January 9 - 26, 2019 – 4 years 7 months: Barra de Potosí, Mexico, Part 1

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May 1-9, 2018 - 3 years 10 months

Proud Mama moment… I ordered breaded green beans for us at the Sheep Creek Lodge as a lame attempt to provide my child with a vegetable and guess what!  He not only loved them but peeled the greasy breading off and ate only the green bean part and said, "Yummy!!"

Later on, a band started up, playing fun rockabilly and lounge music and Kadin said, "Too loud" and would only watch from outside.  (Can you spot him?!)

My little helper these days… "Me help Mom, ok?"  And he cleaned every window on my car, including the sideview mirrors.  He started to try to wash the entire car, and I managed to convince him that he had already helped out plenty.  

OK, this might be one of my favorites… picturing him as a 30-year-old intellectual in his university office… absolutely too cute!

We must have spent over an hour playing in an old log pile, climbing up and down, "catching fish in the lake" (the bottom of the pile was the lake, sticks were our catch), and getting Bucky to follow him down the rabbit hole.

Buckarooni!

Our new favorite bathing spot on the 2nd floor of the Fairview.  It's my favorite because, one, I can get in the tub as well, and, two, they let me order a drink and bring it up to the bath.  Heavenly!

Kadito, Buck, and I had a great time just playing in the hollow across the street from our house.  Kadin would throw the ball down into it and we would sometimes have to give Bucky directions to find the ball – and he got it!  Gee (right), Haw (left), Uh uh (nope), Da Vuelta (turn around), and Sigue, sigue (keep going).  Kadin won't let me take many photos but he loves showing his talents on video!

January 22-23, 2018 - Playa del Carmen, Mexico (3 years 6 months) - THE TOWN

On the bus to Playa del Carmen, Kadin wanted to play with my hair ties and asked me to put them in his hair.  Too cute!!!  Unfortunately, he says, "Mi niña!" now, and I had to tell him that boys can wear ponytails too but if he wants to pretend he is a girl, that's ok too!  

We stayed in a really nasty hostel only one night, but it's advantage was that it was right next to this plaza (Parque Los Fundadores), where lots of exciting things were happening.  The beach was right here as well, but we didn't hang out on the beach that much in this town.

Our first night in Playa, we watched the Mayan Dancers.  They were super colorful and fun.  You could ask to have your picture taken with them but Kadito was a bit leary of some of the dancers who were dressed up as animals and a skeleton.

Kadito liked the dancers but he LOVED the Voladores de Papantla (Flyers from Papantla).   He heard the drums going indicating it was about to start and took off running to see them fly. 

It's a blurry photo, but this is how Kadin watched the flyers, riveted in his seat, fascinated.  I asked if he wanted to do it and he said, "Mi hombre, me do it." (When I'm a man, I'll do it)

And here they are… Los Voladores de Papantla… This video is from YouTube because none of mine turned out.

I finally convinced Kadin to leave the Flyers and go out for dinner.  Here he is with a mouth full of pizza, watching the musicians play in the restaurant.  "Too loud!", he said.  My little monkey.

Another blurry photo, but too adorable to leave out and I wanted to include a photo of him wearing his surfer-boy necklace made out of a cut shell embedded with crushed blue stones.

The next morning, we left the nasty hostel and walked for about an hour to our new place, a sweet little condo I found on Air B&B.  It was already pretty hot so we got some ice cream… and even with ice cream in his hand, the little punk wouldn't smile for the camera.   He was happy, I swear!

January 14-15, 2018 - Mahahual, Mexico (3 years 6 months)

Look Mama, you can't see my thumb!

Listening to the ocean waves…

Mahahual's beaches were mostly calm with lots of sea grasses and shells and other treasures for my budding naturalist.  

Showing me his treasure – a barnacle and sea grass covered shell of some sort.

Of course, if there is a puppy around, Kadin wants to be his best friend.  This cutie was about 9 months old and named Luna.

Yum! Octopus!  He loved it and mostly liked to eat off the suction cups.  Whenever we'd go to another restaurant, he'd say, "Me want eat pupu!"  Of course, pupu is pulpo, Spanish for octopus, but it made a few people turn their heads. ;-)

Same meal.  Kadin decides to paint his fingernails… with ketchup.  He was very proud of it and was happy to let me take his photo.

My little funny face, I love you so much.

Here's our campsite at Mahahual.  Definitely my favorite.  Right on the beach and not too crowded and there was even a bar and restaurant right there.

October 1 - 15, 2017 - 3 years 3 months

We went out for sushi and Kadin did a great job with his chopsticks!

ARGGH.  He LOVED the calamari.  He actually ate everything but wasn't too excited about the raw salmon.

As a surprise reward for being so good in the restaurant and in Value Village, I let Kadin pick out a toy and he is super excited about his new pirate ship!

It even has little mini wheels so it can smoothly sail the concrete seas.

Soleil's Birthday Party!!! Soleil is the girl to the far left.  

Mr. Monkey Acrobat in the bath.

In aerial yoga, this would be the orangutan pose.

Throwing rocks and sticks and leaves and watching them sink or float down the coast like a pirate ship.  (Everything is a pirate ship these days!)

It took Kadin over an hour to finally work up the courage to approach Sparky, the fire dog.  Sparky was quiet and patient and eventually Kadin wanted to show him all of his toys and art.  He even started to "read" the fire activity book to him!

We visited Wendy for a lovely tea and biscuits and a fun romp with her dogs.  Kadin found a feather on her window sill and he let me put it in his hair.  I love his facial expression in this picture for some reason.  

Yes, he's still running around naked.  But the awesome thing is that he had watched me mop the floor a few minutes prior to this and then immediately picked up the mop, mopped the floor, and used the squeegie thing to get the water out.  Kids' amazing ability to watch and imitate never ceases to surprise me.

August 16 - 30, 2017 - 3 years 1 month

Kadin loves climbing up on the old fire truck at the station and can even climb down without my help.  My little monkey!

Kadin wasn't there for loading up the logs onto a trailer, but it is still one of his favorite videos to watch.  The bigger the machinery the better in his world!

Kadin will now put on the googles but still won't go under the water with them on.

After swimming, Kadin and I went out to lunch with Alden and his family.  Here, Kadin and Alden are both using the butter knife to try to cut up the ice cubes.  They are definitely two kindred spirits.

Alden's mom, Nikki, and his sister, Althea, read books together while the other two were playing with knives.

It wouldn't be summer in Alaska without at least one puddle photo.  Here, Kadin's shoe came off in the sticky mud and he just kept on running with out it.  I also tried to keep his cute red Converses out of the mud, but I knew that it was not going to last.

The rains began in August, and along with them, many beautiful rainbows.  Kadin would only pose for the photo if his curly fries could be part of it.

One rainy day, we drove down to the Alaska Transportation Museum and fortunately, it stopped raining intermittently and we enjoyed the outside exhibits.  Kadin sure looks little next to these giant planes!

He was quite disappointed to find out that we were not allowed to climb inside the planes!  

There was a train set up that he could climb into and he would race through each car as fast as he could, jumping on the seats, grabbing any levers he found, and avoiding the scary barmaid manequin in the dining car.

A gift arrived in the mail for Kadin and after opening it, he studied it closely to figure out what it was….

Tinkerbell stickers!!!! Yay!!!!  Thanks Abuela Baiba!!