Coolest birthday party ever.

For Amaya's birthday party we went to this awesome restaurant called Andres Carne de Res. The food is amazing but even better is that they have a giant area just for kids to play in while the adults can relax and eat. Actually it's more than just a play area - for $8 per child you can create something at the wood working station (complete with saws, nails and paint), bake cookies, make a pizza, create and paint your own paper mache mask, make jewelry, color, and go to a movie (they have a little kids theatre). They also have a playground, puppet shows, a soccer area, and stilts! The kids obviously had an amazing time. We actually ended up being there for about 4 hours. Amaya was so happy. She loved rocking on the rocking horses and playing in the sand. For an extra $25 they provided us with decorations, a huge yummy cake and a mariachi band for Amaya and Arianna's shared party. Arianna is the daughter of our new good friends here, the Tennys. The girls are only a few days apart. They also have another daughter about a week younger than Jay. Mika and Jay are already best friends. They had SO much fun at Andres.

 New baby!

 Un besito!!

Everyone thought the baby looked just like MyMy :)

 Amaya was thrilled with letting these balloons go. She thought it was so fun! We figured it was her party so she could choose what she wanted to do with them :)

 The birthday girls!

Arianna actually fell asleep at the party and they brought this little cuna basket for her. Amazing! This place just kept getting better and better. We couldn't' believe it but Arianna slept through the entire mariachi band singing and birthday celebrations. She is such  cutie.

The food was great too!!

 Jay and Mika

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Jay's creations...

The craziness that is Andres...

Supposedly there is one in New York now too. We will have to check it out if we ever make it there!

Happy birthday sweet little 2 year old!! You are sure beautiful!

Happy Birthday MY MY MY MyMy!!!

Little Loo, Tiny One, Yittle Yittle, Baby Girl, Teeny Tiny, NeHow HoHo, MyMy... YOU ARE 2 TODAY!!! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday dear MyMy!!! Happy Birthday to you!!!!! You are a bundle of energy and you light up the world. You are hilarious and VERY willful. You are independent but you love to snuggle. You are OBSESSED with your buh-buh (aka the sippy cup). You don't eat much but you do love bread and strawberries. You also eat raisons by the fistful and you like bananas too. Pizza is a favorite and of course mac and cheese (is your brother teaching you or what?). You LOVE Jay. You follow him around and you love to do everything he does. You also love to pull his hair. You are kind of a "tom-boy." This morning when I walked into your room to turn off the noise maker with you in my arms you started reaching frantically for something on the desk. You were saying, "This! This! This!" I looked over and saw these things: your new doll, Mater the tow truck, a bracelet Jay made for you and Strawberry Shortcake. When I let you lean down to show me what you wanted, can you guess what you wanted? Mater! I should't be surprised since you do love everything Jay does. Your very favorite toy of all is Woody from Toy Story. He's your best friend. You call him "B" and carry him around everywhere. You also love playing cars and will sing the first 6 notes from the Cars 2 theme song while you play (also just like your brother). You LOVE watching movies and cartoons. Any movie or cartoon really. You are happy with whatever Jay wants. You talk ALL. THE. TIME. When I don't hear you singing or talking or babbling I know you're up to no good :) You are actually quite a good talker! I know Jay didn't talk nearly as much as you at the same age (sorry baby boy - girls are just like that!). You can say so much now - I don't even know where to start. And even when you can't say something you always try to say it. I love hearing your little voice. Remember how I said you are willfull/independent? I wasn't kidding! If I give you an inch you will take a mile! You run every chance you get. Since we're living in Bogota now I'm pretty scared to let  you out of the stroller on the street. The other day though I found a backpack/leash and I decided to try it. You were thrilled to put the backpack on (bah-pah - just like Dora). Jay was excited to hold the leash. I felt kind of bad about it. I don't want to treat you like a dog - but I WILL keep you safe. You actually thought it was pretty cool. In fact, when Jay would drop the leash you would pick it up and give it back to him. Ha ha ha!!! That worked until we got to a major street and I tried to hold your hand. You FREAKED out until I had to pick you up and then you proceeded to pull my hair and scratch my face. You actually left a mark! Yeah, that's the willful part :) But you are so sweet my love. When I showed you my owie you were very concerned and you pet my face saying "owie mommy! Owie!" and when I told you, "Yes MyMy. Mommy has an owie. You gave me that owie. Can you say sorry?" You looked at me with those big blue eyes and said, "Sorry mommy!" and gave my owie a kiss. How can I be mad when you do that? You love everyone. You don't like to be left behind without mommy but when we're out and about you love to talk to anyone who will talk to you (which is almost everyone here since your blond hair and blue eyes attract everyone!). You will give hugs and kisses to new friends and you will answer anyone who talks to you - we don't always know what you're saying, but you answer. Like I said Amaya, you are a little sunshine. You light up the world like a little ball of fire. You are amazing and your daddy and I absolutely adore you in every way. Happy birthday to my sweet little girl!!

