Paperwhites and Daffodil

Brrrrr, It's January

2012-02-01T06:39:00.000-08:00

Rowan came home from school and taught us a new song. It's the first one he taught us. Just ignore the yogurt all over his face and enjoy the song.

Ryder Mae - 8 months

2012-01-25T13:25:00.000-08:00

Ryder rolled over for the first time over Christmas break at Grandma and Grandpa's house. Until then she just sat there being cute. Now less than a month later she's crawling and clapping.

Ignore Thomas the Train in the background.

4th Quarter 2011

2012-01-25T12:39:00.000-08:00

Oh my! I have a video of Miss Mae crawling and I want to share it on this little, family blog but I just can't do that until I post some pictures of us (mostly them.)

This was Ryder's first Christmas and she was more impressed with bows and paper than anything. Rowan was into it more this year than any other thus far but still appreciates small doses of gifts. Here are both of them with our stockings at home (Christmas 2011 #1 of 3.)

Rowan's favorite gift from Fayetteville Santa was a pair of black shoes that are very similar to Esten's. He asked me to put some pants on him so he could wear the shoes immediately. He needs pants touching the shoes or they just aren't right.

I mean he really loves them.

Ryder and her first purse.

In November, the 30th to be exact, Rowan turned 3. While he was at school I put all of his gifts together on our coffee table so he would walk in to this.

He was thoroughly unimpressed! He didn't want to open his gifts but after a little coaxing he did.

That night we went to Chuck E Cheese's. Did you know they serve beer? We were delighted to discover this. Now our trips there will cost even more. A few of our friends came to celebrate with us, including Luke, Rowan's nieghbor buddy. Candles were his thing this year. Fire equals fun.

And in October we all dressed up for Halloween. No explanation needed here.

These are a few randoms from October.

And finally, at the beginning of October we went the Harvest Music Festival. The weather was unseasonably warm but we managed. Our kids were great and we will be back next year albeit in reserved camping. We are too old to camp with the stay up all nighters.

That was just a glimpse but mejor que nada.

Let's Go Get Cloned

2011-11-15T14:25:00.000-08:00

Enjoy this video from the Vintage Vernon Festival in September. And because everyone needs at least one Doc Mason song on their Ipod buy this song on Itunes. It's called, Let's Go Get Cloned.

Happy Fall

2011-10-07T12:41:00.001-07:00

Photo Credit: Jules Pierce or if you ask Rowan her name, "My Jules"

This Fall we are celebrating our one year anniversary of living in Fayetteville. To celebrate we are taking our little family to Harvest Music Festival with some friends from Texas next weekend. The highlight of the weekend will be Rowan meeting his namesake, Peter Rowan. Camping with a 5 month old and nearly 3 year old should result in lots and lots of photos and stories, stay tuned.

4 Months

2011-09-13T12:59:00.000-07:00

Since my 3 month post was so late, 4 months came quickly. Our girl is just as sweet and laid back as ever. She is trying so hard to roll over, her hiccups have subsided and she loves chewing on her pointer finger. She is using the jumper and the exersaucer now. She loves being able to see everything going on around her, which is a lot of "to infinity and beyond" these days. This is a picture of her and I at the Tulsa Zoo. What do you think? Do we look alike?

Preschool Begins

2011-09-13T12:35:00.000-07:00

Last week we loaded Rowan up for his first day of preschool.

When we got there I tried to get a picture of him outside the school but this was what he left me with. Something about the sun in his eyes was his excuse.

This is the "I'm not so sure" look he gave just as we were entering the room.

Then he went off exploring the kitchen area with Livi.

We told him we were leaving and that we would be back in 5, 10 minutes. 5, 10 minutes is our only concept of time with him. He cried but let his teacher hold him and we went on our way, a few tears on our end too. The good news is that the tears have subsided and he is enjoying himself at school. The only complaint from him is that his class isn't allowed to climb in the tree house when they go outside. His teachers told us that he is very polite and likes to hang with the adults. Is he still too young for cooperative play or is he just too smart for all of these other 2 year olds? ;)

Baby Pool

2011-08-30T13:04:00.000-07:00

I must let you know that Rowan has 3 swimsuits but it seems that he prefers something a little more European;)

Eating Raisins With Pliers

2011-08-30T12:25:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure where Rowan comes up with some of his stunts. This one was superb. He sat on top of the table with a box of raisins and a pair of pliers.

Skillfully retrieved them out of the box, one by one, with pliers.

And then ate them.

Delish!

3 Months

2011-08-30T12:04:00.000-07:00

Ryder is proud to announce her 3 month accomplishments. Hold on to your seats people.

- I found my feet.

- I bat and grab anything in front of me, including hair. See.

- I still have my crazy hair.

- I have super chubby thighs, as one lady put it, I'm juicy.

- I can talk your head off and you'll never guess what I'm saying.

- I've successfully outgrown all of my clothes that say they should fit me.

- I'm as lovable as they come.

- I let my parents sleep most nights.

- My Daddy says I'm starting to look less like an old lady and more like a baby.

- This pictures really captures my personality. It's the "ni modo" in me.

- I'm kind of enjoying chewing on my fingers. If I suck on them I gag. I'll stick with chewing them.

- Lastly, I really love my brother. He is fun to watch bounce around the house.

First Carnival Ride

2011-08-13T16:01:00.000-07:00

We're at the Tontitown Grape Festival complete with carnival rides.

Chocolate Donut Anyone?

2011-08-09T13:06:00.001-07:00

We went to open gym at Gymnastic Joe's this morning and Ro scored a chocolate donut. He hated every bite;)

Summer 2011 in Photos

2011-08-09T12:32:00.000-07:00

I know Summer 2011 isn't over but I'm wishing it away. Bring on the Fall. Here's a little of what we did.

Rowan drummed with his cousin.

Ryder met Vaughn.

Ryder got lots of love from Aunt Ava.

Ryder slept on a picnic blanket while Aunt Ava read.

My BFF since forever, Alison brought her kids out to Moms' and Pops' house to play and swim.

We went to Port A with some friends for some beach time. Rowan hates sand on his feet. Need I say more?

We went to Memphis on a business trip with Esten. We went to the Children's Museum one afternoon. Rowan piloted a FedEx plane.

Shopped for some groceries.

Checked himself out.

Put out a fire.

And jammed on the green screen. I think this was All the Single Ladies.

We've had a great summer (minus our dog dying and our AC going out 4 times) and are now brushing up on our wake/sleep cycles to get Rowan ready for preschool. He starts September 6th.

Ian Dog

2011-08-09T12:21:00.000-07:00

July 4, 1999- August 6, 2011

I'm not sure why we always added Dog to end of his name but we did and that's who he was, Ian Dog. He was lucky enough to live 12 years but has now left a hole in our hearts. We miss him very much.

2 months

2011-07-27T14:50:00.000-07:00

Ryder Mae was 14lbs 13oz and 23.5 inches long at her two month check up. She is the happiest baby and gives smiles as often as you'd like. She has started "talking" to me today and I caught a little on video. Never mind the hiccups in the video, she has been plagued with them since birth.

Yeah, I know, so exciting! We'll give her a little while until we expect the real entertainment like her brother produces. For now we'll enjoy her baby babble.

First Boat Trip

2011-07-27T14:08:00.000-07:00

For those of you who don't already know this, we lucked into the BEST neighbors. They are our age, have a 3 year old, invite us over for dinner often, came with a fantastic group of friends (who have graciously adopted us), threw a surprise baby shower for Ryder and have not one, but two boats. Let's just say we are loving our neighbors.

They took all of out to Beaver Lake in June and it was beautiful.

It was both Rowan and Ryder's first time on a boat and they loved it. Ryder pretty much slept the entire time on the seat of the boat.

Rowan was his usual self and wanted to "drive" the boat.

He also experimented with a life vest for the first time. He jumped off of the boat a few times and learned the hard way that you have to close your mouth and hold your breath when you jump.

The World's Tiniest Violin

2011-06-27T14:18:00.000-07:00

Pops knows how to get to the boy's heart. I hope violin his teacher is patient.

1 month

2011-06-14T14:10:00.001-07:00

Happy Belated One Month Birthday, Ryder Mae. Our sweet baby girl is growing like a weed. She was 10lbs, 3oz at her two week check up and I'm sure she's gained more since then. My arms tell me so. Here are some new photos.

April Rewind

2011-05-23T14:36:00.000-07:00

We were busy bees in April. After the long winter everyone is eager to get out and enjoy the cool, Spring weather. Festivals are plentiful, farmer's markets are awakening and the flowers and trees are blooming. Beautiful! We joined in on some of the events around town as we waited for Ryder.

We took Rowan to an event that was put on by the Let's Move initiative that Michelle Obama started. Rowan got to meet the mayor of Fayetteville and ride his bike with his buddy, Luke. They rode up and down a hilly trail from our green library to a fabulous park. He, Luke, Esten and I all made the news that night. This is me and Rowan at the park after the ride.

Rowan on the trail.

We enjoyed some watermelon on our back porch.

Delish!

Since we spend a lot of time in the backyard, Esten cleans dog poop out of the yard everyday (and I do my part, as well!) I know it's gross, but better than washing someones shoes everyday. Rowan likes to help too, he'll grab his rake and shovel and make attempts.
FYI: He picked his own clothes and boots.

The Junior League of Northwest Arkansas puts on an event, Touch A Truck, where kids can come and climb on, touch, pretend, etc... on trucks of all kinds. We were sure Rowan would love it. He, of course, was scared. Esten managed to get him to climb on a few of "trucks" and get a few pictures. But more importantly he had his first cotton candy. Can you tell how much he hated it?

The school bus, see the fear.

The smart car was his favorite.

And he did come up with the courage to get in the mail truck.

My Mom came to stay with us at the end of April and the first night she was here we took Rowan to an event called Farm Friends where people from local communities brought their farm animals that were friendly enough for kids to pet them. Rowan took to the animals much better than the trucks. He held baby chicks.

And milked a fake cow.

The next weekend was Rowan's preschool's fundraiser called the Backyard Bash. He starts in the Fall, very part time. They have a 2 acre playground equipped with a cement tricycle track,

a tree house,

swings, playscapes, a sandbox, a basketball court and a lot of grass. Wish his teacher luck getting him inside!!!!

My parents bought Rowan a Powerwheels Jeep after he begged my Mom with those beautiful, blue eyes until she had to fork over the money. He has driven that Jeep everyday since we got it and most of the time until the battery is dead. The boy is in love with driving and he's surprisingly good at it. Before it had wheels on it, he grabbed the steering wheel and put it in it's place and hopped in to pretend. No, I can't explain why he hasn't any pants.

Here he is cruising in the backyard.

And again.

Phew! That's a quick recap of our April 2011. 12 days later our baby girl arrived. She is 2 weeks old now and being the sweetest baby one can ask for. She takes a bottle and sleeps for a least one long stretch at night. She is quite the drama queen though especially about taking a bath and getting dressed. If you didn't know you would think I'm drawing blood, seriously! She turns it off just as fast, thankfully. We have lots of new pictures of her and if I can find the time to upload them, I'll post some this weekend.

Introducing our Lily of the Valley...

2011-05-15T13:59:00.000-07:00

Ryder Mae. She was born on Thursday, May 12 at 3:44pm. She weighed 8lbs, 1 oz and was 20.5 inches long. We came home 24 hours after she was born and we are all doing well. That last month of waiting for her seemed incredibly long and we did so many fun outings with Rowan to pass the time. I have tons of photos and stories to share soon. For now, take what you can get and enjoy these few photos.

The Farm

2011-03-18T17:33:00.000-07:00

Dear Sweet Rowan,

You have enjoyed animals since you sprouted an opinion but on our most recent trip to Texas you just fell deeper in love. We came home to frequent requests from you to "see Pops' cows 'gain" and "drive tractor 'gain." And although we wish we were closer to Fredericksburg so we could pack you up and take you there, the fact is, it's 12 hours away. So instead we talk about all things farm daily and you pretend with your Schleich animals and John Deere tractors that you are there. You call, "Bessie, Maaaaeeee" and in your mind these mammals come out of the brush to find you.

And once you get them to the barn and feed them, this particular cow, Honey, lets you pet her. She's "sawf and has horns."

And in your imaginary world, you also pet the "white one," but in reality she won't let you near her. However, you really like this "white one." So much that you've had me and your dad running all over town trying to find one for your barn that looks like her.

You claim that this "black one get you." This isn't true but maybe we've told you she might.

And this little guy, I think it's a bull, is my new hero because we talk about how his Momma puts him to sleep, which is a complete fabrication of mine. You bought it. She and her baby lay on the ground and they look at the stars and talk about their day and then the Momma cow rubs her baby's back as he drifts off to sleep. You agreed that you could go to sleep like the baby cow without "nee, nee" and we haven't looked back. I hope I never see you on my plate little bull, I'm putting in a good word for you right now.

