DB, Jeni, EB, and Lorelai

Last year about this time, my friend Christie introduced me to the joys of pumpkin painting with babies!  Before that, I would never have considered letting EB paint because of the huge mess it would make, but Christie made it seem so easy and cleaned it up so swiftly that it made me see that art projects and painting are totally doable, and I needed to just get over the whole mess thing.

So, this year we decided to paint pumpkins again.  Of course, here there are no little baby pumpkins like in the States, so we painted big pumpkins and EB really enjoyed herself!  EB’s little friend Nicole came over to paint with her.  Nicole is only a few months younger than EB, and Nicole’s mother is one my closest friend in town – we meet every week to pray and the girls play together really well.

 Nicole was hilarious!  She did not want the paint to make her dirty – she got very upset when there was paint on her hand, and tried very hard to wipe it off.  EB just dived right in and covered herself, her pumpkins, and Nicole’s pumpkins with paint.  Both girls had fun, and now we have beautifully painted pumpkins for fall!  

She LOVES stuffed dogs – she has several of all sizes, they are all named “ruff ruff” or “dog” and no other stuffed animal is as dear to her as these are.  She might play with them for a while, give them a hug, or have tea with them, but when it comes down to it, she wants “Dog,” preferably what Jody fondly refers to as “Dog the greater,” or, when he is being washed, “Dog the lesser.” 

She likes to chew on her stuffed animal’s noses.

She asks for “shoes” when she wants to go outside. 

She says water and bread in Dari.

She loves to look at pictures, especially of family members and herself.

She is very independent.  She rarely wants to do anything if she has to be helped with it.

She LOVES to watch me put on makeup and wants very badly to put some on herself – sometimes I let her play with my make up brushes, but often I get them back wet 

She always laughs when she runs.

She sings a lot when she is playing by herself, eating, going to sleep, well, I guess doing anything

She likes to sit on the counter while I cook.

She likes ground beef, but doesn’t like chicken.

She often sucks the good part off of food – the juice from grapes, the topping off of toast, etc… and then spits the rest out.

Spaghetti is her favorite food, but requires a bath afterward 

Actually, she really loves French fries too, that may tie for favorite.

She can say some version of cookie, banana, water, juice, shoes, car, dog, cat, cow, too many animal sounds to list, book, bye bye, nite nite, please, more, milk, bath, mama, papa, jo-jo, Geka (for our friend Rebekah), doot doot (referring to her little people), turtle, and she says “Ah Ah” when she points to frogs or monkeys, ball,

She loves to prepare pretend food and eat it with mommy and papa or her animals.

She always wants the food or drink that someone else has, even if it is the same as what she has.

She likes to sing and dance with the theme song form Gilmore girls.

When she wants to be picked up she says “Baby.”

I am pretty sure she thinks her name is Baby – we say Baby interchangeably with EB and they sound a lot alike.

She always wants to be in the middle of anything DB is building or fixing – when DB was building shelves she got her toy hammer and hammered away on the wood.

Warning: long post but written especially for other moms or preschool teachers to read and give advice 

 EB is almost 20 months old, and I am trying to figure out how to structure her day better.  I have found some great resources online, but would love some input from some of you about what you did/are doing with your toddlers.  For those of you who are thinking that EB is just a baby and too young to learn anything, this is my answer to that:

 1.              Without guidance, EB wanders around the house and gets into trouble.  She is aimless, and not quite capable of deciding for herself what she wants to do.  She just gets into stuff!

2.              She is a little sponge – she repeats everything we say, she copies our actions, and she is learning learning learning!

3.              And, if the first two are not enough, remember that we live in a third world country behind a wall – EB is not exposed to a lot of the things that other children are exposed to, and does not have the interaction with other children or adults that most children have at this age.  I need to be more intentional than the average mom to make sure my child learns things and doesn’t fall behind developmentally, socially, and intellectually.

