The Picnic - Dream of the Sun (with special guest Vusi Mahlasela)

After 2 years in the making (and 4 children later),

 the Valdmanis' brothers long awaited CD has finally been released. 

World renown South African singer, Vusi Mahlasela, otherwise known as 'The Voice',
has guest appeared on 'Come my Way', Track 2.  Check it out!

Available on itunes and their new website.  Click here for more information.

Dreaming of Snow

3 Raglan Sleeve Rollneck Sweaters for my Valdmanis boys

We are at the tail end of the hot season in Dakar; the rain is slowly subsiding and the temps continue to soar.  We've been quite lucky this summer with power outages; only a few nights we have completely been without power.  However, we are now experiencing daily outages averaging 6 hours.

The above 100 degree temps have not stopped my knitting frenzy.

In July, just before Richard fell seriously ill, I stopped by a lovely knitting shop in Scarborough Maine and found a worsted weight wool blend yarn that is washable and dryable.  This yarn was screaming to be made into the classic raglan sleeve roll neck sweater that I have made countless times.

I casted on at Higgins Beach in July, and casted off the 3rd and final sweater at Virage Beach here in Senegal.

                          

 

I can't wait to see my 3 men sporting these sweaters in cold and snowy weather.

More info about this sweater and pattern can be found on Ravelry.

First day of Preschool

When the boys were 1 ½ years old, they went to a preschool once a week for a short time.  That only lasted temporarily, as the boys nap schedule made for a rough day at school for everyone involved.

Needless to say, today was the big day.  The boys are enrolled full time in the mornings at a lovely French school that is within walking distance from home.  In recent weeks, Mom and Dad have been ‘prepping’ Laird and Dylan about school and what to expect.  They were excited about reading books, making art, playing with new toys, recess, and making new friends.  They also knew that Mom and Dad would walk with them to school but then we would have to leave and pick them up at lunch.

At 5 am, Mom woke and showered, excited and needing some alone time before the boys woke up.  Her babies are growing up way too fast.

Laird with his favorite breakfast, French toast and mangos.

Dylan, too excited to eat before school.

Laird, very sad, telling Faye that his stuffed sheep doesn't go to school.

Mom and Dad walked the boys to school, met the teacher, Ms. Florence, and left the school all within a short amount of time.  Many students were crying, yet Laird and Dylan were too excited about the outdoor playground to even notice Mom and Dad leaving.

The walk to school.

Mom and Laird.

Dylan saying to the sheep, 'Hey sheep, D going to school today!', as we passed the neighborhood sheep.

‘Wow’, said Mom, ‘that wasn’t too bad. Not at all what I had expected’.

And then, after walking a block away from the school, we heard it.

‘Daaaaaaaaaadddddaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa’ cried Dylan echoing throughout the neighborhood.

And then the high pitched shrill.  ‘Daaaaaaaaaadddddddaaaaaaaaaa.’

And then two identical voices screaming in unison.

‘Should we go back?’ asked Dad.

‘No,' replied teacher mom, giving herself the same pep talk she had given Kindergarten parents at school a hundred times.  ‘They will cry for a short amount of time and then they will be fine.  If we go back, it will do more harm than good.  If they truly can’t calm down, the school will call us’.  I had to repeat this over and over in my head.

Mom and Dad drove downtown where we purchased their schools supplies and a special ice cream treat for the boys, both constantly checking our phones to see if there were any missed calls.

At pickup, the boys happily told us about their day, while Mom dusted off the sand from Dylan as he apparently was making snow angels in the school yard during recess.

‘They were very happy and quite independent’ the Director told us.  ‘Lovely boys’.

Mom and Dad were also quite happy that neither of the boys had any potty accidents at school, even with all the excitement happening!

The boys had a big lunch and enjoyed a special ice cream treat in celebration of the big day. 

As Laird got in his bed to take a nap he said, ‘Momma, Laird loves Florence.  Yes, Laird loves loves loves Florence.’

And Dylan said, ‘Yeah, Dylan likes school too.’

My babies are growing up way too fast.

Since the boys are in the same class,
they will have to wear these name tags
everyday to school.  Let's hope they don't
figure out how to swap them!

