A party just for me...

OK, it was a combined bbq party to celebrate my coming to live with Mommy, AND Uncle Topher coming to live with us. But....it felt like a party for me. Oh, except that we did sing Happy Birthday to Uncle Topher (he turned 18 a few weeks ago and its a big birthday).

Lots of Mommy's friends came and lots of mine as well. The adults ate and the kids played. The men seemed to congregate around the bbq and they cooked meat. There were veggie cheese and meat kabobs. There were also salads and lots of finger food that everyone kept eating. And, there was apple and pumpkin pie and a birthday cake for Uncle Topher.

All is all we had great fun. It rained a little, but that didn't stop people, they just came up on the veranda and into the house and kept going. I got some cool stuff too....like some new PJs....and a new fun book, and some shark toys to go in the bathtub with and some other stuff. And, everyone was so nice to me. I could get used to that. Mommy says it's good its not an occasion that happens often or I might get really spoiled. But....it was nice to have so many people paying so much attention to me for just one night. I felt very special. Nus made me laugh when she tickled me, and I had fun telling everyone, "bye bye". Auntie Alex gave me lots of bites....I ate some salad and I REALLY liked it and wanted more. I also ate some cous cous and some bean dip and some grilled tomatoes and some strawberries. Oh, what fun.

Oh, and did I tell you that my friends came as well. Ella and Aiden and Elias, and (another little boys who's name will be filled in when Mommy's migraine goes away and she can think again) were all playing in my living room and we all had a really really fun time.

But, now we are all tuckered out. And, it is definitely snooze time. I guess I'll wake up tomorrow and it will all go back to normal....no doting on me huh? oh well....it was sure fun while it lasted.

play group

Mommy took me to play group today with lots of kids in the expat community here in Arusha. I was a little overwhelmed, and stayed next to Mommy for a good portion of it. She kept trying to get me to go with the kids and play, but I was a bit unsure and tentative. I just wanted to make sure I could see my Mommy at all times. Mommy was sympathetic, but on the other hand, I think she wants to make sure that I'm not getting too clingy and reliant on her. It is important for me to be able to play with the kids. There was one boy who just kept wanting to hit me. He would see me from far away and come running up and hit me. Mommy said she was proud of me though. I was very gentle with all the kids and just touched them with my fingers if I wanted to be friends. Near the end, I managed to befriend Gabriel (the hitter) when Mommy spent some time with both of us and we were able to be gentle with each other and be friends. I think it will be ok now....Mommy just should have spent time introducing us to each other first thing. Also, I never hit Gabriel back...and I cried a little when he hit me, but I also learned to just push him away when he hit me, but to not hit back. Mommy was very proud of how I handled myself.

Tomorrow is a big day as we are hosting a bbq for friends at our house. Mommy looks really tired by this week (I think that there were problems at her job in Holland and so she was working in Arusha, working for Holland, being a single Mom and dealing with a teenage nephew as well as running the staff at the house...all by herself this week....and we have a bbq tomorrow). I think she needs a good nights sleep in order to make it through tomorrow. So, I've decided to be a lovely little boy and go down to sleep easy peasy tonight.

Sleep well.....

playdate with Aiden

Today at lunch, Mommy and I went to Aiden, Kyle and Linda's house for some good food and some fun! There were lots of fun toys there and it was really fun to see Aiden. He likes to hug...a LOT. It made me kinda overwhelmed sometimes...and I got a bit scared. But, that's just because he gives great big bear hugs. He's a lot of fun too...and I think when we get a bit older we'll just have so much fun together. Aiden is almost walking (he takes a few steps here and there) and once he's up and going....well, before you know it we'll be on the soccer team together! (or maybe football....Aiden's Mommy, Linda kept telling him to stop tackling me....I think that's some sort of football term).

Thanks to Linda, Kyle and Aiden for having us over for the yummy lunch and fun times. Next time, we'll host....right Mommy?

I'm all grown up!

I'm wearing grown up shoes (ok...ok, so they're Mommy's shoes and it may be a bit weird that I'm dressing in woman's shoes, but still....I'm WALKING in grown up shoes!)

