Roll on out.

Sad day in the Luque Fisel home. We had to bury Nora´s Maclaren stroller. She´s been rolling in it since she was about four months old. If we would have put a mile counter on that thing it would have been INCREDIBLE. I think it would have showed that we pretty much rolled to the equivalent of the moon and back. The wheels were dying and it was just super worn out. SO we got a new Cybex stroller (Thanks Mom) and it´s for older kids. It´s AWESOME! It no longer feels like I´m trying to push a stroller filled with giant watermelons ...although I will miss the arm workout, I won´t miss the boob sweat. Kids here are in strollers a lot longer than they are in the USA because our daily life consists of SO MUCH walking. At least a few miles a day and there is no way an almost three year old would be able to keep up. So, they just sit and chill. N likes to watch her IPAD and it´s hilarious looking at people´s reactions to it. It´s like she has fifteen heads or something. Someone in the tram today was like ¨WHAT IS THAT!?¨ Anyways, that´s the big news of the week! ROLL ON!

yes indeed

I am still alive. I feel like things have been incredibly busy these past two weeks with extra appointments, meetings etc. I´ve also been busy losing hours at my job thanks to my boss cancelling two of my classes which leads to a whopping 400 euros less a month. Needless to say, I´m not pleased. There might be good news next week having to deal with A´s job, or it might be sucky news ...so lets keep our fingers crossed that it´s the latter. So, there you have it. Our wonderful exciting lives in a nutshell! My baby is turning THREE in a few weeks which makes me tear up every time I think of it;/ Time really does fly by!

..

It rains nearly every weekend which makes it tough to do anything at all. Yesterday it was so windy I thought we were all going to blow away. Our TV antenna did. It was the quietest our building has been in ages. I think since no one could watch TV they all went to bed. It was glorious! This morning we took a walk downtown and it started to rain. Which reminds me, we need to get a new stroller. N will be three, but kids are in strollers a lot longer here because we walk miles a day! Anywho, so, she wanted to carry the umbrella and NOT sit in her stroller with the plastic over it. Parenting is tricky. I am very strict I will admit and I do NOT like taking crap from my daughter. I am not one of these ¨nice¨ mothers that is like, ¨Ok honey¨ but more one of these mothers like ¨bend over and I will spank you.......¨ N can be very stubborn a lot of the times and a bit manipulative so this is where it gets tricky. Do I just sing her the three songs that she wants me to sing before naptime (that are only supposed to be sung at night time) or do I let her cry for two hours about it? Obv sing, right? The other day I undressed her for the bath and I had to get her dressed again so SHE could undress herself, or else she would have cried all night long. I´m trying to figure out that fine line of ¨WHO is actually in charge here?¨ and how to maneuver my way through a day without my daughter having an hysterical hissy fit every five minutes. Ideas? Thoughts?

on languages

Sometimes speaking in Spanish makes me laugh. I find myself in interesting situations and I´m not even really sure what to say. For example: In America it would be so easy to walk into a supermarket and ask the clerk, ¨Do you have eggs?¨ I found myself in this situation HERE yesterday and I couldn´t bring myself to ask. Why? Because ¨Tienes huevos?¨ also means, ¨Do you have balls?¨ Awkward. Today I was on my bike and I almost ran into an old lady. She said, ¨next time honk.¨ ¨No tengo pito¨ Nope. I couldn´t say that. That also means, ¨I don´t have a penis.¨ SO you see, after nearly 8 years in this country I´m still maneuvering my way through this sticky mess of a web called Spanish.

Mommy

¨My head is kind of like a circle.¨ ¨Daddy, have a sweet day!¨ ...at eight thirty pm. ¨Mommy, are you happy?¨ ¨I love my bed!¨

sha what?

When I was in the USA this X mas break my mom introduced me to the wonderful world of ¨Sha lack¨ for your nails. It was twenty five dollars and totally worth every single penny. I got a beautiful French manicure and it lasted a month, and could have lasted more, but it was growing out at the bottom. Sha lack is just a special polish that you put under a blue light when you are finished and it´s Amazeballs. It doesn´t chip or anything, which is amazing as you know, esp with a toddler. So, I´ve been looking around places here to get them re done and I couldn´t really find anything so I decided to just take them off myself. I tried regular finger nail polish...ha, ya right! What a joke...it did nothing! My mom mentioned something about acetone so I bought some of that.......and still nothing. GREAT! This sha lack stuff REALLY works. So, I pretty much HAD to go to a nail place to get it taken off. I found a random asian nail place that said ¨unas de gel¨ which translates to ¨gel nails¨ This had to be it, right? I went in and the guy cut off all my nails really short and then started BUFFERING them with that little machine that feels like someone is burning your nail beds off. WAIT; WHAT IS HAPPENING?! I guess ¨unas de gel¨ means ¨porcelain nails¨ NOOOOOOOOO so, after he buffed the shit out of all of my nails I told him I didn´t want fake nails. He nail shamed me! He was all like ¨WHAT! Why didn´t you tell me before...and then he kept saying stuff that I couldn´t understand.¨ BOO! I basically walked out of there with the ugliest nails I have ever seen. To top it all off one of my toenails fell off today too. The nail Gods were very very angry with me today...very angry.

ode to Polka Dots

What a sad day in my household. As I was making the bed this morning my bottom sheet pretty much ripped in half. I bought the white sheets with several colored polka dots at Target, in February of 2005 for my move here. 8 years. Not too shabby Target. I won´t go into great detail, but some good times were had in and on these sheets. Get your head out of the gutter! Late night breastfeeding sessions, snuggles and family wrestling matches. RIP polka dot sheets. You will be greatly missed. Thanks for providing us with such great times these past eight years.

