Tereza

Last week we met a new friend. Her name is Tereza and she's the sister of our friend Lucie from Project Antioch. Tereza is studying for her master's in education in Conneticut on a basketball scholarship. She and I are the same age and we three get along swimmingly! Tereza plays with Magdalena so I can do stuff around the house or run to the library for a bit of on-my-own time during the day. In exchange, I help her prepare for the English section on the PRAXIS exam.



Today, we were planning to spend some more time together, but she came down with a bad cold and had to stay in bed. : ( We hope you get better soon, Tereza!

Carriage ride

Now that Magdalena can sit up in her carriage, she actually enjoys riding in it! This morning we went for a walk around our apartment building and to a local park. The sunshine was beautiful and not too hot. Magdalena watched the trees pass by, listened to dogs bark, and felt the breeze from the comfort of her newly discovered perch. I'm so glad she like the stroller now -- it's a lot cooler for me than her prefered mode of transit in the baby sling. :)

Daddy's lovin'

Petr had the oppertunity to spend the weekend with his co-workers on a company vacation. He decided though that he'd rather stay home with his family. One co-worker asked him why he wasn't going and he replied, "I want to spend my birthday with my family. Plus, the weekend is when I get to spend time with my little daughter." Here are a few moments I captured this weekend of Magdalena getting some lovin' from her daddy.
Every time I see Petr cuddling our little girl, I fall in love with him even more. They are just too sweet together!

illegal activity

The past couple of Thursdays, Sunny and I have spent some baby-free time together after Magdalena went to bed. This week, we met at the top of Wenseslas Square and walked down the length of it, through Old Town Square, across Charles Bridge, through Mala Strana, and almost to Andel mall! On our delightful trek, we spotted a fountain which I jokingly mentioned we should jump in. Sunny, not to be joked with, promptly kicked off her cute polka-dotted flip-flops and waded in!
Of course, she wouldn't let me miss out on all the fun entangled in illegal activity (swimming, wading, etc is, we are pretty sure, prohibited in public fountains). So, I peeled off my tennis shoes and socks and waded in too. Here I am imitating the fountain's arch. : )
As we were drying our feet after ending our play session, and inspiring several others to hop in the water too, we attempted to take a picture of ourselves together. As this was proving difficult, a girl offered to take it for us. Here is the result. Ah, I love my dear friend. She truly makes my life "Sunny"!

Big 2-5

Yes, everyone, Petr is a quarter of a century old! To enjoy his birthday weekend, Petr is kicking back and being a coach potato. The movie rental place where we get our dvd's gives 5 free rentals on the member's birthday.

During the birthday phone call from his mom, I took this picture of him with the movies. Presently we're watching "Matrix Revolutions" after completing a Jackie Chan (spelling?) movie. My sweet husband let me choose one of the 5, so I picked an Audrey Tautou movie. Don't know the English name of it since it's been translated into Czech and don't even know what it's about, but hey, it's Audrey! It's gotta be good with her in it (unless it's The DaVinci Code, right?).

Happy Birthday, my Darling Husband! I love you. :-)

Little flirt

Magdalena and I spent a couple of hours with Laura and Owen Syvertsen yesterday. Laura and I first met a couple years ago in Prague not too long into her pregnancy with Owen. When we were reunited, I was pregnant with Magdalena. Now, with them at 19 and 4 months old respectively, they were such a cute little pair! He kept saying, " kiss baby, kiss baby!" And Magdalena kept grinning at him so sweetly. Even with both of the kids getting a bit antsy at the end (too close to nap time), Laura and I still had a nice visit. It's so nice to spend time with another Christian mommy!

Rolling

Magdalena can roll over! Monday evening, while we were watching the World Cup game between the Czechs and Americans (Czechs won 3-0!), we heard the baby crying. Petr went to check on her then turned toward me with his eyes really big and said, "Come quick! Look at her!" I figured something was wrong so I ran over only to see her on her back! Poor baby had turned over while moving around to get comfy and had gotten stuck. She looked so scared.

All day Tuesday, whenever she'd roll over I'd clap my hands while smiling and saying "Good job, Magdalena! Look at you practicing your new skill." By Wednesday she was smiling and cooing on her back. This morning she rolled over after waking from her nap and stayed that way looking around for nearly half an hour before getting fussy. Amazing. She's growing up so quickly!

Today, I lifted up the back of her stroller so that she could sit up and see the world. Boy, did that make a difference! She actually enjoyed riding in the stroller -- didn't even fuss when the sun was in her eyes.

Look at that!

Hey,

I decided to post something. Rebekah told me that my last thing what I posted was really fun. I don´t know if this post going be fun but you can say it later :-) So I was thinking about several things and this is idea what get in my head. (I was doing that yesterday but I deleted not in purpose - it was perfect and hopefully I will remember all of it).
On this world is several things what is fascinating for me - I guess that you can say what is at least one. It is architecture ,everything whatś growing and have some cool design. If I could go back in time I would like to be architect. Maybe next time I will tell you other . .

So this pictures what you can see is our new metro stop which is going be part of our traveling to work or somewhere else. First picture is how this building looks now - itś really cool to see how they putting all pieces together. And other two pictures is how this stop will look like.

