day 1

somehow in the midst of preparing to move, i forgot that babies get jetlag. paige slept really well on the airplane, but would not fall asleep last night. she stayed up until nearly 3. i really hope our neighbors don't hate us.
as for today, my first day in london made me a little nervous jeff went to school and i've been puttering around trying to figure out exactly what's going on. after cleaning up a little, we walked around until we found the tesco (a grocery store). it was a harder trip than i thought it would be. i couldn't find the rice or salt until i asked someone, and i had to come home and look up what the differences were in laundry detergert. i'm still kind of confused. there are biological and non-biological detergents. biological detergent apparently has enzymes in it to help break down stains and odors. in addition, there are regular and colour detergents(is regular only for whites?). oh yeah, and there's hand-wash detergent. i'm not sure if they mix and match. i didn't see any biological colour detergent, or biological handwash but the pictures on the back all had coloured clothes. all four kinds come in powder, liquid, caplets, and gel packs. i'm pretty sure i stood there for at least a half hour before i grabbed the one that said it was half price today.
anyway, as i was checking out, the cashier put all my groceries into three little bags, then looked at me and asked if i was sure i could carry all of this. i live a block away from the store. i thought about grocery shopping in utah or maryland and walked out of the store laughing.
one thing i couldn't find at the store was a plunger. i just looked up where i could find one, and it turns out, you can only really get a plunger from a plumbing or hardware store. plungers are pretty rare here. why, you ask? (at least i did) don't people poop here? more research revealed that, in fact, british pipes are bigger, so clogs are less common. i'm still suspicious.
this post is getting really long.
we still need to drop by the furniture store to see about a crib, figure out where the trash (sorry, rubbish) goes, and how to work the doorbell, but the baby's napping and i need some food. *sigh*

new discoveries

we have ourselves a thumb-sucker. it's interesting to watch her discover her hand and start to develop hand-eye coordination. it makes me wish i'd taken more physics. then i remember that physics requires math.

grandpa came home one day and found somebody had commandeered his chair. little baby in a big chair...
and this is her best friend. they discuss kierkagaard on the weekends.

family picture

still working on pictures of the cute one. er, cutest one.

limey

our cameras are already packed away, so no pictures for now, but i got a request for some limeade we've made a couple times. mmm...limes. anyway,

Brazilian Lemonade
(in Brazil, the word for limeade sounds the same as lemonade. also, they call this Swiss lemonade. i wonder where it's really from? we may never know.)

4 juicy limes (try and find ones with thin, smooth skins; they're the juiciest and the thin skin cuts down on the chance of your drink being bitter)
1 c. sugar
6 c. cold water
6 tbsp. sweetened condensed milk (i have no idea who measures this. it's roughly 1/2 cup, i like a little less. mmm...limes)

wash limes and throw 2 of them whole into the blender, along with 1/2 cup sugar and 3 cups water. if your blender is weak, chop the limes into quarters first.
pulse a couple times and strain the liquid into a pitcher. press the lime guts with a spoon to get the last little bit of juice/oil out. repeat with the rest of the limes and water.
add the milk, stir well, and serve immediately over lots of ice. the drink starts to fight with itself after a little while, so you want to drink it right away.

we'll try to have a real post with cute baby photos once we unpack our cameras.for now, enjoy the limeade. see you guys later! we'll miss you.


p.s.--i found the original recipe here. also good with limes is to substitute them for the lemons in this sherbet recipe.

mona lisa smile or otherwise

i love this little girl. she makes me laugh. we blessed her in church today while jeff's parents are in town for a wedding. it was a good day, and she was very well behaved.







even though she wasn't a big fan of all the attention.

she did buck up enough to give us a fashion shot. well hello, taylor...



the dress, by the way, was made by sue, who did a fantastic job. we're sad that we don't get to see any of the texas coopers before we leave. being poor stinks sometimes.



we all changed after we got home. the dress was too nice and too hot to wear for long in the august heat. the booties were made by my mom! and i made the headband because i couldn't find one that didn't either look like a garter, or have a flower the size of the baby's head.






here's the lot of us. what a happy family!

laundry day

whenever i see clothes on a line, i want to take a picture, and lately, i've had several opportunities. though it provided a good platform, jeff wasn't lying when he said this. our dryer really did die. only, paige didn't get the memo. luckily she has the cutest clothes of the three of us.

homework

we listen to a lot of NPR in the car when we go places, and one morning we woke up to paige sympathizing with the greek crisis. she's pretty cosmopolitan.

in light of this, jeff and i decided that she should probably have her little black dress. every girl should have one and, after all, she is already two months old. we're still working on getting her some business attire. i'm thinking pinstripes.



this one won't fit her for a while, but at least she has shoes to match. as long as they fit her at the same time. we'll see.




as for jeff and i, it's apricot season and we tried our hand using a fruit dehydrator. we now have a good number of apricot chips. mmmm yummy.



i'm a little sheepish about this last one. we call it the ghetto-mobile. jeff came home one day to the baby asleep and me puttering around in the garage with electrical tape, industrial clamps, and coat hangers. he started laughing, i looked at myself and realized--i'm turning into my father. jeff helped me make the paper pieces, though, and paige likes to look at it (when she's less asleep), so at least we're all nerds together.