Today I Baked

Today I baked.

From scratch!



Perty, huh?

Yeah, I thought so too.

Baking from scratch is literally just about an everyday thing for me in Africa. Want burittos? No packaged tortillas. I mix, roll and dry fry my own. Want pizza? No packets. I make my own crust. Want muffins? No box mixes my friends. All from scratch. Want cake? Break out the cookbook. No funfetti folks.

I could go on and on.

And on.

And on.

But I think you get the idea.

However, for some reason baking from scratch is not really a part of my life in this country. At least not when we're here 'temporarily' (what does that mean, exactly, at this point?!... still waiting on visas. Boo.)

Aaaanyway...

It's Lemon Meringue, if you care, and I'm about to go eat it now.

Showering Baby Braxton

About a month ago Baby Braxton got to be the guest of honor at his own shower! Usually these things happen when the babe is still in the belly, but this shower was different and that meant I could be a part of it!



These four sisters (don't they look beautiful?!) threw the party. But I wanted to help too. So they agreed. Yay for me!

My gig was the decorations! Perfect!

Wanna see?

No?

Too bad!



I made approximately 25 yards of cute baby bunting. It was so simple and makes such a great impact in the room. And can I just take a moment and state for the record that I made bunting for my boy's nursery four years ago before EVERYONE and their sister was making it? In fact I could hardly find directions online cause no one was doing it yet. But I persevered and have been enjoying the fruits of my bunting (?) for four years and now I can call myself a trend-setter. Ha!

Well, maybe I could be a trend-setter if anyone knew about me or cared what I did. So maybe I won't ever be a trend-setter, but I do feel happy that I saw the potential in bunting before the rest of the (female North American) population did.

K, I'm stepping back on track now.

The decorations!!



Table displays were squares and rectangles of the same fabrics, combined with vintage white lace trimmed napkins, white doilies and Ball jars (thanks cousin Lori!) with tea lights, twine and more strips of fabric.

Easy peazy.



The jars were my fav.



Can you tell?



So sweet. Wait, um... I mean handsome?! It was a shower for a boy and this isn't very boy-ish. But the shower was attended entirely by females (and one other cute little male cuz) so how's a girl to decorate?



Lori also did the cupcakes. She's pretty much a cupcake master. And they tasted amazing. I asked her "How do ya make 'em taste so good?" and she said "Butter." And I thought "Duh."

Then I asked for another.

Ha!

Actually I'm not sure if I actually did ask for another. But if I didn't, I totally regret it now.



Baby Braxton got introduced to many ladies for the first time, including Great Grandma.



The sole game was "Mold a Baby". I made some playdough, gave a handful to each woman and told them to "Mold a baby." (The game is pretty straight-forward, I know.) I think it was a great game cause it gave us all something to do with our hands while we visited. It was also a great game because no one had to stand up and sing a solo or get wrapped in TP or re-enact their birth experiences on top of the table.

Oh my.

What a terrible thought.

An awful thought.

That awful idea is not a real shower game (at least I HOPE it's not), but I admit my awful-shower game brainstorming session got a bit carried away...

Pretend I never mentioned it.



The molding results were impressive! Including this cute little guy sleeping soundly on his belly.



And this baby? Maybe this is a re-enactment of the birth? Not sure.



And there are these two. Possibly worthy of a participation ribbon? I appreciate the effort.



This happy little fellow was the winner. Blue ribbon baby!



I totally see the resemblance.



Present time!!



Go ahead... say it with me...



"Aaaaawwwwwwwwwwwwww"...

The Results Are In...

...and the conclusion is that this baby in my sister's belly



pictured here getting a big smooch-aroo from his/her big brother...

...doesn't have to be called him/her anymore because she's a SHE.

She's a GIRL!! The baby is a girl!!

I am gonna have a niece!! And I'm a little excited about it, in case the large number of exclamation points didn't clue you in on that.

Now, I don't usually get any sort of hunch for these things. I don't usually pretend to have any clue what type of human being is growing inside another human being. But when my sister was still nauseated at sixteen weeks and still puking at eighteen weeks (so sorry sis) I had a pretty good feeling that this was going to be a different sort of gender than her womb previously produced. Ha!

And I was right! I was so right.



It's a girl. Waaahoooo!!!



And she has sweet "teensy bitsy" (as my boy says) little girlie feet too...

What Is It?

