"Fun, Fun Halloween!"

Last night in the car, Brian and I were talking about plans for the week. Emily overheard Brian talking about friends he wanted to visit and said, "But Daddy! Not tomorrow! You don't want to miss fun, fun Halloween!"

Luckily for me, we never went trick-or-treating in America, so she doesn't know to miss it here in Egypt. But when she went to bed tonight, she told me that this was the best Halloween ever, so I guess we did okay.

When I originally starting thinking about the upcoming holiday several weeks ago, I planned to have a small group of expat friends over to join us. But since I'm two days past hosting an extra 6 adults and 3 children in my house for a total of 13 days... I decided to taking a hosting break today.

 The girls and I made Candy Corn Cupcakes. There is nothing like baking, unless it is baking with two girls. Emily amazed me today - she practically made these herself, until it was time to add in the food coloring. She is getting so big.

 These are deviled eggs with black olive spiders on them. Emily and Savannah thought these were so funny.

 And a pumpkin shaped veggie tray....

 Along with nachos and orange kool-aid, because orange was deemed the most Halloweeny flavor.

We introduced Sophie to American black olives tonight, thanks to one of our friends who visited us last week and was so kind to bring them in for us.

We also watched Charlie Brown's The Great Pumpkin Patch.... I had never seen it before, but the girls thought it was cute.

This morning, as we were getting ready to begin making the cupcakes, Brian came in and used the last of the milk for his cereal. Emily almost immediately noticed that we need 1/2 cup of milk for the recipe. Neither Brian nor I were dressed or had any desire to get dressed any time soon, but Emily was in despair at being so close to making cupcakes and then having to wait.

After talking for a moment, we decided to let Emily and Savannah walk down to the "chipsy store" at the end of our street to buy milk. We laid out the rules, gave them Brian's cell phone, reminded them how to say "I want milk" in Arabic just in case they couldn't reach it, and enough money and off they went.

So much for not getting dressed... Brian and I both immediately went to our room and put clothes on and then I hung out the window watching for them to come back. Soon enough, here they came. Walking together, just like we had told them.

When Emily saw me at the window she grinned triumphantly and waved the bag with the milk at me. Savannah waved like she had been gone for 2 weeks instead of less then 10 minutes.

I'm not so sure about this growing up stuff. They seem to be handling it fine, but me, I'm not sure I love it...

Funny Kids and Fun Fall Recipes

Last night at dinner, Emily was obsessing about her loose tooth so Brian told the joke about the Colgate Toothpaste delivery truck that gets stuck underneath a tollbooth. The punchline is that the toll booth gets fixed with "tollgate booth paste." I have heard it before... so no laughter from me and Emily was too wrapped up in her worries of her loose tooth to appreciate any kind of humor, but Savannah burst out in a hysterically convincing, but fake laugh. Which made Brian and me laugh.

That is so like Savannah. She is my little people person and she is always ready to get into whatever you are doing with great gusto.

Emily has the funniest new thing that she says at random times. This afternoon, Brian was teasing her about something, I can't even remember what, but he had gotten her good and she knew it. She grinned with all good humor, but shouted, "Free Punch!" (Don't worry, its a joke, not an example of poor parenting.)

We have started having our windows open today. There is a nice breeze blowing our lovely gold curtains and we are getting reacquainted with our street noise again. The weather is prettier when you are outside... it is still a little warm for me on the inside, but it will soon be just perfect "fall" weather. Which gets me in the mood for baking pumpkin stuff.

Pumpkin Stuff, like these Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes from Bakergirl. But who makes cupcakes for two? I don't even know why I would want to do that!

Pumpkin Stuff, like this Pull-Apart Cinnamon Sugar Pumpkin Bread from SanDiego. Yes, click the links. It will make you drool all over your keyboard.

Not Pumpkin Stuff, like these Caramel Apple Cheesecake Bars from The-Girl-Who-Ate-Everything.

I'm currently a little frustrated in my internet recipe binge because many, many recipes I find use Oreo Cookies. Good, delicious recipes with tantalizing pictures. For example, how about these Cookies and Cream Cheesecakes? Doesn't that make you want to run to the kitchen as fast as you can and not-pass-go-who-cares-about-200-dollars?

My problem? Uhhuh. Oreo Cookies in Egypt cost about $10 a package. And they aren't even double stuff oreos!

Okay, I need to go parent...

Texas!

The last couple of weeks have been very busy... We were supposed to attend a conference in Kenya and then go on Safari, but after the arrangements had been made, we were cautioned very strongly by my doctor against my trip due to health concerns for the baby.

It was decided that Brian, Emily and Savannah would go ahead with our original plans while Sophie and I were invited to go visit my family in Texas. (Click this link for pictures from Brian's trip)

Do you know how long of a flight that is with an almost 2 year old? Oh.my.goodness. It was one of the longest days of my life... the other being our return trip. However, there were so many sweet people that helped out by playing and holding Sophie and I was bumped to business class during two legs of the trip. So there were some redeeming moments to the otherwise misery. And, of course it was well worth the trouble when we finally arrived.

My mother was well stocked with Blue Bell... She must love me :)

(I am 21 weeks along in this picture) 

Sophie absolutely adored playing outside. We don't get to do that much in Egypt and the little person begged to go out and play every waking moment.

My sister, Leigh, playing with Sophie at my sister, Mary's house.

We also managed to get a picture of all of us girls with our Mama during the visit.

(Me, Leigh, Mama, Shelley, Mary)

My brother, Jonathan, has grown so much since I left 1.5 years ago. But his piano skills are just as awesome as I remember.

My friend, Tina, drove up for a visit. 

Remember what I said about Sophie and outside? Mom and Dad have this long tube that the kids love to climb through, around and on top of... I'm pretty sure this is where Sophie skinned her knee one of the 4 times.

Goofing off on the seesaw.

Granny and Grandpa loved having the time with this little person. We left when she was 5 months old, so it was a wonderful opportunity for them to get to meet her all over again and see how her personality has developed.

We ate at Chik-Fil-A... (when I got back to Egypt and showed all the pictures to Emily and Savannah, this was by far their favorite.)

Every night, after Sophie had her bath, we would get a bowl of Blue Bell. She would sit on the table and we would share our ice-cream. She and I both loved having the time together and the ice-cream.

Before taking me to the airport for the return trip, Mom and Dad took us to Cracker Barrel for breakfast. Sophie had her first blueberry pancakes and bacon... she loved it!

Sweet little girl was a trooper for most of the way home. She slept not a wink during the first flight from Texas to Germany which lasted 10 hours. She played with a sweet family that was sitting behind us and flirted with everyone within range.

When we got to the airport in Germany, the poor kid just couldn't go anymore... as we walked through the airport, she kept laying down on the floor with her bear as if she would take a nap right there! When we did get on the flight, she crashed and slept the majority of that flight.

It was interesting to go back to Texas after living in a foreign country for one and a half years. I was more friendly with strangers in stores and restaurants than I ever was before I left. I missed the clean bathrooms in Egypt (I know there are filthy ones in Egypt, however, if you go into a large store or mall's bathroom in Egypt and go into a Wal-Mart or mall's bathroom in Texas, Egypt wins for cleanliness, hands down.)

In a sense, it was weird to go home... I kept waiting for this moment of something. But it just felt normal. Almost as if I had never left. Oh, things had changed... kids are older, my sisters have all experienced new and different things, my perspective on life has broadened, Chik-Fil-A has changed their ketchup packets.

But for the most part, it was just good to be home.