Another Fiesta de la Piscina!

Casa 2 is located on some gorgeous property out in the country - the house is beautiful, and there's actually a pretty big pool! The pool almost never has water in it, but last week for whatever reason, the pool was filled up about a fourth of the way...so of course, we needed to have a pool party! One group of tias decided that on Monday we would take alllll of the babies from Casa 1 to join Casa 2 for a little fun in the sun. Wild idea...so much fun!

The first issue we had to tackle was transportation...no problem...in just 2 trips, we drove the tias, Katrina & Caris, our physical therapist, our cook, a ridiculous amount of lunch food, (including 2 huge crates of eggs,) and 22 babies, in our little auto. :) I thought I'd driven packed cars before, but this was just ridiculous! I've never seen so many babies all over a car...!

We had a really fun time playing outside all morning with all of the kiddos. Our sweet cook, Silvia, worked all morning to make us a huge lunch to eat as a picnic outside. After lunch, we alllllll went swimming - none of us with actual swimsuits, but we all had such a good time. 22 babies + a handful of older kids in one pool = a little craziness but a lot of fun.

Playing Outside

Picnic Time

Bananas for everybody! wahoo!

This is 1/2 of our older set of twins - they will be 2 in a week or so and are starting to learn more and more words now...although most of the time, we just hear "hoooola!" from them. :)

Picnic

Pool Party!

One of biggest blessings to me in Bolivia...Tia Rosi!

A little naptime outdoors today!

Big fan of pool parties right here:

The tias are so great - I don't think just anyone would have taken on such a project like this, but it was really good to mix up the routine and get the kids out - what a fun day!

Mt. Tunari

This weekend a group of us climbed Mt. Tunari. At 16,500 ft, it wasn't the easiest day of hiking but definitely was one of the most fun.

the drive

Katy, Lauren, and I on the way

The perfect off-road vehicle...a trufi van...that we pushed halfway up a mountain!

chocolate covered everything provided all the energy we needed along the way.

View from the peak

Made it!

There was an electric storm at the peak - I've never seen anything like it - you could hear the electricity, our hair stood up straight, we got shocked everytime we came near someone else, and whenever we moved, (pointing a finger for example,) the motions made noise. We didn't stay at the top for too long, since our heads kept on getting shocked!

Picture taken as we shocked each other...

Then it started snowing!

What better way to end the day than to jump into the freezing cold lake on top of the mountain?

the fastest we moved all day:

2 Months

Our baby's 2 months old this week! (And smiling almost nonstop!) :)

Hard to believe that I've spent two months in Cochabamba - time is absolutely flying.

Hasn't she grown since September?!

And now, a quick announcement from Baby F:

A little stage fright, I think. Let's try again:

Casa Dos...all weekend long!

Part of the welcoming committee/gate unlocker of Casa 2- there's nothing like a pre-breakfast frolick in your onesie!

I had a pretty full weekend - thanks to some switching around, I had a double dose of 13-hour shifts at Casa 2 this weekend. (And was back again on Monday...but that's a different story.)
I have to admit - I was not super pumped about the weekend at first, but it ended up being a real treat. The kids at Casa 2 can be a handful sometimes, (umm...when I take them to church without backup support!), but they really are great kids - sweet, unbelievably responsible, and full of personality. Saturdays are full of chores, baths, and playtime. Sundays we throw church into the mix.When I work weekends at house 2, I work with one other tia. One of us takes the kids to church and the other one stays home and cooks lunch and dinner for the day. (Yes. I've learned to cook for a small army. what. a. joke.) I don't think mom believes me on this one. I don't blame her - cooking huge pots of vegetable soups has never been a favorite pasttime of mine.

Sunday afternoon I had the kids by myself for a few hrs. I was going a little stir-crazy from being in the house all weekend, so instead of watching a movie (the kids' weekend reward if they behave all week,) the kids wanted to go on a car ride. But first, literally all afternoon, they BEGGED me to let them wash Jennifer's car! (They are obsessed with the car!)

I gave in, they had a ball, and Jen, your car is sparkling!

 Ready to head out in our crowded but clean coche! (The 11 yr old in the front seat drove.)

 Just kidding - I definitely drove - it's always an adventure driving a dozen kiddos around! If you've read the book Cheaper By The Dozen, it talks a lot about the family driving all 12 kids around in one car, and getting to do this myself gives me a good sense of the craziness that comes with these outings! The kids behave really well in the car and are just nonstop-excited for the entire ride. Sunday afternoon we decided to drive to the market to pick out ice cream for after dinner...we paraded into the store hand-in-hand...the whole dozen. I will say we got some stares as we weaved in and out of the aisles! I couldn't stop smiling though, and neither could the kids. Plus, picking out favorite ice cream flavors turned out to be a great way to bribe encourage everyone to have good manners at the dinner table that night!

  

Ice Cream Time!

Very attractive

Yum!

