Pizza Night

Amanda gave me some pizza crust mixes the other day and I made two yummy pizzas :) Then I had cheese leftover but no more crust mix, so I looked up online how to make my own crust! It turned out great and the pizzas were really good. I took it to school and ended up selling one!

Yummmmmmm :)

Happy Birthday Leyla!

Leyla turned **TWO** today!

I can't believe it has been two whole years....WOW. She was born 45 minutes and 2 years ago :)

We had a great party. We celebrated big for her 1st year, so this year we didn't think it was necessary to go all out again. I really wanted to try my hand at a fondant cake, so, I thought I have to at least invite a few people over to help eat the cake! So I decided we would have just a small party. We invited Angel and Carmen and their son Isaac (Leyla and Isaac are great playmates); Kyle and Bety and their daughter Mia (She will be 3 in December); Amanda, of course; and Eda. Everyone got here around 6:00 and Leyla showed up with Abuela shortly after. We surprised her with balloons at the door! Then she got really excited and started playing with all the balloons.

We all ate Chinese rice, YUM.......and visited some before cutting the cake. The kids had fun running around with the balloons and playing on Leyla's little tricycle-bike. Mia was very distracted by the cake and kept asking when we were going to eat cake! We finally convinced her to eat rice first or she wouldn't get any cake, and she understood that REAL well!

Tried to get a birthday picture with Leyla but she wouldn't put her water down!

And now, my first attempt at a fondant cake......The marshmallow fondant was easy to make but SO difficult to work with! It sticks like crazy! I used almost 2 lbs of powdered sugar! I had trouble at first but finally got the hang of it and it turned out pretty well. It slid a bit and definitely didn't look professional.....but it was pretty, and everyone like it :)

You can see the 4 layers in the cake! Oops...

I added dots to hide some holes....

The cake says "LEYLA" around the side and has three groups of balloons on top. Although I didn't ice it very thickly, the fondant started sliding a little and tore (I didn't notice until I had finished covering it). So using a friend's advice, I added extra details to cover the holes! But, for a first-timer, and for a two-year-old, I think it turned out alright :)

Leyla LOVED it (so did Mia.....) and she blew out the candle all by herself! She loved the singing and all the attention - she loves to be in the spotlight! Here is the video of her blowing out her candle:

And here are some more photos!

 Mia wanted to get in on the licking too!

 Leyla, showing her how it's done!

 Opening her present from Joni!

 She loves her little Cabbage-Patch Doll!

 Dancing with her new doll :) Love her skirt, thanks Tom and Katherine!

 Balloons from Abuela....aren't they neat??

Well, that's it! We had a great night, and Leyla really enjoyed it (She's passed out asleep!). Everyone loved my cake too. Thanks to all who came to spend the evening celebrating with us. Happy Birthday Leyla!



Belly Dance

This post will have to come with a little bit of explanation.
As everyone knows who reads my blog or knows me, I had a c-section with Leyla almost exactly 2 years ago. And, after two years, I've been bitten by the baby bug again...
This time around I am determined to have a natural birth, what's called a VBAC (vaginal birth after c-section), and need to prepare my body if I want a successful one. Most labors end in c-sections for a failure to progress--the longer the labor, the higher the likelihood of fetal distress and uterine rupture. I need to go into labor on my own, naturally, and push a baby out with 2 pushes!! Soooo I have started exercising.
I started exercising 3 days ago, just doing core exercises since that's the area I need strong for childbirth. I've been doing crunches and planks, and since I took a belly dancing class a few years ago I thought I might as well practice up and throw that into the workout too. Today my abs are soooo sore....so I guess it's working!
I looked up more today and was excited to find this:

"Belly dance helps in preparing for childbirth: The movements of raks sharki make an excellent prenatal exercise regimen that strengthens the muscles used during the childbirth process. The toned abdominal muscles and natural hip tucks, which are similar to the "pelvic rocking" taught during prenatal classes, teach the expectant mother how to move her pelvis. For women who desire natural childbirth, this form of exercise through dance, with its emphasis on muscle control not only facilitates natural childbirth, but also makes an excellent post-natal exercise that helps encourage abdominal tone."

