Where did I go? What did I do?

The towels were folded, new sheets on the beds, the fridge stocked. Our first guests were about to arrive! Of course, we made a last minute trip to Ikea for the essentials, rushing along the long pathways, me with the pusher, Senol with a trolley, making snap decisions at 9.59pm before racing to the registers before the store shut. Poor Senol ended up with 'Ikea hand' the next day - so many blisters from putting everything together. My sister, her partner and their 3 gorgeous children made the long journey to Turkey to see us and we were so excited!

So that is why I haven't been around here for a while (sorry about the late notice). We had such a wonderful time and I was so sad to see them go and to realise that I am alone (well not alone, but, you know, sort of alone without family and old friends) here again.

The visit was fantastic. It was so good to relax and have some fun with them all and it left me feeling reinvigorated and motivated. I feel so lucky to have a baby with a generally peaceful nature and go with the flow attitude, but also felt all consumed (and just plain tired) by the constant and unrelenting care, the need to protect him from everything, the crying and the sleepless nights. My sister and her partner do an amazing job with the kids and they are all such individual characters with wonderful natures and so much fun to be around! It made me realise that they grow up (!) and do become so much more independent. That life does continue!

I also saw that it can be a great experience to have more than one child. Up until now I couldn't imagine having another baby. It all seemed so exhausting. That feeling has now changed (no plans for more kids in the near future though!!).

I have lots of photos to go through and will show you some of the things we got up to over the next few days. Turkey is so full of treasures to be discovered!

The prettiest girl at the circus

Yashar is looking very spunky in his overalls and cute new pink T. So I guess the pink t-shirt does not help to abate all the comments that he looks like a beautiful little girl! But those comments always put a smile on my face anyway because they remind me of a story my Dad tells that my sister Emily and I always loved. It goes something like this...

When he was little he went to the circus with his parents. They had him dressed up very nicely in a little white bonnet. The ringmaster bellowed to the audience that the white pony prancing around the ring would stop and bow its head in front of the prettiest girl. The pony slowly made its way around the ring, then brayed and lowered its head in front of the cute little baby in the white bonnet - my Dad - the prettiest girl at the circus!

Is that how the story goes Dad? That's how I remember it anyway.

...Oh, and that's me holding Yashar.

28 things to do before I turn 29

So, quite a while ago I read a post by Andrea over at Hula Seventy called '37 things to do before I turn 38'. I thought that was a great idea - I love lists, I want to get all the things done that I mean to do and would love to do but never actually get around to doing...this is totally what I need! 5 months later and my point is proven -I need that list! (ok so I actually wrote the list back in April just after my birthday, but have only now got around to posting it - hope that is not cheating)

Here are my 28 things to do before I turn 29 in no particular order:

1. Go swimming with Yashar

2. Read 3 novels

3. Get up earlier

4. Get photos of Yashar printed and organise them in an album

5. Improve my Turkish to 'advanced' level

6. Draw a picture for Yashar's room

7. Generate some income -how? That I do not know!

8. Take photos of strangers - this is a hard one -see the 22 April post on Hula Seventy

9. Buy a sewing machine (and actually use it)

10. Take 5 pictures I love

11. Buy some vintage fabric

12. Sell one thing I have made

13. Get to know at least 10 new people in my area

14. Find other Mums to meet up with

15. Make a gorgeous room for Yashar

16. Knit a scarf

17. Have a romantic dinner with Senol

18. Buy handmade

19. Learn to crochet (see my earlier post about this - it is cool to crochet -believe me!)

20. Paint a picture

21. Go to Trilye

22. Get one of my photos printed 'ginormous size' for our bedroom

23. Write letters (not just emails!) to friends and family

24. Cook 4 things from Greg and Lucy Malouf's gorgeous book Turquoise

25. Paint a chair

26. Plant some herbs

27. Go to Topkapi palace (again)

28. Make the Christmas presents for my family (sorry to my family but that's what you are getting!)

...and what does this have to do with tomatoes and lettuce? Nothing, it's just dinner.

Baby steps in the dirt

On the weekend we spent a gorgeous late afternoon in Senol's Uncle's garden over on the Asian side of Istanbul. Yashar and his cousin got to feel the dirt on their feet for the first time! They were captivated.

The garden was growing beautifully - a fig tree with the promise of delicious fruit to come and this walnut tree - I had no idea that this is what they looked like.


Another Uncle and a cousin arrived carrying a large sheet, with purple juice dripping from the bottom. They plonked it on the table, grinning and ready to accept the forthcoming compliments and gasps of delight. What had they delivered? Kilos of mulberries!

It took us a while to figure this out as the varieties are different here to the darker mulberries I have seen before. Here the white and purpley/red varieties are common. In fact I think it is pretty rare to find mulberries available in Australia. Here they are abundant, splatting on the ground as you walk past the trees! Apparently the white variety's leaves are the favourite for silk worms.

The evening light faded as we had lots of laughs, playing with Yashar and his cousins and enjoying the mulberries and a cool drink.

Dinner time!

...and speaking of Yashar, here is his weekly photo - getting ready for another delicious home cooked meal - well I'm not so sure about the delicious part! This has been a huge week for him and very exciting for us! He has learnt to 'give me 5' and 'give me a kiss'. He hasn't quite mastered 'sleep through the night' yet though ;)

Happy Father's Day!

