What we've been doing (while we weren't blogging)

So, our family was kind of sick for a couple weeks, and then we took a few more days to catch up and get back to normal. Though we weren't blogging like we normally would, we still had a few outings and activities. As always, we documented them with pictures.

Zeke was a pig for Halloween. Except he was sick on Halloween and the day after. I had sewed Zeke this adorable little pig costume, complete with ears and a tail, and I was so bummed when he didn't get to wear it for Halloweekend. Tom's class at school had read "Alice in Wonderland" and he was having a special tea party for them at school in the library after Halloween. The kids dressed up in costumes, and I brought Zeke in his piggy costume. The reason this was appropriate was that the baby in "Alice" is named Pig. Zeke was quite the hit!
Then it was National Build-A-Fort-In-Your-Living-Room weekend. I built this fort in our living room for Ruby and Zeke. Both enjoyed crawling in and out and having a special place to play.


Last weekend, we went mini-golfing at La Ceiba's brand-new mini golf course! Zeke loved his first game of mini golf at La Rana Mini Golf here in La Ceiba. It's a great family-friendly activity, and they have a trampoline too!



One of the unique things about living in Honduras is that sometimes you see things in places you just don't expect. While we were golfing, we looked up and over the wall into the next lot. In the sky, we saw this bathroom. The house surrounding the bathroom is long gone. All that is left is a bathroom in the sky- weird, huh!

Speaking of bathrooms... Since we moved down here 2 and a half years ago, I've really missed bathtubs. Most homes in La Ceiba do not have bathtubs, including ours. Recently, I've begun to think about what it would take to make this dream come true. We rent our house, so we're not really looking to do any remodeling projects on our own dime. This would be a pretty big project, because our house does not have hot water either. We currently use electric shower heads to heat the water right before it comes out, giving us a warm shower. If we had a bathtub, we'd need a small hot water heater too.



So, I've been pricing it out, thinking about putting a proposal together for our landlord. I found this bathtub at Ace Hardware, and I think it would it would fit in the existing space without knocking down any walls or anything major.

We've also been out to eat at a couple of beach places in the past 2 weeks. Last weekend, we went to Guapo's on the beach for lunch. Here are the guys enjoying the view.


Finally, on Thursday night, we went out to the Quinta Real hotel on the beach in La Ceiba. Zeke and I went for a little walk/photo shoot on the beach.
When we came back, Tom had hired these mariachi guys to serenade us. Zeke loved the musicians, and I think they loved him too.


Glad to be back to blogging- stay tuned for more!

La Playa

Honduras has been celebrating Independence Day for almost a week now (Officially on Sept 15). We began celebrations on Friday at school- complete with traditional dress, dances, chasing a pig covered in manteca (basically Crisco), and games involving a mud pit and students.


After the festivities at school, Tom and I started off the weekend with a relaxing day at home and a visit to the paint store. We bought the paint to turn our pepto-pink guest room into a baby boy's beach room. Today, Tom has promised me that we will start painting!

To be truly inspired, we decided to take up a friend's offer to visit her beach house for a couple days. One of the lovely ladies who works in the library with Tom offered for us to go out and use her beach house for a couple nights to get away. This house is just 20 minutes from our own front door, but just far enough out of town that the water is clean and turquoise. Besides a few cute kids from the nearby villages, or fishermen paddling by in their canoes, we don't see or hear any other people!


One highlight was bringing Ruby with us. This was her first time swimming in the ocean, and after getting over the initial fear of those crazy waves, she loved it!



Ruby and Tom spent hours playing fetch with a tennis ball. Tom would throw it out and most of the time, Ruby would go bounding into the gentle waves, doggy-paddling out to her new favorite toy. (The other times, Tom would go swim after it and bring it back) While all this was going on, I just floated and swam in the warm, Carribbean waters. It was pretty nice.



After playing in the salty water, we all came back to the house for a dip in the private pool! It was awesome to have this little pool right in front of our hammocks. Whenever we got hot, a quick dip would cool us off. Ruby liked the fact that she could drink this water. (The ocean proved to be a bit salty for her digestive system).


