Pool side

Luka helping to fill the pool 

We've pretty much established than ever since the little man made his early arrival, he has been tremendously blessed.  We've been over the concept of privilege for even being able to evacuate, to being able to access world-class health care.  Bottom line, we continue to be blessed and fortunate in ways many are not - this weekend was no exception.  Our friend and neighbor has taken the lead on constructing our communal pool in Dili, and this weekend we got to reap the benefits of the labor by watching the pool be filled.  Fortunately for us, Luka was there to lend a much-needed hand....

The boys' first splash in the new pool

Mountain-bound to Maubisse

Trouble on two wheels... 

Since a friend and colleague was melting in front of our eyes (he's an East Coaster in some desperate need of 'fall weather'), a group of us decided to pack up and head to the mountains for the long weekend last week.  Here's three things I learned from that trip:

1. Friends don't let friends travel with toddlers alone
2. Yes, we can in fact survive an entire weekend without nannies
3. I want a motorcycle again

Now let's see, where could they have gotten this from? 

On Friday morning (somewhere between 09h00-11h00) we finally set off, the (big) boys on motorbikes, and the (small boys) and girls in two cars - which meant Luka and I were headed off solo - armed with a bucket load of Cheerios, a mountain of Marie biscuits and an iPod full of nursery rhymes for the 2-4 hour drive (roads are terrible, and people's speeds vary so much it is hard to get a good estimate at any given time of how long a particular course would actually take you).

The drive for us was uneventful - Luka fell asleep for 2 hours and I relished in the enjoyable (terrible roads notwithstanding) long drive, by myself, with a sleeping angel, good music and cool weather to match the winding roads up the hillsides.  We briefly stopped for lunch (read: chasing 3 boys around a local restaurant filled with dogs and other interesting things, and trying skillfully to wee in a less-than-stellar bathroom with said boys in tow), and arrived in Maubisse at the Pousada shortly after lunch time.

"My Supreme Court Justice-at-lunch impersonation"

At the Pousada we were thrilled to find that we actually had rooms (apparently reservation doesn't mean much at this destination-with-a-view) and cold beers soon ensued.

The rest of the weekend was spent hanging out on our porch where they boys played (and Luka tried to escape either through the door, or by climbing over the strategically placed cooler boxes at the entrance to the porch).  The guys went motorbiking, we did some sight seeing, and generally just chilled out.  Evenings were spent drinking copious quantities of wine, debating the (then) upcoming American election, and all things toddler-hood.  Very nice to sit on a porch in cool fall-like air with awesome friends. 

Kaito showing up the Timorese kids with his skills

"I'm telling you, I KNOW that's where
they hide the cookies...just follow me!"

"Whoa dad!"

"Faster! Faster!"

The Kaito Kiss

Luka is super fortunate to have some of the most awesome friends here in Dili.  Only in an expat setting can you have seven nationalities between 3 babies....one of Luka's closest friends is a Japanese-American named Kaito.  We had the pleasure of spending a lovely Friday evening of sunset drinks on the beach with Kaito and his parents - where Luka decided to try out his new 'kissing' skills.  Kaito was less than impressed see Exhibit B.

"If you do that again, I'll punch you!"

Dili International School

Deep down inside we are VERY nervous....

Apparently there comes a time in everyone's life...when the eternal educational wheel starts turning.  For some it is brief, for others a rather extended walk through life (my mother got her PhD in her 50s)...but nonetheless - we all have to start somewhere.  And so, Master Luka started at the Dili International School Pre-school a few months ago (yes his mother is only now getting around to sharing this groundbreaking news with you).

Now, trying to get Luka to appreciate the notion of 'circle time'
will take some doing....

'now why would I sit in a stupid circle when there are
playground equipment to conquer??'

'...afterall, I have a perfectly good view of the "circle" from here'

Essentially there are a few international schools in Dili.  The one that Luka frequents is commonly referred to as the 'Australian school' for following the curriculum from our friends down under, and staffed mainly by Australian teachers; whereas there is also an American and Portuguese school in town.

And then of course, nothing makes you as hungry as
'learning'!

