Home Again!

Well, Lucas and I have now been home in Vancouver for several glorious weeks. It has been such a tremendous joy to see friends and family, as well as to see the pleasure Lucas shows in experienceing all these "new" things in Vancouver. After we got over the initial cold weather (tee hee - it has since warmed up) we have been spending our days out and about town. We've had lots of visits to the local pools and parks as well as a couple of special outtrips. It's been so great to catch up with people and hear all about their own adventures during the past year. It has also been really neat to see the kids again, who have all changed from babies to toddlers in what seems like lightening speed!

Lucas and Logan sharing a plate of dinner together; with a lot of concentration.

A visit to Stanley Park and the Aquarium with Uncle Scott. Lucas sat through the whole Beluga whale show if you can believe it!

Lucas has learned to say "cheese" for the camera. Here he is practicing.

I had the pleasure to be able to spend the day with Val and Ian in Whistler to celebrate their wedding. It was a perfect day, and a pretty perfect couple too. Our happiest congratulations go out to them both.

This is my garage sale find of the century! A radio flyer ride-on for $30! What a steal! Lucas has learned to bomb down the little hill in Mom's yard and crash gleefully into the hedge. What a riot.

Here's the little guy at Adam and Ashley's 2nd birthday party. He had a blast running around and (as you can see from the picture) seems to have taken to Ashley quite well!

Lucas, Ashley and Adam.

Almost Home

Hi Everyone! We are counting down the days until we hit Vancouver soil again, but until then we have been enjoying our spring here. The end of May saw us forced out of our home for a weekend while the electricity was "fixed" for the upcoming summer rains, so we ate everything perishable in the fridge and packed the family up like sardines into the truck for the weekend.
We ended up in Barra de Potosi, a small village 45 minutes south of us. We found a lovely little beach house to rent that was pet friendly and right on the beach. Both Lucas and the dogs were in heaven as they had free-run of the shady, breezy property. I can't tell you how many times we showered sand off of Lucas over the two days! He would ask to be rinsed, then run gleefully back down to the shady palapa and plop his clean, wet butt right back down in the sand!

Pillo was is heaven with the wide open beach, plethora of geckos to sniff out, and a stray herd of cows to "defend" us from early Sunday morning. Chola dozed contentedly in the shade and followed me faithfully back and forth. On Saturday night we sat at the beach and watched a truly magnificent sunset, tucked Lucas into bed, and read ourselves silly. It was a very relaxing little holiday and despite the fact that we locked ourselves out of the house when we returned to Zihua, one that dissipated a lot of stress for all of us.

So as we are getting ourselves organized for our visit home, we await the rains here with excitement (it would be SO nice!) and are getting in some good games of Settlers before we lose Mom! (Seen above played with the Seafarers of Catan extension.)

Can't wait to see you all! Love Ting

A Special Picture

Rob, Lucas and I just wanted to post a little picture for all to see. This is Lucas' little brother or sister, due around the end of November beginning of December. We can't wait!

The Circus

Another circus has arrived in town. This time with heaps of panthers, camels, lions and tigers. Lucas, Mom and I went to peek at them last Friday and Lucas was determined to come for the show with his Dada. So go we went. Lucas made the most of running through the ring before the show started, staring open-mouthed at the scantily-clad women doing strange bodily contortions and hula-hooping, watching the incredible cats roar and jump, eating popcorn, and my favorite; devouring a whole hotdog. This was after dinner too. Worth the price of admission alone!

First Haircut

As you may have noticed from the last few posts here, Lucas' hair has been growing like wildfire and has gotten out of control. Although we love the long-haired surfer look on him, this morning I was horrified to count fifteen dreadlocks. The misery of getting them out had weakened me and we finally decided to get Lucas his first haircut. Now, there is a kiddie-salon in town replete with car-chairs and entertainment. But why pay when I have sharp scissors, the will, a tv and lollipops?! Ah...skill you say...that's purely a figment of your preconceived notion of hairstylists, come-on - he's a kid with curly hair! How hard could it be? Lucas just had to join the list of family members who have fallen prey to my scissors.

No wiggles now...

Bribes work well.

Well, Lucas lived through the experience (as did Mom and Rob who were worried about butchering) and now has a lovely head of fresh bouncy curls minus the dreads. I'm quite proud of myself and wonder whether there might be need of an English-teaching kiddie hairstylist upon our return to Vancouver. Hmmm.......

Birthdays

A little late in coming, but a Happy Birthday to Rob who celebrated two weekends ago. We had a very quiet evening together opening his gifts, eating Singapore Style noodles ala Ting, and watching him blow out candles on his ice cream sandwich birthday cake. Then it was off to bed early as my gift was a fishing trip in the morning.

