Happenings

Our neighbor is really sick right now; her husband is in Jakarta at the moment, so in talking with her daughter this afternoon, I offered to let them use our finger pricker thing to get a blood slide to test for malaria. She was really excited, so I ran inside to get Brant and the pricker thing. (Do NOT do the finger pricker thing myself!)

Elijah was looking at the box of needles after Brant left and said, "Mom, looking at this thing makes my bones shake."

In other news, Ezra finally, finally after 18 hours of not eating, decided to eat his chicken pieces from yesterday night's dinner. But then tonight he didn't want to eat dinner again. We got a few bites down him and he threw everything else on the floor while we were giving the older boys baths. You win some; you lose some.

We had the best dinner tonight. I found a great new recipe in my favorite magazine, and was definitely a hit... with everyone except Ezra. :) You take boneless, skinless chicken breasts, coat them in melted butter then dip them in a mixture of crushed Ritz crackers, shredded cheddar cheese and minced garlic... I think the recipe called for one clove, so I used 6. (Not an exaggeration; we use a LOT of garlic here; cheap and great for the immune system.) It was REALLY yummy and so easy - just bake for half an hour. We also had zucchini sauteed in butter and garlic (another 5 cloves) which was a special treat - the first time the boys have had zucchini I think other than in zucchini bread.... I can find zucchini occasionally at the import grocery store an hour and a half away, but it's usually got rotten spots or is old, so I just shred it to make bread; but last week I found some that was really fresh (as fresh as imported zucchini can be!) so sliced it and ate it tonight - so good! Topped the meal with garlic cheese bread (more garlic and butter!) and with mangoes (also imported; don't grow naturally here, how weird is that?) that Brant found when he was supply buying the other day - GREAT thing having a husband who shops - and who shops enough to know a rare treat (like mangoes) when he spots them at the grocery store.

All in all, used one full bulb of garlic on tonight's meal.

Turns out our neighbor had malaria. Brant took her some re-hydration drinks as she wasn't eating or drinking anything. I talked with her daughter this evening and she said she had taken "medicine" ...but I'm not quite sure she was taking malaria medicine.... so we'll see how she does in the next couple days....