Ok, not really. But I do find it peculiar that Liam is picking up a LOT of words from his videos, mainly Noah's Ark but not saying words he has heard every single day of his 17 month life!
Two days ago, while eating lunch he was watching a video (not a normal thing but lunch coincided with the video already being on...) and when we got to the The Outback portion he spouted the following words, clear as day:
Wombat
Lizard
Koala Bear
Kangaroo
And he has continued to repeat them even without the video on. Aren't those words a little difficult to say? A little more difficult than "up" or "chupie" or "noni"? And yet he doesn't say any of those words! He's baffling me!
I also found in his Animal Alphabet Elmo (and still says LA LA and not Elmo!) a two page spread with a Koala, Kangaroo AND Lizard on it - I'm sure we are fresh out of luck with the whole Wombat options and he repeated them again while looking at different images of the animals. Which only leads me to correctly assume that he DOES know what those animals are & is not simply associating with the video. Why those 4 though? Wouldn't cow, pig or lion be easier? He's pushing the multisyllabic (wonder who he gets his vocab from!?!? HA!) words before his one, easy as pie, syllable words & it's baffling me, people!!
Also this morning he has started to pick up "turtle", "octopus" & "dolphin" from his bath toys Santa gave him - don't judge, they haven't made it up stairs yet.
And...is it wrong that I'm teaching him to say "ding! Turkey's done!" when his kitchen stove timer goes off?
More later, of course! I have lots to share - just settling back in AGAIN! Photos might be on the plentiful side as they are easier to tell my story quickly - so my apologies in advance for those who cannot stand the sight of Liam any longer ;)
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Top Chef
Number of Hours Spent Putting it Together: 5
Number of Tools Used: 2
Number of People Who Put it Together: 1
Number of Times that One Person Swore While Putting it Together: 4
Number of Time that One Person Made Themselves Bleed with a Screwdriver: 3
Seeing the Joy in the Fellow's Face when Playing with His New Kitchen: PricelessFriday, December 28, 2007
This is Christmas
The Wonder of Christmas through the Eyes of a Fellow
upon discovering Santa had visited
upon discovering Santa had visited
Monday, December 24, 2007
Friday, December 14, 2007
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Riddle me this
Why would Liam not eat any of the delicious table foods (minus the yucky-to-me blood sausage) while we were in Argentina, even the fresh ravioli (but would eat the boxed mac & cheese), even the bananas BUT when we were eating our Thai take-out last night did he practically beg me for some spring roll & panang chicken and rice last night?
He ate it up. LOVED those spring rolls. Didn't bat an eye at the spiciness of the chicken or anything. I think he even might have disliked the whiteness of the rice, preferring the chicken & rolls over the rice.
Then he refused to eat his turkey & carrots that I had made for him. His tummy was full so we didn't push it. But I was anxious to get him back on his meats after being eye-rollingly annoyed that he dissed all the fantastic meats available to him in Buenos Aires.
He ate it up. LOVED those spring rolls. Didn't bat an eye at the spiciness of the chicken or anything. I think he even might have disliked the whiteness of the rice, preferring the chicken & rolls over the rice.
Then he refused to eat his turkey & carrots that I had made for him. His tummy was full so we didn't push it. But I was anxious to get him back on his meats after being eye-rollingly annoyed that he dissed all the fantastic meats available to him in Buenos Aires.
And we're back!
Although still not in fully functioning mode as it took me three times to type that title up there correctly...
Eventually, I will get around to finishing up our daily recaps but for now I want to give y'all a shortened version of How Our 20 Hour Delay Occurred Upon Leaving Argentine or Big Middle Finger to You, American Airlines!
