18 Months Old! How did that happen?

Dear Lucy,

I can't believe you are 18 months old today. The past year and a half has gone faster than I ever thought possible! Especially the last 6 months. I hear that time will only keep going faster from here on out so I guess I better hold on tight, because you'll be driving a real car before we know it.

You have changed so much in the last month. Just in the last two weeks your vocabulary has quadrupled! I think when you were 17 months old you were only saying Apple, Dada (or Daddy), Bubble, Up, and Hi. Now in addition to that you also say Nana (for Banana), Bye, Elmo, Help Please (your first two word phrase! although it comes out more like 'hep peas'), Car, Cool, Go, Dog, Cookie, Cracker (Ca-ca), Tomato (Toe), and my personal favorite, Momma! Tonight you also repeated the word "happy" clear as a bell. It's a little hard to keep up with what words you know versus what you just repeat, because now you are actually repeating a lot of what we say! Another fun thing you do is animal sounds. You are really good at Duck (you make a great "Ack!" sound), Cow ("oom"--it's ok that you say moo backwards), Elephant (you kind of buzz your lips), Kitty Cat (you make the most adorable high squeaky noise you can muster), Lion (rrrrrr) and Sheep (Ba!)

You are THRIVING in your Mother's Day Out program at First Friends. The first two months were a little rough and it has taken you awhile to get adjusted. Now I can *almost* drop you off without tears, but I think you still don't like being away from Momma even though I know you have lots of fun at school. At school you've learned to jump, spin and put your arms in the air. So much fun! I think school has also helped you to have more fun with your friends and be more independent. However this independence is also making things a little more difficult for Momma! Like when you want to walk into the street without holding my hand or run amok at a restaurant. You have also decided you really like Elmo. I'm not really sure how that happened since we've only turned on Sesame Street maybe 10 times in your life. I love this picture of you totally engrossed in whatever Elmo is doing:

Your favorite foods come and go in phases. Of course anything really delicious like goldfish or cookies  (Guh-gie!) is always welcomed in your palette. You especially love eating grapefruit for breakfast and you are usually unhappy when you've finished an entire half and there's nothing left. For awhile you were really into grapes and strawberries, but those seem to have given way to your current love for tomatoes (Toe!). You ask for a banana on a regular basis but rarely seem to actually want to eat it. You also enjoy eating apples whole. Slices won't do for this big girl. However, your absolute FAVORITE food is peas. Anytime I offer peas you get excited. Sometimes I make more than I intend but you never cease to amaze me with your ability to eat every pea on your plate (minus the few that don't make it when you're shoveling whole handfuls in your mouth). Peas seem to be a pretty healthy food to love so I don't mind indulging you in this habit. You also enjoy spaghetti with meatballs and mac and cheese. In fact you ate three whole servings of spaghetti for dinner last night! You're generally pretty easy going about food and if you're hungry you'll eat what we serve you. If you aren't too hungry then it better be something you really enjoy like goldfish and ritz crackers. And yes it must be Ritz, saltines or townhouse just will not do.

You are becoming proficient with a fork! 

 You really like to charm people by telling them "Hi!" and waving. Clearly you know what you're doing here because everyone pays attention to you when you say it :) You are also good at giving hugs and kisses and blowing kisses when we say goodbye to someone. I'm afraid now that you're saying 'Bye' you won't blow kisses as much and that makes me a little sad.

Being silly in a box

I think that about sums you up! You still really dislike being put down for naps or bedtime but that's not any fun to talk about. Hopefully you'll grow out of hating it soon.

Lucy thought the Children's Sermon needed an interpretive dance

We love you, sweet Lucy!

It's official, we're moving to the Kingdom!

After nearly 6 months of waiting, wondering, and anticipation, we are officially moving to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia! Travis received his visa today and will (probably) be leaving tomorrow for a 3 week stint to get his Iqama (residency permit or something like that), which will allow us to start the visa process for Lucy and me when he returns. And maybe this is totally inaccurate but that's how I understand the process to be :)

We did not expect the process to take nearly this long, but one advantage is that it has given us a lot of time to think about and plan our upcoming move. I've also been blessed with the opportunity to ask a LOT of questions to some nice people that already live there and this has greatly eased our minds regarding the move. I'm sure there will still be some culture shock once we actually arrive for good!

We have been thinking about an international opportunity for awhile, and especially now that I'm a SAHM to a toddler this seemed like a good time. Saudi was definitely NOT on our radar as a place to go, but Travis had an opportunity to visit during a business trip in August 2012. His supervisor (who lived there for several years) was clearly trying to plant some seeds when he said "Be sure to visit Murjan Village, where the expat families live!" Once Travis saw that the compound the families live in actually looked like a nice place to live we began to consider Saudi as a place to look for an international opportunity. As these things go, a job opened within two months. We had been praying for guidance but were not quite ready for what God had planned!

Travis applied for a job in October, interviewed in December and was told they would make a decision by the end of the year or end of January at the latest. Finally in MARCH he received an offer letter. It was a nerve-wracking 6 months not knowing what was in our future! Travis' plant in Houston has a turnaround in June, so we will not officially be moving until July.

In the meantime, I'm constantly making lists in my head about what to take, what to send in our air shipment, what to send in our sea shipment, what to store, and what to sell! Not to mention all I need to do to get our house in 'show ready' condition to sell. Needless to say it's keeping me very busy. Lucy is in a great Mother's Day Out program two days a week and I'm very thankful for the free time I have while she's there to get things done.

Keep your fingers crossed Travis makes it on a plane tomorrow so he can get there and home again to help me with my lists :) Don't worry too much about him while he's there, he gets to fly business class and the good cooks at BRC put extra bacon on his meal tonight!

I hope to use this blog to chronicle our adventures in moving to Saudi. I'm not normally good at finishing things I start so hopefully I can keep up with this! Keep me honest, folks!