Babysitting Directions for Nana

Mom,
You can give him a bath, if you want. Here's a Thomas movie if you want him to watch a movie, he loves popcorn, too!

Read him a couple of books.
If he asks for:
"Sun" = Blue Train, Green Train
"Max" = Where the Wild Things Are

Turn on his music on the iPod. Just hit this button twice.

If Max wakes up, give him his pacifier and monkey. If that doesn't work, try milk.
Worse case scenario, call me and I'll come home.

And, Mom, if he says:
"poo", he means his pacifier (derived from the Spanish "chupon")
"mono" - his monkey
**Essential winding down and bedtime necessities**
If he says, "cuna", this means crib in Spanish, and this means he's really tired and just set him down in the crib and he'll go down easily.

and Aunt Carrie's favorite:
"fuckers", he means stickers - He loves them.

Thanks,
See you soon. I have your cellphone if you need us.

Jam Packed

It's a bit hard to fit in a year's worth of visits into two weeks in Georgia and two weeks in Connecticut. We're trying hard, but are also trying not to stress ourselves out too much and more importantly, we're trying to keep Maximo well fed and watered, because he's a train wreck when he's off his schedule.

Mom and John have watched Maximo a couple of nights so we got to hang out with John's high school friend, Greg, who now lives in Hartford and last night we went to the Mohegan Sun Casino with Tim, Kim, Pete and Elvia. It's nice to hang out with my siblings now that we're "grown-up". It was great seeing Carrie, though her trip was too short, and it was nice hanging out with my brothers with no kids last night. It just confirms the fact that Maximo NEEDS siblings - ones to love and hate growing up, and hopefully cherish when he's grown.

I've updated some pictures from the Connecticut leg of our trip here.

And here's a few of my favorites from the past couple of days:

Maximo totally unimpressed with his first lobster.



On a whole he's been great meeting tons of new people and staying in different places,
but he has had his moments!

Since we've been going out for meals and drinks and night or have had people over here, my normal blogging/internet surfing time has greatly diminished, hence the lack of posts, but it's been really nice catching up with people, though it's starting to catch up with us.

Catching Up

I was going to do a "End of Savannah" post before arriving in Connecticut, but it didn't quite happen. Well, for one, the last couple of days in Savannah were hectic - we squeezed in some quality family time - meals and play time with Maximo, catching up with friends, and last minute shopping, which led us to...

4 over-weight pieces of luggage, so we were at the mercy of the US Airways counter clerk.

Luckily we were at the BEST.AIRPORT.IN.THE.WORLD! The Savannah Airport is small and so easy to get through. We were running late with the heavy bags, a carseat, a toddler... and we had a great travel day. Max LOVES avions (planes) and was fascinated by the fact that he was in one!

We've arrived in Connecticut safely. Max has been a trooper with all this moving around. Though he calls Nana either Gigi (John's mom) or BA-Nana (ha!). He's trying to tame the cats and loves all the toys at Nana's.

Maximo missed his Uncle Pete and Aunt Elvia last night when they came to dinner because he was wiped out from our day of travel and went to bed early, but today he got to see his Uncle Tim and Aunt Kim and his cousins, Jessica and Amanda and they had a great time!

Mowing the lawn with Grandpa J

Pete & Elvia!

Max and Nana playing with the water table


The Barbie bike


Ride 'em cowboy!

Cousins Max & Amanda (1 month difference)

Jess

The kids' table - Jess needed 25 cents to sit there watch each baby!

Tomorrow, lobsters... Life is good!

Vacation Update

The best part of being a teacher is having the SUMMER OFF! Ask any teacher. They'll tell you the same. Unfortunately we have to squeeze a lot into our month in the states, but the most important being catching up with family.

Here are some (photo) tidbits from this past week:

Running around in Forsyth Park (where we got married)

One of my favorite things about Savannah - the Spanish moss

Cousins! Jillian and Maximo!

Hanging out on River Street today

The best invention... EVER (for toddlers) - STICKERS!
This is how we get through waiting for our dinner to arrive!

This is the sign of a 'happy Jule' - pizza and beer from Vinnie Van G0-G0's

Dinner at Vinnie Van Go-Go's

A New Member of the Family

A Nikon D5000

John's dad, better known as David, bought us a NEW beautiful camera for a birthday/anniversary/Christmas present. He'll never have to buy us anything again, though I know he'll still continue to spoil his grandson.