The airport in BA has no less than 7 check-in points before getting to your gate, be it security or simply practicing their English by reading our passports & tickets multiple times before sending us no our way SO this literally takes the allocated 3 hours you leave to check-in for an international flight. The FIRST time we checked in Luisita strolled the Fellow around while we waited in the first check-in line (over an hour) so he was "taken care of" and very happy. And also? Very loud! Never knew my boy was that loud until you could hear him calling out "Mama!" and "Dada!" over the enormous hum of the airport. The board said our flight was "on time" so we were feeling pretty dang good about our departure. We had no problems going through all the lines, paying the airport tax (separate line!) and going through security & customs (we got fast-tracked through customs because of The Fellow though) and finally getting to our gate.
Upon arrival at our gate, the board was stating our flight was delayed 15 minutes. No big deal, right? And thank you AA for telling us about the measly 15 minute delay, right? The 15 minute delay turned into 45 while we waited to hear if they could fix our mechanical problem. The Fellow turned into The Boy Who Cannot Sit Still & we let him run around (after putting his shoes on, thankyouverymuch) and he wreaked havoc on the Duty Free store. At this point, we decided to tempt fate & try to get into the Admiral's Club with my dad's card - SUCCESS! There was so much chaos in there they would have let Osama in there without checking his card first. We set him up with a bottle & a Signing Times video (or two) while we had some delicious snackies ourselves & waited out the "delay". I went out to the smoking lounge and watched the board and noticed that our flight was no longer there, as it was just a mere second ago. No notice of cancellation, no nothing, just gone! I ran back to Matias in the Admiral's Club who was watching the board himself & we gathered up our stuff in the midst of all the Business Class & Platinum people getting their flights changed inside the Club and ran back to the gate. Enter Mass Chaos. There was a flight leaving right then for Miami connecting through to JFK but all the Admiral's Club people had already gotten those free seats and such so us lowly Tourist Cabin folk had to wait it out, all the while they had STILL not "officially" cancelled the flight. It's about 11pm at this point & our Little Boy is not asleep or happy in his stroller anymore, thankyouverymuch. No one could have expected him to be, that's just crazy talk right there.
At this point they tell us we are being put up in a hotel in El Centro cause there are no hotels out by the airport (not that there was no rooms, there are no hotels!) & that we would be taking remises (not licensed taxis) to the hotel. We have to back out through immigration, as if we were arriving, and gather around the remis stations. Turns out those are all closed for the night since no other flights are arriving. Lovely. About an hour later, they finally arrange car service for everyone & we are 2nd in line (behind an elderly couple) to get a car, thankyouverymuch nice remis man who noticed our child when AA could have cared less & basically told Matias as much.
We take the 40 minute cab ride to the hotel (the PanAmerican for those keeping track), checked in & were told that they had dinner waiting for us but that meant keeping Liam up with us (which he turned out to be fine with another bottle, of course) and by the time we actually made it back up to the room it was 2am. 2am, people! Liam fell asleep really quickly all snuggled up next to me like a Little Fellow & we didn't wake up until 9:30!
Left the hotel, after a very nice breakfast and stealing 2 bananas, milk & another yogurt, at 12:30 and got to the airport 1 hour before AA even opened. Bummer. The Fellow had fallen asleep in the car & was still asleep in his stroller until 2:30 rolled around when the check-in lines opened. Our flight was never cancelled, just "delayed" for 20 hours...and the new departure time was not a scheduled flight so all the AA people had to come into work early to check us all in. We finally got through security and all that rigamorow and couldn't find our flight on the board, we had no idea which of the three AA gates we were departing from & the fact that our flight wasn't listed on the board somewhat frightened us, but knowing that it was not a regularly scheduled flight kept our spirits up somewhat, you know? Our flight was delayed another hour or so due to heavy tarmac traffic & they couldn't get it out of the garage and over to our gate in a timely manner - it is quite typical of Argentine's to not leave on time OR leave enough time to arrive at the intended destination - y'all know this is you know my husband ;)
Finally boarded our 5pm flight closer to 6pm. Fellow was no longer a Fellow. He was a cranky bebe who didn't know what to do with himself but did know that he no longer wanted to be restrained or sitting. Welcome to our hour or more of crying on a plane. Signing Times saved the day though, as did dinner (more yogurt & milk along with a roll from my dinner - he turned his nose up at the pasta they were serving) and finally after changing him into his footed jammie he was sound asleep - and all the passengers rejoiced! I kid - they were really good about him being so cranky because who wouldn't understand his situation after all, we had all been through it ourselves & who wouldn't want to cry & kick and scream over it all, right?
