It's All Greek To Me...

Let's see if I can play catch-up...

When Liz came to see us in Germany before we left we wanted to take her someplace (looking back; like Germany wasn't cool enough?) So Alex got on the internet to find out where in Europe it wasn't going to rain that weekend- and Athens had sunny skies, so we left for Greece the next morning.  This is Jence in the Munich Airport with his goofy must-have-it-everywhere juice. (And the only sippy cup I have ever found that actually does not leak- and of course I bought it in Germany and can't find another one anywhere- I'm still searching and not quite over being bitter...)

Liz and me upon arrival in Athens.

Jensen loved the puppies...

Here we have a perfectly caught image of the true Jensen. He doesn't hold hands.

The Acropolis. We chose to take the picture here because this is where Jence rooted himself...

As seen here. He decided that right that moment he could no longer stand for wearing shoes and socks.  So, I thought, I can win this one- fine kid, take em off!  See how you like it.  And he did like it.  So then we had the trauma of trying to get them back on after a while of happily running around the Acropolis barefoot- for which we received more than our share of what-awful-parent looks and do-you-really-think-that's-safe comments- to which my thoughts were in the neighborhood of, oh yeah- we were just about to tell him to run with scissors too!

Liz and I looked around for a bit while Al had to stay right here at this concrete block where the replacing of the shoe nightmare finally calmed down.

It was fun to have Liz with us and not just because we didn't have to beg strangers to take our picture- which I am quite proficient at, by the way...

And life was good again when we found a playground.  

Baklava, oh baklava how I love thee... We ate sooo much of it- it would have been a crime not to find the best one out there! (And we all agreed that we did, in fact, find the very best.)

I caught the little thief in the action! I don't feel bad that Jence took a few while the guy's back was turned because I watched him rip me off and didn't say anything- Alex was not pleased...

Look at the top of this picture and you will see the wheel of the motorcycle that was suspended above the lobby- very distracting for Jence; "Ha-cycle! Ha-cycle!"

This is how half of Lizzie's vacation pictures turned out.  She's all posed and Jensen is just doing his thing somewhere within the frame. I find it humorous...

Nakey bum giving Momma a kiss.

Huge donuts and fresh orange juice- "can life get any better? I submit that it cannot!"

Jence agreed about the donut part.

Big strong Daddy.

Here you see Jensen has found a curb that is to his liking and could not be bothered to move along...

We had to run back and get him for the family pictures... about which he was none too pleased...apparently a good step is hard to find.
I always love moments like these- I remember seeing this funeral mask in my sixth grade history book, it's fun to put a name with a face... or something like that...

Aaand back to the airport where heavy bribery was the order of the day.

Along with a little one on one soccer. People love it when we show up to board their plane with them...

These were taken right before we left Spain on the beach where we stayed.

Gibraltar- Day One

Our first day was a little short due to flying in and getting settled in our little apartment, so we decided to hit Gibraltar. It was really bizarre- one second you're driving down the coast of Spain and then you're being funneled through the border patrol and then all the signs are in English. It's really weird, this little outcropping of land in the Mediterranean is owned by Britain, and apparently Spain is still sore about it. The citizens of Gibraltar are allowed to vote now and again as to whether they would rather belong to Spain or England, and they always choose the Mother Land... and I wonder why, they are ALL British.

We went to the "Rock of Gibraltar" 

to see the views...

and the monkeys!  Jensen's new favorite word is officially "MONKEY!" Here he is spotting his first one.

More monkeys

And still more monkeys- you see they are very entertaining.

Though we did get sidetracked by this little lizard...

We took the lift to the midpoint to see more monkeys...

This is one of our funniest- if not most embarrassing pictures to date.  Al wanted me to be in a picture, so I stood there for him- a "safe" distance from the monkey because there are warnings all over the place not to get too close to the monkeys- and until we looked back through the pics we didn't realize what our monkey was up to... Whoops!

Two monkeys.

And here we have the beginning of the end.  It starts with a place Jensen doesn't want to leave.

And continues through things that he should enjoy. (The sky car down the mountain)

We are obviously used to the tantrums...

This is Al's tantrum position because Jensen can't get at his face.  Look at that arched back.

The last tantrum step is the wrestle with the car seat, but that one is so stressful I didn't even consider taking a picture.  It usually calms down about 4-10 minutes into the drive.  Gotta love it.  

That's all for that vacation- I'll be working on the next one!

Day Two: Morocco!

We took the ferry over the strait to Tangier. I have wanted to go to Morocco for years, so I was so excited! We had called the guide that our guide book suggested (gotta love Rick!) and Mohammed was waiting for us as we got off the boat. While everyone else was funneling though security we breezed though with a nod to the guards, and when people would come to hound us to be our guide Mohammed would just wave them away.  It was fabulous!

