Going to Bogota!

Yesterday was a chilly day!!! YAY! I am definitely more Colombian the longer I'm here because it was about 65 out, and I felt the need to buy a new sweatshirt since we were going to go to the farm, and I was "too cold". It was about 65 out. In March in Cincinnati, at 65 degrees, I would be thinking how warm it is! What a difference a continent makes! So anyway, I had a good excuse to buy this... I love Juan Valdez for clothes. They always have a lot of sweatshirts and long sleeved stuff. It reminds me of home :) Even though it's usually too hot to wear that stuff here, it is great for Bogota, or the farm. Plus I am a sucker for long sleeves :)

OK- this I also think is weird.. I haven't noticed it until recently, but it seems like there is all kinds of Christmas stuff around here! It seems like it is leftover from December, and they are still trying to get rid of it. For instance, I saw this today at Carrefour. I bought bread at Exito the other day wrapped in this. And at Juan Valdez they gave me a bag with trees and ornaments on it. In the US, you would NEVER see Christmas wrapping in March.

Ok, this post is about spa services. I have been a fan of the price of spa services since I got here. But recently, my experiences have improved greatly! I had been going to the salon in the clubhouse, and it was ok, but not great. I always had to wait a while, and it was definitely not relaxing. They were rough, fast, and the place was full of gossip that I don't understand. So, now I have finally done people have been recommending me to do. I had someone come to the house. Oh the delight! It is so much nicer to get it done on my porch with the sounds of the fountain in the background, in the peace and quiet! Plus, Lucy does a great job! She is gentle, nice, and you can't beat the price. About $10 mani/pedi! Monday, a friend came over and we both got our eyebrows waxed, and she got a mani/pedi, and then Emma got her nails painted a sparkly pink color :) All of that for about $15. AMAZING! Then Tuesday the spa day continued. I went to the spa here and got a massage. I was just going to get a normal 60 minute massage but I got a special one they talked me into by saying it was (roughly translated) "the ultimate, most delicious, and spectacular" massage. It was ok. I wouldn't use any of those words to explain it. It was pretty good I guess, but next time I will just go with the normal one. My upgraded massage cost me about $35! Woo Hoo! Then yesterday Lucy came back to do my pre visa appointment mani/pedi :) So for a waxing, 60 minute massage, and a mani/pedi, it was less than $50! I love that here. Plus, I just learned yesterday that people do massage domicilios!!!! I would definitely like to look into that! Maybe Lucy even does it.. I will have to ask!

So this morning, we are leaving the kids for a little getaway in Bogota! We are going for a medical conference that Carlos is speaking at! So it isn't really a romantic getaway, but it is a little peace and quiet! I have been so excited for this, but then when I dropped the kids off this morning at school, I was so sad :( I told Emma yesterday that we were going out of town, and if she was good, and nice we would bring presents home. But if she was mean and bad she gets nothing. So all morning she was like, "when mommy and daddy are out of town, if i'm mean no presents. If i'm nice I get presents later!!" Such a sweet little girl!!

So wish me luck!!!! I am going to attempt to get my Colombian resident visa tomorrow!! I am going with a relative of Carlos' who lives in Bogota. I hear that it is supposed to a no lose thing, that I could go by myself, no speak any Spanish, and still get approved... But I am still nervous because you never know what will happen when it comes to government agencies. Gulp. If I don't get it approved, I need to leave the country for another little getaway. This sounds great, and very nice... But I really can't see spending over $1000 on a trip by myself for two days. I never really thought about leaving town on my own. Like not for a girls weekend, or a getaway with Carlos, just by myself. I don't know how I would feel about that. It would be relaxing sure, but I would miss my family!

My kids are official Colombians!

Ok, it has been a while! A preface: I started writing this entry on Friday, and then my computer gave me issues, plus I sounded a little angsty. So I am finally posting this (slightly revised:) entry! Sorry there aren't pictures.. but I will hopefully be writing another entry later, and I WILL post pictures on that one :)

