The Pumpkin Patch

Last night was amazing. Elkin ate good, went to bed on time, stayed in bed most of the night, and woke up with a big smile on his face! Let's hope that's the beginning of a new streak!

We went to the pumpkin patch today - a very different experience than when we would go by ourselves. We always looked at all the families with children with a little jealousy so it was very weird being on "the other side" this time.

Elkin was overwhelmed as usual but he had a great time. Here are a few shots from the hayrack ride and with the pumpkin that he picked out.

¡Basta!

During Elkin's tantrums, he yells over and over a Spanish word - ¡Basta! We had no idea what it meant and it certainly sounds like something bad in English (you have one guess) but we really had no idea.

We were doing some translating this evening and just for fun, looked up how to say Stop! What do you know - it's ¡Basta! That's what he's saying when he gets really upset. Makes sense... more so than that other word we thought he was saying :)

His English seems to be developing a little at a time which is great. He loves to repeat things he hears and ask what things are and then repeats them. We think he has down 'pumpkin' and he really has 'bye' and 'uh oh' and 'oh no' down (though the last two are probably the same in Spanish). It's really, really funny to hear him repeat everything... scary too! He's been repeating everything as we tell him what things are and it's so cute!

He's even been laughing when we laugh which causes quite the chain reaction! We were watching The Office on NBC this evening and every time we laughed he laughed just as hard right after us as if he got the same joke... so funny!!

When we were watching Survivor later in the evening, he went off on this long ramble in Spanish during the vote off like he was expressing his concerns/opinions/etc. about who was getting kicked off. Not sure what was going on there but the boy was very in to it!

Totally off the topic but I'm feeling one-post today... he falls asleep in the car like magic. Sometimes we'll be in there for not more than a minute or two and nowhere near nap time and he'll completely fall asleep. He's so excited to get in the car and go places and he tries so hard not to fall asleep during this favorite part of his day but he can't help it! It's so cute but we feel sorry for him because he misses out on all the excitement of driving around.

A Few Days at Home

It's been a busy several days at home - lots of adjusting on everyone's part but things are getting better.

The tantrums are better, we think mainly because there's a place for Elkin to go by himself. In the airport, when he got upset and wanted his space, there was nowhere for him to go - thus the spitting, hitting, pinching, etc. when we had to physically restrain him. And he's a very strong almost-3-year-old. Plus we're learning how to deal with him in specific situations - something that obviously had to come with a little experience with him.

The trips out have been almost perfect. He loves riding in the car and if we keep moving around in the store and around town (which is our natural state anyway) he seems very happy. He's usually fine coming home too. I don't know if there's any child psychology to back this up, but we like the fact that we're occasionally going out and coming back to the same place. That isn't something he's had with us much lately (hotel to hotel to hotel). We think it surely helps reinforce that this is home.

We're really looking forward to his language developing more. It's really hard to convey that something is his but he can't use it right now for a very good reason or that dinner will be here in an hour and we're not just saying no to more snacks because we're mean people. We know some of that is just three year old stuff but it would certainly be nice if he could at least understand even if he disagrees.

On a lighter note! He loves his new tricycle (which he calls a motorcycle of course - the kid's in love with anything on wheels) and he took a ride this morning in the driveway. It's extra cold here for mid October so we got him all dressed up in winter garb. Surely it's the first time he had a stocking hat or gloves on. It didn't get much below 80F where he came from.

Homecoming on Sunday

Sorry for the late post (I've gotten several nasty emails for the lack of updates!) but it's been really crazy around here. Elkin has had a hard time adjusting... and so have we. But things are starting to look up.

Here's a few shots from Sunday... our arrival at the airport and then the walk in the house:































We'll post some more soon (I know, I know, I promised that last time) but we really will try.

Back in the US!

We got back to the US last night after a very, very, very, very long day of travel with a very, very, very grumpy 2 year old. It wasn't at all a fun trip but we're almost home.

