Overlooking the rooftops and of course the volcano, wearing the Guatemalan soccer team's jerseys.  They wore these home the day we traveled home and got lots of oohs and aahs!  :-)

Otto's 1st day of kindergarten!  I can't believe it! 

We're Home!

We're Home! We finished school on Friday and had another week and a half before we were scheduled to leave. We were all SO ready so we decided to come home early! We flew home Sunday and got home about 11:30pm. The boys fell asleep in the car and when we arrived home, they woke up and it was hysterical! It was like Christmas for them! All the toys they had forgotten about, missed! We were all up til 2am!!! Kept hearing things like, "oh mom, my truck!" "oh mom, my red cup!" "oh mom, my blanket!" "oh mom, my train!" They were so busy, so cute and so funny, and they played well while we settled in a bit and scoped everything out. Owen threw a fit when we finally said they had to go to bed. There were several toys he wanted to take to bed with him!
Took Otto and registered him for school, he starts afternoon kindergarten today! Oh my goodness! And get this, the principal wants to start him out in a "normal" kindergarten class, not a special needs class! She wants to give it a couple weeks and see how it goes, then we can always switch to the other class. I am thrilled!!!!! While I am not thrilled about possibly switching him in a couple weeks, I am thrilled about seeing how he does with several "typically" functioning children. Praying Otto is wherever is the best spot for him to learn and thrive and love school!

Tremor!

Oh! Two days ago, we had a big tremor here which is normal b/c of the volcanoes but actually Aaron turned the news on right after and the news said, “this just in” that there was a big earthquake in the Pacific Ocean right off the coast of Guatemala and that Guat. even felt the effects! We sure did! It was so weird! It was bigger and lasted longer than any of the tremors I felt when I was here 4 years ago.

Food

I wrote before about how we receive our lunch and dinner cooked for us by Marie who cooks for the students in the guesthouse. As of a week ago, we decided not to receive that service anymore. I felt the food was good and Aaron did also…most of the time! We didn’t feel it was enough food and it mostly consisted of vegetables which we didn’t feel warranted what we were being charged. Aaron doesn’t care for many vegetables, he likes some but there were a couple of nights he couldn’t even eat. For example, one repeated dinner was cauliflower fried in eggs with a red sauce and rice. It was good! But Aaron doesn’t care for cauliflower. I liked it but cauliflower does a terrible number on my Irritable Bowel Syndrome. Actually that’s the other reason, we both had been so bloated from the food!!!! For me, I think it was all the veggies, some just don’t agree with me (two of them I had never even heard of before!!! LOL), and all the corn tortillas (which I would eat several b/c the portions never quite filled us up) and corn is another big aggravator of my IBS. So we decided to start cooking for ourselves again! ☺
Cooking the food: I just have to share my cooking conditions b/c it’s comical and quite a puzzle to coordinate! Here is a picture of what I have to cook with. There is no stove, but there is a microwave, toaster, and an electric “hot plate” I guess you could call it?! (Another reason it feels like we’re camping!!!! LOL) It’s like one burner from a stovetop. Which is great, 

however, I usually use 2 or 3 while cooking. So I’ve been trying to think of some “one pot” meals since I only have 1 burner! LOL So far we’ve had fried chicken with noodles (in the microwave) and cucumber (no need to cook), chicken and onions with rice (in the microwave) and broccoli (in the microwave). That one was tricky b/c the rice took forever (the microwave isn’t that powerful, maybe b/c of the altitude) and 2 things had to be cooked in the micro. Last night we had ground beef fried up with salsa and some other seasonings and crumpled u

p tostada chips mixed in and cut up guacamole. This weekend I am hop

ing to get some pork chops. You can only get what the small little supermarket has and so you have to get what’s in!

