Ditto, ditto, ditto

This post is from Monday, October 2. Once again, sorry for the delay, but it's hard to get these posts uploaded without internet at home!


I just have to say that once again that I am the world’s happiest mom! Today Oliver and I had another pie in the sky awesome Guadalajara day. I swear, this city is mama/baby heaven. Today, neither of us was bored for a second. We woke up, had breakfast, and then strolled over to Lupita’s. Oliver fell asleep on the way so that I could put the wash in the washer, then I showered and joined him for a nap myself. After a nice snooze, the phone woke us up. It was Ricardo, a good friend of Jaime’s inviting us all to lunch.

Ricardo, a sweet lanky type with a large unibrow also known as “Muppet” but would kill me for writing that here, came to pick us up. Now that he’s a professional working man, he’s really trying to rid himself of his old nickname, even though some people still know him by nothing other than Muppet. Sinclair, another good friend, who came over with Ricardo, absolutely fascinated Oliver with his dark glasses, goat-tee, and funny faces. Before heading over to the restaurant we picked up Mauricio, better know as Masso, a sporty type with a great head of curly hair. (If there are any single women reading along, none of these great guys is hooked yet!)

Lunch was mostly time to catch up since we all hadn’t seen each other since last time we were in Guadalajara, and of course there was lots of business talk. Since Ricardo, Masso, and Sinclair are all associates at Saurio Films, a video house that makes commercials, videos, etc. Jaime hopes to do photography work for them too. After Lunch, Ricardo dropped Oliver and me off; Jaime stayed on with Ricardo to work on his business cards and hunt for a car. (Tonight when he got home he told me he’d found one—a 1974 Datsun, “It’s my age” as he put it and in our price range.) At home, Oliver and I had some fun smashing old water bottles to put in the trash, etc. but once I started to get tired and realized Oliver wasn’t in anyway wanting to take another nap, we went next door to visit Javier and Lorena. If I hadn’t already mentioned it, Javier and Lorena are Jaime’s aunt and uncle who are lending us one of their vacant apartments right next to theirs. It’s wonderfully gracious of them because the place is wonderful—3 bedrooms, 2 1/2 baths, kitchen, living room, patio. It’s really more space than we can possible fill up with furniture considering we’re on a budget, but it’s awesome nonetheless. The garden/patio area is what really inspires me. I want to put grass in for Oliver to play on and plant some herbs and other plants as well. It’s the first time in a long while that we’ve had a place with an outdoor area. It’s oh so exciting!

Back to the events of the day... As I was saying, we went next door to find Lorena, her daughter Jesusita and Jesusita’s absolutely adorable two and a half year old son Alvaro. Some day I’m going to post a photo of him for you all to gawk over. This little boy is not only gorgeous with his dark hair, blue eyes and never-ending eyelashing , he’s also incredibly sweet. Oliver had an absolute ball with Alvaro. Alvaro made him laugh, Alvaro lent him his toys and they both climbed up the stairs over and over again to visit his grandad’s big shoes upstairs. Kids have fun with the strangest of games! Later, Lorena’s daughter Lorena and her husband Oscar stopped in too, although their little son Joshua, was fast asleep after his first day at Kindergarten.

After plenty of chasing Oliver up the stairs and then carrying him back down—he didn’t like the look of going down—I decided I was ready to take off and treat my tired but happy self to some caffeine. Half a block from our apartment is a wonderful little spot that sells cappuccinos and nieve de garafa, homemade ice cream. I ordered a 15 peso cappuccino, (Starbucks can’t beat that price!) and then Oliver and I headed out to the café’s little playground for a swing before my drink arrived. The café/neveria ended up being the perfect spot for a mom and baby. There were other moms with their kids, plus a live-in cat and another patron’s tiny poodle for Oliver to entertain himself with. We had a great time, and then headed home. At home Oliver ate his dinner like a pro, picking up little pieces of carrot, potato, and chicken with his newly- aquired pincer grip. Then I bathed him, read him his nighttime book and nursed him off to sleep. For a mom like me, today is what life is all about.