First day of school teacher gift for Ms. Florence:
Hand sanitizer, cough drops, vitamin C drink, tissues, hand cream, and cookies!

Before school photo.  Priceless.

Dylan's monkey face.

Entamoeba Histolytica

Entamoeba Histolytica

The Valdmanis family vacation to Maine was extended this summer by about three weeks, thanks to a one-celled creature that fell in love with Richard's liver. This was wonderful in a lot of ways - the kids got to spend more time with their cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents on the beach. But it came at a cost.

Entamoeba Histolytica lives in water in the tropics and then hitches a ride with whoever is unlucky enough to drink it. Unfortunately, Rich managed to pick up some of these amoebas somewhere in West Africa during his travels for work. Its unclear where or how, exactly, as these things can hide undetected for a long time. But he started to notice it once we arrived in Maine for our annual summer visit. Needless to say, it cast a bit of a shadow over things.

It started as a mild belly pain that just wouldn't go away and it developed slowly as the days went by into a light fever, tremors, night sweats, and fatigue. It didn't immediately stop Rich from having fun -- two camping trips to Richmond Island, some good striper fishing, lots of lobstering, and days building sandcastles with the boys. But after July 4 it got to the point where a hospital visit seemed prudent.

"Have you been drinking alcohol lately?" the doctor asked.

"Well, yes, but..."

"How about barbequed food," he asked, raising an eyebrow.

"There has been some barbequeing, yes, but..."

"You have gastritis and maybe a virus of some kind," he said, dismissively before condemning Rich to a life without beer, chocolate, coffee, wine or anything remotely enjoyable.

"But I live in Africa, and I think I might have a..."

"Let's not get carried away, let's rule out the simple causes first," he said.

Needless to say he was wrong. On Rich's second visit to the ER a few days later  -- which happened immediately after he gave a speech on the dangers of a life in West Africa to an audience at the Scarborough Library (they all laughed when he wiped his brow and said he was headed to the emergency room later that evening) -- doctors advanced the diagnosis only slightly, by doing some additional tests.

"We have good news, Mr. Valdmanis, you have cryptosporidium," said a lady who called with results the next morning. "Its a protozoa that can cause stomach pain and fever. You can cure crypto with pills. You have an appointment with the infectious disease specialist first thing tomorrow and they'll take care of you," she said in a cheery tone.

Crypto! That was indeed good news. A diagnosis that seemed reasonable, and which had a name similar to the glowing green rock that troubled Superman. If you're going to be sick, its nice to have something cool-sounding to point to as the cause.

As it happened, we were headed out to Chebeague Island when we got that call. We'd planned to spend a night at the Chebeague Island Inn to celebrate our anniversary, and we weren't going to let a little illness get in the way. More reason to celebrate, now! 

Unfortunately the Crypto was not about to let Rich have much wholesome fun. After a brief reprieve while sipping sundown cocktails on the Inn's giant porch, Rich started getting the chills. Dinner became impossible. In fact standing upright shortly became impossible. We went up to the room, debating whether to take the boat back to Portland through the darkness, but in the end we decided to tough it out. The fever was quite insane that night, sort of a Hollywood version of a malarial fit. It was not something that gastritis would bring on. Damned crypto.

This picture was taken a few days before Rich was admitted to the hospital.  The ameba was thriving.

The next morning, the infectious disease specialist broke the news that Crypto, while present, was also unlikely to be the root of Rich's troubles. Our spirits sunk. More tests were ordered. 

We went home and Rich went straight to bed where he proceeded to shiver and shake and sweat for another 20 hours. When he rose, he looked pretty terrible. "I'm getting worse and no one knows what's wrong," he said. We were meant to move out of our house within 24 hours. We'd been there for a month already. We were days away from our flight back to Dakar. None of it seemed possible.

We called the infectious disease specialist who took a quick look at the previous day's blood test and said it was time for another visit to the emergency room. "Tell them to admit him until they find out what's wrong. Things look very serious," he told Kelly. Rich's blood test was essentially catastrophic.

"You've got the whole ER's attention," one of the nurses said as teams of doctors came in and out of the room trying different things. One of the rather barbaric tests was for typhoid: the doctor tied a tourniquet around Rich's arm and left it there for five minutes while the fingers on his hand turned pink, then blue, then deep purple, then black. "Nope, you don't have typhoid. You would've gotten a rash on your wrist," the doctor said as Rich struggled to revive his throbbing digits.