Chanel 5

So, on Wed and Fri mornings I teach professors English at the University near my home. I love this class! They are super nice and have an intermediate level so we are actually able to have conversations about various things. Today, for whatever reason we were talking about TV and the Bradd Pitt Chanel number 5 commercial came up. One of my students asked me if that was really Brad Pitt´s voice. I have no idea why anyone would even ask that question ( so yes, there is such a thing as a STUPID question) It´s Brad Pitt, standing there moving his mouth and speaking. Are they going to dubb his own voice? At any rate, I have a projector and access to internet in class because we watch videos sometimes and look at different music videos so I looked up the commercial and this is what I found: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6sw_-ewTNM I was laughing so hard I had tears streaming down my cheeks. Not only was it just hilarious 1)I love Conan and 2)I wasn´t expecting it. I was just expecting to see the normal commercial. You can always count on my classes for a gosh darn good time.

hot

I am a hot sweaty mess at the age of 32. I can´t imagine how I will feel when I go through menopause. Only walking with the stroller and Nora downtown and back I was forced to change ALL of the clothing I was wearing because I was soaking wet and disgusting ( and I wasn´t wearing a coat and it´s 50 degrees) GROSS! The level of anxiety that I feel riding the 4 minute tram ride downtown is off the charts. Latin people are very anxious and they HAVE to get a seat (on this four minute ride) or they might die. I was standing in front of one of the doors w the stroller and people stand up like a minute before the door is going to open (there are a total of four stops in this four minute ride) YES i see you lady and YES I will move out of the way. OH THE STRESS! I seriously wanted to scream WHERE IS THE FIRE?! Did I mention I was hot?

Weight Limit

This is just disgusting. Every time I see Matthew on TV or an interview or online I honestly don´t even recognize him. Why would anyone ever go to such extremes for a movie role, like seriously? I recently read that he weight 135 pounds (Which I think the last time I weighed that was like in elementary school) and this his goal weight is 165. Are you effing kidding me? I think my right boob weighs more than that. It´s an ongoing annoyancw with me how Hollwood portrays weight and so the ripple affect occurs and everyone wants to be on DIETS and be pencil thin and get cleanses...blah! Honestly, how many times a day do I read about weight loss and women giving birth and walking out of the hospital in the jeans they were pre pregnancy. Why am I so angry about it? Jealousy? Maybe a little..........but not really. Mainly, I just want people to be healthy and REALISTIC. Hollywood is not realistic. Ya, maybe if I had a night and day nanny, a personal trainer and a special cook living in my home I would have lost the weight in a week too! But honestly, who has all that!? Gone are the days of Marilyn Monroe curves and beautiful white powdery skin and in are the days of oompa loompa tans, fake eye lashes that look like wind shield wipers, nails that could kill a linx, lips that could be mistaken for a toddlers butt and boobs that could suffocate any man that got too close. I´m going to eat a hamburger.

3 Kings!

Happy 3 Kings Day! It´s like Christmas all over again. It´s always funny when I come back from the USA because X mas is still in full swing here, trees, music, gift shopping. Until today. FINALLY it is over. I mean, I do love it and all but it´s been like almost 3 mths of non stop X mas activity! Enough is enough. Tree is down and decorations are put away. Until next year! N got way too many things (from other fam members!) as usual. Kitchen plus all of it´s food and appliances, mini washing machine, supermarket stroller, guitar, chalk board, scooter, baby stroller complete with baby (which she hates..ha) Melissa and Doug magnetic doll and much more that I´m not remembering at the moment. NOW...to find a place to put all this stuff.........