10 hour flight & 2 hour time change difference, a fast-tracked trip through customs (thank JFK!) and we were collecting our luggage at 3:30AM. Matias' parents made the 45 minute drive to collect us & thankfully Liam slept on the drive home & went back to sleep relatively easily at 5:20AM on Monday morning only to awake at 9:30AM to start his day! Matias got up with him (as if our "agreement" - when at your parent's house, you are the Parent in Charge...) & allowed me to sleep until 11AM. Liam went back down for a nap at 12:30 and slept for two more hours but really hit a wall around 7PM (9PM Argentina time) and we had to shovel food into him & get ourselves all gathered up & packed into the car so that we could leave before a meltdown occurred OR before he fell asleep in the house. He slept the entire time in the car, came home & was a little overwhelmed about finally being Home (also it was 1:30AM) and we thought we might almost have to have him in bed with us to comfort him but he did end up falling asleep after 2AM in his own crib & waking up at 6:30AM (8:30 Argentina time)! Yuck. I brought him back to bed with a bottle hoping he would chill and go back to sleep since it was still dark outside but he wouldn't - so I put him back in his crib & crossed my fingers that he would soothe himself back to sleep and with only 5 minutes of crying he resigned himself (maybe?) and just fell back asleep until 10:30! YAY! Then he actually took a 3 hour nap later which was a blessing for us cause we were/are exhausted, as you can imagine!
In all a normal 10 hour flight (with 2 hour time difference makes it a 12 hour flight) took over 36 hours to complete. With an 16 month little boy. Our new nickname for him is Little Trooper - and he earned it, he's such a great little guy & I couldn't have asked for anything more from him (well maybe to eat more table foods...) on this trip - especially considering our "delay".
I obviously have more to say about our time in Argentina but I am still trying to catch up with "normal life" & getting ready for Christmas (!!) so I'll try and be current with everything & detail more about our trip as time allows :)
It's great to be home, I missed everyone immensely & cannot wait to Celebrate Christmas at Camp Carolina!!!
Eventually, I will get around to finishing up our daily recaps but for now I want to give y'all a shortened version of How Our 20 Hour Delay Occurred Upon Leaving Argentine or Big Middle Finger to You, American Airlines!
The airport in BA has no less than 7 check-in points before getting to your gate, be it security or simply practicing their English by reading our passports & tickets multiple times before sending us no our way SO this literally takes the allocated 3 hours you leave to check-in for an international flight. The FIRST time we checked in Luisita strolled the Fellow around while we waited in the first check-in line (over an hour) so he was "taken care of" and very happy. And also? Very loud! Never knew my boy was that loud until you could hear him calling out "Mama!" and "Dada!" over the enormous hum of the airport. The board said our flight was "on time" so we were feeling pretty dang good about our departure. We had no problems going through all the lines, paying the airport tax (separate line!) and going through security & customs (we got fast-tracked through customs because of The Fellow though) and finally getting to our gate.
