Stories

On Saturday we went swimming at the Maadi House. Andrew entertained (ie: threw around) Emma and Megan while I corralled Rachel and Sam. Jessi and Jake stayed at home to do homework and play some electronic device respectively.

It was kind of nice to have two kids to watch because it meant that Rachel didn't want to stay at the wall the whole time because Sam didn't. Sam wanted to hold onto me, which meant that Rachel did, too. That meant that we could play some fun games like "Ring around the rosie...we all blow bubbles" and "Motorboat, motorboat."

I was so happy when, after taking Rachel away from the wall one time, she sang out sweetly, "Moty-but, moty-but!" I'm not sure why that made me so happy. Maybe it is the swim teacher in me. I can't wait until she's big enough to play "Fishie in the basket." Kids love that game!

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Rachel has started saying Sam's name, which is hilarious. She says it completely backwards. It's possible we've done too much Arabic with her, although Arabic isn't spoken backwards, it's just written backwards. Anyway, at any given point in the day she'll run up to me crying.

"What's wrong?" I'll ask.

"maS!" she'll sob and then will say whatever it was she thinks he did to her (yell, hit, push, etc).

Usually it's nothing. She just likes to tattle.

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This morning we played "Ring around the rosie," which seems to be a favorite game of both Sam and Rachel. Unfortunately for them, the somewhat-queasy pregnant lady (ie: me) doesn't find the game all that entertaining, or even doable, after 5 or 6 times of ringing around.

So I sat on the floor playing the part of the "rosie" and Sam and Rachel ran circles around me while I sang for them over and over and over again.

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Rachel's been having a bit of a hard time here. To her credit we haven't really been home very much since we left for Greece at the end of March. She was throwing fits last night, so when it was time to take Jacob to scouts, I told Andrew I'd walk him over and take Rachel with me. Andrew was busy helping Jessica with her math homework (oh, that's where he was during the beginning of conference) so he thought that was a good plan.

We dropped Jacob off at the CAC and I told Rachel that we then had to go home. From CAC, our home is in one direction and the Lewis home is in the other. Rachel took off running in the direction of our home.

"Stop, Rachel! We're going this way." I pointed in the opposite direction.

"No! Home! Go! Mama! Home!" she cried.

I think it's cute that she knows where home is. And she's really having a good time here. Even if she wants to go home.

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This morning Andrew got up to help get the kids ready for school and usher them out the door and let me sleep in, which was nice. We've been doing a lot more praying, I guess, since he had family prayer with the school-aged kids this morning and then before he left for school we had our own family prayer.

Sam and Rachel had already started eating breakfast when I announced it was time for the stay-at-home family prayer. Sam wanted to say it. So we let him.

He blessed the food and thanked Heavenly Father, and that was that.

"Amen!" Rachel said happily and started bringing a piece of honeycomb cereal to her mouth.

"We are going to say another prayer, Rachel," I told her, "Daddy's going to say it this time."

She sighed and slowly put her honeycomb back down, but got ready for prayer anyway. So much praying before breakfast is hard on a little girl, I guess!