You might think that the green hose in the picture is filling up the pool. It is not. It is actually our makeshift "long leash" for Ruby. When we first arrived, Ruby showed us that she is not yet ready to handle being completly free, so we improvised by tying a 30 foot garden hose to her leash. This slowed her down enough that she didn't stray too far from the beach house, and still had the freedom to wander around a bit.

And here I am in my favorite outfit of the weekend. I brought all these clothes, but just wore my swimsuit the entire time. I guess that's how it goes at the beach!


The reason I'm posting a picture of myself in a swimsuit is only to show how preggo my belly is getting. This picture was taken at 19 weeks and 4 days. For those of you who don't do weeks- it's about 4 and a half months. I'm halfway there!


The other activity of the weekend was reading. We both spent hours and hours in our beachfront hammocks, reading our books. On Monday morning, I began reading Water for Elephants
by Sara Gruen. This is a book all about life in the circus back in the day. We blogged about the Circus World Museum in Baraboo, WI back in July, and found out that much of the research for this book was done at the museum. I LOVED this book. I didn't put it down till I had finished the last page on Monday night. I can't remember the last book I read all in one day like that- but I'd highly recommend it- especially to anyone who liked the movie Toby Tyler when they were a kid!

Cayos Cochinos and other stuff

Yesterday, we took our second annual trip to the Cayos Cochinos. (Follow link for pics from last year's trip) This group of small white sand islands are located just 4o minutes by boat and a 25 minute car ride from our house. Yesterday, a group of 8 teachers headed out for a day of snorkeling along the pristine reefs, swimming, eating, and fun. We had a blast!

One highlight for me was that Josue, our guide for the day, asked me how many months I had. This may not seem significant to many people, but for me it meant that I actually looked pregnant and not just fat to someone who didn't know! Here's a picture of Tom and me with Josue and our friend Jason.


While we waited for our lunch of freshly caught red snapper to be prepared in the local Garifuna village of Chachauate, we were entertained by a few of the island kids. There is no tv, electricity, or arcade to keep people entertained out there. Instead, the locals make their own entertainment in the form of kids! One little boy, Pedro, was hanging out with Tom and was loving the Gatorade I shared with him in his cup.


We are so excited for all the celebrations coming up this week. I've got 2 student birthdays in my class on Monday, so we're enjoying cake on Monday and cupcakes on Tuesday afternoon. On Wednesday, the kids are very much looking forward to one of their favorite Honduran holidays- Children's Day. This is a day where the whole country celebrates youth and spends time appreciating children. The PTA has organized a 30 minute, mini-train tour around the city for each grade and a big party at the end of the day. Tom is hoping to accompany all the grades on the train ride since he loves trains so much.

Then on Thursday, we celebrate my 30th birthday. I think I'll make monster cookies and bring them to school for the kids (we're going to have sweets every day this week!) For my birthday, we'll celebrate with an ultrasound and dinner. I'm hoping that the baby will show itself to be a boy or girl as a gift to me on Thursday- we'll keep our fingers crossed!

Finally, on Friday, we will celebrate Independence Day at school. Honduras actually celebrates its independence on the 15th of September, but we've got a 5 day weekend due to the holiday, so we'll celebrate on Friday in school. I'm sure there will be more treats.

In baby news... I felt the baby move for the first time this week! Now that I know what it feels like, I've noticed it every evening. In fact, the little guy/girl is squirming around as I type this blog. It's exciting!

Also, we'd like to thank our readers for their dog advice. After much deliberation and thought, I think we're going to hold off on a second dog for awhile. Ruby might just have to settle for us for now, and then once the baby is born, there will be someone here all day, every day to keep her company.

See what you miss out on...

...when you don't come to visit Honduras!

Here are a few of the first release pics from our fantastic floozical weekend.

We headed to Roatan on Friday after school and found West End to be delightful! On Saturday morning, we took a water taxi (with some policia nacional men) over to West Bay. West Bay is just 5 minutes by boat and filled with beautiful turquoise waters and white sands. For some reason, we and the tipsy 55 year old lady were the only people asked to wear life jackets.

We took in some rays. I was especially concerned about sand fleas. While we were vigilant about re-applying deet, some of us ended up a bit sunburned by the end of the day.



By Day 2, Ann was sporting socks with her flip-flops to ease the pain of foot sunburn. I'll be honest, the front and sides of my neck are peeling today. Lesson learned (again).