And one more thing I will reveal a secret for you. But is really secret - you better keep your mouth shut! This information is good for those who aren´t satisfied where Prague transportation isn´t running or something similar. Are you still curious ? Ok, here is it. I don´t know who will be lucky and have chance to live in Prague in 2100 ,but if you will - you going have pretty cool option to travel in Prague :-)

This is a map of Prague transportation in 2100. If you know how Prague looks now you know what is different :-)

PS: If you didn´t like it - don´t look at it for next time :-)

Petr

Warm weather at last!

Ah, at last, sunshine! Yesterday we took advantage of the sunny weather and spent some time with our friend Jenn from Florida. She spent the afternoon with us eating ice cream, chatting, and visiting the pharmacy (I needed some allergy medicine). It was so nice visiting and having fun in the sun...although, Magdalena didn't quite know what to think about so much sunshine!

Reading

We read Magdalena's first book today! We borrowed it from the library yesterday. On each page it has a baby animal and it's Czech name. Entertaining for Magdalena and educational for me. She especially liked the kuratko (chick).

Answers

"The King and I" is based on a true story! But it happened in Siam, not Singapore. Alas, I got the countries mixed up. Anyway, in response to Sunny's comments on the last entry -- there weren't any models in the section where I was looking. Each article was displayed on a plastic mannequin and the entire site is in very good English...a few typos perhaps, but good English nonetheless. : )

For you other mommies out there, this site is actually good because of their variety and the currency exchange rate being lower than USD (plus they ship overseas relatively cheap). If you'd like to check it out, it's www.momsinmind.com.

S$

Wondering what the title symbol means? Well, that is what I was wondering yesterday. Read on, dear friends, and you will find out. If you already know, you will find out how unobservant I have become!

So, on Friday I was surfing the internet looking for a particular item when I came across the perfect website with exactly what I wanted. Since I had my nearly 4-month-old daughter by my side, who is very fun but quite distracting, I overlooked that all of the dollar signs had a mysterious "S" in front of them...and procceeded to order.

Well, yesterday I decided to revisit this site (which is in perfect English) and see what else they have to offer. Lo and behold, I noticed that one item had won an award "Voted Best in Singapore in Year 2006"! Hmm, could this be a Singaporese (?) site? I continued on and saw "All prices are listed in Singapore Dollars"! GAAH!! How much is a Singapore dollar worth!?!? I had ordered without truly knowing how much I was spending...what if the currency rate was really high? This is a country where chewing gum isn't allowed in public in order to maintain cleanliness. Surely, their money is worth something. I quickly found an exchange rate site and calculated what I'd spent. The current rate is about O.7USD per SD. Whew! I actually spent less money than I thought.

Now, I must muse, how is it that Rebekah the Observant One managed to not notice she was in a Singaporian (?) site? I noticed the pig on the Neiman Marcus St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital benefit fashion show poster didn't have a tail , but it did on their pamphlets! But I didn't realise I was in a Singaporean (now know because I looked it up on wester.com) website! That, my friends, goes to show that a woman's mind truly does turn to mush after childbirth (hence the reason so many moms can't remember their children's names).

An interesting factiod I learned after discovering my bumble yesterday: English is one of Singapore's official languages. Did you know that? I knew that the king in "The King and I" wanted all 92 (or some other outlandishly absurd number) of his children to learn English and that is why Anna and her son went there, but not that it still is a significant language to these people. Question: Is "The King and I" based on an actual event? Reason for my asking is that the video store here has it in the "History" section.

Hanging around the house

Whee! Flying is fun!

This little cutie can't decide if she prefers her thumb, fist, or a couple of fingers...one thing's for sure, though; she loves to suck on her hand!

Little Sweetheart

This is Magdalena's summer "jacket" that I bought for her with Eva last week. Who says lil girls can't wear blue? She is a picture of sweetness in this beflowered heart sweatshirt! Of course, it's a bit big since it's the next size up from what she's wearing now, but that way she can wear it longer. :)

The weather continues to be chilly (good thing baby has her new layer of warmth!), but at least we had a break from the rain yesterday. It was beautifully sunny! So, we took a family walk to the neighborhood Tesco for a few taco fixin's and to get some pictures developed. Petr is there now picking up the pictures -- I'm really looking forward to seeing them! Magdalena is napping (yay!) for the third time today. Poor baby really needs the rest since a rude neighbor was drilling and hammering last night around 7-8 when she was trying to get a good night's sleep!

A tisket, a tasket...

...Magdalena in the laundry basket!

More children's day pictures

Lucie, Ema, Mirka, and another mom (R to L)
Magdalena with Mrs. Cermakova, the City of Prague sponsor/organiser of Children's Day in Stromovka Park
A bunch of little kids drawing chalk art

Mezinarodni detsky den!

International children's day! Yay! We had a lot of fun, despite the cold and wet weather (a sprinkley 52F). Here we are with Lucie and Ema -- notice Ema's headfull of beautiful hair.

We didn't participate in any activities because all of them were for older kids...and evidently the carriage race was a rumor; Daddy can be assured that we didn't race with Magdalena in the stroller since we didn't race at all.

Mirka was going to take Magdalena for a ride in the bicycle trolley but the driver was taking a snack break and wouldn't peddle! Alas, she at least got to look cute inside it for the picture.