Sienna Marie

Our December vacation started off with a five hour drive from Guatemala City to the Copan Ruins in Copan, Honduras . We had another three car caravan consisting of the Turners, Connors (and their nanny, Andrea) and the Storelees (and our nanny, Reyna). All went smoothly until we came to the border and Wade Turner, who was in the lead, was unsure if we needed to pull over and park or just drive into Honduras as the Guatemalans waved us through and nobody seemed to be manning the Honduran side. I hopped into the lead and, as Wade put it, cruised up the hill faster than I'd driven up a hill all day. The Turner car followed, but the Connor car was stopped by the authorities. They phoned the Turners and told them that we were supposed to return to the border. When Michele Turner called to tell me, I told her I wasn't going back, but would wait for them up the hill. Surprised, Michele turned to Wade and said, "She's not going back" and later referred to me as a renegad

Sienna's one year checkup came at 13 months on September 3. She weighed in at 21 pounds 12 ounces (50th percentile) and was 30.9 inches tall (90th percentile). She had her MMR vaccination and was a trooper once again. She's walking by herself all over the place now. She hasn't taken too many falls and none that injured her, which is what I worried about with these hard, tile floors. She eats very well, just about everything I put in front of her which is mostly cooked vegetables of all sorts, strawberries, papaya, pasta, oatmeal and more. She's starting to dabble a bit in fruit juice mixed with half water. She loves to drink out of my water bottle, but that sometimes consists of pouring it all over the floor so I take it away from her (she likes to do that with her bottle, too). She now drinks vitamin fortified powdered milk (Nido made by Nestle). It's easier than using fresh milk which can go bad in a short amount of time. Sienna is an absolute doll, travels well

Sienna and I left Guatemala on June 17 at 2pm and flew to Houston where we had our usual three hour layover. My friend, Ruth, was on the plane with us and was a huge help! We had an empty seat in our row and were seated in the bulkhead, so we had ample room for Sienna to play. She was her usual princess-self. In Houston, we got a bite to eat with Ruth before sending her off on her flight to Seattle. We spent an hour walking - Sienna is happy as long as the stroller is moving and boarded our flight to Minneapolis at 9pm. We lucked out again and had an empty seat and were seated toward the back of the plane with a bunch of high school kids returning from a Spanish trip to Costa Rica. Sienna was smiling and they were entertaining her. One of the boys with several piercings made a comment that she's the first kid not to be afraid of him ;) Sienna slept the entire trip and we landed in Minneapolis close to midnight. My parents and my niece were there with a cute sign to greet us and a f

I've been slacking on updating my blog due to a two-month summer vacation and the start of a new school year, but I'm back! Sienna's 10 month checkup was on June 11 and she continues to be very healthy. She weighed 21 pounds 4 ounces and was 30.5 inches tall (77.5 cm), which, if I remember correctly, put her in the 75th and 90th percentile respectively.

Sienna had her 9 month checkup on Thursday and all is still well. She has both of her lower central incisors, but no signs of any more teeth. She weighed in at 20 pounds 8 ounces, a gain of only 8 ounces in the last month, and she is 74 cm (29 inches). The biggest development is she started to crawl!! All of the time in her walker didn't have an affect on her ability to crawl, after all. We moved out of our zone 10 apartment into a zone 15 townhouse, just across the street from school and we love it! It's very secure; at the garita (gate), visitors have to exit their vehicle and give their ID to the guards behind what appears to be bullet-proof glass. The guards call the house to let you know your visitor has arrived and asks if they can let them in. The neighborhood has a little park with a playground that Sienna visits almost every day with Reina and with me after school and on weekends. We also live next door to a CAG teaching couple, Christine and Doug, and their almost

