Easter....Guatemalan style

Has another week gone by??? Time is really flying. My baby turned 8 months this week. It’s crazy to think it’s been that long already. I visited my cousin’s new baby today and it hit me that my baby isn’t really a baby anymoreL. This has been a nonstop week. It seems like even though we aren’t working or going to school yet we are busier than ever, but soon we’ll have those things on our plate as well.

Colton got a cold this week, not too bad but his nose was just really runny. One of the boxes we sent were all his diapers, but it hasn’t come yet so I had to buy him some new diapers. Unfortunately these diapers were no good for him… the first diaper we put on him gave him a bad bad rash, his bottom was so red and even had white dots all over and we couldn’t even touch him. That night I left him without a diaper and put a bunch of medicine on him so next morning he was still red but didn’t cry as bad anymore. It was sad to see him hurt so much. Other than that he is doing great, he is getting to know people really quick and is happier now when he isn’t with me, he is eating almost everything and more and more every day.

Layla keeps dancing and singing, she gets a big audience every time she performs haha. She has also started to think that because we aren’t in Arizona she can do whatever she pleases, she will learn better after spending some quality time in time out. People here think I’m the worst parent for making her go into time out and being so strict with her especially one of my sisters who really gets mad at me for doing that and wants to know exactly what she has done to deserve time out.. my answer every time “nothing you need to worry about” lol. On the other hand my dad has expressed his feelings on how happy he feels whenever he sees the kids pray and doing things like that. My dad does catholic meetings every week with the neighborhood and this past week Mike, Xavion and Layla went with them. I had to stay home with Colton. When they came back my dad came to tell me how happy he was that Layla offered to say one of the prayers and how he told everybody to follow their example because what they were doing was exactly what Jesus wants all of us to do.

Xavion keeps feeding the turkeys and still loves riding his bike. His Spanish is already getting better and he isn’t as shy trying to speak to people. Everyone is really patient with him and they help him out a lot. He loves playing soccer with his cousins and Mike. He also really enjoyed a ride with Mike on a moto this week. After an exciting and near fatal attempt at driving a moto a few years ago, Mike borrowed my sister Yani’s moto and had no problem getting the hang of it. Now he can borrow it to go into town before his beloved truck gets here, which should be soon.

Easter is celebrated here for a whole week…Semana Santa. Everybody is off  of school and work some starting since Thursday and some on Monday. We planned a bunch of activities for this week to keep all of the kids occupied. Yesterday was the first day all of the kids were off school so we had mix and match day but everybody focused on just having 2 different shoes haha. We also had a bunch of activities like musical chairs, duck duck goose, red rover and ended up with a water fight followed by soccer. Pictures to follow!.... also 2 big customs during Easter here are making bread and fruity honey. The making of the bread started Friday and will end on Tuesday, one family each day takes turns and makes their bread in a special oven. Its soooooooo yummy especially hot right out of the oven. 

One of the mornings this week, my parents house surrounded by trees. one funny thing that happened this week... because it was so foggy... i was talking to Xavion and you could see my breath. when i see  him trying to run away from me and covering his face with both of his hands.. i asked him what is it matter? he responded.. there is fire coming out of your mouth.. he thought i was turning into a dragon lol

one rainy day, the kids enjoying the water while everyone else was hiding from it lol. 

 

playing soccer under the rain..

 

still playing soccer hours later.

 

us cheering for the players

this is the oven where they bake the bread. they start the fire hours before they start kneading the bread so it stays hot the whole day. 

Mike preparing the oven to start putting bread in it. they make their own broom with flowers to swipe all the sticks to the side. 

 

 Kneading the bread!

 this is part of all the bread that we made. the first day we made a total of  75 pounds of flour

bread all done and ready to eat!

Mike loved the bread, he really enjoyed it and ate like 5 breads right as they came out of the oven. 

This is how Colton takes a bath... whenever Mike gives him a bath he gets an audience because guys never do stuff like that here haha. 

Layla drank some rice drink then she got so mad that while throwing a fit rice started coming out of her nose lol.... i had to take a pic before talking to her lol 

Layla always asks people to pull their pants up when they are showing their crack in this case she decided to cover it for him lol. we happened to get a pic right at the time she was doing it lol.

Everybody getting Mike. 

Everybody getting Xavion... and he loved it like you can see in the pic 

After we were done with our water fight. 

