happy days

I'm so happy to hear that you all haven't ditched me, despite the long absence! Thrilled to be back.

We're still in Buenos Aires and things are still going swimmingly over here. Weather has been lovely, the kids are loving school, and miracles of miracles, they have actually started to speak some Spanish! Halting, broken, incorrect Spanglishy Spanish, but whatever, I'll take what I can get. Poor Josie has been putting together particularly mixed up sentences like, "I need to limpiar the mesa," or "donde is my conejo?" Baby steps, you know? Gabe has been learning by astonishing leaps and bounds. A few days ago, he was having a hard time of things. He was tired, and cranky, and not saying a word in Spanish, and asking to go home. And then all of a sudden, he picked up a coloring book and said, "quiero colorear esto," and I almost fell over. Since then, he's thrown out several phrases or short sentences throughout the day, and he is clearly understanding 99% of what people are saying to him. I'm amazed, honestly.

Amazed, and feeling a tremendous pressure to lock in the Spanish in the 10 days we have left. I know that sounds crazy, but there it is. I'm so nervous about slacking off when we get back and everyone is speaking English and the kids go to school. Maybe you all could contribute to my accountability? Yell at me periodically. I would appreciate that.

Besides that, we just finished up an amazing visit with Josh for 16 glorious days. 16 days! Of no work, and no work calls, no housework, no laundry (because there isn't a washing machine in the house), and the kids in preschool all morning. We kept pinching each other to see if we were dreaming as we walked the busy avenues and stopped for coffee and ate treats and took the kids to parks and enjoyed the tremendous weather (71 degrees in winter!). It was one of the best vacations we've taken in a long time, certainly since before we had the kids.

Now I'm feeling sad that Josh is gone, and not just because he washed the dishes every day, although there's that too. We've been planning this for so long and now we're nearing the end and it feels surreal. I can admit, though, I'll be happy to see my home and all my things and back to separate bedrooms for the kids!

If I'm being perfectly honest, there is one difficult part of this trip, and that's the sleeping. The kids are sleeping, but I am decidedly NOT. We're in a rental, obviously, and I can't shake this idea that tons of people could have copies of the key. Tie that in with a busy apartment building and echoing hallways and doors opening and closing in the elevator all night long, and it makes for sleepless nights for me. Plus, the kids have lucked into a series of colds and fevers, so we're up a lot at night. Sigh. I'll have time to sleep when I'm dead, right? Or maybe when they leave for college.

Other than that, we're good. I'm eating my body weight in dulce de leche per day and loving city life. Quite a change from our sleepy suburb. I can confirm that this is a great place to visit with kids. Very kid friendly!