Maybe coloring with markers isn’t an age appropriate activity for an 11 month old. It was an experiment that lasted nearly three minutes. Willy Wonka’s room has plexiglass on the back of the door. Before Willy Wonka it was used to keep our Boxer from destroying the door. In the future it’s going to be wonderful for washable markers and toddler art.
I’ve been a bit of a Negative Nancy lately. Being a SAHM (stay at home mom) and being a SAHM in Turkey is making me lose my mind! I’m feeling isolated and bored. My good brain cells are fluttering away. I can barely put a decent sentence together for my blog. So yes, I’ve been a Debbie Downer. Now it’s time to take my mother’s favorite advice and put it into action.
In 8th grade, when I was sooooo depressed about being away from first boyfriend for the summer, Kay suggested I find 5 positive things about my day and write them down. To this day, when I start whining about my life she says, “Ann write down your positive things.” I’ve decided to kick Kay’s idea up a notch. It’s going to be my positive photo diary. Simply, I’m going to take pictures of things that make me happy throughout the day. Now I just wish I could get a picture of my neighbor who always wears the most amazing wolf jacket. It’s like something you’d see in Montana. I’ve never seen another Turk with anything like it!
Here are my entries in my Positive Photo Diary for today:
Imagine if the NFL was dominated by just three teams. And if one of those three teams won the Super Bowl every year. You’d just ask yourself, “Will it be the Packers, the Cowboys, or the Patriots?” How boring! Well this is the unfortunate situation in Turkish football. Galatasaray, Fenerbahce, and Besiktas are the three powerhouses. Since 1957 one of these three teams has won the title of champion 87.5% of the time (yep I did the math). The only other two teams to claim the title are Trabzonspor (8x) and Bursaspor (1x). ONLY TWO!
Even with this dominating trio, there remains much passion for Turkish football. Fans in sections of the stadium don’t rest for a breath between chants. An empty section must be left between the home and away fans to keep fans from fighting. I once witnessed fans destorying their own statium, yep the crazies were ripping out the seats, because their team underperformed. I’m provinding the link to a fascinating article from The New Yorker, titled “Life Among Turkey’s Soccer Fanatics.” Sadly you can’t read the article in its’ entirety but here is a link with more information.
At one time I donned a yellow and blue jersery in support of Fenerbahce. With recent changes in my husband’s work I’ve found myself loving an underdog team. Who isn’t an underdog when you’ve got less than a 13% chance of becoming champion? My new team is Kasimpasa. This year it went from a second division team to a first division team, SuperLig. At this time the team is in 5th place out of 18 teams in the SuperLig.
On Friday KP played the league leader, Galatasaray. I left Willy Wonka with my MIL and headed to Kasimpasa for the match. I was fully prepared for a nice ass kicking from GS. I just hoped KP could score a goal (goodness I sound like an awful fan). The gods laughed at my pesimism and KP won the match. It was thrilling so see GS fans handed a big dose of reality. Yes, come back to earth GS because you arent the sole star in the sky. After the match I wanted to shout “haha suckers” but sadly I have yet to learn this phrase in Turkish.
Although KP played an outstanding match the football commentators spoke mostly of GS faults rather than KP successes. Again the focus stayed on the top three teams. One newspaper went as far as to call it an “embarassing loss for Galatasaray.” Really? Embarrassing? Are the other 15 teams just around as mice for the big cats to play with until the top three can meet each other for one large cat fight? Wow… I’m starting to sound like I care about football. I’ve even started calling it “football.” What has happened to me?
Oz has a job that never stops, but for the first time in months he had a weekend “off.” Willy Wonka enjoyed his Baba
One thing I love about being in the United Sates is having lots of yummy ingredients for baking. Butterscotch chips, condensed milk, marshmallows, chocolate chunks, sprinkles, peanut butter . . . I am not a talented baker but I do enjoy attempting new recipes. Here are two I good ones for Christmas.
Snowmen Cookies
These little guys require no oven. Thanks goodness I don’t need to worry about burning them. You simply dip Nutter Butter cookies into almond bark. Use M&Ms and Tic Tacs for decorating.
These cookies taste like the holidays. Mine aren’t as perfectly round as the ones from the recipe. But I’m no professional and I’m just impressed that nothing was burnt. We did have a small oven fire earlier in the week. It’s not the holidays if something doesn’t start on fire. Isn’t that a saying?
My Life
Istanbul Experiences and Insights
Growing Up Willy Wonka