Snow shoeing

Okay, this is a LITTLE out of order. But, back in February, when we still had snow on the ground, we went on a family date to Boulder Lake and went Moonlight Snowshoeing. Nate carried Isaiah on his back in our AWESOME Ergo carrier. It was a beautiful evening, of course a bit chilly, but the moon was full and gave off plenty of light for us to snowshoe our path. Okay, I'll be honest...one of Nate's snowshoe bindings broke while we were putting our shoes on, so we ended up having to walk the path. It worked out just fine though because the path was pretty packed down so you didn't have to worry about falling through the snow. I think we'll put the snow shoes away for this year! The way the weather has been, I don't know that we'll see anymore snow before October. But, this is Duluth...

Spring Break!

Although I didn’t have Spring Break from work, my 16 year old sister and Nathan both did. So, we did our annual meet up during Spring Break. Pearl and my mom drove up from SD and met me, Nathan and Isaiah in Minneapolis. We had a great time.

We started our break by driving down to Minneapolis Wednesday afternoon. We visited a friend who just had a baby and then had dinner with Nathan’s sister and her partner. Then, we headed to the hotel in downtown Minneapolis where we waited for my mom’s and Pearl’s arrival. They finally arrived and we spent the evening catching up.

Thursday we began our vacation by heading to the Minneapolis library and playing in the toddler area. It's a newly remodeled library and had a GREAT space for toddlers. It was so beautiful outside, that we decided it would be in our best interest to spend some time outside so we headed to Como Park. We walked around the zoo and the gardens throughout Como Park and enjoyed the wonderful weather. Being that it was my birthday, we then headed to a wonderful Indian restuarant for dinner and enjoyed a delicious meal. Then it was back to the hotel for some Ben & Jerry's ice-cream! :)

Friday Nathan headed to St. John's for class, so Pearl, my mom, me and Isaiah headed to the Mall of America to do some prom dress shopping for Pearl. Yes, Pearl is going to prom this year! She found her dress after not too much stress (lucky for us all!). Then, off to Ikea. I can't believe how well Isaiah did through all the stimuli! We are one lucky family to have such an awesome kiddo! :)

Saturday morning we woke up and headed to St. Cloud with my mom and sister to celebrate Isaiah's birthday with a birthday party with friends and family at Nate's parents house. We had a lovely Mexican themed dinner with lots of yummy dessert! My grandma recently sent me the birthday candle used on my first birthday, so that was used on Isaiah's cake. I can't believe my grandma kept that candle after all these years!

We had a great time celebrating and were so lucky to have both sides of the family attend the party.

Valentine's Day in Duluth

Our 1st Valentine's Day as parents was perfect! As I shared before, we got a babysitting co-op going and I was the secretary for this first month, which means that I arranged all the sits. So, Nathan secretly went behind my back and found the list of sitters and called around to see if he could find someone to watch Isaiah so we could go on an early Valentine's day date (our 2nd date in one week...gotta love this co-op!). So, I came home from work, Nathan had picked out my outfit to wear and had Isaiah all ready to go to a sitter's house. We dropped him off and went to dinner at Va Bene, an Italian restaurant that has a year round balcony that overlooks Lake Superior. It was absolutely beautiful as the ice was beginning to break up and the sun was setting. Below is our view from our table. We enjoyed a lovely dinner together.

The next day, Nathan, Isaiah and I walked down to Bayfront Park for a full day of festivities to mark the first day of the Olympics. We had a beautiful day just moseying around by the lake and enjoying a crisp February day. Here is that awesome Lake Superior ice again...as I write this April 5, the ice is LONG gone!!

Babysitting Co-Op

Our group of moms continues to get together, which has been just a HUGE blessing in our lives. Especially mine, as motherhood can be challenging at times and I often question myself on the choices we make. However, to have other moms sitting in the same boat is a lifesaver.

We recently started up a babysitting co-op, which has also been a blessing. Nate and I were able to go on our first date in several months thanks to the co-op (I guess we're just too cheap to pay a sitter). So, instead of exchanging money for watching each others' kiddos, we exchange points. It has been excellent so far; it will be fun to see how the co-op expands and changes to see how our relationships with each other continue to grow.

