Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for the ‘Family’ Category

A journey of 100 posts …

Posted in Adoption, Family, International Adoption, Island life, NaBloPoMo, Seychelles, tagged , on November 13, 2007| 5 Comments »

Yesterday I published my 100th post on this blog. Given that up until last month I was posting close to 100 per month on the triple combo of my pro blogs, 100 since April seems a paltry contribution to the tonnage of wordage in the blogage, and I’m actually surprised at how many days passed with me thinking, “Nah. I’m wrung out.”

NaBlogPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) is bringing me here every day of November, although I have no idea why I’m finding this challenge so compelling. Blogging every day is not new for me, although blogging HERE every day is.

Not only is it easier for me to take a pass on any given day on Paradise P’o’d than on the Adoption.com site because no one is paying me to post whatever dribblets I manage, and the fact that the only commitment happens to be one of no consequence whatsoever that festers in my little mind, the lack of any specific focus on this blog often stops me in my tracks. It’s never a case of having nothing to write about, but rather of having too many potential topics and not enough energy to pick just one.

I could write about adoption issues every day using this space for angles that don’t fit under news, international adoption or adopting as an older parent, but quite frankly I really need to get away from the subject after pounding out 1500 to 2000 words on one take or another every morning.

I like writing about my family, but I fear that waxing lyrical day after day about how wonderfully happy and content we are in our little cocoon would become dull as stamps for all but a few regular readers.

Tropical living, Seychelles in general and island quirks are fun, but even I’m not interested enough to yammer on daily about fish, the weather and who may be sleeping with whom … the pop-topics in local conversations … and with any luck at all the horrible trauma of recent days won’t repeat any time soon, or ever.

So … 100 posts and counting. So much to say, yet so much of life outside my office calling for me to participate, to enjoy, to get the hell away from my computer.

Note the graphic illustration of the choices as they are presented to me whenever I sit down to write:

Sandra’s office

My office

Not my office

Not my office, and only three steps away

The beach at the end of the road

The beach at the end of the road

Read Full Post »

Sam’s slide show

Posted in Adoption, Family, International Adoption, Island life, Seychelles on November 11, 2007| 1 Comment »

In honor of our boy growing up, here’s an encapsulated version of how that happened.

Read Full Post »

Sam’s 5th Birthday!

Posted in Adoption, Cambodia, Family, International Adoption, Island life, NaBloPoMo, Seychelles on November 11, 2007| 9 Comments »

A birthday has been had and a boy is now five.

The event was a huge success. Sam was thrilled to bits about everything from the way his planned menu turned out … roast chicken, grilled red snapper, coconut crab curry, rice, eggplant chutney, pumpkin salad, roast potatoes … to the musical candle and sparkler in the shape of a 5, to the wonderful company, to the raft of gifts.

Mark’s family considered me cruel to the extreme for not letting Sam open any gifts until after dinner. The giddy charm of anticipation eludes them completely, so they consider placing wrapped presents in plain view to be slavered over for days in an ever-increasing frenzy of expectation and suspense little more than torture.

How many times over the course of the evening I heard, usually from my husband’s mother, some oblique reference to Sam’s fortitude and my cruelty over the apparently arbitrary wait to satisfy curiosity with some furious wrapping paper demolishing.

My mother, on the other hand, sent an email in total support of the enforcement of a period of anticipatory agony.

“It’s the best part,” she reminded.

Even Sam admitted as much under the influence of afterglow this morning, acknowledging that long longing made the revealing more fun and stretched out the excitement over a longer period than simple gift opening frenzy would allow.

Keeping in mind that many things kids in the real world take for granted and have seen time after time are completely unknown on this island, you will see in the photos that a Spiderman suit complete with built-in muscles was the cat’s pajamas … so to speak … although much too hot in a non-breathing polyester sort of way to be Sam’s pajamas no matter how dear his wish was never to remove this perfect fit of an alter ego.

(Sent from Utah by my friend Holly along with a bounty of Americana, she provided this piece de resistance … triceps de isometrics?)

A tiny china tea set from my mom was a big hit with Cj, who spent the rest of the evening pouring.

With my boy well sated, I’m figuring I now have a couple of weeks before the pre-Christmas mania begins to build.

Enjoy the photos.

Before the party

Sam and Cj before the party.

SamSpidey

Casual Spidey

Spidey pose

Spidey pose, Spidey pose, doing the thing only a spider does

Happy Birthday Boy

Such a happy Birthday Boy!

Happy Cj, too, with her very first tea set

Cj’s Tea Set

Read Full Post »

We be ‘pupulatin’

Posted in Family, Fun, Island life, NaBloPoMo, Seychelles, tagged , , on November 8, 2007| 4 Comments »

It’s a ‘pupulation’ explosion, and we’re knee deep in cute. By Christmas we’ll be pooping precious around here.

Our dog Dinah gave birth to eight of these little sweeties, and being the great mom that she is, they’re doing very well.

There are details … sort of … on one of my pro blogs here if you’re interested in more of the pupdate.