We'll post some homecoming pictures soon, we promise!

We're Ready to Go!

I went by myself this afternoon to pick up Elkin's passport with his US visa in it from the US Embassy. Everything is fine but it was a bit stressful.

The taxi ride there was quite the trip. A heavy storm, heavy traffic, and a semi-lost taxi driver made for a stressful trip. We HAD to be there before 4pm. No exceptions. This isn't a pharmacy or the post office - it's an embassy.

When we arrived at about 3:40pm, the place looked deserted. It was crazy outside yesterday morning with all kinds of people doing all kinds of things. Not today. There was one guard which tried to tell us that no visa work was done on Fridays and to go home (panic #1) but the agency rep I was with just kept walking and smiled and rolled his eyes. He didn't chase after us so I figured we were OK at that point.

The security checkpoint that was next was crazy yesterday and was pretty much exactly like airport security except the embassy had a super high tech full body x-ray machine. Today, the "carry-on" scanner wasn't even on and they just rushed us through the x-ray. They didn't even ask for ID. It was 15 minutes before closing time on Friday - everyone apparently wanted to go home or something.

As I walked into the embassy, the 5,000 chairs that were completely full of people were COMPLETELY empty. It was bizarre. I thought we might have been wrong about the time or what we could do at this time and that things were closed (panic #2). No worries though - I went to the window, gave the guy the little pink slip, and about 5 minutes later came Elkin's Colombian passport with a shiny US visa glued inside, along with a huge packet for immigration when we get to the States.

(On a side note, it's kind of scary being at a US Embassy in another country. It's definitely the most dangerous place we've been in Colombia if you really think about it. US Embassys are regular victims of terrorist threats and attacks in many countries.)

The cab ride back to the B&B was yet another adventure. The taxi driver was yawning as he pulled over to pick us up. I didn't think anything of it until he started in falling asleep while driving through Bogota traffic! (panic #3) I seriously thought I was going to die for a few seconds there as he was weaving through traffic with his eyes closed. I made it here so obviously everything was OK but it was maybe the scariest cab ride yet even though it wasn't the crasiest driving per se.

Anyway, we're off for the aiport pretty early tomorrow and we'll try to blog as soon as we can in the US!

Oh yea, here's that kid again :)

The Dennis Family

Before we left for Colombia and since we've been here, we've chatted back and forth with the Dennis family who is also adopting from Colombia.

They were headed here to Bogotá to say for a single day before heading off to the city that their new daughter is from. We joked that if things worked out just right that we might be able to meet. Well it did! Yesterday we met them just before heading out.

They posted here on their blog and even have a picture of all of us.

We're Coming Home on Sunday!

We went to the US Embassy this morning and everything went very smooth. We're picking up Elkin's US visa tomorrow (Friday) at 3:30pm and then we'll fly to Miami on Saturday. We'll make the remainder of the trip on Sunday and arrive mid-day.

Anyone that wants to know exact times so they can be there can just email us at fishertimj at gmail.com.

For family and friends - please don't feel like you have have to be there on Sunday. You're all more than welcome to stop by anytime and meet him. On the other hand, we're not worried about the size of the crowd either so everyone is invited. Elkin is shy at first but he definitely won't be scared.

We're also thinking about meeting somewhere for lunch with everyone after we land so we can get something to eat :) and so everyone can have a bit more time to interact with Elkin. If anyone has any idea where we can do that near the airport, please drop us an email.

We couldn't take pictures of the US Embassy (duh) but it wasn't quite what we expected. It was all open (great climate here) and very easy to get around. Nice place actually. We were assigned a particular window to do our work which was in several stages. It was near the edge of the building so we were able to keep Elkin busy around some trees and stuff - the rest the place looked like an airport waiting area which would have been bad to be stuck in.

