The Zone

I just realized I never posted this.  Here's a little peek into the end of our summer.


We live near the border and there are certain places you can only access with a special border zone pass. This year our family was able to get passes, unfortunately we haven't been able to use them like we thought.

A couple months ago Marvin went hunting for some good camping spots in the zone. Unfortunately he discovered you need a better vehicle to travel very far into the zone. Since the only one we know with this type of vehicle recently fell into this river with it, we were out of luck.

Marvin also discovered we have some pine forests in our area. The majority of our mountains are pretty rugged with lots of rock and cliffs, so this was a fun surprise.

He saw some paragliders.

Made it up to an old campsite.

Our backdoor is pretty spectacular.

You should visit!

Yo Ho Ho

Our little pirate was SO very excited about his birthday party, and so was I. I love planning parties and told Marvin I'd love to do it as a job but only with a staff who could make all my ideas happen. Since that will never happen, I'll just enjoy planning my little guys' parties.

Since you couldn't make it here's a peek into what we did and a few of the details.


We had a full house in our little apartment. We had a total of 14 adults, 5 school age children 8 preschoolers and 4 babies in our apartment this past Saturday, yep that's 31 people in our two bedroom apartment. Since we had a full place I knew we'd have to keep things organized and utilize the playground outside for some games. Thankfully the weather was nice enough to do so!

As people arrived we had several activities for the children to stay busy with.
Dress up. We printed out some pirate hats and I sewed some elastic to a felt pirate eye patch that was free for the taking.

Make your own "spotting scope" as Calvin likes to call them.

Creating a pirate flag.

Treasure hunting.
I made an I spy bag for Calvin recently which worked great for this, but I ended up making another one out of an empty soda bottle for the party. For this activity I gathered small toys (several from Calvin's beloved kinder eggs), and then photographed them. I then cut open a soda bottle added the toys and taped it together with some packing tape. Next I filled it with rice (if you want it more permanent add some super glue to the lid). I printed off the pictures and had the kids hunt for the buried treasure circling the ones they found.

There were some various pirate printable coloring pages, along with pirate word searches and mazes for the older kids available to do.

After all our guests arrived we ate.
We enjoyed "Pirate Joes", fruit and veggie swords, salad and goldfish.

Then it was time for the treasure hunt. Marvin made a map and they needed to collect all the keys to open the treasure chest. This was a BIG hit, and it turned out to be more of an Easter egg hunt rather than a following the map activity. But they LOVED it and were the most excited about this game.

All the kids loved their treasure. I made little drawstring bags, printed off some coloring pages on the internet and sewed a few together for a custom pirate coloring book, we added some sweets and stickers, and boom we had a fabulous treasure to give out.

Next we played cannon ball war. We used crumpled computer paper for our cannonballs and the two teams had to throw the cannon balls to the other side, the team with the most cannonballs on in their ship was sunk and had to walk the plank.

Lastly we played sword tag, we made a soft sword and they had to use it to tag everyone making them frozen. Calvin's very into freeze tag at the moment so it was fun to incorporate this into the party.

We brought the cake down, sang happy birthday to our little pirate and were able to pass out cupcakes to all our neighbors who were outside playing or sitting outside. These cupcake wrappers were the way to go they made it very easy to give to our neighbors. It was fun for Calvin's neighborhood friends to share in his special pirate birthday too. We were thankful that most all of them were out that night.

After cake we headed inside to open presents. Then we let the kids watch the pirates who don't do anything which gave the parents some time to chat.

Marvin decorated the cake, didn't he do an amazing job!

It was so much fun. Of course I didn't have time to make everything I had planned on making but it was sure fun to see what I did have time for come together.

If you're curious, I printed the banners and cupcake liners from here
I made my own invite via photoshop elements.
I used this basic template for the food labels and added some words in Picnic.


I'm so thankful for printables, especially since we live in a place with zero craft supplies but I did score some fun pirate napkins and candles locally, so I guess we can find some stuff here.

