On the Mend!

quick update for everyone: cruz is on the mend! he actually slept really well last night and only woke up one time. we ended up using a humidifier in his room and also put vicks baby rub on his chest and back (thanks for the recommendation cyndi!). when he woke up at 8:15 this morning (wow!), he was fever free and has been all day! he's in much better spirits and has been playing, smiling and babbling like his normal, easy-going self. i'm wondering if maybe he just had a nasty cold and not RSV?? we'll see what the doctor says tomorrow morning. thank you for all of your thoughts & prayers!

ang

Home Sweet Home?

well we've now been home for 5 days and it's been quite a ride so far! poor cruz came down with what we thought was a nasty cold and fever on sunday night. as of today, he still hadn't shaken it and we were already scheduled to go to the doctor for his 9-month checkup, so the doctor fully examined him. he thinks cruz has RSV! they did numerous tests and checks on him and even put him on a nebulizer for a while. his white counts came back normal, but his heart rate was really high...high enough that the doctor was trying to decide if he should send us home or straight to childrens hospital in saint paul! he decided to give us a prescription and sent us home with instructions to give cruz a dose of ibuprofen and his first dose of the antibiotic and then put him down for a nap. after his nap we were to bring him back to the doctor's office where he would then check his heart rate and oxygen level again. he ended up sleeping from about 5:00 until 6:30 and when he woke up he was much more himself again! we took him back to the doctor's office and he rechecked him and both his heart rate and oxygen levels were significantly better. thank you god! he does want to see him again on friday morning just to make sure everything is still looking ok, but thankfully we didn't have to make a trip to saint paul tonight. cruz is certainly training us in quickly!

other highlights of the week:

auntie melissa and jeff stayed overnight on friday night and heath made us all yummy breakfast burritos on saturday morning. on sunday afternoon, mel came back to hang out with us (well, really to hang with cruz!) and stayed with us til monday afternoon. monday morning, our friends courtney and val stopped to meet cruz on their way home from laughlin and our friend kevin dropped off a johnny jump up for cruz to borrow (thanks avery!). on tuesday grandma and grandpa johnson came up to spend the day and today our friend cyndi brought lunch over. despite cruz being sick, we've had a pretty fun week!

oh, before i forget, the doctor also gave us updated stats on cruz. at 9 months he is 17 lbs 10 oz. and 27" long! these numbers put him between the 5th and 10th percentiles...he's now on the charts! yippee!

a few pics from week one:

hanging with tia mel:

snuggling with grandma johnson:

daddy's back in the kitchen!

our beautiful welcome flowers, signs & balloons!

good night!

Homecoming! (16 photos), by Angie Reedy

on friday, march 25th, we got up at 4:45 am so we were ready for freddy to pick us and the jaenischs up at 5:30 am for our shuttle to the airport. as you will see, heath had a little run in with the colombian policia at the airport! luckily they just wanted to practice their english with him! cruz was a rock star on both flights and we landed in minneapolis right on time at 7:05 pm. we were so surprised to see so many of our family members waiting to greet us! thank you so much for the warm welcome home! now if only the temperature would warm up...cruz isn't much of a fan of the winter coat, hat & mittens!
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Last Days in Bogota (76 photos), by Angie Reedy

we thoroughly enjoyed our last few days in bogota before heading home on friday! here are some memories through photos. (i even included some pictures of our room at hotel paris...can you believe we lived in that room for 6 weeks?!)Click here to view photos

Hasta Luego Bogota!

just a quick note before i go to bed one last time here at hotel paris...we had a wonderful last day here in bogota! this morning we got up and the sun was finally shining (at least partially!), so we ate breakfast and headed to monserratte about 9:30. i'm so glad we went as it was beautiful up there! we arrived back at the hotel about 12:30 and then walked to lunch at azzerro's for some italian and it was delicious. (mary & brian had been talking it up, so we figured we better try it on our last day!) after lunch, we came back to the hotel and found out some fabulous news....the jaenischs were able to get jack's visa so they are flying home to minnesota with us tomorrow! we are so happy for them and are very excited to leave together. heath headed to the embassy around 2:30 to pick up cruz's visa while i started packing. he was back in less than an hour as he had an awesome driver. we then quick ran to nicolukas to pick up some desserts we had ordered to celebrate our last night and i made my last stop at the juan valdez i frequented. yum! dinner was delicious ajiaco soup (traditional colombian soup) followed by our desserts. after dinner, we passed out thank you gifts to all of the staff and took some fun pictures with them! we will certainly miss them all - they treated us so well and took such good care of us. we are now all packed up and ready for bed. freddy is picking us all up at 5:30, so it will be a very early morning. our flight leaves here at 9:30 and we should be in atlanta at 3:30 (eastern). wish us well and think good thoughts as we all go through customs and immigration! :)
will write more and post pictures from our last few days after we return home!

