Strep

Strep
The big news is that I got strep. At least it felt big at the time because man was I ever hurting. Now that I've taken three doses of my antibiotics, I feel much, much, much better. I don't remember strep being that bad when I was a kid. I couldn't get through the night without Tylenol + codeine. The only reason I have that on hand is because I hardly ever taken pain medications that are prescribed to me. This time, I dug through the medicine cabinet until I found something that would help with the pain and drugged myself up. Between my throat and my achy body, it was awful.

But today I'm doing great. Tomorrow I plan to resume my walking regime along with food logging. Tuesday I'll return to Crossfit.

Unfortunately, we think D now has it. He has an appointment tonight to see.

Travel
Our flights back from Mexico were easy. We managed to get on an earlier flight out of LA, so we got home at 9:30 pm rather than 11:50 pm. So much better.

The layover in LA also went fast because Vic & Mike & Bear (or "the Vics" as Avery calls them) had a long layover, too. We sat in a diner, ate, and played spades.

When we were waiting in line to order food at the diner in LAX, I noticed the guy in front of me was wearing a "Fighting Reds" t-shirt. I looked closer and realized I recognized some of the names. Then I realized he was from Eaton. I tapped him on the shoulder and we visited about small world, etc. I guess it's not that strange to bump into someone from the same small town as me, but I note it nonetheless.

Spy

Spy Games

We have some walkie talkies down here. I bought them to use while snowboarding and never used them, so bringing them down here seemed like a good idea. Avery asked to play spy with them, so I obliged. We spent 30 minutes or so running around the neighborhood playing spy. Avery's code name was Pinkalicious and I was Mickey Mouse (because I had MM on my hat). We'd take turns reporting things to each with urgency in spy/military terminology, like, "fall back! fall back!" and "Pinkalicious on point. Mickey Mouse stand down." Fast forward a bit to a trip to eat a meal at the pool bar. Avery gets the walkie talkies out and decides she's going to go walking about for a bit. She takes the walkie talkie with her and ventures off. When she reaches the part of the cement not covered in shade, she steps out carefully and then immediately talks into her walkie talkie to report, "TOO HOT! TOOOOO HOT!!!!" It was hilarious. Trust me.

It was during this game that Avery discovered the most fun person to have on the other end of the walkie talkie was Uncle Mike. That'll teach him to be funny.

Avery
As we were walking about from dinner the other night, Avery wanted us and the U's to have a race. She said, "Smiths go this way! Vics go that way!" As Vic said, she clearly knows who wears the pants in the U family.

Overall, Avery has done stellar down here. I can see how it's a bit rough for her when D and I get together with Vic and Mike. More so than with any other group of people, we're nearly constantly engaged in banter and catching up and just general talking. Avery gets left out of that much of the time. On top of that dynamic, we're down here with an 8mo whose naps are precious. Every time Bear goes down, we remind Avery to be quiet and not play in the courtyard, etc. There've been a couple of attitudes about being left out or about having to be quiet, but overall, I've got to say I'm absolutely proud of and thrilled with her behavior.

Along those behavior lines, she's also seemingly maturing quite a bit with the tantrums. The epic tantrums have been at bay for a few months now. The mini I-didn't-get-my-way tantrums are short lived and well within what I consider to be normal 4yo behavior. She's starting to respond better to logic and reason when we explain why she can't do something or why she can't eat something. She's also starting to negotiate better when she disagrees with our answers. While I never reverse a No when she's throwing a fit or when she just continues to whine about it, I will  compromise when she presents a logical and calm argument. It feels like she's made a leap (that I'm sure will backslide at times) to understanding a No can be changed with calmness and logic, but it can never be changed with a fit or whining.

Avery can swim! It's not pretty, but it's fun to watch. It's mostly a doggie paddle, but sometimes she throws her arms in there and gets some good strokes in. She has close to no fear in the pool, which is a bit disconcerting. She will reverse course and head for shallower parts when she starts to feel out of her depth, so that makes me feel better. Her confidence and ability in the pool made it much easier for us to sit on the side while she happily played in the pool. She wanted us to join her, of course. And we both joined her for extended periods of time (versus a quick dip) to play, but she also had to come up with games to play on her own. Some days were better than others. I must say watching her play fetch with a plastic cup all by herself was odd. She'd toss someone's old cup then swim to it. She could do this for a solid 20 minutes.

The last few days there have been more kids around the pool. Most of them have been Mexican, so they don't speak English. Avery clearly wanted to play with these kids, but just couldn't summon up the courage to say, "Hola!" So what she'd do is follow them around the pool like a dolphin following a boat. She'd then stick her head in the water and make really loud bubble blowing noises to get their attention. It was awkward to watch.

Me
I was sick all day today. Not with food problems - which both Mike and D suffered the day before - but with flu-like stuff. It hurts to swallow and my whole body aches. I spent from noon to 6 pm in bed, got up to drink a protein drink, then went back to bed until hunger finally woke me up at midnight. It's 1 AM now.

I utterly failed on my goal to walk everyday. The reasons for failure are numerous: laziness, hotness, boredom. I'm hoping that I'll be able to get back on things when we get back to Portland.

My good(ish) eating habits also slowly disintegrated as we've been down here longer.  Who knew how good tortilla chips dipped in condensed milk and washed down by grape Fanta could be?