Upon arrival at our gate, the board was stating our flight was delayed 15 minutes. No big deal, right? And thank you AA for telling us about the measly 15 minute delay, right? The 15 minute delay turned into 45 while we waited to hear if they could fix our mechanical problem. The Fellow turned into The Boy Who Cannot Sit Still & we let him run around (after putting his shoes on, thankyouverymuch) and he wreaked havoc on the Duty Free store. At this point, we decided to tempt fate & try to get into the Admiral's Club with my dad's card - SUCCESS! There was so much chaos in there they would have let Osama in there without checking his card first. We set him up with a bottle & a Signing Times video (or two) while we had some delicious snackies ourselves & waited out the "delay". I went out to the smoking lounge and watched the board and noticed that our flight was no longer there, as it was just a mere second ago. No notice of cancellation, no nothing, just gone! I ran back to Matias in the Admiral's Club who was watching the board himself & we gathered up our stuff in the midst of all the Business Class & Platinum people getting their flights changed inside the Club and ran back to the gate. Enter Mass Chaos. There was a flight leaving right then for Miami connecting through to JFK but all the Admiral's Club people had already gotten those free seats and such so us lowly Tourist Cabin folk had to wait it out, all the while they had STILL not "officially" cancelled the flight. It's about 11pm at this point & our Little Boy is not asleep or happy in his stroller anymore, thankyouverymuch. No one could have expected him to be, that's just crazy talk right there.
At this point they tell us we are being put up in a hotel in El Centro cause there are no hotels out by the airport (not that there was no rooms, there are no hotels!) & that we would be taking remises (not licensed taxis) to the hotel. We have to back out through immigration, as if we were arriving, and gather around the remis stations. Turns out those are all closed for the night since no other flights are arriving. Lovely. About an hour later, they finally arrange car service for everyone & we are 2nd in line (behind an elderly couple) to get a car, thankyouverymuch nice remis man who noticed our child when AA could have cared less & basically told Matias as much.
We take the 40 minute cab ride to the hotel (the PanAmerican for those keeping track), checked in & were told that they had dinner waiting for us but that meant keeping Liam up with us (which he turned out to be fine with another bottle, of course) and by the time we actually made it back up to the room it was 2am. 2am, people! Liam fell asleep really quickly all snuggled up next to me like a Little Fellow & we didn't wake up until 9:30!
Left the hotel, after a very nice breakfast and stealing 2 bananas, milk & another yogurt, at 12:30 and got to the airport 1 hour before AA even opened. Bummer. The Fellow had fallen asleep in the car & was still asleep in his stroller until 2:30 rolled around when the check-in lines opened. Our flight was never cancelled, just "delayed" for 20 hours...and the new departure time was not a scheduled flight so all the AA people had to come into work early to check us all in. We finally got through security and all that rigamorow and couldn't find our flight on the board, we had no idea which of the three AA gates we were departing from & the fact that our flight wasn't listed on the board somewhat frightened us, but knowing that it was not a regularly scheduled flight kept our spirits up somewhat, you know? Our flight was delayed another hour or so due to heavy tarmac traffic & they couldn't get it out of the garage and over to our gate in a timely manner - it is quite typical of Argentine's to not leave on time OR leave enough time to arrive at the intended destination - y'all know this is you know my husband ;)
Finally boarded our 5pm flight closer to 6pm. Fellow was no longer a Fellow. He was a cranky bebe who didn't know what to do with himself but did know that he no longer wanted to be restrained or sitting. Welcome to our hour or more of crying on a plane. Signing Times saved the day though, as did dinner (more yogurt & milk along with a roll from my dinner - he turned his nose up at the pasta they were serving) and finally after changing him into his footed jammie he was sound asleep - and all the passengers rejoiced! I kid - they were really good about him being so cranky because who wouldn't understand his situation after all, we had all been through it ourselves & who wouldn't want to cry & kick and scream over it all, right?
