Boricua en la Lima

My mom is arriving today to help take care of the baby after he's back home from his surgery. I can't wait! We haven't seen her since we were in PR in April, and although it takes a superhuman amount of effort to resist her delicious (and equally unhealthy!) cooking, I am looking forward to have some family back in town (and free babysitting too, yes). Baby's cough is getting way better so it looks like we might be able to have the surgery after all, although we won't know until the anesthesiologists look him over. I am nervous for him! I hope everything turns out well.

Sebastian is supposed to have a (very minor) surgery on Wednesday for which my mom is coming into town since he has to stay home from day care for five days. We also coordinated with 4th of July weekend so that we didn't have to miss as much work. However, he's going under general anesthesia which is starting to make me a bit anxious because he's supposed to be completely healthy but he's had a cough for a while now that seems to be getting worse instead of better. Jose the eternal pessimist is even more nervous, so it looks like we might need to reschedule, which sucks because I'm sure by the time we get another date my mom will probably be gone so we won't have any help. On a lighter note, we hung out at Hyde Park Blast yesterday which was a lot of fun although the kids were so grimy by the time we got back home (so were we!) we had to give them both a bath even though it was way past their bedtime. And of course you would think they would sleep in today but n...

Jose: "What is your boca for, Gabi?" Gabi: "For eating". Jose: "What are your ears for, Gabi?" Gabi: "For listening". Jose: "What are your ojos for, Gabi?" Gabi: "For blinking". Jose: "What is your nose for, Gabi?" Gabi: "For taking the mocos out!" She's one smart cookie. The picture of the gorilla reminded me of a story Valeria used to tell us in college. She used to crack up every time she retold how she saw a gorilla in TV poking his butt with his "fingers" then smelling his finger and falling back on his ass from the stench (I'm sure the video's somewhere on YouTube in case anyone finds the link and wants to send it to me). Anyway, Valeria used to laugh so hard she could barely get the words out, and it took us forever to understand what she was saying, actually come to think of it, it always took us forever to understand what she was saying.

Gabi was invited to the bday part of one of his friends from day care. It's the first time we go to Parky's Farm in Winton Woods and it was really fun for both of the kids. The animals were awesome, Gabi rode a horse for the first time ever (we had a miniature pony at her bday party last year which she refused to ride...argh) and the weather was amazing. Best feature is having the bday party in a really fun place and not having to worry about a lot of the details. Only downside was that we all had to take showers/baths when we got home to get the smell of animal poop out of our systems. :) Oh, and that I couldn't eat all the delicious looking food (home made!) because we had just eaten at Sabor Peruano.

Abuelo (Jose's dad) came to visit this weekend and since he'd been here a few times already we decided to head down to Gatlinburg for our first Smoky Mountain visit and give him a change in scenery. The car ride was a little painful (5 hours and I was stuck in the backseat in between the two car seats) but it was definitely worth it. Our cabin was awesome -- jacuzzi, 4 plasma TVs, wifi, everything brand spanking new, and the second and third nights I slept like an angel ALL BY MYSELF in the sofa bed in the living room so in the morning I would wake up to floor to ceiling views of the forest. If I had a cappuccino by my bed it would've been heaven. Unfortunately we're back, and that means work tomorrow, but not before I catch up on So You Think You Can Dance which makes my summer TV viewing sooooo worth it! And maybe seeing all those skinny twenty somethings cavorting on TV scantily clad will make me want to work out a little bit harder.

Good friends, nice weather, lobsters, beer, Alms Park, lazy Sunday. Enough said.

We went to the Cincinnati Zoo today as many zoos around the country had free admission for Mother's Day. All Gabi wanted to do was ride the carousel, the train and get face painting, so I guess technically we didn't have to actually be in a zoo to do all those things but it was still a good time. :) Sebastian is still carrying over a cough and now has an ear infection, the poor kid. I know one day he'll be fully immunized thanks to day care but for now it's heartbreaking to see him getting sick so often. I guess the fact that it's cold one day and warm the next doesn't help too much either. While Jose was in the driving range with Gabi on Saturday (which was cute to no end) I went to Stride Rite and got the cutest pair of sandals for Sebastian, since now he's going to be spending a lot more time outside at the day care. The cost me an arm and a leg but I guess contrary to Gabi who has plenty of shoes to rotate, this will be the only pair the little guy w...

Check out this video on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_tcE4rWovI You will never hear the song the same way again.

http://onlineraceresults.com/race/view_plain_text.php?race_id=10625

This week has been just a little bit crazy. On Sunday Sebastian developed a fever and a cough so we kept a close eye on him and talked to the pediatrician who said it sounded like croup. By Monday Morning he seemed worse so we decided to bypass the doctor and go straight to the hospital where they confirmed the croup diagnosis. Gabi had never had that so we'd never dealt with it. It seems that with Sebastian we've had to deal with some illnesses that we'd never dealt with. In fact, the last time I can remember Gabi being sick was when she got scarlet fever, right after Sebastian was born, which was basically a year ago. Anyway, I had to work from home on Monday which is always hard with a sick kid because they are typically fussier and more clingy than normal. It's also a lot harder to get them to go to sleep although he's normally super easy to go to sleep. On Tuesday i was supposed to go Boston early in the morning, but I had to delay my flight to the evening and ...

All of a sudden she's big enough to sit in the chair at the hair cut place all by herself. No fear. Complete opposite from the dentist just a few hours ago. She never ceases to amaze me.

