27 July 2008

Pray for my Little Kitty

Someone in the neighborhood poisoned all of the cats and our little kitty was also poisoned, we knew as soon as we saw her that someone had poisoned her so we gave her some milk right away and Arthur said that if she lived for 30 minutes more she might make it. So I stayed with her for a while to make sure she drank the milk and stayed comfortable, she made it. She is still feeling sick but was able to eat some food yesterday so we think she will make it. The neighbors were not so lucky, one guy lost all of his cats and blamed Arthur. We think he is trying to pick a fight with the family, Greeks are strange like that.

This is a photo of little kitty looking into KokaRoka, she is so well trained that she doesn't even come in when the door is open.
If you are wondering her kittens did not eat the poisoned food, so they are doing fine, but they had to fight off the fox when it came around the same night that their mother was poisoned.

21 July 2008

We have teeth

Baby Nik now has his two little bottom front teeth, the first one came in about 5 days ago and the second one 2 days ago. With no crying at all, I was very relieved.

19 July 2008

Everyone should learn a little Greek

Today we are going to talk coffee, (Leslie you might not want to read this-good luck with the no coffee ban) the Greek coffee life is very important. People spend hours at the small coffee houses, longer than what you see in the States, much longer. Now I wasn't much of a coffee drinker when living in the States but I have now become addicted to the coffee I make here (Ι don't know if it's because it taste good or if I just really need the pick-up after having a kid). I even worked for Starbucks and pretended to drink coffee there by making a "Vanilla Steamer" aka. warm milk with vanilla syrup. Now I drink φραπε γλυκο με γαλα και παγωτο (frappe sweet with milk and ice-cream-sounds like frappe gliko may gala kay pagoto). The Frappe is their cold drink if you want a hot coffee it is a Nes Cafe, simple hey!
So here is how to order your favorite drink or as close as you can get here in Greece.
Hot Coffee - Nes Cafe (Νες Καφε)
Cold Coffee - Frappe (Νες Φραπε)
Espresso Shot(as close as you can get, but taste even better) - Greek Coffee (Ελληνικοσ Καφες)
The sugar (ζαχαρι) they add when they make the coffee including the Greek coffee
sugar little - may ligi zachari (με λιγη ζαχαρι )
sugar medium - metrio (μετριο)
sugar sweet - gliko (γλυκο)
milk - may gala (με γαλα)
vanilla ice-cream - vanilla pagoto (παγωτο)

This is pretty much it for the Greek coffee system, so I hope you aren't the type who gets a Grande Latte Extra Foam Four Shots of Vanilla in a Venti Cup Type- Starbucks Lingo.

17 July 2008

Watermelon Season

The watermelon season is here and we are buying them cheap! These two whoppers where only 5euros and today we got 3 for 5euros (a matchstick box showing the size). I just have to emphasize how much baby Nik enjoys watermelon, A WHOLE LOT!

14 July 2008

Yesterday


Another family in town this one from Holland, Arthur hasn't seen them since the oldest son was 1 year old and he is now 17, but they have kept in contact through the years. They brought some wooden shoes for Nik, I can't wait till he can wear them and clomp through the house. They also brought me a delicacy for when you give birth this is what you give the people that visit you in your home Beschuit met muisjes, a kind of anise sweet that you put on toast with butter. In Holland a women that has just given birth is given a nurse to stay at home for a week with the family, how wonderful would that be!

This Morning

I didn't know that we had such a sensitive little guy but the above picture is where Papoos and Yiayia are trying to cheer Nik up after saying goodbye to Toni and his family. When Arthur said say good-bye he started to cry, I have never seen him cry like this before. Sure he might tear up when we are a little late with his milk and he wanted it yesterday but this was real tears of sadness. I didn't realize that they could understand something like this at such a young age, at least his memory of the sadness he felt at the time didn't last long he was smiling again about 10 minutes after they drove off.
One of the kids in the back doing a peace sign, they are great kids and I think this is why Nik got so sad because he especially cried harder when he saw them in the back of the car.