10 hour flight & 2 hour time change difference, a fast-tracked trip through customs (thank JFK!) and we were collecting our luggage at 3:30AM. Matias' parents made the 45 minute drive to collect us & thankfully Liam slept on the drive home & went back to sleep relatively easily at 5:20AM on Monday morning only to awake at 9:30AM to start his day! Matias got up with him (as if our "agreement" - when at your parent's house, you are the Parent in Charge...) & allowed me to sleep until 11AM. Liam went back down for a nap at 12:30 and slept for two more hours but really hit a wall around 7PM (9PM Argentina time) and we had to shovel food into him & get ourselves all gathered up & packed into the car so that we could leave before a meltdown occurred OR before he fell asleep in the house. He slept the entire time in the car, came home & was a little overwhelmed about finally being Home (also it was 1:30AM) and we thought we might almost have to have him in bed with us to comfort him but he did end up falling asleep after 2AM in his own crib & waking up at 6:30AM (8:30 Argentina time)! Yuck. I brought him back to bed with a bottle hoping he would chill and go back to sleep since it was still dark outside but he wouldn't - so I put him back in his crib & crossed my fingers that he would soothe himself back to sleep and with only 5 minutes of crying he resigned himself (maybe?) and just fell back asleep until 10:30! YAY! Then he actually took a 3 hour nap later which was a blessing for us cause we were/are exhausted, as you can imagine!
In all a normal 10 hour flight (with 2 hour time difference makes it a 12 hour flight) took over 36 hours to complete. With an 16 month little boy. Our new nickname for him is Little Trooper - and he earned it, he's such a great little guy & I couldn't have asked for anything more from him (well maybe to eat more table foods...) on this trip - especially considering our "delay".
I obviously have more to say about our time in Argentina but I am still trying to catch up with "normal life" & getting ready for Christmas (!!) so I'll try and be current with everything & detail more about our trip as time allows :)
It's great to be home, I missed everyone immensely & cannot wait to Celebrate Christmas at Camp Carolina!!!
Monday, December 03, 2007
Listo!
I'm still here! Just lacking in computer time & energy but I'm uploading another batch of 70 odd pictures to dropshots so I thought I would update here too so that I could give you come more background behind the pictures :)
The past couple days have been a little quieter during the days but our nights have been late (for Bebe) and busy but very nice. Pepe y Lusitia take "siestas" for real so we've been finding ourselves sleeping along with them & Liam. Thankfully, Liam has been taking nice long naps (about 3 hours) so we've been out & about in the mornings & again in the evenings, then we come home, have dinner, a sink bath & go to bed - notice a routine here? It's good though - I'm very happy he's napping so well but the naps I've been taking have been screwing with my night time routine & I have found myself unable to go to sleep before 2am at times...and then up when Liam's up in the AM!
So let's see if I can remember all that we've done in the past few days!
Today we:
(I just checked to see the last time I updated & realized to my dismay that I haven't updated since Wednesday!! I might not make it all the way back till then tonight!)
Tomorrow we are:
Liam is definitely saying "chau" though & it's very, very cute. He misses his Nana! & his kitties though for sure & loses his mind when he sees pictures of Nana! and smiles until he face breaks when he sees any gatitos (kitties) [I should start charging a fee for these spanish lessons, people]. I am finding myself missing talking to people or more simply said speaking english so I do look forward to coming home to that!
P.S. the title of this post means Let's Go or Alright & it's my New Favorite Thing to Say.
The past couple days have been a little quieter during the days but our nights have been late (for Bebe) and busy but very nice. Pepe y Lusitia take "siestas" for real so we've been finding ourselves sleeping along with them & Liam. Thankfully, Liam has been taking nice long naps (about 3 hours) so we've been out & about in the mornings & again in the evenings, then we come home, have dinner, a sink bath & go to bed - notice a routine here? It's good though - I'm very happy he's napping so well but the naps I've been taking have been screwing with my night time routine & I have found myself unable to go to sleep before 2am at times...and then up when Liam's up in the AM!
So let's see if I can remember all that we've done in the past few days!
Today we:
- went to UniCenter (again) - Matias bought his birthday present from his parents (a fountain pen) & we got Liam's picture taken with Papa Noel (Santa!)! He was a little freaked out so we are in the picture with him. We pick them up tomorrow & if you can believe it or not it only cost $8pesos (divide by 3 to get $USD)!!
