Sept 16-- SENTENCIA!!!!!!

Great news came our way today at 10:50 am. Helena called and said, "Tell Brian I am on the way to get him. We must sign the sentencia by 12:00". We couldn't believe it. We (all the families here) were in the family room and together we all started jumping up and down with happiness. We got many hugs from our friends and the staff at the hotel. Oddly enough, I (Trisha) also felt sadness, even while we were celebrating b/c I began to realize that soon we will be leaving this wonderful place. Truly, this is such a special time in our lives and such a beautiful country. And we have very dear friends. It will be bittersweet to leave.

We were shocked at how quickly the sentencia had to be done. There is usually a days notice. Fortunately, only Brian had to go with the passports and the money to give his signature. He and Helena ran errands until 3:00.

An amazing thing happened while he was in line at the courthouse. Behind him in line was our lawyer, Gertrudis from Cali who helped us adopt Lucia!!! We have tried to contact her, but have been unable to. So we feel it is God's grace in allowing Brian to bump into her in a city of 8 million. She now lives in Bogota. We hope to spend time with her before we leave.

While Brian worked on the sentencia, I stayed back with the kids and all of the families went out for lunch. Then the kids played all day. And then around 5:00, another family got their sentencia. More dancing and jumping with happiness.

What lies ahead of us is some pretty busy days of new birth certificate, visa, passport, embassy doctor, etc. So we are definitely on the home stretch. We are aiming to leave on 9/23 or 9/24 and can't wait to be home (and to see our new bathroom...long story, but our bathroom pipes broke the week before we left and ruined the downstairs closet. The bathroom needed to be completely remodeled, and the closet. So that will be fun to come home to!)

Stay tuned!

Lucia and Valentina blowing bubbles.

The kids played in Lucia's tent. Much fun.

Nicoli and Peder Dilon.

Out for lunch at La Taqueria. Both families are from Norway.

Pierre and Nicoli.

Sept 15--Saying goodbye to friends

Today, a wonderful family left for home. We were quite sad to see them leave, for it is amazing how quickly friendships form here. Yet, we are so happy for them that they are on their way back home to Holland.

Lucia with friends. Manuela, Valentina, Peder Dilon, and Michel. She will greatly miss playing with Manuela and Michel. They have been terrific friends.

Lucia and Valentina, who will likely be here with us for the remainder of our time. They have enjoyed playing with a stuffed puppy that they throw up and down the stairs. 

Silas is sporting the Radius look. We like the mohawk and may give it a try tomorrow. Silas ate well today, so avocados worked well for us! 

Sept 14--First Food!!!

This morning, Silas took his first "bites" of food. It actually went pretty well! He dined on mashed avocado. We were considering beginning with Rice Cereal, but in Colombia all baby products have sugar in them. So it is not uncommon for people to make their own baby food if they are concerned about the sugar. They even put sugar in the milk.

Sept 13--Happy 5 months!

Today has been a fun-filled day...

On Sundays, the chefs make a special breakfast of french toast or pancakes. Here are our new coffee mugs that we bought at the craft shop yesterday. We are already creating many wonderful memories together with them. (Lucia loves coffee).

This is the Colombian doll Lucia picked out at the craft shop. She is wearing a traditional Colombian dress.

We went to church this morning at United Church of Bogota. It is nice b/c we are getting to know folks there and they are recognizing us. Again, we had a wonderful time.

When we got back to the hotel, we found that we were going to have a cookout. This is Berta and Herman, some of our wonderful chefs. Lunch is the biggest meal of the day in Colombia.

Pictured here is Inez, who is one of the owners of the hotel. She is fabulous to get to know and shared with us about the Colombian culture. A couple highlights from Inez--Colombians are happy people, always happy even though their history and lives are difficult. There is also a love for dancing!

The cookout was a terrific community builder. We talked on into the afternoon. BTW, Silas sleeps from 1:00-3:00. Since we have a baby monitor, we can feel free to leave him in the our room upstairs.

Afternoon coffee! Don't worry, Lucia's is about half milk.

Lucia's friends.

Making necklaces with Manuela and Michel.

Happy 5 month birthday!!!! Lucia made this hat for Silas. It is a dinosaur with army men. It was so cute b/c Silas had no qualms about wearing it and kept in on all afternoon and at dinner.

Silas is getting so big!

One funny story for my girlfriends--Today Brian ran a personal errand for me to the grocery store... understand? As he was standing in the aisle trying to figure out what exactly to purchase, not only from my instructions but also trying to understand the Spanish labels, 2 women came up to him and began explaining all the products to him in Spanish. They were asking him questions and so forth. When they realized he didn't understand, they went and got a man who could speak English. So they would explain the products to this man who would then translate it to Brian. Can you imagine!!!  But good for the women...he came home with exactly what I needed!

Sept 12-- A day of shopping!

We left today around 11:30 and returned at 4:00-- a full day of shopping at an artisan store. (Brian was in heaven...ha...ha...)

This shop was about a 10 minute cab rid from Halifax.

There were 3 stories of Colombian treasures...pottery, hand crafts, etc. Lucia picked out her Colombian present, which was a doll wearing the traditional Colombian dress. She was the happiest little girl in the world playing with this doll. And yes, if you are wondering...I found a terrific pottery coffee mug to add to my collection! We also got Silas some gifts for his future Dia de Bienvenidos celebrations.

For lunch, we had some American food, well sort of. The cheeseburger came with fried yucca. Tasty, but tougher to chew than french fries. The fresh mango juice hit the spot!

Since we were gone for the day, Silas took his nap in the stroller, which is very uncomfortable. This stroller is for the birds. We bought a cheap one b/c last time we flew, Delta snapped our Combi in half and replaced it with a recalled dinosaur stroller. So we didn't want to chance messing up a nice one. Now we are wishing we would have taken the chance. This stroller is very hard to push and it it is very hard for sitting. We try to make is as comfortable as possible for him.

