African Halloween

I'm a bit late in writing this up, but this year we actually celebrated halloween with trick or treating!! Last year when I tried to organize something with the French neighbors on our street most answered that they weren't American and it wasn't their tradition. I guess they forgot to notice that we weren't in France either, and that as a multicultural community it can be nice to celebrate new tradtions with others...

This year however, Deanne, a very motivated young Texan mom whose French hubby works for the French oil company Total, single-handedly organized a halloween party followed by good ol' trick or treating on the Total compound where they live. All were invited and we weren't going to miss it!
Noah and I had just flown back from Paris the night before, and that morning I surprised Jourdain and Cecilia with the news that it was Halloween. They were more than excited to dress up, and quickly invited our housekeeper Ines' two boys to come and join in the fun. Boy were THEY excited to come along when I told them they were dressing up as a pirate and a king. I still don't think those two boys have the slightest idea as to what it was all about except that a whole lot of French people gave them candy when they knocked on doors. Their mom says they're not complaining though, even though she made them give most of their candy to other less fortunate kids in their neighborhood the next day.

Yann the king (or knight I guess since we had no time to make a crown!) went home a happy boy.

And Etienne took his role as a pirate (with American flag bandana no less) quite seriously.

At age 4 Cecilia has reached the pink princess stage in life.

And Jourdain was just happy to wear whatever his mom gave him! (No time to get a cowboy hat and the gun's all wrong, but hey - what does he know? He lives in Africa.)

The climate at the party was a few degrees warmer than what I grew up with, allowing many to go barefoot.
Deanne had the great idea to teach everyone the about bobbing for apples. I think I was the only guest who'd ever heard of such a wacky idea!!
The evening wound up with trick or treating in the Total apartment buildings. I sure hope Deanne sticks around Port-Gentil for a few more years! (Creepy eye effect on mom in picture here is not Halloween related - I just don't know how to fix it in my picture software.)

In the end we were so busy having fun that we never had time to carve up watermelons. I just may have them do it this week anyway.

And After School...

It's Friday night and Jourdain has karate with his buddy Yann!

Noah's Halloween Trick

So Noah enjoyed his very first Halloween this year, as can be seen by the smile on his face and the inscription on his little suit (a present from Kristy, our Floridian-American friend in town).
Well, at least everything seeeeeeeeemed to be going well for him on the 31st...
....until he began to get that little pensive look in his eye. I could tell he was up to something.
Definitely planning something devlish. Something he had most likely been planning out for a long time that day. Something to both scare and surprise his mama, maybe. A Halloween baby trick, perhaps? Hmmmmm........
Yep. Trick or treat. Let's hope there's more treat next year.

Sunday at the Beach

Yay! The Blogger people have made it easy for me to post a film now!

Here's a scene of Olivier and Jourdain from our day yesterday at Cap Lopez beach on the Atlantic coast. Next weekend we'll head over to our little island off the other coast (the calmer bay side) and I'll try and get a good clip of what our Sundays are like there in our cabana.

Broken Toe

I must remember to never again brag about how men can't manage more than one activity at a time while we women are great at multitasking and can change a diaper, write a business email, talk on the phone and color with Cecilia all at the same time.

Owch.

I blame motherhood.

Smack the Baby

Imagine you're sitting comfortably at home in the evening with a five-week-old baby snoozing calmy in your arms. It took you a while, but he's fallen asleep, and with the house finally quiet you figure if you're lucky he'll keep sleeping and you just might be able to watch at least part of a movie on TV tonight (something you haven't done in five weeks).


Then, out of nowhere, without catching even a hint of a buzzing noise, you spot a mosquito closing in slowly, stealth-like, on the back of the baby's motionless, sleeping head. A sub-Saharan African mosquito. The kind of mosquito that comes out only after sunset and might be carrying the malaria virus. And you love that baby. But you want to watch the movie too. What do you do? Shoo the mosquito away and hope to be able swat him later, before he sneaks back up and bites the baby when you're focusing on the movie? Or do you smack the baby right on the back of the head as the mosquito lands? Right. You smack the baby. Which is exactly what I did last night - and I missed the damned mosquito too.

Let's Hope So...

From the BBC News website:

Being bilingual 'protects brain'

The findings are based on tests on 104 people

Being fluent in two languages may help to keep the brain sharper for longer, a study suggests.

Researchers from York University in Canada carried out tests on 104 people between the ages of 30 and 88.

They found that those who were fluent in two languages rather than just one were sharper mentally.

Writing in the journal of Psychology and Ageing, they said being bilingual may protect against mental decline in old age.

Previous studies have shown that keeping the brain active can protect against senile dementia.

For full article:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3794479.stm

Poopy Pants

The day I came home with Noah both Jourdain and Cecilia followed me around the house, watching wide-eyed as I changed his diaper, nursed him, and rocked him to sleep. At one point Cecilia sat down calmly next to me on the couch to watch the baby nurse. After a bit there came a slow, gurgling, gaseous sound followed by a long bubbly-liquid noise emanating from Noah's diaper area. With a look of concern on her face, Cecilia sat up straight, stiffened, and shifted her eyes from right to left without moving a muscle in her body. Feeling her unease I explained that babies always poo when they nurse so that they can make room in their tummies for more milk. A look of great relief came over Cecilia's face as she shifted to look at me and said, "Oh. I thought that was me."

Gabonese Baby

Before Noah was born I had to explain to the kids that no, we could not choose the sex of the baby, nor could we choose his eye color, hair color or even type of hair. That was a tough concept for them, and while Cecilia took quite a while to digest this information, she finally accepted that she would be getting a baby brother rather than a sister, and that while his hair might turn out curly like hers there was a pretty good chance it would end up straight like "everyone else" in the family (a major hang-up for her for most of her short life thus far).

Just a week before Noah's birth we were all riding in the car together when from the back seat Cecilia asked, "Mama? Can we choose the color of the baby's skin, or is it going to be black like the other people in Gabon?" Stifling a laugh I calmly explained that a baby's skin color comes from the mama and papa, and that we were not actually Gabonese, so in our case, no, the baby would not have black skin.

Olivier leaned over from the driver's seat, looked back at Cilia, and announced "He'd better not have black skin, Cecilia".

Noah David Doeff

During our four blissful days in silence at the hospital I kept whispering to Noah that before he knew what hit him our snuggle-fest a deux would be interrupted by

non-stop kisses and hugs
and endless touching and cuddling from his older siblings.
Luckily for all, Noah is proving to be a very calm baby, taking everything in stride thus far. I'm just sorry he slept right through the 0 year birthday party held for him once he and I were back home.
Now all that remains to be seen is how he adjusts to life back in Gabon where we'll try to keep him awake for his 2 week birthday party...