Peru

We’ve been out enjoying the final days of summer while we’ve still got sun.  For those who don’t know, Lima loses it’s sunshine for roughly 7 months a year thanks to the Humboldt Current, a jet stream that pushes the clouds eastward.  Those clouds run smack into the Andes and just like that we’ve got perma-cloud-cover.  And one other bizarre thing – Lima is a desert, so it never actually rains hard enough here that you’d use an umbrella.  However, during the winter months we get this cold mist called garua nearly every day.  Granted, it doesn’t get below 50 degrees F, but you’d be surprised what constant rain and no sun can do to one’s mood.

So back to where I started – we’ve been sucking up all the sun we can because it’s going to disappear very, very soon.  Today we went out for a romp in the park – here’s a short video of Nick and Nia enjoying each other:

Nick’s other passion as of late has been rock climbing.  We have a climbing wall near our house and he tries to get there 2-3 times a week.

It’s been great strength training for him, as well as a wonderful stress release after a long day of work.

Nick has a dream that Nia will join him on the wall within 6 to 12 months.  Crazy perhaps, but I think it’d be a great way to help her channel her abundance of energy (and stop climbing all our furniture).  We are going to start bringing her to the climbing wall to play around so that within a couple months she’ll be comfortable trying to climb on her own.

As you can tell by the picture, Nia took to it immediately and Daddy couldn’t have been happier!

Hi readers – Miss me?  I know, I’ve been a horrible poster.  I just haven’t felt inspired to write lately.  I have a plan though!  I’ve come up with some themes that encourage me to write more and give me built-in ideas.  One that I’m introducing is called Tech Tuesday where I’ll showcase an app, product or website that can add value to your life.  I’m always coming across awesome stuff and I think this would be a great forum to share them.  Stay tuned for next Tuesday’s inaugural post!

In other news, we’re just about to the 1 year mark.  I FINALLY feel settled here, it took a good 9 months, which was a lot longer than I anticipated.  The language barrier added more distance and hesitation than I thought.  Both parenting a 1 year old and learning a foreign language have challenged my patience immensely this year.  I know I’ve had some major personal growth, but it’s hard to see when I’m still in the middle of it.  It just kind of feels like I haven’t done much this tour (at least in comparison to the Philippines, that is).  We’ve had less travel, had fewer unique experiences and I’m definitely still struggling to find friends (although it’s improving week by week).  Don’t misunderstand, I’m happy here, I’m just having a hard time articulating what my accomplishments on this tour are.

Perhaps most exciting though was that this past Saturday morning was the Embassy Garage Sale!!!  For those who don’t know, garage sales are one of my favorite things that exist in this world (alongside Caribou Mochas, Minnesota and St. Ben’s).  We participated in one last fall and raked in $500 with only 1 table of stuff.  

This one was just as nutty as the first time around with 10-15 people mobbing my table at the opening.  I started with close to 250 items and only 10 remained at the end.  The Peruvians are all about the US brands, especially in baby clothes (which I seem to have an excess of ).

God was it fun.  

I was in my element all morning.  Repeat customers came up from the last sale and told me how much they loved our stuff (and what great quality it was).  One woman was even wearing my old shirt – SO WEIRD TO SEE!  

Peruvians love to bargain (I mean, who doesn’t) but it makes it so much tougher to add things up, especially when they want you to count in Spanish.  To remedy this, I created a no discounts policy this time around and said that I’d be happy to offer a discount on the item in the last half hour of the sale *if it was still here*.  Needless to say, I sold lots and lots of merchandise at full (garage sale) price.  

And just in case you were wondering, we broke our record from the first one, making a whopping $550!  I’m pretty sure we’ve got at least one more in us before we go, so I’ll be sure and report back on the results…

We’ve had helper drama lately.  I haven’t written about it because I wasn’t sure how it was going to be resolved, but I’m ready to give you the full lowdown now.

In early February I fired Lupe, our helper of 9 months.  The tension had been building between us for a few months due to the disrespectful way she spoke to me (she loved telling me how to parent Nia and run my household).  It got old real fast and I knew she needed to go, but I also knew that she really loved Nia and had proved to be a hard worker (these situations are never black and white, are they?)

