Time on The Toilet Seat

Time On The Toilet Seat: Before you begin to think that this is a weird potty post, ( its not what you might think) just give me second to explain how I ended up spending a couple of hours (literally) parked on the same toilet seat in Adot Tina hotel in Addis Ababa this evening ... Today was amazing to say the least. Being parents has been just as much fun as we thought and thankfully not quite hard as thought. There have been dome minor challenges, but mostly joys! We started off the day with a gourmet breakfast at our hotel where the girls practiced using silverware.... Not necessarily for the first time, but an event for sure! Before we even began, my mamma skills kicked in and I decided to sit us in an area of the dining room that was in a corner and separated from everything else, and everyone else. I can't exactly count the miscommunications, and the times silverware ended up on the floor or flying , yes flying , in what would have been a dangerous trajectory had we been near other human life and not just the flowers on the tables. Then we all got dressed for church as the girls had requested we visit a congregation they knew of. The girls were so excited about their new dresses ( and new, new shoes.... a whole other story...)and I used my momma skills again to get all of the wrinkles out from being squished in the suitcases ... When in need of an iron and none is available.... A blow dryer will suffice! So off we went with no one getting stuck in the elevator door ( this time) and embarked on our first "worship experience". When we arrived at church, we were told we had to pay 50 Bir per person and that we had to wait for the priest and a tour guide..... So we discovered that there was NO service, we were just getting a tour. A tour that ended halfway through when some of the other guests started taking pictures in other areas of the building. Ha! Bill wanted to get his money's worth so we finished the tour ourselves as the tour guide "chill axed" . The girls were enthralled and spent significant time getting their photos just right. When we left I was kind of frustrated and felt like we had wasted time, but as I reflected, and as our driver pointed out, we are blessed, church service or not...we have two beautiful daughters that God has lead to our family and my worship today is just a grateful heart. Speaking of the daughters, after the church fiasco, and an akward lunch afterward, we decided to just stay in the hotel for the rest of the day and bond. Room service baby! We made a magnificent fort where we used bills IPhone flashlight app strobe light to do some dancing in the dark. We also pretended to be asleep and snoring and then " woke up" to scare the girls. They were dying with laughter at our snoring and trying to do it too! But they couldn't! So for now snoring makes me cool! We also tried out our gymnastics skills: doing back bends, flips and (probably somewhat dangerous for the all wood floors )and handstands. Kalkidan through guestures let me know she wanted to slide around on the floor , so we came up with all kinds of crazy ways to do just that. ( thankful for a long hallway and room big enough to do this in) she also let me know she liked bring thrown in the air, twirling around in our arms and getting that dizzy feeling. So we all did this until we all felt sick. We then played some serious hide and seek! Kumnager was almost always last to be found. She somehow contorted her body to hide in a space smaller than a microwave! Kumneger also wanted her hair " undone" which was a hour plus long project... So we all pitched in there to undo braids and thought we would be kind of done with big projects for the evening. Time for rest! But no, Kumnager had other plans. Even though she'd already taken a shower and had pjs on, she decided her hair now needed washed. A couple miscommunications later and we found ourselves next to yhe jacuzzi tub ( I know right! ) in our bathroom and a few minutes later Kumnager was in her swimsuit preparing for the Olympic swim team in the tub! Ha ha! Kalkidan eventually joined In the fun and again, my momma skills bubbled to the surface and I spent the entire "swim meet/bubble bath/ spa night/ chick fight" parked on the toilet seat beside them, getting splashed, getting covered in suds, breaking up altercations, washing hair and laughing myself silly! When most people think of being on the toilet for a couple hours in a foreign country, they assume gastrointestinal /medical problem"!! Ha ha! But in this case I can honestly say that there was no other place I would have rather been than on that toilet seat.