How I spent part of my afternoon...

(sorry if it's playing kinda funny)

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What We've Been Up To

Life has seemed a bit on the busier side lately. What we've been up to:

Owen was diagnosed with his first ear infection and was prescribed his first course of antibiotics. I am so grateful he's been such a healthy kid! But now I know how miserable life can be when your baby is sick and not his normal self.

Despite taking care of a fussy baby, I managed to pack up our whole apartment for our move while Josh has been busy with school and on-call nights. Then last week we moved to a bigger, better, and brighter apartment a few blocks away. We love it and are happy here! But man, moving is such a pain. And I think unpacking is way worse than the packing and moving. I still have things everywhere and need to buckle down and put them away. But, I seem to find playing with Owen more fun than unpacking. Someday our apartment will be in order and when that day comes I'll have to post some pictures of it.

This is NOT the definition of fun!

Owen walking

Here's the proof:

Videos

Some random videos from the past few weeks:

Owen's first horse ride at Aunt Chris's house in Queen Creek

Owen figured out the doggy door

some of the sounds I get to hear on a daily basis

Owen loves the swing!

Eleven Months Old

Owen just gets busier and busier and busier these days! He is my little energizer bunny and is non-stop from morning to night. I'm so happy that he's so happy. I love him to pieces!

Updates:
*I try to feed him almost anything now, but he has recently become quite a picky eater much to my frustration. He used to eat nearly everything I put in his mouth, but now if he doesn't like it he sticks his tongue out, grabs the food off his tongue, and throws it on the tray. And/or he'll make himself gag, even if there's no food in his mouth. A lot of times he won't eat unless he has a little cup and spoon to play with. He is starting to prefer only finger foods, hates peaches/nectarines and egg yolk, and could eat cheese and bread all day long. If I'm lucky, I can sneak some veggies in his diet.

*He walks well when we hold just one of his hands. He's still a scaredy cat and won't stand on his own.

*He loves to climb stairs and every time we come home he wants to climb the flight of stairs to our apartment.

*He tongue-trills all the time, especially when he's crying or upset. He's been doing this since January or February, but we thought he's grow out of it. Since he hasn't grown out of it I thought I better take note of it so I don't forget about it!

*He love to open and close things- doors, lids, containers. He loves to open pop-up containers with his bottom teeth.

*He loves all things with wheels and makes a "vroom" sounds when he plays with his cars.

*He loves to kick his soccer ball when we stand him up, and will chase it all over the room.

*He still loves dogs and loved chasing Teedo around (Josh's parent's dog).

*He is getting more and more stranger and separation anxiety. He will let a stranger hold him for maybe 5 seconds before reaching back out to us, and he still cries any time I leave the room he's in, even if for just a few seconds.

*He has adjusted surprisingly well to his carseat. After using it only once our whole time in Ecuador I thought it would be a while before he tolerated it.

*He definitely seems to prefer his right hand. They say handedness can't be determined yet, but I'm convinced he's going to be a righty.

Settling into Chicago

We've been in Chicago a week and a half now, and I'm just finally starting to feel somewhat settled. When we first got here we unpacked some of our things, but left a lot of things packed still since we'll be moving to another apartment at the end of this month. Then for a week we had to plan all microwaveable, grillable, and crock-pot-able meals because our cooking gas couldn't be turned on for a week due to the holiday weekend. We are also without internet service in our apartment and are waiting to set up service until we're in our new place. So, we've had to work around these little inconveniences, which we've been able to do fine, it's just been a little more inconvenient.

Fourth of July weekend wasn't as fun as we had hoped. On the 3rd we were able to have an in-house BBQ and we invited a friend. We had made plans to go see fireworks that night (Chicago's main firework show is on the 3rd), but then Owen suddenly got sick so we stayed home. Owen was pretty sick on the 4th-- he had a fever, would hardly eat, wanted to be held all waking and sleeping moments, and he wouldn't play at all so I knew he was pretty sick. I felt so bad for him, this was the worst he's ever had it!!! Before we left Ecuador I had joked that Owen since Owen was so healthy there he would get back to the US and get sick. Guess I was right.