Sam Cj Puppies ©2007 SHBenoiton
Sam and Cj and puppies, oh my!

Puppy Paw ©2007 SHBenoiton

Wanna shake? Here’s my paw …

Puppybutton©2007 SHBenoiton

And here’s my tummy button … it’s that little thing there below my great big head.

Read Full Post »

A NaBloPoMo Winner (blush)

Posted in Adoption, Family, NaBloPoMo, tagged , , , on November 3, 2007| 1 Comment »

NaBloPoMo, National Blog Posting Month, is just seeing the dawn of its third day and I have already managed to embarrass myself into being declared a winner.

Not that the point of the daily post-fest has anything to do with competition; in fact, the camaraderie building feels comfortably non-comptetitve and I’ve yet to see any announcement of prizes for “most compelling post on recipes using feta” or “best tips on cable knits”.

No, I won’t see any award, but kudos are coming, nonetheless, with one poster stating emphatically, “You win for the BEST story I’ve heard in a long time!” while another is shamelessly “*bowing deeply and kissing Sandra’s big toe in attitude of adoration*”.

To what do I owe these accolades so long coveted?

My big, fat mouth and my most embarrassing moment.

I should have known that any distinction I’d ever manage to achieve would end up having something to do with my innate talent for offensive verbosity, as even when trying really hard to make nice I oh-so-often end up leading an unintentional pas de deux that stumble-starts with a faux pas … a faux pas de deux, so to speak.

That’s what first attracted me to the topic … the discussion is here … a title that told me I could really get my teeth into this one: How Does Your Foot Taste?

The story I recounted for my new NaBloPoMo pals has been told before. I fessed up big time on one of my pro blogs a couple of years ago, but this seemed a perfect opportunity to trot it out again.

If you’ve not yet heard my “Ugly Baby Story”, check out either link, or both, for the whole train wreck. If after doing so you would like to join the ranks of those presently bestowing approbation upon me for my mortifying blunder …

Line on the left, one slap each.

Read Full Post »

Bird Island photos

Posted in Family, Island life, Seychelles, tagged , , on October 30, 2007| 8 Comments »

Life has once more come between me and my personal blog. Not only have I been dealing with some unpleasant work issues and sick kids, I’m putting the finishing touches … I hope … on a collection of short stories and other bits that have been begging to be included between the front cover and back page.

Of course, I’ll be flogging the book here when its available … no worries about that.

Since I’m using up all my meaningful words in other places at the moment, I thought I would post some pictures (worth thousands of them, I hear) of our Bird Island trip for general consumption.

birdda-plane.jpg
De plane … de plane …

The runway … avec Giant Aldabra Tortoise
That’s no rock on the runway! (Yes, that is the runway.) It’s a Giant Aldabra Tortoise.

Runway tortoise, up close and personal
Up close and personal with the runway tortoise.

Bird/Sam&bush ©SHBenoiton
No footprints, please. (Sam with a bush on the beach.)

Read Full Post »

A little slice of island life

Posted in Expat Living, Family, Island life, Seychelles on June 28, 2007| 2 Comments »

Tomorrow is the last of the June holidays in Seychelles … June being THE month for them with a total of three days dedicated to the celebration of political events and one religious day off … the 29th of June, Independence Day.

On the day in 1976 the British lowered their flag, folded it up, and went home, as Seychelles became a nation in its own right with no colonial overlords to placate.

Two hundred years after the USA became states united in America under the Stars and Stripes, and without nearly the fanfare, the event was nonetheless momentous and will be celebrated in island fashion with beach picnics, barbecues and no small amount of driving aimlessly around the island with frequent beer stops and the equally frequent pit stops for peeing alongside the road.

Here at our place we’ll be livin’ it up in our usual devil-may-care way … by working. I’ll be blogging from the veranda and getting stuck in to a couple of speeches, while Mark clears land and makes hooch … a licensed, legal venture that brings in needed extra cash … a yummy concoction called baka consisting of fermented sugar cane juice that is aged in the finest of blue plastic barrels and provided to discerning clientele in expertly crafted 50 liter jerry cans and is deemed most desirable to the local palate.

We have a special building on our property … the baka barn … for this sideline, a jaunty little pied a terre down the road from our house that’s locked up tighter than the back string on an Italian tourist’s thong bikini any time Mark isn’t in there doing his impression of the Sorcerer’s Apprentice … without the brooms, of course.

The weather isn’t the best in June, so some of the festivities organized for any of the holidays are always rained out. Thankfully, rain here doesn’t mean anything but wet, as cold doesn’t really happen, so most folks just get on with whatever they had planned and pay little attention to drizzle.

June is also the slowest month for tourists, so some small hotels and many restaurants are closed for the month. In my neighborhood, this means the beach at Grandma’s is like it was when I first came to Seychelles … no one but family day after day. Lovely.

If it’s a nice day tomorrow, we’ll certainly make time for a swim and to enjoy a run-around without having to dodge those aforementioned Italians in thongs.