This afternoon Lucia played and played with the other kids at the hotel. Fun memories.

Sept 11-- Missing Home

We are so thankful for the wonderful families at our hotel. The language barrier can be quite difficult for Lucia since she is the only child who speaks English. God's grace is so tangible here through the many things He blesses us with, like the lovely children here who reach out to Lucia.

And these two little girls are some of the blessings. They have reached out to Lucia. Today the girls came and knocked on the door and asked if Lucia could come play. Brian and I had big warm hearts. They also came over to our room and built a tent and played baby dolls. Lucia is having a wonderful time with them. BTW, I braided lots of hair today (for those of you who don't know, I love corn-rowing and french braiding hair). I beaded these girl's hair.

Tonight, we went and had dinner with a great family we met from the church we are visiting. It was so nice to be in their home and speak English and connect about American things (they are from Wheaton area). We had a lot of commonalities. Lucia cried and cried when we had to leave and kept saying she wanted to stay. We think it was because it has been our first "American" experience since we have been here. It felt good for all of us.

I am feeling quite home sick today. A few families are leaving to go home in the next few days, and things will be a bit quieter. Their leaving makes me long for home. We have heard stories of family's paperwork not being processed for things like the government office running out of paper or toner. Or maybe someone decides to go on vacation. Meanwhile the paper work just sits. We are in prayer that we are not going to be one of those stories. We hope to find out next week about our sentencia. We are comforted by knowing that God holds our days in His hands. And He is gracious to us, providing for all our needs.

Sept 10--Thursday

Today has been a nice down day. Not too much happening. Another family arrived, and now we have 13 kids at the hotel. And 6 are little girls 4-6 years of age. So Lucia is getting to know some new friends. Of course, we are still the only American family. But that is alright.

We went to Parque 93 after Silas's nap and then got an Oblea for a yummy snack. Several people have mentioned that Silas is looking so much bigger. It is hard for us to tell b/c we see him every day. But he is a little chunky guy.

In the mornings on some days, Lucia and I do "school". The science nerd comes out in me. And Lucia loves science too (one of her favorite shows is Sid the Science Kid). What fun! We have a kids book about the body that goes through each body system. It gives a lot of fun facts. Today we did the heart. Oh, here is a fun fact about the eye--did you know that you have microscopic eight-legged mites living on the base of your eyelashes? (they eat germs to keep our eyes protected). Yeh, nice.

Sept 9-- Part I--Monserratte & Old Bogota

Today has been a fantastic day. One of the best! It started early with a visit to Monserrate. Our tour guide (Mouricio, with good seat belts :) picked us up at 8:30 and drove us into the mountains to one of Bogota's most famous places. Monserrate was built in 1640 and overlooks the city of Bogota. Please look at the following website if you are interested in learning more:

www.cerromonserrate.com

We boarded the train in the last car, so we got an excellent view as we road up the mountain. Lucia was very excited about riding the train.

This is looking down at the track as we drove up. It was very steep!

Lucia is leaning against the window of the train. Notice the steep tracks below her and the city behind her.

Once at the top of the mountain, we began a climb to the church. The stations of the cross were along the cobblestone path that lead up to the church.

We are almost there!

The view was breathtaking. We took a gazillion pictures. This is the view from one side of the mountain. This is the city of Bogota. It helped us appreciate just how big this city is. And also we were able to see how Bogota is in the mountains, nestled in a plateau b/t the central and west Andes Mountains ridges.

In stark contrast to the view on the other side of Monserrate is the view on this side. Lush mountainside. The clouds were hiding the top of the mountains. Gorgeous.

Monserrate Church.

We had a great time touring Monserrate. It was much colder and windier than we were prepared for. But nonetheless, we had a wonderful time and believe it is a must see for anyone who travels to Bogota.

When we got back down the mountain we saw this guy with a llama. The llama had a very fancy saddle and it made us laugh.

Another car picture...but alas, we are all buckled in with working seat belts. Well, all of us but Silas. We held on to him tightly! But it made for a tricky feeding.

After Monserrate, our tour guide took us to the old town (1500's) of Bogota called La Candeleria. This is Bolivar Plaza, we think. La Candeleria has beautiful architecture. The hard part for us was the intense traffic. It was very slow moving which is hard with two little ones.

One reason for the bad traffic was that university students were protesting the U.S. putting military bases in Colombia. So they filled the street we were on and stopped the traffic. We got to see all kinds of "friendly" signs about us yankees. Fortunately, this is not a common thread here. The cars on our street ended up having to back up a fair distance to get to another street. Made for an interesting trip through the old city!

Sept 9-- Part II--Colombia vs Uruguay

As most people know, soccer is HUGE in Colombia. Well, it is huge in most parts of the world except the U.S. And the Norwegians and Colombians were very excited about the soccer game today, Colombia vs. Uruguay. They made sure to give Brian a hard time! They are doing their best to turn him into a soccer fan. 

Inez, one of the hotel owners, and her staff arranged for a party for all of us (I must mention that now we have 6 families and 9 children). The hotel staff and guest piled into the "TV room" for the game. We were served drinks and snacks. They even got a new flat screen TV! Most everyone was decked out in the Colombian jerseys and colors. It was blast!

The new flat screen. We were all very excited! Oh, btw, Colombia lost.

Watching the game.

Silas dressed for the occasion.

Getting ready for the game.

"Vamos Colombia" -- we heard this a lot.

Herman collecting the reward for betting on the correct score. Uruguay 3. Colombia 1. 

This really helped to build community here at the hotel. It really has been a great day!