2016: Love more.

My friend/cousin-in-law Karen, put this beautiful little post on her Facebook today reflecting on 2015 and then she posed two questions at the end.  She asked:

1. What did you accomplish in 2015?
2. What lesson have you learned in 2015?
And I'd like to add:
3. What are your goals for 2016?
I would love to hear your responses!

I've gratefully accomplished a lot this year from having our daughter, to moving cross country to re-entering the career field.  The things I've learned are about to put me on my soap box and I'm about to say things I would have never said just a few years ago...

First, I learned to not let fear hold you back.
Second, I learned that you can't wait for the world to give you what you want, you have to go and get it.

Moving to Texas and re-entering my career were (and still are) both scary things.  I honestly don't know if I could have done it had we not made a crazy move to the Dominican republic a few years back. After doing that, I feel like I can do anything in terms of moving.  We wanted to live somewhere warm and re-establish our lives somewhere after leaving the country and returning again.  So we chose Texas for the weather and housing costs.  However we did not have a job willing to re-locate us.  My husband still doesn't have a job here (although he is working remotely from Minneapolis for now).  If that ends before he finds something new, we will be taking a pay cut to live off my salary alone. We also own a home in Minnesota.  We JUST had a new baby! So many reasons to not move!

But we went anyway.  I re-entered the career field after being a stay at home mom (which I loved) so we'd at least have a salary.  We packed up our stuff, ordered a moving truck, took our two kids and our dog and drove down the country.  My point and my soap box is if you want a change in your life, go and get it!  What's holding you back?  You have a good job where you are?  You don't want a pay cut? You own a home?  You have kids?  We had all that too...but you can do whatever you want!  Years ago, we got married, bought a home, had a baby and thought we'd live that nice settled down American dream.  But that all changed for us and we wouldn't have it any other way.  We have grown so much through our moving even though it hasn't been all adventurous and fun. It has been stressful, scary, emotional and even a financial headache. Somehow things have still worked out. It's still important to be responsible and live within your means but ask yourselves how would your decisions change if you removed fear from the equation? One of our biggest excuses to not get what we want is fear. At least that has been a huge excuse in my life and I know I'm not the only one. So again, what I've learned, is you can't wait for the world to give you what you want or for the world to come to you (like a promotion or a job willing to re-locate you for example). Sometimes you just have to go and get it!  Make a way and ditch the fear.   I guess that's my pep talk for your next big life change...or even a small life-change.

So what are my goals for 2016?  I found this cute little sign to put over my pass through window separating the kitchen and dining room.  And it sums up perfectly what I want to do in 2016.

Love More.

I hope this can start at home especially with my husband.  He needs to know I appreciate him. By doing that, our kids will see the love we have for each other and in turn they will see how much we, as a couple, love them.  I want to love my Savior and my Father in Heaven more.  I want to show them by reading my scriptures more and serving others more.  I want to love people that have hurt me by forgiving and taking less offense. I want to love my family back home and extended family more by making an extra call or sending a hand written note. I firmly believe if I love more, I will be happier and less stressed.  Clearly this is a life long goal but at least I can focus and reflect on it for the new year.  Goals that are measurable seem easier to attain for me. I don't have a plan on how I'm going to measure this one yet but seeing the sign every time I walk in my home is going to be my motivation so I can't forget.

So humor me and take a moment to ponder your year and answer the questions above.

Happy New Year 2016 Friends and Family!

Christmas in Houston

Thanks to this family right here, we had a wonderful Christmas!  The guy on the right is Jesus's cousin, Uki. Next to him is his wife, Karen and her family. Since we just moved to Dallas, it worked out great for us to go and spend Christmas with Karen's family in Houston.   We've always loved Jesus's cousin and his wife so much that now living only 3.5 hours apart is very exciting!

Christmas began with PJs and El Salvadorian sandwiches.  How lucky am I to keep getting new Latin family members?!  A Mexican sister in law, A Dominican husband, a Peruvian aunt and now an El Salvadorian cousin in law!  I love learning about different cultures, practicing my Spanish and eating all of their traditional foods.  That last part's my favorite!

The next day we drove to the island of Galveston, TX on the gulf to see a big lights display at Moody Gardens.  Oh but first the food, here's the traditional El Salvadorian breakfast with beans, sweet plantains, eggs and sour cream.

The weekend continued with a visit to Houston's China town, Joaquin and Uki playing in the pool, and a local Mexican taco spot with these amazing carne asada fries.  Thanks Karen and Uki, next time we will see you here in Dallas!