I couldn´t have said it better myself....by skidmarking.com Oh my god trying to lose weight sucks balls so bad. Big wrinkled sweaty smelly bloated old man balls and I hate it. I worked out five days last week. FIVE DAYS! And I ate Lean Shitusine every day for lunch. And by Friday I lost a pound and a half. Great, right? So I took a break from the gym this weekend, mainly because it was starting to feel like someone tied one end of a rubber band around my knee and the other end to a Buick and hit the gas. Just a little break - no big deal, right? Oh no, it was a big deal. A big fat hairy deal. I stepped on the scale this morning and saw that I had gained two pounds from Friday. What the hell, man?! I just took two days off! And ate a little cheese spread. A jar of cheese spread. But two pounds? I weigh more now than when I started. Awesome. So this morning I decided to mix it up by taking a break from the treadmill and found a whole new way to torture myself with a Zumba class. I would like to begin this story by sharing some common knowledge: my dance moves are straight raw. I am definitely the best dancer of my friends. And usually pretty much everyone on the dance floor. And it's always been that way. So I fully expected that by the end of the Zumba class the teacher would offer her tearful resignation and beg me to share the brilliant and unparallelled talent god had blessed me with by teaching all future classes. Then everyone would gather round me and cheer as I was crowned Master Zumba. Then the music started. It was some 128 beats per minute Spanish mess that everyone, including the 80-year-old woman in front of me with a cat on her t-shirt knew the moves to. Well, no matter. I'll pick it up soon enough. But there were arms flying here and feet flying there and at one point I was just jumping up and down while slapping myself repeatedly in the face. But as I mentioned I am an awesome dancer and it didn't take long for me to master most of the moves. I incorporated my own freestyle choreography into the mix and soon I was the belle of the ball. Then the old lady with the cat on her shirt moved out of the way and I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. Holy hell. I looked like I woke up strapped to a gurney and was desperately trying to free myself with my elbows. This isn't how I looked in my head! Is this how I always look when I dance? I tried some of my more popular moves and yes... I still looked like a big white douche bag. I tried to use old lady cat as a mirror shield but I couldn't keep up. Oh the humanity! I was a train wreck! Driving home I had an entirely new perspective on my life. I questioned everything I thought I knew. Was the sky even blue? Was this jar of peanut butter I was eating even made with real peanuts? After I polished off the peanut butter I had a revelation. Of course! How could I have been so stupid? I knew exactly why my moves had been little stiff. Next Monday I'm showing up to the class drunk.

Thank you Internet

I never think anyone reads this lame ole blog and I finally figure out how I can see who is ... I had 32 page views just yesterday and am rocking all of Spain, France, Russia, Germany, Bolivia, South Korea and Sweden......Don´t forget U.K. and USA! Thanks! I feel humbled that you would want to read about my boring life;)

hmm

Is it weird that I have absolutely no NY resolutions for this year? Maybe finding a cool new job could be one. Or maybe some more patience too. Being a mom is hard. Ya, kids are cute, but when they are toddlers and you say, ¨Hey, don´t touch the dog and lick your fingers.¨ And then the look right at you and touch the dog and lick their fingers, it´s really a buzz kill. Discipline is a struggle on a daily basis because I am indeed a spanker...but I will admit I do not like to spank. It´s a cyle of spank, cry, ¨sorry mommy¨ repeat. Kids can ruin the day quite easily based on their moods. Your whole day is based on what THEY want to do and then they complain, which is also a buzz kill. So you see, patience is necessary ,and most days I have none. Hopefully in 2013 I´ll be able to find some, somewhere. Meanwhile, I´m going to try to smile more and laugh on a daily basis with this lil thing. I mean, come on, isn´t she so cute?????

Hello 2013!

Sorry I´ve been gone for awhile friends. I´ve been busy travelling to the States and doing important things like getting my nailes ¨sha-lacked¨ getting my hair did, getting a facial and my eyebrows waxed. These are all of the amazing perks to travelling ALONE. It was my first time sola to the USA sans breast pump. So, I picked up a copy of ¨50 Shades of Grey¨ and read the whole entire thing on the airplane. I immediately had to buy the other two upon landing. Amazeballs. Anyways, Christmas in the USA is always good, although everyone was sick this year. So far so good...I think I came out of it unscathed. I saw some friends,ate some great food, drank some delish alcohol, and opened up some fab presents. We must also remember that Jesus is inded the reason for the season...duh! Church is a must on X mas eve. I also got to see snow which I LOVED. (side note: why does my husband ALWAYS have to have the radio and or TV on? annoying) ok back to real time...... My nephew just turned 5 so it was a super fun age to share X mas day with. He was super excited. I missed N, but she´s still too little to know what´s going on, so not that big of a deal. Plus, we have three kings coming up on Jan 6, so I didn´t miss a thing. I had to laugh when I was at Madrid airport coming home on the tram to get to my terminal. There was a couple on my airplane with three small boys and one of the boys was crying upon landing. Anywyas, on the tram there was this 18 year old girl talking with her friend saying, ¨I don´t even know why people travel with kids under four. It´s dangerous.¨ And they were going on and on and on about how they couldn´t believe people would have the audacity to travel with children. I was very tired and cranky at this point and knew that if I opened my mouth, probably nothing good would come out of it, so I kept it shut. But I WANTED TO SAY ¨It´s so obvious you DO NOT have children...so if someone lives in Europe and their parents in the States they shouldn´t travel until their kids are four years old?¨ And then I wanted to cut her uterus out because she´s un deserving of having kids. So ya, that´s that. 2012 was a good year. I really can´t think of anything majorly good or bad that happened. Just coasting along on this road called life. Enjoy!

Happy new year!

All the best for 2013!