Mazatlan

We are having a wonderful time here in Mazatlan. Check out our Photog Blog to see photographic evidence.

The kids' swimming skills have improved by leaps and bounds. It is incredibly fun to be with them in the pool. Eva can now swim on her own! She can even dive to the bottom of the pool by herself! Micah loves to dunk his head over and over. It is very cute because he counts down from three then slowly lowers his head under. He comes up with very red eyes and then starts the process all over again. He loves to dunk under in Andrew's arms as well. We will probably load some video yet.

Eva and I got our hair braided. I know, very nerdy and very touristy... but also VERY practical. I made a bad management decision and told her to leave my bangs out at first. I finally rectified it this afternoon and it looks much better.

Right now the kids are playing air hockey. Micah can barely see over the top of the table but he is holding his own. These kids just get more and more fun.

We are loving spending time with Al & Alice. The kids- especially Eva- are glowing with pleasure at having time with their grandma and grandpa.

Al & Alice had a one bedroom top floor ocean view for their first week here. Amazing! We camped out in their living room then this week we were to move to a two bedroom ocean view room. They informed us that there were no ocean view suites available this week. We were extremely disappointed and made a second trip to front desk to speak to someone else about it, who was also unhelpful. Then right after we got back up to our room we got a phone call informing us that they actually did have an ocean view two bedroom, but it was 'under maintenance' and wouldn't be available until the following day. So today we completed our third and final move, into a top floor ocean view two bedroom suite. It is so perfect for our needs, and the ocean view just caps it off. Gorgeous!!

I'm off to embarass myself at ping pong!

Accent

I forgot to mention that Micah has adopted an english accent. How did THAT happen?

Quick Update

Andrey and Jen are gone :( We had such a wonderful time with them! As I said to Jen, it felt so exciting yet so normal hanging out. We are incredibly blessed by their friendship.

Micah has been wearing undies everywhere for about a week now and doing awesome. I worried he might regress while we were toodling around in Monterrey but he kept his undies mostly dry. [exactly while I was writing this he had an accident. Ha, ha!] He is always dry in the mornings now, though we put a pullup on him anyway just in case. The problem we do have is that he generally refuses any kind of suggestion or direction to go pee. He is doing well at holding it for hours but eventually he can't hold it anymore. He hasn't been taking himself to the toilet so unless he decides to accept our advice he generally doesn't pee. I hate the power struggles and hope this passes soon. I sure do love seeing him in his cute little Cars and Transformers undies!!

I seem to have a sinus infection. Just on one side of my forehead but the periodic headache is annoying. Yesterday at yoga every time I bent over the pain got really uncomfortable. I have been surfing for home remedies and I will be steaming myself as much as I can and maybe taking some garlic. I don't want to have a horrible headache at the beach and I would like to avoid antibiotics. I welcome any other suggestions for dealing with this.

Yoga

Things I am learning at yoga:

- Better body awareness
- That not only do I have ridiculously inflexible hamstrings, but my shoulders- of all things- also lack flexibility
- Some yoga postures are incredibly difficult to pull off

There is a part in the middle of the class where it gets really really challenging... and not just because I'm pregnant. But I really enjoy the relaxing beginning and end, and the results I expect to see and feel in my body. I am looking forward to seeing what impact this practice has on my labour and birthing.

Congestion

The congestion finally left me about 10 days after it began. This is my standard healing time when I get ill. I guess it was a cold....

new post please

The only reason for this post is to limit the amount of exposure of my son wearing a dress. At the mall yesterday Eva did some good work on the giant jumper.

Three Little Princesses

Yesterday Xochi came to play. Here are the three kids enjoying the trampoline. Fodder for Micah's wedding!

One of Those Days

It began with a dream. I was playing ringette and my performance was terrible. Missing every pass and just making wide lazy turns instead of doing anything remotely constructive. Left me with a feeling of disappointment and frustration.

All night I felt like I had solid sleep waiting in the wings, but never quite got there. Woke up tired, even though we went to bed quite early.

I am getting discouraged because I have yet to exhaust the never ending supply of cement-like substance which is blocking my nasal passages. I could blow all day long (and kind of do) and never have a clear moment, not even immediately following a three-kleenex series of blows.