You also love these little birds, while talk and imaginative play with them usually involves a cat chasing them up the ladder into the barn. You can thank your dad for that. We are allowed to have 4 hens in the city limits here and we are debating getting some to bring a little bit of the farm to you. And to feed our own egg habit.

When we are at Moms and Pops house, you wake up, let us have sip of coffee and then ask to "go see cows." Someone always obliges and off you go, usually with your cousin Mara. I think she's showing you how to "moooo" in this picture.

And then she somehow convinces you to get in the doll stroller so she can push you around. Or maybe it was your idea, who knows.

And I know you looked at these flowers at least twice you were there this spring and this summer you will eat their most delicious fruit. The Peach! The juice will run down your shirt (and stain) and you will pick any within your reach, consuming more peaches in one day than any toddler should.

You're only 2 and I know each time you visit Moms and Pops you are going to enjoy yourself more and more. Maybe they can even get some tractor work out of you someday. There are still so many memories to be made on "the farm" but I didn't want us to forget these. Farm on, little man, farm on.

Love-
Mom

Big Bike

2011-03-16T13:16:00.000-07:00

Rowan outgrew his tricycle recently and has graduated to his "big bike." It only took him a few times to build up the courage to ride that 12 incher in the cul-de-sac with our neighbor's son. And I'm not biased or anything, but my two year old can hold his own with the 3 year old. We're still working on braking but he's steering and pedaling on his own. Yesterday he rode to the park and back with a few pushes from me on the "big hills." He also took a 4 hour nap, bike ride or the flu? Not sure.

And this my friends is what you call a silent video. The silence is far superior to Esten and our neighbor's father talk about their new cameras. Trust me.

Farewell to Winter

2011-03-16T12:49:00.000-07:00

This winter was particularly brutal to most of the country including us. I lived in New York for one winter and Fayetteville's winter has been rather comparable temperature wise but with more snow than I ever saw fall on Long Island. We had the most snow fall here in Fayetteville since 1918 and we were measuring it in feet, rather than the usual inches. It was fun to watch it fall and play in for a few days, but the cold air just kept blasting through with our lowest, low reaching -15 F. After living in Mexico last year where our daily weather forecast was ~75/45 with a 90% chance of sunshine, we are all ready for spring, including the dogs. They have had few chances to soak up the sun here. These are some photos from our historic snow of February 2011.

Walking in snow is hard, especially when you're two.

Devil's Den State Park

2011-02-01T07:07:00.000-08:00

This past weekend was lovely and we decided to go on a family hike. We went to Devil's Den State Park. There are some trails easy enough for grandma (or pregnant women) and we hiked one of those.

Rowan was ready with his hiking stick in one hand and the other hand tucked in his pocket.

The guide that we had said the hike would take about 1.5 hours, but with Rowan stopping to pick up every leaf along the way we would have easily doubled that. We convinced him to hop in the pack and take a ride. Here are Rowan and Esten looking down into a cave.

Here is another cave. They were all closed due to white nose syndrome. It's a fungus that causes bats to come out of hibernation too early and since the insects they eat are not available yet, they starve. And I suppose that humans are spreading it from cave to cave and so we are not allowed in them now. Honestly, the caves were kind of scary and I probably wouldn't have gone in anyways.

We passed a wet weather waterfall and then took a break on a log bench at the bottom. Someone should enter this picture into a "Parents of the Year" contest for us. I promise the backpack is really stable and he wasn't going to fall, the look on Rowan's face tells a different story.

Me and Rowan taking a banana break.

He decided he would hike the rest of the trail himself and at this point was climbing onto things so that he could jump off of them. Esten put him on top of this tree that had fallen over and we tried to convince him to jump. Didn't happen.

Still trying to convince him. He didn't do it until I went and held his other hand.

Esten and Rowan crossing a little rock bridge. They were probably looking at a rock or piece of mud that Rowan found intriguing.

For the record, there were some parts on the trail that were not kid or grandma friendly. Narrow trails with steep drop-offs and muddy, slippery rocks. We enjoyed ourselves and maybe if you come and see us we'll take you there.

Station #1

2011-01-31T13:03:00.001-08:00

I took Rowan to visit Fire Station #1, which is the oldest and busiest station in Fayetteville, last week. He was so excited about getting to drive the truck and see the firefighters. He even grabbed his little fire truck, from the movie Cars, and took it with us. I mean he was pumped, right up until we walked into the station and they closed the garage door. He immediately made me pick him up, "Mama, scared."

I'm glad we went because what if we really had an emergency and this firefighter, dressed from head to toe in his gear, shows up at his window to help him and he runs from him? He listened to every word they said and we practiced a "fire drill" with a smoke alarm. I'm counting this trip as insurance, that in case of an emergency he has at least seen a firefighter in full gear before. He's that kind of kid, super cautious the first time and adventurous the next.

One of the firefighters finally convinced Rowan to give him five and then asked him if he would like to drive the truck. Rowan told him, "No, too big." I had our camera and was ready to get some really cute pictures, FAIL. I did manage to get him to stand with the other kids and take a few pictures at the end.

We are awaiting the next snow storm as I type this. It was 67 on Saturday and now we are not getting above freezing until next week and our lows at night keep getting lower every time I check. Negative 2 on Wednesday morning, let's just say Spring has not sprung. I predict six more weeks of winter. We'll see what Punxsutawney Phil says in a few days.

Snowman

2011-01-26T11:27:00.000-08:00

After the powdery, dry snow had a chance to melt for a few days, it was snowman time. Esten and Rowan, ok Esten, rolled this guy up.

And the old man, Ian, put up with the cold to be outside with them. The snowy, white background really brings out the white in his face.

Rowan really didn't care too much for the snow until he realized he could eat it. Five day old snow is still "lishous."

He seems to be saying, "Mom, it's just snow."

I'm hoping that our snow days are over for the year. It has been much colder here than we anticipated. Yesterday, it was 42 degrees, so we went to the park. It felt like Spring to the Arkansans, but to this Texan, it was the dead of winter out there.

Name That Tune

2011-01-21T09:38:00.000-08:00

Rowan's First Big Snow

2011-01-20T09:42:00.001-08:00

Happy 2011

2011-01-09T12:23:00.000-08:00

2010 found us in six different homes, two countries and living out of our suitcases for 5 months of the year. I wouldn't change one second of our experience but I'm ready for a less mobile 2011. As I was telling my father-in-law this at Christmas and telling him how I was looking forward to an uneventful year, he calmly said, "You're having a baby this year." Oh yeah, that's what I've been meaning to write about! Rowan is going to be a big brother to baby girl Mason in May. We have been telling him that I have a baby in my tummy and he now points to his and says, "Baby in there." I guess he understands,if not he will soon enough.

Rowan has turned into a little person these days and will talk your face off; most of which you might understand. He still has some words that he pronounces wrong every time and I love them. My favorite is wok-wee. Broccoli, of course. Water has gone from agua, to ah-wok and is now wok-er. Will he ever get it right again?

By little person, I mean he has an opinion about everything, including his clothes. He made me take him out in public like this.

The shirt was too small and who taught him to tuck his pants in the boots? He is entertaining! I took him to try out a gymnastics class and I watched through a one-way window. 50% of the time he was jumping on the trampoline in the back of the gym, alone. But it was his first experience with another adult giving him instruction and for the first 15 minutes or so he was digging it. I'm still debating whether to sign him up for the class. Here is a video of the very beginning of the class. Excuse the chatting women but I like that you can hear Rowan let out the occasional scream so I didn't want to dub over the voices.

It snowed a few inches here this week and I took him outside to explore the snow. He touched it and told me it was "colt" and then when I finally convinced him to walk in it, he told me it was "crunchy." I think I got an "awesome" out of him too. After that he wanted to come back inside, which is where we've been this entire week. It's been so cold, 5 in the morning when we wake up and warming up to 30 by the afternoon. I checked the weather in NYC and it's warmer there this week than it is here.

Along with my stable 2011, I'm hoping that I'll be able to share more with you all here.

Happy 2nd Birthday!

2010-11-30T09:20:00.001-08:00

Our birthday boy started his morning with a 7am birthday party before Esten went to work. When you're two and stay up until 11pm and wake up before 7am you feel like this. Actually we all feel this way when we do that.
Singing Happy Birthday.

His first attempt at blowing out his candle.
Got it. And in Rowan fashion he wanted, "Mas."
So we lit it again.
On to the gifts.

He had a fun morning and loved everything his cousins and grandparents sent him. This morning at 2:45am Rowan received another present from his Uncle Tom and Aunt Bunny, a baby cousin, Vaughn. They are exactly two years apart and both share their birthdays with their Uncle Cy. I think November 30th is officially booked in this family!

We've moved into our new house and are still working on unpacking. Once we are finished we'll take some photos and give you all "the tour." This is Rowan in his little room, in his bedroom. The people who owned the home before converted storage spaces into little playrooms in both bedrooms upstairs. They have a light and a door. Rowan loves his room. All of the pink is gone now and the room is so much more inviting.

Bike Ride

2010-11-12T10:20:00.000-08:00

Rowan has been riding his tricycle for a few months now, but at this point he has mastered the trike. We're going to move on to a balance bike for his birthday. It's a bike without pedals or training wheels and is supposed to help with the transition to a normal bike. This is video of Rowan cruising around on his bike. And yes, the helmet is necessary because sometimes he freaks out when he goes down hills and bails. He has several notches on the helmet for proof. For the record, he has had just one bloody lip from tricycle accidents to date. Just one and he cried more when I tried to take him off the bike. He rode that day with blood running down his face.

Happy Halloween

2010-11-01T11:41:00.000-07:00

We took Rowan trick or treating last night in a really fun neighborhood called Park Place. The houses, huge. The people, welcoming. The kids, plentiful. The neighborhood kicks off the night with a parade of all the kids in their costumes down the main road.

Cheese.

It took Rowan a few houses before he "got it" but after he realized these strangers were giving him candy, he was all over it. He even told one lady, who only gave him one piece, "Mas."

And we cut him off, half a bucket is plenty! This morning when we woke up the first thing he asked for was Dada, followed by, deedee (candy.)

Stateside

2010-10-21T06:35:00.000-07:00

Hello out there, where have you been? I've neglected this blog for the past month while we were on the move. So much time has passed and I don't know where to start. Here is my attempt to recapture our last month or so.

- We had to hire two companies in Mexico to move us here because a full move from any one company started at $12,000. We had one company pack and load our belongings from their truck to another truck. The other company just drove our stuff here to Fayetteville. Coordinating this was fun :/

-The packing company was very, let's say, thorough in their service. For example, a plastic tuperware container was wrapped with three pieces of packing paper. When we moved to Mexico we had 49 boxes and we didn't buy anything except large furniture, when we moved back, 135. Like I said, very thorough.

-Our drive from Mexico to the US was uneventful. We waited on the border for an hour or so. The immigration agent asked us about a million questions and then we were on our way.

-The first thing we did after crossing the border- Whataburger. We wanted a "good" fast food burger, STAT. The Cuotas (toll-ways)in Mexico lack food stops. Our first day we didn't eat lunch until 5pm because there wasn't anything. Well, that's not completely true, there was a man who had rice and chicharrón tacos. I ordered a plate of rice for me and Rowan and he gave a metal fork in our to go box.

-We made tons of stops in Texas to visit family and friends. We're waiting for our visitors here, come see us.

-We rented an apartment in a four-plex that has a garage. We've (Esten, really) stored most of our belongings there because we are buying a house and don't want to unpack only to re-pack.

-Of course, all of our boxes are labeled in Spanish. It's a fun treasure hunt to find what you need. We're thankful we learned some Spanish while we were there. See example below.

-Our only piece of adult-sized furniture in our apartment is a love-seat that the legs were removed from during packing (thorough) and is now being propped up by folded cardboard. Classy!

-Our end-tables, shelves, dressers, etc are currently made of cardboard boxes. We've been getting out the jackets and sweaters from our wardrobe boxes on an as needed basis.

-We are under-contract on a house right now and if all goes well, we'll close on the 17th of next month.

-Fayetteville has great farmer's markets, trails, local shopping, food, and we're loving it.

-Oh yeah, my camera cord is in the garage in a box somewhere. I'm hoping that Esten will find it for me tonight, because tomorrow is Halloween on the town square. Believe me, you want me to post some photos of this little man in his costume.

Flowers

2010-09-14T12:18:00.000-07:00

Rowan does not let one flower in our yard die a natural death, nope, he picks every single one he sees. Sometimes he brings me the flowers and sometimes he brings me the entire plant.

He also loves torturing pill bugs, lady bugs or any other bug that doesn't bite. Just had to mention that too.

Sausage

2010-09-11T17:15:00.000-07:00

Rowan is talking a LOT these days and we crack up at some of his pronunciations. They're hilarious. This one is our favorite right now. Sausage.

The Lists

2010-09-11T14:29:00.000-07:00

When deciding whether to move "home" or stay in Mexico we didn't want to make a rash decision so we made lists. It was simple concept really, a sheet of paper, two columns (Mexico and Fayetteville) and things we liked about each place. Here see for yourself. Click the picture to enlarge it.

