Trip to Greece

Since we have been here a while we had to leave the country to get new visas. After some thought and research we decided to take a train to Greece. It was a long short trip, we left early Monday morning and returned around 9:30 Tuesday night. The train arrived at the city we spent the night around 5:30 at night and we headed back to Istanbul at 12:30 the next day.

Calvin was did great traveling, the motion of the train lulled him right to sleep. We aren't so sure that was a good thing as he did decided it was time to wake up around 4:00 in the morning. We decided he wanted his Dad to get to see a Greek sunrise! Thankfully Marvin did catch up on sleep on the train ride home. We were very thankful to have a cabin all to ourselves both ways, it was nice to be able to spread out and at least change his diaper without people staring at us. We did have a little wait at the border but there was a sweet man who made the smokers leave the non smoking waiting room and he turned up the heat for us. It made the wait much more pleasant.

We caught him in one of his few awake times on the train. It was crazy how much this kid loves motion because almost every time we would make a stop he would start stirring or wake up, only to go back to sleep as we started moving again.

Yes that's Calvin sleeping for the first time in his travel bed. We love how compact it folds up, and we were even able to pack his clothes in with the bed, talk about multi-functional.

Before we left we were unable to book a hotel online. The only ones with that option were out of our price range. We did find a list of hotels on a website so we knew there were plenty of other options but as we looked at the list one place intrigued us, Hotel Erika. We were surprised to find that it was just a block away from the train station and fit our budget, so we couldn't resist staying at Hotel Erika.

The small building in the middle of this photo is the train station seen from out balcony. It was so convenient.

We could also see the sea from our balcony, unfortunately it was cloudy and rainy so we didn't see the area in it's finest state.

A little square near the water. Overall we enjoyed our little trip and an added bonus was that we were able to enjoy a couple of great meals along the way.

Root-a-toot-toot

Calvin has become our source of entertainment now. For such a little guy he can sure produce some big sounds. I guess we will have to work on being a gentleman!

Our Sweet Baby Boy

I came into the living room today and this is what I found, a sweet sleeping baby boy. It certainly made my heart melt!

We also want to wish Calvin's Grandma S a Happy Birthday today! You are loved and in our thoughts today!

Bye Grandpa, Grandma & Aunt Natalie

We had such a good visit with my parents. It is hard to believe that their time here has come to a close. It seems like just yesterday they were thinking about coming to visit and now they are making their way home. Living so far from our family made this visit extra special and are so grateful that they were able to make the trip, even though we are a sad to see them leave. This is the hardest part about living overseas. Sure we miss a few tastes from America, but we would give it all up to have a few minutes with our family. We know the rest of our family would love a chance to squeeze him so we will do out best to keep the pictures coming. We will continue to tell Calvin all about his family and friends in the states and we will give him lots of kisses from all of you.

Calvin wanted us to tell his Aunt and Grandparents thanks for visiting him!

All tuckered out in Aunt Natalie's arms

Staring at Grandpa!

So cozy in Grandma's arms!

Who can resist dressing up a baby?

My mom picked up a cute little Halloween outfit for Calvin. Thankfully we snapped a few pictures of him in his outfit before he spit up all over himself and Grandpa. But don't worry we had a second Halloween outfit on hand thanks to my cousin. Here are a few pictures we took of him decked out for the holiday.

I love this picture. Calvin looks like he is showing everyone his hat.

He had these little pumpkin booties that were a bit on the big side, as you can tell in this picture. But since they went with his outfit we had to wear them, it was pretty cute.

Outfit #2

Christmas in October

Last night we celebrated Christmas together, we turned on some Christmas music made a little paper tree and boom it's Christmas in October. Marvin's mom made Calvin a stocking and it has a little history behind it. The fabric came from Marvin's kindergarten naptime mat. We love the fact that Marvin used it when he was little!

One of the highlights of the evening was when Marvin opened a gift from his mom, Pfernilssees. They are a staple snack during Christmas at Marvin's family. He was so excited, and they made a great breakfast this morning, yum!

Seeing the sights

Since my parents & sister made it all the way around the world, we thought they needed to see a few things while they are here. So far we have hit a few markets and seen a few historical sights with them. Calvin has been a trooper through all this sight seeing, he loves is baby bjorn and stroller so it makes taking him out with the family a lot easier. Surprisingly I have only gotten scolded a few times for having him out, well I think I was getting scolded a few older ladies scowled at me and shook their finger at me. Oh well it seems like they are having a good time. We will make the most of the last few days with them.