Just taking a break on the couch, having a drink after a hard days work (Ok, so actually its Twiga's couch and its a bottle of milk....still, it WAS a hard days work!)

lack of sleep

Today was good for me, but rough for my Mommy. Let me preface this by saying....I got plenty of sleep last night. But, my Mom didn't. There was a robbery in the house next to ours last night around 3am, so everyone was shaken up. I slept through the whole thing. But, Mommy was woken up to Twiga barking and the guard outside calling out to someone and then, all the sudden, the Warrior trucks were at our gate and all sorts of craziness was happening. There were men from Warrior all over the property with flashlights and sticks, ready to attack. The guard at our house, John, had heard the neighbors being robbed by two guys with machetes and pushed the panic button which sends a signal to a truck of guards who wait in the area in case one of their clients has a problem. Anyway....Mommy just told me all this because I slept through the whole thing. She said she wasn't sure if she should come in and wake me when all the guards were in our compound because they seemed to be heading around the house to where my bedroom is, and Mommy was getting very nervous. But.....John was a star and we are all safe today. Mommy and Uncle Topher and I went around to the neighbors house at lunch today, to visit and to see if we could help them. They were pretty shaken up. And, while no life threatening injuries occurred (thanks to John who scared away the robbers), one guy has his knee caps bashed in, another woman has her hand broken, and they all have gashes and cuts where they were beaten. Very scary!

So, we are on heightened sense of alert at our house tonight....all windows and doors have been locked and checked and rechecked....Warrior cars are coming often here to the gate and Twiga is growling at any noise she hears. Mommy is very very tired, and hoping that all the nervousness won't stop her from sleeping tonight. No photos today.....hopefully by tomorrow we will have all calmed down and the camera will reappear. For tonight....we're all headed for a hopefully, RESTFUL and UNEVENTFUL nights sleep.

My First Hair Cut

Mommy thought it was time to get my hair cut. I don't know...I liked it the way it was, but I guess it will grow. I'm also not really a fan of the salon....where they TRY to make you sit still (believe me, it didn't work, and there is a bald spot of the back of my head to prove it!). They were really nice to me there...and now I have REALLY short hair. Mommy misses my hair....so do I. I keep rubbing my head, wondering where my hair is?

But, Mommy keeps telling me it will grow back. In the meantime, we have photos and Mommy saves some of my hair and put it away in a box when we got home, so I'd have some locks of baby hair.

What do you think of the new do???

The Snake Park

Today, Sunday, we were supposed to go on a game drive to Tarangire National park to see all the animals. However, Uncle Topher was still not feeling well. He actually looked ok to me, I think he just wanted to sleep in. But, he's had some tummy problems the past day or so. So, Mommy said she wasn't going to pay a bunch of money to drive around with him complaining about his stomach all day....so we postponed our day safari again.

Instead, we had lunch in town and went to the snake park, just a little ways out of town. Mommy does NOT like it there. She kept reminding me that we should NEVER ever pick up or touch any kind of snake!

They had so many types of snakes there....and Mommy was very alarmed to see that all were native to this area. Black mambos, green mambos, pythons (HUGE), the queen of sheba snake etc. Uncle Topher thought it was really cool to see all the different types of snakes.

They also have some birds that they are helping to rehabilitate and then send back out into the wild. And, they have crocodiles (babies and the big ones), and turtles. Mommy learned that our tortoise, Samantha, is only about 18 years old and can live to be 200. She will also grow very very big!

power just came back

We are just on our way to bed and the power finally comes back on! The problem is that we are all just way too tired to post much on the blog tonight. So, I'll just post a couple of photos. I call them, "Bathroom Fun", Mommy calls them, "Mischevious-into-everything-possible-Akira"

no power

Here in Arusha the power has been....spotty at best the past few days. It's not so bad during the day....what do we need power for anyway? But, my Mommy gets a little bummed at night with only candles and books to read (her eyes hurt after a while reading by candle light).

My only problem is the water. It needs to be heated and we use the electricity to heat the water here. There is a switch on the wall and you need to turn it on about an hour before you want hot water. When there is no power, there is no hot water, and therefor there is no bathtime. I guess Mommy could give me a cold bath....but she wouldn't do that to me. I'm a little sad though....I like my bath time. We play and read our bath books and sing and soap up and brush teeth. None of that could happen tonight (except for brushing my teeth....but I like it better when I brush them in the bathtub and can be as messy as I want.)

So, hopefully there will be power in the morning and I will have a bath. In the meantime, I got to have dinner by candle light. I have learned how to tell my Mommy when I'm really hungry and ready to eat. I climb into my stroller!

You can't see the candles that well from the photo because the flash makes it look like it is quite light inside. In fact, it was dark and I got to eat by the light of the candles. And, I ate a lot more than usual....well, at least I wasn't picky about what I was eating...and I ate all the bites with my peas in it (and usually I spit those right out)....but I couldn't see what I was eating and it seemed to make all the difference. I thought it was all pretty good really!