Josh has been busy with school, and he's on-call every 4th day, which means he stays overnight at the hospital. So I've had to adjust to a new schedule. But, now we're settling into our new routine and Owen is healthy again and things are feeling much better.

Since being back in Chicago we've been reminded again why we like this city so much! The weather is so nice, we love all the green, we love that we can walk outside during the day (as opposed to Phoenix this time of year), we love spending time on the lakefront and at all the parks, we love being able easily walk to so many stores, we love the diversity.
We are excited for our last year here!!

Owen familiarizing himself with the new apartment

We made it to The Taste of Chicago one last time

Hanging out at the lakefront

Enjoying the park

Enjoying Arizona

Well, we're back in Chicago now with our car and all our belongings! (thanks to Josh who drove solo for 15 hours each for two days.) But before we got here we enjoyed spending time with our families and friends for about a week. Here's some of what we did:

Played with turtles and this desert tortoise. Owen thought it was one of his cars.

We went swimming.

Owen got to know his cousin Easton.

We did some more swimming.

Owen went for his first horse ride. He wasn't even scared at all!

Owen rode on his first quad. (don't know why the picture is funny)

Owen discovered the doggy door. By the end of his stay, he was quite proficient and crawling in and out of it.

We played with friends.

We had fun with family.

Owen had a blast with so many new things to explore! He really loved all the space, especially the back yard. We can't wait until we're in Arizona for all of Septebmer!!

Leaving Ecuador

Well, tomorrow we are leaving Ecuador! Our bags are packed and we are ready to go. We can't believe this experience that we had talked about, planned for, and waited for for so long is now coming to an end. Looking back on it all, I still can't believe we decided to move to South America for nearly a year with a new baby. It has not been the easiest experience and we've had our ups and downs through the journey, but we can honestly say it has been worth it and we are happy we decided to do this. It really was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and now nobody can take it away from us. The things we have seen, experienced, and learned have forever changed us. Our eyes have been opened even more to the world. We have experienced a new people and a new culture, new foods and new terrains. There really is no way to fully describe our experience here. But we are better because of it.

Things we'll miss:
-the mountains and having a great view from our apartment
-weather that is practically perfect - "eternal springtime" - with no snow
-being forced to walk everywhere since we don't have a car
-having our laundry washed, dried, and folded for us
-all the good food-- the bakeries, the tropical fruit and fresh juices, the empanadas, the patacones, the hot chocolate, the Magnum icecream bars
-super cheap rent
-ridiculously cheap roses
-not needing a prescription to get medication at the pharmacy
-being able to sleep in almost every day
-having Josh around so much during the day and being able to spend so much time together
-all the people who stop to admire Owen and say how cute, precious, or handsome he is and that he looks like a little doll
-all the people from church
-traveling around and seeing new things

Things we won't miss:
-stinky, dirty streets and rough, bumpy sidewalks
-bad drivers
-relying on taxi's and buses to get places
-daily afternoon rains
-inefficiency and lack of organization
-feeling like a walking target for theft
-worrying about getting sick from dirty food or water
-strangers telling us that Owen is cold, when it's 70 degrees outside
-baking at high altitude
-the metric system
-12% sales tax (and we thought Chicago was bad!)

Things we look forward to:
-not having to travel so much
-being able to take Owen to nice parks, zoos, and libraries
-buying new toys for Owen
-having a full-size bathtub for Owen
-having four seasons
-having our car again
-having a gym membership
-not having to worry about the tap water
-being able to use coupons
-eating foods we've missed- blueberries, condensed soup in a can, our favorite brands of foods and candies, better milk!
-our queen size bed (we had only a full size here)
-our full-size couch (we only had little chair-seat things here)
-catching up on movies
-regaining some sense of style.
-having church in English
-Josh having a more consistent schedule
-spending time with family and friends

Good Bye Ecuador, we will miss you!!!

Saying our Goodbyes

The senior missionaries, who took us in and adopted Owen as their own grandchild.

A few church friends.

This is Lydia, Owen's best fan. She asked her mom if she could switch her new little brother for Owen.

Fani and David, FHN employees

Rolando, one of the security guards of our apartment building. He was Owen's second best fan.

And we can't forget Scott, one of our favorite dogs. He lives at the place where we got our laundry done.