signing off from bogota for the last time...
ang

Fiesta Fotos!

here are a couple of fun fotos from the fiesta for juliet's 15th birthday party!

family foto

jaenisch family minus ben

there was even a band!

the singer was on 'colombian idol'!

the birthday girl & cruz

ben & lauren

mary & i with our boys

cruz & luz stella, our representative

beer boys! brian, heath & ryan

the ladies with their babes: ang & cruz, mary & jack, lisa & vivi

FIESTA!

Moving Right Along....

just wanted to let everyone know that things have been moving right along this week! yesterday we applied for and received cruz's passport (wait til you see how cute his picture is!) and had his medical exam in the afternoon. he currently weights 16.5 lbs and is 25.5" long...he is continuing to grow and has definitely developed a buddha belly and chubby little cheeks! the doctor said everything looks good and is certain he will thrive in minnesota. :)

this morning we headed to ICBF and picked up one final form and then proceeded on to the US embassy to apply for his visa. everything there went smoothly and we can pick up his visa at 3:30 tomorrow! that is our final step before we can leave. yippee!

it was also an exciting morning for me as cruz has been babbling quite a bit and seems to have figured out how to say "mama"! heath is very jealous and is trying to get him to say papa...so far it hasn't happened!

last night we celebrated juliet's 15th birthday here at hotel paris (she is one of the group of 4 siblings that has been adopted by a family from frazee, mn). 15th birthdays are very important for colombian girls and it was a BIG deal here. we celebrated with a live band, cake, flowers, balloons, etc. i will post pictures as soon as i can.

time to head to lunch. hasta luego!

ang, heath & cruz

He is His Father's Son

photo taken at la taqueria mexican restaurant. YUM!

also, we just met with luz and will be heading to get cruz's passport at 9:00 tomorrow morning. his medical exam is set for 4:00 tomorrow afternoon. things continue to move smoothly and we are set to arrive home at 7:00 friday night!

juanita's pizza for dinner tonight...look out!

looking forward to seeing everyone soon!

xoxoxo,
heath, ang & cruz

Things I Will Miss About Bogota....

i decided to start making a list of some of my favorite things here in bogota that i will miss when we leave. this list will be ongoing as i think of things worth noting, so bear with me. also, the list will be in a completely random order...

things i will miss:

*sunday ciclovia!
*juan valdez
*walking everywhere
*eating ice cream whenever i feel like it
*every day being about 65 degrees
*not working
*bonding as a family of 3
*the hotel paris staff! katya, juanita, valeria, guillermo, patricia, herman, karina - we love u all!
*breakfast sandwiches on wednesdays (or whenever else we requested!) and pancakes on sundays
*someone else doing our laundry, cleaning our bathroom, making our beds, etc!
*the mountains
*sunday markets

things i won't necessarily miss:

*the rooster at 5:00 am
*less than 10 tv channels in english
*carne, carne, carne!
*traffic
*our bed without a box spring
*rain
*the toilet paper 'situation' :)
*crappy sidewalks

stay tuned for updates....

Last Saturday in Bogota....

so today was our last saturday in bogota! we are officially flying home next friday, march 25th, and will be landing in minnesota around 7:00 pm assuming all goes well in atlanta and we make our ATL-MSP flight! it's still so hard to believe that our adventure in bogota is coming to an end. we did receive some additional good news late yesterday - the jaenisch family also received sentencia!! they are hoping to get all of their appointments done very quickly and have also booked the same flights home to minnesota that we have. yippee! now fingers crossed that everything goes well for them and we can all fly home together.

today we had a super fun time at a crazy restaurant in chia called andres carne de res. see the post below for a link to all of the fun pictures. (i used the share feature on snapfish to upload the pics for the first time...hopefully you can access them!) the reedys, jaenischs and celeste & her boys went on the outing and we had a blast! i can't even describe the restaurant...food is great, drinks are delish, tons of crazy things for kids to do, mariachi bands strolling around, etc, etc. good times!

i've been trying to capture random photos of our life and times here in bogota. here are a few from the last couple days. enjoy!

ben & cruz

cruz & lauren

the latest paris kiddie photo

*love*

tomorrow we are planning on hitting the market near the candelaria district and strolling around the historic area of bogota. fingers crossed for a beautiful day!

good night and see some of you soon!

