Zeke on the move

Staycation Day One: Photos

Karine made pancakes for breakfast this morning. They were awesome. Now she's trying to make some bagels, also awesome. I will begin filling up the swimming pool after I finish this little project.

I'll try to put these pictures in order, more or less, chronological.

Zeke's number one toy these days. I guess you could call it an obsession. The man loves ice water in tall glasses. Its because he cut his first tooth this week. He's all about cool sensations on the gums. I took this glass away from him because somewhere in the instinctual protective father part of my brain alarm bells rang. Something about not letting your children chew on glass. Even if they want to. His cries when he realized I wasn't just goofing around: heart wrenching.

Zeke loves grass. Ruby loves Zeke.

In the backyard at dusk, with a flash. Did I mention that we figured out how to use the flash on on camera? Its neat.

Here's Zeke after bath time. This is pretty much Zeke's attitude toward life captured in this photo here. Unless you take his ice water away.

Here's dinner last night. Pictures of food are so weird. Lobster tails with chipotle-lime shrimp, served with ginger glazed carrots and rosemary potatoes. Washed down with a Chilean chardonnay that was nice and cold. Zeke did us the favor of shuffeling to dreamland before the food was on the table. I'll post recipes later.

Karine is making some kind of wacky stuffed Chinese balls for dinner tonight.

Fifteen Pounds of Basmati Rice

Part of the fun of Staycation is spending the money we would have spent on travel and lodging on splurgy-type items for the house. Our first splurge was a fifteen pound bag of Basmati rice. Wow! These fifteen pounds of starchy goodness are going to bring us basketfuls of fun. We just know it. It started last night with the braised snook and will surely continue for many meals to come. Just look how happy Ruby is with the bag. She was all like: Oh, oh I love this Basmati rice, take a picture of me with the Basmati rice!

Family Update

Ezekiel is now almost 7 months old! He likes to sit up, and can play pretty well without toppling over too easily. He also loves standing in his exersaucer and johnny jump-up. Zeke's little legs are getting quite strong! At his 6 month checkup, Zeke weighed in at 17.6 pounds- a healthy weight and right in the 55th percentile for his age.

Developmentally, Zeke is doing great. He can roll over both ways, but chooses to stay put unless there's a toy or a dog that he really wants to get. He's not crawling yet, but seems anxious for takeoff. We're prepared for it any day now. Still no teeth or hair. Good things come to those who wait!

Yesterday, we bought Zeke a highchair. He's been a great eater at mealtimes, enjoying all sorts of fruits, vegetables, oats, and rice. We're excited for Zeke to become a part of our family dinner table experience.

Tom has been extra busy the past few weeks because his job at school has changed significantly. Due to some movement within our school staff, a position opened up in the middle school, and Tom is now a teacher! He loves teaching 7th and 8th grade English and Math. He's the homeroom teacher for 8th graders so he gets to spend a little extra time with those kids. Each middle and high school teacher is also responsible for teaching an elective class. Tom has enthusiastically been teaching his weightlifting elective every Tuesday and Thursday to a small group of guys. Between his weightlifting class, and running 3 times a week, I think my husband is going to be one of the most fit guys around town pretty soon!

I have been thoroughly enjoying school so far this year too. I've got a really sweet class of 4th graders, and now that it's my 3rd year at our school, I feel like I really understand what I'm doing. I recently acquired a new cookbook from my friend Erin. The America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook is awesome! A couple nights per week, I've been trying out some new recipes- meatloaf, chicken piccata, and omelets have been some recent hits. It's strange that for the past 4 years, we have tried and tried to make omelets, and never had success. I get this great illustrated cookbook with all sorts of helpful hints, and they turn out wonderfully! I'd recommend this book to anyone.

Ruby will be celebrating her 2 year birthday on August 26. Our goal is to find her the best dog bone in La Ceiba by Wednesday. Our dog has been handling all the transitions in the past few months really well. She had 2 dog/housesitters this summer, a new nanny in the house (and her whole family- but that's a story for later), a baby that has started grabbing at her in glee, and another new nanny. Ruby takes it all in stride. Tom has also been working with her off-leash a bit more. Tom and Ruby sometimes take late-night walks around the neighborhood without a leash. Ruby loves the freedom, and Tom loves that his dog is well-trained enough to not run away.

