One week home in the US and I am already refreshed and have almost forgotten that I was robbed of a day back with my family. I've gotten my fill of turkey, cranberries, and pie (thanks to mom!) and have loaded up on all the veggies we cannot find in Ghana (well at least affordably find) - namely spinach, broccoli, and asparagus. It has been really incredible to be back with my family in Georgia and to watch them get reacquainted with their grandson after so many months apart.


And to top it off, we got a solid few days with my brother, sister-in-law, and 1 1/2 year old nephew, Gus, who were all visiting from Miami. The highlight was to watch Gus and Eli "play." It's really the first time Eli has gotten time to play with another child because he's mostly playing with us or Rita and doesn't yet have baby friends. I figured he wouldn't take much notice of Gus but in fact, he reacted at times with giggles and eagerness as Gus got on the floor to play and at other times with whines and fussiness when Gus got a little too close for comfort. But overall, they did great together. Gus showed Eli how to crawl properly - tummy off the floor- and Eli really perfected it over the weekend. Gus let Eli touch his Winnie The Pooh fire engine but only for a minute or two. And the both got plenty of loving from aunts, uncles and grandparents over the last few days.






Alan and I have really enjoyed just spending time in a Malaria-free environment with sidewalks and crisp air. It's funny how very small things feel like such luxuries. One of the first things I did when I got home was to take Eli for a walk in his stroller around the neighborhood...something that is impossible to do where we live in Ghana. And it was so much fun to bundle him up, as he's never felt the cold outside air before. I even managed to make this hat for him.


We realized that Eli had never felt leaves before so after we plopped him down in some leaf piles he soon became enthralled with them, even tasting a few.


Just as Eli is getting comfortable being an Athenian, we're going to whisk off to Colombia today to visit Alan's family who have been deprived of their grandson for 6 months now. Eli sure is the world traveler and his momma is getting pretty good at packing and unpacking for a 7 month old.

Getting Dirty

To distract ourselves from our disappointment about having no passports to go home as scheduled, we were invited to a Braai (South African BBQ) at Alan's boss, Rob's, house. They often host braai's and they're always great fun. We really just relax, watch Rob as he man's the BBQ, and then we eat loads of food.

Yesterday we were joined by Rob and Julie's friends and their daughter and granddaughter who were visiting Ghana from Johannesburg. The little girl was almost 2 and so it was fun to have the two kids together and watching them play and share toys.




The highlight of the day for us was when Eli discovered grass and dirt in Rob and Julie's front lawn. We realized that because we live in this cement compound and there are no parks to go to in Accra, Eli has never seen dirt or felt grass (which is actually quite sad). But once he felt it, there was no stopping him. He just sat there grabbing the grass and rubbing his hands through the dirt and couldn't have been happier. He really got dirty for the first time (I'm sure the first of many times).

No Passport... No Going Home

In Ghana, when your passport is stuck at the immigration office, you can bet that your travel plans will be disrupted. And in fact, that is just what happened to us this week. Eli and I have been anticipating our trip home tomorrow for weeks now and I had already even begun to pack up because I was so excited to visit family and get a reprieve from Ghana for a bit. Our passports have been with the immigration office for 2 months and for 2 months Alan has followed up with the coordinator of travel at his work about the passports.  On Thursday we still didn't have our passports and our worry really increased but we were told we would have them in time. Then on Friday at 3pm, we still didn't have them. Then at 4pm, we still didn't have them. And at 5 we realized that Eli and I will be delayed getting home, could potentially miss Thanksgiving with my family, and might just miss seeing my brother, sister-in-law and nephew. But, all of this is so insignificant in a country where things don't work consistently, people die every day due to other people's incompetencies or ineptitude or even because they didn't bribe someone fast enough, and peoples lives are disrupted 10 fold to this because someone didn't do their job or follow instructions.

We were promised that we would be getting our passports on Monday and so we will cross our fingers that this happens and we can catch a flight to Atlanta via JFK on Monday night arriving on Tuesday, just in time for Thanksgiving.

New Accomplishments and New Toys

The last week has been full of new and exciting things for Eli and his parents. Eli has really gotten the hang of pulling himself up mostly in his crib which posed all sorts of new worries for us since each time he makes it up he also had to get back down. This usually means a crash against the sides of his crib which started to leave bruises and scratches on the boy. He started to look like we were abusing him. So with some quick sewing, I managed to make some colorful padding around his crib so now when he falls, he's a little more cushioned.



He is also working on standing although he hasn't yet mastered crawling (hands and knees style). He spends much of the day in this position.



As Eli gets more and more advanced with his skills, we've noticed that some of his toys seem to be boring him and so he's been looking around the house for new ones. The other day, when I thought Alan was watching him and he thought I was watching him, Eli made it into our bedroom and then into our bathroom and pulled all of my hair clips out of the cupboard and started playing with them. This was in a matter of minutes. Of course we got scared and realized that all of his new accomplishments mean we've got to become more watchful.

Thankfully, I saw an ad in our local expat email listing that someone was selling baby items and the timing was perfect. Because we cannot run to Target and pick up the next baby gadget or toy, we have to wait patiently until someone decides to sell something they no longer need here. I managed to acquire a baby gate/play yard to help contain Eli a bit when we cannot be so watchful and some fancy new toys that he immediately pounced on.





Of course the simplest of toys...pure sunlight shining on the floor is just as much fun according to Eli.



And during this last week, we finally properly hung Eli's mosquito net which was prompted by him grabbing hold of the net and sucking on it through the bars of the crib. Now he can barely reach it and is much more interested in standing up in his crib anyway!




I figured I'd finish this post with a preview of what's to come...