A year ago today, you came into our lives. True to your nature, your entrance was unobtrusive and your sweet, flexible personality increasingly showed itself. I've loved getting to know you, to feel the familiar warmth of your smile when you see me. Praise God for my little joy, my little baby, now a little boy.
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Kevin and I went on a no-kids vacation to Central America. It was amazing, of course.
We went first to Nicaragua's paradisical islands- the Corn Islands. There we stayed in a hut and spent many hours in our porch hammocks. One day we took a water taxi to tiny Little Corn Island. We found a little beach and swam for 30 minutes out to a coral reef to snorkel around a large school of blue fish before finning back. That was a long time breathing through a tube for me. Of course, Kevin was fine. The next day Kevin convinced me to scuba dive and it was totally fun. It was easier than snorkeling because I wasn't as scared of beaching myself on the coral. We swam right over a large sting ray and by lots of cool fish.
The Corn Islands are touted as "untouched," which is apparently means untouched by huge American-style resorts or hotels. Our resort/hotel/collection of huts was one of the biggest on the island and had 10 huts total. But the islands were definitely "touched" by humans. Being a "Third World" country, Nicaragua and big Corn Island have yet to figure out how to properly dispose of trash. After you overlook the plastic bottles floating in an otherwise beautiful lagoon off of the main thoroughfare, the rest of the island is idyllic. Kevin and I walked along the less-inhabited north side of the island and I couldn't believe the variety of fruit trees I saw along the road- plantain, banana, kiwi, mango, coconut, "breadfruit" (they cut this up and fried it- I thought it was potato for sure), avocado, fig, starfruit, etc. David, our Israeli dive master told us that there are so many coconuts that no one claims possession over the trees and that if he is ever thirsty he just grabs a green coconut, chops it open and drinks the milk. I was a little chicken to snatch a coconut off of a tree, even though there are tons littering the ground.
We ate a lot of seafood on the island. I had my first taste of lobster and conch. We also had several dishes with red snapper, which is apparently a common fish in the waters around the island. One of the restaurants had two water pens underneath their dining balcony that contained lots of native sea life, including barracuda, starfish, nurse sharks, a sea turtle and some big crabs.
We took a local airplane back to the capital and from there, shared a taxi to Granada with some expats currently living in Costa Rica. They decided to stay at the Colonial Hotel and it was gorgeous, so we stayed too. Granada is a European-like city with walled streets enclosing beautiful, lush courtyards with pools and tropical plants. There were a few beautiful churches with big park-like squares. We went to the "market" in Masaya and I was sad to find a bunch of tourist kitsch. There aren't that many tourists in Nicaragua, but apparently they all go to this market. Kevin asked a kid selling us gum where the "other" market was. He retrieved his big brother, who put down his shoe-shining bench-kit, and ran us over to the artisan's market that the locals shop at. It was a crazy maze of overloaded vendors' booths with both artisan craftwork and everyday things, like Nike knockoffs. We picked up a few things- Kevin got a Guayebera shirt that makes him look like a 50 year-old Central American man, and picked up a matching shirt for Caleb too. Kevin paid our "guide" handsomely (it wasn't much, but it was fortune to him) and he trotted off with a huge smile on his face. We arranged for a canopy tour in the national park (a rainforest) and a kayak tour of Lake Nicaragua with a local guy that our expat friends introduced us to, but we couldn't go because of rain. To fill the day, we each got massages in a courtyard, listening to the slow trickle of rain. Kevin stopped in at a local barbershop and got a $1.50 haircut. The last night we stayed in the capital, Managua. We took a taxi tour of the presidential palace (where Daniel Ortega works) and saw hundreds of people setting up stages and concessions for the 29th anniversary of the Sandinista revolution that took place the day we flew out of Managua. Tens of thousands of people were there to celebrate, including Ortega and Che Guevera's widow. Our taxi driver noted as we passed a large group of people waving party flags and chanting something that we did not want to be around to see the fiesta the following day. That was an interesting piece of culture, and one I was content to witness from behind the dingy windows of an old taxi.