And the nanny... Some of our readers may have heard about our nanny drama. I'll keep it brief, but the young, enthusiastic girl we hired to care for Zeke turned out to be a different person than we thought she was.
Some of the surprises included: stealing two of Zeke's keepsake baptism gifts from grandparents (one of which she took to her family's home), lying about many things, watching tv all day long while leaving Zeke alone, packing our food in our tupperware containers to give her family members through the gate, inviting her dad in for gourmet lunches in our kitchen, having friends over to watch tv, and inviting her whole family to our house in the daytime to cook up lunch for her whole family. Every day, she would go under my bed, take out my straightening and curling irons, use them and my makeup and lotions.

Because of some carelessness on her part, we started to discover the stealing and lying last Friday. When she came clean and confessed to stealing the keepsakes, crying and begging forgiveness, we decided that maybe this could be a real turning point for a young girl. Everybody makes mistakes, and this could be a real opportunity for change. Except that 3 days later, Tom stopped home in the middle of the school day to find a baby (not ours) wandering around our house in a diaper, the stereo and tv blaring, her mom cooking up a storm in our kitchen (and later taking it all with her) and Zeke all alone in his crib- wide awake. Tom fired her on the spot, for violating one of our biggest house rules- no visitors! She and her family and friends were out of our house within 10 minutes.

Fortunately, thanks to the outpouring of help and suggestions from our friends and coworkers here, we had 5 great leads by the next day. We interviewed 5 women- all with experience and strong recommendations, and we hired a real winner. I think Zeke will be much happier with his new nanny, Belkis. She's an experienced mom who is musical, intelligent, and best of all- has a professional reputation of being honest and trustworthy. She doesn't live with us, but bikes from her own nearby neighborhood. She had her first day on Friday, and we have high hopes this time. And now, for a happy thought- watch this cutie in his new high chair!

As for what's going on here in Honduras politically, things seem pretty normal in La Ceiba. I don't claim to understand all of it, and I don't care to turn this into a political blog. Our own lives here in Honduras have been fairly normal. We're not trying to say that we don't care about people whose lives have been changed and affected by the events. It's just that this blog is about Karine and Tom (and Zeke and Ruby too) in Honduras- our lives and the stuff that happens right here in our little home. We've been a little slow on the blogging this month, but will try to get back on it!

Dog Rider, Beach Bum

After a very eventful week, we were thankful for a relaxing weekend. Friday was our last day of school with students. We went to bed early on Friday night so that we could enjoy the weekend. On Saturday, we took a family trip to the mall. The mall in La Ceiba is always packed on weekends because it is one of the few free air-conditioned places in town. Lately, the weather has been HOT HOT HOT and humid.

We spent the rest of Saturday around the house.



Sunday we went to the beach.

The Inflatable pool

When I was a kid I always liked the idea of building models. I say I liked the idea of building models because, in truth, I lacked tenacity and patience as a child and never did successfully complete a single tank or airplane or anything. I never allowed adequate time for the glue to dry. That was my problem.

I remember working on a model F4U Corsair when I was in about the third grade. That’s a great little fighter plane, the Corsair. It was my favorite. I desperately wanted to get the pieces together, so I could fly it around the living room. I couldn’t finish fast enough. I jammed the landing gear in and slathered them with glue before the wings had set. I left the plane to dry. When I returned the wings had dried all cockeyed and crooked. I tried to pry them loose to reset them, but I broke one of them off in the process. At this point, my little head exploded and I smashed the thing to bits. That was the end of the Corsair and my relationship with model airplanes in general.

This sad little story about the Corsair that never was is one of those sticky stories. It’s sticky because it’s a variation on a theme that has played out many times in my life. A hasty race to perfection leads to inevitable imperfection which, in turn, results in explosive anger. Usually the anger is directed at myself, or at inanimate objects. Karine has seen it many times. That little vein looks like its going to pop out of your forehead again, dear, she says. I am writing about this today because of two things that happened yesterday.