I visited the pre-school with my mother-in-law shortly before they left Timor in August to get an educated opinion (she is after all an educational psychologist) and she was very positive and impressed about the setup.  So Chris and I decided that, despite not necessarily wanting to send Luka to school before he was 18 months old, the combination of his energy, and exploratory desire to learn things - that he was in fact, ready to start a more structured form of stimulation.  He goes 3 mornings a week and gets to hang out with Ms. Glau and all the friends doing circle time, painting, singing (his favorite is the dancing!~)

We have been absolutely amazed at how fast he learns and makes associations.  He is really starting to listen to requests, and instructions - which in the case of such a passionate little person, is a good thing ;)

Planting a vegetable garden

Helping!

I know there has to be a cookie in here
somewhere!!

 I've always said, of all the cool things I've been fortunate enough to do in life, eating food from my own garden was one of the most incredible experiences.  Those who have followed our previous blog on our kitchen adventures in Afghanistan may recall that we had a lovely vegetable garden in Kabul which provided us with abundant tomatoes, lettuce and plenty of other goodies.  So, I've decided to give it a 'go' one more time in Dili.  While I won't have my trusty chowkidor to assist, I am happy to report, I have a new, willing helper!  Luka and his friends had a blast digging in the dirt, disorganizing our seed stash, and of course - driving the biggest garden tools he could find!

What friends are for, procurement

They say a good friend will help you move, a great friend will help you move a body... okay, this is not quite as dramatic as that, but close...

Bottom line, more often than not my friends amaze me.  Like the time a friend from high school in South Africa, whom I haven't been in touch with for close to 2 dozen years, sends me care packages in the NICU in Darwin - from South Korea.  Or when friends in Dili would drive all the way up the hill to once again explain to the cleaning lady not to feed Gus litter sand.  Or, when my girlfriend and classmate from Oxford rocked up with a fresh organic Turkey for  Luka's first Thanksgiving (and eight Scotch Fillets, cranberry sauce, you know the drill...).

If you know who I am am referring to, you will also know that Auntie Becca looooves a challenge - and so I suppose it should be no real surprise when this is the image that emerged from the Dili airport last weekend when I picked her up at 07h00 on a Friday morning. ..

Princess Rebecca and the cot mattress emerge from
the Dili customs - I think they remembered her
from last time :)

Yes, in case you were wondering - that is a full-size, or shall I say 'standard size' infant cot mattress (inner spring of course, not the sponge type) from Australia.  Said mattress was procured in Canberra, nearly missed its flight to Darwin, then spent the night taking a taxi from the Darwin airport into town, and back to the airport only to spend the night sleeping next to Becca on the floor of the Darwin airport for the 05h00 flight to Dili.  Seriously.

Of course, Luka was SO excited and overwhelmed, he proceeded to vomit all over the mattress that first night - for the first time ever in bed mind you.  He just couldn't take the anticipation I suppose ;)

Thank you becca! We have disposed of the toxic piece of sponge he has been laying his sweet head on for the past few months.  Who knew Australia's 'standard' is different than everyone else's 'standard' cot??

Dili Bub Club 26 February 2012

In case you haven't noticed, there was a slight 'baby explosion' in Dili.  Yes, yes, we realize many of you think this is a 'post-conflict' country - just keep thinking that, so we can keep it all to ourselves.  In actual fact, it is a thriving community of young families all battling the unknowns of parenthood together, which from time-to-time does feel like post-conflict!

Here is a group shot of some of the regulars, and newer members of the Dili Bub Club!

Members of the Dili Bub Club hanging out
at the Irish Embassy

Double Trouble

Luka and neighbor/twin/partner-in-crime on their way to Nicole's for 'parent group' (read: and excuse to get together for a cappuccino on a Tuesday and steal 30-minutes with Luka during an early lunch).

By the looks of it, Luka was quite thrilled to have some company in the backseat!

Me and my homey off on an adventure!

  

Bub Club #2: Introducing 'arts & crafts'

The calm before the storm....