We didn't get that many photos from the fishing (I think we were both a little dopey from taking anti-nauseants in fear of sea-sickness) but this was definitely our favorite. The cats looked positively possessed as they lay waiting to see if they could snag some early morning fishies!

We had a great day out on the lancha with one of my students Cesar and his friend who made us some of the best tiritas we have ever eaten. For those of you who haven't had the chance to come down and try this regional specialty, it is raw fish marinated in lime with lots of chilies and onions. Sooooooo good. We ended up catching four black tuna and two Spanish herring. Very fun. We also got to see the coast from the water and have a swim off of the boat.

Congratulations in order

Our congratulations to Tasha (Rob's cousin) and Phillip who were married this last Saturday in Bellingham. We're sorry we missed the wedding, and especially the cake!!! All our best wishes go out to you guys.

(photos courtesy of Scott)

Baby Aitken Makes an Appearance

Well, a week has come and gone and with it the arrival and departure of Lindsay, Ewart, and Owen. We had a fantastic week together of sand, surf, food and a lot of settling. (Settler's of Catan - our favorite board game for those of you not in the know!)

The boys were so cute together, although we really had to try and keep giant Lucas from squishing baby Owen flat. After Lucas got over the confusion of Owen not playing cars with him, he quite took to having him around; sitting beside him and watching him every once in a while.

Look carefully at Lucas' left hand in the above picture. We believe he may be saying, "hey dude, you're a little close buddy." teeheee...

Pretty good looking families, hey?!

What a looker!

Ouch!

Happy Easter!

I hope the Easter Bunny was good to you all. Here we were spoiled with gifts from Grandmas and a warm swim in the pool. It was especially exciting to have chocolate bunnies left by the Herman's when they came to visit. Just look at the pleasure on Lucas' face!

As Easter, of course, is primarily a religious holiday (and a very important one) in a predominantly Catholic country such as Mexico, there were no bunnies to be seen around here. Just a few chickens running around and cock-a-doodle-dooing as usual! The Easter thrill here was a visit from Sub-commander General Marcos - the highly esteemed as well as mysterious leader of the Mexican Zapatista movement. Rob was very disappointed to have missed his two appearances, but I think perhaps it was a good thing; I don't really think we would have fit in... ;~P Rob seemed to think we should try and get a photo of him and Lucas... well...I didn't really think that it was such a great idea! I've posted a stolen photo that someone else took yesterday. Those of you who have been to visit will recognize the main downtown basketball court.

I hear it's raining a lot in Vancouver; we'll send thoughts of sunshine to you. Ting

Barra de Potosi

It seems as though it's been an awfully long time since Rob has had a day to play, so this morning (after a little lazing about) we got off to Barra de Potosi for a day of fun. We had only ever been there once before with George, Justine and Logan, and so we thought it was time to give it another try. This time we opted to hang out on the lagoon side of the area, where it meets the sea. After checking on the security of swimming in potentially crocodile infested waters, we chose a great little shady spot with knee-deep lagoon water for Lucas to paddle about in. He's really mastering his water wings, I'll tell you!

Anyways, we spent a great day kayaking through the lagoon, (Lucas fell asleep it was so peaceful) eating all sorts of yummy seafood creations, swimming, kicking a ball around and laughing. Lucas was the charmer as usual, making friends with other kids and posing for photos for Mexican tourists. Today Lucas also surprised us by showing us he could shake his head for no (apparently he's been watching us intently when vendors come by to sell us stuff!) as well as for signing "please" when the ice-cream man came by. How could we resist?!

I hope you all had a great weekend too!

A Peek into my Day

Happy April!

I thought I'd share a little slice of Ting life with you today.

This morning was quite an insightful for me when I took the dogs and Lucas to the beach for our normal dog exercise after dropping Rob off at work. It started quite badly with Pillo clothes-lining Lucas from the side and knocking him very hard onto the ground. This, of course, was followed by abundant tears and much sand wiping on my part as Pillo lay submissively (not bouncing) as his punishment. Crisis solved with a lovely little stroll in the shade. Then everything got out of control. First, Chola went for a swim, which means incredible barking to announce that she is in the water and I'd better watch her NOW in case she gets blindsided by a wave and needs assistance. At the same time Pillo was refusing to retrieve his ball which was quite a ways down the beach from me. So what does Lucas do to help? Runs, (which is truly a run, not jog) down the beach in the opposite direction from all the doggy action. As I ran off after Lucas and hauled him back screaming, I was dropping every dog and kid toy with me (too many) and avoiding the pointed stares of the tourists having their breakfast at the cafe. Erk. This is when it came to me; I really am, whatever others may think, a much more patient person than I was pre-baby. I didn't scream once, nor did I shed tears; even though wanted to!(And this is a very good thing I think!) Haha! A little moment for you to picture me in.