I arrived home from work to find that Ruby, our German shepherd, had spent at least a portion of the day yesterday swimming in our brand new plastic inflatable pool. We splurged on this luxury item last Sunday. We loved this pool. We felt like it was the best money we ever spent. Ruby killed the pool. In her frolicking she punctured one of the sidewalls. The half-deflated pool now sits in the mud, utterly useless, a picture of sadness.

I wanted to punch the dog in the face and throw her down a dark hole. But I couldn’t. Instead, I was mad at the dishes and the curtains and the patches of dirt in the backyard. I was stomping around the yard scowling at a pile of rocks when Karine called me into the house.

Ezekiel was lying on his back on the couch. He was smiling. In his six short weeks on earth, he had learned from us that smiling is something that humans do to communicate. And it hit me like a ball peen in the forehead. Whatever this little fella learns about anger he is going to learn from me. So maybe I need to examine what is going on with this sticky story of mine before it becomes a sticky story of his.

Daytime fun at home

Over the past 9 days, I've cherished every moment of being a mother. I love it! I'm enchanted with our son and can't get enough of him. Newborn babies don't really do a lot more than eat, sleep, and poop, but there are a few special things I've learned about our little Ezekiel.



He's a voracious eater. He'll nurse for an hour at a time and then sleep it off for the next 3-4 hours. Over the past three nights, he woke up only one time in the middle of the night. I'll feed him for an hour or so, and then he drifts back to sleep until 6am. It's wonderful! And the midnight feeding is such a special time for the two of us- I just love him, and I get the feeling he thinks I'm pretty special too. (Or at least my chest is!)


Zeke's arms are always on the move. When he was in the womb, I always told Tom that I could feel his little arms and hands reaching, poking, and tickling me. Tom caught Zeke trying to tear his tiny ear off the other night. He is incredibly strong, so we're going to have to keep an eye on that. We can't have him ripping off any major body parts just yet.


He also gets the hiccups often. It seemed like he constantly had them when he was in the womb, and now that he's out, it's no different. Luckily, they don't seem to bother him too much, and I can usually nurse them away.


I think we're going to have a big boy on our hands. Our little guy has long slender fingers and toes and the cutest skinny legs. I'm hoping they're not skinny for too long. He's already managed to put on a second chin, so we're going to keep plumping him up.



We spend our days quietly at home. I work on little projects while Zeke sleeps. Ruby is behaving like a champ around him. Not so curious anymore- just aware and gentle. Of course, safety is our number one concern and we watch her like a hawk when she's in the same room as Ezekiel. When we were in the states over Christmas, we bought Ruby a couple of "big doggy sister" toys for after Ezekiel was born. Today, Ruby is chilling on the front porch with her new Kong Wubba.


I continue to feel well. I had my stitches removed yesterday, and am recovering pretty easily. I suppose the restful nights of sleep have helped a lot. It's still a bit difficult to get up from a reclining position in some chairs, but mostly, I'm feeling great!


So that's about it. Enjoy the pictures, and don't worry about that plastic clip on Zeke's belly button. The nurses didn't forget to take it off- that's just how it's done here. I've been assured that it will fall off in time and his belly button will look totally normal.

Ruby Meets Ezekiel

Ruby doesn't know it yet, but she has just met her new best friend. She is sharp as a tack and very observant. We made her sit in a corner and watch us with Ezekiel for about ten minutes. She saw how careful we were him. Then we let her smell some of his blankets. We invited her over to the couch and she gave him a delicate sniff. We'll watch her very closely over the next couple of days to make sure there is no play in her when she approaches him. But so far so good. We think she gets it.

Belly Update

In case you didn't hear. I am now officially ginormous.

Dogsitter

This man has agreed to take care of Ruby and watch the house while we are in the states.

Ruby: Super Number One Yard Helper

As Karine mentioned, we've been doing a little landscaping in the backyard. I cut a nasty tree out last week. It was really ugly. I don't even want to call it a tree. It looks better as a pile of leaves and sticks in the garden than it did growing out of the ground. Today, with some help from the dog, I removed the stump.

