TWENTY-ONE

Grandpa Dean so graciously read "Hand, Hand, Fingers, Thumb" about twenty times in 5 days. Sometimes 3 or 4 times in a row.

2015 week twenty-one

We took our annual trip to Mexico!

Jazz Hands, or spell casting, on the beach.

Almost every morning we took a couple hour walk along the deserted beach and the men fished while we picked up sea shells, played in the waves, and kept having sticks dropped on our feet by excited dogs.

Matthew's first fist this trip. He averaged at least one fish a day -often much more than that. 

The first fish didn't make it through to be tossed back  and the dog kept fetching it out of the water. Vera was delighted. "My touch a fish!" was her repeated mantra.

Papa lets you get away with more than merely touching the fish. The dog, Arena, perceives anything about to be tossed as a stick. This was better, though, than the first day on the beach when the very first thing Vera picked up was a jellyfish... 

V's on again off again love of letting the waves crash over her. On the days she loved it she kept begging for "more again, please" as she was shivering and turning almost blue. 

We spotted a snake on our drive. It had to be examined more closely. 

More playing in the waves.

Sunrise fishing out on the boat. I did not join this year. Just thinking about it turned my stomach. Come on nausea, go away! 

Probably the proudest moment. Matthew caught a fish that my dad had not caught before (unheard of) and we ate it grilled for dinner and it tasted liked the best pork chop ever. 

Needlefish.

Pelicans on Cabo Pulmo.

A close up of all the trigger fish as evidence that Matthew's was by far the largest. The guide said it might have been the biggest he had seen. It was also delicious.

The trip to Baja is worth it for these shrimp tacos alone. We got to eat them twice and I could have had them every day. 

Vera loved Grandpa Dean. For many reasons, but usually when he was around...

juice and candy and breakable treasures were nearby. 

I has a little nervous that my vacation would not really be much of a rest. I didn't anticipate it would be easy for Vera to take naps in a strange place. But this precious child took 3 hour naps every day. And I didn't have to do any dishes, so yes, it was absolutely a vacation.

I just read an article that said saying "absolutely" in conversation makes you sound less intelligent. Now I notice that I use it literally (another of the taboo words) all the time. 

You may notice that she is wearing the same clothes in all these photos. They were not all taken on the same day. She requested the same outfit every single day. It is her absolute favorite; and since we're all dirty, sandy, and sticky anyway, why not.

Trying to touch the crabs and fish.

Post snorkeling. Pre really bad sunburn. 

I don't know why I was so amazed by this, but we found a hermit crab on the beach! Vera, of course, loved it and wanted to touch it.

She chased it down when it got away.

Thank you so much Dad, and Grandpa Bruce for letting us come stay. We love coming down to Baja so much. We'll see if we will brave it next year with a six month old. We really want to. 

When we got home we did a little needed gardening. We got 8 more pounds of potatoes! But sadly, about as many had rotted in the ground from all the rain. It was the same story with our onions. We planted over 300, but will probably end up with only a dozen or so full grown. Seriously, the rain has not stopped for 2 months. 

We took our annual trip to the tip of Baja and as usual it was perfect everything. Perfect weather, (more) perfect baby (because she wasn't crying all the time and she was taking a three hour nap every day), perfect breezy days, perfect food, etc. We feel so lucky to have the opportunity to go there. If you're going to travel to visit family, what better place could there be? I have mild anxiety around the ocean, though. It almost feels uncontrollable, and I certainly had stress dreams about it. Matthew laughed at me really hard when he saw me panic as I fell off the boogie board while we were snorkeling. There is just something about water when you can't touch the bottom and where sharks or eels (even more terrifying in some aspects) have access.

Grandpa Dean had a tent set up outside the palapa and Vera thought that was the best toy ever invented. She would race from the house to the tent, bring toys in there, zip and unzip the entrance and collect sticks and flowers and leaves through one of the little windows for as long as we would let her. Though we were truly spoiled with the food: freshly caught fish (often by my husband) for breakfast, lunch and dinner. One night Vera had the audacity to throw a fit over being tired of perfect seafood and beg for a peanut butter "swenich." Who are you, crazy toddler?

The day we came home Matthew had to immediately jump on another plane to go to a trade show in Florida, and I had to immediately rush the cat to the vet because she wasn't walking and had huge gashes down her middle. Turns out she has a nasty infection. So bad so that there were maggots growing in one of the cuts! It is apparently a tough life for cats in the Cole house... How do we have this luck? She's still not totally better, and it will probably be a few weeks until she is. In the mean time she gets pedialyte and antibiotics squirted down her throat a few times a day. Poor cat.

It was a hard adjustment back into real life for all of us on Thursday. Welcome back. :) At least Vera is still taking those delicious three hour naps.