Dili Bub Club #2 was hosted by the awesome hosts - Nicole, Fiona, Amelia, Angelica and Luca.  We gathered at their gorgeous home in Dili to, well...how to say this lightly - completely wreck it!  Afterall, what do you get when you take 10 babies stripped down to nothing but their nappies, large swaths of construction paper, a bucket of jello, plenty of bubble wrap, four different color paints (non-toxic of course), and cherry red play dough - that's right - most people's worst nightmare.  But not if you are Nicole and Fiona.  With three little ones under the age of two (that would be the lovely Miss Amelia, and her twin siblings, cool as a cucumber Luca, and feisty Miss Angelica), they make it all look so much easier than I often feel with only one!

The storm... Picasso, make way for Lukasso!

The idea was to introduce the babies to the concept of 'texture' - and boy did they get a big kick out of that.  Everyone stripped down to their nappies, and were set free on the floor filled with cleverly positioned construction paper, paint, bubble wrap, and other textures taped to the floor. The Bubs crawled and clamored over each other to get to stick their hands in the bucket of jello, play with (okay, and taste) the play dough, and smear paint on the back of huge topo-maps taped to the shiny tile floor.

It was absolutely fascinating to watch the babies explore the various textures, tastes and sensations.  And explore they did - between enjoying his first 'jello shots' and me scraping the play dough off the roof of his mouth after spying a suspicious red coating lining the top of his mouth when he leaned back during a belly laugh, there was plenty of 'exploring' and 'experiencing' going on.  Watching their little brains firing and just taking it all in reminded me of the wonder and honor of watching the process of a little person growing into a big person.

For little ones, they did quite well with the whole 'big kid activities', considering all but two are still under one year of age, so the notion of 'arts and crafts's' and heck, even fine motor skills, remain somewhat of a mystery - yet, they each enjoyed the experience in their own special way.  For Luka, this meant immediately diving into the paints, then trying to throw the entire bucket of jello out of the floor, then exploring his talents as a make-up artist by diligently painting Miss Maya's face both with the paint brush, and his paw print (Video Here), and finally ripping the topo maps on the floor to shreds at the end of the day (mommy, just helping to clean up!)

My first coach: swim lesson in Dili

Lining up for instructions from
Coach Meg

Well, it had to happen sometime - Luka has his first 'coach', and not surprisingly - it involved water.  Apart from a few dodgy weeks in the tub when he was about 3 months old (might have had something to do with the sudden onset of freezing exit air in Cape Town versus what he was used to in Darwin), the boy has always loved water.  And while he has spent about as much time in the water as out of it since moving to Dili, he finally had his first official swim lesson yesterday.  We did a combination of stationary exercises followed by a number of movements around the pool in which the babies were transferred from front to back, encouraged to kick, paddle, and float.  For a brief video, click HERE.

Making the rounds

Members of the Dili Bub Club joined at chez twins+1 for their first structured swim lesson with a very competent and experienced instructor from Australia named Meg.  With seven babies in the pool, it was not for the faint of heart, but Meg walked us through the basics of floating on the back, the front, putting the face in the water, passing the baby from one person to another to get them used to being submerged. Luka clung to me like a nut hanging onto my hair (and earrings) for dear life when on his back, but when on the front, was happily laughing and kicking up a storm.

Practicing blowing bubbles

A great initiative, and definitely beneficial to bubs and parents alike, can't wait for next Wednesday!

Inaugural Dili "Bub Club" event

When you live in a tiny island nation in the middle of nowhere, there tends to be a lack of organized kids gyms, classes, and other group events (among other laking amenities, mind you).  From our perspective though, this simply means more opportunity to be creative and figure out how to survive this babyhood sans Ikea, pediatricians and the FDA (I did notice today that drugs here are sold conspicuously closer to their expiration date than manufacturing date, and that Listerine bottles do not have child-proof caps - and people wonder why we need full-time nannies to watch our children??)

