Life Update

Greetings from northern Arizona - where, despite snow and nighttime temperatures dipping towards the single digits, the abundant sunshine coaxes forth crocuses, even in January!The bursting forth of our backyard bulbs helps console us for the fact that we are still here and not in Washington state. Our initial closing date of January 30 (tomorrow) is not to be. In fact, we are still not 100% sure that we are even moving there, since the Indian Health Service continues to delay things regarding the signing of Papaya Daddy's Memorandum of Agreement. Progress continues to be made, albeit at a creeping pace. The continuing ambiguity of it all really tests my ability to feel peaceful and content, and is the main reason for the blog's long silent period. I kept on hoping to be able to share news, and news kept on being non-forthcoming. I think we need another crocus picture at this point to cheer me up again. We are sure enough that we are moving to have irrevocably committed $5000 of earnest money to hold "our" house in WA. And Papaya Daddy recently received his license to practice medicine in that state. And I've highlighted our driving route all the way there on maps I ordered from AAA, and started to plan where we'd spend the nights on our trip. All things that will make it even more difficult if it all falls through.

We had a delightful time at Uncle T's California house over Christmas. The kids made an incredible gingerbread A-frame that they happily devoured, we took lots of fun walks to see and feed the nearby ducks, spent lots of great time with Papaya Daddy's parents, and stuffed ourselves silly on an abundance of good food. Our relaxing week in Sacramento was bookended by a miserable travel experience on US Airways. For the first time in over three years, we decided to fly out of Flagstaff and avoid the unpleasant drive to Phoenix to back. Advice to anybody else tempted to do this: Just say NO to US Air. Fly Southwest instead. We have been amply punished for our lapse in loyalty. Our trip included:

- Spending the night in a Flagstaff hotel and showing up at the airport at 6:30 a.m., only to find that our small airplane had a mechanical problem. We sat in the small terminal (with no bathrooms and no water fountains) for over two hours before being discharged to the ticket counter (flight was canceled) and waiting in a line for another two hours. We finally left the airport (in our car) past 12:00 p.m., starving, after being rebooked for the following day, with absolutely no reimbursement for the hotel we would need to book for that night. Here we are, looking pretty chipper despite the presence of a non-functioning airplane in the background.

-At least our hotel had a nice indoor pool, and we had suits with us. Here's the Portabella, angelically sleeping on the hotel bed after splashing her legs in the hot tub:

-The next day we actually made it to Phoenix. Our flight to Sacramento was delayed three hours, but we did make it to Uncle T's house, arriving only about 30 hours after we were supposed to. We would have made better time by driving.

-On our return, every single one of our three flights was significantly delayed (at least we didn't miss any connections!) Our final nighttime flight to Flagstaff, in a packed 27-seater turboprop, ranks as the worst flight I've ever experienced. They couldn't get the heat turned off, and we spent the whole of the mercifully short flight in a tiny, crowded space that was at least 95 degrees (no exaggeration), with absolutely no regress. When we turned on the little vents over our heads, even hotter air poured onto us. The passenger next to me was almost yelling at the flight attendent to "Turn the heat off - NOW!!!!", and I felt myself trying to stifle a rising and franctic sense of claustraphobia. I stripped the Portabella. The only liquids available were small bottles of water being sold for $3 each. Luckily, we did find a little water left in the kids' sippy cups, and sprinkled each other for most of the flight to make it bearable. When we finally stepped off the plane in Flagstaff into the 20 degree night, it felt wonderful!

-After arriving in Flagstaff, Papaya Daddy went out to the parking lot to try to scrape 18 inches of snow off our car with his hands, while I tried to control three fairly hyper kids at the baggage claim. When none of our luggage arrived, my relief at escaping from the Stifling Oven of Doom was still so great that I just laughed. We spent the night in Flag again and got our luggage the next day. I did NOT trust them to drive it out our house on the rez in any reasonable length of time!

So, US Airways out of Flagstaff - NEVER AGAIN!!! The drive to Phoenix isn't really so bad, after all.

It feels good to get that story told! Another entry to the annals of travel stories for this family. At least nobody threw up...

Papaya Daddy's parents spent a few days with us here in late December before heading back to Germany. Since, then, we've done a lot of school and work. Papaya Daddy worked an insane amount of nights and ER days this past month. I think that since they know he's probably leaving soon, they can give him a lousy schedule without fear that they'll lose him (they are anyway). We survived a miserable cold virus, and the Banana survived two nights of croup with sitting-up-and-struggling-for-breath episides (of course, the first night she had it was when Papaya Daddy was working all night long). Happily, there was a lot of cold, dry air available to help her.

