full of mistakes

Back in the US

Our 12 hour flight from Istanbul to Chicago actually went remarkably well.Turkish Airlines has constant TV programming, which kept Lula busy for a long time. Adele took a nap and made her usual fuss, but not much more. Just threw up in a way that managed to cover all of us while we were standing at the back of the cabin together. Even that was not that bad. The hardest part was the sorrow of departure sinking in every other hour.

We had a great year in Turkey. We got to spend time with our old friends. We made wonderful new friends. We visited sights in Istanbul for over a year with the excitement of freshly arriving tourists. We ate a lot of good food and tasted a variety of Raki. And the best - we were spoiled by the love our of big immediate family.

We believe that Chicago will be a better place for our family, for Lula and Adele in the long term, but obviously, it is quite hard to be away from Turkey now. We are at least relieved to have the direct and fantastic Turkish Airlines flights in between Chicago and Istanbul!

Now, we are in Chicago. For the time being, the weather is close to Istanbul's and we can go out for walks. We are comsuming food that we thought of in Istanbul (I did not really miss too many things as I was catching up with the Turkish food I missed in the last 10 years). Good and cheap sushi to begin with. I love seeing the runners on the cold streets, it is motivating me. We are driving around the neighborhoods to see where we might like. John was born and raised here, but hasn't lived here for 25 years or so. He knows his way around but we are looking at the newness with the same eyes. Kids are happy to ride along. 

We will be reunited with Buddy today. Now, that will be fun!

First goodbyes

Lula's school is closed for their Christmas vacation. Some of Lula's classmates' parents moms made the holiday time so special with the gift packages and tasty cookies! She especially enjoyed the one above with her name on it.

Her school will start when we are leaving Istanbul for US, so, we said goodbye to all her friends and their parents. It marked the beginning of the end of our special year in Turkey; it was emotional. Lula enjoyed all the hugs from her friends...

Birthdays

Posting has been slow. My days are filled with thinking, researching, planning for Chicago; packing, canceling services for Istanbul. Not the type of experiences that you can take photos of and write your reflections about!

However, we still had the joyful celebrations for the birthdays of Lula and Adele. This year, we decided to do one birthday party for both and invited family and close friends. It was crowded and I could not get great photos from the party but I was able to take some photos of our decoration before everyone came.

Paper poms poms from Martha Stewart and calligraphy from Diva of Linea Carta. Here are some details.

It took a while to make each one of the pom poms but it was fun seeing them come together.

Diva visited Istanbul a few weeks ago and during her busy trip, I troubled her for a banner for our party. She did not have her usual materials, but I think that the end result turned beautiful. I got it printed on canvas here at a local university print shop. Thank you, Diva!

And of course, every party needs some flowers. Pink peonies preferred this time. We had a great time with all our guests. Our girls are a year older and we can feel that from every little change.

Tekirdag and the Festival of Sacrifice

My family is not very religious but really enjoys being together during the two important religious holidays (which usually become one week long vacations with government decision). For the Festival of Sacrifice last week, we were all in Tekirdag where one of my aunts and her husband live. I had visited Tekirdag before and enjoyed certain parts, but staying for one week, several walks in the city and day trips to the nearby towns helped me appreciate this beautiful area more.

 Some photos are here.

Tekirdag Marina.

View from the fish restaurant at Igneada by the Black Sea. Tekirdag is at the Marmara Sea. The drive from Tekirdag and Igneada, especially the part closer to the Black Sea was covered with trees that had leaves in every color of fall. Girls were screaming yellow, orange, green, red, brown. No photos of that beauty.

Late afternoon walk by the Tekirdag seashore. Many seashells and random stones were collected, as usual.

We went to Hoskoy for winetasting at Melen Winery. It was a very sweet small winery with a beautiful wine tasting room. The current winemaker, Cem Cetintas, happened to be one of our neighboors old student and we got some extra wine to taste. Small world.

Just hay, beautiful hay. My aunt and uncle are both professors at the Namik Kemal University, Faculty of Agriculture. We visited farms and barns for the girls to see all the animals they talk about all the time.

