i think we might be weird...

so i've been thinking about our move to the US for a while now (since we were planning on coming in december) and i've come to the conclusion that we might be weird when we move back. we'll do things like use cloth diapers, have a garden to grow our own vegetables, compost, conserve water, hang our clothes out to dry instead of using a dryer. these are things that i used to make fun of my mom for - and now it'll be me. we do all of those things here and it seems so normal. well, we don't have a garden but that's because fresh fruits and veggies are right up the street. and all this stuff that we do is more out of necessity or to save money, but now it seem weird to me to dry clothes in the dryer if you can hang them up instead or to use disposable diapers when the cloth ones are clean. it seems wasteful to throw away paper and banana peels instead of putting them in the compost bucket or to take a really long, hot shower (even though i loooove doing that and probably still will). so we'll probably keep doing these things, even when we don't have to. and now i'll be weird like my mom was. maybe i can pass it on to hiba.

moving on....

so, some big changes in our life. well, really just one - we're leaving palestine on nov. 16. yes, like in eleven days.

we had an appointment to extend our visas through december last week. we really weren't worried about it and figured that since we have a one-way ticket to leave in two months, they would give us the extension. well, we were denied. and they gave us two weeks to leave. so, we either have to overstay our visa or leave by nov. 16.

the problem with overstaying our visa is that when we leave, we would probably get blacklisted and not allowed into israel/palestine for at least five years. before we actually got denied, we had said we were just going to stay no matter what. but when we actually had the decision to make and thought through the actual consequences, we realized that we should probably leave. so after a night of prayer and talking it through, we've decided that leaving is the right thing to do.

so, in less than two weeks we'll be back in the US. it's a very bitter-sweet decision. on the one hand, we only had another six weeks after that anyway, so it's not so hard to say good-bye. plus we're going back to family and friends and the comforts of living in our home country. but on the other hand, we have a very short time to say good-bye to our friends and "family" here, people who we have spent the last three years of our life with, the place where we have started our family. not to mention all the stuff we have to do in order to actually leave in less than two weeks.

we'll try to keep everyone updated as we make decisions. we're looking forward to finding out what is next for us....

Happy Halloween!

people don't really celebrate halloween here, but there were enough americans around to make it a fun day. first, we dressed up hiba and matthias and went to rachel's to make carmel apples.

hiba was a ballerina.

matthias was a pumpkin....

...who was a little happier in his daddy's arms than in a chair.

making carmel apples at rachel's.

matthias missing all the excitement.

then we stopped by erich and candice's for a while. hiba and opal were dressed the same, so we tried to get a few pictures - they weren't so interested though.

we had fun eating the carmel apples and playing.

later, jason and i went to a halloween party. he dressed up as the mayor of beit sahour and i went as our friend andrew. my costume was pretty good, although the clothes had been recently washed and didn't smell bad, so it wasn't exactly like andrew. :-P jason's costume was a huge hit at the party, as most of our friends like the mayor just as much as we do.

Zeus and Pictures

"matthias" is quite a big name for a little guy. so he needs a nickname. we don't really want to call him matt, so we came up with zeus. well, jason came up with zeus. it's easy for hiba to say and it makes sense with his name. how does it make sense with his name? well, glad you asked. here's how...

in beit sahour, most people don't pronounce "th", they say "z" instead. so "matthias" would become "mazias". nicknames for babies are usually made by replacing vowels with an "oo" sound. so, "hiba" would become "hiboo" and "mazias" would become "mazoos". hence the nickname "zeus".

anyway, i tried to upload pictures, but apparently our internet isn't fast enough. so, you can see pictures from this fall here. enjoy!

where does the time go?

so it's only been two and half weeks since my last post (which is actually kind of a long time), but so much has happened in that time. really, i feel like we've had matthias forever, although he's only a month old. time flies when you're having fun, right? so here is the run-down of the last couple of weeks....

-paidia built a ropes course. the first one in palestine. it's pretty awesome. we had a contractor come over from the US for a week to help build it. when he got here, of course everything went wrong and things weren't ready, so in the end they had three days to build it. and they got it done. you can see pictures and videos on paidia's website.

-my mom came to visit. she was actually here for the ropes course building, which was excellent since jason worked at least 12 hours each day that week. i had so much fun having her here. she played with hiba, taught her song, held matthias, made us dinners, cleaned my house....it was great. it made me really excited to be moving closer to family. and i know that when we live there the novelty of seeing us will wear off and i won't get my house cleaned and meals cooked all the time, but hiba and matthias will get to know their grandparents and aunts and uncles and that is exciting.

-hiba started talking. and doesn't really stop. ever. she babbles a lot, but also learns new words every day. she knows a lot of food words (her favorite category), lots of her toys, some animals, names, body parts, and random words she hears. she only speaks in english, but the people at daycare insist that she understands arabic too. and she seems to when jason or saleem talk to her. she seems so grown up now, between having a new baby around and having her talking all the time.

-matthias turned one month. he's a growing boy! literally - he weighs 5.6 kilos, which is 12.3 pounds. he is huge. he has started smiling every once in a while, but still mostly sleeps and eats. i think he is much more of a home body than hiba ever was, because he is on a perfect schedule if we're home all day, but not so great if we're not. it's fun to see already how he is going to be different than hiba.

-we bought our plane tickets. we are coming back to the US on december 30. now that it's official, it's weird that we're leaving. i'm excited and sad, but i still feel like it is time for us to leave here. we're flying out of amman instead of tel aviv, which could be a fun adventure. or it could be the worst idea ever, since it means more border crossings and a hotel with two kids. we'll see.

my next post will be filled with cute pictures and maybe video clips of my adorable kids. i know you're all holding your breath....