Coop & I at the Plaza in Granada

Cooper the Trooper

every house a different color

a beautiful volcano crater lake

Cooper had a playdate with Lucy

disc golf paradise!

Let’s get right to some new pictures!  Now that we are in Granada- I feel like we have really hit our stride.  The colonial feel and colorful buildings is so much more interesting than sitting on the beach worrying about whether Coop is getting sunburned or has sand in his butt.

Fruit stand in Leon

As some might know, I have a special kinship for folks with fruit stands.  I also like that it shows Cooper just gnawing on a strap of his backpack- content and waiting for the next admirer to come along.

Leon

countryside...and that smoking volcano that promises it will be nice

These smoking volcanos do make me nervous, I’ll admit it.  They are awe-inspiring.  The countryside (in some areas in the West) looks surprising like Texas, huh?

food at the 'beisbol' game in Granada

This is the food you get at the baseball games.  Regional baseball is a fanaticism here and we went to our first game on Friday night.  Tiburones (sharks) are the local team so that’s who we were cheering for.  Every play worth a damn got the stadium SCREAMING and out of their seats.

Viva los Tiburones!! (They won)

We didn’t know how rowdy it would get or how much Cooper would be into it, so we stayed up in the standing galleys to watch.  Cooper was such a good sport- considering it got a bit past his bedtime…

Notice the raw fish in the bucket. Yum.

This was the bus that took us from the beach (Las Penitas) to Leon.  The buckets in front of us are full of fish that the fishermen take to market.  There are guys at the bus stop in Leon with handheld scales that weigh the catch, pay the men and they take the bus right back out of town.  Pretty efficient if you ask me– just don’t as the health department I guess?

Fun for Coop- even if it doesn't look like it.

Course Coop can have fun with a hole in the wall!

Here’s the thing about our little angel boy.  He is down for whatever but when it’s his turn to cut loose and have a blast- it’s funny the things that make him so happy.  The fish ride (above) was okay, but that little ledge on the wall in our first place here in Granada– hours of fun!  While we were in Las Penitas, we had a queen bed next to a twin bed and there was about a six inch height difference.  I’m not kidding when I say that he must have jumped and crawled and tumbled over that ledge about forty times an evening!  It was our sole source of entertainment in the evenings until he tired himself out and passed out for the night.  He also gets an amazing thrill from drinking from our water bottles and then shaking the bottles.  That’s another half hour of fun a few times a day.  Since we plan to play disc golf while we are down here, we brought about four discs with us– what a brilliant idea!  Whenever we have to distract him, we take them out and slide them around on the ground and he has a blast.

VIDEO CLIPS:  For fun, I just threw together (in like five minutes, so please don’t expect much) a quick compilation of video clips.  From now on, I will take better quality- this is as much of an experiment as anything.  I hope it just shows a little bit of the flavor here.

CLICK ON THIS LINK TO WATCH THE 5MB VIDEO: nicaragua_0001

HIGHLIGHTS:

• Our hotel manager, when we were checking into our beloved suite here in Granada, was looking at Cooper all strapped into his backpack and said “wow- Cooper the Trooper!”  I love it!
• We are staying in a hotel room with a kitchenette and wi-fi and a living room for SEVENTEEN DOLLARS A NIGHT in downtown Granada.  Now that’s a bargain!
• Cooper started vomiting after having some watermelon juice the other night.  It wasn’t ten minutes later that we were at the pharmacy late-night getting let in to see a doctor.  No biggie in the end- it wasn’t food poisoning, but we were so scared.  I think I saw the doctor roll his eyes and call us ‘rookie gringos’ under his breath but I could give a damn. He gave us Pedialyte and an anal suppository (for Phillip?…j/k) and we said our prayers of immense gratitude to the universe that he was going to be okay.
• This kitchenette set-up means we get to get back to Phillie’s home-cooking!  After a week of gallo pinto and other unremarkable Nicaraguan fare (sorry, I’m just being honest-) and that scare with Cooper, we are going to cook most of our own food here from now on.  It is so nice to eat veggies again.
• Granada is so beautiful!  We are having fun walking around and just running into music performances, parks, markets, etc.  I haven’t gotten good photos yet, but I will work on that today.

That’s all for now!  We love ya!

smoking volcano!

Las Penitas

the beach at sunset- day two

The Knight family has decided to take a trip to Nicaragua to celebrate our Honeymoon, Cooper’s first birthday and life in general. Phillip has been a few times now and fell in love with the country and insisted that Cooper and I must experience it for ourselves. We are on day three today and so far, we have been osillating wildly between thinking this is the best decision we’ve ever made and the worst. Travelling with our little wild man has been challenging and fun and totally different then what both of us seasoned travellers are used to. We bought a little backpack for him which has been a godsend.  Here is him all packed up and ready to begin our adventure!

