January on Moon Close

That's our street: Moon Close. Pronounced as in, the moon is close to the Earth. That's what dead end street are called: sth close. This is our temporary home. And now that we have a few more pieces of furniture, it really feels like somewhere we could live, but alas. We must move by June. I'm glad to have the chance to look around some and make a more educated choice about where we will actually live here. Although the market is not good. It will be all a luck of timing. But so are most things!

What Moon Close has going for it mainly is the garden, as you can see. For the kids, it's been heaven after living in a flat for the last 5 years in Khartoum and Amman. We feel very lucky to have this place while we do! Eliza loves the trampoline most. Being in-ground (something you see everywhere here but I've never seen before), the trampoline is easy to on and off of, and you don't worry too much about their falling an additional 4 feet or so if they fall off. Miles loves the swing most. It is tied to a very high branch and so has a huge arc. Instead of sitting a waiting to be pushed, Miles grabs the swing, runs, lifts his legs and just goes spinning. He goes straight for it every morning and afternoon after school. The way he hangs on, it's got to be a great work out.

This is Shepherd with the kids. He's the son of Tari, the housekeeper, who lives in the cottage next to the house. He just turned 5. They all play together in the afternoons and on weekends.

All the rooms, except our bedrrom and the kids' shared bedroom have looked like this until this past weekend when we got a couch in the living room. The kids don't seem to mind that there's no furniture, but they do seem to mind the size of the house. "Mommy, where are you?!?!"

Imagine a wall full of 12 "Cat-in-the-Hat” faces all pretty much the same and then there's this one really colorful one. Yep, that’s my son.

To follow up on the parental drama of my child settling into a new school... I'm happy with the support at the school. Miles is making a lot of progress, and everyone is pleased. I used to wonder how the behavior of my infants and toddlers would manifest in their personailities as children, and now I'm starting to find out. Miles's intensity as a baby (he used to cry horribly instead of fall asleep when we put him in the carseat) is coming out in the strong desire to do what he wants to do. The good side of this is his strong character, uniqueness, creativity, vivid imagination and energy. The bad side is that it's a real struggle for him to do what he's told which means, for one, that he can't enjoy or get from school all that he could. So we are trying some different approaches with Miles than the usual parenting techniques to get him "focus his energy." More on that later, if you want. I am just so grateful that he has a super sweet side of him, a great sense of humor, a curiosity to learn, and an intellect that allows us to really communicate.