- had lunch & took a siesta
- went to Recolta & shopped around these way too high priced (think Rodeo Drive) stores which I cannot stand
- went to San Telmo (one of my favorite areas in town) and walked around for a short time because all the stores were already closed for the day. I really want to spend more time there & just soak in the "vibes", it's kind of the artsy part of town. We went around to a few places & got a couple presents (!). I really wanted to stop & get some coffee and sit around for a little while but we ended up in flea market sort of place & got some peaches & squash for Liam
- went/came home, gave Liam dinner, a sink bath & put him to bed
- had dinner ourselves, sweated to death (it's over 90 today & no AC, mind you) & watched Capote
- walked a 10k - this is such a longer story but here's the gist of it - Mike was running in it in Tigre & we wanted to go cheer him on. Pepe couldn't find the train station where the ended so he just sort of randomly dropped us somewhere. Matias decided to follow some runners since they were obviously going in the right direction, right? Turns out we followed them around about 80% of the course. The train station was behind where we got dropped off. It was really hot, I had non-Croc flip flops on & jean capris (yes, mom my hot ass pants) & I was not in a happy mood at all. Needless to say, we never found Mike.
- we took the train home
- we went over to Mike's to celebrate Tomas & Maria's birthdays that are coming up. Mike made about 5 different kinds of specialty pizzas - they were fantastic! Olives & blue cheese & onions - oh my! Then we had two kinds of cake AND about 4 kinds of ice creams (these Argentine's love their ice cream)
- we watched the Tigre vs. Argentina's Jr. soccer game
- we all got tired out from watching Liam run around & play with the dog - I cannot tell you how many times they asked me if he was always as active as he was being. The answer is yes, always yes. Then the next comment is usually "does he ever get tired?" or "does he sleep well?" - yes, yes he does. Thankfully!
- went to Txiki (she corrected my spelling! Matias actually spelled it wrong...) y Toto's to hang out & watch the Polo match from earlier that day.
- put Liam down for sleep & woke him back up to go home at 1am - he did really well with being woken up & taken somewhere else but didn't really go back to sleep very well when we got home
- ended up with Liam sleeping with us cause once he finally fell back asleep in the pack and play something fell over outside or the shutter slammed against his window & he woke up frightened but thankfully slept the rest of the night peacefully snuggled against his Mama
(I just checked to see the last time I updated & realized to my dismay that I haven't updated since Wednesday!! I might not make it all the way back till then tonight!)
- finally got some pictures of Liam drinking mate - he hasn't quite grasped the straw concept 100% yet but sometimes he does get some pulled through! He's also pretty much perfected drinking solo from a Big Boy Cup so we give him Soda (seltzer water) as often as he asks for it & that's quite often
- went to the grocery store for more Asado fixings - actually only Matias went & I stayed behind to put captions to the pictures & talk to my mommy
- went to the Polo game!! It was very exciting & we actually had FRONT ROW SEATS!! It's not like I know what's happening but, man, the sound of those horses running full out right past you - very cool! I'll go through the videos to pick out the best ones to illustrate that para vos! (spanish is just expanding daily.) Liam was in fact the Best Dressed Fellow there - sporting his blue & chocolate brown polo shirt & madras shorts with his bucket hat - there was no finer Fellow to be found!
- went/came home, went out to dinner, Liam had mashed potatoes (called pure here) & we came home and went to bed
Tomorrow we are:
- going shopping in Tigre
- going on a boat ride along the river & (I think) it stops at some of the islands as well - one aunt & cousin are coming along with Pepe y Lusitia & us three
- going to dinner at Toto's cousin (they are DuPontes) who is the keeper of the Family Archive & wants to meet us as Matias is the First Nino Grandson & Liam is the First Nino Great Grandson
Liam is definitely saying "chau" though & it's very, very cute. He misses his Nana! & his kitties though for sure & loses his mind when he sees pictures of Nana! and smiles until he face breaks when he sees any gatitos (kitties) [I should start charging a fee for these spanish lessons, people]. I am finding myself missing talking to people or more simply said speaking english so I do look forward to coming home to that!
P.S. the title of this post means Let's Go or Alright & it's my New Favorite Thing to Say.
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