We first gave them all the paperwork, then had a short discussion about what we gave them about 15 minutes later, then we paid for the visa, and then a bit later I had a detailed discussion about Elkin and all his paperwork with some sort of US official (not sure her title). There were a few stressful questions but nothing too crazy. She did ask how we got our sentencia since the strike was going on and I assured her it was due to Elkin's lucky birth in a small town and not some under-the-table judge payoff. She believed me :).

The whole process wasn't more than an hour. MUCH better than we had been told about. We have our little come-back-tomorrow-and-pick-up-his-visa slip that we have been dreaming about! We're finally on our way home!!

Just in case you haven't been looking at our cute kid:

Doctors Visit a Complete Success!

We left for the doctors visit at about 4:20... 20 minutes late (taxi was late). We're not sure when the appointment actually was but my guess is it was soon after 4:00 because we made high tailed it there like I've never seen. The taxi driver was weaving in and out of traffic like a maniac! I actually leaned over to Stacy and told her that this was just like a video game only I'd NEVER drive this fast in a video game.

I'm not exaggerating... it was INSANE! I wish we had had the camera to video this one. Remember - no seat belts here.

Then we hopped out of the taxi, literally ran into the clinic, up the elevator, down the stairs (wrong floor), and right into the doctors office. Who knows when our appointment was but we got in!

The visit was a little traumatic, only partly because Elkin slept all the way into the office. I had to wake him up, strip him down, and the doctor did a bit of everything to him to make sure he was OK. I'd say we were in there about 20 minutes or so. He prepared the medical documents that the embassy will need and sent us on our way. He did speak English.

So next up is the US Embassy tomorrow morning at 9:00am. It's the very last official thing to do so we can all come home. Well, we have to pick it up the next day but other than that.

Man we love Bogota. It's beautiful, lots of different kinds of people (read: no one stares at us), and the weather is amazing.

Poor Elkin thinks this is his new life... pictures all the time, different hotel rooms, uncomfortable people situations, very uncomfortable doctor visits, irregular meals... :( Poor kid! We CAN NOT wait to get him HOME!

¡Viva Bogotá!

We're in Bogotá!

Our to-dos in Monteria this morning went better than perfect. Our interpreter begged her way into the building that the passport office is in at 8:00am (20 minutes before they opened). She and Stacy went up and got the passport, had to make some copies of it, return the copies to the office (why we don't know) and then were back down at the taxi at 8:30am!

We made it to the airport in plenty of time. In fact, our plane left 45 minutes late so we were actually quite early.

Elkin LOVED the plane ride. He just laughed at every bump during take-off and was enthralled enough about the inside of the plane to keep pretty busy on the 45 minute flight. We're glad he loved the plane ride because he didn't care too much for the airport wait. He threw quite a tantrum on the floor in fact.

The weather in Bogotá all year round is just amazing - 50s and 60s pretty much all day, every day. Exactly what we needed after the insane heat and humidity of Monteria.

We have a doctors visit for Elkin at 4:00pm today - a required trip before he can get his US visa. After that we have to get some pictures taken of him for his visa. Hopefully he's not too upset after the visit with the doc to get a decent picture taken. We'll see.

Tomorrow is the US Embassy visit to apply for Elkin's visa which supposedly a very long process. Friday, assuming what we're told is correct, we'll be able to pick it up. You can not pick up the visa the same day no matter how early you're done with the application.

So that means we could leave on Saturday. There's no way to get from Bogotá to home in one day on our airline if you leave on a Saturday. Fine with us. We'll stay over in Miami and head home on Sunday. Hopefully. :)

Wish Us Luck!!

Our interpreter should be here at 7:30am this morning to help us check out of our hotel.

After that, it's off to the passport office at 8:20am where things will hopefully go smoothly and quickly. Then it's the airport (about a 15 minute drive) by 9:20am - well, assuming they let us on right before takeoff. We're not sure how strict they are at this small airport.

