Finally baba is back

Christmas is over that means I will get to see baba more although I don't like being a to complain carrying this belly and the two kids and being alone all the time is not easy.  I find myself more tired and with lots of back pain I think is my sciatic nerve...but I know is only for a couple of weeks and I will have my little man in my arms..Inshallah. So any pain is more than worth it.


On Christmas days we all got to wear our matching pajama pants...Shookran baba for wearing pink once again..last year we did Hello Kitty this year we did some Diva Reindeer.

Let me talk about a little bit about the gifts las nenas enjoyed them so much..although I think it was too many gifts and I know they were not so many compare to other households but las nenas were just opening them and putting them to the side I still have things I hide from them that were not even open and they had not even realize that they are mising them.  So baba and I talked about it and decided that next year it would only be 3 gifts for kid.  Is sad to say but the more you give the more they want.  At least for now they don't know as they grow up things would change I know.


Las nenas have enjoyed allot their little ponies, their bears, the felt house I made plus the felt food..oh and they have enjoyed so much the table and chairs...and the easel was a win win with Gamila she loves to draw although I have to agree even baba has enjoy it.

So now is time for baba and mami gifts...baba surprise me with and Iphone..I had wanted it when it first came out but I then kind of put it in the back burner...I know baba had being looking at them since he got this new store all of his coworkers have them and they are always talking about all the great things they do...so he went and got it for us...and now I am loving it....I also got a little gadget to make my coffee addiction bigger and baba got some audiobooks...


But the best gift of all was this that Tio Cesar gave to me..

Nenas this is Abuela when she turned fifteen...nenas in the spanish culture turning fifteen is a big thing...the picture resurface when tio Cesar was in Colombia earlier this year..

The story of the pictures is a bit sad..when Abuela took this picture she had already giving birth to tio Cesar and she was waiting impatiently for her father to arrive from the USA..so she dedicated it to him she wrote the following  "Papi el no tenerte en esta fecha tan importante me da mucha triztesa pero el saber que pronto te vere me da fuerzas" (Dad not having you around in such a special day makes me sad, but knowing you will be here soon it gives me strenght) The saddest part is that her father my grandfather died prior to returning to Colombia...she never saw him again.

Feliz Navidad ~ Merry Christmas 2009

So the day started with allot of preparation we first had to prepare the food for the reindeer not sure where Samia learned this but we prepare oatmeal with some glitter so the reindeer can see where to land and eat while Santa unloads.  Las nenas enjoy preparing and throwing it out in the patio baba and mami join in the fun as well.  Nenas I never did this when I was growing up and for sure neither did baba.

The whole afternoon Samia was very anxious about Santa arriving at night so I tried to keeper her busy but the weather made things difficult since they had to be indoors...finally baba arrived and we started our night we got dress, dance, sang, fixed the table enjoy a nice dinner talk about what Christmas baba read the story of Jesus being born from his Koran and mami read it from her bible.  I think we would start doing this so the girls know that our two faiths have baby Jesus being born.


I think is our dutty as parents of two different faiths to teach our daughters our books one day they would decided what they want to follow the important thing is to believe that there is a God.


Samia as very helpful setting up the table is nice to see her grow into this little girl that is always happy to help, Gamila you help as well as much as you can.

Preparing Santa's cookie platter I know this big plate for 3 cookies Samia's idea.

Here we are fixing the table before our meal las nenas were so much help, baba enjoy himself making sure the tamales were warming up the right way and taking pictures, nenas baba loves to take pictures every time he gets hold of the camera he can easily take over 100 shots he loves to hear the click I think....

Nenas Abu made this dresses for you I just love them and I know the girls did as well!

For some reason Samia figure that if she did not have her pj SAnta would not arrive in our house so as the night went on she started telling me she needed to change I was like no is too early, Samia you insisted and insisted till I gave up and put on your PJ's Samia you are as persistent like your baba...is a very good characteristic but Boy can it drive me crazy...like I told tio Cesar me tiene cacorra la culicagada esta con Santa....

After having our dinner we decided that Santa was going to arrive, .  So while mami pick up the girls and baba  heard the jingle bells outside the girls figure it was the reeeinder arriving you should see them running all around the house trying to find out what door Santa had drop off the gifts. They  finally figure it out their faces were full of expressions.

The girls enjoyed bringing all of the toys from outside and putting them around the tree before opening them.

Cooking and many other things!