Shopping for the food: Here is a picture of what I take on my 10-block walk to La Bodegona (the grocery store here). The stroller is b/c the bags are very heavy after a 10-block walk (I       used to do it repeatedly untilI got the bright id

ea of taking the stroller to ease the strain) and the bags are so that I don’t have to pay for bags and they are just sturdier to make the trek home. Our first month, we lived about 15 blocks away and we had to buy water too. So I have to l

ug 4-gallon size waters home too! I would take a Tuk-Tuk (little 2-seater "taxi") on those days (which I’ve attached a pic of also, they only cost $2 to take home) until I had the idea about the stroller. Now, though, our water is delivered! How nice! We shop twice a week b/c we can only buy at one time

enough to put is those 2 bags. I go on Wed morning and we all go on Sat morning. McDonald’s is 2 doors down from La Bodegona so the kids can play for a little bit! I can’t tell you how much I miss Wal-Mart!!!!!!! Driving my car there, having a nice big shopping cart, walking down nice big aisles (I can barley fit the stroller down an aisle at La Bodegona!), having many choices of everything, the cashier packing my bags for me and driving back home.

Cumpleano Fotos!

Figured we'd take advantage of the beautiful potential backgrounds here and take the boys' bday pix!  They don't turn 3 and 6 for another month and a half but they'll look the same!  :-)

Oh, Koalas.....?!

Is this a Eucalyptus tree?! How crazy!!!! I love eucalyptus! I got a whiff of it too one day when I was walking by. My favorite animal when I was a kid was the Koala. They love to eat eucalyptus. I assumed these would only be in Australia. How weird!!!!

Cerro de la Cruz (Hill of the Cross)

Just a little ways down from our street is the entrance to a trail up the mountain to the famous statue of a cross where you can see the entire town of Antigua! You can see the cross up on the hill from almost anywhere in Antigua. We’ve never done it before b/c you’re always warned that robbers hide up there and rob the tourists. We found out that everyday at 3pm, the tourist police escort hikers up there so we went! It was awesome! The kids loved it! The clouds are covering the top of the volcano. It would be neat to have a pic of it from the cross on a clear day. (I took this pic from the end of our street and just at the top of that hill where it looks like the road turns to the right, is where the entrance to the trail is, so very close!)

Playtime!

Our daily “trying to keep the kids busy” has become one of a few things….a walk, going to the basketball court where inevitably some other kids or whatnot are there, or to this little park we found with some swings, a slide, and some climbing things. Owen is funny, he is kinda shy, but he’ll go up to anyone at the basketball court with intentions of playing with them. He made friends with a teenage girl named Esperanza. Her father is Mexican and her mother is Swiss. They met here and live here and Esperanza was born here. She is very pale with blond hair in dreds so it was funny to see her amongst all her male friends speaking Spanish as they were trying new tricks on their skateboards. Owen was fascinated with the skateboards. Otto loves to watch all the kids and will participate if one of us is out there with him. He can bounce a ball now and loft it into the air every time! That is really great eye-foot coordination for him! Here are some pix of the boys playing at the basketball court and of our street that we’re living on.

Sidenote: I forgot to mention in the post about our

 apartment…..my teacher said that the reason many Guatemalan homes have an “open” area (ie courtyard or garden area) is b/c of the tremors caused by the volcanoes. They have the potential to “bring down the roof” as the saying goes. So they need to be able to go where there isn’t a roof! I haven’t felt a tremor since we’ve been here but I did when I was here 4 years ago. At that time, my landlord told me that it is good to have the tremors, if there are no little tr

emors that is not good. Meaning that something bad may be going on with the volcanoes!

