More laundry stories

Today we took a drive on the outskirts of town while the girls took their naps. We drove down some rocky roads that probably weren't great for our little car, and we saw many families washing their clothes on rocks and rinsing them in the stream. We also saw some clothes hanging out to dry on barbed wire. Amazing.

Here are some pix of the girls at the little playground in town. Audrey & Avery rode their first see-saw (Audrey loved it, Avery not so much), and Audrey said "those are funny looking swings" because the seats were metal and straight.

A full day without meltdowns until the very end, when Iain said he was making eggs for breakfast in the morning (this is Avery's favorite food). She jumped off of our bed and ran to the dining room table. When I explained that the eggs would come in the morning and not NOW, all kinds of tears flowed down. But she was in bed, happily sleeping, about 10 minutes later, so the next thing she'll know will be cheesy eggs on her plate. =) (One random thing about the eggs in the grocery store here is that they're not in the refrigerated section. I find this odd.)

World Cup

Iain has become a World Cup fanatic since arriving in Panama (he even bought a Brazil flag to fly from our rental car ... no, he's not really a Brazil fan, he just couldn't resist having a flag). Here's some video of the girls playing soccer in the house yesterday (the rain outside prevented a full-on game, so we had to make a goal out of Audrey's frog boots).

Cats and Monkeys and Homework, Oh My

Our first 2 days of school have been good. The girls' teacher is Aralis and they seem to really like her. Yesterday, they did puzzles and colored ... today, they had their first homework assignment where they had to color their favorite fruit. Audrey chose pineapple and Avery chose strawberries. Some pix of them coloring are below.

Also included are some video shots of them chasing the local hotel cat around the gardens yesterday (they took strings to let the cat chase but then didn't really want the cat to touch them) and some video of a monkey at some local gardens today. In the car on the way home, though, they both told us that they didn't like the monkey on their shoulders. =)

Yesterday, Iain and the girls also did laundry (which consists of dropping our laundry off at a lavanderia, coming back the next day, and receiving our completely folded laundry for almost less than the cost of the soap). Today, the girls and I had rocky road ice-cream for a snack after lunch. If ice-cream shops were so cheap near our US house, I would weigh about 300 pounds. =)

I did my homework today in the hammock outside our door while the girls took their naps. Life is good!

Some things never change

The girls watching Olivia on the floor of our house and eating grapes (that came from Chile, just like the ones we bought in SD). =) It's still pouring outside and there's apparently a limit on how long it continues to be fun to stomp in the puddles.

Playing in the Rain

My video from yesterday must have been too long and it never uploaded. Trying again w/ a new one from today. Looks like it'll be pretty easy to get 'playing in the rain' footage here, since we're now 2 for 2 of rainy days.

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We're in Panama safe and sound

We are here, and Boquete is everything we hoped it would be. The little town is authentically rustic, and our cabin is awesome. Here is video of the normally-rain-phobic Audrey living it up in the puddles. We shopped for groceries at the little store (like a combination hardware store and grocery store) and made macaroni and cheese, hotdogs (which were locally made, and the girls wouldn't even eat them, but Iain thought they were fine), and fresh green beans. The only bad thing about today is that the US lost to Ghana.

[The video will be uploaded shortly.]

Our new baby

The title was just to get your attention. We don't have a REAL new baby, but Audrey has been pretending for the last few days that we have a "little tiny baby." And his or her name (it's a girl or boy, depending on the hour) is "Twinkle twinkle little star how I wonder what you are." =)