We're trying not to get our hopes up too high. Really, like we said before, if we miss it, we'll just take the one this afternoon. Killing time all day with all our luggage won't be fun but things could be worse. Honestly, we're most anxious about the passport being correct. If it's not, that will put our trip off at least a day or so which would be worse of course.

Hope you hear from us next in Bogotá!

Number Five

Wow, 5 posts in one day. You'd think we were actually busy! :)

I called our interpreter at about 6:05pm (she was supposed to be here with the lawyer at 6:00pm) and she told us that herself and the lawyer and the ICBF representative would all meet us here at the hotel at 6:30 to 6:45. To my surprise, they were all here promptly at 6:30. Little things like that make us very happy at this stage in the game!

Everyone came up to the room to talk over all the last minute details before we head to Bogotá tomorrow. We even got our agency's representative in Bogotá (the woman we're told "is in charge of everything down here" and who I so far think really does have a grip on this whole process) on the phone to make sure we had all the paperwork needed for the US Embassy.

We're told we do and we're set to go! This was a big point of worry because we didn't want to get all the way there just to find out we'd have to fly back to Montería to do some other official business.

The only roadblock to everything working out here in Montería is that one hour we have to 1) Get the passport (long, long lines and the possibility for the office being closed without notice), 2) Pick up Stacy and Elkin at the hotel and 3) Check in at the airport and get on our plane. It's going to be very close.

Worst case scenario if we miss our flight (well, within reason I guess) is that we'll have to take the later-in-the-day flight to Bogotá which may or may not have a drastic affect on when we come home. It could (it's complicated - we'll explain later if it happens) but we just don't know for sure yet.

So as far as we can tell right now, the very best and most unlikely day we'll be home is this Sunday. The earliest day after that would be next Wednesday - not due to flight availability but instead to days that certain things can be completed. Then of course if anything goes wrong that we're not aware of right now (very likely), our return dates move further out from there. Our originally scheduled return flight is a week from this Saturday so at very least we'd love to not have to stay longer than that.

Although stepping back for a minute, we fully understand that we're very, very lucky to be able to come home at all. Many families whose adopted child(ren) are from larger towns where the judges are striking have been here for months and have no end in sight. We're in infinitely better shape than that and can't imagine being in that situation. We really feel for all of them.

We'll try to update everyone tomorrow night. Our Internet access may or may not be as easily accessible when we're in Bogotá. We won't know until we're there.

Wish us luck!!

Our Little Elkin

This is how we know Elkin most of the time - laughing about some random thing! It's so easy to get him going. I don't know where he gets the energy to laugh so much, let alone run around a million miles an hour.

Can you tell we're just waiting around today? This is our fourth blog post so far in one day... I think that's a record.

Some Progress This Morning

Our interpreter showed up EARLIER THAN SCHEDULED this morning which was great. We headed over the passport office, then to the bank, then to another office, then back to the passport office. All necessary to get the passport going.

Government office lines are nothing in the States compared to here. We'd give anything to wait at the DMV in the US. No problemo. Other people in line were very, very rude too. The men just stepped over the women and there was lots of pushing and cutting. Believe it or not, people in the States are WAY nicer in these kinds of situations. No comparison.

As much as our interpreter begged, our passport could not be completed today. Apparently this government office building is again shutting down this afternoon to show solidarity with the judges strike. We're supposed to be there again (actually just one of us) at 8:20am to pick it up.

So with this news, we bought plane tickets to Bogotá! The plane leaves at 9:20am. Yes, 9:20 - an hour after the passport office opens.

In that hour, Tim will get the passport, then head back to the hotel to pick up Elkin and Stacy, and then head to the airport, all with our interpreter. That's a lot to do in an hour. We're hoping we don't miss the flight. If so, we believe there's another one in the afternoon though that will mess up our tentative plans in Bogotá for the day. Hey - we have plane tickets. We're ecstatic right now about that.