Meals

We have been receiving lunch and dinner prepared for us by the cook who cooks for the other students. Her name is Marie. I LOVE the food! It’s very typical Guatemalan and soooo good! Their lunch and dinner is like the reverse of ours. Lunch is larger and dinner is smaller and light. Lunches have been amazing! Dinner is more like scrambled eggs with smashed black beans and fried bananas or some rice with cooked veggies or spaghetti. Everything is so good though!
I feel so bad for Marie. She has 2 children, ages 8 and 11, and she works here from 6:45am until 7pm, 6 days a week, and then walks home in the dark (about 15 min walk). She is the cook, the housekeeper, and the launderer for all of us students staying here which right now besides us there are 7 students. She washes all of our laundry with a machine but washes all the towels and bedding by hand and hangs it up to dry. At home I’m sure she washes all her laundry (probably on Sunday) by hand, most do here.  It's very expensive to not only have washer and/or dryer but to pay for the electricity for it!  Electricity is expensive!  She told me that after she arrives home after cooking all of us dinner, she then prepares dinner for her family.  Oh my.  Most families eat dinner late, like 7 or 8pm, but wow after a very long day of work, I'd just want to crash.  So very different.  I can't imagine!

Soccer Player in Training!

For something to do, we take the boys to this basketball court and let them run around kicking their balls. Aaron and I have been blown away at how good Owen is at “dribbling” the ball. Not basketball dribbling, but soccer dribbling where you run with the ball. He is amazing! I’m serious, I’m not just a proud mama (well I am but….LOL), but also a former soccer player and he looks like he could be a on a little kids’ team already or something. And he’s a brut! He’ll run right up to you if you have the ball and slam into ya to get the ball away. Hilarious! Aaron and I already starting talking about signing him up and how fun that will be to watch. I think he has to be 4 or 5, can’t remember which, so still a couple years away.

Camping

It’s feels as if we’re camping, not in tents, but in cabins. I’m slightly reminded of many of the retreats we’ve gone on with students where we stayed in cabins. Let me first describe our current apartment. I love it! It’s really cool and very typical Guatemalan. It’s in a u-shape with a wall on the 4th side (the open part of the u) that backs up against the side of the mountain (Antigua is a valley surrounded by mountains and volcanoes and we are on the furthest north end up against the mountain). The 3 sides of the “u” are our apartment. The sides opposite each other are the 2 bedrooms and a bathroom and the side at the bottom of the “u” is where our kitchen is with a “sala,” living room in front of it (we moved the couch into one of the bedrooms). Every room is separate and enclosed except for the living room. The living room is like a covered outdoor patio, there is a roof but no 4th wall enclosing it in! Every room has a door that opens to the living room and no room is connected to another room. So what that means is that every time you exit the bedrooms, bathroom, or kitchen, you are in the living room and essentially OUTSIDE!!!!! So in the middle of the night, when I have to use the potty, I have to “go outside” first to walk over to the bathroom. It’s pretty chilly here b/c it’s considered to be their winter (which basically just means it’s the rainy season and it’s chillier but still not as cold as a Michigan autumn). In the mornings we wear long sleeves and sometimes when it’s raining but other than that, short sleeves. In fact, when the sun is out, it is blazing! The rest of the open space in the middle of the “u” shape is a cobblestone patio (with no roof), perfect for the boys to kick their balls around!
The details of the apartment are cool….the mouldings, doors, light fixtures in the sala, kitchen cabinets, floor, tile work.  It reminds me of camping for several reasons…..first obviously b/c of feeling like you’re outside. Secondly, the bathroom is a little rough, reminds me of a cabin shower at a campground. And your towel never seems completely dry by the next time you need to use it, b/c of the chill in the air from the rain which is almost everyday. And finally the mosquitoes. B/c it’s outdoors, there are mosquitoes and many other bugs too. I have to admit it’s not that bad but they’re still there. The first night I was so anal about keeping the lights off at night so as not to attract them. But we learned that even with the lights on at night, they aren’t that bad. The basic garden spider here is pretty disgusting. It’s I think a wolf spider, so very big, dark brown or black and looks like it has a little fuzz on it, so it makes it look hairy. Ug! Very eery and gross! But I guess harmless like our garden spiders.
All in all, I love the place and would stay here again if we come back. The hospitality is great and the price is good.