We took a walking tour through the old city. Mohammed showed us the way the city really works. It was wonderful.  Here is a man cutting tiles with a chisel and a hammer. He handed a little yellow tile to Jensen- who for some reason was thrilled and kept it for the rest of the day.

We got to see a nice touristy snake charmer (in between tour groups- lucky us!) The funny part was that the whole time a strange man was draping a live snake around Jensen's neck he was busy staring and the men with the drums. (Mohammed is in the middle in the tan kaftan.)

So we took him over to see them, and this face resulted!  Such a typical Jensen face!

From the old city looking out to sea.

I loved all the writing/graffiti, probably because I couldn't read it...

The boys in front of the Kasbah.

Rock the Kasbah!

Most people here don't have water in their houses so there are public fountains all over and they bring their bottles to fill up- and as you can see here- Mohammed says some people are smarter than others...
I wished I could imprint the smell of the spices on my brain and call up the romance of it any time I wanted. It was just like I hoped it would be.

We ate at a traditional Moroccan restaurant that was phenomenal. One of the courses was a spiced ground chicken wrapped in phyllo dough with little piles of powdered sugar and cinnamon on top- sounds crazy, but oh my goodness, with the ambiance and everything it was magical.
Jensen and I watching the musicians. See that huge window- letting a nice little breeze in... sigh.

Jensen liked the bread.

Jensen paid the man for his artwork- wasn't so sure about handing him the bills he'd just fought for. (He loves money...)

Mohammed and me in one of the market stalls- full of olives!

Yummy! And when I looked at these pictures the first time I realized that I forgot to eat one!!!

Chickies.
Escapees!

Jence and me at the main center of the old town.

A cemetery. Al always makes fun of me for thinking cemeteries are so cool, when I haate dead bodies... oh well.

Jensen can spot a kitty or puppy at 100 yards.

This is how they weave their cloth. Your buy your yarn and bring it to any of a number of men in these little tiny rooms and they make your cloth- then you take it to get it made into your kaftan.

We had such a wonderful time. And the most amazing part is that Jensen was amazing!  Like unexplainably good- astoundingly good. Bizarrely good... so we have decided to start praying to Allah, seeing as how the miracle happened on his turf... 

And he was pooped.

A Short Aside...

Not to inturrupt the vacation pictures, but we had an interesting day we thought we'd share...

This morning while playing in the hall Jence fell against a corner and put a gash in his forehead.  He only cried for about three minutes as Al (who luckily had just come home from work to get some stuff ready for the move) and I soaked up the gush, then he was back to normal.  We headed to the hospital, again- our fifth trip with him- 

They debated but decided that gluing it shut would suffice.  Al says he got pretty queasy watching them open shut open shut that nasty gash in his little guy's face, we decided it's different (harder to handle) when it's your kid that's hurt.

But he just laid there on Al's lap (with this look on his face).  He was amazing. And of course Puppy was with us- fitting that a stuffed animal from Gramps would make so many hospital trips ("Oh my doctor and my nu-rse wheeled me down to surgery, put their masks on took their scissors, cut a big hole i-in me...")

Happy again with Mommy

Oh, wait- back again!  We went home and put Jence down for a nap and when Al went to get him up a few hours later he said that it looked like a horror movie, the glue was all undone and his forehead was all gory again.  So this time it was stitches.

They put anesthetic into his head and he didn't even flinch!  It was crazy, the Dr told us to harden our hearts because it was going to be awful and he just took it, with one silent little tear slipping down his face and slowly eating a marshmallow. 

Stitches.... like a champ!

Three (and I'm questioning if that was sufficient...) stitches later.  Look at this kid!

All's apparently well.

Just playing on the table, waiting for the Dr. to finish up her report.

AND he actually ate dinner- amazing!

He got to choose a new toy for being so good- though I don't know if it made a difference to him, seeing as how we almost always let him choose a new toy (see him making the motor noise with his lips?) at the PX... In some things we're big sissies. Unlike our crazy tough kid...

E"th"paña

I'm going to try something new this time.  I'm posting a bit at a time of our adventures.  I get too burned out doing it all at once and then I start to skimp on the pictures- and seeing as how I took half of them for my own personal scrapbooking purposes and the other half just for the Blog, I figure I've all around wasted my time when I don't put them all up. So here we start.

Sevilla.  And Jensen saying "horsey!"

Jence and I are there in the middle. 

Playing with his Moroccan cat. (I didn't decide to only do one day at a time until I already had half of our last day already loaded, so we'll go backwards this time.)