Lupe did a little bit of everything – cleaning, laundry, cooking and watching Nia.  Although monetarily more efficient, I didn’t feel like it ended up being the best situation for Nia’s care.  Therefore, I decided to take advantage of this change in regime to separate the duties more.  The new plan was for me to take back laundry and some cooking, hire a cleaning lady to come in and do a deep clean one time a week and then get a Nanny who’s sole job would be to care for Nia (with a few dishes & some light cooking during her naps).

The more I thought about it, the more I liked my plan.  The only problem… Nannies were much harder to come by than cleaning ladies.  Being the creative gal that I am though, I came up with a novel idea.  I printed a crap ton of fliers and went to the kiddie playground during peak hours to pass them out.  I targeted all the nannies, knowing that they must have other nanny friends that were looking for jobs.  My plan worked beautifully and I was inundated with calls & texts over the next 48 hours.

Interviews started the next day and I was so delighted with the first 3 candidates that I stopped interviewing.  It was a tough choice, but I went with my intuition and hired the one I thought was best.  She was overjoyed and by the end of her first day I was absolutely thrilled with my choice.  Then came day 2, the day in which she failed to show up!  I was flabbergasted.  Who does that?  She texted me that night saying she needed to quit.

I was bummed, but I knew I had a good back-up candidate.  She was still available, so I got her to come in a few days later for a week trial.  #2 was sweet as could be, but lacked the ability to set limits for Nia.  My intelligent little girl figured out how to manipulate her in no time and it was crystal clear to me that this was not going to work.  It was about that time that #1 called back begging to get the job back.  Since #2 didn’t work, I thought, why not?  I like to believe the best in people and thought that maybe she had just messed up.

I call her up to confirm a Monday start date; she is ecstatic.  Monday comes.  #1 fails to show.  AGAIN!

By this time I’m starting to feel quite down about my Nanny search.  Thankfully it was time to go to Mexico, so I tabled the whole damn project for a week and resolved to attack it when I got back.  When I returned, I found out that by some lucky turn of events, my favorite nanny was now available (I know many of them from the playground).  I was ECSTATIC.

Her name was Paola and I had spent many days watching her play with the previous child she watched.  What I liked most about her was her high energy, her ability to manage bad behavior and the fact that she always had the child out playing at the playground or at City Toys (our equivalent of Gymboree).  I couldn’t believe my good fortune!

Well, turns out good things do come to those who wait.  Paola started working for us this week and I’m not kidding, it feels like a match made in heaven.  Nia ADORES her and it already feels like she’s been part of our household for months.  I am amazed at how much this change has reduced my stress level.  What a blessing she is!

As I’ve mentioned before, Embassy Lima does a great job of putting on festive holiday celebrations.  Holidays tend to bring up additional feelings of homesickness and events like this really do a lot to counter-act the pain of being so far from home on these special days.  This year’s event was extra special because it was held at the Ambassador’s Residence, which is somewhere I’ve never gotten to visit.  BONUS!

Grandma Janet had supplied Nia with another FAB party dress and I’m pretty sure she knew she was hot stuff by the way she twirled and waved.  It was a hoot!

When we arrived there were a variety of activities to choose from including face painting, arts and crafts, games and food.  What did Nia want to do?  Stand over by the giant speakers and shake her booty!  My gal LOVES to dance.  So dance we did (we were the only ones, by the way).  We created our own little party!

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Next up was the Easter Egg Hunt.  The kids were split into 3 age categories and each child was allowed to take home 13 candy-filled eggs.  It took Nia a bit to figure out the objective of the game, but once it clicked she was totally into it.  .

Here she is, collecting her eggs.

As you can tell from the photos, it was pretty chaotic (the type of environment Nia thrives in).  Her Daddy, not so much… I think he was pretty happy when Nia petered out after an hour of partying.  :)

And what Easter Celebration would be complete without a visit from the Easter bunny?  I am pleased to report that Nia had much less of an aversion to the Easter Bunny than to Santa (although she still did not want to touch him).  I dare say we’re making progress!  For those who are interested, the full gallery of photos can be accessed by clicking on the collage below.