Elijah's Got a Lot to Tell Daddy!

Only in India #17

Only in India when you order out does your chicken come in a bag like this...

Nestle Cerelac is a brand of baby food, such as infant milk, rice cereal, etc. 

Visiting the Family

Although we've moved we still go over to see the family we used to live with about once or twice a week. We're actually invited to dinner a lot more often now...I guess because we have to catch a rickshaw to get there and not just walk a couple of steps. Eating with them is something Neal and I have really enjoyed. We like not only experiencing the way they serve and their food, but as well the fellowship around the table (or floor, which is very cultural).

Elijah always feels as home and shows his true colors when we're with them, especially when we all sit on the bed together to talk.

Elijah Loves His New Room!

Elijah loves everything about his new room...even the monkeys on the wall!

It was the cutest thing watching Elijah touch the monkeys and tree over and over the first time he saw them. He was excited!

Elijah's always talking to me or Daddy, and even to himself. And his noises have become so animated! He entertains himself well.

Elijah and Daddy Building Together

Elijah and Neal built Elijah's last new piece of furniture together. Elijah loved having all the wooden boards spread all over his room...he thought he was such a big boy working with Daddy. His favorite thing to do was pick up the boards and slam them on the ground. 

  

After all the work was finished Elijah had the best part of all...playing in the box.

This reminded me of my own childhood when my brother's and I would play in boxes and slide down the stairs in them.

Our Furniture Arrived!

All of our furniture arrived! We have everything in it's place except for a couple of little extra stuff, such as pictures on the walls, mirrors, exhaust fans, a couple of bookshelves, rocker in Elijah's room, and desk in our room, etc. But, those are things we will be getting in time. When my whole house is complete I'll make a video for everyone to see, but for now this is what the apartment looks like.

When you walk in the front door you're in the living room.

The opposite side of the living room looking back at the front door

From the living room looking into the dining room (which is the room in the center of the flat). Having curtains to cover all doorways is cultural so that if there are both men and women in the house there can be something to separate the two without closing a door.

The other side of the dining room looking into the living room. (We are using Elijah's stroller as a highchair until we get a real highchair.)

This is looking into Elijah's room from his door. So many Indian's are fascinated by Elijah's room because having a room for your baby is not cultural. All children sleep with their parents until they are five, and then if there is another bedroom in the house they can start sleeping in that room, or at least another bed once they reach five years of age or older. 

Elijah's room gets really hot, so we have curtains that cover not only the windows, but also the door that leads to the deck outside.

Looking into mine and Neal's room. Our room also has a deck that connects to it that wraps around the side and front of the apartment building. We also have a bathroom in our room.

Looking out of the door from our room onto the deck.

This is our favorite view that can be seen from our deck and the window and deck in the family room...you don't see much grass here so the little patch is beautiful to us!

This is a very famous house in our city where the old police commissioner used to live. The yellow and green building is one big house, which is really large in our city. It's divided up into many small apartments now.

Looking down our street...just a little farther and you'd hit one of the main markets in town.

This is our family room. It's actually the third bedroom, which looks like it should be the master bedroom, but we use it for our family/TV room (we don't have the TV yet...but maybe soon). There is a bathroom, with the only western toilet in the house, and a little deck connected to this room. (There are three bathrooms and three decks in the flat)

Looking from the bathroom into the family room

And last, but not least is the kitchen. We don't have our exhaust fans up yet, so we have a brown bag covering the hole in the window where the fan will go. All Indian homes have a stove connected to a gas can, which is why there's a green tube going from the stove under the counter, but no oven. However, we plan to get an oven. You can find them here but they are rare.

We love living here. It's so peaceful and a blessing!

First Days in our New Flat!

We have been waiting for this day for a long time...it's finally come...the day we move into our new home. It feels like it's been months and months since we've had a place that actually felt like home to us. Months since having a place of true refuge and rest. 

Thank you Lord for providing a place for us!

First days in a new home are always filled with cleaning, unpacking, arranging, moving, etc. This first day was consumed by such things, however, it was different from all other times I've moved in the past. This move didn't consist of bringing all my furniture, frames, decorations, kitchen supplies, etc. and just putting them in their place. This move consisted of bringing the little we had to arrange, knowing we'd be getting the rest some time later. I wasn't able to have any of the things from my house in America sent to India, so I was starting from scratch. (Stinks that we couldn't have another wedding shower once we got here:)

One of the most fun things was going into the room that would be Elijah's and giving him his new walker. Like all parents, it blessed Neal and I to give it to him and watch him play and enjoy.

Most of the furniture that would fill our house had already been ordered. Neal and I decided we wanted to have everything in place to be delivered around the time we moved into our home. So, we'd selected couches, table, chairs, fabric, rugs, and curtains before moving. Two of the couches for our family room and all of our rugs had already been delivered, so I was thrilled to lay out a couple of the rugs over our marble floors so that Elijah had a nice place to crawl. 

Our next project (after the kitchen was finished, our bed in place, and curtains up) was to put together Elijah's pieces of furniture (we only had one piece and his crib, we would get the second piece a couple of weeks later). I'd been excited and waiting for this since before he was born. Every mom wants to get the nursery for her new baby all ready and cute, and I was finally having my time to do that 9 months after Elijah was born. Neal was so faithful in helping me to get things ready, even when he wasn't the most thrilled to do so. Thank you God for my caring husband!

After working a while in our new place you're really hot. We only had one AC that could be turned on because of our transformer not been hooked up yet. We were told it would be all hooked up and ready by the 30th of May, so that's when we moved. It wasn't hooked up that day, so the guy that owns the place said he'd get the electrician to come and hook up power from his place to ours until the transformer was turned on. We thanked God because it was 10 at night and we were still without power. So, since we were sharing power we were only allowed to run one of our ACs. It was 110 degrees outside so you get quite hot working (we kept our bedroom door shut so that the cool air from the AC would keep at least one room cool). Praise the Lord, though, that we do have an AC in our bedroom!

With the heat we drank lots of water, Elijah as well. One of his favorite things to do is drink water from our cup. It's too cute!

Now, we wait for our furniture to arrive to finish everything else.