Once back in La Ceiba, we headed up to the river (with Tom this time) for some swimming and to try to even out our tans.

Below, you can see Tom sharing some of his knowledge of river rock formations to Vegas.

Once we said our goodbyes to Megan, we tried to find ways to amuse ourselves. Ann rode my bike around town in a coordinating outfit with my bicycle. Way cute!


Good times. Friendship abounds where the sun shines. It brings me delight to welcome Ann and Megan to their Honduras blog debut. Congrats ladies, you've done a nice job.

Roatan Part II

So, we had so much fun with my family out on Roatan that Tom and I decided to go back right away! We went out there to do our Open Water Scuba certification. After 5 days of wind and rain, Tom and I have passed the written test, and cleared our masks and breathed underwater in a tiny swimming pool. We have not yet done any of this in the sea. Some may call us wimps, but we decided to leave and try some other weekend. All flights and ferries leaving Roatan had been cancelled for the past 2 days because of the weather, and we were excited to learn that the ferry back to La Ceiba was going to start up again today at 2. We got on the boat, and took it as a sign of things to come when the boat guy passed out barf bags to every passenger. Luckily, my brother had left us with some Drammamine and it helped us survive the rough ride in much better shape than some other unfortunate passangers.
We're glad to be home and having fun thinking of the places we might go next... It's such an andventure!

The Sea

Living on the Carribbean coast can certainly have its perks. On Sunday, we joined 8 friends on a chartered fishing boat out to the Cayos Cochinos. These are a small series of tiny cays and islands just off the coast of Honduras. The islands are considered a natural park reserve, yet people are allowed to buy the lots and live there. Our friend has just purchased a lot on one of these islands. We spent the day lounging in the water, getting a little sunburned, eating fresh fish at a Garifuna village, and snorkeling in the reefs. It was a beautiful day!



As some of you have probably heard, we are in a red alert here in Honduras as Hurricane Felix makes landfall today. While it hit land as a Category 5 off the eastern coast of Honduras and Nicaragua, the storm is expected to lose a lot of its windpower as it passes over the many beautiful mountains here. By the time it reaches La Ceiba, we won't be dealing with the winds as much as the rain. In the past, when La Ceiba has been hit with torrential rains, it floods the rivers and the streets become undrivable. Bridges are washed out and people are not able to get out of their neighborhoods. We are still living at the Dole guesthouse (our stuff is still in the port with customs) and we are actually in one of the safest places in La Ceiba. The campus here may have some standing water outside, but is not expected to experience serious flooding. Dole has also set up several buildings on the campus as a safe haven for any employees living out in the community. Here, we have a generator and backup water, so we shouldn't be without either of those for very long. But, this is Honduras, so I can't guarantee any communication for a few days.


Bottom line- we'll be fine. That sea just likes to change things up once in awhile. It can't always be as picturesque and perfect as a Corona commercial! (Seriously- some of the islands were a tiny sand oasis with two perfect palm trees) If we need to get anywhere, we now know a guy with a boat! Besides we have today off of school, and probably another couple days depending on how the roads are!

PS- Thanks Cousin Mark! We ate at Ricardo's Saturday night, and it was delicious. I had Lobster Thermador and Tom had steak and lobster. It was a yummy treat!

La Playa (The Beach)

We got some sun today at the beach. Tom put his own sunscreen on, and now he's kind of like a leopard- except he's got pink and white spots. Luckily, there's still a half can of aloe vera drink in the fridge!
Today, we went with 3 other teachers to a little restaurant/hotel on the beach about 20 minutes outside of town. It is located just beyond Sambo Creek, a small Garifuna villiage. Hotel Helen is a great little place with tables and hammocks right on the beach. We had lunch, fresh juice and 5 hours of sun all for about 5 bucks! The ocean was so warm, and when we swam, we looked back at shore to see the mountains right there.
It was perfect! We'll definitely make it a regular weekend mini-getaway!

The Beach

We went out to dinner at a nice restaurant on the sea last night. Half-way through dinner, a three piece band showed up. They arrived by bicycle. They asked us if they could play a song for us, but there was already music blasting from the speakers. So we said no thanks. I hope we see these guys again so we can get a picture.

We're thinking about taking a trip this weekend, either the mountains or the beach. It kind of depends on what hurricane Dean does though....