Rich got a catscan later that night, a much more comfortable experience, and then was sent up to a room in the ACE (Advanced Care for the Elderly) unit, a spot carved out for him because there's no 'Undiagnosed Tropical Diseases' unit at Maine Med yet.

At about 2 in the morning, a doctor came in, a bolt of light from the corridor shooting past his head, and said, "We've got it. The catscan showed you have an abscess on your liver the size of a tennis ball. You have entamoeba histolytica, a water-borne parasite that has attacked your liver. We'll begin treatment right away." (Kelly's sister, btw, was very concerned about Rich and managed to diagnose his illness a few hours earlier, using Web Md.)

Rich called Kelly. It was a very happy and emotional moment.

Entamoeba histolytica is Africa's second-most deadly parasite behind malaria and generally kills when, undiagnosed and untreated, it eventually explodes one's liver.  Apparently we're all evolved from amoebas, which begs the question why these ones are so hostile.

The next few days involved a surgical procedure and a lot of morphine for Rich, while Kelly sorted out the move and Uncle Rob rescheduled the flights (a time- and patience-consuming task for which he deserves a medal of honour).

It was another three weeks before Rich was healthy enough to fly. But those days were like an unexpected gift in a lot of ways.

My little Artists

They love books.  And they love to draw.

Nothing makes an Art teacher mama happier, than to see her boys enjoy making art.

These pictures were taken on a beautiful Sunday morning, after a 4 mile run with mom in the stroller.  The boys sipped on homemade mango smoothies, while mama 'pushed, pushed, pushed' as the boys like to say.  After a relaxing bubble bath together, the boys climbed onto their bean-bag chairs with their water drawing boards and spent 45 minutes drawing fish, elmo, broken eggs, and bull-dozers.

This was taken 2 weeks ago.  Dylan (on the right) titled his 'Circles' and Laird titled his 'Tree with Moon'.

Now, if only I can get them to start knitting with me.

The Valdmanis Invasion

The neighbourhood changed the moment Mum, Warren and Thor arrived.

"Let's set up the cricket," someone said, heading outside onto the normally quiet dirt road between our house and that of Hissene Habre, the Chadian ex-dictator who is under house arrest.

Within minutes, we were batting sixes over Habre's wall as guards from up and down the block came over for a chance to throw or hit. Cheers erupted each time someone knocked over the wickets, or struck the ball well. At one point, Warren ran over and hugged Sonko, our guard, in a moment of unrestrained bliss over a nice bowl. Yvonne, Astou, and nearby residents came out to check out the comotion, and join in a game they'd never seen or heard of before.

Playing cricket on our beautiful front yard 'lawn'.

Later that afternoon, Mum, Warren, Thor and Rich descended on Goree Island with a rugby ball. After a mostly civilized lunch by the harbor, listening to kora players and chatting about nonsense, the Valdmanis lads stormed the beach and began tossing the rugby ball with a group of visiting local school kids. It wasn't long before the passing became tackling, and everyone ended up in the sea. Except Mum, who wisely watched from the sand, too proud of us to speak.

This was just the start of a wonderful four-day visit that was jam packed with excitement and flew by way too quickly.

Laird and Dylan got to spend lots of time with Nana, who read them books in the morning before breakfast and allowed them to leap on her bed. They're now counting the days to summer at Higgins, when they'll be able to visit Nana in the mornings, and maybe get donuts.

Jumping on Nana's bed.

They also were introduced by Warren to Angry Birds, a silly game on his iPad that really captured their imaginations, and to a real rugby ball by Thor, who brought one up from South Africa for them to pass around. It won't be long before all the cousins get together for a beach match.

We also played tennis, lounged by a swimming pool, surfed a bit, and solved all the world's problems over multiple bottles of wine at dinner (and learned how to 'pass the napkin' instead of yelling over each other). It was exhausting, and fantastic, and it made Dakar feel much more like home.

Thanks for a great visit, we'll never forget it! (See you soon on Higgins Beach!!!)

Brothers Valdmanis' minus Roberto. 

Dadda read le livre please?