I wish you all a dinner by candle light tonight with the people you love....it's a pretty nice way to spend the evening.

Feeding myself

This is one of my Mom's biggest issues. She knows that it's important to let me start using the fork and spoon and feeding myself....but anyone who knows my Mom will know that she is both a bit of a clean freak and a definite control freak. So, this is one area in which she is really struggling to let me go at it. She keeps saying that once my high chairs comes in the shipment (our good friends Inneke and Derik have put a high chair in their shipment coming from Europe for me....so we are waiting...in the meantime, I eat in my stroller every day), then she will let me do it all myself. But, the truth is that there is no difference between doing it now or then, she is simply struggling to give over control to me.

Tonight, after putting enough food in my mouth to satisfy my Mommy that I had eaten a good dinner, I thought I would take matters into my own hands. I grabbed the spoon and she let me! For a while I just played with it....putting it in my mouth and taking it out. Then, she finally put my bowel of apple sauce up to the tray and indicated that I could try. With a little of Mommy's help I actually fed myself a few bites of apple sauce. It was very fun! Especially because my Mommy clapped and cheered after every bite.

A few photos to remind us all of why she may not let me feed myself again too soon.

Uncle Topher has a blog

www.lifeinarusha.blogspot.com


CHECK IT OUT!!!!

Obama - of course!!

Today is a great day for me. At least that is what my Mommy is telling me. I have to say, she may be right. I thought it was a pretty good day. I ate lots of food at every meal, Mommy and I were in good moods and had so much fun all day playing and laughing at our silly games. And, something weird and special happened tonight. Well, actually a few weird, special things happened. First, I got to stay up past my bedtime. We had our night routine....dinner, bath, teeth and book....and then I thought, "oh geeze....here comes the part I don't like...she's going to put me in the dark room again". But....instead she didn't and we all sat together in the living room. Which brings me to the other very strange thing that happened....I watched TV. Mommy NEVER lets me watch TV, and in fact it is a house rule written down that the TV is not to go on during daytime hours and while I am awake. This regularly annoys me, as it seems very interesting and I'm just dying to see what tricks that big gray box can handle.

Mommy told Uncle Topher that if there was one thing on TV that was ok to watch, it was Barak Obama becoming President of MY United States and Mr. Bush leaving the White House. I don't totally get it....but it seemed to be really exciting and special for my Mommy and she wanted to share it with me, so I was pretty excited too. I even stayed really quite during the music portions. And, I did stop and watch, mesmerized when President Obama was sworn in. People were all pretty excited.

Uncle Topher thought that my Mommy was really stupid to keep me up (and quite frankly, I believe he was just upset that I was keeping him from his dinner). He told her I'd never understand or remember this anyway. First off....he doesn't know...I'm extraordinary, so I might remember this. But, secondly....Mommy's no dummy. She told him that it was important to see this change in leadership of the U.S. and amazing to see the first African American become President....and the point is that she wants to be able to tell me when I am older that I watched it all happening from East Africa when I was right on the cusp of joining the USA myself! I think Mommy' pretty cool for wanting that for me (OK....I'll fess up. I actually mainly think she's cool for letting me stay up 45 minutes later than usual and letting me see how the big grey box works....it's cool man!)

To all my 'soon-to-be' fellow citizens....I congratulate and salute you. Good job in picking a President this time!!! Happy inaguration day!

Happy Birthday Uncle Topher!!

Well, it's been quite a day. Uncle Topher had the royal treatment today which meant that the rest of us didn't have it so easy. I was pretty entertained as my Mommy tried to manage me this morning while getting ready for work. She promised Uncle Topher that he could sleep in today, and Hope was 45 minutes late for work this morning. That meant it was ALL up to Mommy. Twiga decided to throw up all over the house and then to walk through it in case it wasn't spread around enough. I wanted to play in it as well...but Mommy really put her foot down on that one. I thought she might blow a fuse right about then. She was really not happy!

But....once we got her off to work, it was all ok. Uncle Topher slept in and when he got up he went to the pool at the gym for the afternoon and so I was left with Hope and Jenny for the afternoon. Then, tonight Mommy and Uncle Topher did our usual night routine before I headed off for bed. We sang Uncle Topher a round of Happy Birthday and then I went to sleep and Hope came over to watch me so Mommy could take Uncle Topher to dinner.

Happy Birthday to my favorite uncle in the WHOLE world!!! (also my only one....that I know about).