Read the caption of this sign posted around China town.  While this may be serious, I still laughed at the warning of he will "make you fall in love" with him.

Dallas: What I like about you.

Dallas: What I like about you:

What do they say in Real Estate? Location, location, location!  Choosing our first home here in Dallas was tricky because we've never been here and Jesus is still working remotely so we don't know where he will be working later.  We based our decision off of my job location and apartments.com.  I think we got lucky because so far we love it!  Our apartment is nothing fancy although I do like the finishes of faux wood floors and granite counters. The dim lighting inside is a bummer but overall the location is great.  We are close to shops, restaurants, diversity and really are in the heart of the city!  We are just blocks away from all different neighborhoods and it's so fun exploring everything Dallas has to offer. Tonight we drove to the Highland Park neighborhood with multi-million dollar mansions to see the professionally done Christmas lights and horse drawn carriage tours passing through the neighborhood.  None of my photos do justice of these beautiful streets but you can always google it.

Even Biscuit came to see the lights

Can you see the two nutcrackers in the entry?  So many houses had these and I was obsessed!

The next thing I love is the school I work at.  I do not have enough good things to say about it.  I will say that everyone makes sure I know it is the exception to Dallas public schools and it's own class.  I hear from random people I meet that ask me where I work as well as from co-workers that it's one of the best and I ended up in the right place.  Granted I've worked at schools with much less money and programming and I've loved them too but let me tell you why this school is so amazing.  

First, the PTA.  A day has not gone by where there have not been parent volunteers in the cafeteria, in the copy room, in the teacher's lounge doing projects or helping in the garden.  There are volunteers in the building every. single. day.  The teachers had a paper Christmas tree in the hall full of sticky notes of items they could use in their classrooms.  It was designed so parents could take a sticky note off of the tree and buy that item for the teachers.  Within an hour, all of the sticky notes were gone.  The whole school had holiday parties for winter break and the teachers didn't have to lift a finger.  The PTA set up tables, provided treats, took out the trash and planned the whole thing.  I've really never seen a PTA like this.  

Second, the garden.  The garden is huge and beautiful and since I have not gone out there for a mini photo shoot yet,  I wish I could describe it's beauty.  There are rows upon rows of crops each used for a different class.  Classes are out there all the time taking care of the soil, harvesting broccoli, cabbage or whatever else, watching wild flowers, visiting the chicken coup...the list goes on and on of what happens in the garden.  Being the Garden coordinator and still having a bit of an un-defined position, teachers have taken it upon themselves to invite me to the garden to help their classes harvest or get supplies and I have loved every second of that part of my job.  My job entails much more but sometimes I wish it was just that fun part!

The cabbage we harvested

Other great things about my school include the deaf education program and bilingual program.  I see teachers, students and teachers aids signing daily.  When I ask teachers how they learned to sign, they tell me just from working at this school!  Isn't that amazing?  I can't wait to see what I will learn.  The bilingual program includes several dual-language classrooms of Spanish and English and that is exciting for me because I love practicing my Spanish any chance I get.  The last thing I'll share about the school just as a tidbit of information is, did you know Texas schools still do the Pledge of allegiance?  But after that, we do the Texas pledge, talk about Texas pride!  I'm still learning that one...

The next thing I love about Dallas is my ward at church.  We may not have callings yet or have hung out with other families yet but people have been so welcoming and we are excited to make friends.  The part I really love though is that it's a bilingual ward.  When we sing hymns, you can sing in English or Spanish and both hymnals are always provided.  Prayers are also done in either language. Testimonies are given in either language.  Again, any chance I get to practice mi espanol is alright by me!

The people truly are friendly in Dallas.  Last night one of our apartment neighbors, who we don't even know yet, invited us to her son's birthday at Chuck E. Cheese because we have kids the same age.  This family is from Peru and everyone at the party spoke Spanish so again I practiced.  We were so happy to be invited and it was great to meet some of our neighbors. Chuck E. Cheese is amazing for little kids FYI.  We also met an older Spanish woman who babysits the younger brother of the birthday boy and one other child.  She lives in our apartment complex and we talked to her about the possibility of babysitting Joaquin. We have been having a bit of an adjustment and a rough few months ahead of both Jesus and I working full time while he is also trying to watch the kids at home.  It would be so great if Joaquin could go to a babysitter/daycare/school/something for at least while Jesus has meetings during the week. Khaleesi is still an easy, sweet little baby that can handle dad working from home. For a three year old, it's not as easy.  With this babysitter option, Joaquin could get social interaction with other kids, learn some Spanish and it would be convenient for Jesus to drop him off and pick him up while he's working.  Who knows what we will all decide but we are looking forward to finding something to help us all through the next few months until I'm off work in the summer!