We tallied it up and Fayetteville was the winner. Done. We're still finalizing plans but we'll be back stateside early next month.

Razorbacks

2010-09-04T09:17:00.000-07:00

According to Wikipedia, a razorback is a feral, domestic pig. It also happens to be the mascot of the University of Arkansas, which is where Esten has accepted a faculty position. Yep, that's right, we're moving. Esten will be a wheat breeder, working to develop wheat varieties for the state of Arkansas and other southern states. He will also be teaching a class or two.
U of Ark is located in the northwest corner of Arkansas in a town called, Fayettevill e. It's a progressive, small town and seems like a mini-Austin. They have a pay as you throw trash program, an organic, vegetarian meal delivery service, a "green" library, the Buffalo National River and a brewery. We are thinking we'll fit right in. We'll be leaving Mexico at the beginning of October. Ahhh. So much to do, so little time. Congrats to Esten on such a big accomplishment. It seems like yesterday we were just college students and now he's a college professor. How awesome is that?

El arco iris y los burros.

2010-08-10T10:49:00.000-07:00

Rowan can climb into his stroller now. And that's what he does when he wants us/me to take him on a walk. After dinner the other night he did just that, climbed in and started buckling himself while yelling, "Walk." On this walk we went left out of our gate instead of right, partially because right is uphill and partially because we never go that way. Look what we found.

The picture really does no justice to the sight but it was a full rainbow. One end was in the village on the next mountain, San Miguel Tlaixpan and the other end came all the way to our village. It's been a really long time since I've seen a full rainbow. And then we found these guys resting after a long day of work, pulling a plow. The field they work is behind the brick wall.

You just never know what you might stumble upon when venture out beyond your walled paradise.

Evening in our Garden

2010-08-02T08:56:00.000-07:00

In Mexico they call a yard, a garden. Have I mentioned we have a beautiful yard? Last week we were outside playing in our garden and after Esten and I both did some pull ups on our bar, Rowan wanted to try. Much to our surprise he could hang on the bar all by himself. He's strong. This picture didn't capture him all alone on the bar but notice Esten is not holding him.
And then he just wanted the camera and wouldn't hang anymore for a better photo op. But this one is cute.

This video needs a little explanation/translation. Rowan loves giving the dogs treats. Ian can sometimes snatch them from him and "bite" him. He doesn't bite hard but it happens. Rowan does NOT like this so he will mostly throw Ian's treats. Before he throws them, he "counts." He can say, two so he substitutes that number for all numbers. Pablo is small and Rowan puts Pablo's treat directly in his mouth. For anyone watching who doesn't know any Spanish, mas means more. It is probably the word that Rowan uses most often. This video is of Rowan giving the dogs treats. Enjoy!

Mount Tlaloc

2010-07-26T13:20:00.000-07:00

This past weekend we braved the rain and chilly temperatures (50's) to hike Mount Tlaloc. Tlaloc is a rain god that is worshiped by the Aztecs. This makes a lot of sense because this particular mountain is one in the range of mountains that our storms come over. It is 4,151 meters high and gorgeous. Some friends from CIMMYT have climbed this mountain before and since there is not any signage and there are no permanent trails, besides the one main road, it is rather important to go with someone who knows where they are and where they have been, especially if you plan to venture past the main road. People illegally take timber from this mountain and as you walk you can see the donkey trails that have carried the wood out of the forest. When we arrived we saw three women coming down the mountain with buckets full of mushrooms, which were likely going to market. We went to look for mushrooms as well. Chantarelle and porcini mushrooms grow in the leaf litter from the pines and oaks high on the mountain. We came down with maybe 20 mushrooms in all and no one could confirm that they were 100% safe to eat. So maybe we didn't get dinner but we had a really good time and workout.

Just as we began hiking looking over at another mountain.

It was very misty.

Ro in the pack our friends Cristina and Jeff gave us long ago. Despite the look on his face he really did love it.

Ian the international hiking dog. Pablo couldn't come because of his attitude problem with other dogs.

Some of the mushrooms. I think they were alleged porcinis. I googled them and I'm glad we didn't eat them. Maybe they were chantarelles. I'm not a mycologist.

¡Qué tenga un buen fin de semana!

Sea World and Water Issues

2010-07-26T12:08:00.001-07:00

Before we left on our vacation we had yet another Mexico "experience." With lots of laundry to be done, our maid waiting to clean our house, showers to be had, diapers to be washed, etc... we had not a drop of water. On the second day we decided to ask our neighbor if she had water, wondering if it was just us or a village problem. It was just us. We looked at our pump (bomba) and it was old and sounding funny so we decided, instead of waiting for plumber who couldn't come until Saturday (the day we were leaving) we would just do it ourselves. And that's what we did. Here are Esten and Rowan working hard at attaching the new pump.

FAIL. The pump was not the problem, but we have a new one now. We looked at the fuses and they looked old, so Esten went and bought news ones and installed them, FAIL. The fuses were not the problem. So we gave up. We bought 12 5-gallon bottles of water to pour into the washer machine so that we could at least rinse Rowan's diapers and to do the huge pile of dishes that had accumulated over the days. The most frustrating part was that our cisterna, the tank under the house where water is stored until it is pumped to the tank on top of the house, was full but we couldn't get the water from there into our house. Errrggghhh. We arranged for our maid, gardener and neighbor (we figured between all three of them, one of them would run into the plumber) to talk with the plumber when he came on Saturday and get the problem fixed. And thankfully since we've been home our water has been plentiful. It was a filter part and some really old washer-looking things that had been causing the problem.

On a much happier note, while we were home, in the great state of Texas, we went to Sea World. A friend of the family, Clay, works there. He was able to let all of us, mostly cousins and our children, into a part of the park that others don't get to experience. The kids were able to pet a wallaby, a huge tortoise and see an owl, up close and personal. We like owls, remember? It was really hot but we had tons of fun. The cutest thing of the day was when Rowan saw Shamu jump out of the water, he called him/her an "airmee" which in Rowan's language means airplane. We laughed because she kind of does resemble one.

And without further ado, the BIG news. Rowan is using his potty. He mainly uses it in the morning and at night but we're not complaining. He knows what it's for and that's the first step. He is very proud of himself and claps a lot when he pees in it. We're taking it slowly but we are on our way to a potty trained Rowan.

Here is a picture of our "foyer" (it's really big to call it that) where Rowan's GeoTrax train is setup. We play out there a lot in the morning while we drink our coffee. Oh and in case you care to know, under the floor in that room is where our cisterna is, it's like a hidden swimming pool under there.

We are enjoying the cool, wet weather here. The highs are in the 60's and lows in the 40's with rain daily. If you need an escape from the heat, come for a visit.

Krantz/Mason Wedding

2010-07-22T10:57:00.001-07:00

This wedding was special for Esten and I since it was a sort of repeat of our own wedding, sans stress. The rehearsal dinner was at the brewery and the ceremony/reception was at Kairos. Bring back any memories from our wedding? While the venues were the same, the parties and the memories were unique and perfect in their own. We had so much fun!

At the rehearsal dinner, Jess and Mic gave Ro a fabulous, pretend guitar. As soon as he pulled it out of the bag, he said, "Out!" As in, out of the box, pronto. I fumbled with the eight thousand twisties and plastic pieces that they bind the toys into boxes with these days and got it out as fast as I could. As I was working, Esten suggested that we get him up on stage with the band and his new guitar. I think there is a photo of Micah as a child playing a guitar onstage with his dad. Before we could take him, Ro was running with his guitar to the stage. He plucked the strings, strummed them with a whole fist, made the lights come on and was beside himself over this little guitar. He continued to put it down and to clap for himself. Perfect gift for a little music-loving ring bearer.

Ro and Mara practiced walking down the isle at the rehearsal and we were all pretty confident they would pull through come show time. Wedding day was different in that we had a princess melt down just before showtime but the diva pulled through, with a little bribery, and had a solid performance. Ro had a goldfish break just before performance to tide him over and luckily saved his melt down for the reception.

Here they are walking together down the isle, like angels, slow angels. While they were walking a few petals spilled from Mara's basket and Ro said, "Uh oh." They started to stop and pick them up before we pushed them on their way. Rowan doesn't like things out of place and it wasn't any different this day.

They made it down the isle and sat, with more bribery, through the short and sweet ceremony. Ro loves to cheer and clap and when everyone applauded the newly weds he wasn't left out. Mara, on the other hand, didn't clap as she wanted to make sure she was looking good in these photos.

After the ceremony the prince and princess were climbing trees with the help of Esten.

And this was just too cute not to post. Ro and Mara playing with the water hose, the day after the wedding. Dah-ling.

Breaking news to come in my next post...

Ro meets Singer and Philly

2010-07-21T16:56:00.000-07:00

As promised in reverse order, Philadelphia. We flew to Philadelphia after Mic and Jessica's wedding to visit our friends, John and Jess, and meet their new addition, Singer Nash Noel. This visit consisted of a lot of, "Yes Rowan the baby has eyes, but we don't touch his eyes." Next time when Singer can defend himself, it's on. Jess and I spent most of our time taking care of babies and catching up, while John and Esten spent their time in the basement (aka. The Man Cave) recording a SOLID gold album. I'm still waiting for my check, Jess did you get yours? While we were there our friends, Susan and Bruce, came down from NYC to visit and we also had the pleasure of hanging out with Ava for the 4th of July.

I can't believe I'm posting this picture of myself but the boys are cute.

The boys at the park, I believe they are discussing Singer's hands.

And here is Singer smiling at Ro.

And Ro running to bring me a lily.

We braved the heat and went to see the Liberty Bell. Ro was very impressed :) Here's the fam in front of the cracked bell.

Coming up next, wedding photos.

Home Sweet Home

2010-07-14T11:36:00.000-07:00

We made it back home from our vacation. I'm reporting the happenings in reverse order because I want to write about our drive home while it's fresh. We were supposed to have been home earlier but that didn't happen due to the flooding of the Rio Grande (see pic above) and the absence of our title to the fabulous 1997 Pathfinder (aka. P-Funk.) You need the title in Mexico to get a temporary registration permit. While we read Laredo news online and waited for the international bridges to open, we were also trying to secure a new title to the car. You need a release of lien from the bank that financed your car to get a new title and when that bank was bought by another which was then bought by another, this proves difficult.
We waited for 3 days to receive a release of lien fax and once we did receive it we learned that Texas DMV doesn't accept faxes. We needed original papers and Esten needed to get back to work so we had to come up with a new plan.
Plan B. We decided to fly Esten home and Ro and I would stay in Texas until we somehow got a new title, then Esten would fly back to Texas and we would drive. Esten drove Ro and I to Corpus so we could stay with my Mom while we waited. While we were there we found the title. It was there tucked in an old passport I had given my Mom to hold on to.
So we moved to Plan C, pack up and head out early Monday morning. And that's what we did. We left a 6:30am on Monday morning and headed to Laredo to cross the border. Crossing into Mexico took about 10 minutes and then we drove around to find the place to get the temporary registration for the car. The one at the border was closed because it was flooded. We found it after a while and got our paperwork squared away. We headed for Monterrey. As soon as we got going the Federal Police were stopping all traffic and when we took our turn, they told us the highway was closed and the only way to get to Monterrey was to cross back into the US drive to McAllen and cross there. McAllen is 140 miles from Laredo. Crossing back into the US took another hour(which included a long line and an X-Ray of our entire car sans living things) and the drive on US83 was SLOW. We finally got to the border at 4:30pm and crossed again. We drove past Monterrey and stayed in Saltillo for the night. We found a hotel that accepted pets on our second try and took it. In bed by 10:30pm.
Day two of driving started off a little rough as well. First we got robbed 200 pesos at the gas station. We both saw 437 when the pump stopped and then the next second it was 637. Not sure how they did it but they did. Oh well, we just let it go. Next stop, the golden arches, we never eat McDonalds except when traveling. We were heading out to the highway, coffee in hand, when we got pulled over for speeding. Esten was using the miles/hour instead of kilometers/hour on the speedometer. Oops. We successfully bribed the cop with 500 pesos and went on our way.
At lunch we stopped at one of very few gas stations equipped with a food court. There was an ambulance and fire truck there and we saw someone laying on the porch to the food court. After we pulled in we realized the person was dead. He was covered from his head to his legs so we could only see his blue toes and fingers. Freaky. It was one of those situations where you don't want to look but can't help yourself. We suspect he died on the bus that was there. We are not CSI's but we didn't see any foul play. Rowan was oblivious to the entire situation. So we jumped the body and got our sandwich (torta). The rest of the drive seemed extremely long and never ending.
We finally made it home about 8pm on Tuesday night.

Our dogs are loving the yard and the fact that our doors are open all day so they can go in and out as they please. Now to unpack. I'll post pictures soon of the family reunions and of the wedding.

