Catching up...December to January

Where to begin?  The beginning of December was filled with Eva on stage.  She had her ballet recital, which is the first we have seen since we have been here in Mexico.  She looked like a little angel.  They did their own rendition of the nutcracker, that was nothing like the nutcracker, but the little girls were angels.  They had the entire ballet classes from the university perform and every time the little girls hit the stage everyone was ahhing and oohing at them.  They were priceless.  The performance started at 7pm on a school night, and since our kids are in bed by 8, by the time the performance was over our angel turned into a little monster.  No fun, but she managed to humor me and smile for the camera.

At school, they had their Christmas program.  Their theme was an Arabian Christmas story.  Everyone was quite confused when the costume list came out what they were going to be doing, but made sense once we watched it all.  It was pretty cute.  And like always we are impressed by Eva's little dancing skills.  She doesn't like to share with us what she is going to be doing until the actual performance, which can be annoying, but it is a pleasant surprise when we see the real thing.  Elijah was also a nice surprise.  He sat through two, two hour performances two days in a row and he was GREAT.

Then on the 10th of December we made it to Oregon.  It is always nice to be home.  The iPad, made the flight a good experience.  Okay, well not just the iPad, but it did help.  My kids are getting really good at flying now.  And since they are getting older, the tantrums seem minimal.  In order to make the most of what we spent, we were there for a whole month.  Even though we were literally, back and forth between Sisters and Hillsboro, it was nice.  We were able to spend quality time with family and friends and get things we can't get here.  I laughed when I saw that Matthew's carry on was filled with chocolate chips, chowmein noodles, and taco seasoning when it was time for him to go home.

So, here is a rundown of some events...

Our kids love "pap."  Everytime my dad would come home from work, Elijah would run up to him and give him a huge hug.  My mom would try to get the same affection from Elijah and he just wouldn't give it the same most of the time.  Elijah would get up in the morning and always ask, "uhnta pap?" Meaning, where's pap.  Too cute.

Okay, so when we got to Oregon, Matthew and I were having some serious contact issues.  We had had eye infections and couldn't wear contacts.  I think we spent the first half of our vacation in glasses.  Man, seeing this picture with my mom makes me realize I am a spitting image of her.  When did that happen?  This series of pictures is when we dragged my mom, brother Ricky and Keri to the Grotto in Portland.  When I was in high school I used to sing with the choir in the church that is there.  And literally, as I am typing this, a friend of mine posted this on facebook.  What are the odds.    

It was cool to go and relive those moments.  They had lights, music, a puppet show (that the kids really liked), and a petting zoo.

                                     

We made a trip, (two trips actually) to the Portland's Children Museum.  The first time was with Matthew and the kids and the second was with my brother, Erik, after Matthew left for school.  We took the Max and enjoyed hours of fun.

 Elijah played with this contraption for a long time.  He would stick the rubber ducky in the slots and make it move with the water.

 This is the coolest thing I have seen.  It is a rubber dirt pit.  We loved the thing.  Eva made a face.  Do you see it?

 I was a patient in the ambulance.

 Eva's dressup with the lego exhibit.  That dragon is made of legos.  Pretty cool.

We were also lucky enough to use our new brother in laws' parents club house to have fun.  It's called Brasada and the place was great.  The kids had access to a nice kiddie pool.  I would have hung out there more if I had the chance.  We went a couple times, even when we didn't have John with us.  In fact, the first time we went I ran into a glass wall.  Who does that?  So the second time we went, the guy who works there was like, " Hey, were you the one who ran into the wall?"  I told him I was but was super embarrassed.  Who wants to be known as that person?

 

Christmas came and went.  We spent Christmas eve with my parents and Christmas day with Matthew's parents.  This year Eva really wanted a minnie mouse.  She went and visited Santa at the mall, and she told him she wanted that too.  My parents got the kids a minnie and mickey on Christmas eve and Eva's face was priceless.  I had to include this picture of Elijah because we couldn't get that hoodie through his huge noggin'.

Then, one of the main reasons why we came to Oregon, was Matthew's baby sister's Cathryn's wedding.  Woah, that's a lot of contractions.  Don't judge if I didn't get them right.  They were married at the end of December.  It was nice to have all of the family together.  The kids have a blast with all of their cousins.

 Elijah had a rough night.  He had a major blow out.  We literally had to hang out in the bathroom in socks only while Matthew went home to get me a new shirt for the kid.  Then right when we were getting ready to leave, he decided to drink out of the SUPER hot, hot chocolate, burning his mouth and spilling it on his shirt.  But, when he managed to be dressed he looked pretty good.

