Coffee Mix Up

So having a baby in the house has led to a few "moments" - moments of forgetfulness, moments of sleepiness, moments of anxiety, moments of tears, moments of the most incredible joy, moments of confusion, and moments of laughter.

My most recent "moment of laughter" happened to take place while attempting to be a proper hostess for a couple of neighbors.

Now that I'm getting up and moving around a lot better, it's becoming more and more necessary for me to resume the role of hostess, especially when Mark is not around the house to help. The day these particular neighbors came by, I wasn't expecting guests (no, they don't normally call before coming), but since they came, it was appropriate for me to offer something to drink at least. I offered them a cup of national coffee. They both accepted.

Let me describe the coffee here and the process used to brew it . . . the coffee is a very fine powder (think espresso) and it is placed in a small pot with water and a cube of sugar (if desired) and brought to a full boil until foam forms on the top. It is then poured into the cups (and hopefully the foam will stay put on top of the coffee as a sign of one's hostessing skills).

Well, I went into the kitchen, got out the coffee, sugar cubes, and coffee cups. I mixed the coffee, sugar, and water and started heating it. When it started to boil, I removed the pot from the stove to pour it into the cups. I noticed that it wasn't keeping the foam very well. Strange . . . I've become a decent coffee maker and mine usually foams pretty well. Then I caught a quick whiff of the coffee . . . hmmmmmm . . . it didn't smell like coffee. One more whiff . . . it smelled like cocoa. I realized that I had mistakenly pulled the container of cocoa out of the cabinet, thinking it was coffee - they look practically identical!

One of my neighbors had walked into the kitchen as I was finishing the coffee and we were chatting when I realized what I had done. I told her that what I had fixed wasn't coffee. She asked me what it was, and when I told her it was cocoa, she (thankfully) thought it was funny, too. I insisted that she let me make coffee, but she insisted that they would drink it.

Drink it they did, too! I couldn't believe it!!!

Normally, people offer small chocolates to eat when drinking coffee . . . since my guests were drinking "hot cocoa" I didn't even bother to offer them any chocolates. I figured what they were drinking would be enough chocolate.

A few days later a group of neighbors came over together to see Nathan. The plan was to serve coffee. Do you think I made coffee??? Not a chance! And fortunately I just provided a brand new bag of coffee for my friend to make so there would be no confusion.

I guess I need to label my storage containers so there aren't any more mix-ups. My saving grace is that I'm a sleep-deprived new mother. I'm thankful they were so gracious to me!

Local advice . . .

I'd love to know if any of you have ever heard these same tidbits of advice . . .

Don't let wind blow towards the baby - he'll get sick.
Don't dress a baby with only one layer of clothes - he'll get sick, especially if he's sweaty.
Don't put the baby too close to the floor - he'll get cold and sick.
Don't let the baby's feet get cold - it will cause gas.
Don't let the mother's feet get cold - it will cause the mother to get gas, which will pass on to the baby.
Feed the baby every 10 minutes if he cries every 10 minutes. (They can't stand the fact that we have Nathan on a feeding schedule.)
Don't try to sit the baby upright before he's 3 months old.
Don't pat the baby's back to burp him - you could hurt his back.
In order to help jaundice go away, wrap the baby in a yellow blanket.
To keep evil/bad luck away from the baby, the mother should wear something red.

When people come visit they often bring a container of fruit juice. The reason is so that the mother's milk will be plentiful. When they bring a plate of food to us, they say the same thing "Eat this so your milk will be plentiful." I was even told to eat chocolate today to help my milk remain plentiful. And a (male) friend of Mark's made a list of veggies, fruits, and herbs that would help my milk remain abundant. We thought it was funny that he was giving advice on this topic!

Oh, I'm sure I'm forgetting something, but maybe those tidbits give you a taste of the kinds of advice we get daily.

Nathan James has arrived!!!

It's funny that the night I wrote the last entry was the night I went into labor! Who knew?!