Lessons in Paint

2010-06-14T10:05:00.000-07:00

We attempted to paint Rowan's room this weekend. We've never painted concrete before and someone should have warned us. We used an entire gallon and it looks like we did it blindfolded. Uneven and ugly. Lessons learned, use primer next time and pick a better color. Currently you glow green when you walk in the room but we are going to buy a different color to tone it down. I'm calling a re-do on this one. Look at these! Hideous!

I cut the back of Rowan's hair off :( The curls are still there, the mullet is not. Here are pictures after the cut.

And in case you didn't know, it's World Cup time. Check the jersey.

We leave Saturday for our three week vacation. First San Antonio for a Huizar/McGowan reunion, then Fredericksburg for the Krantz/Mason wedding, followed by the Mason/Noel reunion in Philadelphia and finally the reunion of all reunions, we are reuniting ourselves with our dogs and driving back to Mexico. See most of you very soon.

Mañana

2010-06-02T20:14:00.000-07:00

That's what I keep telling myself about posting this blog. It's been a long time. How are ya? Let's play catch up. Ro and I gave in and traveled home from Obregón with Esten after I vowed to fly home. This time though I had a few more "tricks in the bag." While we were in Obregón, Rowan took a liking to Elmo and The Wiggles. We didn't have a great outdoor space so I turned to the computer for entertainment. He would watch for 20 minutes or so while I cleaned (Yes, shut up, I did my own cleaning there) or cooked. So before we left I bought two movies on Itunes and put them on my Ipod. Worked like a charm. See below.

We did the trip in two days and traveled an average of 140 kilometers per hour. That's fast. About 100. We came home to a comic welcome. First a dog runs out of the gate when we opened it. Our neighbors we share a yard with got a a golden retriever, TuPac. He knows one command, NO. Then we came in the house, which was very clean, to find we didn't have gas which meant no baths after 14 hours in the car. Ick! Next we find that our refrigerator broke at some point and so we couldn't buy any food until we bought a new one and more importantly our butter stash was in grave danger.

Let me explain our $80 investment. The butter we buy here has a peculiar taste. It's almost gamey and anything you use it in/on tastes the same. In Obregón we found this imported Danish butter and knew we were bringing it home. We did and now half of our new freezer is butter. CIMMYT people bring back anything from flour to beef to butter from Obregón not because you can't get it here but because the quality is better there. It's just what you do.

While we're talking about quality, check these plants out I bought. We found our aloe vera in Obregón and had to bring that back as well. But the pots, just hilarious.

And this was funny too. You can buy individual eggs at our corner store.

We're getting cozy in our little brick-walled hacienda here. Getting used to the electricity going out at night which means showering and reading by lantern. Also becoming immune to the sound of fireworks, they pop them daily/nightly and I'm still not sure why. And trying to make a habit of turning our water pump on to fill our tank on the roof so that in case the power does go out we would still have water. Living off-campus has it downfalls, but are you really living in Mexico when you're protected by CIMMYT? Would you get to run Rowan to the front door to show him a horse trotting down the road with two men riding bare back? Or see the shepherd moving his sheep up the mountain on your way home?
Today we got couches, you know those things you sit on when your legs are tired. Until today we (me, Esten, Ro and my Mom) have all been racing to see who gets to Ro's rocking chair first. I'll post some pictures of our new furniture as soon as Esten gets back from Russia. He is there for a conference and this lovely company would have paid for his family to go as well but we opted out of the 29+ hour travel time there and the 9 hour time difference. Doesn't sound as fun as it would have 5 years ago, toddlers like schedules and slides.

Beece, as Ro would say.

P.S. Esten graduated and is officially Dr. Mason. I need to get some pictures from others since I was bad and took zero.

Mexico thus far

2010-05-19T09:01:00.000-07:00

Recently some friends of mine asked me how Mexico was and whether I could clear up any of the ideas and myths they have about the country. I thought this would be a good chance to reflect on our experiences the last four and a half months.

The family and I have driven clear across Mexico twice and lived in two different places, for two months each. The interior near Mexico City where we are currently and will mostly be living is over populated, a bit smoggy, poor, but still very beautiful. The place where I work, about 20km to the East of Mexico City, is surrounded by small mountains, or cerros, two active volcanoes, and is quite beautiful. Its the rainy season so every evening the clouds roll in, it gets windy and if you are lucky it rains for 30 minutes to settle everything. The weather is amazing, with the highs only around 75F, but the sun can be intense at 7000ft. We live in a small village called La Purificacion, up a small hill about 10 minutes from work. The house is Mexican style, large but not too fancy, with an amazing yard about 3/4 an acre full of fruit trees. We have a cleaning lady, Sacoro, and a gardener, Hector. Its a quiet paradise, except around 7pm when all the dogs in the valley start barking. The village is small with many of the same shops that sell the same stuff, like bottled water, fruit and vegetables, hot dogs, etc, only the essentials. There is also a butcher, tortilla shop, and an internet cafe. People are friendly, although they sometimes look at us funny because we are gringos, and dogs roam the streets. The woman and children love Rowan, more so in Obregon that here, but his beauty is obvious to all!

The divide between rich and poor in Mexico is very obvious. You have particle board shacks next to amazing houses on the side of a mountain. La Purificacion is a village within Texcoco, which isn't unlike a US city in that it has two Wal-Marts, Home Depot, Office Depot, I went and saw Robin Hood last night in English. The difference is that it was founded around 1500, the streets are narrow, the roads poor, and the infastructure isn't strong enough for the population. But it manages. This is not unlike Mexico City, which I have only driven through once with the aid of a GPS (which actually worked quite well), but is a complete, for the lack of a better word, clusterfuck!

The country side is beautiful, we drove for three days with mountains the entire way, until we hit the desert. There are nice, empty, toll roads, cuotas as opposed to taking the libre, so you can drive 90mph no problem. You see some Policia, but if you are on the toll roads you are more or less safe. A co-worker of mine from Chile, Sybil, got flagged down for going 100mph and they told her to take it easy. We've stayed in Guadalajara, which Shannon and I both thought was a fun city, and Mazatlan a couple of times. Drove through Tequila and saw Agave being farmed on the side of the mountains. Drove through Sinoloa State which I believe is the largest tomato producing area in North America.

The last two months we lived in Ciudad Obregon, which is just NW of Mazatlan in Sonora state, about 6 hours from Tucson. Its new Mexico, very different, very organized, more like the US. Its a college town so there were good restraunts, sushi, hot wings, bar food. Not a bad place, but its the desert and extremely dusty, dry, and hot. It didn't rain for two months when we were there, but they irrigate the heck out of their crops and get wheat yields in the range of 9 tons/hectare, compared to 2.5 t/h in Texas. Its also about an hour from San Carlos, which is a quaint little beach town on the Sea of Cortez, where we spent a couple of weekends. Its beautiful there.

Obregon is closer to the border and you can feel it some. There are more military check points set-up at random locations and you hear about the violence more. Over Easter weekend Federales were taking peoples door panels off on the way to the beach. The University of Texas actually recommended the evacuation of all there staff and students in Sonora. However, I've never felt scared for myself or my family. I've had two interactions with the Policia. The first was in San Carlos and we paid $200pesos ($18USD) to the cop to let us go after we went the wrong way in a retorno. They were just looking to make a quick buck. The second time I got pulled over for speeding on the way to work on a Saturday. The cop said something in Spanish that I didn't understand, I apologized for not understanding, and he asked me where I worked. I told him CIMMYT and he grabbed me on the shoulder, told me buen dia, got back in his car and drove off. Working for CIMMYT you are considered a diplomat, I have diplomatic plates on my car, and this saves me at least some trouble.

Now we are back in Texcoco, where it actually is starting to feel like home and will even more so when Shannon and Rowan get back from Texas! I'm hoping we can get out and explore this area more. Puebla, Cuernavaca, Acapulco and Vera Cruz are all within in driving distance. Chiapas is a little further, but I have to see Palenque before we leave.

Although, I don't see us leaving within the next few years.

El Día Del Niño

2010-04-30T12:47:00.000-07:00

Today is Children's Day in Mexico. School children have the day off and the park (with the zoo) is having a huge party to honor children. Our neighbor and I decided to take Ro and Vimal.
As soon as we walked in, government employees were handing out goodie bags. I cringed but let Rowan look at the junk food. Candy, cupcake, more candy, cheetos, cookies, etc... Here's Ro with his loot. They were also giving free vaccinations, yikes. They were throwing eyedrops and nosedrops at all of the kids as they entered. A little Mexican welcome. I passed.

First, to the carousel. Ro loves this thing, but all of the horses were taken so he had to settle for the carriage. This is our neighbor, Shaun and her son, Vimal with Ro.

Next, roller coaster. It was Rowan's first time to ride a roller coaster and he was really excited about it. This is when he realized that the little balls in this "toy" were candy.

And then he decided he couldn't wait and would proceed to the front of the line.

He didn't want to wait in this line.

For this.

His excitement was over after the ride. This is how he felt.

But all was well again when he saw this.

And this. He stood on the fence and mooed at the cow for 10 minutes. She never responded.

He had fun and even got to eat a few bites of candy. Feliz Día del Niño Rowan. Most of the parents had a wrapped gift for their children but Rowan will have to wait until we get stateside. Have I mentioned how overpriced quality toys are here? Three to four times the price.

Barley Circus

2010-04-13T11:23:00.000-07:00

We took Rowan to the circus last night. It was a one-tent circus with seats up to the edge of the ring. No cages, no nets, nothing much in the way of safety. The first animals Ro saw were elephants. He was mesmerized and sat perfectly still, barely blinking, for probably 30 minutes. He wasn't so much for the highflying acts but the animals were right up his alley. The baboons were rowdy and on leashes (scary) as were some of the llamas. Have you ever seen a chimpanzee pole dancing, I'm talking taking his pants off and slapping his behind? We have! Jealous? But the act that blew my mind was the hippopotamus. How do keep a hippo in the circus, don't they need water? And even more disturbing, they let kids ride him, 5 at a time. It was wild. So once again, Esten and I were appalled by the lives those poor animals live and Rowan was thoroughly impressed, just like the zoo. But this, this was Rowan's favorite part. The voiceover is his Pops' song, Ride Em' Cowboy.

A Boy and His Hats

2010-04-07T11:23:00.000-07:00

Esten has perma-hat hair and I'm usually wearing a souvenir hat (you know, the ones you don't really like but have around because it was free) most of the day. Try taking it off and Rowan will tap the top of his head, which means put your hat on. And then try telling him, “I don’t want to wear a hat right now, we’re going to bed.” Ha! He will whine and proceed to cry if you don’t submit, hence the perma-hat hair.

As for himself, the A&M baseball hat in the bottom right picture is his favorite. He sees it around the house, picks it up, puts it on, nods his head (as if to say, “Yep, now I’m ready.”) and looks at you with a big smile. So consider yourself warned, next time Rowan comes around, either hide all of your hats or get ready for a hat party.

Makeover

2010-04-06T15:39:00.000-07:00

I'm ready for a makeover! Of this blog of course. I'm attempting to do this on my own instead of paying someone. Please pardon my dust as I do this and let me know if I killed any links or if you hate it.
Today's accomplishment: a new banner. I can change the photos (and I will) but I just thought I would use professional pics so I didn't have to edit my own images today.

Let's Go Fly A Kite

2010-04-05T13:03:00.000-07:00

Well it didn't happen, I failed to dye eggs with Rowan. We didn't see one basket, bunny, plastic egg or marshmallow chicken this year. The thing to do on Easter weekend here is fly a kite. People sell them at virtually every stop light and along the beaches. We bought one for 35 pesos ($3) and we fit right in with the locals at the beach. It was little things like a cheap kite

and watching the sunset on a beautiful horizon that brought joy to us this Easter.

Buckles, Words and Signs

2010-03-31T13:51:00.000-07:00

At last success! I've captured Rowan saying some of his words and signing too. I'll have you know that it took all day yesterday and lots of video editing to come up with this. Enjoy!

