News from the Jacobs family in Saudi Arabia
We’ve been making every Friday a “dough day.” We make a pound of bread dough in the bread machine and then have fun making different shapes before baking.
Summer is surely here. In the last week we topped 110 ((according to our backyard thermometer which is in the shade)) and we also had a dewpoint of 84 degrees–thankfully they weren’t on the same day. Still, it is getting harder to play outside unless it involves water.
Crystal is having a great time provding art time for Kai and Nora. Kai enjoys making things while Nora mostly likes to taste them. Some recent expereinces were recently held in the backyard–you’ll see why in the pictures.
Kai went into the hospital for a couple of days recently with some respiratory problems. He kept coughing and was having trouble catching his breath. The doctors admitted him to “Hotel Pediatrics†((We figured that telling him that he was staying in a hotel was a bit less stressful than telling him he was going into the hospital)) for a couple of days of nebulizer treatments and observation. The first day he was pretty upset but after that it was great fun–pancakes in bed, a playroom right in the ward, nice nurses and as much ipod as he cared to watch with Dad delivery fresh shows daily. Crystal stayed with him overnight with some brief breaks during the day to shower and change. It was a bit tough for me to be in there since the visitors were mostly Saudi women and having a male around clearly made some uncomfortable. At one point a nurse pointed out that many of the mothers would come into the playroom with a male in there. She was clear that she wasn’t asking me to leave but she did agree to keep and eye on Kai if I wanted to wait in his room. We were very fortunate to have the Collins take Nora on short notice to allow me bring in new toys and changes of clothes in the evening.
There isn’t much to write here, the captions pretty much speak for themselves. Enjoy!
The other day we brought out the stir-crazy popcorn maker to make colored popcorn. Though the colored stuff is always pretty stale and stains thier lips the opportunity to watch the popcorn pop is a real treat for the kids.
Kai’s bed isn’t really new, it is the same one that he had before. However, those clever people at Ikea designed it so that it can be flipped over turning it from a canopy bed into a loft bed.
One of Kai’s preschool teachers organized pony rides for charity a few weeks back. Her family has been doing charity work in Ethiopia/Eritrea for generations. The offered pony rides, sold cookies in horse shapes (we had to leave with two of those, as you can imagine) and sold hand woven baskets from Ethiopia to raise money.Â
Nora, having not seen too many horses in her life, exclaimed excitedly “CAM–OO” (translation: camel) when we got there. It took a fair bit of practice, but by the end she seems to have understood that she actually rode a horse.
Â
We are at that pleasant time of year when it is nice and warm ((I started drafting this post two days ago when this was true but today the high is 104 and the sky is full of dust)) but not too hot to play outside with the wiggle water snake in the backyard. After a session getting everyone wet and muddy ((the wiggle water snake doesn’t discriminate)) we hosed off, had a snack at the table in the backyard, and practiced making faces.
