I can play with this?

When I tell Nate to stop doing something, he looks for something else he can do.

We have a gas stove, but there are no city gas lines to hook into. We don't have a large tank out back, either. The way we do it here is with a small canister right next to the stove. Typically people will have the gas canister in an outdoor closet opposite the wall where the stove is, but the owner of our house is using that closet for his own storage, so we have ours in the corner of the kitchen.

It makes fun sounds when tapped, so it is quite an undertaking to convince the boys to stop playing with it. It's not a safe toy!

I heard Nate playing with it the other day. Without looking, I called out to him to stop playing with the gas tank. I saw him walk over to the refrigerator, and he said, "I can play with this?" Then he kicked the fridge. Hard. With no shoes on. It hurt. He cried.

I had no idea he'd been banging on the gas canister with his toes!

The plus side: I don't need to worry about him kicking the refrigerator in the future.

perfection

Or nearly there.

We used to always snack on granola bars, cereal bars, muffin bars, etc. We called them all "breakfast bars" to simplify things for Nate. There are such things here, but they are all imports and super expensive. So I started thinking that surely I could make some. Our oven scares me, so I scoured the internet for no-bake options. I settled on Rachael Ray's (no linky right now because her website is down, but it's easy to find).

I had some trouble with it, though. It's ok. I'm not afraid of experimenting with a recipe. I don't know if it's because of the humidity here or what, but I couldn't get the bars to stick together. We had granola clumps for a few batches. But, I think I have arrived at the best way to make them.

Melt 1/4 cup margarine, 1/4 cup honey, 1/2 cup brown sugar over medium heat until sugar is dissolved. Remove from heat. I experimented with the amount of sugar and honey and with adding peanut butter, but the stickiness wasn't right.
Add 1 1/2 cups quick cooking oatmeal, 3/4 cup rice crispy cereal, 1/2 cup pretzel sticks, 1/2 cup raisins. Mix until thoroughly coated in the syrupy mixture. RR calls for 2 cups granola and 1 cup rice crispies. Mine stick better with oats instead of granola and with less cereal total.
Press into jelly roll pan. Mine's small, and this doesn't quite fill it up. I just squish it into about 3/4 of the pan and make a line with a knife on the "open" edge.
Top with 1/2 cup chocolate chips or 1 crushed dark chocolate bar if you live somewhere that doesn't really have chocolate chips like me.
Chill until set. I work on these during naptime, and right about this point, Ben is waking up, so I come back to it the following day to cut them into bars. I store them in the fridge because of ants.

We left our previous batch of breakfast bars, which was nearly but not quite as good as this one, in Malindi in the fridge at our hotel. I reminded Rodgers yesterday that I'd made more, and they were already cut and ready to eat, then I went to put Nate down for nap. I came back and Rodgers said, "Those are gooooood. I had four."

The only thing I think could possibly make them even better would be a bit of peanut butter. Maybe melted and drizzled over the top of the chocolate?

your Rodgers

A few days ago, we were upstairs when Rodgers came home. Nate, very excited, yelled "Daddy's home!" He ran up to me, "Your daddy's home!" I said, "No that's not my daddy. That's my Rodgers."

Now, when Nate is talking to me, he clarifies that his daddy is my Rodgers, just in case I didn't make the connection myself.

"My daddy - your Rodgers - is home!"
"Let's follow Daddy. That's your Rodgers, Mama. You follow Rodgers."

Malindi

We had quite a lovely weekend in Malindi. It's not a holiday weekend here (Labor Day already happened for us), but we'd been invited to visit our country church and decided to make a weekend of it, rather than a 6 hour round trip day trip.

We stayed in a hotel we've stayed in before. Last time, the fans in our room were super noisy and the mosquito nets were insufficient. We all got mosquito bitten and hardly slept because it was either noisy or hot. Still, we liked the place itself. So we told them, and this time they gave us a 2 bedroom flat, with screens on the windows and quiet fans. They gave us a good deal on half board (breakfast and supper), and we ate lunches in our flat. We played in the pool and went shopping in the Malindi Tourist Market. My sister-in-law also took me shopping in the non-tourist shops for some Swahili sandals, since I'd forgotten to pack shoes to wear with my dress Sunday. They have them in the Tourist Market, but they are more expensive for tourists.

The boys and me playing in the rooftop pool

With the breeze, Ben was too cold in the pool. He was shivering, but he didn't want to get out. The look on his face here tells me he's plotting against me.

Rodgers helped Nate jump and splash in the pool. Ben was super jealous.

Church was both good and frustrating. The service was great, they gave us gifts, Rodgers preached. But Nate is becoming unmanageable for me during church. If Rodgers isn't preaching or if I can get Ben to let someone else hold him, Nate is fine. But if it's just me and I'm holding Ben, he figures no one is going to make him mind so he can wreak havoc. Usually, I end up holding Ben under one arm and Nate under the other and going outside to wait for Rodgers to finish preaching. I miss church nursery.

My boys. They were supposed to wear their matching shoes, but I couldn't get Ben to keep his on. They're leather and kind of tight. We'll have to practice wearing shoes I guess.

Rodgers and the boys at church, listening to the choir singing - before the sermon, obviously.

toddlers, with an S

Nate took his first step at eleven months, his second step at fourteen months, and he was taking many steps in a row right away. It seemed he spent those three months figuring it out mentally instead of experimenting physically.

Thus I was surprised this week. Ben's first birthday is just 2 weeks from today. He took his first step Tuesday and fell down onto his hands and knees. I helped him back up. He took his second step and fell down again. Then he cracked up laughing and crawled away.

The next day, we played the one step and fall down game for a long time. AND...he took two steps in a row before grabbing onto Nate's shirt, taking a third step, and falling down, laughing so hard he couldn't stand up again.

Quite fun. And exciting. I love milestones!