Close & Cozy

Thank You Marvin's family for the carrier. Calvin absolutely loves it, it puts him right to sleep. I highly recommend this little thing to anyone. It has been perfect for when we want to go out to crowded areas and it has been amazing when we have to use public transportation. I know it will see lots of miles.

Sweet Sounds

We love all the sleep sounds Calvin makes, so we thought we would share a few with you.

They're Here!

My parents and sister arrived Tuesday and we have enjoyed their company. Right now they are out checking out a little region close to our house. We took a little stroll down the the weekly market this morning and they enjoyed all the new sights and sounds. It has been a little rainy the past couple of days, but it is suppose to clear off tomorrow so we will be ready to hit the more tourist geared areas of town once the rain stops.

Grandpa got to hold Calvin first, but only because he made it to the door first. Grandma quickly swept him away as soon as she walked in. My sister has mananged to hold him a bit, but only because we place him in her arms.

Amazingly they made it here with all their suitcases and boxes still in tact. Last night we opened all of the baby things everyone sent. Let's just say our cup is overflowing right now. We appreciate everything everyone had taken the time to send. Calvin is certainly going to be warm and well dressed! It took over an hour to look through everything people had sent. We had a lot of fun looking through all the sweet clothes and we can't wait to read all the books.

This morning my mom helped me sort things into sizes. Here are a couple of pictures of the piles of clothes. We are certainly blessed. I hope to get some good pictures posted of Calvin with his Grandpa, Grandma & Aunt in the next few days.

I love my Stroller Great Grandma & Great Grandpa!

We tested it out yesterday and Calvin loves his new set of wheels, it put him right to sleep. It is the perfect width for maneuvering around the streets of Istanbul. We all want to thank his Great Grandpa & Grandma for such an amazing blessing!

Crazy Hats!

Shortly before we put Calvin to bed the other night we had fun trying on a few of his hats. The blue one was the one I made and the other was made by a pretty cool girl we know. We think he looks pretty cute, and provided a bit of entertainment for us

First Real Bath

Calvin's cord fell off last Friday which meant we could officially give him a real bath. It wasn't that pleasant, but we think we had the water a bit too cool for his tastes because the other night we had it a bit warmer and he was pretty content. We are continuing to catch on to his likes and dislikes.

Hi Grandpa & Grandma!

First trip to Europe

We had to make the long trip to the US Consulate yesterday. Marvin was able to find out that there was a fast ferry which could take us to within a 5 minute taxi ride from the boat docks, which left at 8:00 am. It was truly the fasted way to get there, unfortunately there wasn't a boat coming back to Asia at the time we needed so we had to take a taxi to a different boat dock.

We had planned out what time we needed to wake up, feed him, and leave the house but that didn't go as planned as we both slept through the alarm. Thankfully Calvin knew we had places to go and woke us up a little later than we wanted, but it all worked out.

Everything went very smoothly and Calvin nestled right in my arms the entire time. We were able to walk to a shopping center down the hill from the Consulate, sit down in a little cafe and feed him before we headed back home.

Our first excursion out took 6 hours, he was such a trooper through it all. We also were very thankful that we were able to get a document that we needed to apply for our visas yesterday. We weren't sure if they would let us do it since he didn't have his passport, but after asking they said it was okay. PTL we are so thankful we don't have to make that trip again.

Mr. Bright Eyes...well sort of

We needed to apply for Calvin's passport as soon as we could, but first we needed a picture with his eyes opened. We had the camera ready and a white sheet in place at all times and thankfully Monday we finally got a picture that fit all the right dimensions, so Tuesday we were able to head to the Consulate and apply for his passport. They said it would take 10 days or so before he recieved it, but we have heard it takes around a week. This is the first of many steps we must take before we head home!

Sleepy Boy

We were hoping to go to the consulate today to apply for his passport but unfortunatley the best picture we had taken with his eyes open didn't quite meet the guidelines. So we had to wait until he opened them today to get a new picture, this was harder than you think. It looks like we have a big trip ahead of us tomorrow, Calvin will have his first ferry ride and his first trip to Europe! We are still new at this so we hope everything goes smoothly.