Sebastian had his 12 month appointment at the pediatrician yesterday. It continues to baffle us that no matter how big people think he is, he is always in a super low percentage. Yesterday they said he was like 15% for height and 25% for weight some ridiculous thing like that. What I don't understand is if 12-18 months clothes fit him fine, doesn't that mean he's on track!? And if he was supposed to move up to the new car seat at 1 year or 20 lbs. and he weighed 20 lbs. doesn't that also mean he's fine?! I know there are some huge babies out there, but I don't know when huge babies became the new norm. Anyway, while I wasn't there for most of the visit because I had swimming classes with Gabi, the doctor apparently told him that the baby's drinking too much milk. Since when did drinking milk became a bad thing? They say that when he drinks too much milk that means he can miss out on other important foods like meats, cheeses, etc. But Sebast...

Last night Gabi started watching Harry Potter on ABC and I told her it was my favorite movie so she was really intrigued but since it was time for bed soon after I told her I'd record it so she could watch in the morning. This morning she woke up excited to see Mom's favorite movie and in usual fashion has been asking who's this, and why's that every other second. Which basically means she's hooked. :) There are parts of the movie where she's of course scared because she's hiding behind the bed covers and I'm telling her it's OK it's all just pretend. But then a more "fun for kids" part comes up and I tell her oh you should watch this this is the quidditch game, or oh you should watch this this is the big chess game because I think those will me more fun for her. Anyway, In the part where Ron sacrifices himself in the big chess game, I guess she assumed Ron died because seconds later, lips quivering, trying to hold back the tears, s...

My husband wrote this after coming back from vacation to share with his colleagues at work. They say the first step is admitting that there is a problem, right? ;) *** Many of you asked me how my vacation went…so I thought I give you a quick summary. After a long trip down to PR (with many delays because of bad weather and airplane problems) I decided that my goal for the next week was going to be to sit down, drink and do nothing My goal was that from the moment the sun came out…. To the moment the sun set… To sit down by the ocean with a drink in hand doing nothing . I put Ivette to work… I put my mom to work… Put my sister to work… And even her boyfriend who I don’t know very well… Still, with no father supervision, my kids decided to do whatever they wanted, including but not limited to: Sebastian decided it was time to do as dad and have a beer Or maybe 2… Or maybe 3 (just to get a nice buzz)… And, why not, he decided to eat sushi to help with the hangover Gabriela decided that it...

It's hard to believe that we are already going home tomorrow, but not nearly as hard to believe that sebastian is already one year old. We had the perfect day for his birthday, only interrupted by a one hour meltdown to end all meltdowns (either from exhaustion or constipation from eating so much sand, who knows). We first went to the Bacardi tour which I had never been before and was actually kind of cool (especially since it was free). Then we went to lunch at El Jibarito - best damn mofongo in the whole island. Then we went kite flying in El Morro and after unsuccessfully trying with the $2 Dora kite it finally broke and we got a Yoda one for $5 from the street vendor which used the force to kick Dora's ass. So we finally flew a kite and gabi was over the moon. She was so proud to fly a kite herself and then when it was time to go she kept calling out "Yoda, come down!!!". Hilarious. After that we picked up an ice cream cake from maggie moo's and that's wh...

We arrived in puerto rico on Friday after a relatively stressful flight. We have since seen some of our friends which is always a wonderful thing. Especially with two free babysitters in the form of two abuelas. Gabi sometimes takes a few days to adjust to the new people but this time she was fast and furious with abuelas. She didn't even care that we went out the last two nights, and she quickly made friends at the beach yesterday. I've been running which is awesome but no matter how early I go it's always too hot. Now were on road 413 to rincon, aptly nicknamed road to happiness. Therefore I will stop blogging because the view is too beautiful to miss.

Tom and I were having lunch at Original Pancake House yesterday (yum) and I was talking to him about Gabi's newfound Star Wars obsession. He tipped me off to the iphone app Lightsaber so as soon as I got home last night I downloaded it. Gabi made me personalize it with a picture of her and she made me change her light color to PINK (she has to be girly while opening up a can of whoopass!). She had a blast with the application, and Sebastian was even trying to imitate the woosh woosh sound and moving his hands imitating the motion, it was histerical! Alex who I was babysitting was quite enjoying himself too...all of this of course led us to having to replay Episode VI for the millionth time and her going to sleep insanely late because the movie is so damn long. Anyway, I must take some video of this happening this weekend so I can post it on here, and I MUST buy Episodes I-III cause yesterday on the way to work she kept arguing with me (while we listened to Weird Al Yankovich...

Ever since Gabi became old enough to be able to repeat everything we say, I figured it was no longer a good idea to play Howard Stern on the radio while she was in the car. That's when we discovered Kids Place Live on Sirius Satellite radio. There's one particular song that makes me smile every time I hear it, and I found the YouTube video earlier this afternoon. I know my friend Tom would really appreciate it. My only question is why hasn't it gone mainstream???

On Friday afternoon we went to Target to get Gabi some movies as a reward for sleeping in her room all night (it's been 4 days and she's slept through the whole night 3 out of the 4!). On Saturday night she snuck back into our bed around 2:30 am and we were too tired to do things the "right way" and take her back.   In any case, Jose convinced her to get Mary Poppins because he loved that movie as a kid.  I didn't think that was a good idea because personally I wasn't a big Mary Poppins fan when I was growing up.  I didn't like the "real people" Disney movies nearly as much as I liked the animated ones.  Also, for the duration of Friday night and Saturday during the day despite the fact that we had Mary Poppins on had Gabi insited on watching Star Wars!!! (she's a strange one indeed).  Finally on Saturday afternoon Jose convinces her to watch Mary Poppins by telling her it was Paloma's favorite movie.  OMG...what ensued!  She LOOOOOOOOOVE...