Another Pin on the Map: Home Alone

This Sunday was Día del Peatón (Pedestrian Day), and there wasn't any transportation all day. Many of the tías live pretty far away (several take 2 trufis to get to work), so they would have to walk to work which would take several hours. Although they've done it in the past, it's a hard day for everyone. This year, the tías decided that it would be more fun if everyone took the kids home for the weekend! It's not unusual for a tía to take a child home for a night, but they never all leave at once.

Every tía took one child, and Lindsey (the other volunteer at the baby home) and I kept three here with us! Everyone headed out Friday afternoon and came back Monday morning. I was worried that the weekend may seem a bit long, but it actually went pretty quickly!

Saturday morning was pretty relaxed and that afternoon we headed over to the girls' house because I had to drive them (yes, I'm driving our giant trufi now!) to the boys' house for J.'s big 10th birthday celebration. Then we all (boys, girls, and babies) headed down the street to La Horita Feliz. Once again, we weren't the most well-behaved in our class, but I think we're improving! Lindsey and E. spent the night at the boys' house, but R., J.M., and I headed home. The girls were EXHAUSTED. After a quick dinner, it was time for bed for all of us!

Sunday was pretty relaxed, as well. We enjoyed a picnic breakfast outside and spent some time enjoying the sunshine. Lindsey and E. made it home just before lunch, and I spent the afternoon making a birthday cake for J.M.'s mom (her birthday is Monday so I'm taking J.M. to visit her). By the time everyone woke up from naps, I was feeling like I needed to get out of the house, so we headed out to enjoy the car-free streets. For those of you who know Cochabamba, it was so weird seeing Blanco Galinda without any cars! The babies started to get a little fussy, so we headed back home for dinner.

It was a fun weekend, but we were all happy to see everyone again on Monday morning!

Starting off our weekend right with a little cake before bedtime!

Buen día, chicas!

"Rico, tía!"

It only took 5 cakes to finally get this cake made... And then, as if that wasn't bad enough, it took a few tries at the frosting, too. I knew I should've just bought a boxed cake mix, but the tías seem to think that I need to learn how to bake from scratch!

S. LOVES to help with the babies, so she was super excited to see J.M.! I don't know how many times I heard "I can help J.M.!"

R. had a lot of fun playing on the slide at the boys' house... I don't know what I was thinking putting a white skirt on her, but it was brown by the time we left!

R. was so excited to see S. at La Horita Feliz!

I failed at documenting our weekend with E.! I think this is the only picture I have of him.

Most fun pijamada ever...

This was taken approximately 30 seconds after the above picture was taken.

That's better.

Enjoying a pretty morning outside!

Basically all we did this weekend was eat.

J.M. drools more than any kid I've ever met. I jokingly told her to clean off her face, and she took one of the trapitos from our laundry pile and cleaned her mouth. It was too cute!

Helping fold laundry

E. and J.M. watching a little spanish Barney while we made lunch!

I wouldn't go so far as to say that we're potty training the kids, but she insisted she needed to use the bathroom... Come to find out she really just wanted to wash her hands!