El Bebe Se Callo (the Baby Fell)!

The first few days home:



Grandpa pulling the kids through the snow

My dad was here when we arrived at the airport, but he had a big inspection at work this week and had to head back home on Tuesday.  My dad's coworkers sent a beautiful basket of flowers, thank you so much for the wonderful surprise!  Abuelo checks in multiple times a day with us to find all of the latest news and remind the kids that he's thinking of them.

So, after 2 days without hot water, we are back up and running.  Jason replaced both thermostats on the water heater, and still, no hot water.  Shoot!!  So he consulted with a good friend of ours, and they figured out what the problem was.  Our power company had put a regulator on our electrical supply to the hot water heater, and had shut us down to only run on off-peak hours (they forgot to mention it to us, and have been billing us full-price for the last 2 years!  Customer service got an ear-full today!).  So, there was never really anything wrong with the water heater except for the fact that we ran it down to nothing, I think we did about 10 loads of laundry in 24 hours, and then didn't wait long enough for it to heat back up.  At least now we know.  Thanks Al and Carol for coming to our rescue!!




The mountains of laundry that blew out the water heater!

 The kids have been doing well, and we are all adjusting.  Christian is really blossoming.  Of all 3 boys, he seems to be the most relaxed and happy to be settling in at home.  He is running around exploring, and chattering away in his baby-talk.  If only he was a little less prone to falling on his head!  Well, I am happy to report that today he did not fall on his head once, and all of his previous bumps and bruises are starting to heal.  Poor kid, I sometimes think he would really benefit from a little football helmet until he is steadier on his feet.  I have been reassured that this is typical for 2 year olds, so am trying not to get too paraniod and just let him explore and play without me hovering over him every single second.

The older 2 boys have had a little rockier transition since we've been home.  It has been challenging, but we are starting to see them settle in a little bit more day by day.  Santi had really been withdrawing and behaving fairly aloof the first couple of days, but he is starting to show more love and affection again.  At dinner tonight, the kids were singing the meal time prayer that Tia Vicki taught them (sung to the tune of Superman...Thank you God!  For giving us food!  In Spanish, of course)  Tonight the kids started singing "Thank you God!  For giving us Mom!  Thank you God!  For giving us Dad!  Thank you God!  For giving us Abuela!"  It was really cute.

Juan Manuel has just started giving us kisses.  The boys give us lots of hugs, but we have only in the last 2 days gotten kisses from Juan Manuel.  We still have yet to get an "I love you" from any of the boys, but we know that they need time to come to that, and we just keep on loving them in the mean time.

The boys and Ruby are the best of friends.  We are amazed to see how gentle and accepting Ruby is of the kids...it is as if she has been waiting for them, and is fulfilling her life's purpose in letting them hug her and kiss her and play fetch with her.  We are also amazed to see how motivated the kids are to learn English in order to play with Ruby.  They very quickly learned "sit", "come", "go get it", "good girl", and "shake".  We may have to put Ruby in her house at dinner time, as she has figured out that the kids drop a lot of food on the floor, and the kids tend to drop more food on the floor to lure Ruby over to them.  Nice try, but Mom and Dad are onto you!




Ruby realizing that Christian is a walking treat-machine
(even if he isn't eating food, he is usually covered in it)





Grandma reading to the kids





Christian giving Ruby a kiss (on the mouth!)





When a 2 year old is bundled up for the snow and falls down,
he's just like a turtle on its back.  Ayudame!!!






Mom and the kids in the snow (the first time I've sat/layed down all week!!)





Santi getting ready to sled down the hill


Ok, so here's a really funny story that happened yesterday.  The kids have started to mimic some of the English phrases that we say the most often.  The kids have picked up on me saying "Oh, my gosh!", and now they say it (or something that sounds close to it) all the time too.  Last night I was reading the kids a book about adoption, and the book was talking about how children are born, but that sometimes children cannot stay with their birth moms and are adopted.  There was a page with pictures that were fairly graphic, see below.  When I turned to this page, Santiago nearly ripped the book out of my hands to stare at the page, and exclaimed, "Oh, my gosh!  El bebe se callo!" or "Oh, my gosh!  The baby fell!"  I laughed my head off.  These kids say the funniest things sometimes!

Not too much else is new here.  We continue to have our ups and downs, and continue to be grateful to my mom for all of her help.