Happy Halloween!

Diego went to school in the morning (wearing a bright orange shirt) and I picked him up early to go to Papi's office for the festivities. We changed him into his horse costume in Ricardo's office and he was not happy...but only for about 40 seconds. Once he realized he had a tail and a horsey head, he was thrilled. And then of course once he saw how much attention he got with his costume, he thought it was the coolest thing ever! All the cubicles and offices had buckets of candy and a lot of the employees were giving out the candy themselves. He didn't quite get down the "Trick or Treat," but was very polite and said "gracias" every time he picked up a piece of candy. He carried around a black bucket and loved loading it up with goodies. He was fascinated by all of the other kids in the costumes and by all of the decorations. There was a contest for the decorations so a lot of the areas went all out - it was pretty impressive. Luckily, Diego is not at the age where any of this nonsense scares him, but it was quite spooky for the bigger kids. He was very eager to tell everyone that he was a "horsey" and that a horsey says "Neeeeigh."
The whole way home he repeated all that he had seen "monstruo verde" (green monster), "vapor" (vapor, meaning smoke), "pumpkins," etc. There was one monster that laughed and made funny noises and he perfected the imitation of that monster.
It is so much fun to talk to him these days because he really tries to engage in conversation and answers questions really well. He rarely ever says just one word anymore, he tries to combine words and make up his own sentences. He'll say things like "Globo nubes" (balloon clouds) which means his balloon went up to the clouds. Or "rhinoceronte push cabeza" (rhinoceros push head) remembering how the rhino at the zoo pushed the log with it's head.



This area must have won the prize because they went all out with the decorations!



Posing with all the other munchkins

Here we are!

I can't believe it's been almost two weeks since I've written! My computer is SO slow these days that I just have a hard time finding the time to sit down and work on it. I am taking it into Best Buy this week to wipe out the hard-drive and reinstall everything....so, it should be up and running just in time for baby girl's arrival!
We're all doing great and Diego has been a busy boy the past couple weeks. We went on a family camping trip with a group from church last weekend and had a blast. The beach pictures below are from the trip. There were a ton of kids there and they scooped Diego right up and hauled him off to play with them. It's so fun that he's at the age where we can let him go off with the big kids and he has a blast. As long as we know there is one responsible person taking care of him, we are comfortable. We went on a long hike (which I was sure was going to induce labor!) and just had a fun and relaxing time.
On our way back home Saturday Ricardo and I decided to call a babysitter and have one last date night before Alexia arrives. We went out to a fabulous Thai restaurant and had a lot of fun talking and enjoying each other's company. After dinner we went to a dessert cafe and treated ourselves to delicious desserts.
On Sunday we had a special visit from Tante Paige and Diego LOVED having her here. He called her "Paigey" and followed her all over the apartment. I enjoyed her visit more than anyone because we had special girl time and even went to the movies (which I hadn't done since before Diego was born)!
This weekend was a fun one too! On Saturday we took Diego to the zoo for the first time and we all had so much fun. Diego was in awe the entire time and didn't say a single word. But as soon as we left, we wouldn't stop talking about all of the animals we saw. His favorites were the rhinos, gorillas and lions.



He was so busy that it was hard to get him to stop for a picture


Uh-oh, a little mud on the hand!


Throwing rocks in the water


Lovin' the outdoors!


Poor Papi had to carry him most of the hike which was over 45 minutes!


At the playground with Paigey


Riding Paigey's stuffed doggie



This was at "Kanga-zoom" which is an indoor play area full of inflatable slides, houses, tunnels, etc. I even went into the inflatable houses with him and jumped around - it's a great place!


If I shower with a shower-cap on, he insists on wearing one too.


Our closet has at least 15 toys in it, but now all he wants to do is stomp around in my shoes while I shower and get ready


He couldn't believe he was actually seeing a real lion!



The gorillas were fascinating!


11 days (or less) to go!

"PAYGOUND!!!!"

Diego's new fascination is going to the playground - he looooooves it! And the way he says "paygound" is soooo cute. He loves to go down the slide, swing, turn steering wheels, just about anything that's there, he'll enjoy. He also played in a sandbox for the first time this week and had a blast. He played with Caitlin for almost an hour and didn't sit down once.
He's been a busy boy this week. There was no school on Monday so he was very excited to go to school today. He remembers all of his classmates names and recounts them several times throughout the day, but his favorite is "MIA!" The others are Ella, Henri, Blake, Taylor and Gene. Mia is always first on the list though!

He's going to miss having a built-in stool on mami's belly

Steering wheels are his new favorite!

After mami and papi enjoyed a game of frisbee (which fascinated Diego), he would NOT let go of it

Mami went so high she got queasy!

Having a blast with Anjuli

Cuddle for Anjuli

Showered with Love

This past Saturday our baby girl and I were the guests of honor at a baby shower! My good friends, Emily and Katie and my mom (who flew in from Seattle) hosted a wonderful shower at an adorable tea house. Everything was perfect and we had a blast playing games, drinking tea, eating delicious tea sandwiches and pastries and opening PINK presents! It was a really special afternoon! Thank you mom, Em and Katie!!!
Diego was thrilled to have Grammie here for the weekend. They had a lot of fun playing together and Diego kept her very busy reading books, playing with his vehicles, singing songs, coloring with crayons and running around the apartment. Unfortunately, I didn't take a single picture of Diego this weekend, but here are some pictures from the shower:

With the gracious hostesses, Katie and Emily. I'm holding Emily's adorable 6-week old girl, Madelyn who was an angel the whole time.

