Finding you Inner Gaucho

We've been up to quite a lot these days. On the 10th of May I hosted a baby shower for my friend Carolina. Gabe was sent away with his dad and the other husbands (below with Leandro). Mario totally did NOT want to take him because he was afraid he wouldn't be able to bowl, and in the end Gabe happily sat in his stroller the entire time watching the lights and listening to the music. He came home having wet through everything he was wearing, but both father and son were content.

I planned the party with my friend Jazmin and Carolina was very surprised and very happy. Below you see the diaper cake we made her and the favors. I also made all the bedding for the to-be-born Celeste, but I am a dork and didn't get a picture of it. Before anyone gets the wrong idea, my making of the quilt and bumper pads was completely selfish. There is a lot of ugly here. And often times otherwise good and relatively stylish people get fooled into thinking the ugly is acceptable just because there is so very much of it. Ugly baby bedding distresses me greatly, so to prevent my having to witness it being used, I made and gifted something I like and will like to see creating the habitat for this new baby. It's really too bad I didn't get a picture because it was lots of soft yellow with pink highlights and so adorable it made me start thinking about another baby. Too bad you can't chose the gender or Gabe might possibly have a sister on her way.

Last Sunday some friends came over and Gabe and Sofia were hilarious. Here we are trying to convince Sofia to share the balloon with Gabe.

Then we discovered Gabe wasn't so interested in the balloon, he just went over and kissed Sofia. She was only mildly distressed.

Last Thursday we checked into the hospital for Gabe to have his tear duct opened. It is a very minor procedure, but it does require them to be completely under anesthesia. Holding him down while they put him out was very sad to me, but 40 minutes later he was awake, crabby, and back in my arms. As soon as we could give him some food and end his 14+ hour fast, he was back to his old self.

As some of you may know, when I first moved here I started a website http://www.spanishinrosario.com/ to help (for money of course) students that wanted to come to Rosario to study Spanish. I organized their classes, housing, etc. for them. Just after Gabe was born I wasn't really doing anything with it so I turned it over to my friend Stephanie. However, I already had in the works my first university study abroad group. After almost a year of talking, planning, proving credentials, etc. the students arrived. It has been a good experience, but so much more work than we ever thought. Seriously, these kids need so much hand holding!! Paige, did we ever ask Dr. Call to accompany us ANYWHERE??? Anyway, we'll do it again, we'll just charge double to make it worth it.

Last Saturday we took them all to a typical "Dia de Cammpo" at an estancia, and Mario, Gabe and I had a great day. Below are all the pictures.

Descendent of Don Silvano explaining the typical gaucho dress: pants are Turkish, belt and boots Spanish, vest and scarf French, and thing around the back of the best Italian.
Alicia on the staircase build to remind the owner of Gone with the Wind.

Us on the old tractor.
Stephanie and Claudio - my favorite people in Argentina I'm not related to.
Gabe spent the whole day picking up sticks and practicing walking. At one point he had a crowd of Chinese tourists huddled around taking his picture. Not sure if that says more about Gabe or the Chinese.
Gabe's dirty face after falling down so much.

The gauchos trying to grab a dangling ring with a pointy stick - they used to then present the ring to a women to ask for her hand in marriage.

Gabe on his first horse, which looked more like a burro but they swore was a horse. He's trying to keep up with his cousins Colton, Kallie and Cade.

Conquering the Couch

Gabe is a funnier kid every day. Lately, he gets really hyper before bed time so we have about 30 minutes each night where we just play and wrestle on the floor. It's really fun. The other night he tried to climb up on the couch. When I got out the camera to film him, his fascination with the camera pulled his attention from summiting the couch. That's when I had to refocus him by putting his favorite forbidden toy - the remote control - on the back of the couch to distract him so I could film.

First he tries and tries then gives up and gets distracted by other toys.

But the distraction is short-lived and I barely turned the camera back on in time to catch him wiggling up onto the couch.

Now that he has done it, and been filmed doing it, we are trying NOT to encourage couch climbing as we feel it won't be so "precious" when he's 5.

Ashley - as you can see here he claps when anyone says "muy bien" or "yay", which for me counts as bilingual.

* please forgive background noise from both the tv and the heavy breathing filmer

A Good Sunday

Here is Gabe all ready to go to church on Sunday. And this last Sunday he behaved SO WELL I have to post this a little for posterity, and more to remind myself to be thankful that I really have a pretty good baby.



My previous strategy had been to sit in the very front, side bench, next to Abuela who plays the piano, where I can create a little corner of toys for him to play with and contain him

in a small area. However, the last few Sundays have turned into a maul-a-thon with him trying to escape his small play area to climb up on the dias to see dad, climb all over me, etc. This last Sunday, I left him in his stroller, pushed the stroller to the front, turned it around so he could look at all the people (don't we all wish we could do that anyway??) and randomly passed him toys while I actually listened to the meeting. And every time he opened his mouth to make a peep I popped a goldfish cracker in. Worked like a charm, and even though he was exhausted and had missed his nap, he sat there the entire meeting hardly making a noise. Now we'll see if we can repeat it two Sundays in a row...

Gabe Videos

Here are some recent videos of Gabe so you can see him trying to walk - and also if you watch closely you will catch this new face he makes - which is really a lip-snarling grow. Kind of hilarious, kind of frightening. Also note in the last video that anytime anyone says "Muy Bien" he claps. It's really kind of cute.

Hair Sprouts = Love

I have a very good friend who has beautiful, thick, NOT fine hair, that looks picture perfect if she's just washed it, if she's been playing sports, if's she been in the wind/rain/sleet/snow, or even if she hasn't washed it for a week. Over the years she has had many a chuckle at my ridiculously fine hair that manages to have small pieces sticking up at all times, in all conditions. She has particularly laughed at the sight I make when tying my hair back to wash my face at night.

Last night as I was washing my face, and noticed that 4 months-growth-post-highlighting-fiasco-that-burned-off-hair would give her a particularly good laugh. And because we can all use a good laugh, I send this ode of personal humiliation out to my wonderful friend, that she may have yet another reason to smile today.



p.s. when I asked Mario to take the picture he said to me "You're not going to put that on the blog are you??" "yes, why?" "Adrianne, my friends read that too!" So if you are one of Mario's friends, the photo above is not of his wife, it's just a joke.

p.p.s. Erika, I don't have bangs, I have burn-off-out-growth!