Because we live in the city, we have also found great food.  Thai, sushi, bbq, southern, it's all here and we are enjoying it!  Every time we move to a new place, I also get a new resolve to start cooking again so I've surprisingly even been enjoying that...for now... ;)

Sleep!

Initially my blog started out as mommy blog but has developed into so many things!  Today I want to go back to talking about motherhood and particularly one of my children.  A mommy confession if you will.

A good year and a half ago my family and I returned to the States from living in Dominican Republic.  We lived in my mom's basement and she had two spacious rooms down there being one for us and one for Joaquin.  I remember Joaquin sleeping in his crib briefly after our return but then I remember letting him sleep with us because he was sick or something...well that began a six month long battle!  For 6 months, we battled with him to sleep in his room but he was afraid of monsters, crocodiles, the dark or just wanted to cuddle (hard for me to resist the cutest little boy saying "I want to cuddle you!")  We tried monster spray, laying with him until he fell asleep, crying it out, a big boy bed, letting him choose his own "Thomas the Train" bedding, enforcing a bedtime routine  etc. etc. and finally I confess, we gave up!  Joaquin has slept in our bed the last year and a half!  He even refused to nap without me laying next to him.  Now this wasn't the whole problem.  Everyone slept great and we cuddled and we had a nice king size bed. The real problem was he no longer had a bedtime.  He would stay up with us and this got to be very late.  Granted he slept in in the mornings but can you imagine putting kids to bed at a certain time and then having time to yourself or with your spouse kid free for a couple hours each night?  Doesn't that sound nice?  Oh wait...that's probably your life since you're not the one writing this confession so I'm happy for you.

But guess what?  Ever since we moved Joaquin has been in his own bed!  And since we moved into our apartment, his own room!  It really is so nice to have a bedtime and kid free time in the evenings...oh and nap time too! We began our trip to Texas staying with family and there he slept in a toddler bed and loved it.  Back in MN, his big boy bed was a twin size with this annoying guard rail and I think that was part of the problem.  He probably didn't love that big bed all alone.  Once we got to our apartment here in Dallas, we bought him a little toddler bed and put it in his room and he loves it!  He even says "I'm going to bed" and goes in his room all by himself. What happened?!  Little Khaleesi shares a room with Joaquin and they both sleep soundly through the night.  I'm so happy.

Please don't let this blog jinx my life!

And for parents battling anything with your little ones, know that everything is a phase. :)

Texas Commencement

So much has happened in the past two weeks!  We made it to Dallas!  It was a two day road trip in two cars with two kids and a dog but we did it. We only had to stop twice per day with one time being for everyone to eat and the other time to feed the baby. 

Biscuit on the luggage cart

Who doesn't love childhood hotel pool memories?

This only lasted so long until we needed the pack n play. 

Once arriving in Dallas, we stayed with Jesus’s cousin and his family in McKinney.  They are the best for letting us stay with them and Joaquin had the greatest time playing with their kids.  McKinney is a beautiful suburb of Dallas with brick homes, cute neighborhoods, community pools and every store and restaurant you need. During our stay there we began furniture shopping, apartment hunting, getting new insurance, changing our address, applying for Texas licenses, etc etc…

Hutchins BBQ in McKinney voted best 2014

Over Thanksgiving, we drove another five hours to Alexandria, Louisiana to stay with Jesus’ sister and her family for the holiday.  We went to a friend of theirs for a Puerto Rican/Dominican/American Thanksgiving dinner and then of went shopping.  Shopping however was cut short by the shooting that occurred at the local mall (really?!).  Oh Alexandria, what  can I say about you and your small town lifestyle?  Let me put it like this, my brother in law says he is fine living there because it has everything he typically does in a day: goes to work, plays tennis, goes home.  There’s a JC Penny to buy clothes and a movie theatre.  He can go on road trips to places like Houston or New Orleans on the weekends.  He has a point, it is sufficient but sufficient is the only word I’ll use to describe it.  I personally just prefer a little more action.

My niece and nephew and my babies photo shoot!

Black Friday/Thanksgiving shopping

Thanksgiving dinner

Super cool Alexandria safari where Joaquin had no fear of the animals.

I was a little more hesitant.

 After Thanksgiving break, we returned to Dallas and moved in our apartment.  If I want action,  I’m getting it as we are in the heart of the city.  Just 15 minutes from downtown and close to tons of stores, restaurants and two beautiful malls.