My dad always told me to use the right tool for the right job. In Honduras, there's really only one tool you could possibly consider for a job like this. Ax? Wrong tool. Bow saw? Wrong tool. Chainsaw? Definitely, wrong tool. Machete? You betcha. A German shepherd comes in pretty handy, too.

The New Dresser

Here is a picture of my husband Tom embracing our new dresser. He sure likes it. He might like it a little too much. Every time he walks by it he touches the wood and says something about what a great piece of furniture it is. He says that he is looking forward to having a long relationship with this dresser.

"I think I might love our new dresser. It is really a quality piece of furniture. I'm happy, but I am also a little scared. Because when you love something you become terrified that you might lose it."

He made me take a picture of him hugging the dresser. And then he posed the dog in front of it and took a picture of that. Is this a common problem? Does it get worse with age?

Sunday Dog Lounging

This and That

It's been another busy week in Lake Wobegon- I mean La Ceiba.

Due to Tropical Depression Sixteen, school was canceled on Thursday and Friday of this week. While the storm did bring about quite a bit of rain on Wednesday, and was supposedly going to get worse in the coming days, the storm fizzled out once it hit land, and didn't pose much of a threat to us in La Ceiba. We woke up Thursday morning to blue skies and light showers later in the day. Our school totally would've had class, but COPECO (the Honduran equivalent of FEMA or something like that) declared that it would be illegal for any school to have class for 72 hours. Unfortunately, they declared this in the middle of the worst day, and Thursday and Friday were beautiful.


We went to the doctor again for a checkup on Thursday. He said that everything looks great! We even took a tour of the recovery rooms (that's what I think of them as) for after I have the baby at the hospital. Each room is equipped with cable TV, air conditioning, a second bed for hubby and a walk out balcony with an oceanfront view! You can visit our hospital's website here. Our doctor is a German man, who speaks 5 languages. He's the founder and director of the hospital. We like him!



Our doctor had not yet seen our ultrasound pics that proved our baby was, in fact, going to be a boy. When he looked at the pictures, he said (in Spanish), "I don't see any boy parts here! 18 weeks is too early to tell. That ultrasound doctor (not the one that our doctor normally works with) didn't know what he was talking about!" Imagine my concern when I pictured our little boy actually being born a little girl! So, we took advantage of a second day in a row off of school to visit the sonographer again (the one our doc recommends) and confirmed that Baby Lew IS actually going to be born with boy parts. It may seem like we do a lot of ultrasounds, but they only cost us $3 each! It's so fun to check him out and see him moving around. He's already up to 1 lb. 5 oz and around 12 inches long! That explains my ever-expanding belly.

Ruby thouroughly enjoyed her almost three-week stint with her boyfriend, Fisher. He went home to his owner today, and Ruby has been a bit sad ever since. Yesterday, we came across the dogs just hanging out in the doorway to the backyard. It was just too cute!





This morning, Tom had band practice with his friend. They're playing again on Wednesday nights at Expatriates Bar here in La Ceiba. It's always fun to listen as Tom learns new songs to sing and to play on the guitar. For the 10 years I've known him, I've been listening to him on bass, but recently his guitar skills have become quite good! Plus, he has such a nice voice too!

I'm officially in full nesting mode. Every day, I begin thinking about the evening meal. This week, my new recipes were rosemary roasted chicken, homemade enchiladas, french bread, monster cookies, and tonight's special- chicken pot pie from scratch! (I did have to substitute rosemary for sage in the crust, but it was still very tasty.)



Last weekend, we got our crib and put our rocking chair together (Okay, so Tom put them together, but I was solid moral support). Today, I saw the table man walking down the street selling this table. We already had a similar one that we've been using on our patio out front, but I've been thinking that it's just the right height for a changing table. I flagged him down and paid him 350 Lempira ($18) for his craftsmanship and home delivery. I think I'll sand it and paint it tomorrow. The nursery is really starting to come together!


Well, that's the news from La Ceiba, where the women are strong, the men are good looking, and the children are above average. (At least I'm pretty strong, Tom is definitely good looking, and I've got a good feeling about Baby Lew being above average.)