12 July 2008

Swimming



Sorry for the side shot, Arthur thought it would be a good idea to include me in the photo. I think we have a swimmer on our hands, not only are the feet going but look at the hands. If I had put him completely in the water I think he would have taken off.

I think everyone should learn a little Greek

Obviously if you don't want to learn Greek then you don't have to read this blog entry.

So today I thought we would do a little grammar lesson.

When you come on your Ταξιδι (trip) to my σπιτι (house) you will be coming to the town of Καλαμπακα (Kalampaka) where the Μετεορα (Meteora) rocks are.

The Greek language does not have a B in it, the β you see sounds like a V. So in order to make a B you combine the Greek letters (showing upper case and lower case together) Mμ (Mm) and Ππ (Pp), they also do not have a D, the Δ you see sounds like th. So to make a D you combine the Greek letters Νν (Nn) and Ττ (Tt). So if your name was Braden it would be spelled ΜΠΡΑΝΤΕΝ. p.s. the P is a R so my name is spelled MAPA.

What is the proper spelling of where I live when translated into English from Greek?

You may wonder why I am doing this and it is to help me, the more I write it down the better I understand it, so thank you for going through my Greek lesson's with me.

08 July 2008

Weekend at the Lake

Arthur has a friend from Australia visiting with his family, Tony is taking the picture, his wife and three kids are pictured above with Arthur and I. Tony was born in Australia but both of his parents are Greek and his mother was from Kalampaka, Tony and Arthur met here in Kalampaka in 1993 and became very good friends quickly. We took them to Lake Plastiras and had a great lunch and then played in the lake.
I'm glad Nik doesn't have any older siblings, he didn't take a nap all day he was so excited to see and play with other kids. He was especially fascinated by their youngest Emanuel (3), Gabe (6) is the one giving a big grin and Eleni (8) is playing peek-a-boo one of Nik's favorite games.
Here Nik enjoying some watermelon while sitting on Leticia's lap, he has really developed a taste for any fruit and will eat anything you give him.
Ready to play in the Lake, here he is waving to mommy.
Last minute sunscreen application, Eleni was a super smart kid and had her swimsuit already on, I wish I had thought of that.
Eleni and Gabe took out the canoes, while us big kids and little kids hoped onto the paddle boat. The paddle boat had a lot of white spiders on it, definitely not a ride for the arachnophobic.

Gabe and Tony
Baby Nik playing in the water

So wiped out when we got home, he fell asleep rubbing his eye, poor little tyke he only had maybe a total of 2 hours of napping broken up in 15 minute interludes all day.

04 July 2008

I think everyone should learn a little Greek

When you come on your Ταξιδι (trip) you will be coming to visit me at my σπιτι (sounds like spi-ti, means house).

03 July 2008

The Car Seat has Arrived

The car seat came in today, I will feel so much safer having Nik in it when we drive. He was very excited about the box and kept using his walker to run into it. He has become a proficient user of his walker, he even chases after a ball with it. I really like it because it lets me do some things around the house while he self entertains. We also started feeding him rice cereal and boy does he like it, I can't shove it into his mouth fast enough without him crying. Pictures and Video forthcoming.

01 July 2008

Chillin with Dad

I'm trying a new schedule, when baby and I wake up in the morning we play a little bit then we go on a walk while it is still cool outside. Then when I come back around 8:30, I hand Nik off to his Dad (pictured above hanging out with dad) so I can do a quick shower and some stuff around the house, I tell Arthur to give me 30 minutes and then we feed Nik and are off to KokaRoka.

Yesterday we didn't have any rooms to clean so Arthur and I left Nik with Katerina and we went to Larissa for some shop therapy. I bought a much needed new bra and Arthur bought a pair of underwear, only the essentials for us, HAHA!

Last night we had a full house with 4 turks on motorbikes, a mom and young son from Australia and a single traveling boy from Seattle WA.