I can't tell you how much I miss being in Vancouver as the Cherry blossoms are in full bloom and the buds poke their heads out to see the world. I especially miss those cool rains and wandering through the neighborhood with dogs, strollers a cup of coffee and good friends! This all comes as the heat begins to rise here in Zihuatanejo. Those lovely cool breezes are starting to fade away into searing heat and sticky humidity once again. Rob and I put the air conditioner on last night for the first time in what seems like many months. Ah well, I can finally bare getting into the pool again! (It was actually too cold for a while! HA! I've never been one much for cold water; even here I still prefer a warm shower.) We are, however, seeing lots of spring blooms on the trees here as well. Mom tells me the bright orange ones are Acacia trees, but alas the rest I do not know. I am simply enjoying them. We are also seeing a reduction in the visibility of tourists in the area, although Semana Santa (Holy Week) should bring a swack more.

The dogs, I'm happy to report, are feeling much better. Pillo, who is becoming fat, is currently obsessed with what we think may be geckos living in or around the stove. Yesterday he managed to pull the stove apart into metal pieces in his attempt at gecko liberation. Chola has become my little shadow as she follows me faithfully around the house now. We all change, I suppose and Chola is just needing a little more Mommy time these days.

Speaking of Moms, it's great to have Mom back and we are slowly sorting out our rightful roles in the household. Lucas has been enjoying having another person to boss around, that's for sure!

Wowzers...

I can't believe I haven't posted since the first of March! Thanks to Mom's friends for their encouragement to keep it up. I had sort of gotten caught up in other writing projects and have been ignoring this.

It has been a busy month so far with the cycle of visitors starting again. We had Emily, whom I taught with at Bodwell, visit for a week at the beginning of the month, and now we are enjoying a visit with Rob's parents. I am jumpy with excitement as the date for mom's return creeps nearer. She arrives on Monday and then on Tuesday morning we are all piling into a mini van and driving to Acapulco for two nights. It should be a crazy week! I'm sure it is going to take Lucas a couple of weeks to wind down after all the excitement of seeing his grandparents...but so much fun!

Rob has been really busy at the club with 100% occupancy. As exciting as this has been we find ourselves looking forward to the end of the high season so that we can have a bit more time together. Rob has been working a pretty grueling schedule of six days a week and very long days. Ironically he will now be home before Lucas and I as the manager's retreat this year is in Vancouver! I was a bit stunned at the news since had we planned it better we could have gone home together, but that's the way it works sometimes. I think they'll have him pretty booked up anyways.

The weather here as been quite lovely the last month with gentle breezes coming in and out most of the days. Lucas and I have slipped quite comfortably into a nice routine of dog walking, car playing, eating, dancing and laughing together. He is an increasingly active boy. He happily walks several kilometers on his own when we walk the dogs. It's not usually in a straight line...but the stroller is rusty from unuse! He is trying very hard to get more words out and has mastered some of the basic baby signs we've taught him. Thus communication is getting easier and easier. He is growing upwards very fast, and those feet of his that were unnaturally large when he was born; well they are still unnaturally large! I think the shoe shops here are going to like us. Even if they constantly try and discourage me from buying such big shoes for a 1 1/2 year old!

We've had lots of doggy adventures in the last month or so. Unfortunately these have not been so good. Chola had a terrible encounter with an angry, angry hippie who decided to punt her like a football from two feet away. Granted she had peed on his dirty blanket that was on the ground, but I was right beside her and would have happily paid for his hemp bracelets. Poor Chola, who is mostly deaf and blind, just couldn't fathom what had happened and literally cried in pain as she curled up like a little bug. Needless to say, all of Mom's unintentional training in how to swear is Spanish came in very useful. I'm afraid I made quite a scene yelling in Spanish and then English when words failed me. Anyways, I scooped up Lucas and picked Chola up off the ground to see if she could get home. The man said nothing and sheepishly began to clean up his wares. It took us a disproportionate amount of time to get home, where I finally crumbled and called Rob in tears. The idiocy of some people I will never understand.

