Halloween stuff

It was a very festive Halloween. Marisa had a mini field trip to a plaza within walking distance from her school and I joined her class to trick-o-treat there. Elena had a festival at her school that was enjoyed by all and then of course we did the usual pumpkin carve and trick or treating in the neighborhood. Our fellow Aggie friends joined us with their 3 year old and newborn baby girl! Fun, fun, fun!

On our way
Central Market

See the mom in red in the background? That was my favorite costume. It's Veruka Salt from the original Willy Wonka. Her sons were Ooompa lumpas. How creative!
With her teachers

The carve

Fall Festival at Elena's school
games





Omar stayed behind to pass out candy while I joined the girls. When we were done we rang the doorbell and surprised Omar since he was expecting neighborhood kids.

Swim safety

The girls got a kick out of this swim class. Their swim class does a safety day and the kids ride on a raft to learn what to do incase they go overboard. The instructor really flipped the raft over and then the kids had to swim to grab the rope on the side of the raft and call for help. Notice they are wearing life jackets.

Karina is 10 months old

I love this age! Karina is so much fun despite her recent neediness lately. She seems to catch some type of illness every two weeks and then just wants to be held all day. It doesn't help that she has 5 teeth coming in simultaneously either. The other girls never seemed to care about their new teeth or at least they never showed discomfort but Karina seems to mind. She is still fun loving, cuddly and laid back. She started crawling with her belly off the floor two weeks ago and she is loving it. Her sisters entertain her immensely which I didn't realize until she and I were away from the family for a conference (more on that later).

Karina loves to eat anything and has tried more foods than her sisters did at this age. This mostly has to do with her wanting food instantly. To meet her needs I must serve her what everyone else is eating immediately. She will eat and eat and doesn't seem to get full. She once started to fall asleep while eating. It was hilarious, she had her eyes closed while inserting food in her mouth.

Sleep is so, so, recently. Along with the illnesses come night wakings. I try to be patient about it because she doesn't feel well but the regression is hard for me since she was already sleeping through the night at 3 months. Luckily though she does wonderfully during the day regardless of how she slept the previous night. She will nap twice in a day or on the go and is very adaptable. She must know she's the 3rd child.

Karina nods no, signs milk, says mama and leche which sounds like e-te.

Now that I know how long babyhood lasts, it saddens me to know that we're half way through it. If only I could stop time--just for a moment
1st spaghetti



1st swing ride

Finding pictures

I found these old photos on Omar's phone the other day and they made me smile. It must be almost exactly a year ago...notice the pumpkins.

AT LAST!!

I CAN POST!! Sorry I've been MIA. We got a new computer and with the new Explorer I couldn't publish anything. I have so much to catch up on...be on the look out for new posts soon. In the meantime, here's a recent picture.

TABE Conference

This time I went to a conference! In order to maintain my teaching certificate, I have to take 150 hours of professional development every five years. I don't want to lose my teaching certificate so I've started to work toward those hours before my current certification expires. I have a couple of years so I'm kind of cramming. I was able to attend the Texas Association for Bilingual Educators (TABE) conference held in McAllen this year thanks to Omar and my Mom who watched the girls. Omar worked from home during the 3 days and shuttled the girls to and from school and all those other "mom" duties. He did an AWESOME job!! I'm still nursing Karina so she came. along with my mom so that she could watch Karina during the sessions. I returned to the hotel for Karina during breaks and it worked out perfectly. On top of that, Omar used his hotel points for our stay so we were more than comfortable and I was able to save some money there. I have to admit it was like a little vacation for me with minus 2 children! It also felt good to be in the education realm again, and I realized that despite how removed I am from it at the moment, the subject still interests me and that makes me look forward to someday returning to my former profession. My next conference is NABE in February. I am looking forward to learning even more.

Wedding

Elena and Marisa were recently flower girls in my cousin's wedding. We are lucky to have some family nearby and we were happy that they asked the girls to be part of the wedding. The girls were really looking forward to it and enjoyed wearing beautiful dresses and carrying their flower. The wedding was beautiful and we even enjoyed part of the reception alone because we were able to get a babysitter for the latter part of the reception. My youngest sister was in town for the wedding and we enjoyed their company and visiting a few of our favorite Austin spots with them and their two kids.


I needed a pedicure and brought Elena along. This was her first pedicure. She enjoyed it.



The girls with the blushing bride
Elena and Marisa love their cousin Christian!
There they go
The vows
Isn't their getaway car awesome?

The Hula Hut on Lake Austin

My sister and her youngest on Mount Bonnell. Isn't he the cutest? He is 3 months younger than Karina.


My sister and her family