Parenting

I feel like I've just jumped years forward into the depths of parenting. For the past week or so, Ruby's doggy boyfriend, Fisher has been staying with us while his owner is away. (Ruby gets to spend some time at Fisher's house over Christmas) The dogs have a blast playing together. For hours each evening, they walk around the house together, bite each other's faces, and try to sit on each other.

While both dogs are fixed and we're in no danger of puppies, there are times as a mom that I feel I must step in. Tonight I told Fisher that I thought he should go stay at his house tonight (with another friend who is staying at the house). The Lewandowskis need to have some family time- just the 3 of us. I'm going to have a little talk with Ruby about spending too much time with just one other dog. She's young, and she needs to spend more family time with us! I feel like I've hardly seen her during the past week! Those two are always off running around the backyard, or worse yet, kissing each other.

When Fisher is here, she doesn't always follow the house rules (like no sleeping on couches at night). I feel like she's a different dog when Fisher is near. She's even started drinking! (Out of the toilet, that is.) Somtimes it's hard to be a (dog) mom.

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!

What's Cookin'

I'm not sure if it's a nesting thing, or that I was just hungry when I woke up, but I've spent the past 6 hours in the kitchen working on some tasty creations! I really debated whether to put the whole recipe on the blog, or just the link. I settled on the links, but I really think you should check the recipes out!

When I woke up this morning, I really wanted some cinnamon rolls. Since the closest Cinnabon is in a mall somewhere in Miami, I did my best to make some of the tasty rolls myself. I used this recipe for some Ultimate Cinnamon Rolls.



It turns out that they actually take closer to 4 and a half hours to make (with the rising and stuff), so they were more of a lunch dessert than a breakfast. They were well worth the wait though... Tom's comment- "Wow, Karine."

Since the weather has been extra hot lately, I decided to do a bit of a mediterranian lunch with some homemade hummus (yesterday's creation), fresh tomatoes, pita bread (Yay! This is a new item in our grocery store.), and some tzaziki, a cucumber/yogurt sauce.



I made this tzaziki recipe today using my mini-food processer. I've begun writing a post several times, meaning to urge everyone to buy themselves a mini food processor. I personally own a red Kitchen Aid Chef's Chopper Mini model. They retail for around $45 and I love it. I probably use it 3-4 times per week. Instead of grating 2 cucumbers and ruining my knuckles, I simply peeled, de-seeded, and threw them in the food processor. Same with the garlic cloves- so easy!


The other 4 hour project I've been working on today is this awesome ginger soft drink. Last night, we had an amazing Indian dinner with our friends, Sophia and Patrick. Sophia is an excellent cook, and she introduced me to the yummiest, most refreshing drink I've had in ages!

This recipe makes 3 quarts of an extremely refreshing beverage concentrate. It is made by boiling ginger root and cinnamon sticks in water, and then adding a few more types of juice. This is perfect for our hot, hot days, but I'm also excited to make it as a spicy holiday beverage.


The ginger flavor makes it almost sparkle, even without adding sparkling water or soda. I love the hint of cinnamon and lime too. Served over a tall glass of ice, I know this will be my favorite new drink!




FYI- I also saved my knuckles and some major time on this recipe by using the mini food processor instead of grating the ginger root with my cheese grater.

In other fun weekend news... While I've been working in the kitchen, Tom has spent the day working on the backyard. Here's a picture of Tom just before watering the lawn (his favorite Sunday activity). The little purple flowers you can see in the background are a part of a vine-type plant. Tom spent part of today transplanting some of those fines to cover some walls and support beams in back of our house.



Ruby has had some excitement the past few days as well! On Friday, Ruby was spayed. The neighborhood stray dogs were becoming a bit more interested, and we're just not going to take any chances. We're also dog-sitting for Ruby's best friend, Fisher this weekend. Yesterday was a resting day, but today, both Ruby and Fisher are having a blast together. (Playing gently, of course)


Some advice is needed. Tom and I are entertaining the idea of getting a second dog. Ruby is so much happier and less needy when Fisher is around. We sadly realize that by the time our baby comes, Ruby will not be the center of attention in our family anymore. Right now, Ruby is home alone for about 8 hours per day, and we know she gets bored. We're curious on others' thoughts and experiences with two dogs versus one. Is it a good idea? Tell us what you think in the comment section!