On to news of the kids...

The Portabella continues her reign as the Cutest Baby in the Whole World...

She's sitting up really well now, but is still not crawling. She's made a few attempts that ended in face plants, and the memory of her failures has kept her from trying again for the past couple of weeks. She's making up for this by working on verbal and small motor skills. Her first word is "Hi!", and she says it while waving (opening and closing her outstretched hand) at both friends and strangers. She is incredibly engaging!I thought it would be fun to post comparison pictures of the Portabella and her sister at similar ages, both sitting in the Boppy, wearing the same outfit. So, here's the Portabella:

...and here's the Banana, in 2006:
The Portabella has more hair, but I think they look pretty similar on the whole (at least from the back). From the front, they're fairly different. The Banana has blue eyes, while the Portabella has true brown eyes. It really tickles me pink that all three of my kids have different color eyes! Here's the Portabella, sitting up in her bath seat for the first time ever:And here's the Papaya, back in December 2003 (he was a little chubbier):She's eating more and more solids, but refuses to let us put foods in her mouth with a spoon. She'll only eat what she can put in her mouth with her own hands. Since she has no teeth, this limits her diet and also creates quite a mess. We wish she would eat more, since she still clocks in at below the 3rd percentile in weight (her length and head circumference are quite a bit higher on the growth chart). But I guess she likes being skinny, since she's pretty clear about when she wants to eat and when she doesn't want to eat. Here she is, sampling spaghetti: She continues to inspire great interest, great amounts of love, and occasional mild torture from her siblings.

The Banana continues to be the World's Cutest Toddler.

And I'm happy to finally report that she is (mostly) a potty-trained toddler! We've left her in big girl underpants for most of the last two weeks, and she's risen to the challenge (with the occasional expected accident - hurray for tile floors). Here she is, enjoying her ice cream bribe after staying dry all morning:

The Papaya recently survived a buzz cut at the hands of his Daddy. I personally thought his hair was cuter while it was longer, but it's growing out again (and he can't twist it into rats' nests any more). Here he is before the carnage happened, filling his mommy's boots for a muddy walk outside (he grew out of all his own boots). You'll see some post-shaving pictures in the school update:
The Papaya and his accomplishments are going to get a lot more coverage in the soon-to-come School Update, so I won't spend much more time on him here. I will, however, post a picture of the cake he insisted I make to celebrate Jesus' birthday. (Somewhat belated, but nobody knows when it is, anyway. He got the idea after attending a birthday party for Jesus in Sunday School at Uncle T's church.) He was very clear about the design, icing colors, and cake composition. We took it to church for Sunday potluck and it was much enjoyed by all. Here it is, exactly as he told me to make it:Soon after making Jesus' birthday cake, I made my own (with help again from the Papaya, who LOVES cooking and baking, and now says he wants to be a pool digger, house builder, and cook when he grows up), and we celebrated my 33rd birthday. I received three beautifully wrapped gifts from the Papaya: a crayon, two colored pencils, and The Cat in the Hat, one of his LA readers for this year ("...because you like to read, Mommy..."). It's definitely the thought that counts, and I was touched.Before I end yet another long, overdue update, I'm going to post a few pictures from our lovely hike yesterday. Papaya Daddy returned home at 9:00 a.m. after working all night, and we drove to church & headed out with our pastor's family to explore the edge of Third Mesa. Our drive there (following their jeep) reminded me a little of driving through game parks in Kenya in my high school years, and we added some nice new scratches to our Pilot's paint job: Once we reached the edge of the mesa, we had a lovely time just exploring: we found delightful little alcoves filled with sand and pinyon pine - they had great scope for the imagination (what if somebody made this their little home for the summer...?), scrambled up rock formations, tromped through snow in the north facing shadows, and reveled in the bottomless high desert sky you can lose yourself in. (The man standing highest is our pastor.) It's the kind of adventure that helps overcome the loneliness and isolation of living here, and that will help us remember our years on the Rez with nostalgia. I hope and pray it's days like yesterday the kids remember after 10 or 20 years, and not the lack of friends or daily playmates in their early years.
I thought I'd end this entry with a sunset picture from our back porch. Someday, I'll have to make a portfolio of Badger Butte pictures (the butte in the background, which has been such an integral part of our sense of place for the past 3 1/2 years). We've captured it in such a myriad of moods. This, too, we will miss (can you tell I'm already leaving here in my mind and heart?)...