 I have found some great websites, like my friend Christie who does a Bible Story each week and builds lessons around that, and a preschool homeschool website with lesson plans, printouts, and fun activities.  (This is what we are currently doing, and it is going fairly well, just a bit above EB – maybe in a few months it will be more appropriate.  Plus, the books they recommend for each theme we don’t have, or access to some of the things to see in person, we don’t have the videos to show, the interenet to download videos to show.)  Also, another of my favorite blogs has a great example schedule to keep a toddler on.  (I am not providing links for security, but if you are interested in them, please let me know – I would love to share). 

 SO, in conclusion, I need to structure my child’s day and help her to develop (I am not talking long division here – age appropriate activities), and I still have two hours a day of language school, plus studying.  Any ideas?  Links to website that have helped you?  Books I could order to help?   

Yesterday morning after our leisurely breakfast, while Jody washed dishes, I heard a scream from the kitchen and went running – Jody had encountered a very bold, impudent mouse that ran right across her foot and down the stairs into the basement. As DB was gone, I immediately asked our gaurd to come in and search for the mouse to find and kill it. He then laughed and said that he had watched the mouse come inside the house from outside the day before! Some gaurd! He was unenthusiastic about the search (and would not even go inside our bedroom downstairs for cultural reasons). After asking him twice to return to the basement and not come back until he found the mouse, i finally gave up, realizing that he didn’t even cared the slightest about a mouse in my basement.  I called DB and told him about our tragedy and he too laughed.  He was playing snooker (what they call billiards here) with a bunch of business men, who thought it equally hilarious that I was so concerned about a mouse.  I guess in a place where people live in houses made of mud with no glass in their windows and only blankets covering their doorways, mice are not feared or hated as they are in America.  Never the less, DB came home with 2 mouse traps, and his friends from the Snooker Club brought by two more.  Strategically placed in prime mouse loving locations that EB could not get too, these vicious traps sat for less than two hours before our little brave house guest met his fate.  Sorry to my animal loving friends, but I have a deep seated horrification of all rodent like animals that goes back to when I was very young.  I happy to say that the little critter’s last meal was cheese and peanut butter – he probably never at better.

I have never quite experienced community like I did for two days in a village . 10 people rode with our family to a village two hours away to go to a mutual friends wedding. A car that comfortably fits 5 was bursting at the seems with 13 men, women, and children. Of course, once we arrived at the home of the bride’s family, we didn’t see the men again. The were whisked away to the men’s guest room and given tea and goodies while the women and children were escorted to a room for changing. After I put on my makeup, best jewelry, and fancy new sequin covered outfit the women looked at me and laughed – they couldn’t believe I would consider going to a wedding with so little make up on. After two more rounds of makeup I finally gave up – there is no way I could bring myself to put on the turquise shiny eyeshadow they pushed toward me.

After getting ready and seeing the bride’s new home (a building with three rooms and a bathroom – unheard of for a newly married couple – in a large yard with 5 other family members homes) we left for the wedding. 6 hours later when the ear busting music stopped and we went back to the brides new home for another party, my dari was already strained. The next four hours I just went wherever anyone took me – every woman in the family wanted me to drink tea in her guest room, every child in the family wanted to feel my white skin and pinch EB’s cheeks. Then, after dinner and several long, very personal conversations with different women, I was shuffled off to another room to sleep.  Somehow, this family understood that Db and I could not stay up all night dancing with everyone else (men and women seperate of course) and they gave us our own room as a family. We fell into bed and slept without interuption until 6 in the morning. The minute Db left the room to go find a bathroom, six women and 4 little girls crowded into the room to talk, as if they were standing outside the door waiting for just such an opening. Even after DB came back, they stayed and watched us get ready and tidy our stuff – it was the first time DB had ever seen Afghan women besides our teachers and house helper. This was a true indication of being accepted as family. The rest of the morning, he wasn’t shuffled off seperately, but even sat outside in the yard with the family patriarch to drink tea. We were definitely guests (no one let us cook or clean – food and tea magically appeared before us) but we were family too. DB and I both discussed many deep subjects with our friends, and I believe this excursion will lead to a true deepening of our relationships, and certainly contributed to some shapening of our dari skills!  It was a very difficult few days – lots of new experiences and flexibility required – but totally worth it!