The happy Grammie-to-be!

The food was exquisite!

Thank you friends!!!!

And the fun continues!

On Saturday we had a fun family day. We went out to brunch and had a wonderful meal. Diego didn't eat much, but behaved really well and let Ricardo and I enjoy our meal and conversation. From there we went to Piedmont Park and Diego had a blast. There was a game of "ultimate frisbee" going on and he was enthralled. He did not want to move an inch and kept his eyes glued to the frisbee. We had to pull all sorts of tricks to get him to walk with us. He found a leaf and pretended it was his frisbee and threw it all about for awhile. He ran and ran and ran some more before he was worn out and ready to head home. He fell asleep in the car and took a nice, long nap at home. I had to wake him up (which I hate doing) since we had a wedding to go to and I had to get him dressed up. He wore his very first suit and looked so handsome. He was mad when we put the dress shirt and coat on him, but we found the perfect solution. We put toys in the pockets of the coat and he thought that was really cool so he kept the coat on for the whole afternoon. He was an absolute star at the wedding. Fortunately there was childcare during the ceremony so it was really nice to be able to enjoy the wedding by ourselves and then he joined us at the reception. He knew he was hot stuff and loved all the attention! I have to say, he was the cutest guy in that room! :) It's so funny, but for some reason he is drawn to older girls. He ran up to every girl he saw and tried to play with them - we had to keep a very close eye on him because he was always on the go.
After his nap this afternoon I took him to the Dunwoody Nature Center which is close to our home. We had never been there before and it was great. There are several trails and activities to do in the woods so it will be fun to go when he's a bit older. We trekked up to a playground in the woods which he absolutely loved. We couldn't stay long because there were too many mosquitoes and I didn't have repellent, but we enjoyed the short time we were there. We will definitely be going back. There were a bunch of squirrels so he loved trying to chase them around.


Keeping a very close eye on that frisbee!


This was the leaf that he threw around like a frisbee - he loved it!



Run, run as fast as you can!


Just 6 weeks to go!



Heart-breaker!!!



This is part of the playground at the Nature Center



He was itching to pick up these wood chips, but did a good job resisting




At first he thought this was a slide and tried to scoot down it!

Busy days for a lil' guy

I rarely feel like weeks escape me, but this past week FLEW by. Ricardo has been extremely busy at work and Diego has been busy at play. He did well at school this week and was excited to go on Wednesday, which made me happy. On the days that he doesn't go to school I now make more of an effort to have a bit of structure to our day and to do fun things with him. On Tuesday morning we went to the library for the first time and would have had a better time if it hadn't been so close to his nap time. He did ok for a little while, but then was acting up a bit so we had to leave. We checked out a few books and I'm really looking forward to going back in order to get a better stock of books. There are so many other things that keep him busy around home that he hasn't been reading as much lately and I want to get that habit back. He also seems to think that there are more important things to be doing than eating so he hasn't been eating much either. We can't believe how quickly his rolls are fading from his arms and legs! We are hoping this is just a stage he's going through and will be back with a hefty appetite in a few weeks so he can maintain some of that baby chub that we all love.
Last Saturday we went to dinner at Jana, Kane and Mara Kate's house (good friends from church) and had a great time. Diego and Mara Kate had a BLAST playing together and were so silly. I took at least 10 pictures of them sitting on the couch and the one below is one of the only ones in which they're both smiling.

I found a great little gift for Diego last week and he loves it - a watering can just his size. He has always enjoyed helping Papi take care of the plants and used to fill up small tupperware containers with water to pour in the planters. Well now he has his very own watering can and can't get enough of it. I refilled it with water this afternoon at least 15 times!

Having fun with Mara Kate

The few seconds of good behavior at the library

He is a pro at watering plants and makes sure to evenly distribute the water around the whole planter

Creative Corner

We decided to set Diego up with a little Creative Corner in the living room and he loves it! So far, his favorite thing is to sit in the chair and play with his cars. I bought him 4 mini cars this week and they are his new fascination. He won't play with anything else! This morning he was happily eating his waffle & peanut butter when he suddenly picked up his plate, passed it to me and said "all done" "all done." He had spotted the cars on the red table! There was no way he was wasting any more time eating his breakfast - he had to have those cars! He then carried them all in to the bathroom so that he could chat with Papi while he got ready for work.
You will notice two projects hanging on the window - these are his masterpieces from Monday morning. He was sooo excited to show them to me and to tell me all about them. He showed me where the whole family is "mami", "papa", "digo" and "bebe." He even said "bebe cry" when he showed it to me. Now he loves to recount the members of his family and always remembers to include the "bebe." The yellow paper has a tree that has his green hand prints and each hand print represents a member of the family which he also loves to talk about.

Yesterday we went to the salon, yet again. He loved it and was such a champ, as always!

When he realized today was a school day (because he saw me preparing his lunch), he got very sad and clung to me like a little koala. I felt so bad and kept telling him how much fun school was going to be today. When we arrived he went right into Ms April's arms so that put me at ease.






I've lost count, but I think this was haircut #8