I've been having this same conversation with myself almost every night for the past 3 or 4 weeks. It's getting to the point where I think I may need to take away my own computer privileges or put myself in time out or something. This is ridiculous.
But actually I haven't been sleeping well the last 3 or 4 weeks because Eleni's been teething again. Poor little thing never gets just one at a time. This is our second round of teething, so far 3 have popped out this time around bringing us to a total of 9 teeth (finally) and they're all big molars. We'll see if there are still more to follow.
Not a fun time for our little munchkin.
Also not such a fun time for Mommy, but only because Eleni's decided she really likes sleeping in bed with us lately.
I'm not a big fan of this arrangement. She's a wiggler. And a furnace.
It think it's already crap that I have to share the bed with her father who is also a furnace, and a snorer....snoring? No this is more like the sound of a dull chainsaw hacking through a thousand year old tree....
So yeah, a wiggler, a chainsaw and all at the comfy, cozy temperature of 10,000 degrees. Good times!
I'm really hoping this is a temporary situation and she's just doing this because she's wanting some extra cuddles while all these massive teeth make their appearance. But I guess we'll see.....
And not only do we have some new teeth but we also have some new words! Actually, not just some. She says over 30 words now!! Here's the list:
Baba
Daddy
Mama
Mom
Mommy
Papa (for Grandpa)
Yiayia ('Grandma' in Greek)
Papou (Grandpa in Greek)
Nonos ('Godfather in Greek)
Nonai (also 'Godfather' in Greek)
Yianni (the name of a lot of men)
Baby
Babi (a friend's name)
Hi
Bye bye
Ya (for 'hi' and 'bye' in Greek)
Yeah
Yes
Nai ('yes' in Greek)
No
Uh-oh
Cheese
Cookie
Tickle tickle
Tick tock
Shoes
Ball
Happy
Ti ('what' in Greek)
Pou ('where' in Greek)
Kako ('bad' in Greek)
Kaka ('poo' in Greek...yep)
Poo (yep, thanks for that Katrine)
Pee
Kitty
Cat
Mooo (for a cow noise)
She's chatty! And Mommy is SO proud because this is just amazing considering she's only 14 months old and she's learning 2 languages at the same time. Oh, she also said her first sentence last week....."Mommy NO!" Good girl!
And now after all this bragging I'm realizing that I don't actually have any news about anything other than my child......and that's probably why my parents are the only people that bother reading this blog....
Anyway, I'll try to be a bit more social in the next few days so I have some non-baby-related material to entertain you with. Until then, I'm not quite done with the bragging....she's also learning how to use a fork and a spoon!
Today I was thinking
about children’s toys. Do you remember that one where you pull the handle and
an arrow spins around in a circle, in the circle are a bunch of animals and
when the arrow lands on one it makes the animal noise for that animal? I don’t
remember what it was called, a Speak and Say or something like that? Anyway I
had one of these as a kid and I loved it. But then I got to thinking….what’s
the Greek one like?
Yes even though it's clear that animals within the same species speak the same language, us humans have taken it upon ourselves to butt in and mess everything up with our own culturally specific interpretations. In other words: animals in Canada speak English while animals in Greece speak Greek. There are a few exceptions where an animal noise is the same in both of our countries....but I'm sure if you ask a Greek they'll tell you that's because that animal noise originated in Greece and we stole it from them...
Now I don’t even know if
this toy exists in Greece but if it did, it would sound like this:
Cat: Niaou-niaou
Dog: Guv-guv
Bird: this depends on
the size of the bird, a small one: tsiou tsiou; a big one: kra kra
Rooster: Kikiriku (get
a Greek person to make this noise…it’ll make your day)
Cow: Moo (yay, we agree on this one!! But I guess this means "moo" isn't technically an English word???)
Horse: they don’t
imitate the horse apparently…yeah I’m skeptical too so I’m still looking into
it
Sheep: Mae-eee
Pig: I couldn't get a straight answer about this one either but that might be because they were thrown by my oinking....
Frog: Quak-quak (I’m
serious)
Duck: Pa-pa-pa
Turkey: Glou-glou
So apparently Greek cows can carry on conversation with English speaking cows no problem, and Greek frogs can chat up Canadian ducks.... I know. This is important stuff. You're welcome. But before we go ahead and roll our eyes at how weird the Greeks are, remember that we think a rooster says "cock-a-doodle-doo"......
Antonis took Eleni for a walk the other morning so I could get some things done around the house.
So after 30 minutes of completely uninterrupted house cleaning
...which was bliss by the way...
Eleni brought me this
The most beautiful flower I've ever gotten!
