California Dreaming

So last weekend we decided it was high time to visit the aunties in San Diego and since our credit card was nice enough to cash in our points for a plane ticket, off we went. We arrived early Friday morning with just enough time to say hello and introduce the baby to Bubie Joanie at the airport as she was leaving that day to visit family in Colorado.
A wonderful time was had by all. We ate dinner at Little Italy, walked along the port and saw cool ships, hung out at the beach on Coronado island and visited Bilbao Park. Blue Prince had never seen the Pacific ocean and neither had Bella and both enjoyed it immensely. Bella was a little angry at first that she couldn't eat the sand (she burst into tears at her first mouthful) but soon got into the grove and loved crawling around. Now if only I could teach her not to eat leaves.

Off and On

So it has been a couple weeks since my last post but unfortunately that seems to be how my life has gone lately. Putting out fires and sporadic attendance for things in my life. I have been taking an institute class for mothers with young children this fall on Tuesdays and Thursdays, (my days off work) and I love the class and the teacher Sister Eagan but due to my life it has been hard for me to go. I actually made it again today after about 6 weeks of not going and as I walked in (late as usual) she stopped her class and gave me a hug welcoming me back. It makes you wish that every activity that you make the effort to go to while dragging along a small child could be so rewarding. Anyway at least she understood the time conflicts inherent in my new Relief Society President calling. The calling in general is going well, though most of the time I try not to think about it too hard or the sense of responsibility over all I should be doing overwhelms me and makes me slightly catatonic. Right now I have a family to visit to fill out a food order for the bishops warehouse, another sister I need to check on to see if she needs clothing to go to church, and oh yeah tonight they should be delivering the turkey I need to cook for Saturdays ward Thanksgiving dinner. It should be an interesting dinner, they are asking the sisters to cook the turkeys however they would be cooked in their own countries. The catch is that most Spanish speaking countries don't routinely cook turkey. Like I said should be interesting.

Anyway I should go check on Bella, she is in bed but has a nasty cold with a hacking cough and stuffiness. We shall see if either of us are up for the next nasal aspirator vs child battle. Man I can't wait till she can blow her nose like a human being. When does that happen by-the-way, it's not exactly one of those developmental milestones they put in parenting books. (okay I admit I have never actually looked to see if it is there, but I'm guessing it's not and I try to avoid the parenting books as much as possible, see above comments about too much responsibility causing catatonia)

Halloween

So here is Princess Bella in her Halloween costume,

The pink leopard costume was a big hit and knowing her personality a perfect fit.

No Prissy or Passive sheep or pumpkin costume for her.

Here are myself and my Dear Husband holding Miss Princess

Both the rabbit ears and the devil horns lit up, they were very cool.

Anyway I just wanted to post some quick pictures, more to come latter.

Weird Dream

So last night I had a very strange dream: I was dreaming about finding the blog of a girl living in Maldonado Uruguay. The thing is that she was an American and LDS and she was there living as an Expat off money she received from Social Security Disability for reactive airway disease. The dream must have gone on for quite some time because I remember her writing about several different getting adjusted type adventures but the funny part is how your brain gathers all the different parts of what happened and what you think about during the day and tries to make sense of it in a narrative form. It's like my brain said: "well you have been thinking about writing a blog, and you have been reading several expat blogs from the Uruguay coast, how bout we mix in a patient you have living off Social Security Disability payments and oh yeah, you spoke with a couple of your sisters today, so lets turn on the mental blender and see what floats up".

First Post

So I have been threatening for several weeks to actually start this blog and following my initial miss-start where I got all frustrated trying to get creative personalizing the blog with a cool header and such (way beyond my limited computer publishing skills), I decided that cool looking or not, I wanted to give it a try, so here we are.

Some may ask "What's with the funky title"? In reality it makes slightly more sense in Spanish but only slightly. For those who know me, you will be aware that my husband is from Uruguay (a small South American country near Brazil and Argentina) (no not in Africa and no not the land locked one in the jungle, that's Paraguay). Anyway when my husband and I were beginning our long distance dating thing he would often tease me asking if I had found my Principe Azul, (Blue Prince) which in English would be more like White knight or Prince Charming. As things progressed there was a time when I let him know that he was the only Blue Prince even in the running and he has been the only one for me ever since. So there you have the Blue Prince in our story.


As for the Orange Sock.... During my first visit back to Uruguay to see if there really would be any real life connection between myself and aforementioned Blue Prince, I had the opportunity to go to church in a ward where I had been a missionary for 7 months. While greeting everyone in the traditional Uruguayan style (one by one, a kiss to the cheek and heaven forbid if you miss someone) I ran into a older gentleman friend of mine asking if I had returned to find my "Media Naranja". I, having never heard the phrase before, could not comprehend what an Orange Sock had to do with anything. I found out latter that "Media Naranja" is a term meaning your soul mate or other half. Technically "Media Naranja" is best translated as Half an Orange but in my defense to all my Mexican Spanish speaking friends, in Uruguay socks are called medias. (Contrary to what one of my MTC Spanish teachers believed and made a huge deal over when it came up on our vocabulary list, but that is a story for another time).


I decided not to take the name Half an Orange because that was the name of one of the first blogs I started reading several years ago, unfortunately now defunct. It was the bilingual blog of a woman who was married to an American and serving as a diplomat for Peru in China with her husband and two small children, cool premise huh, I miss it.


So I guess you can say for this blog's sake I will be the Orange Sock and my husband the Blue Prince. We also have a little one, known here as Princess Bella, who is the real reason for most people to be visiting this blog. As you will see in forthcoming pictures she is incredibly beautiful and in order to protect her from kidnappers and paparazzi we shall attempt to protect her privacy. Anyway welcome to my blog:)