Cooper is so unbelievably popular with the locals. They are crazy about babies as it is, but you have a little “chele” (white boy) with blue eyes and you throw him up at eye level in that backpack and Nicas (Nicaraguans) young and old, male and female almost trip over themselves to get up close to him. They say “aye, que liiiiiiiindo es! Que hermoso este bebe!” (how beautiful…how cute is this guy! Etc.) He has quite a routine where he smiles and waves and charms them pretty good. I was saying the other day that it’s like walking around with the dalia lama or something– everyone staring and smiling. In that way, it is a real treat to travel with such a crowd-pleaser.

A new amigo, Juan!

On the other hand, it is exhausting trying to keep him “wrangled.” Nicaragua so far is the absolute opposite of baby-proofed. There are potential dangers everywhere and Coop’s dead-set on heading for them. Phillip and I have been good about taking turns with this. But truth be told, his disposition is so good– he’s down for whatever. No a/c- he’s fine. Stinky taxi- he’s fine. Mom and dad have cramps in their legs from the bus ride to Las Penitas, Coop’s passed out asleep. The airplane ride from Austin to Houston was such a white knuckler that I was singing every church song I could remember just to calm down- a woman was throwing up from the turbulance– Cooper’s passed out and drooling. We were stuck on the tarmack for three hours in Houston with bad weather in a hot, stuffy airplane– Cooper’s flirting with the pretty lady a row behind us completely oblivious to the fact that his parents are about to lose their shit.

We realized that the key for us so far is (a) to get good sleep and (b) take turns getting some alone-time. The first two nights were horrendous sleep. Let me just say that polyester sheets should be outlawed in tropical countries. Enough said about that. I despise synthetic fabrics as it is, but seriously…Phillip was so hot and sweaty that he literally started punching the 2” thick mattress at about 3 in the morning. We moved rooms, have cotton sheets, water pressure (most of the time) and slept amazingly yesterday. Our neighbors are a nice Canadian couple who shared some good coffee with us this morning. Sidenote: so Nicaragua makes some of the best coffee in the world, but ends up exporting most of it. Our hostel only serves instant coffee and the best we can find so far is some watery brown drink that they are pretty sure should be coffee. I can keep it together with polyester sheets and an air conditioner that kicks on and off all night but no coffee! Well, let’s just say that it’s extra hard for me to be my charming self without my Joe. I’m going to find a cup if I have to make it my damn self…stay tuned on my quest for a decent cup of coffee.

So to cap our travels so far: best parts-

• Cooper interacting with the locals. Some kids were kicking a ball in the street last night on our way to dinner. He walked right up to them and took their ball– and walked it to another girl and gave it to her. They were so cute and told him good job. He smiled and waddled on to dinner like he really accomplished something.
• The way the folks around here pronounce “Coo-pair”. It’s pretty cute.
• The tropical plants everywhere are amazing. They are so healthy and happy that they almost look plastic.
• The simplicity. Open air rooms, cold showers, just a sheet on the bed. No one gets to be high-maintence around here. Or I guess you could try- but you’d just be disappointed. I translated for some Germans who couldn’t wrap their heads around a change in their reservation at a local hostel. I think the hotel was actually politely kicking them out because they were pushy, ran around naked like Europeans do, and just sort offended the conservative sensibilities of the local staff, etc. But their Germanic inflexibility was just such a reminder that we are all guests here and should do as the Romans do.

Some of the struggles we have encountered:

• Crap coffee. See above.
• Trash everywhere. I will try to get some understanding of this- is there no trash pick-up? Do Nicaraguans hate the environment? They have such green thumbs and seem so proud of their paradise– I don’t get it. But as you drive the countryside, I keep wanting to stop and get to work cleaning it up. It breaks my heart. If the trash were gone, this would be such a garden of eden.
• Dogs everywhere eating trash and looking stray. Who knows if they are.
• Skinny horses being worked in the cities.
• Lots of honking in the streets. So much drama just to get from point A to B. And here Cooper is in the backseat with no seat belt. I know, I know…

Here is a family photo from last night.  Cooper made the pissiest face and we couldn’t get him to shake it so I photoshopped a happier face on him

Hola amigos!

Man, when I get rich, I am going to outsource this blogging stuff.  Don’t get me wrong, I love to relive these moments by writing them all out and I know one day when I’m 80 (and still rockin’ it…fyi), I know I’ll be happy that I wrote all these memories down and made them into books at the end of the year.  Yes, I know this– but the discipline required to keep up with this!  Well, folks, I ain’t got it.

So I’m letting the half-chewed pear pieces harden to the floor, I’m letting the mountains of laundry stay piled up as the veritable petri dishes that they are, and I’m going to ignore those patches of mildew I found in the bathtub earlier today to sit down and try to archive the magical, wonderful moments that I are passing by at lightning speed lately.

