The year that was

It seems to be the thing to do when you have a blog to record the passing of the year, so here goes…

2007 was an exciting and busy year for our family. When it began I was doing a pretty good impression of a beached whale, being very pregnant and ready to pop with our second child. Gorgeous little Chiq arrived in the world on the 3rd day of the year and 2007 was defined by us being a family of four. Her birth was a challenging and interesting experience, mostly because we were dealing with some pretty different attitudes towards babycare than at home.

The first few months of the year were a blur of sleepless nights, cracked nipples and first smiles. In March we travelled home to Australia to see family and friends in Sydney and Perth and to attend my brother’s wedding. Guerita was a very excited and sweet flowergirl at the wedding and I was thrilled to give a reading at the wedding - the same one that my other brother had given at our wedding.

Amongst all the loveliness of the wedding was sadness, as my grandmother passed away a week before the big day. She had been fading for several years and her quality of life was quite poor, so it was not an unexpected time for her to go, and there was certainly some releif that she was no longer in pain. Her 12 grandchildren are often spread around the globe, but she always had impeccable timing my Nanna, and we were all in the country at the time she died and able to attend her funeral. She also got to meet little Chiq once a few days before she took her turn for the worse.

On our return to Mexico we started to really feel settled with our life here, having settled into a routine with 2 kids and feeling more confident with our Spanish and the Mexican way of life. Guerita finished her first year of Kinder by performing well at her Clase Publica (graduation - yes they have a graduation for Kinder here). She got the Student of the Year award, which kind of blew us away and reassured us that she was adjusting well to learning a new language!

A long hot summer holiday followed, when I discovered how difficult it is to entertain a preschooler and a toddler when you´re stuck inside to avoid the stifling heat. In August I started my blog (which has kept me occupied during those summer months and beyond!).

In September our steady stream of visitors began with a visit from my mother in law and we started our string of holidays with a visit to the US and then a trip to Veracruz in October and numerous Halloween parties.

In November we continued our exploration of Mexico with a trip to the capital to get a taste of all the amazing things there are to do in Mexico City. From there we popped over to Playa del Carmen, near Cancun for some beach time with my cousin and her husband who later came to visit us at home.

My parents also visited us and December was filled with the usual Christmas parties, concerts and celebrations - all with a Mexican twist.

So here we sit with only an hour or so of the year to go (yes, we are boring old farts, or more precisely the parents of young children having a quiet night in on New Year´s Eve), thinking about our potential next move and cursing the home-made firecrackers that every man and his chihuahua is setting off in his backyard (waking up Chiq *grrr*) and laughing and cringing at the Extras Christmas Special.

Hope everyone has a great 2008 and I´ll look forward to seeing what it has in store for you all, and us