So if the morning flight works out, we're planning on doing the doctors visit at the US Embassy in the afternoon (he only does them in the afternoon). That's Wednesday. So that puts applying for his US visa on Thursday. Visas are picked up the day after application. Since no visa work is done on Friday and Monday is a holiday, we'll be stuck in Bogotá until next Tuesday when all we'll do is pick it up. Then we can come home.

If things would have been done on time here in Montería, we wouldn't be facing the 4 day weekend in Bogotá. I'd say bad luck but it was certainly preventable.

It's all relative I guess. We'll still be coming home early so that's great... we just got our hopes up for earlier.

This afternoon we're meeting with the lawyer to get all our paperwork in order and get her paid. Hopefully that'll be OK.

The Many Moods of Elkin

There are several that we've not taken pictures of for reasons you can guess but here's some recent pics we've enjoyed:

Happy!!! (man I love the playground)



Busy (those are Tim's glasses by the way)



Enthralled (he's watching some little girls swim)



Sad (waiting WAY too long for the interpreter to show up)



Pensive (when WILL the interpreter show up... really? when will she???)

A Frustrating Day

Yesterday turned out to be a frustrating day. We did get Elkin's new birth certificate but didn't get his passport. The day was made up of our interpreter continuously saying that she would be here at a certain time and then not showing up because she was busy with her other job.

In order to get a passport here you have to turn your paperwork in in the morning, stand in long lines at the bank to go back and pay for the passport and then pick up the passport in the afternoon. We finally made it to the passport office a little after 5. When we got to the office building there were guards there that said the office building has closed as part of the strike and that they had closed just a few hours before.

So yes, if our interpreter would have shown up when she was supposed to we would have the passport. The guard said the building would be open this morning but needless to say we are pretty nervous whether that will happen or not. If they are truly participating in the strike we don't see how that can happen. If it is closed today we plan to find out if we can get a passport in another city for Elkin. We aren't sure if this possible and if it is if all the other passport offices are closed because of the strike as well.

So the interpreter is supposed to show up this morning and take us down there. So hopefully 1) she shows up on time 2) she shows up sometime today 3) the passport office is open and we can drop off our paperwork and 4) the passport office is still open this afternoon so we can pick up the passport.

We'll keep you updated!

Hopeful for Birth Certificate and Passport Today

If things go well, we'll have Elkin's new birth certificate in hand in the next hour or so and then we can go get his passport. That's all we need to head to Bogotá.

We checked flights and realistically, if everything goes as planned today, we can leave for Bogotá in the morning and get started on the US Embassy stuff in the afternoon.

Wish us luck!

Passport Photos

We didn't do much today - just lots of rummaging through paperwork, worrying if we have everything we need for the insane week ahead.

We did take another trip to the pool (or should I say the big bath tub since he won't clean himself any other way) and did our regular grocery run.

This evening, we did get something worthwhile done. We went to a photo place down town here and got Elkin's picture taken for his Colombian passport that hopefully we'll get completed by Monday night or Tuesday morning. We got enough copies so we could use a few for his US Visa - that should save another trip to a photo place in Bogotá.

We were going to go to the beach tomorrow but decided not to since this week will be so crazy. We figured a relaxing day around the hotel and a lunch out with the interpreter was a better idea. Elkin is not going to get to maintain any of his sleeping or eating habits for a while so we didn't see any reason to add a day to that.

Trip to Exito by Ourselves and... oh yea... SENTENCIA!

The day started out innocent enough - our regular trip to breakfast in the hotel and then showers. We decided to quit whining about everything and just hop in a taxi by ourselves and head to the mall.

The mall trip and taxi rides by ourselves went well. We were there a bit early at 9:30am or so (stores seemed to open around 10:00 like back home) but Exito was open of course.

We strolled around, picked up some things that our grocery store doesn't carry, and got Elkin a new pair of shoes! (US size 6 if anyone was curious ;).