I haven’t started working yet because transferring my out of state teaching license has been a very extensive process (ugh it’s getting stressful!) but thankfully Jesus is still working remotely.

I will say that we are definitely in the south and it’s been fun pointing out all the little culture shocks.

1.     While in Kansas City on our road trip here, they served biscuits and gravy in the hotel continental breakfast!

2.     The place I got my fingerprints for my new job was also a place that taught conceal and carry classes with a lovely sign saying “Prayer is a great way to met the Lord but trespassing is faster.”

3.     Everything really is bigger in Texas!  Big freeways, big populations, big furniture stores, biggest indoor Christmas tree, you name it!

4.     I don’t remember what state I was in during my travels but I saw the biggest Baptist church!  It looked like a mall…well it used to  be a mall and now was one ginormous church!

5.     The word Y’all is not a stereotype.  It’s real and everyone says it.  I wonder if it will ever become second nature for me.

6.     The word M’am is also second nature and it’s almost like it’s rude if you don’t say it.  I used to hate when people called me M’am in MN because it made me feel old but not here.  Here I just think it’s so polite because that’s the intention.

7.     Speaking of polite…people are so nice here!  People wave you on in traffic and four way stops.  People hold doors, say hello, and are in general so helpful!  I won’t bore you with my specific examples.  I’m from the land of “Minnesota nice” and yet here the kindness is  still so obvious to me!

8.     I ate at a fast food fried chicken place and they served me fried okra, a yeast roll and the spicy seasoning on the chicken was good enough to make my nose run!  Thank goodness my apartment has a gym!

9.     And of course BBQ and Tex-Mex here have not disappointed.

You can take the girl out of Minnesota but you can't take Minnesota out of the girl.  Skating rink in the mall and the country's tallest indoor Christmas tree.

 We are still unpacking and decorating and doing paper work things to get settled.  Tomorrow is our first day in our new ward at church and so far we’ve had a good experience of people from there helping us to move in, and then one of their familys' coming over to meet us and bringing the most delicious white chocolate covered popcorn.  It’s a bilingual ward with 20-25% latinos and they do a lot of things in both Spanish and English so that is perfect for our family!

What a whirlwind and what an adventure we have begun. It’s been an adjustment for Joaquin and it broke my heart every day the first week when he said he wanted to go home and play with grandma Jane but now when we are out, he says he wants to go back to our apartment so I think he’s finally learning that we’re staying.  My anxiety is starting to kick in with also realizing we are staying and it’s not vacation anymore.  I really think we are going to love it here and we get more excited each day we drive around and see new things but of course I’ll get homesick and will need to adjust.  While it does give me some anxiety, my excitement and all the things we love about Dallas already are winning out…

Moving is exhausting.  Finally a family moment crashing on our couch!

Goodbye Minnesota...again.

It can't be real that we're saying goodbye to Minnesota.  Family is here, we own a home here, there's so much history here and we have friends here.  We'll be back!  Whether that's just to visit or someday return to live is still unknown but it's hard to believe we're really leaving.  We left once before when we went to Dominican Republic but we knew that job was only a temporary position.  This time leaving is different.  We are moving to settle somewhere new!  Settle?!  We've been married almost five years and still haven't settled but with the weather and cost of living, Texas really could be the place to keep us...well at least for longer than 1-2 years.  With that said and all the anticipation and excitement we are feeling, there is still sadness.  Change is hard, leaving is hard, missing family and friends is hard.

We are so so grateful for the beautiful goodbye party Kristy threw for us tonight!  Thanks to EVERYONE who came to say goodbye! It was so fun to see people from all different parts of our life come together at one gathering.  It was like a reunion and each person there is so special to me and my family for a different reason.  I sure can't wait for you all to come and visit and I'm grateful for the technology that will hold us together in between.

I want to write something profound about Minnesota, the people, and all the things I'll miss and am grateful for but I'm not feeling it tonight.  Tonight I'm just feeling like "Minnesota is home" and I am grateful for that!

Here are some pictures from our party:

Thank you Nell for the MN onesie, she sure needed it today!

My Epistle to Joaquin on his Third Birthday

I love my birthday poem tradition.  I don't have a lot of traditions yet as we are a young family that can't seem to stop moving but I do look forward to writing my kids their birthday poem each year.  Here and here are Joaquin's poems from previous years and this year on his third birthday I've written him an epistle!