The Stroller Story

2010-03-30T16:34:00.000-07:00

Rowan and I walk everyday around Laguna del Náinari near our apartment. We go along with two friends we know from CIMMYT. I took along some old bread to feed the ducks at the end of our walk one day and after we had made our loop I started down the hill to do so. As soon as I took a step down the hill I noticed that it was muddy, but we have a really nice stroller that can handle it and I had on my running shoes.
Pause...We have a Kelty Speedster Swivel Deluxe that was kindly given to me as a birthday present last year by Esten's parents. I wish it had an odometer so I could tell you how many miles we've ran/walked. If you've been reading this blog for a long time then you may remember a picture of Ro in the stroller from long ago.
Continuing, I was going down at an angle and moving very slow so that I didn't slip. One of the ladies that was with us came down the hill too (she had her son in our moby wrap tied onto her) and she slipped in the mud probably because of her flip-flops. Two ladies walking on the trail came down the hill to help her up and they both slipped. All the while, Rowan and I are standing still on the hill watching this happen.
Man to the rescue right? Wrong! A man, with good intent, came down the hill and he had the worst fall of all. He slipped and grabbed the hood of Ro's stroller to try and stop himself. Instead of him stopping, he flipped the stroller over and over and over. Rowan was rolling side over side down the hill in his stroller. I was holding the handle and I immediately starting pulling back on the stroller trying to get it back up and prevent him from going into the water. I was dragged down the hill too, on my knees. I was pushing the man off of the stroller while this was happening and after he finally let go, I flipped Rowan over and pushed him back up the hill as fast as I could, without slipping might I add. He was crying and I was worried that he was going to have a broken bone since that huge man was on top of him. I took him out and walked down the hill to feed the ducks(distraction from the chaos), the tears subsided and my heart rate slowed. I made him move all of his limbs and put him down to walk, he was fine. I was covered in mud, as was the stroller, and blood was running down my legs and off of my hand.
I'm so grateful that Rowan was in a good stroller with a five-point harness and the sturdy metal frame that probably kept the man's weight from being directly on him.
If at any time you find yourself slipping down a hill and see a baby stroller that might stop the fall, may I advise you to just fall?

Toddlerhood

2010-03-26T12:00:00.000-07:00

Our once tiny baby is a toddler. Developmentally, he has grown by leaps and bounds in the last few weeks. Many of the toys that he had no interest in when I packed them in December are mastered now. Blocks, check. He stacks them and then releases a high-pitched scream as he knocks them over. Sorting shapes, check. Puzzles, check. Books, check. Finger painting, see pictures below. He painted, said "Agua," and then proceded to lap the paint off the paper. We have some work to do on painting.

Running, check plus! He can boogie. He was trying to catch this bear of a dog named Toby. He's an Old English Shepherd that belongs to a co-worker of Esten's.

We were at a party honoring Dr. Borlaug and Rowan didn't leave Toby's side, except to eat and watch the mariachis. Someone at the party snapped a photo of Rowan on all fours, next to Toby. I wish we had the picture. He loves dogs, just like his Mom and Dad!

Climbing, see photo :)

He is mastering the skill of napping once a day. He's not what you would call a nice baby come bedtime but refuses to take more than one nap a day.
He speaks gibberish most of the time but he can say, agua, bus, this, night-night, Mama, Dada, bath, Ava, Rowa(no N is his pronunciation) and probably others I'm forgetting clearly. He also signs please, more, all done and as of last night is dabbling in signing thank you. And nevertheless he can get his point across by taking you by the hand and putting your fingers on exactly what it is that he wants. No communication problems here!
Yesterday we took a Sunday drive to a little village about an hour from here called Alamos. It was quaint. That's all I can say about it.

It's Semana Santa here. I don't think the Easter Bunny comes to Obregón or Mexico for that matter. The plethora of pastel, plastic eggs, baskets and stuffed rabbits are not to be found here. If I get really crafty I might dye hard-boiled eggs and hide them for Rowan on the beach in San Carlos. We'll see. People will think we're crazy.

Cumpleaños de Shannon en San Carlos

2010-03-16T22:01:00.000-07:00

Living in Ciudad Obregon does have some advantages over the interior of Mexico, one being that the ocean is located only a short drive away. For Shannon's big 30th we decided to head to San Carlos, a beach community about an hour and a half north of Obregon. We were planning on leaving Saturday but got sidetracked taking Rowan to the little animal safari near the Laguna by our apartment. I say little, but this thing has a lion, huge black bear, and a number of other large predators who's living conditions would have PETA up in arms if this place were in the states. Rowan loves animals though, and was of course naive to their poor habitations, so we let him enjoy himself. So being that you really don't want to drive to an unfamiliar place in Mexico in the dark, we decided to leave early Sunday morning. Monday was a Mexican holiday for former president Benito Juárez, so I had the day off.

Having received mixed reviews about San Carlos from my co-workers, we really didn't know what to expect. I booked a cheap hotel on-line, as it was really rather difficult to find an expensive one, packed up three six packs of Pacifico beer, some fruit and snacks and set out. The drive was easy, as most of the time we take the cuota (toll-way) as oppose to the libre (free-way) and these roads are generally very good, better than Louisianna for example. Apparently we must have gone to a different San Carlos than some of my more negative co-workers, because this place was beautiful. The water was clear and the view was excellent. Mexican beaches, like the rest of the country are often mountainous, which gives them a different feel than in the states. In addition, the humid and sticky feeling was missing, I'm guessing because this area of northwest Mexico is mostly dry and desert. We arrived before check-in so we spent some time in the sand followed by some excellent fish tacos and shrimp stuffed avocados for lunch. This is Rowan fourth trip to a beach. He's been to Padre Island, Galveston, and Mazatlan as well. He loves the water, but I'd say it is a love-hate relationship between him and the sand. He hates for his hands to be dirty, so he's not much for building sandcastles at this point, but he loves to run into the tide. He'll also pick up the occasional shell, making sure to use his finger tips and get as little sand as possible on his hands. Nonetheless, he had a great time, we did as well. Our $70 hotel (San Carlos Plaza and Resort) could have easily been $170 in a more touristy local, beers were only $280 pesos (or about $2.30 US) and food was extremely cheap and very good.

Rowan running in the sand and me trying to finish as much Pacifico as possible. Shannon said I would come home with a 12-pack of my 18 left. I came home with 11.

There is a story behind the hat, it finally fits him now.

No worries, we rubbed him down good with sunscreen and he had a shirt on most of the day.

He only got in to about knee deep, no tumbles into the ocean water. The kid pool, that is a different story.

Dunes and some mountains in the background.

A little Brown Bear Brown Bear What Do You See before Rowan called it a night. He partied pretty hard up until around 7pm.

All in all a very good time and we will definitely be planning a return trip, or trips when possible. As part of my birthday present to Shannon, she wanted me to write a blog, so, feliz cumpleaños mi amor!

La Purificación to Obregón

2010-03-13T18:55:00.000-08:00

Well it happened. After nearly 3 months we received our shipment from the United States. Apart from a few broken glasses and banged up furniture it arrived unscathed. Our new gardener, Hector, helped Esten unload things from the huge trailer into a borrowed CIMMYT truck and then unload them again at our house.

Our street was too narrow and the power lines too low for the truck to make it to our house.

Esten, Rowan and I unpacked most everything as quickly as possible, packed up some different toys and clothes and headed north for our "two-month vacation" to Obregón.
While Esten and Hector were working hard, I took a few pictures of plants in our yard.
Some apples are blooming.

Some are small and tasty.

And the avocados are bountiful. We’ll likely miss some of them but there are plenty more on the way.

We left for Obregón last Saturday and let’s just say, Ro and I are flying home. We live just east of D.F. (Mexico City) and had to drive through that unorganized, over populated city (you can only drive your car certain days according to your license plate number because there are simply too many cars) to be on our way. We had a GPS system that works really well, minus the times when it told us to turn left into a field or onto an unpaved road, but still managed to miss ONE turn. That one missed turn cost us three hours of two lane, slow, windy, steep, tiny village, mountain driving. I was pretty sure we would never get to Guadalajara. That was our first stop. We made it, barely, but later than expected. We couldn’t find a hotel for over an hour but while stopped at a red light, low and behold a cop pulled up beside us. We asked him where to go and he told us to pull over ahead and we did. He asked if we were looking for a particular hotel but we told him any nice hotel would do. He must have saw our diplomatic plates because he kindly weaved us through centro (downtown) Guadalajara and led us to Hotel Moreles. We passed the valet parking, but no problem, he held up the traffic while we backed up and pulled in. The hotel was very nice and we were so tired that we ordered room service and passed out. The next morning we grabbed breakfast at Chai, a hip bistro and hit the road. Day two goal: Mazatlán.

Oh bless you day two, long, straight, toll road the whole way. We arrived and downgraded our hotel (mistake) but enjoyed ourselves anyway. We took Ro down to the beach and at first sight he was frightened by the waves, but after we played run away from the waves he warmed up.

We walked on the seawall and watched the sunset that night and packed up and left for day three early the next morning.

Day three was uneventful also and after paying at least $200 from D.F. to Obregón, we arrived.
Obregón is a newer city and is much more like the US compared to Texcoco. It's easy to navigate, restaurants are abundant (hot wings, sushi, tacos, Spanish, etc...), and get this, people stop at red lights. We’ve been here a week and it’s been rough. Let’s see: Ro's first head bang resulting in blood, no hot water in the kitchen (good thing about the restaurants), and a rollover stroller accident. Rowan was in his caddy of a stroller so he was fine. I almost boxed a 200 lb man, came up with muddy shins, shoes, hands, and clothes, bloody knuckles and knees. It’s a long story and we're getting ready to leave for San Carlos for my birthday so it’ll have to wait. Things can only get better from here.
And I'll leave you with Rowan getting busted unrolling the toilet paper.

La Casa en La Purificación

2010-02-18T08:13:00.001-08:00

The entrance from where we will park our car:

The inside of the dome:
The foyer/sunroom:
The kitchen:
Death trap stairs:
The back corner of the yard:
The orchard:
The secret plant room:

The back patio:

The avocado tree, it has fruit the size of limes now:

Falling Into Place

2010-02-15T09:15:00.001-08:00

It just seems to work that way for us. Just as I'm getting annoyed with this "minimalist" lifestyle everything is falling into place. Last week we got our official visas and our "get out of jail free cards." The day after we had them in hand Esten booked a flight home. We just returned from that very short trip to Texas and were able to bring back several things that I was missing. Spices, soaps, candles, baby essentials, Mason pecans, etc.. We got the "red" light at customs but they very briefly searched our bags and let us through without a problem. We got our diplomatic license plates for our car so we can say goodbye to our expired paper plates now. We're looking at a big house with a big yard to rent in a small village just about 10 minutes up the mountain from where we are now. We went to meet the gardener this morning and checked it out. It's old and there are some things I don't like but the yard is fabulous. It's probably close to an acre completely surrounded by a brick wall covered in ivy. There is an avocado tree, peach trees, a guava tree, several citrus trees, apple trees, fennel, and who knows what else that isn't blooming yet. Our dogs will love it. CIMMYT gives us a stipend to do some work on any home off campus so with that and a little love, this place might just be our new home. Just in time too, because our shipment with all of our belongings that has been sitting somewhere in Texas since December should be heading south this week. We'll be waiting here to accept the shipment, move it under a roof somewhere and packing up the car to drive to Obregón for a few months. We have an apartment there that Esten rented when he was there a few weeks ago. He left me and Rowan here to go scope it out and I was lucky enough to have my mom come and stay. The highlight of her trip this time was a visit to the Pyramids. It was a first for all of us and they are amazing. Come visit and we'll take you too. That's a quick synopsis of what we've been doing and here are some pictures taken recently.

The two snow covered peaks in the background are the volcanoes that we live really close to. The half finished building in the foreground is very a typical sight in Mexico.

Here are my boys with their new sombreros we bought at the pyramids. We should have bought them in the morning instead of just before we left.

The pyramid of the Sun in the background is the one that Esten and I climbed. We'll climb the Moon next.
Rowan and I bought sunglasses at a market in Texcoco. He loves putting them on by himself and will wear them for a long time before throwing them off.
My mom and Esten with their Coca-cola sweetened with real sugar, imagine that. I've noticed that a lot of foods that are sweetened with high fructose corn syrup in the US are sweetened with sugar instead here.
Ro still likes to climb stairs, especially in the nude. These are the very hard stairs in our current house.
I love this photo of Esten and Ro because of the eyes. Esten may or may not have been drinking at the Rincón that night :)

Watering Plants

2010-01-20T07:24:00.000-08:00

I was trying to water these plants yesterday that were in desperate need of water. Rowan decided to "help."

The carpenter brought us the gates for our stairs and surprise, surprise, Ro thinks they are to try climb over, squeeze through or hold on to and jump. We bought some soft ABC letters to put around the bottom of the stairs to try and avoid an ER visit.

Book Worm

2010-01-19T09:25:00.000-08:00

Rowan loves to read! He'll bring you a book, turn around, sit in your lap and let you read him as many as you'd like. We've also discovered that he knows a lot of words. He'll point to several things in his books like, juice, cow, ball (and pelota), baby, strawberry, banana, tomato, hat, eyes and tons of others. But wait, I'm not sure I'm getting my point across, he is obsessed with reading so much that he takes his books outside to read. In his spare time, when he is not reading, our boy is also learning Spanish. He knows, hola and pelota. If someone says, "Hola, bebe.", he'll wave at them.

We went to El Mercado a Chapingo last Saturday. There are tons of vendors selling fruits and veggies, meats, toys, garage sale quality clothing, etc... Look at these yummy chickens with heads and no refrigeration.
We're sticking with the fruits and veggies for now, except that chorizo we couldn't resist.

We have new wheels. Sorry VW but the Nissan is free. We got the ride yesterday and with the help of someone who knew someone, Esten got a driver's license. It's official we're mobile. We ventured out to Wal-Mart last night since it's the only place we knew for sure how to get to. But we have plans to try to get to a health foods store, back to Chapingo, and to the pyramids in the next week.