His Name

Many people have asked about his name so I thought I would explain it here. Calvin is a the name of a dear friend of Marvin's family, who essentially has been a grandparent figure in Marvin's life. He was married later in life to a sweet woman and they never had any children and Marvin family welcomed them into their family. Over the years Marvin has watched this man display amazing faith and dependency on Father. He has committed his life to serving him and has filled his heart with the Word. To this day it is the most beautiful thing hearing him quote huge pieces from the Word. We hope that one day our son will grow up to be an example of a faithful servant like our dear friend Calvin.

Jacob of course was chosen from the OT and his story has touched my heart this last year. We hope that someday our Calvin Jacob displays some of the same character traits of both these men of faith.

Sponge Bath Time

Calvin certainly does not enjoy being naked and let us know as we attempted to give him his first sponge bath at home. Here are a few shots of the festivities! Last night went much better as Marvin suggested that I hold him while Marvin washed him, he didn't pitch quite the fit, but he certainly didn't enjoy it.

He has Stolen our Hearts

We have been blown away at how this little tiny baby can just capture our hearts. It truly is a blessing to get to hear all of his squeaks and little noises. We have enjoyed getting to know him these first couple of days after his birth. He still remains pretty tired most of the time and we have had to set an alarm at night to wake him up to eat, I am sure this won't last long. Last night he woke up 2 times right around the time the alarm went off, but it still took a while for him to wake up enough to eat!

We have also decided he is our little koala bear. He certainly is a snuggler and will curl right up on your chest and tuck his little legs ups and grab on with his arms. It's pretty sweet and both of us have enjoyed our cuddle time with him.

The first picture I posted is of Calvin getting ready for his first outing to the hospital. We wrapped him up in a blanket, caught a taxi and we were off to the hospital. The end of Ramadan was Friday and it is a big holiday here, so Saturday everything was dead. The hospital was down to only essential personnel, so it made it a bit tricky making an appointment for next week, but we were blessed to run into a pro basketball player from America who was at the hospital with her translator and they helped us communicate. He is good to us.

His doctor's exam went well. He has a bit of yellow tinge in his face, this is not found on the rest of his body and the test results came back negative for jaundice. He dropped down to 6lb. 6oz. which the doctor said was normal. We were reassured talking to her about how he was doing and had a great chance to ask her a few questions. We are very thankful to have such great medical care here. We go back again on Thursday and hope to find out the results of some test in a week.

Home from the hospital

Less than 24 hours after he was born we were released to go "home". We were very thankful to be able to be dismissed so quickly, which means he is a healthy baby boy. We do have a follow up appointment for Saturday morning to check and make sure he is still doing well. He will have a couple of tests to see if they can figure out the cause of the extra amniotic fluid. We will keep you posted on any news.

We are enjoying our son, Wednesday Marvin was beaming after he was born and he made this comment: "I haven't smiled this much since the day we were married." He was a great coach and I couldn't have make it through labor and delivery without him. The whole process went incredibly fast, my doctor's husband's grandfather died and she needed to leave on Thursday to be with his family. So she called and asked me to come into the hospital to induce labor on Wednesday. She knew I would deliver any day, and honestly I think I we would have had him that day or the next without inducing. So here is the timeline of what happened

• We arrived at the hospital I was almost 4 cm, 9:00 a.m.
• 11:00 they started a slow pitocin drip.
• At 3:00 I was at 6 and still not experiencing too much pain.
• 3:30 my doctor broke my water and the game began.
• After this time escaped us and labor went quickly. When the doctor asked if I wanted any pain medication I was almost to 8 cm, so I got a shot of something, but honestly it made me pretty sick, I don't know if it helped a single bit?
• Finally at 5:40 He was born!

I am mending right now, as I tore pretty severely, but overall am doing great. We are all adjusting to each other and learning as we go. He is a pretty heavy sleeper and the hardest thing so far is waking him up to eat! He enjoys his sleep that is for sure. Here are a few pictures of the little man how has captured our hearts! Thanks for sharing in this experience with us, we have enjoyed all of your e-mails, we are certainly blessed!

Our first family photo!

At home this morning shortly after he has eaten, we love his little hand positions.

Trying to wake up to eat at the hospital

With Dr. Deniz our amazing doctor!