As John said today, "That's a whole lotta camera!" and I have to agree. I am really excited about the camera, but know nothing about digital SLRs, so I'm going to have to learn little by little. Luckily, it also has an automatic option too, so I can take pictures while I learn all the manual options. I did play around with it today in Gigi and Grandpa's backyard. It was fun, but I've got a lot to learn. It felt like a pro toting the big camera around my neck and listening to the rapid shutter noise, though my photos fall short of professional quality or artistic style. But, I'll keep practicing!

Here are some shots from today - after I deleted about 150.

The Day in the Life of a Big Boy

First it was eating cereal like a big boy with Grandpa Jim.

Then it was buying a new pair of sneakers.
He couldn't stop looking at them and loved running around with them on.
I've also added a few more pictures to the Picasa site and added captions here.

The Beach

We had an uneventful trip from Lima to Savannah. Max was fantastic the whole way. We're now at Tybee Island enjoying the beach and friends.

Here's a link to our pictures.

More later.

For Maximo

Dear Maximo,
Tonight we leave Peru, the country in which you must have been dying to see, since you jumped out of my nice warm belly 9 weeks early, which feels like eons ago, but was a little less than 2 years ago. Peru has been so kind to you, my love, and it actually makes me tear up a bit to think that you probably will remember nothing from it.

Since the moment you were born, everyone here loved you. They love your strong gladiator name. They love it when you wear your Peruvian soccer uniform or your chullo.
They love that you are a blonde hair, blue eyed Peruano. They love how you speak their language. You are known by everyone who lives within a five block radius of our house. As we walk to the park, everyone stops and dotes on you and you melt their hearts when you blow them kisses as we continue on our way. You put a smile on strangers' faces as you wave to them or as your bravely run up to their dogs and touch their noses or give them besos. They love you because you see beyond the class or color which often defines Peruvians. You are just as friendly to the man who waters the parks as you are to some of your well-off friends' parents. When I am out by myself whether it be at the grocery store or bodega across the street, I'm always asked, "Where is Maximo?" and they sigh when I tell them that you are home with Papa and they are missing your sweet smile, wave and kisses.

Yesterday your friends planned a little despedida for you. It was the first time I really welled up about us moving. I looked at you playing with your friends and how much you meant to them and how there'd be a missing piece in the playgroup tomorrow and my heart hurt and I got choked up saying goodbye and giving besos to all your little friends.

I hope your dad and I can keep Peru alive to you through our photos and stories. I hope that some day we will return to Peru as family so we can show you where you were born, where you spent the first 22 months of your life and what you liked to do - and so you can have a better appreciation for the culture, sights, sounds and food.

We hope that you will enjoy this lifestyle that we have created for you. If not, we will stop for you, so know that. Japan will be a new adventure, one that will be a great influence in your life. It'll be where you start school, where you learn how to ride a bike, where you'll start to sleep in a big boy bed. It'll be a country of many firsts for you, as Peru has been. We're excited to bring you home this summer to reacquaint you with your family and our roots. Then, it's off to our new home in Japan.

Love,
Mommy

Maximo in the park kissing his girl, Hania

The neighborhood gang at his despedida:
Vasco, Fernanda, Jimena, Max, Hania, Malina, Santiago and Cusi

The End of a Chapter

We haven't had a TV for about a month now. John and I actually don't use it much, so it's been fine. Maximo watches a show in the morning while he wakes up and enjoys his cuppa milk, so we've been playing his favorites - Handy Manny, The Backyardigans and Thomas on my laptop. He digs his little set up.

Our house went from this... the kitchen stuff waiting to be packed.

To this! In mere hours...
(Yes, the ballpit is going. Are we crazy? Maybe.)
And here's our living room, in it's cold, echoey glory:

Thankfully, the school partially furnishes our house, so we do have couches to sit on, beds to sleep on, and a BASIC kitchen set up. I can't imagine if they didn't. We'd truly be camping out.
And since we didn't want to drag a bunch of winter clothes to the US this summer, John and I each only have a pair of pants, our fleeces and a couple of shirts we're rotating through this last week of school. It's been interesting. I'm ready to put on my flip flops and a pair of shorts!

And of course, the pictures of Max, playing outside because the inside is a bit bare. He loves wearing my shoes, which is good, because I have a pair and he has almost no toys to play with.


One of many goodbyes we've said this week. We'll dearly miss Ben, Holli and Jana. Unfortunately they just arrived in Peru this year, but I'm sure we'll see them around and we know they have no problems with showing up at our door in Japan.