Laird and Dylan could spend an entire day reading books.  They sleep with books, they keep a stack of books in the car, and are constantly asking (demanding) we read to them.  'Dadda read le livre?' Laird will ask in Fran-glish. 

Dylan will often read out loud listing off everything he recognizes on the page in both French and English. 

We've noticed something pretty cute with Laird.  Whenever he reads a book, he points all his toes towards the floor except his big toe.  Adorable.

A Visit to Astou's Village

Relaxing at Astou's house

Astou snuck off the compound with a bucket, went to the water pump down the alley, and hauled the bucket back filled nearly to the brim on her head. It was hot out and Laird and Dylan were working up a sweat, rolling around in the dust with their new friends Fatou and Awa – children from within Astou’s extended family.

“Bain moussant!” Laird screamed when he saw Astou pouring half the water into a second bucket and placing both buckets under the shade of a tree. (Bain moussant is French for bubble bath, though there were no bubbles here). Dylan immediately demanded that his clothes be taken off. “Enlever,” he said, tugging at his shirt. Within moments, the lads were splashing about, giggling, and drawing the attention of the village kids, who peered over the wall to catch a glimpse of the naked laughing ‘toubabs’.  (Some were in awe as they had never seen a 'white' person before, let alone two identical ones!)

Bain Moussant!

This was a highlight of a very nice day spent at Astou’s family home outside of Thies, a couple hours drive inland from Dakar in an area best described as a village. We arrived to the neighbourhood of narrow alleys between tin and cement houses at about mid-morning to a warm reception from Astou’s parents, sisters, cousins, aunts and uncles. They gave us a tour of the grounds – a walled-off yard with a huge shady tree, a house with a front patio and two large windowless rooms, and a kitchen outbuilding where a fire was being prepared to cook lunch.

The neighborhood

Laird and Dylan set to exploring, initially inside the walls, and then down the alley to a shade tree where carpenters were at work. They quickly made friends with Fatou and Awa – smiling, pudgy little girls who enjoyed running around, jumping and tackling as much as they did. They all got dirty and hot under the midday sun. After the bath – during which the entire Diaou family set up chairs in a semi-circle to watch the giggling twins – a big bowl of mangos arrived. Laird ate most of them, at least four.  Then it was lunch time.

After smelling the slow-cooked onion sauce warm over the wood fire outside, we were moved indoors to one of the big rooms. Astou lay out a cloth on the floor and put a large bowl of rice covered with the onion sauce, meat and vegetables in the center. We all sat around the bowl – boys included – and began eating. In Senegal , you are meant to eat these traditional dishes with your right hand – you take the rice and sauce, squeeze it so it more or less holds together, and then pop it into your mouth -- though Astou mercifully brought out some spoons for us.

Astou's sisters cooking in the kitchen

The delicious Yassa Beef

Full and happy, we chilled out under the tree for a while more while Laird, Dylan, Fatou and Awa continued to roll around. Then we said our goodbyes. “This isn’t like Dakar , is it,” said Mr. Diaou, a gentleman who wore a gleaming white traditional booboo and red fez for the occasion. “I hope you enjoyed your day in the village.”

We did, and we’ll remember the kindness of Astou’s family forever.

Astou's father and Dylan

Climbing the tree

The gang (minus Richard, the photographer)

Sleeping on the car trip home

And Cable Hats too...

It's a good thing I made this a bit big; I'm not sure the boys will get to wear them this year as temps in Maine have been soaring. At least they are finished... and used up some scrap yarn too. I don't know why it's incredibly rewarding to use up scrap yarn...

Spring Sweaters for Maine!

Bring on the cold!

We are counting the days until our Spring trip to Maine. We have all been through some bouts of 'homesickness'; 7 months is too long to go without seeing family and friends!

I realized last month that we may actually see some snow in Maine. I whipped up these two sweaters for the boys and am quite happy with how they turned out. The pattern is called 'Caelum' and can be found on Ravelry.

Seriously, I cannot believe they stood together for this pic!

Beautiful Dylan.

Happy Laird!

Lairdy Pants.

Speaking of Ravelry...

I have been knitting seriously for about 8 years now. Self-taught via youtube and knitting videos. This is the first time I have ever uploaded pics and pattern to Ravlery. Very proud. Check it out if you are a member!