Where are we?

Well Marvin and I have been finding little parks to sit in and enjoy the beautiful weather here. I took along some language material to study and quickly found out that flash cards are a bad idea when it is windy. Marvin was great at helping me run after the ones that had escapes my reach. But the weirdest thing happened when we were going home. We actually stood in a line and waited for the bus to take us home. We were shocked to see that people waited for their turn. After living in a place where it is survival of the pushiest it was certainly a beautiful sight.

Hat

I decided since my blanket didn't turn out so great that maybe I could try to make a circular pot holder and it turned into a hat! How funny! I think I am much better at making hats than blankets.

Freedom...well sort of

My doctor gave me a bit more freedom this week and told me since we were past the critical period, I could be a little more active, and the best part is no more bed rest! I cannot tell you how excited I was to hear this news. We even went to the mall that same day to celebrate, we left around 4:00 and didn't get home until 8:00. Marvin even let me wander for a while, something that he doesn't enjoy at all.

Yesterday we went on a picnic at a little undeveloped area with some trees, near our apartment. It was a beautiful day and perfect for eating outdoors. We spent some time studying in this change of scenery before we headed home.

Each day it has been fun to get out of the house for a little bit. Freedom is something to certainly celebrate. Now all we have to do is wait for the contractions to get a bit stronger. We can't wait to meet our Little Guy.

Night on the Town

Wednesday we decided to take in a movie in the "outside world". It worked out great as the taxi dropped us off right at the mall door near the elevator and we only had a short walk before we got to the theatre. (The beautiful thing about most movies here are that they are in the original language and have subtitles which means we can actually see a movie in English, what a treat.)

We were at the counter buying our tickets and the man didn't speak English so he gave us a pamphlet that had a listing with a picture of all the movies currently showing. We wanted to see the movie Becoming Jane so the first movie I saw that had a picture of a man and a woman I assumed was the correct movie, however it was showing at a different time than what it said online, but not thinking anything of it we purchased the tickets and decided we had time to eat dinner before the movie, so off to the food courts we went. As I sat down looking at the pamphlet I noticed I had pointed to the wrong movie, and Marvin was already ordering our food, oops. As soon as he came back I told him my error and since we only had 5 minutes to eat before the first showing it meant we would have to wait 2 1/2 hours before the next showing started!

After we slowly enjoyed our meal, we made our way down to Starbucks. We have to laugh every time we go to Starbucks because Marvin's name is very odd to the Turkish and they never know how to say it and of course at Starbucks they write your name on your cup. Most of the time they just hand Marvin the cup and pen and have him write it, but if they don't most of the time it turns out to be some version of Marwin! (It just makes us chuckle.)

It turned out to be a great evening and it was nice to have a break from the house. We thought the movie was great and we enjoyed squeezing in a movie before we enter the world of parenthood.

Things that Make me go HMMM?

1. Braclets? For some reason I feel a little unbalanced when I wear one. I guess I don't understand the point.

2. How terrible I am at crocheting. I finished a baby blanket that I have been working on while on bed rest. It turned out to be quite a project due to the fact that I tend to get smaller each row, which leads to lots of ripping out of stitches. I decided to call this type of crocheting using the "rustic" stitch. What do you think?

3. What I should do today? My doctor continued the bed rest, minus medication and it has been hard to find things to keep me busy.

4. How many watermelons can you stack on each other before the bottom one crushes or breaks? My guess is 50. (Do any of our engineering friends want to help us out with this one?)

5. How easily we forget how things taste. We recently found sliced cheddar cheese in Istanbul but I can't even remember what cheddar cheese tastes like. I also forgot how amazing peaches and grapes are. We buy fruit by the seasons where we live, so it will be another year before we taste the sweetness of a watermelon. I guess it is something to look forward to.

6. How pain is always so much worse when it wakes you up in the middle of the night. It seems like there is nothing worse than a leg cramp in the middle of the night, and then I started to think how labor would be quite the shock. This led me to wonder when our little guy would get the labor process going?

Week 33

Well we have less than a week to go before I am taking off medication. I am really surprised we made it this far. My doctor feels like things will progress rapidly after we stop medication due to the fact that I am continuing to dilate on bed rest. Monday she felt like he would come in the next two weeks and told me to take it very easy this week. I am experiencing some similar feelings like I did before I went into labor the first time, hopefully he can hold off until Monday. My doctor is going to be in Italy Thrusday through Sunday, but don't worry another doctor has been briefed about my situation just in case. So ready of not here he comes! We will keep you posted if anything new develops.