Good Friends & Good Life
The 24-hour technical blackout last 24-hours, but no more. We all did discover that when we're together in a group, it's better to just put the damn iPhone/iPad/Kindle down. Victoria has coined a phrase which I think should catch fire soon: iJacked. When you're having a lovely meal and then suddenly everyone is checking their devices, your meal has been iJacked. Same goes for a vacation.

Despite sitting here not feeling great, it's been a fabulous trip. I'm so grateful we have Vic and Mike to join us on some vacations. It's hard to find a couple friend where all parties have fun and click with each other. We also have the same general attitude about relaxing. Dinner plans are made a few hours beforehand and eating out is the preference. There's little scheduling or pre-planned structure. Everyone just wears whatever to dinner. There's no application of make-up or doing of hair. There's no wondering if this excessively casual approach is OK. It is.

Finally, I am ready to be home. I love it down here. I'm grateful we get to come as often as we do. I'm grateful Avery loves it so much. I'm grateful for the slow pace of life when we're down here. And I'm grateful that I look forward to returning to our daily routine in Portland. Life is good.

Swimming

Walk

I missed my walk yesterday after sleeping in until 10:30. It was worth it. This morning I woke up at 6 and walked. It's the first time I've truly seen the sunrise here. It is beautiful. There's no chill in the air at all. I managed to walk for an entire hour, though my pace was probably lacking a bit. I even stopped to take a few pictures. Thinking about it, the stopping to smell the flowers so to speak was probably more of an achievement than the walk.

Swimming

We went swimming at the hotel pool the other day. Avery is basically swimming. I'm declaring this as the first time Avery swam on her own. When she was swimming around in the kiddie pool, she could propel herself anywhere in the pool, but when she stops to breathe she stands up. Regardless, she's able to hold her breath, get back up when she goes under, and is generally very competent (for her age) in the pool. It's nice that we don't have to be in the pool with her and can just watch her from the side. 

Vic & Mike's parents sent a floaty thing for Avery that's kind of like a kickboard. She loves it and kicked around the pool with it for a good hour or so. 

Sleeping
Vic and Mike are a bit tired having an 8-month-old and all, but they're troopers. They still try to stay up with us to visit and/or watch TV. They don't *always* succeed with the staying up part. This picture was taken the other night as we were watching episode 2 of Damages.

Speaking of sleeping, last night was the first time Avery asked to get into bed with us instead of sleeping on her little bed on the floor. I said OK, but now my back regrets it. I sleep much more stiffly when she's with us in this bed than in our bed at home. Anyway, I moved her back to the floor this morning and that transfer went OK, so I think I can just let her up for a bit and then just put her back on the floor next time.

Books
I read Escape from Camp 14: One Man's Remarkable Odyssey From North Korea to Freedom in the West. I highly recommend it.

On to other books.

Today's Plan
After batting around all sorts of ideas, the big plan for today is walking around the big rock off the beach here (the area we explored with you and Henry, Christie). Oh, and Felipe is cooking for us tonight. Yipee!

Treats

Mexico!
Yesterday we arrived at the casa around 2 or 3 pm. We settled in quickly, then hit the hotel pool*. Mike and Bear joined the three of us at the pool while Vic worked on paperwork for a house sale (Realtors never stop working it seems). Vic was able to join us for dinner. The six of us ate at the hotel pool bar.

For sleeping arrangements this trip, Vic & Mike & Bear are in the lower bedroom that has the two queen beds in it. Avery, Damian, and I are in the upstairs bedroom with the one king-sized bed in it. We brought down a memory foam mattress topper (thanks Mom!) to fold over and use on the floor for Avery's bed. It worked out even better than I'd hoped it would. Avery was more than happy to settle onto it for bed and stayed in it all night.  When I came up with this idea, I envisioned that we would simply put the mattress topper on the floor each night, then fold it up and move it out of the way during the day. When we got here, I realized that we're not the type of people to do this on a daily basis, especially on vacation. I also realized that I don't really use the nightstand. So I shoved the nightstand into the corner, folded the mattress topper in half, and wedged it between the bed and nightstand. It's perfect and just what Avery needs at this age. Eventually we might have a trundle bed somehow installed under our bed to accomodate Avery when we have guests with us when we're down here.

I slept great last night. Avery woke me up at 8 AM here (7 AM Pacific time). I'll take it!

Avery declined to go on a walk with me. I only managed to go for 45 minutes before I was too bored and hot to continue. I struggle with boredom on my hour-long walks in Portland, but it's better there since there are significant hills to break up the monotony. No hills here - at least not where I'm walking. Tomorrow perhaps I'll set a goal of walking earlier in the morning so I can venture further without worries of getting far out and then having to make my way back in the blazing sun. Anyway, my goal down here with regards to daily walks is just to go for as long as I can. If I walk slow (because Avery's with me or whatever) that's fine. I just want to stay in the habit of the hour-long mental dedication to some sort of physical activity. So far, so good.

When I got back from my walk, A wanted to go for a bike ride. So she biked and I walked down to the store for a treat.

Avery sitting down to enjoy her treat

Leading the way back to the casa post-treat consumption

* The community pool is being repaired, so it's out of commission for our entire time down here. We can use the hotel pool free of charge and that works just fine for me.