Since the incident, Chola has been pretty sore, but in good spirits. I think she likes the extra attention. She has however developed a worse limp than normal, so we thought we should take the dogs off to the vet for a check-up since Pillo was also due for some vaccines. Well, we always try and do a bit of a better groom before the vet (you wouldn't wear dirty underwear to the doctor would you?) and what would I find to my horror and disgust? Ticks. Nasty, nasty, blood-sucking ticks. I shudder even now just to remember. When Chola was a pup she had once had fleas and I had though that was just about the grossest thing. I was wrong. Ticks are worse.

It turns out the anti-tick flea etc. stuff we had been giving them just wasn't strong enough for the Mexican variety. So our vet appointment turned into a 24 hour gong-show of de-ticking the dogs and de-yuckifying the house. The war on bugs just never seems to end in this tropical environment. The dogs, for the most part however, are doing much better now. We figure Chola was feeling pretty sick with all those ticks sucking the life out of her. Poor thing.

Well, I hope no-one is gagging from that story. I think maybe I needed some blogging-therapy to get it out of my own system. I was having trouble sleeping because I kept waking up dreaming about ticks! Perhaps you can carry that weight for me now?!!

This morning a Jehova's Witness without a word of Spanish knocked on our door to try and convert Rob. We laughed to learn that he was from Vancouver Island and his wife had gone to the same high school as Rob. So weird.

Have a super weekend. Ting

My Boys Again...

Another great pic of my two favorite boys for your viewing pleasure.

Rice Face

He's just so darned cute...

A Chilly Weekend???

Last weekend it was off to Patzcuaro again for a chilly yet refreshing get-away from Zihuatanejo. We have come to love this little town that has so much to offer and were not disappointed in this third trip.

Our first night found us arriving a little on the late side. One of the quaint things about Patzcuaro to us is some of the mystery enshrouding it; one of which was that we couldn't find any reasonably-priced hotels to book on-line. We decided to gamble and just arrive and find a place to stay. After touring several hotels, we settled on the best option...brrrrrrrrr... I'm not sure sure what we were thinking. The double bed was definitively not big enough for three, and it could not have been any colder to our poor tropically-acclimatized bodies. I think Lucas slept ok, but Rob and I surely did not. I can't tell you how happy we were to get out in the morning and warm up in the sun with a mug of coffee and a plate of hot cakes. Lucas was in heaven feeding and chasing the pigeons (emphasis on the chasing since I don't really think that running after them with large cracker chunks counts as feeding.) We did several wanders through the market and oohed and awed at all the knock-offs. We didn't buy much because we mostly just saw clothes that would only work in winter and heaven knows we're already out of style I can only imagine what we'd look like if we showed up back in Vancouver in a couple of years in those... tee hee. Lucas of course cashed in on DVD's and socks.

This extended visit allowed us the time to visit some of the churches around the town, always a treat. We were a little awed to be able to see the tomb of Don Vasco de Quiroga, the beloved founder of the region.

For our second night's stay we found a gorgeous plant-filled, terraced hotel with a mega bed. Ahhhh... After a some hysterical antics from an over-tired and over-excited Lucas, we fell into deep and blissful sleep that didn't have us reminiscing of camping at Strawberry Point on the May 24.

Sunday began with another fabulous breakfast before we headed out to Isla Janitzio, as seen in the photo above. Although our Lonely Planet guide said it wasn't highly recommended except for during the day of the dead festivities, we really enjoyed our morning. The boat ride was quite beautiful and the island itself very interesting in its own unique way.

Lucas hams it up an on the boat ride.

Fishermen "performing" in the lake for the tourists.

This is a picture of the little graveyard on Janitzio. I can imagine that it really would be something else to see this island during the day of the dead, as places like this, which to me seem so picturesque already, would jump out at you with even more colour, history and emotion. We walked all the way to the top of the island, winding our way through homes, shops, a basketball court and this cemetery.

We really could have spent more time here exploring and enjoying the people, but a toddler's needs are a toddler's needs, and we left without climbing yet another set of stairs (something we always seems to do a lot of when traveling, anyone else?!)

Thus we headed home on Sunday afternoon pleasantly pooped and missing our pooches.

It was a great trip for Rob, Lucas and I, all in all (except for the food poisoning I brought home. Blech...but that's another story.)

The final photo here is of Lucas showing off his break-dancing moves in his slick new Adidas track suit and DVS sneaks courtesy of his homies Uncle Fred and Uncle Lanny...

Happy Valentine's Day!

Our own 'lil Cupid wishes you all a day of friendship and love!

I know, I've got too much time on my hands...

This is Lucas saying, "Come on Mom, you can't be serious..." After which he ripped the wings off in seconds flat. I think they stayed on all of about twenty seconds in total after numerous attempts on my part. Ah well, you all get the point. And yes, I know...Rob's going to kill me!