Adwoa und Ama

We made it back to Zw with no problems. The extra Christmas present bags were pretty easy to move, now that we have the second child backpack. Christmas was a lot of fun and we miss everyone. The New Year just rang in here. This is the only time of the year when it is legal to set off fireworks. At midnight it looked like the valley we live in was one big fireworks display. People were setting off their own fireworks everywhere. E slept through it. J was awake already in her crib crying. She got a lot of attention over the last week and now expects Grandma to show up and save her whenever she cries. She’s getting noticeably smarter by the day. She ate baby food at dinner and less than 15% of it ended up on her clothes. She will grab anything that interests her. Today she picked up my travel coffee mug and dropped it onto the floor. E taught me not to use regular coffee mugs at home a long time ago.

Bath time went smoothly and the girls enjoyed some nice hugs afterward, as you can see above. However, E already thinks that she can tell her younger sister what to do– bath time was full of various commands. E is also starting to have a big imagination. Yesterday on the plane, E informed Liz and me that she has an older brother. His name is John and he works at an animal store called “Santa”. Details began to get fuzzy after that. The Da Vinci Code was shown on the flight. It was ok. I thought the last 5 mins were the best part. I would have been disappointed if we had gone to a theater to see it. E watched her new Care Bears movie (thanks, Gina!) several times and then got a good night’s rest.

We are still trying to heat the house up. We had turned the furnace down while we were gone. My body doesn’t really know what time it is now. Between staying up late to watch Battlestar Galactica and getting up at 4-5 with E (”I’m awake Daddy”), I’m a bit low on rest. I fell asleep tonight while reading books to E. When I woke up and went downstairs, I found out that Liz had also fallen asleep after feeding J. Tomorrow should be a nice, slow day.

Here’s a fun little video of our (big) little girl.
She likes the whole process of getting ready for her bath and taking a bath.
Getting dressed afterward? She’s not so fond of that. But since it’s usually followed by a bottle, all is well.

As for fun bath prep, check it out for yourself here.

Did any of you hear this story on All Things Considered on Thursday (NPR)?
We did! When we are up late, our one English radio station plays All Things Considered (10 PM), I think live, at the same time it is played on the east coast.
Anyway… here’s a link to the Chimney Sweep story.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6660510

We had our annual mandatory chimney sweep inspection and he said that the furnace and dryer couldn’t be in the same (20′ x 12′) room… Hmmm… seems like the dryer has always been in that room…. But anyway, we are in the process of moving the dryer to another room in the basement, installing new ventilation, blah blah. Soooooo convenient to wash clothes in one room and dry them in another, no? Ah well. It was very funny to hear this story on the radio as we are dealing with this issue right now. In case you did hear it, we wanted to give you a little real-life anecdote to go with it.

No snow here. No snow in Chicago. Seems like Oregon, Washington, and Colorado have a monopoly on it these days…. I guess that’s an oligopoly then…? Word of the day. Use it twice and report back….