Andres Carne de Res!

I'd like to share my Snapfish photos with you. Once you have checked out my photos you can order prints and upload your own photos to share.
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Sentencia!

we have sentencia! we received a message from luz this morning and will be going to sign the paperwork tomorrow morning and are planning on heading to the notaria right after that to officially have cruz's name changed. we are super excited, but it's also a bit bittersweet as we will be heading home to minnesota late next week and will miss our new friends so much! fingers crossed that the jaenischs receive sentencia soon as well...they are in week 9 of waiting and our thoughts & prayers are with them as they continue to wait.

monday is an official holiday here in colombia (not sure what holiday it is..no one seems to know!), so on tuesday we will get cruz's passport and have his medical examination and then wednesday we will apply for his visa and should be able to pick it up on thursday. we will be in minnesota next weekend! crazy! please make the snow go away.... :)

will update as we hear more! we have many things to squeeze into our trip during this last week. it's gonna be crazy!

love from bogota,
ang, heath & cruz

Mommies' Morning Out!

this morning three of us mommies + lauren had a little girls' outing to norbertos spa (the same place with the fabulous, cheap haircuts!). we enjoyed spa pedicures and manicures, sipped on limanados and coffee and spent some quality girl time together while the boys stayed home with their daddies. it was a nice, relaxing getaway that we all deserved! :)

the lovely lauren:

classy celeste:

marvelous mary:

besties!

mighty me:

john, our favorite fabulous stylist, just HAD to style mary's hair for her!

we had a great morning! thanks daddies for watching the boys! after the spa, the reedys and jaenischs headed to wok (or wok star as we like to call it) for some asian food. it was delicious! as good as the food is here at paris, it's always nice to get out and try something different.

one other quick note...as if we didn't think cruz was amazingly cute and perfect, we are now starting to be told this by strangers! people come up to us (including a sweet lady at wok today) and tell us how cute he is! we are so blessed with an adorable, healthy baby boy! :) i love it!

Gold Museum!

today we took a trip to the gold museum in downtown bogota and had the pleasure of touring it with luz helena, luz angelica and sebastian. luz helena & sebastian were excellent tour guides and taught us a lot about colombian history. we got to see the largest gold collection in the world as well as the largest emerald in the world! very cool. after our tour, we ate at the gold museum restaurant (delicious) and then we did some shopping at the artisan markets across the street. cruz scored an adorable little fleece that was made here in bogota and we also picked up several gifts. very fun!

here are a few photos from the day:

twins!

i'm a big boy sitting up all by myself!

It's a Beautiful Day!

greetings once again from bogota! we just had a beautiful sunday! the weather was absolutely perfect (sunny and 70'ish once again), we made it to the markets with the jaenischs and lenzs and found some great gifts, we spent an amazing afternoon with the upegui family and then i capped off the day with two rounds of skip-bo with mary & lauren! does it get any better? :)

the upeguis invited us over to jose's apartment at 1:00 for dinner and to celebrate luz helena & luz angelica's visit to bogota (jose's wife & daughter). we had the pleasure of meeting several of jose's relatives including two more cousins (one that is a coffee-taster for juan valdez and one that owns a museum - pretty impressive connections!) and another couple. cruz was very excited to see that dario, karina and their two sons, sebastian and oscar were there as well! dario still has the magic touch with cruz. we enjoyed socializing and then dined on a traditional colombian celebratory meal: lechona (stuffed pig!) and arrepas. the lechona is a pig that has been stuffed with rice, pork and peas and it is actually very delicious! dessert was divine as well....tres leches cake and a raspberry & chocolate mousse! YUM! (once again we eat ridiculously well here!) we had a great time meeting all of the family and friends and i think they thoroughly enjoyed meeting cruz. we have made plans to head to the gold museum with luz helena and luz angelica on tuesday and we will also be visiting jose's cousin's museum on wednesday. it's wonderful to have local contacts here in bogota. we are definitely getting spoiled by them! :)

i will leave you with a couple photos from our afternoon. enjoy!

dario!

lechona!

luz helena & cruz

luz angelica, cruz & ang

karina, dario & cruz

sebastian & cruz

hugs from bogota!