Some of the babies at the inaugural 'Dili Bub Club'

Anyway, back to the point of baby groups.  When we were in South Africa, Chris, Luka and I attended a few classes of an organization called Kindermusik.  As the title indicates, this involves kinders and musik.  I was so impressed with the whole approach that for a fleeting moment considered doing a course to become an official instructor - then remembered - right - 'working mother' and did what I have had to learn to do so often recently, lowered my expectations (of myself that is).  Truth be told, I would love to do a course to teach me how to adequately stimulate my child, but reality is that I don't have the time.  Instead, all the working moms in Dili came up with a concept to do a once-a-week gathering of babies (mostly Class of 2011, with a few honorary members from 2010 thrown in).  The idea is that we would get together at a volunteer's house every Sunday afternoon to engage in a baby-oriented activity.  The host would be responsible for 'facilitating' the activity which can range from music-oriented, to yoga, to a walk, to massage, to cooking, swimming - whatever they feel comfortable with, so long as the focus is on stimulating the little ones.  For s short clip from today click HERE.

For today's class, I downloaded a bunch of Kindermusik and other baby play songs from iTunes, and put together a simple program of approximately 20min.  The idea is that the group sit in a circle, babies on lap, or in front of the parent, and we sing songs to which we can gesture, sway, or play.  We used rattles, standing and swaying, blankets to do peek-a-boo, and physical touch with our babies.  All eight babies seem to love the experience, often squealing with glee.  

I did take a step back from the whole group for a minute and caught myself thinking how different my life is, as I watched this explosion of babies take over my living room...what a ride it's been!

  

Play nice...

 It has been so interesting watching Luka and his peers develop their own sense of 'self'.  We believe that all the interaction with other kids will (hopefully) lay the foundation for important notions like 'sharing', 'empathy' and other traits I suppose every parent aspires their children to have.  For the time being though the whole sense of where 'you' begin and where 'I' end is not always so clear.

Once upon a time there were two little boys who loved
to hang out together and play 

From time to time the two little boys would have a
disagreement about who's turn it was to play with
the toy...

And so they would have to sort it out
the only way boys know how...

...by strongly voicing displeasure at the
current state of things!

...with requisite retaliation of course.

Sri Lanka Shenanigans

Luka the main flirt. 

What better way to spend a day than lounging at the beach/spa/pool of a nice hotel with awesome people.  Luka agrees.

Camp Luka, poolside.

A few of us invaded the pool of the Mt. Lavinia Hotel on the coast of Colombo.  Many Lion Lagers and a bottle of Arrack (thanks Leo and Sara) later - we were pretty well established poolside.  Luka was loving all the attention, swimmig, jumping on everyone.  Alas, even this ever-ender has to 'recharge' (what we call 'sleeping' in this house) for which the PeadPod came in every so handy.

Look how big I am now since we took the train to
Edinburgh in July, autie Sara!

:)

Hangin' with my peeps

One of the nice things about living in Dili during the recent baby-boom is that there is plenty opportunity for socializing (for both bubs and 'rents alike).  Tuesdays at Nicole's has become somewhat of an institution - no less for the great company than for the great coffee (fabulous espresso or cappuccino) and awesome cookies.

What is great is it seems to benefit everyone - parents (many of whom steal away from work to say hello to their bubs), nannies (who all know each other and hang out) and of course, the little ones - whom most of which have just come into a place of development now where they are actually noticing other babies around them.

Here is Luka with buddy Morrison - his Australian-South-African brother (with a daddy who is 6foot 4 (at least) no wonder he is Luka's size despite being two months his junior!)

Hey there mate! 

Baby yoga

Downward facing bub!  (And yes, I will once again touch my
toes....)

Getting a baby to do anything
on cue is a challenge, getting
him to do it for 45 minutes, is
a miracle.  All the bubs did
remarkably well!

The benefits of yoga is well established, as is the benefits of pre- and post-natal yoga.  I, for one, continued to practice specially adapted yoga classes throughout my pregnancy and believe that it helped tremendously not only during labor and birth, but also in the post-delivery phase.  Needless to say, immediately following our delivery there was not much time to spend in downward dog since all my waking time was spent shuttling to and from the hospital, but I resumed my practice in Cape Town as soon as it was viable.  I have found many wonderful resources on DVD that I highly recommend, including Shiva Rae's post-natal class.
If you plan on doing yoga during and after pregnancy (especially after a C-section) it as advisable to consult your doctor. As with most exercise however, if you are a regular practitioner, and use common sense - you should be fine.  Either way, doing yoga helps with balance, core strengthening and the much-needed relaxation and 'me time' so needed by moms-to-be and new-moms alike.  I finally got into my groove with spinning, yoga and pilates after joining a gym in Cape Town and spent the last month of my maternity leave working out almost daily.  What a difference it made in my emotional and physical well-being.