I also made pizza buns this week
Both my taste testers approved so they'll be making a regular appearance in the Mallis house
I realize I put a lot of pictures on here of Eleni eating. Why do I do this? Because I love watching her eat! For one I know I'm giving her healthy foods that will keep her healthy and make her grow, so when she's really enjoying the food I make for her I just get a warm fuzzy feeling all over. But also....she's just so funny! She gets it everywhere! And she doesn't care. I'm a bit envious of that actually....imagine sitting down to eat and just enjoying your food so much that you rub it all over your face and in your hair, maybe you throw a little around, and to have no one judge you or think it's weird in any way? How awesome that would be!
I promise if you invite me over for dinner I will absolutely follow protocol and use my manners at all times.
Eleni however....not gonna happen. You're just going to have to find a way to enjoy the show, like I do.
I made her tortellini with
SUPER VEGGIE SAUCE
The tortellini was store bought and white, which I don't normally like to give her but once in a while we can break the rules a bit.
The sauce is homemade though and really easy, I just sauteed a tomato, bit of onion,
garlic, spinach, carrot and some peas until everything was really soft, added some basil and oregano, a little bit of feta cheese, and then whizzed the whole thing up with a hand blender. Done!
That's my Super Veggie Sauce.
I never use tomato sauce from a jar anymore. Eleni's not really a picky eater but there are a few vegetables that are not really her favourite so if I can hide them in something, like a sauce, she'll eat them.
The hidden veggie here was spinach. You probably guessed that though.
I like to make it really thick, I just use a bit olive oil for sauteing. Sometimes I'll add some water if it's come out too thick and chunky but usually I spoon feed her the left over sauce anyway so it's better if it has some texture....she's not a big fan of runny 'baby' food since she's a big girl now.
You can use whatever vegetables you want, it really doesn't matter. Eleni's eaten every version of Super Veggie Sauce I've ever put in front of her, with or without the cheese, and she's always happy.
She also has some apple and banana juice in her sippy cup (homemade again, she rarely gets store bought juice), normally if I give her the juice I have to wait until the end of the meal or else she won't bother with eating, she just wants the juice. Not when there's pasta on the menu though!
Last Saturday we went for a walk in the morning. We had some gifts to buy (2 weddings, a baptism and a birthday...I think we're going to have to drop some of our friends, they're getting too expensive). We also bought some bubbles for Eleni so we stopped to have a break and blow some bubbles.
She thought they were magical
So here are some pictures from the wedding/baptism from last Saturday.
Our friends Tsaki and Kasia were married and their daughter Danae was baptized at the same time.
We were too late to see the wedding unfortunately...I've been dying to get some video of the old ladies whipping rice at the married couple, it's hysterical. They're hysterical. It's painful, trust me I've been there, but so funny to watch them wind up like pro baseball players and double over laughing when they smoke the poor couple. When Antonis and I were married it took me 2 days to get all the rice out of my hair and we didn't even have a church wedding. They get even more into it when it's a church wedding.
Anyway. Next time.
We made it for the whole baptism though, so this is little Danae with her beautiful mommy Kasia
Stavros is her Godfather.
He's so serious right now. A rare moment for our Stavro.
A little video of the baptism.
Danae started to cry and it made me want to cry so I decided to go on a little adventure.
I found a secret door.
Behind that secret door was a secret staircase.
I went up the secret staircase and what did I find?
A secret balcony!
There was a beautiful after party arranged at Panselianos Hotel. We were working that night though so we missed the dinner and dancing unfortunately.
Actually what's even more unfortunate is that we had a group of 40 Turkish people booked to come into the taverna that night at 8:30.
They arrived at 9:30.
We didn't have live Greek music.
They were told by the travel agent that we would have live Greek music even though we told the travel agent we couldn't book musicians because there were none available that night.
The travel agent told us the group was fine with that.
But they were not.
They were never even given that message.
So they left.
We had food ready for 40 people but because the travel agent told everyone what they wanted to hear about the live music situation, all 40 people got back on the bus and left.
It was devastating.
To the travel agent: Katerina Whoeveryouare in Petra....bad karma is coming your way.
Anyway, since we didn't have 40 Turkish people to feed and clean up after, we were out of the restaurant early enough to catch the tail end of the wedding reception...the very tail end of it. Actually we were there in time to get the message that everyone was ready to go into Molyvos for a drink.
So off we went to Manta Bar
Joseph and Joseph
Lefteris and Joseph
(sorry some of these are dark and/or blurry...I over indulged in the wine that night and couldn't figure out how to use my camera like a normal person)
Cute seating area outside Manta.
There's a few tables under the tree, and also pillows on the steps for seating as well.
Very laid back and cozy.
My dates for the night.
Antonis, Vangelis, Joseph, Joseph and Lefteris.
Vangelis and I dancing to Spanish music, at a Polish/Greek wedding in Greece
Joseph and Antonis...I really don't know what's going on here.
