School and afternoon fun

A few days after we got back Henry started going to "summer fun" at a place nearby called Jingle Bells.  Summer fun is a morning program that he goes to with his best friend Jafe along with, as chance would have it, a few other friends from his neighborhood play group.  Here they are with Jafe's nanny and Jafe's family's driver.  Jingle Bells is on the second floor in the building behind Henry and Jafe.  After getting Henry used to day care in the US ( what a stressful ~2 weeks that was) I found dropping him off at this summer fun program to be a breeze. In fact the first day I took him, which was 3 days after we returned, he just walked right in and basically didn't look back. One thing that helped him get really excited for school was the opportunity to wear his school bag with his name embroidered on it. He's wearing it in the photo.  What a great present from my friend Christine!  Below is a photo I snapped of Henry after he got dressed up for his last day of summer fun which ended last week.  After a break this week he'll start going to "school" at Jingle Bells.  

 

All of Henry's neighborhood friends who are in town over the summer, which is about half, still meet up for afternoon play group on most days.  Last week we hosted one at our house. Since I'm at home now I was able to take some photos.  It cracked me up that everyone was playing cozily in Henry's room - didn't they want more space?   Since it's Ramadan and office time is shorter, Scott made it home in time to see the playgroup excitement - especially when they were playing in the tent.

Henry has become so much more fun to talk to in the last week or so because he's started including reasoning in his conversations. He now uses "because" and will confidently answer when I ask a "why" question such as "Why do you not want to take a bath?"  "Because I want to play with Odin".  Before I would just hear a "Huh?" in response.  I love getting to learn more about what he's thinking and feeling.

Elliot is doing great.  He is a chatter box making all sorts of cooing noises when we interact.  On Saturday he giggled for me for the first time as I was talking with him about the London Olympics.  As you can imagine, he's sleeping a lot during the day.  I had forgotten all the things the nanny did when Henry slept back when he was a baby, but when I saw the same things being done for Elliot my memory came back along with a smile and a chuckle. As you look at the photos keep in mind that it's probably 85 degrees in the apartment during the day.
Check out the stuffed animal bumper, the pillow bumper, the quilt bumper, and then of course my tank top as a blanket.

Notice the rolled blanket? For some reason, about 90% of the time sleeping Elliot will have a rolled up blanket somewhere around him - laid on top of him, propped along his side, under his legs when he's on his back on the bed...  I think I'll have to ask about the purpose of the rolled blanket.

Settling in

After a wonderful 3+ months in the US we’re back in Dhaka. We’ve been back about a week and I think we’re settled back in to our ways with the addition of Elliot – and what a great addition he is :)  Since the last time I wrote we spent 10 days in Vermont with Scott’s family.  Sarah and crew were able to join us for a majority of that trip which was awesome.  We returned to Williamsburg on July 4 after which it was a whirl wind of activity to get ready to return to Dhaka a few days later.  After getting so much quality time with my sister and her family I was in shock and a state of denial for many days after we drove away.  Henry had an amazing time in the US playing with his cousins from sun up to sun down and playing outside every single chance he got, but he was still happy to be Home. 

To catch us all up I’m going to put a slew of photos up.  I expect to be back on the “1 entry a week” rate (or at least close to that) after this so keep checking back.

Kaylin and Henry bonded:

Elliot's 1 month old anniversary was back on July 1.  I remember when I took Henry’s photos at that age he just would not open his eyes.  Elliot is quite different in that respect because in contrast he doesn’t seem to close his eyes.  What is so hilarious to me is that completely unknown at the time Elliot and Henry were dressed in the same exact onesie on their 1 month day.  I promise this wasn’t planned because I had not seen Henry’s photos in 2 years and it wasn't even a special onesie.  Since it's hard to see Henry's face in the photos I included another one from a similar age.
Henry:                                                                         Elliot:

More of Elliot:

One adventure in Vermont was catching (and releasing) crawfish.  Over a 3 day period, Scott let Kaylin and Henry put left over turkey bones in a trap, throw the trap in the lake, transfer the trapped crawfish to a crate and then eventually release the ~50 crawfish on the dock and watch them scurry off.  Henry had no fear of the crawfish and chased after a few to catch them until one tried to take a little clip at him. 

We spent a lot of time out by and on the lake, as expected.
We went inner tubing behind a motorboat:

 Kayaking putting the men to work:

Everyone enjoyed trying out the new paddle board. It was awesome. I highly recommend everyone try it out!

 Of course we had to document the initial whip-outs (Scott then Seth).  Everyone was an expert in no time.

Elliot and Henry got a lot of lovin’ from grandparents and cousins.

 Gigi trying out the Moby

 Elliot LOVED being held by Connie.  The second she took a hold of him he would pass out and stay that way until we had to separate them.

 Matching shirts made in Bangladesh

 Blowing a kiss

Henry was forced to play games and run around all the time since he was the youngest by ~20 years after Sarah’s family left.  In order to keep up with the big dogs he wasn’t allowed to sit for one minute.
The "balance beam" kept him busy

 Smores:

 Cooking - of course making cookies was a fav

 Making Uncle Fish (Seth - Henry initial attempts to say Seth sounded more like "fesh" so Uncle "Fish" took hold) and Dada roll down the hill and learning to roll himself.

Enjoying a music concert by Deirdre on the violin and Linda on the piano with Gigi's impressionist dance of Twinkle Twinkle:

And the glorious Merrill family photo:

Back in Dhaka we’re having fun:
Back to cooking:

 Finger painting with the neighbors

 Climbing (and finding monkeys out back)

 And swimming

 

PHEW!!  Are you tired of looking at photos now??  At least we're all caught up and can go back to short entries.  Let's hope my computer doesn't crash again before the next entry like it did this week as I was creating this post. We hope everyone is having a great summer.