Family resemblances

We caught up with Uncle Matt during the week. Hugo enjoyed looking at his future self. Genes are fascinating aren't they? Dexter is the spitting image of his dad. And Hugo is the image of his Uncle Matt, my little brother. (It'd be nice if I got a look in huh?!)

It is quite a wonderful thing though. Sometimes when I look at my second born son I am taken right back to my own young childhood - so much does he remind me of my little brother. Perhaps some of it is imagined. It's possible my memories of Matthew as a toddler - some 27 or 28 years ago now - have slightly altered and blended with the toddler I live with every day. What do you think?

(How awesome is that early 80's singlet top?!)

His dream has been realised!

For a long, long time now Dexter has been hankering for an astronaut helmet. He saw one once in the museum shop and has never forgotten about it. I wasn't able to track one down for his 4th or 5th birthday or Christmas and when I did come across one it was in an online toy store in the US with a hefty freight charge added to the already hefty price tag.

Well, several weeks ago we came across a few, 4 I think, in our local toy store. They brought them in for Christmas but they didn't sell. Not surprising at $80 each! (Seriously, am I the only one who balks at a dress-up item costing that much?!). To cut a long story short Dexter decided he would use his birthday money from Nanny, given to him last November to buy his much longed for helmet. Problem was, he was $30 short. So we told him he could try and save the rest and buy the helmet when he had enough. A new concept. His first real foray into the world of earning and saving money.

We talked about ways of earning money and brainstormed the sorts of things he could do. He decided he could offer to wash Granny Kim's windows for a small sum. And he liked the idea of drawing some pictures to sell to his friends and family! He did not do the former, and while he did produce some lovely artworks he didn't end up getting around to selling them. (They were of rocket ships of course!)

(Counting his coins and checking his purse before we enetered the shop)

As it turns out he didn't really learn much about earning money at all. He simply raided every coin bowl, the toy cash register, various pouches and purses mixed up among his toys, the craft supplies (coins always end up in there for some reason) and searched between the cushions on the lounge and under furniture. He managed to come up with a pile of coins totalling $26!

The next idea was entirely his. He found 3 American $1.00 bills and 4 American quarters during his coin search. And came to me with a glint in his eye and announced that he would ask Papa Ward if he could exchange his American money for Australian money. Because you can use American money on Bermuda Mum! (Which is of course correct, both Bermudian and American currency are accepted there - who knew he was paying such close attention when we were there at Christmas time?)

Voila! $80 in his purse. A trip to the toy store today and my boy has himself a helmet. The very last one in stock too. Phew close call!

(He started to take off the packaging before we even left the store. Which was fine actually, as it wasn't going ot fit in my bike's saddle bag in it's box).

(Even though it was 30 degrees, this is how he spent the afternoon and evening)!

this moment

In the tradition of Soulemama, here's this weeks moment. No words, just a moment from our week that we'd like to remember...

Flour and water

While nothing new for Dexter and Hugo, the ole flour 'n water play, it has been a while. Today I came across some flour past it's use by date in the cupboard and casually asked if they wanted to play with it. I knew the answer of course.

For the next hour or so they made pancakes, bread and cookies. Soup and smoothies. But mostly just a big wet soggy doughy mucky mess. Requiring a hose down for the yard and a bath for the children afterwards. And really, messes just aren't worth making if they don't require a hose and or bath afterwards are they?!

Our Great Adventure - Part 3

El Salvador

It's been days since I uploaded all the photos for Part 3 of our Great Adventure but do you think I can find the time and words to sit down and write about it? Nope. It was such an amazing experience, I don't really know where to begin. Time is passing, it was a month ago now and rather than leave it in the not-right-now basket I've decided to opt for a less cohesive, but practical approach to wrapping up our experience in El Salvador. Or it'll ever happen!

Some photos, and some words. Will has written beautifully about it on our company website, from the perspective of the business side of things so feel free to pop over for those details should they interest you. (They're pretty interesting by the way, even if you're not a coffee nerd such as we are)!

