As promised 
Opening pressies first thing yesterday morning
rrrrrriiiippping the paper :)
test driving the toys:
Giving his dollie a hug
blowing the candles:
the cake:
a family portrait:
and the birthday boy was in bed by eight!!! Totally exhausted from a day filled with awesome pressies and love and attention and of course, chocolate cake
Thanks so much to everybody that send him wishes and made his day so special, I told him about every message!
We send love and light!
May the year ahead be even better-der than the last!!
Last year this time, you weren't even walking yet, and now, well you just don't stop do you? You don't even sit still in the bath!!! You're always going, going going!!! I SO love that about you, you've turned into such a cutie-pie little boy! You're sense of humour amazes me daily!! Especially when you do the "eyes" thing when we eat {reminder to self: GET that on video!!} it's just too funny!!
The way you're starting to talk, imitating every word we say, is just so precious! You call yourself "Nini", I'm sure it's your way of abbreviating {WHY is that such a long word??} Kaydin. I love that you're so absolutely adorable, so much so, that people, who meet you for the first time, comment on how amazing you are, and I know, by the way they say "amazing", they've noticed that special Kaydin-factor, that's what I call it. You have a way of looking at someone, you just make our hearts melt, my love!!
I love that you love your Daddy with such utter abandon and enthusiasm, to the point where he can't go upstairs, without you getting upset! {I do of course also utterly adore how the Daddy is just totally in love wih the boy and tries so very, very hard to be a good Daddy, at which, my love, may I just say, you are completely successful}
But what I love most is the 15 minutes before you go to bed. I give you a bottle and you tell me the stories of the day {while I try to sing a lullaby, it's not too successful at the moment!} You'll say: "Pappa WHAAAAA" I say: "Yes, did Daddy scare you" {a favourite game at the moment} and then you call "Lala", "Pappa", "mmmmmmma", "Nada" {which is Gideon2 by the way} .... you go through your whole repertoire of words and take a few sips of your milk in between. When you're done, you push the bottle away, I then ask: "are you SURE you're finished", at which point you just push the bottle further away and say "doedoe". We then look at the stars and the moons that your night light makes and then I get a big hug and a good night kiss and a quite resolute, "doedoe" and "bye-bye", I cover you with your blankie, send you an air-kiss, *mwah* and you're off to sleep ..... this is my favourite time of the day .....
We love you so very much darling Kaydin, we wish you a blessed and happy, happy birthday!!!
{I will update with photo's later today 
}
Alright, fasten your seatbelts!! The wedding was awesome! I couldn't be happier for Bea and Wimpie, and they are just SUCH an adorable couple!!!
Our visit in SA was just awesome, I LOVE going home!!
And when we got home to Abu Dhabi, it was back and forth about the house-move and then finally, we moved! So, right now, we're in our beautiful new house. There are still a couple of boxes that needs unpacking, but we're mostly settled. I love this house, it's fairly close to the shops, yet still out of town. It's a very new suburb and we don't even have street lights yet!! The garden is MUCH smaller than the previous house, but hey, we've got GRASS!!!!! {NO, not THAT kind, lol!} Green, green grass!!!! So beautiful! Gids of course, made provision for flower beds when we put the grass in, so we're just waiting for Ouma Hettie to bring us the herb seeds!!
said grass:
The Kaydin is awfully cute, learning a new word almost every day, the other day, he said "Jackie"!!! well, ok, not quite, it came out "Ghekie" but we SO know what he means, and of course all the hand clapping and "well done's" just adds to his excitement of the new word he's learned!
Playing the other day .... Gia-Michelle, if you listen closely, you'll hear him say "ganga"
So the G-man's leave was cancelled {we're not talking about it} which means we're here for Christmas. It's not the end of the world though, the weather is positively awesome, we had a whole 10ºC (that's 50F to my American friends) the other morning and the days are gorgeous at no more than 26/27ºC (that's about 78F) it's awesome.
So getting into the Chrissy spirit, we have a beautiful tree and I got all creative and made a Christmas wreath {Marinda's totally chuffed, 'cause she got one too, happiness all round, what can I say, I like to share}
Then we had the oh so important Christmas card photo shoot:
Kaydin, come stand here in front of the tree and smile, please?
hhmmm, no? ok, Daddy, please come and help me here?!
Daddy put him on his lap, and proceeded to tickle him, I kinda new it wasn't going to be too helpful, but hey, I got some awesomely cute shots :)
This is the card I made, we asked him "how does the baba smile?" and this was the response, just hilarious!!
well not much actually, like I said Gideon won't be on leave this year, he'll take Christmas day off though. We have friends coming over for Christmas Eve, going to unwrap presents and have a merry good time, then Christmas day at the neighbours, where we plan on stuffing ourselves with some good food.
My mom arrives on the 27th, we've been telling Kaydin that Ouma (grandma) is coming for a visit. Now, if you ask him who's coming to visit, he'll say "mmmmmma" and then when you ask him when she's coming, he answers "nnnnou-nou", which is "later". Shame it's been "nou-nou" for about a month already! lol!
Kaydin and I joined the mad people that wake up early to go ride their remote control cars, he SO enjoys it, got some nice shots:
We went camping a few weeks ago, just way too much fun!! This was the sunset:
And Kaydin has a new girlfriend (sorry Jo!!, these long distance relationships never seem to work, lol) her name is Francesca and let me tell you, she's a looker!!! Her mom's gonna have to buy a shotgun in a few years time!! hehe, the shotgun will be for the OTHER boyfriends, as Kaydin's got dibs on this one!!! And yes, if you were wondering, she's Marinda and Oscar's adorable little darling, I tell you, she was first in line when "cute" was being handed out, oh, ok a very close second to the K-dude, lol!!