I love our little clothes line setup so much that I just had to show you a view from our tiny balcony. This is Ro and Esten on the balcony that overlooks the front courtyard.

This is where we hang our clothes to dry. The doorway in the far right corner of our wall is the maids room where the washing machine is and where Socorro keeps all of her cleaning supplies. She also changes her clothes in there. She comes well dressed and changes before she cleans.

The Masons and Mexico seem to be getting along just fine for now.

Week One in Mexico

2010-01-11T08:51:00.000-08:00

Wondering about our experience so far, here is a long recap of last week.

Our first night in Mexico was miserable to say the least. Rowan and I were both sick from the altitude. It's 7,250 ft above sea level here and College Station was about 400ft. Rowan was up at least every 30 minutes and we were all COLD. The weather is temperate here but at night in these old, concrete homes with no heating, it gets cold. After about 24 hours both Rowan and I started feeling better and we are both acclimated now. We also scored a space heater, so no more cold nights.
Sybil, a new colleague of Esten's, took us to Wal-Mart the day we got here to buy food. Wal-Mart is new, clean, and very nice compared to everything around it. We had low expectations of what we were going to be able to find here. This is what we found:
*The organic section is about the size of what our old grocery store had for diabetics. Ketchup, rice, soymilk(thank my lucky stars), spaghetti - the basics.
*The produce department is ok and everything is sold by the kilogram. I'm clueless right now of what things cost. We bought potatoes, apples, bananas, strawberries, onions(with the outer layers peeled), lettuce, tomatoes, etc...
*The eggs and milk are not refrigerated here which is different. I know from Esten's parents that eggs can go without refrigeration for a long time if they haven't been washed, so I guess that's the theory here. It is just odd to pick your eggs up off a pallet in the produce section.

Later in the week we went to the Bodega in Texcoco to grocery shop again. We were told there is less international food but cheaper prices. When we walked in I wasn't sure if we were at the club or the grocery store. They play music, loud and all of the locals are singing and dancing along. The selection there wasn't great but we'll survive. One thing Esten and I noticed was the vast amounts of mayonesa they sell. Half of an isle was all mayonnaise. We walked the isles and gathered easy to prepare food stuffs and then we made the last turn and BLISS, the bakery. A kilo of corn tortillas for 5 pesos, conchas, bolitos, and all of the Mexican pasteries I LOVE. We bought Manchego (sheep's milk) cheese and cheese from Chihuahua Mexico to melt on those fresh corn tortillas. Well worth the selection sacrifice from Wal-Mart.

Since we are limited as to what we can cook due to our skeleton of a kitchen, the stores seem fine for now. Our "furnished" kitchen came with three pots, we bought a frying pan, 4 forks and knives but only one spoon. We called to request more spoons and they brought us a blender and toaster in addition to the spoons. I wouldn't say we are roughing it but we are living as minimalist for sure. I'll be so excited to reunite with our belongings. Our permanent visas are being applied for this week so fingers crossed, we'll have our stuff by the end of February.

I was told that living on campus is good in the beginning because it's safe and people speak English. Safe, yes! Gated and guards on duty 24/7, people don't even lock their doors here. People speak English, NO! My Spanish speaking skills and comprehension have been put to the test from the second we walked in our house. Sabina, the housing lady, quickly walked us through the house speaking Spanish the entire time, just as quickly as she was walking, with the occasional head nod and Si! We just kindly nodded back and replied, Si! Although I only understood about 50% of what she said, I heard, "Do you need help cleaning?" as if she were speaking English. Esten said my eyes lit up and I replied, "Si, Si!" The next day, Socorro, came to ask me when I needed her. We had to get the neighbor to come and help us secure the days and times but I hired a cleaning lady within 3 days of being here. She came for the first time on Saturday and I must say she out cleans any maid I've seen in the US. She cleaned all of the floors, did the dishes, ironed our clothes, cleaned the bathrooms(even wiped down all of the walls), swept our front porch and who knows what else. She left here with 120 pesos (~$11) and was grateful for it. She'll be back Wednesday. I LOVE Socorro! After we get our belongings we are going to ask her to cook dinner once a week and pay her a little extra. My only duty now is the laundry. We have a new washing machine and a closed in patio that has rope strung to hang the laundry on. It's different and you have to keep on top of it or you'll never catch up. No complaints from me.

Because we live on-campus, we have to catch a ride into town to shop and it has left us feeling isolated. However, we found out that Esten is getting a car this week so we'll get to do some exploring soon.

Today I picked up the paperwork to enroll Rowan, part-time, in the daycare here. As I write this I can see the daycare out of our bedroom window. There are several boys here about his age and I think he will benefit from playing with them and learning Spanish from the caretakers there. We'll see how it goes. It's $100 a month so why not try it, right?

I haven't updated you with all of the new things Rowan does and says so I thought I should catch up. He is running and climbing with the best of them now. He was actually climbing up a slide yesterday! This past weekend he learned to spin around in circles to make himself dizzy. Watch:

Crazy baby! He is starting to talk, he makes the correct sounds for lots of words but can say Mama, Dada, and hot clearly. He also knows the sounds for cows and chickens thanks to a few weeks that we spent in Fredericksburg with Moms and Pops (They have cows and chickens.) He is starting to eat better for us, which means he is actually trying things. Today he had 1/4 of a bagel with cream cheese and strawberries, chicken salad and cheese and a coconut cookie. If you know Ro, you know he turned a corner in the eating department. So much has improved in a week, probably because he has some stability in his life, after that month of couch surfing.

Pardon the Interruption

2010-01-06T09:03:00.000-08:00

But we were "homeless" and parading ourselves and baby around Texas visiting. We had lots of fun and took 0 photos to prove it. Fast forward to Jan. 4th when we left for Mexico and we'll pick up there. We made it to the airport in Houston with more luggage than anyone should ever have to deal and hopped on our short flight to Mexico City. Rowan slept pretty much the entire way and was an angel, just as expected. We got the green light in customs, so no searching of our luggage and then we were picked up by a CIMMYT driver in a 15 passenger van to accommodate our luggage. We came to Mexico thinking we were getting a one bedroom apartment, but were pleasantly surprised to get a 3 bedroom hacienda. Flamingo pink too! The place is empty but once we get our belongings here Casa Siete will be HOME. Rowan and I battled the altitude for about 24 hours but we are both feeling much better and are getting settled in. Here are some pictures of Casa Siete.

This is the view from the front. Like the color?

This is our backyard, small and fenced in by hedges. But just beyond the yard is a huge playground area for Rowan.

This is Rowan on his first expedition to the playground.

Our view of the mountains. That's where we want to live when we move off campus.

Rowan "helping" sweep the kitchen this morning.

So all is well here in Mexico and I'm going to do my best to keep all of you updated much more frequently. Come see us!
P.S. Happy Anniversary to Us, 3 years.

Happy Birthday!

2009-11-30T07:48:00.001-08:00

One year ago today our beautiful baby boy was born. Can you believe it? He has gone from our helpless, "noodle" of a baby to the oh, so mobile and curious toddler in 365 days. Amazing. We had his first party at his Aunt Bunny and Uncle Tom's house in Austin. I made him a birthday banner which we hung on their porch.

And Esten and I slaved over these monkey cupcakes which were homemade carrot cake with maple cream cheese frosting. The face is a ginger snap, the eyes are M&M's, the ears are mini oreos and the nose is chocolate ganache. They were soooo good.

Rowan was impressed with our singing as you can tell.

And he even tried a little bit of the icing. He's still not big on the eating thing and so my mental picture of him covered in icing and having cake all over himself didn't happen. This is what I got.

There was not a shortage of gifts for this little man. He got musical instruments, puzzles, trucks, blocks, a barn with animals, blocks, books, crayons and did I mention blocks? He for some reason loves this little Papa Smurf that John and Jess gave him.

It was a fun day and we had a great time. This past Saturday we had another party for Rowan at the San Antonio Zoo. We invited kids to this one and they all had a blast.
We started off feeding fish and goats. Then the kids got to pet a hedgehog like creature. Here is cousin Mara petting Sophie.
This is Rowan being helped by Daddy, petting Sophie.
Rowan having a second round of happy birthday and a bit of cake afterward.

The rest of the day was spent exploring the zoo. This is a group shot at the end of the day.

Dr. Mason

2009-11-22T19:18:00.000-08:00

After many long days and late nights of writing his 200 page dissertation, Esten is officially Dr. Mason. He defended his dissertation last Thursday. His parents came to town and we celebrated with a happy hour and dinner. Now it's crunch time with our packing and preparing for Mexico.

This is Dr. Hays and Esten.

Title Slide from Esten's seminar.

Walking

2009-11-07T13:02:00.000-08:00

I think we now have to say that Rowan is walking. It's his primary mode of transportation. I can't believe it. Today was one of his first days to try walking in the grass with his shoes. Here is a video clip of his walking:

Bluesy Ro

2009-11-04T06:42:00.000-08:00

I mentioned the Harmonica skills a few posts ago, well...

Happy Belated Halloween

2009-11-01T12:25:00.000-08:00

We opted to dress Rowan and stay home this Halloween. Ro handed out candy to a few trick-or-treaters and showed off some unforeseen walking skills to his Grandma and Grandpa. It was like he had been walking for months. But no worries he's back to his falling self again.

We stayed home because we took Rowan to his first Aggie football game. He was tired after all of that excitement. Here is Esten and Ro at the game.

Our packing is getting underway over here. My parents took a trailer and truck full of stuff this weekend and I'm wheeling and dealing on craigslist. Our dresser and bar stools are gone today. Hmmm, what to do with all of the clothes in the dresser...

Nos estamos moviendo a México

2009-10-25T18:40:00.000-07:00

We have some big news; we're moving to Mexico in January! Esten took a job at CIMMYT near Mexico City and that's where we will be for the next three years. We are very excited to step out of our comfort zone into a world that most people never get a chance to experience. I'll admit the not knowing what to expect and the "How DO you move to Mexico?" parts are challenging but they are not stopping us from embarking on this great adventure.
Dr. Borlaug, who was credited with saving over a billion lives from starvation, was a distinguished professor at A&M and he was on Esten's committee for a few years until he became ill and had to be removed. He recently passed away and Esten was an "usher" at his memorial on campus. Listening to his colleagues talk of him and what he did to save the world really made me hope that we were going to Mexico. Dr. Borlaug worked at CIMMYT for 40+ years and received the Nobel Peace Prize while he was working there. He once said, "I personally cannot live comfortably in the midst of abject hunger and poverty and human misery." He also believed that the world cannot be at peace until these people are helped to feed themselves and escape poverty. I love that Esten is choosing a job with dignity over a job for a huge corporation (where he would make a lot more money) like Monsanto. And if the corn fed boy from Iowa, Dr. Borlaug, survived Mexico so can we! VAMOS!
We'll be living on campus at first until we learn enough Spanish and feel comfortable living elsewhere. We're going to be about 3 hours from beautiful beaches both ways, east and west and a few minutes from Mexico City. We will be taking visitors as often as possible and CIMMYT kindly pays for us to come home once a year (hopefully we'll make it more often than that.) I'm currently selling things on craigslist and looking for responsible, loving homes for some of our belongings that I just can't part with. Enough about Mexico, how's that baby?
Rowan will be one next month. Can you believe it? He is getting more adorable everyday. He is on the cusp of walking and walks first, until he falls, then crawls to whatever the destination might be. He has a Radio Flyer walker that his aunt bought him last year and he pushes that thing around with speed. Any day now he's going to be full on walking.
He picked up the harmonica this past week. At first he couldn't play it but after we showed him several times he figured it out. He can also wave bye'bye, but only with his right hand. He gives open mouth kisses, tries to sort shapes and puts his socks inside his shoes when you take them off of him. This is video of some of Rowan's latest cuteness, including a Halloween sneak peek.

Kazoo Baby Kazoo

2009-09-25T15:33:00.000-07:00

I was cleaning our house this week and found a kazoo that Esten got in his stocking at Christmas last year. I showed it to Rowan and played my best kazoo for him too. He took it from me, stuck it in his mouth and started playing it. Like this:

If you ever need a kazoo player we have one for hire. He is booked through the end of the month but has some open dates thereafter. And also if you find yourself in need of paper shredder, we have one of those too.

Social Butterfly

2009-09-03T08:23:00.000-07:00

I've been looking for a playgroup to take Rowan to for a few months but was getting discouraged by all of the hoops people on the mommy boards want you jump through. So I had just laid the idea to rest until Esten and I went to Ben and Jerry's for dessert one night. There's a big fountain in the middle of the shopping plaza and we were walking around it to work off some of those calories, ha! This couple with a baby walked out of Atami, a sushi restaurant, and we started talking to them. Come to find out Jennifer knew of the Friends from La Leche League playgroup. So I took Rowan the next morning and one of the moms there invited us to another free activity called Music Makers. And then I found out about a free program at the library called Babies and Books. So we've been socializing. It's fun for both of us, Rowan gets to play with other babies and I get to talk to other moms. Rowan is an observer. The first day he stayed close to me and observed what was going on for 20 minutes or so. Then he was off, taking toys from other babies, begging other moms for their snacks and introducing himself to the group by sitting in the middle of our circle in this pose:

clapping and turning all the way around while screeching at the top of his lungs. He is the loudest baby in the group. Here is a picture of him playing with his new friends.

