Weekend in Kribi

Thorsten is leaving for Belgium on Friday so we thought it would be nice to have a few days away of Yaoundé before. So last weekend, we went off to the sea-side. But instead of relaxing in an expensive hotel, we decided to go "camping". We stayed in the unfinished house of friends of our friends. Which means there was no water nor electricity, but there was a well where we could fetch water, there were beds with matrasses and a garden where the children could play safely.

The sea at Kribi is known to be a bit rough, but we hadn't really expected our children to be mortified by the sound and the waves. Luckily, after a bit of gentle persuasion they decided it was OK to play in the sand at a fair distance of the sea. Once that was settled, we had a great time. Jara, Lisa and Mia (daughter of Julie and Tom who's about the same age as Jara) loved playing in the sand. The nanny's, who came along, loved playing in the sea. And we, we loved having a beer on the beach while the children were playing.
Our nanny's also decided that they could do better than the food in the restaurant and made us a delicious meal.
Saturday night, we decided it was the night off for the parents. We enjoyed the night out, sunset on the beach and long talks without children waking up, crying etc.

We took our nanny's to see how that would work. But we decided that the advantages (parents having a night out, helping hand) did not outweigh the disadvantages (extra people to care/cater for, own agenda,...) so that was the first and last time nanny's would join.



All in all, it was a great weekend away but we also enjoyed coming back home, lighting the oven and having a pizza!

Boys work (2)!

Last weekend the boys finished the pizza oven! We were lucky having picked an afternoon with sunshine and no rain - rainy season is full on and it's raining every day now.
The boys enjoyed playing with the sand, mud, making it the right texture (I didn't know but apparently there's a lot of engineering going into clay oven-building) and patching it all up. Then it was time to get the sand out and light the fire.
Yesterday, we had the first pizza out of the oven and it was... delicious!

Let the party begin!

The only draw back is the rain. We need to get a cover built as when it rains on the oven it could turn our oven into a pile of mud when not protected...

Griet's malaria and its consequences for Lisa

I had malaria last week - No panic! I'm all better now!
For all who know the disease, it is not pretty. Anyhow, due to the medication I needed to take to get better, I am not allowed to breastfeed for 28 days. The medication stays in your system that long and consequently in the breastmilk. Since I have never had any excess milk, and now putting breastfeeding on hold for one month has basically reduced my milk production to a nihil. Even though I expressed as well as I could (especially as I was having a hard time being ill - fever, pain etc) my milk supply has stopped. Unfortunately.

On the other side, since the bottlefeeding, Lisa's been sleeping better and seems more balanced, i.e. not wanting to feed all the time. Even Jara loves 'giving Lisa a bottle'. If we're not carefull, she would even give her own milk to Lisa! When Jara sees Lisa with the bottle, it reminds her of milk hence she now wants to drink milk during the day too (rather than a bottle in the morning and evening). Sometimes she wants to be given the bottle as a baby. Ah well, it won't harm her and the extra cuddle is welcome. She's been eating well and has been a happy little girl (see video below):