This one is for you Reed...

Does the word Sipote sound familiar to you? 

 Replace the "S" with a "CH" put an "L" before the E and you have... 

CHIPOTLE!

Sipote in Colombia is VERY similar Chipotle in the States... so now Melissa and Reed, and Brookie HAVE to come visit to see how it compares (Reed loves Chipotle). When we ordered Mike said to the guy at the counter, "Hey, do you know there is a restaurant in the US called Chipotle that is very similar to Sipote?" The guy said, "Yeah, they copied us!" Except that when we asked how long they had been in business we found out it has been way less than Chipotle. Hahaha! Sorry guy :) The food was sure delicious though! Here we are enjoying some ice cream afterwords - sorry Jay turned out so dark! I have only been using my phone to take pictures thus far because I'm nervous about having my real camera out and about!

 MyMy LOVES i-c-e-c-ream!

 Just had to add a picture of these two cuties at church at the end!

Parks, Refried Beans and the Easter Bunny

Obviously I'm running out of creative titles for my blogs so this one is very straightforward. First of all I finally met again with my friend from Parque 93 and she took me to a new park - Parque Chicó. It is a huge park in the middle of Bogota and so beautiful! It was originally a huge estate owned by a woman named Mercedes Sierra de Perez. She donated the grounds and her home to the city and it was turned into a park - Mercedes was the one who originally designed the area so we have her to thank for the beautiful landscape! The park is located at septima (or seventh) and calle 93. Bogota has a great address system. It's similar to Salt Lake making most addresses really easy to find. Here are some pictures of the kids playing at the park.

 Amaya pointing to the swing next to her and saying, "That's Jays!"

They loved it! Jay especially had fun going on all the "secret paths" and Amaya had a blast throwing rocks and leaves into the ponds and streams throughout the park. Unfortunately at one point she climbed down into a little ditch to get to a merry-go-round without realizing there was water in it. her little feet got soaked! She didn't like that too much. Everyone had a good time at the park though and we will definitely be going back to get out of the city life from time to time.

Jay and Amaya and I spent some time at a new friend's house last week too. Her name is Kellie and she lives up in Los Rosales area. Right behind her is a beautiful mountain area where you can hike around and play. I love how green Bogota is! Here we are taking a hike. Jay again was very excited to explore the paths and they were both thrilled to be outside and, in Amaya's case, out of a stroller!

Ok, so what's with the refried beans? We have been staying in a hotel with a TINY kitchen - it literally only has a microwave and a hot plate and no counter space. We also have a mini fridge but it is not located in the kitchen. It's upstairs in our bedroom!!

What in the world? Makes cooking interesting. They also only gave us a few pots and 1 glass to use. I was stealing plates, bowls and utensils from room service until Mike called the front desk 5 times and they finally brought us some things to use. At one point I was actually kneeling on the floor cutting a watermelon on a dinner plate with a butter knife. Something I'll never forget :) One thing we didn't have even after they brought us some plates/cups/utensils was a can opener though. I had bought some refried beans from the little commissary at the embassy and was going to make the kids bean burritos for dinner. (Sounds delicious right? I only had so many options - believe me!!) I called down to the front desk and they said they would send someone up. When they came up they told me they would take my can and open it in the kitchen and bring it back since they had no can opener we could actually use in our room. So after a few minutes, this is what they brought back...

Hahaha!! Looks really appetizing, right? Here's another treasure for you...

MyMy picking her nose standing in front of the toilet that she just threw 2 new rolls of toilet paper into. What can I say? You get pretty bored after staying in a hotel so long!! She was just trying to be creative! And the Easter Bunny. We went to the mall the other day and found this little guy.

Easter is coming and Mike gets two days off here!!! Gotta love getting both US and Colombian holidays off at the embassy.