Summer of 24

 September 10, 2024

I'm writing from the bakery across the street from Luke and now Ollie's school. Ollie has just begun his adaptation process to school. Yesterday he went there for one hour, when I handed him to his teacher, he already had started his mama mama speech, I said Goodbye and left. This morning, he seemed to remember before I handed him off that he would be staying there without me, and started crying almost as soon as we entered the classroom. Hopefully he improves soon. After Luke was born, they created a new initiative for free public creche (daycare/nursery) until the age of 3. Here preschool begins at age 3 and finishes at age 6 when they enter First grade.  It is also free for those who are lucky enough to find a spot in a fully public school. Regardless, the tuition costs are very affordable compared to the USA.

Let's recap a crazy summer!

We enjoyed a long weekend trip to Soito, hiking around a waterfall called Cascata de Cabreia. The weather and water was a little cooler than expected so we couldn't enjoy swimming in the water like we did during our last visit, but Luke did a great job on a little hike. We celebrated our little German friend Kilians third birthday in the park . Then we were off the the USA! We definitely didn't have our thinking caps ( in regards to traveling with a one year old) on when we planned our trip. For me personally, I had our last trip to the USA in my mind, however Luke was already 2.5 not 1 and a few months. That year makes a big difference I think in travel flexibility. So our flight was Porto to Amsterdam, then Amsterdam to NY.   Initially we planned a long weekend in NY / Connecticut however when our direct from from CT to Denver was canceled I thought we should rethink. So we stayed in an airport hotel and booked our direct flights to Denver, the next morning. It meant some extra days with Grandma Letta and my parents and way less complications. Both boys were wide awake on our long flight until the last hour. Luckily there were some open seats and we were able to have some extra space to spread out however there was a group of young Italians around us who continued to talk loudly and drink wine the entire flight. It was also extremely warm on the flight. I shared the row with a lovely woman from Romania. It was so interesting to talk to her and learn about her country and the racism and challenges they face living among the large population of gypsys.  I think every one of our flights landing in the US, had a long delay waiting to the slip to be ready. Luckily it gave Luke extra time to sleep however little active Ollie was always ready to be out of those airplanes at that point. 

We were really excited to be off our plane in Denver and see Grammy and Grandpa waiting for us. Unfortunately there it was our luggage which took a long time to arrive but the boys played with Grammy in the car while waiting, and the parking attendants were really nice about us waiting for the car seats. The first order of business after the plane on the west coast is..... In n Out Burger! Luckily we were able to squeeze In n Out Burgers in twice before leaving Denver. We got to Grandma Letta's and enjoyed playing on her fluffy carpet and trying to stay awake until bed time to keep our jetlag at bay. The first night Luke woke up around 2am and called out and Grammy and Grandpa were able to take turns spending time with him. If i remember correctly he eventually was able to fall back to sleep. Ollie did pretty well that night but also had a long stretch of awake time in there. In Denver, Joel and I went on a few rums together on a nice running / biking path nearby and Joel got to see the Coors Factory on his runs! We also enjoyed Mexican food, and a few last minute errands before the wedding like new dress shoes for Joel, and of course some shopping for me. Oh and pedicures and manicures for the ladies. Everything tickles my mom so it gave Grandma Letta and I some laughs watching her try to power through without moving her foot around! The kiddos enjoyed playing at Grandpa's school parks. 

Then it was time for our first road trip to Durango for Cody's wedding. I loved seeing the beautiful sights on the drive, crossing through the Rocky Mountains. Luke and Ollie had nice car naps.  (continued on October 19th--») But Ollie was suffering in the end, so we had to stop a few extra times and check out the playgrounds along the way. When we arrived an amazing 3 story townhome awaited us! Elk Point Condos were built a few years after we got our condo in Angelhaus. It took away our direct access to the slopes. I think I still hold a small grudge :P anyways it was really cool to check them out inside. We had plenty of space to spread out and the most amazing views of the mountains. Brians family stayed in the basement, we stayed upstairs and my parents on the main floor. The house was also SUPPPPERRR equipped for kids. Like step stools, night lights, a baby monitor, you name it!  And straight from the get go, we were visiting with friends, family, etc. All of the different events leading up to the wedding seem like a blur, but it was so amazing to see everyone in one place. There were events starting from Wednesday until the wedding on Saturday and even a brunch on Sunday. My parents hosted all the wedding guests at the condo for a BBQ and yard games. I was a greeter at the wedding, and the big day got even more exciting when the wedding planner told Cody that we were about to get started. I told Cody and her that there's no way all of the guests were here. (Oh yes, guests needed to take a shuttle to get to the wedding venue on top of the mountain.) Grandpa Nick, Uncle Mitch, and pretty much all of our friends were not there! The wedding planner said it couldn't be true and all the shuttles were there and that we needed to get started regardless. Cody and I had a look again and he confirmed we were missing tons of people. We told the grr