Unfortunately he has payed the price for his social behavior of sharing toys with his new friends, with a cold. His nose is runny and he has a little cough. So this week we're skipping our playgroups but we'll be at Babies and Books Monday morning.

Rowan learned how to clap. I've been trying for months to teach him to do it so this was a BIG deal for us. We listen to music in his room while he is playing and he has picked a favorite song. He claps at most songs, but Five Little Monkeys steals his heart. He usually stops and stares at the stereo while clapping and humming along to this one. Other songs get a periodic clap and smile. This is a video of him clapping from a week ago. Since then he has perfected the clap.

Rowan has his top, front two teeth now. It was rough but they're in. There appears to be a gap between them but we'll have to wait and see. He had his 9 month check up yesterday. He's ~ 21 pounds and ~28 inches long. I wouldn't say he likes the doctor's office so therefore the nurses do what they can to get an estimate. Can you believe he'll be 1 in a few months? I'm about 50% finished with his birthday banner and we're thinking about party plans.

The Gorge

2009-08-18T19:30:00.000-07:00

Let me explain my long hiatus from blogging. There is a little curious, button-loving almost 9 month old baby who won't let me. When I open my computer his eyes light up and he immediately crawls over to abuse my keyboard. So it's only while he is sleeping that I'm able to use the computer and I usually have his naps booked. By booked I mean every second is being used to frantically wash the dishes, cook, clean, etc... I previously relied on his exersaucer and johnny jumper to occupy him but he isn't in to being confined anymore. He is crawling all over the place, pulling up on everything and standing all by himself. He even took a tiny step the other day. He may be over confident in his standing skills so I am watching him like a hawk these days. He also has started eating much better. He eats anything we are eating or something close to it. Pureed foods are NOT popular with this baby. He prefers chunky foods. My mom told me I also had nothing to do with baby food. Today he ate blueberries and oatmeal for breakfast and chicken, barley and steamed apples for lunch and dinner. He still eats relatively small amounts but he is finally interested. He also has a expanded his vocabulary, to include not only Maaama, but Daada, Naana, Yaaya, Baaba and lots of car noises. One really cute thing he is doing everyday is crawling to the bathtub to take his bath. Esten always strips him down while I get his bath ready. One day he just took off to the tub before he could get him undressed. Now he does it every night and when he turns that corner into the bathroom he has the same delighted look in his eyes that he has when I open my computer.

We just got home from a vacation to Washington where we reunited with some of our best friends. We all met at our friends Joel and Clint's grandmother's lake house. She was such a saint to let 14 of us stay with her. Then we traveled via 12 passenger van and minivan to The Gorge to camp and see Phish. It was an amazing trip and we had a blast. It was Rowan's first camping trip and he did really well. The time change made things a little difficult but he's a trooper. We saw Phish two nights and the first night Rowan stayed up and danced (jumped) for about 30 minutes, the second night he passed out before they even came on. This is from his dancing night. I made those Huck Finn's.

Mama and Ro.

Still dancing.
He loved the tent. And yes, we used disposable diapers for our vacation. His carbon footprint grew a wee bit but it's still smaller than most.
This is a group photo of the crew. We had a baby and pregnant mama with us.

Rowan eating his shoe. One of two pairs that actually fit him. Most shoes are too tight due to the chub on the top of his feet.
Family photo at The Gorge.
This was Ro's first beer. He loved it and slept through the night. Only kidding, it was not open but he liked it because it was cold on those gums. Oh yeah, since last time, Rowan has two teeth! The bottom front two. They are adorable.

Thunder Thigh Giggle

2009-07-15T12:19:00.000-07:00

He calls me Muuum.

2009-07-09T20:30:00.000-07:00

Some things you might hear if you were a fly on our wall today would be: "Baby Boy, you're going to fall", "Rowan Mason, be careful", "Rowan, how did you get there?", "You can't pull up on that, it's going to fall over." I think you may get my point. He is getting really brave with this pulling up thing and uses his crawling skills to get him to whatever it may be that he wants to pull up on.

Oh yeah, he says "Muuuuum" now! My mom heard it, I've heard it and Esten has too, although he will probably never admit it. So far the only time I've heard him say, "Muuum" is when he is tired or hungry so therefore, I think he knows what he is saying.

And tonight I'll leave you with some pictures from our family photos. We had them taken by Butterfly Chaser Photography. Sarah did an amazing job and even put together a video compilation of some of the photos. Those eyes and thighs...

All Images Copyright Butterfly Chaser Photography

Here We Go

2009-06-22T07:52:00.000-07:00

Rowan is officially crawling. He has been inching around for a few weeks but last night and this morning he is mobile. We had a party this past weekend and our friends Bo and Elizabeth brought their son, Isom, who is well on his way to walking. Rowan LOVED him and told him that by screaming in his ear, pulling his hair, and poking his eyes. He really thought that Isom was a super fun toy. Needless to say I'm looking for a playdate for Rowan very soon. He should know that he is not the ONLY baby in the world, right? I think Rowan picked up a few new moves from him too, like crawling.

We took Ro to Fredericksburg a few weeks ago to swim. We were keeping our fingers crossed that he would enjoy the pool since he cried about his baby pool we bought him. Fortunately for all of us, he enjoyed every second of his swimming. He splashes until he is choking on the water, catches his breath and resumes splashing all while kicking his little legs under the water.

Esten and I have a wine barrel that we planted some strawberries in this year. They were doing really well until this sweltering heat came upon us. We would have a few strawberries at a time and they were really sweet. Rowan took interest in them when Esten was picking them while holding him. Esten let him try the berry and he took a few "pecks" at it and made the decision that he liked it. He then continued to suck on it until he was practically gone. Then when we went to Fredericksburg, Esten was picking some blackberries and Ro loved those too. He's a berry baby.

For Father's Day this year Rowan and I made Esten a tie. Rowan helped by letting me work on the tie while he napped or played. I found the pattern on one of the blogs I read. It turned out really nice and he says he likes it. I know, I know a tie is the one of the worst gifts ever, but it's a tradition to give dads ties. So we did. A lot of love went into that tie. This picture is not the best but you'll get the idea.

We had some family photos taken this past week so stay tuned, they should be finished in a few weeks.

Half a Year Old

2009-06-05T06:29:00.000-07:00

Here are some recent pictures of Rowan. He is still not crawling but determined he will. No matter how many times he face plants it, he'll get up again and continue to try. These pictures are from our front yard yesterday at lunch. He was picking and eating grass, a big step considering a few months ago he would cry if you put his feet down in the grass. And I suppose eating grass is better than the post it note he ate last week. Oops!

We've been trying to get Rowan to start eating solids, with little success. Somedays he'll eat and somedays he won't have anything to do with it. I don't force him to eat if doesn't want to but try to offer something to him everyday. Last night he was attacking the spoon for carrots. They were so good that he thought it was essential to smear them all over his face. Ian was taking advantage of this and getting in a few licks of carrots off of his hands. Rowan loves dog attention so I see him feeding his food to the dogs in the months to come.

And these beauties are from our garden. I made stuffed bell peppers last night. This is the first year that Esten and I have actually had enough peppers to make a meal. There are more to come too along with the eggplant.

Rowan's sitting up skills are much better now. He will sit up for long periods and play with his toys. Here he is playing with his favorite flower chime. That toy is a hand me down from Mara and I have to say it has been put to great use. Maybe someday he will be into the trucks, trains and dinosaurs...

These two are best buds. Pablo surprisingly tolerates all of the pinches, pulls and pokes from Ro. And if you leave Rowan alone for a few minutes, you'll come back to Pablo sitting beside him keeping a close eye. Pablo is Rowan's keeper in his little chihuahua world. Their relationship may change when Rowan can chase him, we'll see. Oh and the poor cat, Rowan sees him and screams at the top of his lungs. I suspect Rowan will be chasing him too. The cat is beginning to realize that the screams are screams of interest and scurries away at the sound. Rowan is more and more fun everyday and it is so hard to believe that he has already been here for six months. Time is racing by.

Rowan Meets Jackson James

2009-05-21T10:44:00.000-07:00

So this is a late post but at last the meeting between Rowan and Jackson is documented. Stuart, Jackson and Amanda came to College Station a few weeks ago to visit and meet Rowan. Jackson is about 6 weeks older than Ro so there's no doubt in my mind that they will eventually get together and cause lots of trouble. This was Rowan's first time to share his toys and I think he actually learned a thing or two from Jackson. See how Jackson is pulling the toys on the bar that goes across the exersaucer, well now Rowan does this too. Before this day he never even noticed the toys hanging there.

And here they are both on a giant soft book. This was too cute as they reached to touch one another.

Next time these two get together they will probably both be mobile. Here is a video of Rowan trying to get up on all fours. I put him down on the other side of his room, went to get some clothes out of the dryer, came back and he was by his changing table. Since this he has gotten really good at it and is so close to getting it moving. I guess plug covers and cabinet locks are in my future.

And finally John graduated this past weekend and of course we couldn't resist putting Rowan in his A&M overalls for the event.

Sweet Baby in The Big Apple

2009-05-12T06:28:00.000-07:00

We took our first family trip out of state last week to New York City. We stayed in Brooklyn with our friends, Susan and Bruce. Uncle Cy was in NYC so we got to hang out with him too. We left early Monday morning from Austin and I mean early, up at 5:00 and wheels up by 7:30. But not before Rowan had a chance to spit up on my pants and on my boarding pass. His first plane ride was perfect, I was more anxious than he was. Here's a picture of Daddy and Rowan on the plane.

Once we landed in Baltimore we decided to let Rowan stretch out on the floor while we waited to catch our next plane to New York.

Susan picked us up from the airport and we went to her house and relaxed for a bit. For dinner Monday night we met up with Aunt Ava at an Indian restaurant. Rowan was glad to see Ava and fell asleep while she sang to him.

We traveled from Brooklyn to the restaurant on the subway. It was Rowan's first. He had a very surprised look on his face when the train came racing through the tunnel. This is a picture of us on the subway. We used the subway frequently while we were there and Rowan made lots of friends on the train. Most NYers avoid eye contact on public transportation, but our little man was staring them down and forcing eye contact. I've never seen so many smiles on the subway.

Rowan, Susan and I went to H&M for some shopping while Esten went to the Heartland Brewery. We met up with him there for a photo op.

It was dreary for most of the time we were there but on Wednesday the sun decided to shine and we took advantage. We walked across the Brooklyn Bridge to start off the day.

And then we went to the American Museum of Natural History. You can see a dinosaur if you look behind Esten and Rowan. And not to get you down or anything but these hard economic times have even hit the museum, the gem room was closed because they can't afford to have a guard there all day.

After the museum we went to Strawberry Fields in Central Park. It is just across the street from the Dakota where John Lennon was shot.

We had a great time and Rowan proved to us that he travels well, as long as there isn't a car seat involved. We had a great Mother's Day weekend too. Our friends came over from Houston and Moms and Pops came too. Another post for that visit.

Rolling Over

2009-04-28T14:18:00.000-07:00

He did it. Rolled over that is. I have been biting my tongue not to post this earlier since he did roll over once about a week ago on the floor. Since then he hadn't done it again until today. I put Elmo just out of reach and that was all it took to get him to try to roll over. He did it five times for me and when Esten got home from work he had to test it out too. Here is a video of him rolling over.

And I have to admit we tried some rice cereal with Rowan. I said I wasn't going to try solids until he was 6 months old but he 'begged' enough for me to crumble. When we eat he watches us very closely and tries to grab our food if you give him the chance. He was loving it the first night we (Esten, Jessica, John and I: it takes a village, right? ) tried it but since then hasn't been very interested. I'm not worried about it and we're going to take it very slow until he's 6 months old. Which by the way is only a month away and as you all know the end of May will be here before you know it.

I got my sewing machine serviced and I've been working on a little bib project. I made 16, some for friends and some for Rowan. These will come in handy for his eating solids adventure we are about to embark upon. Now I'm working on making him a pair of shoes with this pattern I found online. One shoe is done and if I must say so myself, it is pretty cute. It is made out of the same material of the bib that is hanging on the neck of the hanger in the picture below.

Next week we are going to New York for a few days to visit Ava and our friends Susan and Bruce. I had an airline credit I had to use before May 18 so why not? We'll most definitely post pictures of more firsts after that trip. First airplane ride, first subway ride, first train ride, and who knows what else.