Micah was in fine form today. Let's see.... crayons and strawberry lip smacker on a variety of walls.... while I was cleaning that he filled the kitchen sink with oats and water.... later a giant meltdown because I buckled his seatbelt for him... toilet brush dragged to the playroom... ripping parts out of his book.... fell asleep briefly in the car and didn't sleep later (when I REALLY could have used a few winks of my own)...

I took the kids to the park to kick a ball around and they would not be convinced to kick the ball to each other.... they both would just kick it away from the other one who would cry and complain and it was generally unpleasant all around.

They did eat really well at supper, which always gives a mother a happy feeling. And went to sleep more readily than they have in three days. I am planning to get to bed on the early side and have my solid heavy sleep!!

Cosmic Cookies

The kids and I made these cookies today. I got the recipe from the Delicious Nutritious Frugalicious blog.

I made one batch using the recommended 1/3 cup but the cookies were so ginormous I downsized to tablespoonfuls and I liked that better. I might even make them smaller next time, because they are so hearty Eva didn't even finish one of the smaller ones. FYI they don't spread so you can space them closely on the cookie sheet.

I am really stuffed up right now so I can't comment too much on taste, but I love them based on the ingredients alone. They are practically guilt free! They make an excellent quick snack or road trip food.

I substituted plain unsweetened yogurt for the oil and slivered almonds for the pumpkin seeds.

2 1/4 cups oats
2 cups flour
1 cup sunflower seeds
3/4 cup pumpkin seeds
1/2 cup shredded coconut, unsweetened
1/4 cup flax seeds
1 tablespoon cinnamon

1 3/4 cups dark chocolate chips or carob chips
1 1/4 cups raisins
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup molasses
1/2 cup honey
1/4 cup oil (I used olive)
1 cup milk (use whatever kind you like... skim, soy, almond, etc)

Mix all dry ingredients in a large bowl. Mix all wet ingredients together in a small bowl. Mix wet into dry and stir until mixed - don't over mix.

Drop 1/3 cup of the batter at a time and form into cookies. Bake at 350 for 24 minutes or until lightly browned.

Fun shots

Yesterday the kids put on their favourite costumes and we took a few shots. Michel came over to join the fun. The only problem was she was sick...as you'll see from the shots.

Micah giving us a lion's roar....even though he's tigger.


Eva giving us her best pose....


This picture is hilarious. Our kids are very into it while Michel is sick and wondering what the heck is going on.


Michel...

Addition

Every Friday Eva comes home with a packet of the work she has done throughout the week. This week one of the items was a page of addition problems. Her teacher wrote the problems and Eva determined and recorded the results (with some guidance from her teacher).



The math component of the Montessori method gets me excited. It's so tactile and visual and natural. Math can sometimes be such an abstract subject for students; the way it is presented in Montessori makes it so much more concrete.

Here is what A Parents' Guide to the Montessori Classroom by Aline D. Wolf has to say about it:

A child in a Montessori class never sits down to memorize addition and subtraction facts; she never simply memorizes multiplication tables. Rather, she learns these facts by actually performing the operations with concrete materials. When the child wants to do arithmetic, she is given a sheet of paper containing simple problems. She works the problems with appropriate materials and records her results. Similar operations can be performed with a variety of materials. This variety maintains the child's interest while giving her many opportunities for the necessary repetition. As she commits the addition facts and the multiplication tables to memory, she gains a real understanding of what each operation means. In a Montessori classroom there are many materials that can be used for adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing.

THE SHORT BEAD STAIR

The Short Bead Stair represents the quantities one through ten in easily recognized colors. A single red bead represents 1. A bar of two green beads represents 2. A bar of three pink beads represents 3, and so forth, with the bar of ten golden beads representing 10. If a child wishes to do the sum 3+5, she places the bar of three pink beads beside the bar of five blue beads, counts the total number of beads and records her result: 3 + 5 = 8.

Daylight Savings Time

Though Torreon is in the central time zone, Mexico changes its clocks on a different date than do Canada and the U.S., who will change this coming Sunday March 8. Here we won't change our clocks until April 5.