oms party to try and contact anyone they could on that bus. Eventually thanks to shared GPS apps, (no one on the shuttle had service at that location!) we realized the people on that bus were headed to the wrong side of the mountain. Obviously Cody and Alexis wouldn't let the wedding go on without all those people, so he had a stern word with the wedding planner and we waited for them to arrive. Turns out they had spent more than an hour on the shuttle trying to get to the venue. And not a smooth one either. They had the guests who were already there, go back up to enjoy more of the cocktail hour.   it was quite the story and ordeal, but of course will go down in history!  Joel did a fantastic job as the officiant. There were so many amazing details to the wedding! It was beautiful. It was a child free wedding, however, since Ollie was completely out of his routine and normalcy, he was a very unhappy baby during all the wedding events.  If he was crying, it was only me who could make him stop crying. So all the other cousins went down the mountain with the babysitters, but we hoped Ollie could stay in the venue, downstairs and sleep while we enjoyed the reception... except of course he wouldn't sleep and was just crying.  Joel was staying with him to try and keep him calm, but he wouldn't stop crying unless I was there.  

Ollie continued to be quite challenging during the trip, because he was only sleeping well during naps. He would have a good two hour nap or so each day, (when we were in one place!) but at night he was awake sometimes every hour or two hours. Sometimes he would wake up and not go back to sleep for a long stretch of time. And again, it was only me who could calm him down. There were maybe three nights when we got to the lake house, where he finally slept a "normal" night for him. Normal for him is still waking up twice a night. 😴  Because we were so exhausted and just couldn't imagine continuing to move around (3 nights in a place, 3 nights in another) with him we made the sad and very hard decision to skip the family reunion to try and get Ollie situated in one place for the rest of the trip.    Sorry to all of our lovely family members that we missed at the reunion. Please come and visit us in Portugal! :) We were also very sad to hear that it would be the last reunion. 

 

 Anyways, we had lots of great fun at the lake house despite our tiredness! Well, lucky for Ollie, his tiredness was cured by the great naps he was having during the trip... hmm i wonder why he was napping so well. 😆 Luke had tons of fun catching lots of fish, going on the boat, going on walks and bike rides in the forest, riding on the paddle board, and swimming at the lake beaches in town and elsewhere. The fourth of July was also a big hit in a cute little tow

n called Winter.   When we go to a parade in Portugal now, Luke is disappointed that there isn't any candy and says parades are better in America. Grammy and Grandpa got to be there for an exciting milestone of Oliver's first steps in their house! He was 15 months and it didn't take him too long to finally start cruising around on his feet! Luke also got to try ice skating for the first time and momma got to try and skate on terrible rental skates! That was an experience and now I truly feel so bad for people who try skating on skates like the ones I had. No wonder people don't enjoy it! It's really tricky to do much when you have no edges. 

When we got back from our trip we had a lot of beach and river beach days with lots of warm summer days. We found our favorite river beach with water warm enough to enjoy and lots of great shade and surrounded by nature. Unfortuantely the area all around it burned in September during the big wildfires but we haven't been back yet to see. I played in an ultimate frisbee hat tournament and the boys watched and had their first camping trip! It the first tournament in my frisbee career where my team won! woo. There were only 4 teams at the tournament this year but it was still lots of fun. The boys loved camping. We also enjoyed a few days with my sister in law and her family at a place called Lago Azul.

In September,   Aveiro, the district we live in had some huge wildfires. Most of the fires were not too close to us, but some were not far from Bosch and the smoke was terrible. We had all doors and windows closed, with the Air Purification mode running on our AC units and it still smelled bad in the house. We tried to stay inside for a few days to avoid smoke exposure. Ash and burned eucalyptus leaves were found all over the yard when it was over.  However, we were lucky that we had a weekend planned in Sao Martinho do Porto with two other families. The airbnb host said that the house was available earlier if we wanted to. Our friends went two nights early, and we went one night early. The men worked from there and we took the kids to the beach and air was so clear and breathable. Such a relief after a few days inside. It made Joel and I really appreciate the fact that Luke was a newborn during covid Lockdowns! 

 

We also had several old friends visiting during late September and October and it was just so much fun to see how much all the kids had grown and reconnect with our old play mates!   

Anyways, more to come soon!  I made a goal to write in my blog at least once a month in 2025, sooo this post took me several months to finish but I hope to use my free time in the evenings to do more things to help me remember these beautiful moments, otherwise you forget! (Or at least I do :O )