Bye Bye Baby

Surprisingly, even to myself, I have been a little more sentimental about Charlie growing up and out of babyhood. I have enjoyed him being small and can't believe how grown up he is sometimes. An outgrowth of this is that I put off giving Charlie his first hair cut (other than one trim around his ears) for a long time. It had gotten soooo long in the back.

Once I decided I was ready to cut it, though, Charlie started screaming bloody murder every time we put him in the bath (still no idea on why that was) so it took another month before we got around to it. The bath was the only time I could think of to do it where we could keep him confined and wet at the same time...

It had grown into a mega-baby-mullett by then!

Having Dave hold a lollipop in once place was the only way to get him to hold still at all. You can see in this pic how long the front had gotten as well!

Not only does he now look a lot older, but he is talking all the time. Not only jibber-jabber now (though lots of that) but also many words. I know Davey was an early-ish talker but I don't remember him being this on top of things by now...

At 15 months, Charlie says... mama, daddy, no, uh oh, woah, wow, baby, go, done, up, down, tickle, woof, baa, quack, birdie, choo-choo, shoes, car, ball, mine, cheese, apple, bite... and will repeat almost any other one- or two-syllable word.

He still has such a delightful little personality, easy to laugh and smile and is cuddly (with me at least). Even for that, though, I wouldn't call him easy-going; he definitely always knows what he wants and tries very hard to insist he gets it, both from me and big brother. We have seen some serious tantrums already when he doesn't get his way....

Having fun self-feeding

Charlie's first drawing - good job!

Living It Up In Bahrain

By far the best thing about living here (from my perspective) is having a full-time maid. Obvious, non? I had my worries and misgivings at first, but I am sure getting used to this. Everyone asks me, "What do you do with all your extra time?" And, to tell you the truth, I don't really know where the time goes because don't feel like I spend tons of time on hobbies and me-time, though I do have more than I did. I spend more time playing with my kids, mostly, and less time stressing about the house being messy. I am looking into finding a paino to rent or a used one to buy. It's time to try to gain some skill and remove the guilt I have about not being able to play after years and years of my parents paying for lessons and me squandering my practice time.



Just as great as not having to do the cleaning and laundry is having a built-in babysitter who knows the kids and they are comfortable with. This post has been a long time coming and I am actually in between maids right now (the details not fit for my blog) and we are hoping to find someone again that will play so well with the children. They were always happy and well cared-for when we came home. Charlie is so very attached to me and he was really getting comfortable with the last one.



For the first time since Davey was born, we started having regular date nights. Monday nights we have a quick night out taking an Arabic class together and Thursdays we go out. It's been awesome! I can really see now why the leaders of our church stress its importance since Dave and I were able to have some time just to ourselves to have some fun without talking about what needs to be done at home and remember why we fell in love in the first place. Not that we'd forgotten, but you know what I mean, right?



Sometimes we go to a nice restaurant (there are tons of great ones here) or a quick dinner and a movie. The night usually ends with a stop at the grocery store since I have to stop at several to find everything I need and never get to all of them at once. Another great part about having our maid babysit is that we don't have to worry about having cash to pay her and I don't have to drive her home late at night.



I can't wait to get a new maid sorted out so we can have our date night back!

All dressed up and ready to go!