That means I DID have a great idea and it will do exactly what I want! Yay!

Here are a few videos Maria and I watched to practice. We also watched several Shakira videos last night...haha.

Maria's Haircut

I cut Maria's hair a few weeks ago and finally took some good pictures!

 Leyla always wants to join in the fun :)

Her bangs look a tad long combed down like that! But overall I think it looks cute and I think I did a good job! (For someone who's not a hairdresser...)

Before Garden Pictures

I took a few pictures of the garden so I'll have some "before" pictures to compare in a few weeks. Hopefully everything will grow!

Okay. Here is the right side of the front yard. We have the huge vinca flower bed that has a mind of its own, in pink, purple, and white. The pink napoleon is in the corner, then by the front gate (the left of the picture) is a small jasmine. By the neighbor's fence I planted the white/yellow hibiscus and a little magnolia.

 Here's an upclose shot of the newest fenced garden.

 This is the magnolia that Ruthie, Maria's friend, gave me. She called it a magnolia, but I have yet to find out if magnolia in Honduras means the same as magnolia in America! I'm kind of worried it will turn into a tree....but we'll see!

The left side of the front yard with the fenced in section. Once again we have a huge vinca bed with an impatiens variety in the middle. In the fenced section, starting from the left, is the pink rose, white/yellow hibiscus, and Francelia, and another jasmine all the way to the right.

Here is my rose! It has had 3 blooms since I planted it. Now it is starting to grow from the bottom, and has a new little bud at the top! I am very proud of it - it always has a rose and continues to grow without problems.

 The other white/yellow hibiscus we planted got a break in it :( We don't know exactly what happened, but, it wasn't completely severed so we wrapped it tightly with plastic wrap and tied it to a supporting stick. I was so excited to see all the tiny new green leaves above and below the break! It looks like it has healed completely!

Here is my teeny, tiny Colchon de Nino I was given. It adjusted super quickly and already has a flower! 

 This is my potted rose garden at the pila, ha. Unfortunately not all of them have rooted, but several are showing good signs. I have a pink hibiscus, a purple dahlia, a red rose, a pink rose, a white rose, and a pink/yellow rose.

 I'm not sure which color rose this one is but look closely at the bottom and it has a new leaf!!!!! That means it rooted!!! Soooooo excited! :)

Piedra Blanca

We went to the mountains yesterday. The mountain is called Piedra Blanca (I think) and it's right in front of Catacamas. It is very close and easy to get to. Marcos bought some land there to plant coffee on for one of his projects. It is very nice and cool, but the hike to get to his land is just that - a HIKE. Oh it was awful. It was so muddy and so steep - Angel and Carmen went with us and Carmen fell like 8 times! I slipped several times and almost ended up doing the splits. At one part of the path we even had to run because there was literally a city of fire ants - not just one nest - a good 5 yards of the path was covered in a swarm of fire ants! Once we reached the top we were literally in the clouds. There's no other way to describe it. If we were standing in Catacamas and I tried to point out on the mountain where we were - I would point to the cloud. It started raining right before we went down (which was worrisome, considering how much of the path was already mud) and the clouds moved back in on is. It was pretty neat to be in a cloud!

 Some type of orchid in the tree. We saw them everywhere but none of them were blooming :(

Most of the land where we went is owned by coffee producers. This is the view of Catacamas from one of their farms.

 Here you can see some mature coffee trees plus the little seedlings growing in the nursery.

 Angel and Carmen

 Their son, Angel Isaac

 Marcos, conquering the mountain!

 A beehive we passed...........Ouch!

 Neat little transparent butterfly...ever seen one of those??

 The view from up in the clouds! Zoomed in, obviously.

Dancing with Elmo

Leyla LOVES her Elmo video, and these are a few clips of her dancing along to her favorite parts.

Play Ball!

Marcos's best friend (Angel) came over with his wife Carmen and their boy Isaac. They were all playing ball in the house, in my living room, as a matter of fact! Luckily nothing was broken! It was cute to watch Isaac and Leyla play as the night went on, they played quietly in her bedroom all night! So sweet :)

More Flowers!