When we first got to Oregon we took a trip to Cannon Beach and spent a couple days there.  At the end of the trip, after Matthew left, my parents and I went back to Cannon beach and in January saw this...

 It was beautiful and warm.  We were there for only a day and a half, but we were able to play at the beach and roast marshmallows.  The kids discovered this time around sliding down the hill.  We really didn't want to leave.  It was actually warmer at the beach than at my parent's house.

Which brings another topic.  The weather.  It is amazing how quickly you forget what it is like to be cold when you are constantly in warm weather.  I couldn't believe what a wimp I was.  I had to go out and by me a sweatshirt because I couldn't handle being cold.  I even had to make a hat for Elijah.  For the first time ever he was telling me he was cold and wanted a jacket.  Coming from a kid who is always sweating, it was kind of funny.  Surprisingly, we didn't see much snow this time that we were there.  It snowed one day in Sisters, but barely.  It was somewhat disappointing because Eva was really looking forward to snow.  Oh well.

Then of course.  It was time to go home.  The kids were great on the plane.  We originally had a less than one hour layover in Arizona, which then turned into two.  But it didn't even phase the kids.  On the last flight, it was a small plane.  Originally, I thought the kids could sit together on one half of the plane, while I was across the aisle, but about 30 minutes into the flight I realized it was a horrible idea.  I talked Eva into sitting next to an old Mexican grandpa that was sitting next to me and then Elijah proceeded to cry and whine and eventually he took a nap.  It was wonderful.  He slept a little over an hour and even while the plane was landing the kid was totally asleep!  I couldn't believe it.  We got off the plane, met Matthew and now we are able to get back to our schedule.  It is always awesome to be in Oregon, but there's nothing like sleeping in your own bed.  And there you have it.  In a nutshell, that was December to January.

Thanksgiving Post

Way late, but this year we had Thanksgiving with some great friends that we have made in Guadalajara.  Total we had around 18 adults and of course a bunch of kids running around our friends home.  We are grateful to them for being so willing to share their home with us.  They made a yummy turkey that was cooked underground.  My first time ever having a turkey like this, but basically, they dug a hole, put it inside, and let it cook underground overnight.  I was in charge of bringing a ham.  Even though I overcooked it (don't get me started on my oven) it was still good.  I mean, how much can you screw up a precooked ham right?  We bought most of the big things at Costco.  Don't know what I would do without it here.  In fact, they are kind enough to make a pumpkin pie, like you would find in the states, and it is actually cheaper to buy the whole pumpkin pie, than to try to find canned pumpkin and make your own.  Silly, I think, but that is how it goes around these parts.  We celebrated our primary president and good friend, Kim's birthday with this fancy layered cake her mom made.  We also played a game where everyone wrote what they were thankful for and then we had to guess who said the statement.  Matthew said the sweetest thing, something about being thankful for me and all that I do, and I didn't even guess it was him who made the statement.  He usually doesn't like to thank me publicly but personally, but it sure is nice to be recognized for the things you do.  And finally, had fun playing ping pong.  It really is nice when you can't be with loved ones, that we are lucky enough to be surrounded by awesome friends to share this holiday.  This year I am thankful for my family.  They bring happiness to my life.  I enjoy the times we get to spend together as a complete family.  I am thankful that we are safe and healthy.

I made everyone take family pictures Thanksgiving day as well.  Just a little sneak peak of the kids.

Guess people liked it even though it was overcooked.

All the turkey off the carcass.

Two green bean casseroles.  The duplicates made me laugh.

Mexican Soda.  That Sangria is good.

Fancy Birthday cake.

Some pies.  The irony was I left my pumpkin pie at home.  Whoops.  We went back over to our friend's house on Saturday and made up for it with leftovers and pumpkin pie milkshakes.