During Semana S anta (Holy Week), Sienna and I drove to Panajanchel to pick up a former co-worker from Mexico, Danna, and her daughter, Becky. We left around 6:30 am on Tuesday and arrived in Pana three hours later after a fairly nice, but foggy drive from the city. The highlight was when it started to rain up in the mountains and a man in a beat-up pickup truck had a wire attached to the only wiper on the truck to manually clear the windshield! In Pana, the weather was sunny and gorgeous. Danna and Becky checked out of their hotel and we headed back up the mountain to the highway and on to San Marcos, a village just west of Pana on Lake Atitlan. It took a good hour to get there and it would have been much easier to reach via boat, but I wasn't sure how that'd work with Sienna and all her stuf f. San Marcos is known as a hangout for those intere sted in yoga and meditation - this I did not know until after we had booked our accommodation at Hotel Aaculaax , an eco-friendly hote

S ienna had her 8 month checkup today and she weighed in at exactly 20 pou nds (80th percentile) and is just over 23 inches long (90th percentile). Dr. Blanco said she's continuing to grow beautifully and we chatted a bit about what she's eating and what she should not eat until she's a year old due to prevention of future allergies (dairy, egg whites, wheat at 9 months, etc). Sienna has sta rted to love tummy time - finally! She crawled backwards for the first time yesterday, so it will be just a matter of time before she's cruising around forward. She's still a huge fan of her walker and loves playing pee k-a-boo with the curtains and being tickled. Another new development is she likes to play with stuffed animals and she loves the ones that talk to her or, the bear in the photo from the Broder family that laughs - so cute! Cori Frieler gave her an angel and when you squeeze it, it says a bedtime prayer. She gets a huge smile on her face when she hears it and st

Happy baby Sienna is another month older. We didn't go to the doctor this mo nth, although here in Guatemala people normally go every month. Ironically, it's for the same reason people in the Stat es don't go every month - money. It's easier on the pocket book to spread out the vaccinations and, the more I read, easier on the baby's body, as well. The actual doctor's fee is cheap even without insurance (200Q = $25), but with my insurance, the charge is only 30Q or about $3.70. Sienna's favorite activities this month are cruising in her walker, smiling for photos, taking baths, being dipped upside-down, going for walks on the Av enida Las Americas and playing with her nanny Reina. We took a trip to Antigua, a colonial town just 30 minutes outside of Guatemala City, and walked aro und with the Connor family. Christine and Doug have a daughter, Zaya, who is almost exactly a year older than Sienna. We'll be moving at the end of April into a townhouse right n

Sien na had her 6 month checkup and she weighed in at 18 lbs 9 ounces and was 27 inches (68.5 cm) long. She got the last of her three Hep B, DTP (Diphtheria, Tetanus and Pertussis), Haemophilus Influenzae B and Polio vaccinations as well as the last of her two Rotavirus vaccinations. The latter is oral, but the others were all included in one shot given in her upper thigh. She's always such a trooper; last time, she didn't make a sound and this time she cried lightly for a second until I picked her up and then she just made a sad face and recovered quickly. I had given her a squirt of Baby Tylenol 30 minutes before the shot and I'm guess ing this makes a big difference. I'm too afraid to skip it and see what happens because it's been such a dream that she doesn't seem to be in much pain at all! Everything checked out well. She falls in the 90th percentile for both height and length and the doctor was very happy with how she's growing, sleeping and eating. S

Almost as soon as we arrived back in Guatemala from Minnesot a, Sienna was due for her 5 month appointment. We went in on January 15 and Sienna weighed in at 17 pounds 6 ounces (75th percentile) and 26.8 inches (100th percentile)! She only needed her rotavirus vaccination and it was given orally, so it was no problem. All else was perfect - she's a very happy and healthy baby girl! Sienna's back to sleeping like a princess - she goes down arou nd 9pm and sleeps until 7am, rarely waking up in the night. She takes naps around 9am, 12pm, 2pm and 5pm. Our nanny Reina has been a dream. I can't say enough good things about her. Sienna loves her and she loves Sienna. She works because she needs the money, obviously, but she often acts as if it's not just a job. It seems she truly enjoys spending time with Sienna. Normally Reina goes to her aunt's house on Saturdays around noon and returns on Sundays around 6pm, but this week she decided not to go. She spent Saturday mo