In the Santa Cruz Barrio, which was once the Jewish Quarter.  This was the site of a synagogue, then a church and now a plaza... times do change.

Jensen taking a picture of Momma...  great precedent... 

Inside the Royal Palace...which had a different name that I don't feel like getting up to research...

More palace

Ducks! 

And the obligatory attempt at joining the swimmers...

Inspection of the ducks- always executed in a couching position.

This was crazy- a few gummy bears and these fish were crowd surfing. (I made them switch from gummies to crackers) Look closely at the duck- he's walking on the fish. Obviously my boys thought that was way cool.

Once again, the crouched inspection.

Later I'll post pictures of the hand holding fight- but here you see the norm; independent walking.

Momma and Jence in the gardens. It's harder to get him to look at the camera and smile these days- he's usually too busy.

He loves to explore places like this.

A bit of a silent fight going on there... "down. down."

We happened to be there on Palm Sunday as they were setting up for the processional.  These were the chairs set up for the paying class.

Still not a fan of actually touching the animals- I'm regretting not bringing Kiki back with us for the last few months here.

Here is our life. Find a curb. Step up.

Step down. And repeat. Over and over again.  And it's not just any curb. It's the one HE chooses. Forever. Any forced moving on will invariably result in a tantrum of momentous  proportions.

Flirting is another favorite activity. Here he flirts with one group, unaware of his second following behind him.

And then they are sighted! The one is pinching his cheek and Jensen really is making that oh-my-goodness-you-caught-me-giggle-giggle face!

And the main event!

This is what they do in Seville to celebrate palm sunday!

I need to Google it and find out what the significance is-- even Rick Steve's simply told us they did it with no explanation- so it must be that no one knows!  (Probably not the case, but Rick is my rock!)
We had to keep assuring Jence that everything was okay.

Hardly any of them were wearing shoes, most just socks, and some barefooted.

They just kept coming!

And then the kids.
And a lot of stopping and starting.

Look how cute!
Now, I find these cultural differences fascinating and not offensive nor creepy and so try to be respectful- my husband, on the other hand could find a joke backward and blindfolded and couldn't resist this display.  For those of you unfamiliar with Alex's sense of humor I shall spare you the details, and for those of you who are, you know I couldn't do his antics justice anyway. Suffice it to say that on this very noisy day in the main square of Sevilla my Al induced giggle fits went entirely unnoticed. 

Mini Me

This picture is for my parents. I considered putting up the matching one of me when I was this same age so that everyone could see why my parents (and maybe Jes) will tear up when they see this, but I think I'll pass and just let Jensen have all the naked glory on this one...

While Al  was gone Jence and I caravanned with Jen and John to see the Najdawis. Jensen had so much fun in a house with big boys in it!

The onsie twins watching the boys play Halo...

Ahh, boy time...

Jammie kids.

This is the load of food and toys that I took for Jensen in the car... The trip may have only been three hours, but I wasn't taking any chances!

Little monkey waiting for me after a good night's sleep...

Another picture of the sweet little monkey on a lovely morning... and a window into my world...

Jensen is a daddy's boy, until mom walks out of the room... 

Or until Jen leaves. Or when he has to come home from Roswitha's house...

Okay- maybe he's more of a "love the one you're with" kind of guy...

Ticklish doesn't quite do justice to Jensen

I know I've put one of these putting-shoes-on pics up before, but every time I see it I have to resist the urge to grab the camera- I think it's hilarious. 

Now get ready for this... 

Soon after Al got home from WLC we had a squadron family run. I only agreed to go because every single blog I've ever seen has pictures of people running a race on it.  So not to be outdone...

Here we are, running our 2K!  (Pay no attention to the folks sauntering with their small children behind us- this was grueling!)

Here's the big radio station bird to congratulate us for winning the race...hehe...

Al with his remaining friends.

Some play place pictures. Of course we can no longer get Jence to eat a bite while actually in the restaurant...

For some reason this time he wouldn't go down the slide, but up was do-able.

Exit strategy; crown + cookie.

Bedtime story.

On our way to church... don't be fooled by the tranquil exterior, we had already had a few tantrums, on the drive I got butter from my toast on the front of my skirt, and then we sat down in the chapel and immediately had to go do an emergency diaper change- the fumes were about to clear the building, came back and 1.5 minutes later the fumes were back.  Al took him out and came back informing me that there was a leak in our security and Jensen had mess through to the outside of his pants and up his back. We packed up the diaper bag and left church after 20 minutes.

Aunt Becky was afraid he wouldn't like Baby Einsteins...  No fears there, Boo!

Tonight Jence and Kennedi took a drive through the PX parking lot for FHE.

K denied Jence the first kiss request.

But as we know about the squeaky wheel...