Mexico Part 27: Aerosmith

This year for Matthew's birthday, he really wanted to go see Aerosmith, and while I had my own plans, I couldn't complain about him wanting to see Aerosmith.  My love for the band goes back to middle school when a friend of mine taught me to love the band.  I listened to the CD Big Ones, all the time.  The concert was the day after Matthew's birthday.  Talk about great timing.  We got our sitter and left the kids about an hour before the concert.  We went out for a light dinner at Tokai, a little sushi place that is literally at the corner from where we live and then had some Yogen Fruz, yogurt (one of my new found loves since coming to Mexico).  It was so fun to hang out and for whatever reason I was feeling "young" again.  But, while we were enjoying ourselves, there was a nagging feeling for Matthew because he couldn't find any information on an opening act and he was getting nervous that the band would come on right at 8:30 and we were having yogurt.  We didn't worry too much, but we eventually got to Omnilife Stadium at about 9:00.  When we pulled out we were surprised that we didn't hear any music.  We headed towards the stadium and we handed the people our tickets and they wouldn't work.  Of course now I was a little worried because we paid quite a bit for them and I didn't want them to not let us in.  We went in through a special place and it seemed like there was a trend in tickets not working, so they let us through.  We found our seats and sat behind a crazy row of girls that were extremely occupied with trying to sneak a cigarette and smoke it every 15 minutes.  Super annoying but at least the guards were on them to get them to stop.  That was nice, for the non smokers.  At about 9:45 they came on.  It was seriously one of the greatest concerts.  Steven Tyler is an amazing singer.  He did not disappoint.  For whatever reason the sound kept cutting out at first.  Typical for Mexico, and I thought that for sure it would happen all night long but it stopped.  They did an encore where Steven Tyler came out on a grand piano singing a rendition of Dream On.  I LOVED this concert.  And sometime in the middle of it Matthew turned to me with a huge grin on his face telling me it was the best birthday present.  What a great feeling.  The concert was over at midnight, and it then took us over 45 minutes to crawl through the parking lot.  They had no organized way to get the cars out of there.  Thankfully some civilians got out of their cars and helped with the traffic.  We then made it home by oneish only to have our sitter and friend stay and hang out with me until twoish.  It was a late night.  I felt bad but the next morning Matthew and I were a mess.  Eva woke up on her own, only for me to go into her room to ask her if she wanted to go to school or stay home.  Well, this kiddo of mine said stay home, and I went back to bed.  Who does that!?!  I won't be doing that anytime soon, but overall this 30th birthday turned out A-Ok.

Mexico Part 26: Swimming with the Sharks

That's Elijah's show me your teeth so I can smile picture

Eva's little buddy from school, Isabella

We went into the aquarium this time.  On one side you could touch and feed the sting rays.  On this side you could see the shark.  I think Elijah wasn't happy that I was holding him with such a panic.  He didn't want to touch the thing.

My friend, Christaine, talked us into going into the shark tank.  It really looked cooler from video and pictures what we did.  I was scared to get in but it wasn't scary at all.

All the munchkins

Last Saturday after about a month and a half of telling Eva that we would take her to the zoo we finally went.  The Guadalajara Zoo really is a nice zoo.  They have great animals and the facilities are nice.  I wish we could go more often but with no membership plan that I know of, and all the walking that you do, I don't dare yet go to myself.  We went with some friends and saw some things that we didn't see last time.  Among them were baby animals.  They were so cute. Elijah had a nice time seeing "vacas" which for him all animals are called vacas but for sure horses are vacas.  I felt like this was the first time he really enjoyed the zoo.  He was running around all over the zoo wanting to see his vacas.  At one point I wondered why I had the stroller, but really in the end it was to keep the kid from running away from me and giving Eva time to take a walking break.

 A funny story.  Before leaving for the zoo I was asking Eva what see wanted to see there and she mentioned she wanted to see the "burros" or donkeys.  I told her that I didn't think we would see donkeys at the zoo and that was okay with her.  Well, as we are walking around the zoo we stop for some lunch and after lunch we get up to go to the nearest animals and I had to laugh when we saw donkeys!  Pretty funny.  I suppose only in a Mexican zoo will you find donkeys.

A scary story.  As we were getting ready to leave the zoo there was a cat by the exit.  We all thought it was funny because the kids thought this cat was so awesome that we decided next time we just needed to bring the children some cats and avoid the whole zoo thing.  I corralled all the children towards the exit and as we were getting ready to head into the parking lot, I turned to Matthew and asked him where Elijah was.  Moment of panic set in and I just ran back to where we were.  It really happened fast, but I know I was starting to think worst case, I mean what if he was roaming the zoo with some stranger, or someone took him.  But lucky for us he was sitting near the stairs where the cat had been crying about falling, or something.  I seriously don't think he realized he was missing.  It was HORRIBLE.  I was so thankful that I found him and he was okay.

So there you have it our zoo adventure.  After being there all day, almost 8 hours after we ate dinner and got home, we enjoyed the fact that the weather was so perfect with it being partly cloudy, we were with good company and had well behaved children.  I don't think it gets better than that.