, she has added:

using her two hands to hold her favorite toy, her rubber ducky.

Rolling over! And starting to inch her way forward when she's on her stomach.

I'm not sure what she's aiming for, but Lydia is successfully making a bbbbbblllhhhhh sound, which usually is accompanied by a fountain of spit and bubbles.

Catching people's eyes as they go by, whether friends or strangers...and also finding people in a room. She's quick to find whoever just walked into the room.

learning how to sleep good and long at night...most of the time anyway.

She prefers to stand up instead of laying down....

Weight: 5.1 kilos / 11.3 pounds.
We love you Lydia!