Summer Hair

I knew this year that we wouldn't be visiting the barber as frequently as I'd like.  In the States, I have a pretty awesome hair trimmer that I use for the boys' hair every other month or so.  I occasionally trim Z's hair myself, and when she wants a more drastic change we head to the nearest inexpensive salon. (Years of crooked Barbie hair has taught me to seek professional help for more specific styles.) B prefers that I trim his hair, too, which has led to some of the more heated "discussions " in our marriage.

I say all of that to say this: I have successfully given my daughter a "hairstyle" for the first time in my life.  It's just a little crooked, like all of my Barbies, but she's pleased.  Now B is insisting I trim his shaggy mane, to say nothing of the boys' out-of-control locks.

Dare I?

Saturday

As my siblings and parents and husband and children will tell you, I am slightly scatterbrained and more than a little distractible.  Except when I am sewing, as I have recently discovered.  Hours can melt away while I am intent on finishing a sleeve or figuring out just how the diagram works.

One of the things I am most anticipating about my return to the States is pulling my machine out of the closet and stitching together the patterns I worked so hard at tracing today.  I am GEEKED, I tell you.  What's more, I am going to go home with cut fabric in my suitcase.  We aren't needing the queen-sized duvet cover anymore, so it's turning into several "muslins" for some new garments for me and Z.  All I will have to do is sew the pieces together.

p.s.  Happy Memorial Day!  Wish we were here celebrating.

Silence

As my mind turns ever homeward, I am finding less and less time and inspiration to post.  And, truth be told, I am sick of the internet.  In the evening, I would rather read a book than come up with something to write on The Blog.  That's not to say that I'm spending less time in front of a screen (I wish), but I am trying to make my time on the internet more productive.  Last Saturday, I reactivated my Facebook account for all of five minutes before it became apparent that it was the exact wrong place for me to be.  For some people, Facebook is a fabulous social connector; sadly, I am not one of those people.

So, all of this is to say, that there might be fewer posts in the coming weeks.  Honestly, there's not much to report.

p.s.  We've been taking pictures of all of the little crafts and projects we have made throughout the year that we won't be bringing home.  I love that Z says "good-bye" to everything before we pitch them.  As long as we have pictures and she can bid her farewells, she's happy to clean out our crafts.  

More Technical Difficulties

This week saw another failure in our communications, this time both telephone and internet.  I'm not usually one to spend much time at all on the phone, but not having that choice was a little maddening.  It turns out that the outage was caused by an essential wire being torn out of the wall.  I won't point any fingers, but I will say that the child at whom I would normally point was not the culprit.  It was a little embarrassing to hear from the OTE technician what caused everything, and it took all of two minutes to fix.

I wish I could say that my absence from the blog is due totally to that, but it isn't.  We've been busy, and I have been lazy.  I've also been thinking about this, and wondering if I should reactivate my Facebook account.  Am I not spending too much time in front of a screen anyway?  At the same time, I am wrestling with being out of touch with many friends and family members; without Facebook, am I cutting myself off from some healthy relationships?  Just wondering...

Finally, a photo of the latest knitting.  A friend here recently had a baby, her third girl.  I was lucky to be invited to a shower thrown for her, and had a chance to hold her sweet little baby.  Sigh...newborns.  I was in heaven.  Since my friend and her family will be moving back to the States in June, I wanted to send along something smallish and portable.  It's this pattern, which comes with directions for all weights of yarn and sizes of baby head.  I used the last skein of Quince and Co. Lark in my stash, and added some flowers out of a mystery yarn.  

And here's T, who was quite the unwilling model.  I promised him a couple of a cherries as a reward,  and managed to snap a few blurry pictures before he ripped the thing from his head.

O-lym-pi, O-lym-pi, O-lym-pi-ah-ke!

The first question boys ask each other here (and I'm sure most of the rest of the world), is "What's your team?"  For a little boy who moved here without any inkling about soccer teams, M caught on pretty quickly.  His team, along with most of the boys in his Kindergarten class, is Olympiacos.  And not only has he learned about all of the soccer teams here, he's also learned all of the things you shout at the players while you're watching a game(including some of the more choice phrases).  It helps that there's a pick-up soccer game at the playground whenever there's a ball and more than one boy.  M has played more soccer in the past ten months than in his previous five years.


M's Christmas present from us was to go to a real soccer game, at the Olympiacos Stadium down in Piraeus.  It was a bit of a hassle, but fairly inexpensive, and it made M's year.

p.s.  Can you sing this?  M can.

A Labor of Love

Truly.

At 408 stitches per row, and 10 rows per inch, it has taken me over a year to knit 14 inches.

That's  approximately 57,120 stitches altogether.

(Not including the mistakes toward the bottom that I will have to fix.)

I promised to finish vest in time for B to wear it this winter.  He even brought a specially matching shirt to Greece to wear with it.

Sorry I didn't come through, dear.

Now, if I put my nose to the grindstone, and if I am not distracted by any other knitting projects(ha!), how long will it take to finish this?

Love you, honey.

(And I love that you are keeping me on task.)

A Little Inspiration

photo credit: James Kicinski-McCoy, here
This picture may or may not be responsible for all of the couscous we ate this week.

Every year after Pascha I have a few weeks of meal planning excitement, and it's back to serving my family the same old boring dishes.  And really, I don't even want to eat them, let alone the troops.  The other day I stumbled upon a couple of series at Bleubird Vintage, which totally inspired me to make my meal planning a little more intentional.  I don't know what it says about my palate, but I want to eat every kids' dish in Kiddo Lunch, and I want to eat it from a bento box.  I may just be finding a recipe for Turkey and Carrot Meatloaf and buying some tiny balls of mozzarella tomorrow.  And since we have access to such fabulous fruits and vegetables here, why not?  Obviously not every meal will be a Herculean effort, but some should be special, right? 

  

photo credit: James Kicinski-McCoy, here

And while we're on the subject of intentional, I love the idea of packing lunch the night before, despite the fact that we're at home for lunch.  It would cut down on some of the lunchtime crazies, and we could be ready for an instant picnic.  Hmmm...