What is it about little people in big people sunglasses?



I dunno.

But I like it.

Big Ol' Stack

The other day after I cried and tucked I went to the library. It's like therapy. And it's also a really good way to be glad you didn't leave the country cause we sure ain't go nothing like a big public library where I live in Africa...

The past month has been too busy visiting peeps and making preparations to leave that there was no time to go to the library, check out books and then actually find the time to enjoy them.

But since we're delayed... there's time for the library! Hallejuiah and Amen!

Before I went, I asked H what he'd like me to get for him. He said he'd like "Olivia", "aminal books" and "cars books". I managed the first two but I failed on the cars books cause I thought he meant Disney Carz specifically (since Grandma and Grandpa were taking him to that very movie that afternoon) but when I came home without any cars books he informed silly Mommy that he didn't mean Carz books... but just books about cars in general.

Oops. Mommy will do better next time.

Aaaanyway I went, browsed most of the aisles just cause I could, chose lots of titles, picked up the items that I had already put hold and then stumbled out to the car barely managed to carry my stack. Oh yes, it also included some DVDs.



Um. Yeah. It's a huge stack. But it's free! And I sure don't take it for granted... I'm so thankful!

I'd like to announce that I've already skimmed/read four of the books I got for myself during kiddos sleep times. And I'll also announce that getting my boy new books to 'read' is WONDERFUL because he'll sit and look at them for a really long time. Then his Daddy will read them to him and then the next day he'll sit down and read the book to me word for word and I get really weirded out that he can remember so much stuff and maybe I should watch what I say more cause I'm sure stuff is gonna start coming back to bite me in the butt any day now. The kid has a mind like a steel trap. Scary.

Whew! Please don't dissect that sentence up there for grammatical correctness. It wouldn't be healthy.

AND I'll announce that this new bundling thing (well, new to me at least) that they are doing at the library is great. Cause instead of browsing all the books on the shelf to separate the mediocre kids books from the super cute/clever/award winning kids books... I just grabbed the bundle of ten that had the "Staff Favorites" tag on it and added it to my super huge stack piled up on the floor. I figure if the staff likes them so will we! I could have chosen other bundles like "colors", "food", "weather", etc if I wanted him to learn more about those topics. Genius idea!

I do believe we'll be back to the library soon!

Now please excuse me, I've got some reading to do.

Stolen Photo

I have been sorting and filing photos recently.

Lots of and lots of of photos.

And I recently stole some photos from others. As in I stole some pictures of Baby Braxton.

There is one photo that I must post here because I love love LOVE this photo.



What doting parents he has!... you can literally see them in his eyes!

He will grow up, look at this picture and know how loved he was, even in his first days.

Tuck and Roll

We got some news this morning and it's not good. Our entry to our home country has to be postponed for longer than we had hoped.

We knew that visa issues were part of the deal when we obediently moved to Northern Africa five years ago. And we've really had a good amount of troubles in that area.

We had planned and prayed that my boy H would be back on Sunday in time to start nursery at his new school along with the other students. I, too, had hoped for my sake to arrive on time so that I could 'start' along with the other parents. I want to know the other Moms, I want to be in this with them and their little three years olds too.

But our plans aren't His plans.

We're here - it looks like - in Ohio, for a few more weeks. And that's fine. We've got a great setup here. We've got our own apartment. We've got a car to drive. We've got friends to visit. We've got the library to use, pools to swim in and playgrounds to explore.

But really, I just wanted to go home.

So I sit here this morning alone (look it up in the dictionary if you're a Mom like me and often forget the meaning of the word 'alone') in our apartment. Hillsong is playing and I'm praying and I'm writing and I'm crying.

I'm trying to wrap my arms around myself and draw my knees to my chest. I'm trying to tuck so that the rolling won't hurt. Or maybe I'm trying to release from my own efforts and just allow God to gently prepare me for the roll. Once I get all folded and adjusted the rolling will be easier.

This ride is not unfamiliar to me. But it's still not always easy. I've just got to let the idea sink in and get myself all tucked up and ready first.

Learning how to thrive in the 'in-between' is one of the most challenging things we've been faced with in recent years. Do I settle in for a one week? Two weeks? Two months? Longer?

There is no way to know.

But I'm tucking. I surrender.

Jesus, thank you for your grace that tucks me up and paves the unknown path we're rolling. I trust you.