Offhand, here are the top ten:
1) Cooper took his first airplane ride(s).  Mom and I and Cooper jumped on a few planes and headed up to Washington state to see my dear aunts.  It was Cooper’s formal introduction to his tribal not-so-elders and proved to be a testament to his ridiculously good nature.  Pre-trip I was trying to cancel actually because I couldn’t imagine a 7 hr adventure trying to wrangle this wild man.  I researched baby benadryl “dosing” that is shamelessly endorsed in the back-alley conversations in Momville.  Trouble was I couldn’t find the stuff and thought I should give him a chance first at least.

I tell ya, he was a peach.  Goo-goo-gaa-gaaing all the way there and only mildly hyper-active on the way home.  I couldn’t have done it without my mom’s help and the occasional “he’s fine…just calm down, I’ve got him”.  That and this lady, Carrie Fischer (shout out to ya!), who we sat next to and was asking if she could hold him “just one more time” to show him something cool out the window or some clever knee-bouncy game that she perfectly with her own kiddos.

Yes, it was actually a joy to travel with him.  Whodathunk it?  Here are some fun pictures from the trip!

contemplative Coop

Don’t let that calm facade fool you- he’s just recharging his battery on a nice walk in the woods.

I also spun him around a few times.  If he weren’t so hilarious as little dizzy baby, I would have stopped after just one.  But I figured that if the offspring of Phillip and me, he doesn’t mind a little spin every now and again.

dizzzzzzy!

Okay, this picture has to be shown because it holds the record in my mind of the cutest all time halloween outfit ever!  Killian, my dear cousin Sydney’s boy, went this year as a triceratops.  But not just ANY OLE triceratops!  A FAIRY TRICERATOPS!  Are you kidding me!?!  Kids are hilarious…and even more hilarious is that Gwen’s dog, Katie, couldn’t figure out what he was and kept sniffing his butt!  Check it out!

Best costume ever!

On another note, Killian also drew Cooper some pictures, mostly of dinosaurs.  But then he drew a picture of Cooper entitled “this is a picture of Cooper if Cooper were a girl”.  Priceless!  It now hangs next to the dinosaur pictures in Coop’s room.

2) First Halloween.  Okay, so NEXT year he’s going as Phillip (was going ot be this year, but he was in Texas and we were in Washington, so what’s the point– no one would get it).  And I was about to cop out on the day in general since my aunts, etc. weren’t planning to do anything.  But then at the last minute, the mom-guilt kicked in and I picked up a drastically discounted (score!) jackolantern outfit that made an adorable fool out of the poor lil guy.  It didn’t fit and it stayed on for about five minutes.  Enough to snap a picture or two!

3)  He’s officially been sorta-kinda walking.  I know this a typical first-time parent thing, but he is now to the point that he can walk next to me only holding one hand.  And he can get himself from the recliner to the couch by taking a step and falling into the couch to catch himself.  Say what you will– I think it counts and I’m proud as hell!

4) Sigh…okay, I’ll admit it.  He finally got his first running nose/cold the other day.  I was rather proud of the fact that he’d gone this far- 10+ months, with almost 6 teeth in, all sorts of immunization shots, and the occasional germy playmates- without getting sick.  But once we were back from Washington for a few days, Phillip and Cooper got all groddy and now I’m officially down with it.  I plan to start another blog someday to whine and rant about being sick when you’re a mom.  I am still looking for the time-out switch that’s hiding around here somewhere.  I could cry (and have a few times) when Cooper needs to be picked up, changed, pulled out of the dog’s water bowl for the four bazillionth time, pulled out of the kitchen cabinets, pulled off of the coffee table, etc. and I’m just feeling so horrible.  At least once a day I thank the good Lord I’m not a single mother.  Phillie has his “quirks”, I tell ya, but I’m damn grateful to have him…

5) He has learned some tricks!  I shouldn’t always equate child-rearing to dog-training, but honestly, I learned alot from training Luna and use essentially the same skills to teach Coop.  He now gives hugs!  Melt my heart!  He can be sitting on your lap and you say “can I have a hug?” and after he gives you a weird look or two, he throws his arms around your neck and squeezes.  If that right there isn’t reason enough to procreate, I don’t know what is.

He also has about a 75% high-five-ing rate.  He gets a touch of moodiness from his mother and selective hearing from his father, so he has that working against him, I guess.

This isn’t really a trick, but he now insists that anytime anyone is in the shower, that he gets to come too!  He bangs and bangs on either the bathroom door or the side of the tub and yells as only this fool can yell until we relent (there are way bigger fish to fry) and strip him down and throw him in.  He crawls up and back over and over, all the way babbling something to himself that only he understands.  It’s adorable and it’s definitely worth the cricks you get in your back from trying to rinse your hair while doing an extreme sidebend.

I mean, really though- look at ‘im!  I have absolutely zero defense against his charms…