A sweet way to close out our weekend!

Movie Night

This weekend four of our oldest kids and I went to the movies! Kathy Alseth, the mom of Casa 3, had mentioned that there was a kids' movie playing right now, (Isla de los Dinasaurios - top on your Movies-to-See list, i'm sure.) She had said that it kept her kiddos entertained for the whole movie, so we took advantage of the opportunity and headed down to the CineCenter. It was quite the experience for us all...some highlights would probably include:

~Helping all 4 kids onto an escalator, obviously for the first time...one child couldn't understand that she couldn't hold onto the non-moving wall while we rode up, andddd another rode up on all fours, but we did make it to the second floor!

~The first time people in the crowd laughed at the movie, all 4 kids whipped their heads around to see...we walked into the theater after the lights had dimmed, and I don't think that they had realized that there were a lot more people in the room with us!

~Every time the movie got dark so that the kids couldn't see me clearly, everyone in our theater heard a five-year-old call out cheerfully, "Tia Sabana? HOLA!" just to make sure I hadn't taken off! (FYI, most people here think that my name is sabanas - in spanish, bedsheets. They think that my parents are pretty uncreative as far as naming me. I feel a littttle bit like Michael Jackson's kid, Blanket.)

Taxi ride downtown...the taxi had a tv in it playing the three stooges in spanish?! The kids were pretty entertained.


Maybe the best part of the day - the little girl smiling here also has a 2 year old sister, and both of them have a really hard time ever leaving the home. They are always excited when I tell them that we're going out somewhere...we get them dressed...and then we walk to the gate...and they just melt down. Once we get out, they're ok, but they get really upset leaving. Today was the first time that this little one left with a big smile on her face, and she was in a great mood all evening...I'm so proud of her!

So whenever we take pictures, the 5 year old on the left here always cheeses it big time...(she's the one who was wearing the Irish t-shirt in an earlier post...) However, times are changing, and now instead of a big cheesy grin, we get this:

and this.

I've got like seven pictures of her with the exact same "smile" tonight - just stunning!

Have a great weekend.

Runs

Look what we found at the end of our run!

Lucky for me, talking about runs here doesn't just mean talking about my digestive problems...(although I haaave just started treatment for parasites...chao chao, amoebas.)

I get to do a pretty good amount of running around here...
most days, running is a little part of my routine - like running after a toddler who doesn't want to sit in her high-chair, or running to catch the bus when I'm late for school, (that sounded like I'm 10 years old...) Fortunately, most days I can find some time to actually go on a run, and I'm thankful that this is the case. Running is something that I really just love doing, but for my first month or so here, it was honestly pretty hard to find the joy in running. Cochabamba has lots of parks and lots of green; the problem is that everyone has warned me that these are places I shouldn't be by myself. Resultantly, when I'm running on my own I've been sticking to bike paths on busy streets...so my runs have included lots of dodging traffic, weaving through people, and not exactly my favorite smells. Combine this with never-ending comments from spectators, (up until this weekend, I had seen one other runner since I've been here. Sidenote, he was wearing sweatpants and a fleece with a hood - it was 85 degrees,) and a little altitude adjustment early on, and I just hadn't been very excited about running here, which was strange since it's something I normally love so much.

Things have definitely changed for the better throughout the past month! Thanks to some new people in my world here, I'm happy to say that running is something that's really been brightening my mornings. A friend from school, Lauren, and I have been running together some, and it's been fun to run more scenic routes together and get to know her better. During a day trip to La Cabana de Torres this week with some school friends, we went running down some railroad tracks and were so surprised with the views that waited for us at the end. Another running highlight here was when a Bolivian friend took us running around the lake by El Cristo before church...I have never seen so many runners up at 5:30 on a Sunday morning! And how can you beat a Saturday morning run with Lauren and Machews throughout random farm roads, (pausing for the cattle herders to cross,) knowing that we were running home to homemade cinnamon rolls from Mauge?! Yup - there's joy in running, that's for sure.

Lauren and I at the end of the tracks

Without a doubt, the best thing that's come from a love of running here is getting to run with Adelaida!

Tia Adelaida is one of the 8 Bolivian staffmembers at the baby home - she's actually in charge of the group of tias, andddd she loves all sports. I can't say how good these tias are to me. All 8 of them have been so patient and helpful to me since I've gotten here, and some of the tias are some of my best friends here! With the language barrier, these relationships have taken more time to build, but going on morning runs with Adelaida has been such a valuable time for our friendship. We have to be finished with our runs by 6am...but what a great way to start the morning!

Last, this is another one of our Tias...Tia Consuelo. Tia Consuelo does not have anything to do with running besides making jokes about it...I just love her!

Gorros, Gorros, Gorros

So many hats!

We've got all sorts of pint-sized sombreros around here!
We've got sunhats...

...fortune teller hats?...

this chick's gone a little Amish on us...

And finally, we can turn potty chairs into hats!