Nathan was born April 8 at 11:55 pm (3.44 kg and 52 cm -approximately 7.5 lbs and 20.5 in) . It was a long day, but everything went very smoothly. We had no problems communicating with our doctor and his staff. They were all great!!! We spent two nights in the hospital (2 very long nights!). The pediatrician wanted to have Nathan in the hospital for a full 24 hours before releasing him, and my doctor didn't want to let me go the next morning either.

Nathan slept so hard the night he was born that his hat wiggled down over his eyes by sunrise. After 9 months of darkness, who wants light shining in their eyes?!

We've been home for going on 2 weeks now - my, oh, my, how time does fly! We've had lots of visitors already. In fact, today about 12-15 neighbor ladies came over for coffee just to see Nathan. A neighbor and a friend served so I could rest and visit with the women who came. It was really sweet of them.

So I thought I would share a few pictures with you of a few odds and ends we've received over the past week or two.

Nathan's first gold coin - a traditional gift. It's about the size of a dime.
We can hang on to it as a keepsake or take it to a gold jeweler and trade it in for cash or a piece of jewelry. What do you think we should do???

My gift from the neighbors that came for coffee today.
Gold earrings and pendant with "diamond-like" stones.

This was pinned on the back of one of the sweater vests Nathan received from a neighbor.
According to their beliefs, complimenting a baby excessively can invoke bad luck, and this bead (the one with the "eye" looking thing) is believed to ward off any harm that could come from that bad luck.

A few more hand-made sweater vests.

No baby yet . . .

The doctor's first words at our appointment yesterday were "When's this baby going to be born?" He said it with a smile and a twinkle in his eye because he knows better than any of us that no one knows exactly when the big day will arrive. While greeting some women at an afternoon tea yesterday I got this response. "No baby yet? You're still getting around? You need to be staying at home." And then there are all of our local friends and neighbors who are worried sick that we won't remember to call them to announce the baby's arrival. I get at least one phone call every couple of days from a friend just wondering if the baby's come yet and I haven't called.

So with all of that in mind . . . just wanted to let you all know that there's no baby yet. But have no fears, we'll send word as soon as possible after he's born!

Our official due date is this Fri., but the doctor told us yesterday that he would give at least another 10 days after that for things to start on their own before he intervenes. We were glad to hear that as we would like to avoid an induction if at all possible!

One of our biggest challenges will be not being able to communicate in English with our doctor and his staff. Thankfully, a dear friend has graciously agreed to sit in the hall and wait on stand-by if we need some help translating during the stress of labor and delivery. Thanks ahead of time for all of your prayers!

Hoping to have exciting news for you soon . . .
M&M

Jello Soup

It seems there's never a shortage of food stories. Here's my most recent kitchen funny.

Last night we invited a friend and her mom over for tea. Another ex-pat friend and I decided that she would make a salty thing to serve and I would make something sweet. And to make a typical size dessert plate full (as is the custom here) I also decided to make a fruity jello thing that could be served in individual serving size bowls.

I made my muffins, and they turned out perfect! Before I mixed the muffins I got the jello made and poured into the bowls. I had a few kiwi left and decided I would put the kiwi in the jello to make it prettier. I let the jello sit a little before adding the kiwi and then put it into the fridge, hoping it would set in the next 3 hours. I opened the fridge to check it after about 2 hours and found that it was still just as liquidy as it was 2 hours before. Since I had goofed up on a jello recipe during the holidays (added too much water) I decided I would reread the directions on the box (for about the 3rd time). I thought I had read all the important stuff, but when I dug the box out of the garbage I found that I had actually only read the How To directions. You would think that's all I needed to read. However, just for the sake of being thorough I decided to read everything else on the back of the box. Guess what I found . . . a warning . . . guess what it said . . . kiwi and pineapple keep the jello from jelling!!! So I knew at that point there would be no pretty jello salad to serve to our guests.

When I explained this story to our guests my friend suggested (with a grin) that I drink it as jello soup. I just finished a bowl of it . . . not bad. It turned out kind of like kool-aid with slices of kiwi floating around in it - very refreshing!