As moves go though, it  pains me to say however, that since relocating back to Dili, I have managed to do absolutely zero exercise (unless you count the unpacking, shopping, hauling of baby equipment (and baby) up and down the stairs, and general sauna-like environs we live in).  So I am thrilled to say that Luka and I joined the lovely ladies from our prenatal pilates class for a morning of baby yoga at the lovely Ba Futura rooftop training facility in Dili. Hosted by new-mom and super-yogi Ms. Tanya.  We were thrilled to share the stage with the likes of all the lovely new bubs in town (sans a few still in route from Darwin!)  What a lovely experience to meet all the little ones outside their mommies' bellies, which is where they all were last time we were together in spandex.  The benefits of yoga for babies are also very well established as excellent for improving digestion, working against stiffness (very common in ex-preemies), and in establishing that bond between mother and baby thanks to the gift of touch.

Tanya walked us through a series of massage techniques, then moved through a number if simple baby-yoga stretches, hip openers, cross-overs and other soothing and stimulating poses before shifting focus to the moms with a few twists, downward-facing dogs and other basic poses.  I look forward to seeing how we all grow and develop together.


What a pleasure to see everyone together once again.  Let's keep it up ladies - and I'm serious, perhaps a baby yoga retreat to Tibar?

Beach Bum

Hey, who's the hotty?  Sporting my new sunnies and hat
(not shown in the photo - the insane amount of sunscreen
mommy slathered on me before we left the house!)

Hanging with my homey Adrian.

One of the few benefits of living on a tropical island with 30C/90+F and 90+% humidity weather all the time is the fabulous beach accessories one can invest in.  And so, it only seemed fitting to ensure that our latest edition is not left behind.  When we wandered off to his first beach foray this past Saturday it took all our self-control not to pack the beach tent, matching picnic blanket or the tent, stroller, and peapod sleep tent, in addition to the Baby Bjorn bouncer and funky hat and sunnies (h/t Rebecca) that we did take.

Hey, how's a boy supposed to get ahead without being stylish?

My first swim

Luka loving every minute of his first swim!

After moving to the Tropics a few days ago, Luka has had to deal with an introduction to all sorts of incredible creatures.  To list a few, these have included: his toes (not seen for six months); mosquitoes (to be avoided at all times); his sweat glands (also, non-functional bar a few hours outside the NICU in Darwin in April); and now today - the best of them all, the swimming pool.

'Splish splash I was taking a ...swim'

We took Luka over to his good friend (and near twin (corrected)), Adrian to play in his neighbor's pool.  Since Luka has spent the last four months in a place where only seals and migrating whales like to swim (I am convinced because they get some travel discount), it was officially his first swim outside mommy's over-sized sunken tub in the bathroom.  Needless to say his ouma had him well prepared for the event and we had a number of bathing suits to choose from.  We went for the island/surfer-dude boy look in a stylish vertical stripe number in blue and white.

Adrian looks like he is saying 'stop
splashing me or I'll punch you!'

To say that he enjoyed the cool water after the (unfortunately non-air-conditioned) ride over to Adrian's house is an understatement as he practically leaped in the water.  He stayed in for at least thirty minutes, splashing, kicking - and yes, splashing Adrian and others around him.  The activity was promptly followed by a nap on mommy's shoulder.  I think a repeat will be in order in the coming days.

Welcome Home Luka!

With Luka in front of our house just outside Dili

When we arrived at our house in Dili, we had a lovely surprise waiting for us to make Luka feel extra welcome.  Thanks to Meredith and Krista (as well as all the little Harries' helpers!).

Luka with the three Harries brothers - we can almost call them
cousins - I am sure they will teach Luka all about being a boy
in Dili

Luka meets Adrian, born 10 days after Luka's due date, so
practically twins!