We wish you could have been here.
linking up to

WFMW

Why not?

Did you notice the dates?
I may be slightly crazy, but I'm having a blast planning parties for my birthday boys.
But due to a planned camping trip for the following weekend, we couldn't spread out the birthday love.
In fact we're celebrating Calvin's birthday on Marvin's birthday. I love that all my boys have birthday so close together.
Hooray, Birthday week is quickly approaching. I have so much to do!

Eleven

Micah's one month shy of a year, somebody please help me stop time! My baby is turning into a toddler. I'm going to savor this last month I have while Micah's still zero, in Calvin's words.

He's such a curious little guy, and he certainly keeps me on my toes. This past month he's figured out how to climb stairs and it's one of his favorite activities.


He's outsmarted our "gates" and figured out how to climb on top of our barriers. He can open the doors to our balcony if they aren't latched, and our trashcan has found a new home on top of our counter.

Micah's started to enjoy playing with cars, which his brother loves.


We get many more smiles out of him in our quiet home but is very stone faced around lots of people and out in public places. Since his brother started school he started jabbering up a storm, I guess he just needed a chance to talk.

He says Mama and some rendition of more. He'll sign please, more and all done. He also started waving bye-bye.


He has 6 teeth, with one more almost through the surface. I've given up on our little finger toothbrush and now use a regular brush with him. I love how he giggles as I brush his teeth and gums.

He's been very fussy this month with both a cold and new teeth coming in. He's spent lots of time in my arms and in the Ergo while I do housework. My squirmy guy loves snuggles throughout the day despite how active he is.


Sleeping has been challenging this month. He's been waking up often during the night. Many times not going back to sleep for several hours, with lots of crying which is the worst in the middle of the night. It's been an exhausting month; I'm ready for these teeth to make their debut.

Our bed is his favorite place to play, EVER. I love watching him smile as he crawls away. He loves lying in the pillows too, and then he'll come and tackle you with his kisses.


He's also started doing a little pouting. I'm sure I won't love it in a few months but right now it's pretty cute. When I take something away or tell him no, he puts on his pouty face and lays his head on the ground. He has a pretty tender heart and a simple no can bring tears of disappointment.

Our little chunker is now 23.4 lbs and is growing like a weed, he's currently is ##inches. I had to break out his 18 month clothes due to needing a few warmer options and some pjs that fit him better, I'm amazed at how well some of the things fit him.

My current favorite veggie

Growing up I don't ever remember a time where I actually ate eggplant. The first time I ever tasted this vegetable was at Olive Garden and it had me at hello. For some reason I just love this vegetable, maybe it's the intriguing purple color or the deep nutty flavor. I've had so many yummy Turkish eggplant dishes over the years, but haven't recreated them myself. So cooking with eggplant is new terrain. A month ago I discovered this amazing roasted vegetable dip/sauce. It's so delicious, and it's ridiculously easy.

Here's my take on my current obsession: (Warning, if you want a real recipe you might as well stop reading, this is a "throw this and that in" type of recipe. Sorry mom.)


You'll need a 9x13 pyrex, or something with decent sides.


Here it goes…

Roasted Veggie Dip/Sauce

Peel a few eggplants, I usually do about 3-4 medium ones.
Now cube the eggplant.
Wedge a few tomatoes(2-3),
Dice up a red bell pepper or two,
Add about 4-5 whole cloves of garlic,
And drizzle with olive oil.
**If you love spice why not add a cut up spicy pepper to the pan to give this some kick.

Stir the oil around your veggies
Pop it in the oven, let's say at 350 degrees.
After about 15 minutes give it a good stir.
Add some more olive oil if you feel it's dry.


Let it roast another 15 minutes in the oven.
If your eggplant is nice and soft it's done, if it's still hard roast it longer.


Toss all your delicious roasted veggies into a pot; add a little tomato paste (maybe ¼ c.) and using an immersion blender and blend away. You could also use your blender or food processor. Add salt to taste and enjoy.


It's great over bread, over pasta or rice. We even put it over the roast I made last week. I love it and hope you do too.