Day 1 with Emilio Lopez Diaz at his specialty coffee plantation. Just below Dexter's hand is where the farm is located. Check out all those volcanoes. We really don't know mountains here in Oz.

Checking out the drying patio. These beans have been pulped (had the fruit flesh removed) and dry in the sun for several days.

The raking of the beans is done constantly, all day, to ensure the beans are drying evenly. Hugo and the other children helped make the job a little more interesting by messing up the perfect lines.

Dexter was so excited about picking the coffee cherries. He took it so seriously, paying close attention to only pick the perfectly dark red ripe ones.

While Will attended the daily cupping sessions with Emilio the kids and I hung out with Christie and Christie Jr in their farmhouse each afternoon.

It was so sweet watching the kids play together, different native tongues and all. The toddlers were especially great at making themselves clear to each other. I guess it's an age when gestures and actions come more easily than words much of the time so it wasn't a big deal to not be speaking the same language.

The boys couldn't believe their eyes when Christie's jumping castle came out. The last thing they expected after a busy day exploring the coffee plantation and mill was to see a jumping castle being inflated in the garden.

As if a jumping castle wasn't exciting enough for 2 small boys we spent the evening around a campfire. I chose not to drink the whisky on offer. Seriously - El Salvadorian's know how to handle their hard liquor!

The mountain side location of the farm was seriously gorgeous. Look at this clear morning light. The air was so fresh, when not down wind of the mill at least. I tell you, fermenting coffee cherry pulp is not a pleasant smell. Imagine composting fruit and times the intensity by one hundred!

While we had our share of over tired bedtime drama, much of the time the kids were so exhausted by days end sleep came easily. We had trouble stirring them many mornings and had we not been trying to fit an awful lot into a short period of time I suspect they could have easily slept half the day away a few times. They coped really well considering the pace we moved at and all the many many little differences to 'normal' life that we threw at them, including plenty of new taste sensations and the change to eating 3 meals a day instead of their preferred all day long grazing and snacking.

Between staying at the coffee finca and a night at Emilio and Christie's beach house we spent some time in San Salvador. We could see an active volcano from the hotel window (with the clouds around it). Apparently it erupts once every 100 yrs or so. The last eruption was 1909. So any day now! We experienced our first earthquake in San Salvador on our first night. It reached 5.5 on the Richter scale - a strange sensation to feel the whole building trembling and the sound of glass windows shaking. We were eating dinner at a restaurant on the 3rd floor of a building at the time and our hosts were so blasé! Oh hey - do you feel that? Only hours before they'd been joking about how we might be 'lucky' enough to experience an earthquake while visiting.

On our way to the beach house we stopped by another plantation owned by Emilio. His company Cuatro M has two farms, at different altitude. Amazingly only a 30 minute drive from each other, the growing conditions are completely different and different species of coffee is grown at each to suit the conditions. It's been a record harvest this year for Cuatro M and after a very poor crop last year, this years crop has far exceeded expectations.

We passed a lot of trucks like this when driving around. Nothing unusual in a developing country but incredibly unusual looking for Dex and Hugo. They were so intrigued by it and had lots of questions about why we don't see the same at home and if it was safe to travel like it. Every time we passed a truck like this, or a bus with people literally hanging off the roof, laying on top of various cargo to keep in from flying off (mattresses were common, baskets of produce also), the boys would point and shout. We were conspicuous that's for sure!

We arrived at the beach house after dark so didn't really know what our surrounds were. This was a pretty nice sight to wake up to.

And this was how our stay in El Salvador ended. Relaxing in hammocks by the beach. Emilio and Christie were such generous hosts. They took time out of the biggest week of the harvest to show us around their farms and their country. Such an intimate experience could never have occurred has we visited El Salvador simply as tourists. We are so privileged to be able to do a business trip like this as a family.

this moment

In the tradition of soulemama, here's this week's moment. No words, just a single moment that we'd like to remember...