Yummm.....the bib tastes so much better than the food!

Birthday Weekend....

My Uncle Topher will be turning 18 on Monday. So, we decided to celebrate as a family this weekend by taking a road trip a few hours up the road to a town called Karatu on the edge of Ngorongoro Crater and Lake Manyara in the Rift Valley as a lodge called Gibb's Farmhouse. We got going on Saturday morning, and drove a few hours to Gibbs....arriving around 3pm. It was a nice ride, but I didn't have a nap and didn't seem to want to fall asleep in the car and I got very cranky near the end of that ride. It is TOO long to expect me to just sit there silently, for heavens sake!

Once we got there though....we had a pretty good evening. We got checked into our room and I had a bit to eat on the veranda overlooking beautiful gardens. Then, we had some snacks and headed out for a hike. Mommy and Uncle Topher took turns carrying me and taking control of Twiga's leash. It looked a little exhausting to me....but, I was ok....I had a ride!

We were supposed to go on a safari as well this weekend, but due to some technical troubles we were not able to go. I heard Mommy and Uncle Topher talking about us going on safari next week to Tarangire National Park. Sounds fun.

Today we got up and had a really nice breakfast and watched so many beautiful birds eating the fruits that the farm had put out for them. I love to talk to the birds...."Caa....Caa", I call out to them, and sometimes they answer back!

Then, my Mommy actually thought she could put me back in the car and drive another few hours home today. I was having none of it. I decided to have a bit of fun with the family. I screamed my head off and the only way I would stop is if they sung Humpty Dumpty to me OVERANDOVER again. Seriously! They tried other songs. They did not work. I ONLY wanted to hear Humpty Dumpty. After over an hour Uncle Topher said he would rather hear me scream then to sing the song one more time.

We got home just in time to go to a going away party for Mommy's friend Mary. She is moving to South Africa with her boyfriend Bas, and her baby Morris. There was a birthday party for Morris yesterday but we had to skip it since we were away, so Mommy felt like we HAD to go to today's party, even though we were all tired. The party was at Inneke, Dirk's and Ella's though....and I love to go there, and I got to go in the pool with my friends, so its was pretty fun.

By the time we got home, I had dinner and a bath and read a book, we were all so tired, we could barely move. I am headed to bed and I bet my Mommy will follow VERY VERY soon.

Happy Birthday tomorrow to my Uncle Topher!!!

ROADTRIP

SNACKS WITH A VIEW

GOING ON A HIKE

DINNER ON THE VERANDA

RIFT VALLEY

ONLY LASTED 10 MINUTES

Just in case you thought it was fluke...

....I'm here to tell you, I'm a walker. I practice every chance I can get. And, after I've reached my goal, I ALWAYS stop to clap and cheer for myself and I insist that all others in the room do so as well. For heavens sake....it's a big milestone. I had better celebrate it. How often do these sort of big achievements come along? I mean maybe a few times in a life, this is like graduating from college or getting married or having a baby....its a moment. So, I say, let's celebrate it!

Today was tough to practice, because my Mommy had a really busy day and she decided to drag me along for most of it. There were errands (none of which panned out....typical Arusha, paintings weren't finished being framed at the framers, gas station was out of gas, furniture store was randomly closed at 3pm on a Friday afternoon....you know, the usual), and some wedding business. This wedding stuff kept my Mom pretty occupied. She kept saying how excited she was to blow dry her hair and put on a dress and some high heels. I don't know....she looked a bit wobbly to me. I think I might honestly be able to walk better than my Mom when she gets those high heels on. Geesh....I don't know if I even want to celebrate weddings.....they look strange. I think I'll stick to celebrating my walking achievements....a much better use of energy!

I'm practicing....

I'm going to be the best darn walker this world has ever seen. Just you wait. I'm pretty fabulous already, but by the time I get done practicing, I'm going to take this world by storm! I was trying to practice earlier but my silly pants kept getting in the way. I'm not quite big enough for most of my clothes....so it's hard to keep them all on. My Mommy has looked for a baby belt, or suspenders, but she can't find any in East Africa....so, my pants come off. I got frustrated by the pants. So, I walked right out of them!

Once I got rid of those burdensome pants, I was able to really practice the walking. Look at me go!!!!

Uncle Topher got very nervous when I fell. He didn't realize that I'm a brave boy. Sometimes I fall down, but I always get back up and keep going. Mommy taught me that....in life, you just have to get up and keep going!

Mommy was so so so proud of me! It makes me so happy when she is proud.