So tomorrow is my big day...nenas you will have figure it out by the time you read this that mami celebrates tomorrow at midnight that is when the gifts would be giving food would be serve and we all would celebrate Jesus being born.  Christmas day is just a day to stay home and play with the toys eat left overs and enjoy each others oh and get to wear our matching pants....nenas I think this would be the last year we would be wearing pink, I don't think the baby and  baba would agree to pink in years to come Inshallah!

I being doing many many things and the only way all of these stuff gets done around my house is with lots of caffeine I am addicted to it what can I say and I have never follow that rule of No caffeine I don't believe in that stuff or else my two nenas would have being born bouncing off the walls.  I love my Cuban espresso coffee but now I have a new addiction Vietnamese coffee I think some time earlier in the year my friend Kim gave me the coffee and I had never done it but last week my friend Bonnie made some for me and what can I say I am addicted to it around 3 PM instead of my mid afternoon Cuban espresso or cortadito  now I do Vietnamese coffee. Here is the place I learn how to do it is so soooo worth it and my Louisiana people the community coffee is great with it.

So as the usual we eat tamales ~ natilla for Christmas eve.   This year I venture to make empanadas so so worth it I did them I think yesterday and since they can be frozen we have being taking them out and frying and eating them.  This are some of the stuff we would eat the next couple of days.

For the empanadas I make a sofrito with tomatoes, onions, potato, garlic, meat and just cook it.
On the side make the maza and then prepare them.

Today I finish making the tamales and la natilla.

Once again I being multi tasking here are a few things for the baby that I have being working on...I did two blankets simple but I love them so baba can wrap him up...Nenas a little secret mami has never being able to wrap you guys for some reason baba and Abuela are the experts they always have done it.  Baba loves doing it and he takes so much pride doing it we call it the taquito wrap some others call it swaddle. 

I also made a pair of pants for the baby from Samia's pants usually Guido and Zetu send us pants and shirts from Egytp and they send so much that I always have left over so now I make the baby pants from Samia's I did play with it here and there to make them funky...now I have to start working on the onesis I am just waiting for them to arrive from Egypt so I can start playing with them.

And here is mami at 29 weeks pregnant for some reason baba took the picture and cut off my face..not that I mind I am not to fond of pictures.

Feliz Navidad 2008

For all of those that did not receive a Christmas card here it is

The night went perfect although Gamila was sick Samia was able to enjoy her night. Very early on she started telling me Santa needed a flashlight since she knew that he would past when it was dark so she could open the presents.

Then she came with the idea that he was going to call her to tell her hello, she drove baba and mami crazy with that idea, so baba had to go outside to make some phone calls (hint hint hint), when all of a sudden the phone rings is Santa it goes like this.

Samia: HI SANTA YOU MY FRIEND

Santa: HOHOHOHO

Samia: YOU BRING ME PRESENTS

Santa: (Speechless)

Samia: I LOVE YOU SANTA BYE BYE

After this I have a running princess happy and wanting to call Abu, to tell her Santa call also when she saw baba she could not stop telling him and is so funny she gets so excited she startles. Finally somebody in Miami pick up the phone her lucky tio Cesar so once again she got to talk about her conversation with Santa and the lucky one was her tio Cesar.

While all of these is going on she is opening the balcony door and screaming out of the top of lungs.

SANTA SANTA SANTA SANTA....It was so hard for her to keep her calm here she is trying to open the presents way way before we could open them up

Before sitting down for dinner mami decided to take a few shots of them around the tree, since I knew in a few minutes there would paper all over the place.

And here she is picking again while mami was getting the table ready

Poor Gamila while all of these was going on she was just to sick to be part of the action she only wanted to be in mami's arms.

So baba told Samia santa has just pass in his carriage and she could open the present. There are no words to explain her facial expression, the happiness, the desired to play with that kitchen, I have to admit after she open her kitchen it was hard for her to understand that there were more presents she just wanted LA COCINA.

I could tell she was so happy while she was opening all those presents some of her phrases were:

"IS AMAZING"

"WONDERFUL"

"SO MANY PRESENTS"

"SANTA PAINT MY CHAIR"

"THANK YOU SANTA"

After putting Gamila to sleep baba and mami decided to build the kitchen we tried to put Samia to sleep but it was impossible she did not want to go to sleep till she got to play with that kitchen. Samia you were so happy with your kitchen that you even pipi while making mami some late night coffee.

Nenas overall it was a beautiful night we enjoy each other, we laugh, we scream, we cried but most important of all we were together. We remember the ones that could not be with us, but we know how much we love them and how much they loved us and Inshallah we will be together next time.

Tamales, Natilla, Crazy things!

I have to admit today has being kind of a crazy day. With moments of allot of happiness and laughter.