No first day here...

This week held special meaning for us. Many of our 5 year old friends and a couple of nieces started school. All those First Day photos on facebook and in the media brought into focus the fact that we weren't experiencing this significant milestone, in the conventional sense at least.

While we don't have a First Day photo to share most of our regular homeschool activities resumed this week after the summer break. It felt like the start of the homeschool year for us. Last year, while involved in our homeschool community, we were just a family with young kids who weren't yet of 'school' age. This week we're proper homeschoolers. It's a milestone for us. Minus the uniform, packed lunches and school-run traffic.

So in lieu of that first day moment snapped in front of the school gate, here's a little wrap up of what our not back to school week looked like.

On Tuesday Dexter enjoyed a special day with his Granny Kim which included a double-decker bus tour of the city no less. We visited the library on Wednesday morning where we borrowed, among others, his favourite bridge book. Only the 3rd or 4th time we've borrowed it I believe?! (Should I just buy it for him do you think?) The afternoon was spent at the PHM, one of Dexter's favourite places in the world. And yes, it was mostly spent in the Space section. Yesterday we enjoyed our SHRIMPs (homeschool) meet at the shiny new pool (pictured above) up the road instead of the usual park. Because if you hadn't noticed folks, we're in the middle of a heat wave.

Moments after our return from the library Dex and Hugo got to work on a project to build their own cottage from a book we borrowed - Building Houses. Here's the finished cottage below. I only helped with the occasional steady hand while they applied sticky tape. Lots of sticky tape.

Remember the reading area we set up last year? It comes and goes but has made an appearance again this week, by the fish tank this time.

Another library score - Clifford Phonics CD-ROM. He enjoyed the change from Reading Eggs. Got to mix up this learning to read business!

Here are the kids as we were about to ride home from our SHRIMPs meet at the new pool. Do they look tired and hot? We're experiencing a heat wave in Sydney - and have been car-less all week. Biking everywhere we need to go. It's been 30 plus degrees each day. Seriously. We ARE hot.

We took a different route home from the pool, zig zagging back and forth in the back streets of of South Newtown and Erskineville. Truth be told I was avoiding the hills - best way to do that in our area is to stick close to the train lines. Of course train lines equal underpasses. We hung out in the deep shade of this one for a while to cool off.

The boys were excited to discover the acoustics inside were seriously awesome. So we stayed a while, shouting and singing. We were loud. Several pedestrian's and drivers turned our way and smiled. It was fun!

Echooooooooo!

Today we had ourselves a bit of a nothing day. If it had been a school day you could say we 'chucked a sickie'. (Oh, that's such an awful saying isn't it?!) We had lunch with Will at our new cafe. Cleaned the kids craft tables. Rearranged some stuff, including a fair whack of strewing (mwahahaha). Ate ice-blocks. Did NOT get on the bike. Dressed up as I don't know what.

How great is homeschooling? Or bus-, library-, museum-, pool-, bike-schooling as it were!

Wow, nice one if you read all of that! I'm done waxing lyrical about our school-free life now. We're a little bit excited. Thanks for bearing with me.

No pocket? No prob.

Hugo for some months now has been extremely into his little Lego people figures. Many of them are called SuperGuy. Two SuperGuys in particular travelled all the way through Central America last month.* In and out of his pockets (or mine) depending on his attire that day.

Today he found an alternative place to stash his little man. It cracked me up big time. Especially as this undie wearing business is still fresh - although nappy free for months the boy refused to wear undies and has been free-styling under his shorts/pants until now.

I asked if this one had a name. He replied with a look of surprise on his face - 'I don't know about it'!

*And yes, I promise the rest of the trip is coming soon soon soon, if the photos weren't so time consuming to trawl through - and I could make a decision about which to include - and if uploading them wasn't so painfully slow I may have had it done by now...