Happy Birthday, Julian!

March 18, 2008. Today my nephew Julian turns 3! Back in Quito in the Old City, Colleen and I had gone shopping for a piñata and small toys to fill it. No candy for the Henderson boys! Believe me, I can't imagine them hopped up on sugar. We managed to score a Lightning McQueen piñata and filled it with small cars, trucks, helicopters, and two LED-flashing fish. We managed to secretly drag the whole big bag of stuff with us into the mountains. This morning my Mom and I went to the Black Sheep Inn's yoga studio and set up the piñata and blew up some balloons while Colleen distracted the boys with an outing to hand feed salt to the llamas.

His first gift was a package of undies! You can see how excited he is! When you're three, and you've just graduated to underwear, getting a whole package of underwear emblazoned with cartoon characters is pretty great.

He also got two big trucks which were immediately coveted by Ian.

Next up was the piñata. Ian and Julian both got to whack at it. It took a little while to break, but it was pretty fun! The piñata was pretty much in one piece, so Colleen gave it to the staff and asked them to give it away.

After a birthday brownie, we piled into our rented car (with driver), and headed back to Quito. This time our driver was a Dutch ex-pat named Lex. He was interesting, but also a little volatile. His driving was pretty aggressive. At one point he was driving at a pretty good clip around a blind corner while gesticulating wildly with both hands off the wheel, and a truck full of people came right at us. He had to slam on the brakes and skid.

We made it back to Quito with several hours to spend at Mom's house before heading to the airport to fly to the coast. We got to exchange all of our damp and muddy warm clothes for clean beach clothes. It was really luxurious to know that the laundry would get done for us while we were gone!

We went to the airport in the evening and flew to Manta on Ecuador's coast. I had been developing a cold as we headed down the mountain earlier in the day, and by the time we flew I was thoroughly plugged up. The flight was pretty painful. I didn't realize just how bad my cold was getting, so I didn't load up on tissues. That was a pretty bad decision since my nose started flowing like a fountain, and the drive to Puerto Lopez took about 2 hours. I had to resort to whipping off my right sock and using is as a hanky. Luckily, it was a pretty clean sock, and I hadn't already been wearing it all day!

We got into Hosteria Mandala at about 10pm. It was really hot and humid compared to the rest of our visit in Ecuador, and I thought I'd never get to sleep, but I did ...

Maine Events

And for my final Maine report, I've strung together a bunch of short videos.

Miscellaneous Maine

Here are some miscellaneous things from our visit to Maine.

Michael tried to eat my nephew Julian. Luckily Julian was wearing his new National Geographic watch and binoculars, and he was saved.Ian beat his Dad, Aaron, at Monopoly with the help of a team of advisers.No vacation is complete with out substitute pets while we are away from our Bijou and JoJo. In Harpswell we had spazzy Scout, and in Camden bloated Manuel and Polly (not shown).
We stopped by The Maine Dog in Camden to visit the Flemish Giant rabbit who lives in the store window. This is a Big Bunny. He's about 3 times as big as JoJo.

Celebrations

There was much rejoicing in Maine while we were there. Of course, I like to think it was because we were there, but probably not. Not entirely, anyway!

December 31st was my nephew Ian's 6th birthday! Wow! I feel like he's no longer a little boy, he's a regular kid. A regular spazz! Ian could eclipse Maine Yankee in energy output.

We also did some Christmas presents all around since Michael and I had come in to town. Here my other Maine nephew, Julian, helps Michael with one of his presents.

After we did Christmas and celebrated Ian's birthday, Michael and I, my Mom, and my Dad headed to Belfast for a New Year's Eve dance played by the Hep Cats. I got all dressed up, fully knowing that only a few other people might be dressed up; I even wore my new petticoat. I must be city-fied, because I was really surprised to find that no one else dressed up. There had been a lot of snow recently, and every one else was in jeans, warm shirts, and practical muddy boots. I wore boots, too, I'm not crazy, but I did change into dance shoes. The floor was slick with mud. I'm used to dance floors being wet, but it's always beer, which is nice and sticky. The mud on linoleum was pretty slick. I had a great time anyway, and many people told me they really liked my dress and the fact that I dressed up. We all had a great time dancing; here I am with my Daddy!

New Year's Day Michael and I saw my long-time friend Ann and her husband Jon. We had a great lunch at Cappy's Chowder House, and then we had to go our separate ways. Too short a visit! Someday I hope we can have a long one.

Then my Aunt and some cousins from my Mom's side of the family came over for a New Year's Day get together. It's always great to see you all! Not many people made it this year as have in past years, partly due to another snow storm which was already dumping snow.