Marie asked if I would recommend Nicaragua. To you, Marie, yes. To everyone else- only if you are okay with not having 4 star options everywhere one looks. Oh and, if you have a weak stomach, bring some Immodium. There were a bunch of mission trip groups on the airplanes in and out of Managua. I heard some high school girls in the Atlanta airport exclaim with excitement about being able to flush paper down the toilet. Central America is not for everyone, but the New York Times calls Nicaragua "staggeringly beautiful" and I agree.
For those of you that know that my college degree is a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography, please don't judge me based on the photos in the show below. I brought my nice digital SLR camera with me on the trip but realized on our long layover in Atlanta, that I'd left the battery plugged in at home. Oops. At least we had Kevin's little digital. But the thing refuses to focus. It focuses, makes a beep telling me so, then when I shoot the pic, it jumps out of focus. Confound it. So that's my excuse for the poor quality of pictures. (David, I know I'm shooting your wedding in just a few weeks, and that you chose me partly because I am, in your words, "responsible," but I promise to bring all of the camera parts necessary to shoot your special day.)
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My favorite thing about summer is seeing friends and family. Some of our best friends, Kevin and Kimmy Hadley stopped by our house on their way up to Indiana. Their daughter, Jesse, was born on Caleb's 1st birthday and it was so fun to see her walking and starting to talk. We celebrated the fun news that Kimmy is pregnant. What a curious thing procreation is. Jesse is a reflection of her parents; and it's just strange to see a baby make the same face that her dad makes. Anyways, it was fun to get together and commiserate. Kevin and Kevin miss each other more than they let on.
Finally, Caleb has stopped trying on my shoes and has moved on to his Dada's footwear. He walked in to show me his outfit and said, "I look just like Dada!" Yeah, you're right, Caleb. Sometimes Dada does tuck his shirt into his undies.
July 2005, 8 weeks pregnant, on cruise boat
November 2005, 7 months pregnant, Budapest
June 2007, Savannah, 8 months pregnant with Joshua
July 31, 2007 Joshua's birth
October 2007, Opryland, Nashville
Last week
The thing I was making Kevin for Father's Day did not get finished before he came home, and so he didn't get anything for Father's Day. But we spent the afternoon playing in the backyard, and I made him breakfast in bed with homemade blueberry muffins. Next year, Caleb will be old enough to make something for Dada himself, since, as Kevin reminded me on Mother's Day, I am not his mom, and he is not my dad.
Do you get something for your kids' dad? Or is that for the kids to do?
boy is between 18 months and 3 years old. I was a little worried because Kevin deployed when Caleb was 20 months old and he has only had me. But seriously, it was like a band-aid being ripped off how fast Caleb ditched me for his dad. I'm glad, of course, but it kind of hurts too. My baby is a little boy now, and he'd rather kick the ball to his Dada than to me, even if Kevin is on the phone and can't play right now.
Joshua is still my baby though. I was seriously concerned that he would be terrified of Kevin and then not let Kevin hold him for a long time. J hasn't been in the nursery at church because the service we go to is small and they don't have a good nursery. And he's at that stranger fright/separation anxiety stage. (Caleb never went through this so it caught me off guard with Joshua.) I thought I'd ruined him by keeping him with me so much. But he's getting through that stage and even stayed in the nursery for 2 hours last night at Bible study. After a day, though, he was fine. Joshua lights up when Kevin comes into the room, smiles his huge, gummy smile, and starts to laugh-gasp.
We went to a volunteer appreciation thing for Kevin's unit Monday night. Caleb played with his friend Ellie while we talked with her parents, the Posts. After a few minutes I looked over at the kids and they were throwing dirt at each other and laughing hysterically. Caleb wiped dirt out of his eyes, tears coming down, and squealed with delight. He looked like Pig-Pen, with a smile.