Easter Pictures

2009-04-16T18:00:00.000-07:00

Rowan's First Easter Egg Find. Ok, ok we found it for him but he at least acknowledged the fact that there was an egg in front of him.

And then there were three. Shortly after this picture was taken he cried. Enough is enough mamarazzi.

A visit with his cousins, Kyra and Rio. Rio thinks that you should pose with your hands on your face if you want to be really cute.

4 Months Old

2009-04-08T15:37:00.000-07:00

Rowan is about a week over 4 months old now and doing new things everyday. He weighed 17lbs 5 oz at his 4 month checkup. He has recently started laughing and we love it. We try everything to make him laugh from pretending we are dropping him, startling him, making funny faces, etc. but the best bet is Pablo. He loves to watch him and Esten play. The rougher the better.
He has a few new toys that he loves, an exersaucer and a johnny jumper. I love them too since they buy me time.

Last Friday we took Rowan to his first bluegrass show with some friends and their baby. We saw Yonder Mountain String Band at Stubbs in Austin. We bought Rowan some earmuffs that block out noise and he wore them with pride. He took two naps while we were there but stayed awake for most of it. This was a trial run for the Phish shows we will be going to this summer in California and Washington.

He has rolled over a few times, I think accidentally, from his stomach to his back. He did it while we were playing on his alphabet mat that we have on the floor in his room.

We're heading to San Antonio and Corpus this weekend to see my family for Easter. Happy Early Easter to you!

Rowan's Voice

2009-03-24T17:38:00.000-07:00

Rowan has a precious voice and there are still some friends and family who have yet to hear it. Here is a short video with some clips of Rowan talking, screaming and whining. Enjoy!

St. Paddock's Day

2009-03-17T20:26:00.001-07:00

Well, Rowan managed to put up with our shenanigans once again. We've taken him to restaurants on multiple occasions and even a basketball game when he was eight weeks, but this time we decided we would get brave and drag him out for a St. Patrick's Day celebration. A couple pints of Guinness, a few green beers, and some pictures later, we have another memorable night worthy of its place in the blogosphere. He really is an angel child. No worries, we were home by 9:30pm. Thanks to our good friends Aaron and Stephanie for owning the bar, Paddock Lane, and for loving our baby. Rowan did manage to stay out later than John and Jessica.....oh snap!!

Cheers,

Esten (logged in as Shannon)

A Week of Celebrations

2009-03-16T19:54:00.000-07:00

Last week was a week of celebrations for us. It started on Monday when our good friend, John defended his dissertation. He passed and we celebrated with champagne and cigars. I think a PhD in physics deserves a picture on our blog. (See our tomatoes in buckets behind him.)

And then Saturday was my 29th birthday. My parents came to College Station and Esten and I got to go out for a few drinks that night. It was my first time to leave Rowan for longer than 20 minutes: we were gone for at least an hour and a half. We met up with some of our friends and had a great time. Rowan did just fine too. Rowan went for his first jog this morning in our new jogging stroller and stayed awake much longer than he usually does probably because he could see where he was going. We've been running with a stroller with plastic wheels that his carseat fits into. He faces me in that stroller so facing the world instead is a huge upgrade. This stroller is a much smoother and enjoyable ride for him and run for me. Thanks Moms and Pops.
(Notice the garden to the right of the picture above.)

Sunday was Mara's birthday so we went to Austin to celebrate with the family. She's a doll and loves her cousin Rowan.

Outside of all of the celebrating, Rowan has started to sit in his bumbo for 10 minutes at a time and seems to enjoy the freedom of not being held but sitting upright. He also got a excersaucer this weekend and loves that too.

And he is just drooling like crazy. Maybe teeth are on the way.
I'm still working on those videos I've promised and since Rowan fell asleep on his own tonight I'm adding a bonus picture. Isn't he a cutie?

Not Much Going On...

2009-03-07T14:49:00.000-08:00

There has not been much going on around here but I thought I would give a little update on Rowan. He has got to weigh 15lbs. We'll find out for sure at the end of the month when he goes for his 4 month appointment. He can now bat at the toys in his play gym and will reach up for anything interesting you dangle above his head. He really wants to grab things but the hands just are not cooperating yet. He also is enjoying talking to us and will repeat "Aaaahhh, goooo" as many times as you're willing to say it. I'm going to attempt to capture his talking and 'I'm tired, but don't want to go to sleep whine' this week and when I do I'll post some video. But for now here are a few pictures from last weekend when we went to Fredericksburg to see Moms and Pops (Esten's parents.)

Rowan prefers to stand up and pretend he can walk. Man the triceps hurt at the end of the day.

Still has the pretty blues.

Rowan and cousin Mara. Someday Mara he will play with you.

Happy Valentine's Day

2009-02-16T18:24:00.000-08:00

Better late than never. We went on our second road trip with Rowan this weekend to see Moms and Pops and for a reunion party with many of our college friends in Austin, which is why this post is late. This picture captures most of us. It was really nice to see and for Rowan to meet all of these people.

Rowan's mobile is up and twirling above his changing table. He loves it and it does a fantastic job of keeping him occupied while I put clothes on him since he would rather I let him go naked.
So this is a picture of the mobile from his point of view.

And here he is looking at it.

Until next time...

Living on Less

2009-02-09T09:03:00.000-08:00

One good thing about global warming is that I can hang Rowan's diapers on the clotheslines that Esten hung in winter and not have them freeze, but dry. For those of you who don't know we are successfully using cloth diapers. These are not your mom's cloth diapers though, they are much more advanced. We use BumGenius 3.0 diapers. They are a pocket diaper that adjusts to fit an 8lb baby to a 35lb toddler. We actually used the old fashioned prefolds and covers when Rowan was a newborn because the BumGenius diapers were just too big. Those took a little more skill to keep the leaks at bay, but we survived. Now Rowan is 1o weeks old now and we have spent zero dollars on diapers and $8 on wipes. We also use reusable wipes. They are hanging on the top line in the picture to the right. They look and feel similar to a baby washcloth, except they are made of bamboo. We are grateful that we are not having to spend money on diapers and wipes, especially since we are currently living on a graduate student's salary.
And since I have way too much time on my hands(joke!), I've started to make our cleaning supplies. I'm not big on chemicals, except for the occasional bleach, and since we are living on the cheap I decided that this would be one way to save a little money. As we run out of what we have I'm replacing it with something I make. So far we have a kitchen counter spray/disinfectant (1/2 vinegar, 1/2 water, 25 drops tea tree oil.) The tea tree really covers most of the vinegar smell and I actually LOVE vinegar so it doesn't bother me. Also I made dishwasher detergent (1c washing soda, 1c baking soda, 10 drops of lemon oil.) No complaints yet, all of our glasses are coming out just as clean as they were before. I probably spent $6 on supplies (I had the essential oils) and they should last for quite a while.
In addition to making cleaning supplies I've also started making our bread. It is a very easy recipe and I read an article on motherearthnews.com about how making your own bread can save hundreds of dollars a year on your grocery bill. It seems true since we buy a loaf every time we go and it costs $4. The only problem with making our bread is that it's so yummy that we eat it by Wednesday (I make it Monday.) And then we are out until the next week. Maybe I'll start making two loaves at time.
Leave me home any longer and I may start making our clothes. Hmmm. That sounds like fun. I'll be posting some pictures of Rowan's Valentine from his Mom and Dad later this week. We, mostly I, are working on a mobile for him. He is so in love with the one he has that I thought we should put one above the changing table too. More later on that. And for the record I really don't think that there is anything good about global warming.

Owls

2009-02-02T18:38:00.000-08:00

I grew up in the country, but never saw an owl in the wild. Owls are interesting animals. They move in complete silence hunting at night, have binocular vision, and can rotate their heads 135 degrees in either direction. They also have their place in folklore and symbolism, representing everything from wisdom and knowledge to illness and psychic power. There is also Moloch, the owl god of the bohemian grove, worshiped by many of our former presidents.

A few years ago I decided that the moment I saw an owl for the first time would signal a turning point in my life. Not necessarily that I would have to make a choice, but that it would have meaning as to where my life was headed. I wish I could say I saw my first owl hiking in the Appalachian mountains on a spiritual journey, but that wasn't the case. Instead, I saw my first owl in the front yard of my friends John and Jessica's house, perched in a tall oak tree. An unlikely place for an owl, I suppose, but like pretty much every other animal, owls have been forced by human intervention to carve out a new habitat. I guess an old, historical part of town with plenty of tall old trees is as good a place as any. I spotted him before I had gotten out of the car. I stared in amazement through my drivers side window at what I am 90% sure was a barred owl, immediately thinking about what I had said about the turning-point in my life. He didn't give me very long, disappearing shortly after I stepped out of the car. Why on that night did I decide to look out the window up into the same tree I would normally just walk by? Fate I guess, a signal of change.

Owls have actually become a routine part of mine and Shannon's life recently. We have an owl blanket, an owl on Rowan's mobile, an origami owl for the O in Rowan, a Leia Bell print of a mother and owlet titled "Momma's Boy", amongst other things. Turns out that not only are owls fascinating animals, meaningful in folklore, and worshiped by our political leaders, they are also a popular baby character. Before today, I had actually forgotten about my encounter with the owl, not really thinking about what change had come about as a result of our meeting. However, when Shannon called me today to tell me that Rowan's Native American Animal is the owl, it all came full circle.

Lick Creek Park

2009-02-02T11:10:00.000-08:00

We woke up Saturday morning to beautiful weather, 70ish and not a cloud in the sky. These type of days have seemed few and far between since Rowan was born. The clouds have lingered around here producing absolutely no rain but dreary days instead. So needless to say we enjoyed this day outside. Lick Creek park is a leash free park (except for mean chihuahuas) and it is probably the least developed park in the BCS area with not much more than equestrian and hiking trails. We called our forever faithful friends, John and Jess (and Malcolm, their dog) to come along. Rowan loved our walk. He started out in the sling but got hot and wanted out, indicating this with his grunts that he does so well. We learned that pale babies need sunscreen and shades even in January. No sunburn or anything just the most sun he has had since he made his appearance into this big world. We all had our turn carrying him as he took it all in. He was awake most of the time and talked into our ears as we strolled along. He was a sweetie as usual.

By the way our 2 month appointment went well. He weighed 13lbs, 13ozs and I think it was 23 inches, but I could be wrong. I'll have to ask Esten and get back. He got both the DTap and Rotavirus vaccines. And I'm debating now whether to fully or selectively vaccinate him. Either way he's not getting all of them at once and will have to go in once a month to get a vaccine. It costs more and he has to get shots once a month but I (along with others who wrote all of the books, blogs, etc.. that I've been researching with) feel like his immune system will be better able to handle the vaccines this way and if he did have a reaction to one of them it would be easier to pinpoint which one.

Favorite Things

2009-01-28T07:20:00.000-08:00

Rowan is two months old now (Dr. on Friday,we'll post his stats.) So I thought I would share some of his likes and dislikes. Let's start with his dislikes:

Being held in the cradle hold, unless you plan on nursing him or he is already knocked out.
Putting clothes on, diaper is fine, but he would prefer to go with just that.
The television, I guess he gets overstimulated by all of the background noise. We've now downgraded our cable to the very basic since we don't get to watch as much as we used to and when we did it was muted anyway. Maybe we will read more now.
Red lights, stop signs or anything else that requires you to engage your brakes while driving. He prefers the car to move the entire time he is in the car seat.
The bottle and a pacifier: we've tried a few different ones but he tends to gag and push them away. We've had a little success with this bottle and by success I mean no gagging. He has not actually sucked on it, maybe in time he will.

It could be much worse - he is a relatively laid back baby. Now for the things he likes.

Smiling and laughing at Esten's forehead. He thinks it's a riot. Esten always wraps a towel on his head to dry his luscious locks after a shower and Rowan finds that humorous also.
He has a mobile that he received from my uncle for Christmas and that is his new favorite thing to stare at. It is safari animals and he will lay alone in his crib and watch it go around and around long enough for me to get a restroom break and possibly check the mail (Oh the little things I appreciate now.)
I have a touch lamp next to my side of the bed that I use at night and the lamp shade on it is embroidered with vibrant flowers, vines and birds. When he is awake at night and early in the morning he stares and talks to the lamp.
The Grateful Dead - If he's fussy (luckily not too often) Esten plays GD vinyl albums and dances around with him and he usually falls asleep. If the music stops he wakes. Maybe it's just music he likes, but we're going with GD for now.
He is still enjoying his tummy time. He presents new and I must say, very cute noises when he is on his tummy. This is a video from the beginning of this month. We'll post a new one soon from his play mat.
Pooping in a clean diaper. It never fails, just after we've changed him he will let it all out. TMI?
Taking a bath is another go to activity if he is upset. He has a plastic tub that has a hammock type contraption that keeps his head out of the water. He kicks his feet over the hammock to get them in the water and he will scoot down to get more of his body in the water too. Hopefully he will continue to like the bath.
And lastly he loves to nurse. He's getting better at not wanting to nurse every 30 minutes but no doubt he loves it.