Joaquin Joaquin, do you know who you are?
Do you know what you've done to my life?
I see you as my guardian angel, my comforter.
Why? You may ask,
Because of you being by my side.
As I reflect on our three years
I can remember so many things
Your talents, your interests, your behavior...
But what comes to mind first
is you being by my side.
The month I spent alone when daddy traveled for work,
you were there.
The day you and I flew to a foreign country to meet daddy and start a new life,
you were there.
When Khaleesi was born and I was in the hospital for three days,
you were still there.
When Khalessi was sick and returned to the hospital for five days,
it was you that cuddled me in the hospital bed.
It's you that tells me not to cry.
I don't know how you do what you do at only three years
but I don't know how I got through anything hard before you.
This Joaquin is why you're my guardian angel and my comforter.
I love you,
Happy Birthday!

A Change is Gonna Come

I haven't been able to get this song out of my head lately!  Jesus has been looking for a new job in warmer weather for the past year and I've just had a feeling that after Khaleesi was born, our "change was gonna come!"  My mom has been so gracious to let us stay with her after our unplanned return from the Dominican Republic while we've been trying to figure out what should be our next move.  We've agreed we want warmer weather and more house for our money.  The place that has stood out to us the most for specifically those two reasons has been Texas.  However Jesus has not found a job there or any of the other warm climates he's applied.  We believe it would be so much easier to get an out of state job if he was just in the state he was applying!

About a week ago, I had a thought.  If we really wanted to go to Texas, maybe I could get us there!  I remember hearing Texas needs teachers.  So I spent hours for two nights filling out extensive applications.  Teacher apps are the WORST with section upon section and then essay questions and personality surveys and some even have math tests!  The next day I decided I better email some Principals directly because how else would I get my name out of a big electronic pile.  Both the Houston and Dallas districts are so ginormous that I only emailed about ten principals each and there were still hundreds of schools left in the districts. There was no way I could have emailed them all.

By some crazy twist of fate, someone had an opening after the school year had begun.  On Tuesday I interviewed, on Wednesday I got an offer and on Thursday I accepted the position.

Friends, we are going to Dallas!

This wasn't our plan.  The plan was Jesus would get an offer and I would keep being a stay at home mom while setting up our new place and finding myself and the kids new friends.  But somehow with the offer we did receive, we couldn't refuse.  I wanted to.  I thought I was going to up until I dialed the Principal's phone number.

It's a pay cut and a leap of faith!

I have been so sad and so scared about going back to work full time and leaving my babies but it's just a school year and school's out at 3:30 every day so I can make it.  Jesus has a whole new world ahead of him being the stay at home dad until he finds a job but he's ready.   I know he and the kids will have fun but I'm just hoping he will get groceries and do laundry from time to time! ;)  So working moms, it's time to insert your advice here. Am I going to cry in front of my co-workers every day missing my babies?!

I've been doing a lot of studying about the difference between inspiration and intuition and fear. I've been finding inspirational quotes that both lead me to go and lead me to stay. The conclusion I came to was that my reason for not taking the position would have been fear.  The best part of the whole thing was when I hung up the phone with the Principal, I actually felt excitement and that was unexpected.  I had been praying and feeling conflicted for days. After I accepted the position, I changed my prayer to: "Lord, I'm doing this.  Please stop it if isn't right."  But as of now, Jesus and I are feeling good.  Nervous to quit Jesus's job and pack up and leave but we know it's an opportunity we have to go for.  We moved to the Dominican Republic when Joaquin was between 3 and 4 months and now to Texas when Khaleesi is between 3 and 4 months.  Maybe we will settle there or maybe we will just move again after a third baby that turns 3 months...JK I hope!  Could you imagine?!

Check out all the quotes I found that just confused me because some pointed one way and some pointed the other.

 


 


Oh and do you want to know about my position? It's not a classroom teacher which I'm actually really excited about.  It's in a large elementary school in Dallas.  Lots of the schools in the district have gardens they use to teach classes about entomology, agriculture, community, etc.  This school has one of the biggest and most historical gardens in the district.  They even have a butterfly garden and a chicken coup within it!  It's basically a community garden run by the school and volunteers and what the Principal described to me as very involved, high maintenance parents.  I am going to be the garden coordinator and liaison between parents and teachers for this program. It's such an exciting program that they have had for years but they just need some help so I'm going to take on the job!

Clearly we're sad to miss so many people we love here in Minnesota but this is our chance to get settled somewhere warm and potentially find a beautiful new home.  I'll especially miss my mom and my brother who have been so close by but flights from here to there are only $80 bucks so that as well as FaceTime will help a lot.  Prayers and happy thoughts needed for Jesus to get a job once we're out there and thanks in advance for that!