We hopped a taxi back to the hotel and the phone rang as soon as we walked in. It was the ICBF representative that we had met the day we got Elkin. She speaks no English by the way. All I understood was "Hi, how are you doing?" I answered and then she asked something else at which time I reminded her that I speak no Spanish - she laughed and hung up.

Weird.

Of course that got us excited. What if everything is done here and we got our sentencia (the final paperwork that no one else can get because of the strike)? We decided to call our interpreter in a few minutes.

Phone rang again almost right away. It was the interpreter. "Where have you been all morning? We've been trying to get a hold of you! The lawyer will be there in 10 minutes and you'll be going to Elkin's home town to get everything completed!"

Yipee!!!! BIG surprise. This is even earlier than they estimated. We were just hoping it would happen sometime NEXT week. Next Friday would have been awesome let alone TODAY.

A Colombian-10-minutes later (45 minutes) she showed up and off we were to get the remainder of the signatures on the sentencia and get Elkin's new birth certificate started. Our interpreter couldn't come with us so some of the details of what we did are a little sketchy due to our language barrier (I'm sure it's all fine - everyone has done this several times before).

Our first stop was in a small town to complete the sentencia. Several people, including a judge, had to sign this legal document which to our understanding is our legal adoption of Elkin in Colombia. So at this point, after this document, we believe Colombia sees us as his legal parents.

This document, the sentencia, is what everyone else adopting in the larger cities where the strike is going on dream about having in their hands. It required a judge's signature and since the judges aren't working in most places, the sentencia can't be completed.

Here's a pic of our lawyer and Elkin at this stop:



After we had the sentencia, we traveled to the very, very small town that Elkin was born in. This is where the records of his birth are located and where we had to get the ball rolling on his new birth certificate with our names on it. This will be complete on Monday and is the last legal thing we need to complete in Monteria aside from getting him a Colombian passport.

The government building in this very small town was quite the sight. It was a concrete square building not much larger than a department store bathroom. The ceiling was falling in, old electrical outlets were exposed, a single florescent bulb was the only source of light in the whole room. There were a couple of computers that were all tied into one overloaded outlet.

At one point, Elkin needed to get his fingerprints taken for his new birth certificate. We were led out back where, and I'm not kidding, his fingerprints were taken under a straw hut.

That was quite the adventure.

The birth certificate will be complete on Monday and we can go pick it up then at the same office. After that, we need to get his Colombian passport made up with his new name (which we obviously need his new birth certificate for). After we have that, we can fly to Bogota, get Elkin's US Visa, complete some other various tasks, and then head home.

So yes, this happened much faster than we thought. It's only a few days quicker than our lawyer quoted us last week, but we assumed it would take longer than that.

Best case scenario, we're home with Elkin the middle of next week. More likely it'll be toward the end of the week. So as long as we don't run into a big snag somewhere, this may turn out to be a less-than-3-week trip!

We're still planning on taking our day outing to the beach on Sunday and I think tomorrow we'll go for another swim and get some ice cream at the park again.

To Elkin From You

We'd really like to turn this blog into something like a scrapbook for Elkin someday so if anyone wants to be a part of that, feel free to comment on this post or any of the previous ones.

So...

What do you want Elkin to read from you someday? What's going on right now? What do you want him to know about? What's the first thing you're going to tell him when you see him? You get the idea! (This isn't just for family either - everyone can join in)

Comment! Comment! Comment!

Stuff Mami & Papi are Missing

We've been gone 13 days now (but who's counting?) and we're really starting to miss some things about home.