This has been a very long week and a half. So I mentioned a little while back that we were getting close to the end of our tourist stay here. Well it seemed like a long way off until about three weeks ago. Thats when we actively started working on getting the kids stuff done. We learned then that none of our Apostilled documents were any good since they were in English. They had to be translated, and then Apostilled again. (Which I STILL don't understand since an Apostille is a document to make papers valid in another country, so why do we need a Colombian Apostille for a document to be used in Colombia???) Anyway, last week, we realized that all of our stuff expires at the end of Holy Week. So we actually have a week less than we were planning on having. Here, everything basically shuts down most of the week. Without too much trouble, just flip flopping some clinics, Carlos was able to get an entire week off! So last week we started to panic.. What if the translations/Apostilles aren't done in time?? What if we don't have the right papers when we go to the appointment? What if we do get the kid's stuff done, but we don't get mine in time? All of these things were stressing me out and we started looking at back-up plan vacations for Holy Week that were outside the country in case we needed to get out, and re-enter (more on that later). Then it comes out that the kids may be REQUIRED to have two last names. We were set on just doing one name, then we realized that the only time kids only have one name here is when the child's father won't claim them, and so they only have the mother's name. This really put us into a quandry. All this time we were against having to name them Prada Prada. First of all, I think it sounds dumb :) Second, if we are going to do it the "correct" Colombian way, they should have my birth last name, not my married last name. Since my name isn't legally DeNoma anymore, we were afraid that this may not work. Above the fact that I simply don't like Prada Prada, Johana told me that now it is popular for kids who don't have a dad to just go by their mom's last name twice to try to look like they have both. OR they have two of the same name because their parents are related. She knows someone who's parents are cousins, and so they have two of the same last name. The first thing people asked when she was young: "Aww you don't have a dad??" to which she responded "Yes.. I have a dad." to which they responded, "Are they cousins?" So, it seems having only one name is just about as bad as having two of the same. So we were really left with 3 options, and the only one we liked (Prada DeNoma) was the least likely to happen. Basically, there was a lot of angst in our house because we kept feeling like we are outsiders with odd and different customs. People acted sorry for me that I don't have my original name, and frankly, I don't think it is something that I should be ashamed of, or sorry about. I willingly gave it up as a show of solidarity to my husband, and I was delighted that our kids and us all have the same name.

Well, Friday morning we went to get everything done. It was a success!!!!!!!! We walked out of there with two little official Colombians!! And their names?? PRADA DENOMA! I am so excited that their stuff is done, I can't even tell you. Now all we need is to get my visa, and the kids passports. Hopefully that will happen this week.

Ok, so at first when we brought up the idea of leaving the country, I was ecstatic. I was so thrilled to get out of the country, and go somewhere new. I LOVE to travel, and having kids makes it much more difficult. I have hoping to get as many stamps in my passport as possible while we are down here because it is simply much easier and cheaper to travel to South American places from South American places. Also it is much faster. Getting to Ecuador or Panama takes a little over an hour, Aruba not too much more, same for Central America and the rest of Southern America is so much easier to do when you live right there. So we were looking at Quito or Panama for visiting. Mostly because neither of us need visas in advance to go there. Carlos needs a visa for most all countries out of South America so we are very limited by that, especially when we are planning in a rush.

As many of you know, I get very jittery and quite a bit stressed if I don't know the details of things happening in the near future. I am getting better about it living here, because almost everything is done spur of the moment, or whenever it gets done. I still don't like loose ends though. So I was trying to find the best place for us to go, researching cities, safety, hotels, possible beaches, things for kids to do.. I spent hours on it, and then Carlos said, "Don't worry too much about it, it's a back up plan anyway..." I am sorry, but leaving the country isn't always possible on a whim. Well, it's possible, but as you wait, prices go up, and things get booked. So I finally got a hard yes out him- we would go regardless of what happens with the visas. So I spent hours looking. Well, as we were getting close to booking a 5 day, 4 night trip to Panama City, with excursions to the San Blas islands (we WILL be visiting those at some point.. it is just a matter of time :) we decided it's just too much. The price was creeping and creeping up, and I was getting so stressed just thinking about how much we would be spending on a spur of the moment trip to a place that, until now, hadn't really been on my radar, and may or may not be fun with the kids. Soo, we were back at square one. Also, I was feeling a tad salty because Carlos had promised me a getaway because the new couch I picked out was about $2,000 less than what he had expected to pay. So as a consolation prize, he promised me that he would take me on a long weekend getaway just the two of us :) I think we may go back to Santa Marta. We went in October with the kids for a medical conference. When we went, I was hoping to get to Parque Tayrona. The park is huge, with multiple amazing beaches, and great views. It is very popular with backpackers and people who want to camp through the park. That isn't exactly our style, nor is taking long boat or SUV ride with two potentially feisty kids. Plus we didn't have much time when we were there before. So, this trip will be dedicated to getting Tayrona crossed off my bucket list :) I am so excited, but I was also really hoping to get to La Guajira too. It is near there, and is basically a dessert that runs into ocean. From the pictures I have seen, it looks gorgeous, and there are supposedly flocks of flamingos that live there by the beach.