Isn't this Amazing

This is a picture of a picture of the 4D ultra sound we had done while I was in the hospital. Sorry it is a bit fuzzy but I think you can see the picture. It's amazing what they can do now. We can't wait to be able to hold and love on this little guy.

Nesting

Well since we have been here I have had this strange desire to straighten the books in the bookshelves and yesterday I finally did it. Can you tell which ones I was able to reach? I figured Marvin wouldn't be too happy if I attempted the top shelf. The beautiful thing is I was able to do most of it sitting down. I only had to stand up to straighten the second to the top shelf. We hope that this little bout of nesting doesn't predict out little guy is coming this week, he still needs to hold on one more week. It's such great news to think we made it to week 33! PTL!

My Big Ideas

Marvin loves it when I start a sentence with, "I have a really good idea" or "You know what I was thinking?" or "I was thinking it would be good to....."

Usually these sentences require some work on Marvin's part, most of the time more than I orginally thought they would take. I am a very big picture thinking, so I often forget about the details, so usually my great ideas often involve a lot more work than I orginally anticipated.

So knowing this about me, you can imagine what Marvin was thinking when I said, "I have a really good idea, but I need your help." This time my great idea was to freeze a few meals so that we wouldn't have to cook once the baby comes, but since I can only stand for 10 minute stretches cooking is pretty much off limits, thus I needed the help of my amazing husband.

I broke up the cooking in two different days, and tried to help with as much as I could do, but the first day Marvin ended up cooking all afternoon. The second day went a lot smoother, but Marvin was very glad that it was finished. Right now our freezer is stuffed with a wide selection of meals, calzones to soup, thanks to a guy who humors my great ideas.

The excitement of our lives

Well Marvin bought me a curling iron!!! I am so so excited to have something other than lion hair! He even stood in line for 30 minutes waiting to buy it. Apparently the store he bought it at was having a huge clothing sale and Marvin was one of the only men in line. He felt a bit out of place, but I certainly appreciate his time getting one for me. My curling iron broke before we left Nineveh and we thought we would just pick one up here. What we didn't know is that they are all so expensive, thankfully Marvin found one that was on sale. This has rocked my little world the last couple of days, and was a big pick me up.

Marvin has been talking about the start of college football all week. It is so fun to watch how excited he gets, it's like he is a kid waiting for Christmas.

Bed Rest

Bed Rest....well I'm not going too crazy yet, but I am counting down the days till my next outing, a doctor's appointment on Monday. In the times when I long to do something other than stare at the walls of the rooms that have become too familiar I remind myself of the task ahead. Keep our little guy put for the time being. It has been a pretty uneventful week, PTL. The doctor lowered my medication to 4 times a day instead of 6 and the last couple of hours before I take a new pill I have a few stronger contractions, but I am starting not even to notice them. I am not sure if that is a good or bad thing.

I have really enjoyed my time in the good book and feel fortunate to have this time to dig deeper and spend more time with our Father. I know moms of young children don't have the luxury of these lengthy times. I know I will look back on this time and feel so thankful for the things he taught me.

I knew it would be hard having others do things that I am used to doing such as cooking and cleaning. I have really been shown how prideful and stubborn I am through this whole ordeal. A few days into bed rest I was wrestling with this issue and I decided I was going to watch a DVD on our computer but I had to bring the computer into our room. I noticed Marvin had fallen asleep and instead of waking him I remember there was a card table that I could slide it to our room with ease. I opened it up in our room but then thought a better place for it would be near the outlet so I raised it up and pop, I nailed the light. Of course the shattering glass woke Marvin up and he wasn't too happy that I decided to set up my own "entertainment center" without his help. But he caringly told me "you have to let me do things for you." These words stuck to my heart.

As I sat there crying, it reminded me of the sin in my life and how so many times I try to do so much on my own. Now as I look at the empty light it has become an Ebenezer. My own "stone of hope", reminding me that I can't do it on my own, it's okay to cry out to Father with my fears and struggles regardless of how little they might seem to me and it has been a constant reminder of the strength only He can provide.