Let's start baba is super tired pobresito he has not stop working, not only does he has to deal with all the crazy guest trying to get everything for Christmas, but he has to come to a wife that is doing snowflakes at the request of Samia and hanging them from the ceiling.

This morning mami finish making some snowflakes that had being put in the back burner for a couple of weeks, I am starting to hang them however I have made a few 3D and boy are they time consuming but the kids love them today.

We had a few visitors at home today. Stacy came with Carson to let us taste some of those cookies she spend the whole day baking yesterday and her tedious work was worth it. Samia enjoy the OREOS snowballs with white chocolate. Poor Stacy she came to visit and ended babysitting. Before writing tonight I read my friends Stacy blog and she had the cutes post about the fun they had while I was gone.

Then we had our other friend Stacey bringing us some more chocolate fudge, chocolate pretzels. By now I am a ball of sugar from eating so much sweet. NO JODA ESTOY MAS DULCE QUE UNA ABEJA! Then to top it off Bonnie came by, but she was healthier she brought me a salad, she knows I tend to skip lunch and my sugar drops and I start to feel bad, well little did she know my sugar was high from so much sweets.

With so much company Samia was enjoying her friends coming and dropping off sweets, she also took the time to show them her snowflakes. After the visitors left mami took time to start cooking tamales.

Tamales

Tomatoes
Onions
Scallions
Garlic
Cumin
Salt
Beef
Chicken
Sazon Goya
Potatoes
Olive Oil
Canned Vegetables


Cut the tomatoes, onions, scallions and garlic in small pieces you can use the chopper. nenas as you will learn mami has not quantities I am just not good at it I just estimate, Inshallah by the time you are in your own mami can tell you exactly how many tomatoes etc.


After cutting put everything in a pot with olive oil, cummin, sazon goya, salt and pepper.

While this is cooking, wash the beef and chicken cut it in cubes and then put everything in the pot.

While this is cooking start peeling the potatoes and cutting them in larger cubes

Check that the stuff in the pot has cooked already if there is too much water take the top off so it can evaporate then add the can of vegetables.

After this has being cooked and cool off. Get the plantain leaves and warm them up to make them more manageable

I take this time to make la masa ponerle sal con un poquito de color

And this is how we put them together

Usually baba is the one that wraps them up

Samia just as a reminder you started to help me make tamales at 2 years old and here is a picture to prove it, I should add you drove me crazy asking mami lets bake tamales, you think everything is bake I can not blame you is being very festive the last couple of months.

So between all of these cooking there is a very funny episode it goes like this:

Samia: Mami I am going pipi

Mami: Okey

Samia is gone for longer than usually, Mami takes a walk to the bathroom.....

OH OH what do I find Samia with a mirror looking at her NALGAS.

Mami: Samia que estas haciendo

Samia: Looking for my tail (buscandome la cola)

Mami: Speechless a lo COLOMBIANO con LA JETA ABIERTA

The cooking continues La NATILLA here I cheat a little bit I buy the box that has the premade mixture so it goes like this not much instruction nenas just pictures follow the instructions in the box oh make sure you follow the ones written in Spanish for the past 10 years every time I buy this box for some reason the english instructions are written wrong.

So today Santa came once again and took one of Samia's beautiful ornaments she made for Santa (wait I really have to stop as I type this is 11:00 PM, GAmila is not feeling so well so we are in bed and she is in my arms picking her nose OH GOSH a 1 year old picking her nose in front of mami....Gamila ten cuidado que te vas a sacar un ojo)

So this is our tree after Santa has made his last trip, tomorrow evening El Nino Dios would be born and then we will open our gifts, the best part is that next to this beautiful Christmas story, Christmas tree we have a beautiful picture frame of the last Sura from the Koran. Nenas this is what we all are about understanding each other respecting each other and most important of all loving were we come from and what we believe in.

Multi, Multi Things

Today was a fun day still a bit sick now is Gamila the terrible cough I think that after dark cloud full of coughs, mocos, germs, and all of that yucky stuff is gone Mami is going to do the happy dance (What is the happy dance not sure, but I will come up with it)

Today I went to do some shopping to get the rest of the stuff we needed. I bought Crystal a guitar of Hanna Montana however Miss Samia was holding the box so long and playing with it that she just broke our heat and I could not resist and open it for her she loved it I think she played with that guitar for about 4 hours. Oh Abuela bought her a crowd set with ring, earrings and necklace she even had mami wearing it. Oh I should mention the mameluco she is wearing mami made it for her after a long night of taking it apart till I finally figure it out. We were all so impress of my mameluco and she loved it.

Abuela and Mami enjoy the princess to the fullest today!!