Kaydin showing her his car, she's a girl though, not really interested, heheee
Did I mention that it was COLD?! We froze our nunu's off!!! My boys, nice and cozy the next morning:
Gideon, practicing for number two:
Kisses:
(no, I have no idea why he's pulling, that face, lol!!)
The camels came for a visit, and they weren't scared of us... at all, they just kept coming closer!!
And if I remember correctly, Chantel didn't even use her zoom lens on this one:
{Credit to Chantel for the pics of the next day}
Right, and tomorrow (or in a few hours) it's run, run, run, to get this house in order for all the people coming over! YEAH!! can't wait!!
We send much love to all. We wish you a blessed and happy Christmas and a wonderfully prosperous new year!
heheee, ok, not quite, but I got your attention, didn't I?
Pieter, here's the video of the cars in action:
and to the grandparents and the members of the Kaydin fan club .... he brought Gideon's t-shirt to me yesterday afternoon, I asked him if he wanted to put it on ..... ok, he didn't have too much of a choice heheee, our little spokie (ghost, for the english people) I just thought he looked too funny!!!!!!
and here's the boy having a SERIOUS conversation with ... um, I don't know actually, but he's talking on the phone , Gideon is looking all serious, 'cause he's about to break the credit card on spares for the toy car, he was surfing the net for prices
We send much love to all!
as you will see, we have a racer-in-training 
The first thing Kaydin did when Gideon gave him the car, was to walk straight to the front gate .... Gideon says he thinks Kaydin wanted to take it out to the street to play with it there .... seeing as that's what dad and Gideon2 does when they're testing their cars!! We told him no, not now, so he walked to the "workshop" instead, to put it away, seeing as all the other toy cars live there!! After supper, they off course had to go get it, and this was the scene in the kitchen:
Ouma Hettie did come for a visit, so fun to have her here. I must admit, I enjoyed giving her some good quality baby-sitting time, I managed to book a whole week's worth of dental appointments! (don't ask!) Anyhoot, took her to see the Picasso exhibition, which was, shall we say interesting. It made me ponder the whole "but is it art?" question. I do think one should at the very least consider it, even if one doesn't quite "get" it or understand it.
Also took mum to the Sheikh Zayed Mosque, she was appropriately awed and kept on saying how pleasantly surprised she was with the tasteful interior decorating
Speaking of dentist appointments, I found me a really nice, totally professional Lebanese dentist, called Dr. Grace. She's so cool, she gives me drugs before the appointment, now being on the drugs (it's half a dormicum, but i'm so weaned from "normal" pills like myprodol, it knocks me for a six) I'm not allowed to drive. So it was an interesting scenario, rounding up the friends to drop me and pick me up. Now, one of those days, Marinda kindly helped, it was cool though, 'cause I helped her as well, she needed a car I needed a lift, it all worked out just fine. Jeez, I digress, the funny thing was, when I stopped at the dentist to give the car to Rinda so she can be on her merry shopping way, as she got out, she quipped "Thank God it's not warm" <- yeah, good thing that, with the temps right up at 48C, it just cracked me up
And today I was yet again reminded of the sometimes unpleasant aspect of being a woman here. Went grocery shopping and as I was waiting in line for the veggie-weigh-in lady, here comes a man with about 10 packs of bananas, he moves my one packet of onions out the way and puts his packets on the counter, I looked at him a little bit surprised (though only for about a second) you live here long enough, you learn that this will happen. I say to him, but I was here first? He had the audacity to smile at me. The veggie-lady was too busy with the other customers to see that he pushed in front of me, so she weighed his stuff first (normally, they're quite good with the arabs and will help "first come first serve") anyhow, so she proceeded to help him, I felt like giving a pack to Kaydin to munch away at, but thought better of it .... In the end, I just gave the guy a piece of my mind ... in Afrikaans, so he didn't understand, but there was no mistaken my tone of voice. The thing is though, that to him, I'm really just a woman and as such can be treated without any respect or dignity. He's goat and/or camel probably gets treated better than his wive(s). I also understand, yet it doesn't make the frustration any less, that in his world, in his culture, where he comes from, he did nothing wrong and I really don't fault him for it. Ok, I feel better now 
Right now Kaydin's being totally cute (I know I've said it before, but it's TRUE!) Both the pups are "Lala", though he knows that one is Lara and the other on Jackie, he just can't say Jackie yet! On the video, I ask him to call Lara, that's when he does the cute little high-pitched "LALA". He does the same high-pitch when Gideon tells him to call me, "MAMMAAA" it's totally funny! He has this TOTAL fascination with Gideon's car keys, ok any keys really, but Gideon's is first prize, now, we've figured out that if he sees the keys hanging on the holder and we tell him that they're "sleeping", he's cool with that, waves "bye-bye" and we can move on This does not however apply when Gids gets home from work with said keys in hand .... then Kaydin WANTS it ... yes, Gideon usually gives in 
Oh and balls, he loves balls, here's another video where he's playing with Gids and kicking it, too cute I tell you!
That's us for now, to those that we'll be seeing soon - YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! To those that we won't, hope to catch you in December!
We send much love
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