I hope everyone had a great father's day, although, as I discovered when I called my Dad in Australia, it is not father's day in all parts of the world! I helped Yashar put this photo of him at bath time (that I also posted a few of weeks ago) in a frame and he told me to write this special message on the back: Dear Baba (Dad), I love you lots and I especially love all the baths you give me. You are the best Dad ever. Lots of love Yashar. XXOO

And, being the amazing father he is, Senol spent most of the day with Yashar and gave me some much needed time to myself.

Some Table TLC

Here it seems that if you see something old that you like you have to jump in and get it as soon as possible! Senol saw some gorgeous old chairs a few days ago in a nearby front yard and wanted to ask the owner if they would sell them. But he was too slow! A few days later they had been put in the rubbish and taken away.

So when we spied this table in the old shed at the back of our apartments we pounced. The landlord was happy to give it to us.

It took some major cleaning, getting rid of spiders (luckily no scorpions!) and washing off years (probably decades) of dust.

I love it! I think it could fit right in some of the photos I posted when I was searching for apartment furniture inspiration. I just had a look at the photos from that post and it so similar to the blue table -I hadn't even realised! I was going to use it for a sewing table, but I am loving the top too much to cover up with all that junk.

So instead it now looks like this:

Little red jewels

So many of the plants here are amazing! They must love the climate or the soil or something. I think I mentioned before that this whole area was covered in quince trees, until the 1960's when most of the people who live here now built their homes. Now there are climbing roses three storeys high and trees so heavy with sour green plums that they should just collapse on the ground from sheer exhaustion!

But what is really tempting me at the moment is the cherries! Hanging off the trees like little jewels, cherry trees are everywhere here! This is the tree in our front garden. The cherries are not quite ripe yet, but there's the promise of delicious things to come.

Instead we buy them from our local Friday market at the moment. So so cheap, about 2YTL a kilo (that's close enough to $2). It's no wonder you can buy cherry juice everywhere here. What a luxury.

And what better to go with cherries...

Crowded markets

The weekend started with an early morning ferry ride. It was surprisingly chilly, despite the forecast being for 26 degrees. Oh well, I thought, the sun is sure to come out soon. A hot drink on the ferry warmed us up on way. 'Oralet' is sort of like hot orange flavoured cordial, very sweet!

A big day was planned...breakfast in Sultanahmet, buy a sewing machine, then head to the fabric 'market' in Sultanhamam. Things didn't quite go as planned.

We made it to Sultanahmet, but the chefs at three of the cafes we went to hadn't turned up yet! Things were getting desperate and the coffee cravings were starting to kick in. Senol made a few calls and suddenly omelettes appeared from a chefless kitchen, followed by one of Senol's cousins bringing some tasty borek from the local 'borekci' and then another cousin arrived with a huge coffee for each of us. I love a big Turkish family!

We bought the sewing machine, and hauled it and the pram through crowded markets, and down winding cobblestone alleys. We finally got there, exhausted. The area to buy fabric seemed to be in and around a particular building that was like a rabbit warren. The passages were lined with small shoe box sized stores with fabric piled up to the roof and little kiosks selling buttons and threads. The passages seemed to get narrower and narrower, until we couldn't go any further with the pram. We had had enough! We gave up and made our way back through the crowds in search of a taxi.

And we were glad we found one when we did, because apparently sometimes the weather forecast can be wrong!

It was a long, but cosy taxi ride home.

A photo for a rainy day

Here is a very recent photo of Yashar! Taken this morning (very early!) while we waited for the ferry. To me this photo conveys our day well - up early, a rainy day, fresh air, spending the first hour on clear blue water as we made our way over to Eminonu and of course Yashar was his usual peaceful self.

Interview with expatinterviews.com

I am excited to say that the crew over at expatinterviews.com recently came across my blog and asked if they could interview me for their website. The site is run by Victor Volder, who lives in the Netherlands and Lizza Capucion, a freelance writer who lives in the Philippines.

They interview expats and are particularly interested in "what motivated people to live in another part of the world, how they generate their income, how they manage to live there, and what they’ve learned from their experiences in a land that's become their new home."

To check out the interview, including some of my thoughts and tips on moving to Turkey, click here!

And a big thank you to Victor and Lizza.

Yogurt fresh from the farm

Some of the fresh produce available here is delicious! We are particularly lucky here in Yenikoy because at our local market (pazar) there is a guy selling lots of yummy cheeses, sucuk (garlic sausage/salami type thing) and cured meats. He also sells this yoghurt we decided to try. It is water buffalo yoghurt! It comes in a beautiful terracotta pot which is a bonus. I might even get around to buying a plant to put in it once we finish to put on the windowsill in the kitchen.

The flavour was gorgeous! How to describe it? Hmmm...thick, full bodied, home made, even a little bit of a cheese flavour to it. We had ours with Yesil Fasulye, but I could easily imagine having it with a cheese plate - Camemberts, quince paste, fresh peaches and freshly toasted bread pieces rubbed with garlic. Mmmm, I wish I was having that right now!












*Ooh, I forgot to mention my yoghurt hot tip...the cheese/yoghurt guy said that you should always use a wooden spoon, never metal, to stop the yoghurt from getting watery *

Cheeky boy

Here is another photo of the little cutie pie! I loved the captions for last weeks photo - thank you! Keep them coming! My entry for this week is 'no, really, Mummy, that's enough with the photo taking!'