My flowers are doing good so far. My rose has now bloomed 3 times since I planted it, the hibiscus is budding new leaves everywhere, all over it's stems, and the 5 or 6 smaller, red hibiscus variety have rooted. The other roses and dahlias I think are rooting but are taking a little longer.

I am excited now because a friend gave me some "Colchon de Nino." They are really pretty purple, pink, red, orange, and white little flowers that grow in FULL sun - perfect for our house! They spread everywhere, like ground cover, so I planted them under the rose and hibiscus bushes, to spread underneath, and also because that area is enclosed and protected from the dogs.

When I told my sister, she actually knew what they were and had planted some herself in the early summer. Here is a picture of hers! They spread a lot and have so many flowers! so pretty!

Leyla's Puppies

Leyla finally figured out how to hold the puppies. She used to grab them by their necks....

My Sick Girl

She is feeling lots better and watching Sesame Street with Elmo :)

Loooong Weekend

This has been a very long weekend for me! But not exactly the best...

Friday, I had to take off from school to go to Tegucigalpa to renew my passport extension. My residency still has not gone through and my extension expired Sunday. The lawyer is confident it will go through by the end of the month, so we just renewed it for one month. We were in Tegus literally 3 hours - quick trip!

Saturday was a normal day. We went to the bank in the morning and then to look at some cows a friend was selling - 3 cows, 2 pregnant, and a baby calf. We bought them, 4 cows, and basically end up with 6! Good deal.

Sunday we went to church but came home after service. Leyla was getting to antsy and Marcos needed to pack to go to the mountains. So, he left around noon, we had a nice afternoon, and Maria came home with her friend Ruthie around 3:00. We played monopoly while Leyla slept and then made dinner. I got a chance to talk to Maria about boys and dating, and she opened up a bit so I was glad about that.

Now, Monday - Leyla slept with me, which seems to be her habit when Daddy leaves, but this time I woke up around 2:30 and Leyla was on my pillow next to me (asleep) hugging me. She was burning hot. I didn't want to wake her but decided to give her some medicine. She went back to sleep afterwards and woke up at 5:30 in the morning. She would not stop crying and was obviously not feeling good. I tried everything to calm her down but she didn't want anything, or anybody else. Finally she fell asleep and slept about an hour. When she woke up I could tell she felt better so I thought she would be okay and I would go to work! She ate a banana and watched TV. Then she started fussing again and her fever still wasn't going down; 101.5! I decided to take her to the clinic.

We got there and she looked so sad and hurting :( While in the doctor's office, she threw up the entire banana she had eaten...The doctor told me I had been giving her too little tylenol and gave me ibuprofen instead. He also said she had a little inflammation in her ears and gave me an antibiotic. I gave her the ibuprofen and she threw it up :( Gave it to her again and she seemed ok. We went home and I started to give her the antibiotic, but she threw it up too. I decided to let her rest and try again later, but was worried that now her fever wouldn't go down. I bought her some Gatorade which she drank well, and then she fell asleep. Now she is resting and seems to be cooler (to the touch). I hope she wakes up feeling better! My poor baby is never sick; I've never seen her feel this bad - her little eyes looked so droopy and sad. :(

So, that's my weekend. Loooooong, 4-day weekend...

Daughter, Wife, Mother.....Hairdresser?

Ha. I am all these things and more! Maria was unhappy with her hair, saying it had no shape and was boring. She also wanted bangs. So we watched some youtube videos and I went at it! I cut in some layers and I gave her bangs. Her hair was longer in front than in the back so it seemed like I cut off a lot, but really I didn't cut but 1/2 inch off the back length. I think it looks really cute!

She took this of herself while I was at school, so you can't see the full haircut, but she still looks cute!

Toy Box for Leyla

Leyla had an old box with her toys in it. It was old and not looking so pretty, so I bought some paper and supplies and dressed it up!
The two sides opposite each other say "Leyla" and "Rebekah." The third and fourth sides say "Toys." And I'm well aware that the flowers will be pulled off within a week, ha.