First Tooth Out!

 

With Irini the teeth came out much earlier than with Amalia. Now six and a half Amalia has been waiting all along for her perfect little teeth to start moving around. So it was with great joy that she welcomed her wobbly tooth a could months ago. We had expected it to fall out quite a while ago and, as the adult tooth started to make its presence known the baby tooth held its ground for a long while. For a few weeks she had both, one just behind the other. But this week, finally, the baby tooth finally moved enough for Amalia to announce that she was ready for it to come out. "Will it hurt?" she asked her mommy. The answer was a negative and she decided last night that it was worth the risk to take it out and have a visit by Ratoncito Perez at night. 

For a while the two of them stood face to face in the bathroom, moving the tooth and getting ready for extraction. Mommy took her time and they chatted for a while. Finally, after around 10 minutes or so, Amalia rushed out to the living room to show daddy.... her tooth was gone and though there was some residual blood her smile was broad and her eyes glittered with joy!

Later, she wrote a little note to Ratoncito Perez explaining the situation and sealed it in a blue envelope. As night arrived and she and daddy read a book and then, with her new smiles, she bode goodnight to daddy and Irini.  It was in the depth of night that the tooth was miraculously exchanged for a small amount of cash, a gift from the Ratoncito himself. Our girl is growing up.  With a small gap between her front bottom teeth she continues to fill us with love, smiles and lots of laughter.  

New Lifestyle... Same Smiles!

We're in a new place, to be sure. Trying to figure our way around a new city, deal with new cultural elements, navigate new housing and dealing with our new surroundings has been filled with it's little bumps and wonderful opportunities.  From big roads to big malls, to the August heat (which has now, thankfully, subsided) this place is quite different from what we've been used to in the past. 

But it's also been a great chance to start new things, or continue old ones in new environments. Our new town and school has given us the opportunity to try new things... like horse back riding!  Our girls are really enjoying it and though it's much more formal than anything they've dealt with before, they are doing very well. They're starting to look like naturals on horseback!  

And then, of course, there is Halloween, which is the one event we had heard all about before we even got here. We dressed up in our new outfits and partook in five different trick or treat events, from a huge 2,600 person event at the school to several neighborhood ones (both in our own neighborhood and those of friends). The girls collected several kilos of candies and happily shared it with others. It was a wonderful series of events which, quite possibly, was the favorite of our girls in our new town. :-)

As the weeks go by and our lifestyle begins to normalize we are slowly getting our bearings as well as learning a bit more and more about this place. Uncovering the city has been rewarding and we're finding just how much this place has to offer. :-)