Eva's Favorite Things

Eva's been on the move for the last couple weeks, and its fun to see more of her personality develop.  She certainly has a mind of her own, and can be quite strong headed.  Luckily (or not so luckily for us), neither Alison nor I can blame it on the other.  We're probably both equally responsible for that characteristic.  But here are some of Eva's favorite things:

2.  Animals - she LOVES animals.  Loves them.  Now that she can walk, when I take her outside she starts to chase the stray cats.  Sometimes I'll put birdseed outside her window so pigeons and finches will come and eat.  Of course, she loves her stuffed animals (though not so much other stuffed items), and gets excited whenever grandma/grandpa or nana put the pets on skype. 

2.  Books - often in the mornings she'll pull out all the books from her shelf, sit on the floor and page through them.  Sometimes she reads silently, and sometimes she reads out loud.  It's really cute.  Her current favorites are "The Hungry Catepillar", Baby Bunny and anything that has flaps to lift up/tear off.

3.  Buttons - She particularly likes my cell phone.  I'll lock it, and she loves pushing the big middle button that lights the screen up.  So far, she hasn't been able to figure out how to unlock it.

4.  My Kindle - She found my Amazon Kindle (an ereader) the other day, and opened up the flap that covers the kindle.  She was already excited that she's found a book, but her eyes got huge when she opened it and found BUTTONS.  A combination of two of her favorite things!  That one quickly got confiscated.

5.  Putting Things in Places:  She likes the toys where you can put the shapes into a container.  However, she also puts the shapes in other places.  We've found them in cushions behind the couch, the letters bag in the Scrabble box, and in the recycling bags.  I'm sure there are other hidden treasures we will find years later.  She also just likes putting objects into containers and taking them out.  Its not uncommon for me to come into a room and find her putting all her blocks in the bin, taking them out again, and then repeating.

I could probably think of more, but I'll leave it there for now.  Not much of significance going on, so I can't use up all my ideas at once!

Eva On the Move

Eva's started walking!  In just a couple of week's she's gone from whining when we put her upright and make her walk to toddling around by herself.  In the last couple of days, her preferred method of mobilizing to destruction has been walking.  Enjoy!

Happy Birthday Eva!

Happy Birthday Eva!  On January 2nd, she turned one.  We had a very small celebration - we went to Dairy Queen and she had her first taste of icecream.  At first, she wouldn't eat it.  I think she thought it was yoghurt.  However, she came around, and eventually started eating, playing and flinging her new beloved food all around the restaurant.  Evidence below. (Overkill on the video?  Maybe.  But Grandma and Nana eat it up.)

Cultural Tidbit:  In contrast to our small gathering of three, it is customary for our friends from India to have very, very large parties when a child turns one.  I was told that this is a tradition because in the past (how long ago "past" means, I'm not sure) many babies did not survive the first year.  We went to what was described to me as a small celebration, which turned out to be no less than 50 people.  Fantastic!  Its also common for parents to shave their child's head - it helps the hair grow quicker and thicker (we are sometimes tempted with Eva's bald head).

On Saturday, we had a small gathering with some friends at the wild life preserve in Bahrain.  It's not big, but Eva was able to see some neat animals:  giant tortises, heyenas, a variety of dear-type animals, and a donkey that licked her fingers and scared her a bit.  At the end, we sang her happy birthday and she had her first taste of cake!

Mafia III - Today Is Not Now

A long time ago (when I was in college), in a  land far, far away (the great state of Wisconsin), my brothers and I filmed a movie on the fly and called it Mafia.  The idea came to us while David and I were taping a friend's wedding, and one of the groomsmen fainted.  The premise was that the mafia had tried to assassinate him, and the agents were going after the mafia.  In Houston, we filmed the second installment.  But if you have a second, you must have a third.  And so, while in Aledo, IL this summer, my brothers and I filmed the third and final in the Mafia Trilogy.

To give some clarity, Stephen, David and I each play one good character, and one bad character.  In retrospect, we should have dressed in particular colors throughout to indicate which character you were looking at, but the biggest key is the dirty, slicked back hair and bad accents.

After you've watched the movies, you'll be able to score yourself on the Mafia experience.  The higher the score, the more fully you experienced the movie.  Enjoy!

Part I

Part II

Score Sheet: (format blatantly stolen from the fantastic blog "Stuff Christians Like").

-You know which Alison is more embarrassed of after having watched the film this morning:  seeing herself in Mafia III, or seeing me in Mafia III.  +2 points
-You can successfully determine which punch actually landed on David's face. +3 points
-You are able to tell which building was edited in with CGI. +5 points
-You think you know which country Bruno's (David's evil character) accent is from. +4 points
-You said to yourself "David has an accent?" after reading the previous item.  -2 points (-4 for David)
-You are able to successfully follow the storyline.  +2 points
-Without asking anyone who was involved in the production.  +3 points
-On the first viewing. +10 points
-You asked for all the outtakes of Eva.  +1 point (and you get the honorary Grandmother Award).
-You asked for all the outtakes of the rest of us.  +2 points
-After reading the previous, you said, "They're all such professionals that there's no way there could be outtakes!" +3 points (+10 for the encouragement, -7 for lying).
-You think I'm a bad parent after watching this movie.  -1 point.
-You think that Eva is super cute.  +3 points
-You think I'm a good actor.  +8 points
-You can accurately determine where each scene is filmed.  +2 points for each correct scene.
-You can understand Jaque's (Stephen) mispronunciation of various words.  +3 points
-You finished watching both videos.  +7 points
-You watched the movie again.  +10 points (+12 for each subsequent viewing)
-You reposted these videos on your own blog/facebook.  +5 points
-You invite all your friends over for a viewing party.  +15 points

What's your score?  Are there any other scorecard items I should have used?

Christmas Day

This was our first Christmas with Eva, and it strikes me the importance of communicating that Christmas should be about celebrating the coming of Jesus.  He is Emanuel - God with us.  According to Hebrews, he is the exact imprint of God's nature.   We continued some of the traditions that I had growing up - such as reading the birth of Jesus from the gospel of Luke, and plan to continue some more - like the advent tree that we (sometimes) did leading up to Christmas.

Our Christmas was also full of fun times with friends.  We went to a friends' house for a large Christmas Eve lunch on Friday, another friends' house for Christmas day lunch and then yet another friends' house for Christmas Day dinner (really, light snacks) and a gift exchange.  I was given a book of Arab proverbs and English equivalents.  I'll share the really good ones on here. 

Unfortunately, Alison and I didn't do ANY Christmas shopping this year.  However, Grandma saved the day and had sent us a package full of presents - 3/4 of which were for Eva.  Here's a video of Eva opening her very first present. 

And here's just one of the goodies that Alison made to take to people's houses - homemade apple pie (she also made scrumptious candy cane cookies, delectable raspberry squares and succulent sugar cookies). 

Last, just because I can - a video of Eva bouncing on Mommy's knee.  Its so great to hear her squeal with delight (sorry, the picture is a little dark)