Because it’s a holiday, however, that will have to wait until after Mark delivers the celebratory baka to all the local establishments that will see a roaring trade.

Santé! Bon zour Lindependenz!

Read Full Post »

Trainers for tots?

Posted in Family, Island life, Seychelles, The USA from the outside in on June 25, 2007| 1 Comment »

A weekend just came and went, and although I spent far too much time in front of the computer, the rest of my family was out and about in big ways.

Mark is clearing the lower bit of our land, so was up and down the hill like so many monkeys jumping on a bed, toting chainsaw and grand kuto … Sam on his heals, then running back up to be well out of the way if and when the call comes, “Timber!”, making the most of our acre-plus and the surrounding jungle. Cj, too small for a Tarzan impression, kept herself busy jogging up and down our road, scolding the dogs as she went along and stopping occasionally to examine whatever pretty rock or fancy bug that happend to cross her meandering path.

A few more hours outside saw buckets being filled and dumped, resulting mud puddles targeted for hops, skips and jumps, sticks tossed for dogs that have no inclination to fetch, flowers picked for mom, and assorted other vigorous activities of the fun kind.

A couple of hours on the beach had both kids running and jumping, chasing crabs and practicing cartwheels while loading their hair and ears up with sand as the days wound down, and some living room dancing had the whole bunch of us movin’ and a groovin’ before settling in for pre-bed quiet time.

A story in this morning’s news had me wondering, though, how parents in the rest of world manage to get kids to pass weekends in any sort of healthy fashion.

This in the Huff Post, reporting that nearly a million American kids have personal trainers, about had me gagging on my guava.

What kind of life is it when children no longer walk to school, play outside or ride their bikes, but instead need parents to fork out $60 an hour for someone to put them through paces in a gym?

it seems the whole concept of being a kid has changed drastically, and I can’t help but worry about this generation. Things do run in cycles, however, and this may just be a phase that will have its own backlash someday.

Maybe by the time today’s pampered kids hit their stride, a rousing game of Ring-around-the-Rosie will serve as an icebreaker at cocktail parties and tag will be an Olympic sport.

Read Full Post »

Bernstein’s New Book and Key Lime Pie

Posted in Celebs, Family, The USA from the outside in on May 30, 2007| Leave a Comment »

My brilliant and talented niece has a piece in today’s Huff Post that jives with a note I’ve had on my desktop for a couple of days, proving something about family … or not … and prompting me to write about Carl Bernstein.

Her post in the Post covers Berntein’s new ‘must read’, “A Woman in Charge: The Life of Hillary Rodham Clinton”, and quotes him as making much of how important he … ooops … it is.

I have no doubt it’s a page turner that’s flying off the shelves; after all, who’s hotter than Hillary at the moment, and Carl sports journalistic gravitas like like a bull dangles mountain oysters.

Not only does promise of an up-close-and-personal look, no matter how over-the-shoulder a peek down the blouse, at the cast iron bra that Mrs. Clinton must wear to deal with her fidelity-challenged Mr. guarantee buzz and sales, any hint of sex and scandal gets an extra boost when the Bernstein name goes with.

Which brings me to the note on my desk.

Carl Bernstein on marital devotion and loyalty. That’s rich!

Leave it to someone who’s been living on a little island in the middle of nowhere for years to remind those who may have forgotten that the uproariously funny book “Heartburn” … a truly inspired takedown of an unfaithful husband with appalling timing and equally poor taste in dalliance partners … was based on Berntein’s real-life philandering by his amazingly talented, now fabulously famous … then profoundly pregnant … ex-wife, Nora Ephron.

Hands down the best retribution ever dealt a wandering ego-with-a-penis, Ms. Ephron managed not only to keep readers, and eventually film-goers, highly entertained while inspiring women to brook no crap and proving that being the cheatee in a marraige can be turned into a position of great power, she put spending time with Carl Bernstein high in the top ten of what no self-respecting woman in her right mind would ever consider.

Yes, it was hard for the guy to get a date. May still be.

So, intimately familiar with all that is Washington politics as he is, as well, who better to probe the ins and outs of Hillary’s dealing with Bill’s ins and outs than the man single-handedly responsible for a British Baroness being forever thought of as the woman with a nose like a thumb and a mid-90s spike in the popularity of Key Lime Pie?

Read Full Post »

Family photos

Posted in Family, International Adoption, Island life, Seychelles on May 28, 2007| 13 Comments »

While hopping around other blogs this morning, I realized that I’d not yet posted photos of my lovely family. I’ll take care of that right now.

In case we’ve not yet met, I’m Sandra, aka Mom, the adult male is Mark, often called Dad. The kids are Sam and Cj. At the moment, I’m 55, Mark is 40, Sam is 4.5 years old and Cj is 25 months. We live on Mahé, the biggest island in Seychelles … big being 4 miles wide and 17 miles long … near the village of Baie Lazare.

Beach familyBox o’ kids
Happy Cj
Sam makes cookies

Now that that’s done, I’ll get back to writing.

Read Full Post »

« Newer Posts - Older Posts »