The Competition Begins!!!

Well, this past weekend Sofia had her first Gymnastics meet. She was so excited about it. She was the youngest one at the meet but she carried herself with poise and confidence, which should be of no surprise to those of you that know her. She placed 4th on Beam, 3rd on Floor Excerise, 1st on Bars, and 3rd All Around. We were all so proud of her. I was the most proud however, when she went up to the girl who one first and gave her a big hug and said congratulations. The meets are still fun now, that the kids are not out for blood yet. It was so much fun and a glimpse into what is yet to come for many of our Saturday's.

Santa Came Early

Santa came to visit us a little early this year. John loves doing this. We were trying to get pics for the Christmas cards. I am also trying to add a video. If it works you will understand what I am about to write. "I bet the Santa at your mall does not do this!" And we are sober. Just having a little fun. We still have not grown up yet.

Gabys First Haircut

Well she is over 2 years old and so I decided that it was finally time to get Gaby her first haircut. This went a lot smoother than Sofia's first haircut. There was no crying or screaming. She got her haircut at the Magic Kingdom. They do an awesome job there with the little ones. They put Mickey stickers all over her legs and then gave her two of those light up spinners. This kept her occupied the whole time. After it was done she got a certificate as well as a Mouse Ears hat that says First Haircut. It does not look all that different but I can leave her hair down for a day.

Halloween 2007

This year we went Trick or Treating for Halloween. One of our friends hosted a pot luck at her house before trick or treating and then after everyone chowed down, the 7 familes went out trick or treating together. It was a lot of fun. The girls really got a kick out of the whole thing. They got way too much candy and we gave most of it to Sofies teacher this morning for ther goody box. Here are some pics of them in their costumes.

Pumpkin Carving 2007

Adventures in Pumpkin carving. That is what we had at out house the other night. Sofie had a school project where she had to guess the number of seeds in the pumpkin and then actually count them to see how many were in there. I told her that since it was her homework she had to dig out the seeds. That is until she almost lost her lunch in the pumpkin. I guess she has a weak stomach when it comes to the insides of a pumpkin. Gaby was unsure of the whole thing but she got into it as well. By the way there were 186 seeds.

Pumpkin Patch

We went to the Pumpkin Patch the Friday night. It was a lot of fun. This is the first year that Gaby knew what we were doing and understood it. Altough there were not any really nice big pumpkins, the kids had no problem picking a ton of little ones out.

Relaxing on a Sunday Afternoon

For those of you who really know me, you know how rare this is. We were actually home for most of the day this Sunday afternoon. It was nice out so I set up the $8 easel that I scooped up at Peir 1 when they were going out of business. I put the kids in Johns old t-shirts gave them some paint and let them have at it. They stayed out there for over 2 hours just painting and having fun. We watched them and sat on the patio reading the newspaper. This was a lot of fun and very relaxing. I am really thinking that we should do this more often.

Fishing Town

On one of the days in Spain we went took a side trip to a little fishing town called Cudillero. This was awesome. We parked right next to the ocean and then walked through the town because as you will see in some of the pics, it is crazy to drive there. The houses are litteraly on top of each other and the roads are smaller then our one way roads, however, they are meant for two cars. It was an adventure driving anywhere there. John did a great job. Although driving home from there, we took a few side roads that ended up taking us around the side of a mountain that the roads were very curvy. Sofie got a little car sick and we had to stop at the side of the road for a little while. This town is set around the fishing industry. At around 4pm everyday is when the fishermen come back to shore. Everyone meets them down by the water to see the catch. The women then hang the fish from their balcony windows to dry them out. Life is really different there, but it seems calm and relaxed and yet they still get things done. The pics really say it all about this town. Enjoy!

Flights to Family

Over half of Johns family actually still lives in Spain so we try to make it there as often as we can, usually once a year. It is never any fun getting there, as I am sure you read in my earlier blog, but it is always great once we get there. Everyone is always so excited to see us, well mainly the kids. I can see his grandma's spirits rise as soon as she sees the girls. We went to a few places that we had never been before there, so that was a lot of fun. For this blog I will concentrate on the Family aspect of the trip and then on my next one I will talk about the places we visited. Families are those things we all have that we count on, on a daily basis and sometimes take for granted. I really did not want to make the trip over there again so soon, we were just there last summer, but I know that everyone is getting older and you never know what tomorrow will bring. And I fugured now we can do it we might as well. HIs grandmothers house is on the side of the mountain and this is where she as always lived. Johns mom and aunts were actually born in that house. It is a beautiful little house with so much to say for itself. You can look around and only imagine the things those walls have seen and heard. It is hard to find that there nowadays because so many of us live in new houses and move around alot. John's dads sister, actually still lives in her parents house as well where all of his siblings were born and grew up. We spent one night looking at old pics, that is always a lot of fun. We played with the sheep, the chickens, the dogs and the cows. We got veggies from the garden for lunch and lived quite a relaxing life for a week. There is something to be said for taking it easy and slow. The quality of life is better there I believe and the families are all so close. It is always good to be home and with the friends and family you know and love. We had a great trip there and will probably be back again next year.

Testing Patience

Last week we went on vacation to Spain. We have done this before with the kids so we expected kind of the same for the plane trip over there. We were sadly mistaken. We left Miami International Airport at 8:30pm Sunday night and we did not get to John's grandma's house in Spain until 2:30am Tuesday morning. Now, it is not supposed to take that long or else we would probably never go. We had a good flight to Madrid then our connector was a little delayed. We got on our connector and we were in the air for about 1 hour when the landing gear went down and we started the decent to land. Suddenly the pilot sped up and went back into the air. Now, my heart is in my throat and who knows what is in my pants, I think we are being hijacked or who knows what. The pilot comes on the speaker finally saying the fog is too heavy and he can not land. He is going to make a second attempt and then he will have to go to a different airport. He circles for a while and then tries again. No Luck!! Now, here is where the PATIENCE starts to come into play. Instead of going to an airport close to where we were supposed to go, we go all the way back to Madrid. Then when we land we are made aware that we are not in the US anymore. Instead of hanging around the aiport for the next flight, we are told that we will go to baggage and collect our luggage where we will board a bus to drive to Asturias (the airport we were trying to fly to). We are told that it is a 5 hour max bus ride. En route, we are made aware that it is far longer than 5 hours. The bus makes two stops, in the middle of a city and then at the train station, before ever going to the airport. When we left Madrid there were 2 buses full of people, when we got to the airport (where everyone was supposed to be going) there was at a maximum of 15 people and 8 of them were us. Only in Spain!. So after a 9 hour plane ride to Madrid and then about another 3 hour plane ride above Spain going nowhere, a 7 1/2 hour bus ride, and a 45 minute car ride we finally make it to our destination. This was a true test of Patience, I did lose it on the bus when we started making alternate stops, I was yelling, but of course it was in English so no one understood me. The kids though, were a Grace from Above, because they were so good. I Thank God everyday for what he has blessed me with. In the end, I know it was all worth it, we had a great time with the family, but you better believe that I am going to try to get some of our money back. Check back on my blog in a few days I will actually post pics of Spain.

Welcome to our Blog!

OK, so it took a while to merge onto the Information Superhighway! But here we are. We just got back from Spain a couple of days ago and we are trying to get things back to normal. Our life here in Fort Myers is hectic enough with Sofia, 5 and Gaby, 2 but when you throw a trip to Europe in the mix, it makes things even more nutty.

So, check in every once in a while to see what is going on in our lives as we try and figure out this crazy thing called parenthood.