• Our three little kitties
  
• Cell phones (EVERYONE has one here - just not us)
  
• Sonic (the restaurant - Route 44 Diet Cokes to be exact)
  
• Our big TV
• Our own washer and dryer (laundry is about $1USD per item here)
• Driving
• High speed internet that works all the time
• Being able to easily call family
  
• Hundreds of English TV channels
• Homemade food
• Hot showers
• Our own bed
• Access to a variety of clothing (you can only pack so much)
  
• Autumn
• Ice (we can't drink the water here)
• A big refrigerator
• Separate rooms (please don't read anything into this one!)
• Air conditioning (only our actual hotel room and a few taxis seem to have AC)
• Being able to brush our teeth with tap water
• ...several more but now we're getting REALLY home sick
  

We keep finding ourselves talking about the things we thought were such a pain or were annoying or "unbearable" at home that we would maybe even pay someone to be able to do right now just to enjoy the feelings of home. Things like standing in line for 1/2 hour at Walmart or having "nothing to do" at home (we had no idea). I think, at least for a while, we'll appreciate things more.

Our Little Bed Plantain (think Couch Potato)

The bed itself used to be this big part of the hotel room that was down right evil to Elkin. It meant bedtime and everything bad that surrounded it - taking out his eye, going to sleep without his foster mami, etc., etc. He HATED being covered up even though it's pretty cool in the room and he would never, ever ask to get on the bed or stay there very long once on it.

Oh how things have changed.

As much as we'll despise this habit later, Elkin has turned into quite the little couch potato - we're in a hotel and in Colombia so we'll call him our little Bed Plantain. He constantly asks to be put on the bed (it's too tall for him to get on himself) and starting today, he even pulls the covers down and gets under them, pulling them up to his neck. It's like he's a different kid!



He's even started taking his shoes off and removing his hat more often - all without complaining. These items could have been considered natural appendages until recently. We're very happy to see the change.

When on the bed, he loves to watch cartoons. It used to be a right-before-bed indulgence only. The rest of the day the TV was usually on one of our two non-dubbed US based channels. Now it's cartoons all day long and his favorite activity is laying in bed, covers up to his to neck, with Mr. Maker or Lazy Town on. (We're very excited to hear what these characters sound like without deep-voiced Spanish dubbing!)

Elkin has also really taken to waving. We're not sure how it started but he loves to wave at the bell hops, housekeepers and restaurant staff. He's probably just more comfortable with everyone.



A wave is a bit hard to capture in a photo but a video seemed a bit overkill too.

Stuff Elkin Loves and Hates

Stuff He Loves

• Motorcycles
• Going places
  
• (have we mentioned motorcycles?)
• (have we mentioned going places?)
• Cars
• Water (any type - pool, river, rain puddle, picture of water, etc.)
  
• Potato chips
• Dancing
  
• Arripas
• Vanilla wafer cookies
• Coca Cola Light
  
• Lazy Town
• Mr. Maker
• Picking out his own clothes
• Picking out his own toys
• His hat - his dirty, dirty, hat
• His shoes
• Being tickled
  
• Playing at the park
• His toy car
  
• Shooing the iguanas
• Suitcases
• Throwing things away
  
• Swimming
• Screaming "Hey Papi!"
• Playing tricks on people
• Turning on and off the TV
• Changing the TV channels way too fast
  
• Being carried around like a baby
• Smiling and laughing
• Turning on and off lights
• Juice
• Pizza
  
• Fried eggs
• Playing with the laptop
  
• Onions
• Repeating things
• Eating and drinking whatever mami and papi is eating and drinking
  
• Going to the bathroom every 5 minutes
• Pushing the buttons on the elevator
• Waving at hotel staff
  
• Nodding YES to... well... anything he doesn't understand
  

Stuff He Hates

• Being messy
• Anyone or anything else that's messy
• The word "NO"
• The word "STOP"
• Oreos
• Scrambled eggs
• Coloring
• Books (we're working on this one)
• Going to sleep
• The dark
• (have we mentioned the dark?)
• Peanut butter
• Taking cold medicine
  
• Showers (he was in to this the first day but hates it now)
• Not being the center of attention
• Being denied something he wants at the grocery store
  

Breakfast Music

The "elevator" music during breakfast everyday is bizarre. It's score music to popular US songs. It's weird stuff though like the theme to Young and the Restless and weird 80's songs we haven't heard in years.