It was a great trip overall.

Halloween 2011 - Two Big Girls

We have an almost 2 and almost 4 year old. I sometimes feel so young and sometimes so old. So young to have such big kids, so old that they are already so big. I, all the time, feel so lucky to have them. They make me smile, they make me laugh (This post I am not mentioning the times they make me feel so tired, busy, mad, overwhelmed).

This past Halloween, one was a strawberry and one was a ladybug. They made me laugh.

Many thanks to Adele's godmother Aynur for these wonderful costumes!

On the water

Even the clothespins are more beautiful there.

We finally did it. The Blue Voyage in the Mediterranean. From Gocek to Marmaris. It was wonderful for many reasons:

* It was John and my first child-less vacation in four years.We love our girls dearly, but a little break was truly restoring.

* We got to hang out with some of our closests friends for five days, almost for most of it. There was not a lot of sleeping.

* As had been told, blue voyage, a boat trip on the sea, going from one small cove to the other, enjoying what is around you without any interruption is heavenly...

I was mesmerized with what I was seeing all the time and took photos mostly of those. Here is one more below and more here.

Somewhere between Gocek and Marmaris.

Updates

We have been through most of our travels and big events in the last few weeks. Some favorite photos are below:

Fuzzy, but this photo shows almost all my immediate relatives on my dad's side. My four aunts, husbands, one of my cousins, my grandmother! My sturdy grandmother has lived to see my kids - it is quite amazing.

The Parthenon. My quick trip to Athens was amazing. It deserves a longer post on its own with the beautiful photos from this great city. I hope that I will get to it.

Lula started her second year at preschool. Adele is so ready to follow. Nowadays, her favorite word is: "me, too."

End of summer

The heat wave for us (coming from San Francisco), or what people here call summer is getting close to an end. With the girls, we usually try to make one big outing a day and then, in the late afternoon or after our early dinner, we hang out in our building's garden which is finally cool enough at that time. We have been doing that often enough that we are getting familiar with the fauna and the flora of the garden. The cats, snails, centipedes and the plants, trees and the weeds, and we are still collecting. I love that Lula gives me bits and pieces and tells me that it is for my art. "Mama, mama, take it..." Here is another piece:

Pine cones, needles and some watercolors. Here is Lula's version (with a little help from me) after she saw mine:

Summer is ending. Ramadan is ending. Lula's summer vacation is ending. Not there yet, but our special 1.5 year stay in Turkey is getting close to an end. We are bittersweet. Life has been great here.

In the water

When we arrived in Istanbul this time, I saw something that I did not before: deniz taksi. It is a private Bosphorus cab system run by the city of Istanbul. You can reserve a small boat to pick up at one of the city ferry stations any time of the day and drop you off at another station. It takes up to 10 people and you can either reserve it for just yourself or a group. It is not cheap but it is not astronomical either. It seems like the traffic in Istanbul is requiring more solutions and/or creating more businesses. John and I had been thinking of doing it for a special occasion and recently a dinner with friends who lived on the other side of Istanbul was a good one.

It was quite an experience. I never had a private boat ride with a 2-person crew before. They opened the gates of the Bebek Ferry Station that was done with its regular schedule just for us, helped us get on the boat and our ride started a little after 9 PM. It was all dark waters, lights and beautiful Istanbul. And a little bit of cheesy Joy FM that was the choice of the captain.

Bebek coastline at night

Bosphorus Bridge.

All photos are from the moving boat, a little helpless but also in the mood of a boat ride! We had a funny ending. Our destination was the Moda Ferry Station, which at the end of its daily schedule did not close but became a restaurant. As the boat arrived, everybody was looking at us while we were trying to hop onto the station (which was quite high up from the boat) and maneuver through the dining tables. Not the most glamorous ending...

And a little photo styling

Girls found all these pieces while they were playing in the garden. They are entertained endlessly by nature. I was reminded of the times I was doing photoshoots for Small Square Design products and got inspired.