Everybody loves Mike's magic tricks... he did a magic trick for my grandma and she called him a warlock  lol

Mike learning how to drive a scooter. 

These are all the kids that live here... we were missing  6 more that only come during the weekend. 

playing freeze dance

playing duck duck goose

Musical chairs

 Mix and match day.

 

we are having a lot of fun here in Guatemala! we have a lot more activities planed for this coming week to enjoy that everybody stays home. We miss you all and love you. Have an awesome week.

We made it to Guatemala!!!!

We are all settled in Guatemala now. It has been a little hard to settle in the small space we have now but thank goodness we are all done for a little while until the next box gets here haha. Kids are loving it here, often we have to go look for them to check what they are up to because they are always out playing with the other 14 kids here in the house. They all love the outdoors!

The way here was nice because Colton slept almost the whole time we traveled… he slept through most of the 3 plane rides and the car drive as well.  He was so tired for like 2 more days after that slept almost as much as when he was a newborn. Everybody is so amazed in how much he can do at his short age. The other day he crawled all the way to where the pila is (huge water container) there was a small container right next to it and he stood up and put his hands in there….. my mom screamed haha. There was a sister at church on Sunday whose baby is just 1 week younger and she was so surprised to see how active he is and she said her baby is not even sitting up. Colton is really a superman haha. Every time he cries people tells me he is hungry and want to feed him but I say no he has a schedule and he follows it very good… they don’t believe me lol.

Layla is loving the food (nothing new here lol). Everybody is amazed in how much Spanish she actually knows. Sometimes they are asking us questions about them and she gets ahead and answers them. They love her enthusiasm and her dance moves. She loves to visit my grandparents, every morning right after she eats breakfast she goes over their house and spends some time with them. Almost every morning she comes in the kitchen and asks for beans… her breakfast is very easy to make haha.

Xavion now can ride his bike without training wheels and that’s all he wants to do all day. Sometimes I need to ask him to put his bike away so that he can play with the rest of us. He is trying to speak Spanish, he asks a lot of questions about how to say something and tries to use them in every chance he gets. He loves feeding the turkeys, he is so amazed and how they can eat the fruit peels so whenever he sees someone eating some type of fruit he waits for them to be done then he takes the peel and throws it to the turkeys.

Mike and I have tried to stay busy, time here seems to fly so we must be doing good. We played with all the kids soccer almost every day and we have done other fun stuff like sliding down the hill!. We have introduced the kids to games like spoons, chicken feet and freeze dance. They really enjoy when we have activities for them to do with us because they don’t spend as much time with their parents. Everything has been great just getting use to changes again like washing clothes by hand lol. We got a system down though….. I wash and mike goes and hangs them in the rope to dry.

We went to church on Sunday it seemed like a very nice ward. Everybody was so excited to have such a mixed family in the ward haha. There was a sister that just wanted to talk to me during Sunday school and RS, she had so many questions about my family I tried to be very short with my answers because I didn’t want to be talking during class but she had questions after questions haha… in the afternoon she picked me up to go to a RS meeting they had going on and she asked me all the same questions again lol…..

The other day we went to the grocery store and there were a couple of ladies that were staring at mike and the kids and started to talk about them, they were so obvious that when we moved they moved right behind them to keep looking at them lol. Right after we paid 3 other ladies came straight to us to touch Xavion’s hair and to ask if they were ours, as soon as they say hi to Layla she threw herself on one of the ladies to give her a hug and they fell in love with her haha. 

Layla and Xavion sleeping in the back of the van on our way to Huehuetenango from Guatemala city. 

Colton sleeping most of the way here from Arizona. 

 

  Mike sleeping in the van he was so tired that could not stay awake his head was going all over the place with every turn the car made lol.

 

Me awake the entire time :(...

 

 

  Sliding down the hill with an old plastic basket. it was fun!

 Xavion riding his bike non stop... going around and around in circles.

Playing spoons with the kids.... they loved it. 

  Colton got so exited with this bike... he was sitting on it just enough for me to get a pic then he fell on his side good thing nothing happened... i know i should had never left them...oh and mike and my mom moving one of our boxes in the back.

Colton loves his crib, we put his crib right next to our bed because he was trying to climb out of it so now when he wakes up he start pulling my hair, my nose and my blanket so that i wake up too. smart kid!

This is all for now. I hope everybody is doing well back in the states. we miss you and love you all!