First Day

Ready to go.

Calvin was thrilled to go to Detsky Sad, preschool. We had been talking it up for weeks. He did really well, but it was so hard to leave him there. It's scary dropping your child off in a place where they don't understand what other people are saying. The only tears came from me, when we were in the car.

After wondering if we were doing the right thing, he came home and told me all about school and the first thing he said with much enthusiasm was, "Momma they read Kalabok." This is a story his nanny read to him every day she was here. It's his favorite. (It's a similar story to the gingerbread man only it's a little roll.) I felt like Father was showing me that it was going to be okay, and that he is taking care of my sweet Calvin.

This past week he's told me things I didn't even know he knew how to say. He's even added a few new sentences to his vocabulary. I am so proud of him. Learning a new language isn't easy, but he's doing great.

All dressed up in his school clothes.  The children change from their outside clothes to inside clothes.

His favorite thing to tell his teacher is, "I don't want to eat." I told him how to say it after his first day of school and when I was putting Micah down for nap I heard him make up a little song, singing it over and over again. So far he's only eaten bread and drank his compote (sort of a fruit juice drink) for lunch, but we'll get there. In the words of Marvin, "I mean they have soup for lunch every day, how often does he eat soup like that."

And he's off.

I think we're off to a good start and pretty soon he'll surpass his parent's language skills, not looking forward to that one, but I'm sure it will come just as quickly as preschool did.

Today

My heart is heavy for friends who have to make some hard decisions. Ones that I wish could be replaced by who is going to change the next diaper, or deciphering their newborn's cry.


I'm praying for them as they enter a road they never thought they would have to travel. Begging Father to be their everything.


 In the midst of this, Father has reminded me that today IS a gift. I'm cherishing my family today.


 I'm choosing to love them through the whines, cries, & sleepless nights.


 Because these days are precious.


I am blessed.


 Thank you little Noah for reminding me of that today.

Recently

Calvin's been adding a few more features to the people he's drawing. I think they look like little monkeys. Totally adorable. This one he even drew with "a lot, a lot of hair."

We've had more fall weather than end of summer weather recently. It's been nice, but strange at the same time. We seriously only had a couple weeks of hot weather this summer, don't hate us.


I've been doing lots of canning since it's been so cool. So far this year I've made strawberry jam, plum jam, blackberry jam, and canned 20 kilos of tomatoes. I'm hoping to get one more batch of tomatoes done and some applesauce this year and I might squeeze one more batch of plum jam in since I have one more box of sure jell left.



I've been obsessed with this jam. Oh good gravy, it's delicious. It's spectacular over waffles.

Marvin bought me a waffle maker for our anniversary. I may just be one of these strange women but I don't mind getting stuff like this as a gift. I've been wanting one for a while, but only wanted to buy one that you could remove the plates. I was so excited when I actually found one, but he beat me to the purchase. He's sweet like that.

Marvin went out on a bike ride with one of our teammates and he's been drooling over bikes during the evening. We had planned on purchasing one next year and he can't wait for next spring. Too bad they are so expensive here (well at least the ones he would love to buy).



I was at a little store that sells office supplies and snatched up some finger paints. Can you believe that I've NEVER done this with Calvin before? He was in heaven, but told me later he really likes to paint with brushes.

A new little playground opened up near our favorite park. It's amazing, like a real playground with the padded landings and everything. Unfortunately you have to pay to play there, $3.50/child, not bad but still not something we can do every day.

Our little Spiderman is the perfect height to explore our washing machine and he can open it without any problem. Which means anytime I have clothes in there he loves to help take them out. He also tends to pinch his fingers, a lot. So I found a child safety latch the other day that would work, and wouldn't you know that little bugger figured out how to open it, without batting an eye, in record time.



Micah caught his first cold. I'm thankful he's been a healthy little guy. I'm also thankful for this. Gross, I know but it works. (I still have to hold him down, but it's a MUCH faster process.)



What's been going on in your world?