9 months

Isaiah had his 9 month check up (although he is actually 10 1/2 months now) and here is how he measured up:

Height: 31"

Weight: 21 lbs. 13 oz.

His growing has slowed down quite a bit and he is now in the 80th percentile for height and about the 60th percentile for weight. Although, he is still comparable in size to some of his older friends.

Believe it or not, he is still not crawling...although, he does an incredible job of turning in circles on his butt, reaching for things and he is even beginning to get a little bit of an army crawl down (his Grandma Sam or Papa Jerry must have been teaching him that over Christmas). :) Just over the weekend he got clapping down, which is just SO cute. Every day is more of a surprise of what he can do. He is getting to look more and more like a little boy, especially when he smiles and you can see his little teeth (he has 6 now). Just like everyone says, parenting just keeps getting better and better.

Mexico, entry 2

We had an incredible hike on our day "off" in Tepotzlan. We started in town and hiked our way up a mountain to where we could get up close to the pyramid El Tepozteco. When we began our hike, we were assured that there were switchbacks up the mountain. We learned quickly that there were no switchbacks...indeed, just straight up the mountain! It was about a mile hike up from the base of the mountain and we made it up in about 1 hour. It was the perfect temperature for hiking and a pretty easy-going trail (although, I wasn't the one carrying Isaiah!). It was great to get out and do a nice hike.

Another day we had the chance to go on an outing as a group to some ruins. This was also very beautiful. Unfortuately, our translator wasn't with us this day and our guide only spoke Spanish so we didn't get to fully understand the story behind these ruins. It was a beautiful area though.

Overall, our trip to Mexico was a great success. We had a wonderful time and Isaiah did great. He was the best traveller we could ask for. We were told before we left that Mexican women love babies; in reality, I think it's safer to say they ADORE babies. I don't think it helped that Isaiah has blonde hair, blue eyes and fair skin! :) Everyone wanted to hold him and play with him...it was really sweet and made us feel very welcomed. Living at the retreat center was the director's grandaughter who was born just three days after Isaiah (she, however, was MUCH smaller than Isaiah). Here are some pics from that:

Our trip to Mexico wouldn't be complete without an outside bath! :) Nate and I thought it was fun, but Isaiah didn't think so though.

Hola Amigos!

Nathan, Isaiah and I arrived in Cuernavaca, Mexico on Monday. Nathan is leading a service learning trip here, so Isaiah and I thought we'd tag along. :) Great time of year to be in Mexico, I have to admit. It wasn't hard at all leaving behind the many feet of snow and the below zero temps. I'm sure it will be hard to get on the plane to go back.

Cuernavaca is a city of about 1 million people and is about 2 hours southwest of Mexico City. We are staying at a retreat center in the mountains here about 20 minutes from downtown. It is a beautiful location and it overlooks the giant city. In the distance we can see Mt. Popo (an active volcano) and the mountain range...this morning Mt. Popo was covered in snow; I guess it is winter here afterall.

Tuesday was our first day learning about the communities here. We spent time at a squatter settlement where families live on government land, but own their shacks. This means that at any point, the government could kick them out and they will become homeless. Scary for many of the families as at any time they could lose their home. Later that day we had a woman speak to us about what it was like to grow up in Mexico and try to find work that would pay her a decent wage. She also shared how she longed to go to school, but her family didn't feel it was important and therefore did not want to invest the money. Later in her life she went on to open a little store and was taught by her children how to keep the books and read! Currently she is doing community organizing throughout Cuernavaca.

Yesterday we started our day by going on a "quest" with small groups. We were given a days wage of 50 pesos and a grocery list. Our task was to take our 50 pesos and see how difficult it was to buy a few groceries on this wage. We took the bus downtown and visited some different sites such as the Zocalo (center of town) and the Cathedral built in 1525. It was amazing to see just how expensive things were, especially considering that the "minimum wage" is 50 pesos a day (equivalent to about $5). Very interesting experience. Last night we hear from a historian who teaches at the university in Mexico City...very intelligent man who shared a lot of background in the hour that he spoke. Gives us all a better understanding of the background of Mexicans and where Mexico is likely to go from here.

Hope to post pictures soon after we get back to MN. These computers don't have a slot for our SD card, so will have to wait. Stay wam and I'll post more soon. Paz!