Hello everyone - hope you're having a wonderful December and enjoying the holiday season. We had our staff holiday party last night which was lots of fun. Even though we miss spending time with family and friends it's kind of nice to be in Ecuador during the holidays because it's so much less commercial than in the states.

In the beginning of December we had 3 days off school to celebrate the fiesta de Quito - the founding of the city. So, Chris and I decided to use a prize we had won last year - two free nights at a beautiful, colonial hotel in the old part of the city.

It's not super far but we hardly ever go there and when we do we're not really sure where to take people.

There are lots of beautiful churches...

The old city has a few restaurants with inside courtyards - we were on the balcony of the second floor and are looking down in this photo.

The hotel we stayed in was really beautiful and very close to the main plaza where the president's house is.
Here's Chris when we arrived in our room - it was really nice and even had two floors!



Here are two pictures taken from the little interior balcony outside of our room - there was a little table there where we played dominoes.



We went to a few museums and saw some cool panoramic photos of the volcanoes here.
Here's a picture from when we were walking around and you can see the streets are cute and the panecillo (the statue of the virgin) is on the hill behind me.

Other than that we had coffee (we did find a good coffee shop that made excellent cappuccino instead of the nescafe you find around here), did a little shopping and hung out in cafes. Unfortunately a lot of the places we were looking for "no existe" or no longer existed so we didn't feel overwhelmed with choices of places to go and after two nights we were ready to head home and see our kitties.
It was a relaxing break and now we only have 3 1/2 days of school before our winter break. Meredith and Michael arrive on the 21st so we'll have more to post when we take a few trips with them.
We miss you all and are thinking of you during the holidays!

some new art .... and it's a ball

peace and love to all ...

and what's so funny about that?

i do not know where it comes from

except the one that Zach came up

with ... thanx, big guy ... you're an inspiration

and things are good here and

we are all the luckiest, aren't

we?

and if you haven't listened to Low Spark in a while, well then I think it's time... and Dark Star if

you're still in the m-groove

and you can ignore this last one if you want, but it will

still be hanging on our wall when you come to visit ...

Hello everyone - yes, we had our second annual Halloween party in Quito... it was a smashing success! We had to have it a week early because there were two other bbqs/parties scheduled for the 27th.

It's funny but there are some things that are tough to find here - one thing is candle holders. Luckily, Chris is incredibly creative and we bought a bunch of turnips and he punched holes in them and they were our candle sticks!


We had such a great crowd and wanted to show you some of the costumes...


Here's Chris, Ana (the witch) and Brenda (saving time - her husband was wasting time)...

Chris and I were cutting and sewing our costumes together as guests were arriving. Can you tell who I was? I made my head out of foam, even though we tried paper mache and some other things first.


We don't have a picture of Chris' full length but he sewed together eucalyptus leaves and made a skirt and shirt and he was the park next to our house. He had a bunch of moss (or is it lichen?) in his goatee and hair.

The kids at school dressed up on the Friday before Halloween - October 31st is actually an Ecuadorian Holiday called Emblem day. The president, who was elected last year, told everyone they could not celebrate Halloween on the 31st - yikes! Well, we just went out with a couple of friends to dinner for Chris' birthday.
Here's a picture of me and my teaching partner on the day we dressed up in school (yes, I used the same costume).

After waiting and waiting to get pets we decided that we should just go ahead and do it. We got two beautiful kittens in August. They are sisters and were almost 2 months old when we got them.

They are making us very happy and are ridiculously cute and playful.

The dark gray one is Maggie and the black one is Rose.

They love trying to catch the mouse on the computer screens...

I'm not sure if this will work but we are trying to upload a video I took from my camera of the whales. If it does work, enjoy the whales!

I think you just need to press play.

More pictures from the summer....
Chris and I visited Merdith and Michael in NYC before they moved to their new place.




In Virginia (unfortunately at this point we didn't take too many pictures and didn't take any at the wonderful 4th of July party!)




Geraldine and Matt's in Goochland and a little goat-milking


Here's a picture from our visit to see Maggie, Chip and Stella near Gettysburg, PA



Chris and Maggie


Beth and Zach in the Poconos


Steve relaxing on the porch in the Poconos


Chris behind the wheel (we don't have a car



Chris and Damion...



Chris and Christopher...




Philly, on the roof...

Okay, here are some more picures from our trip home this summer....

Chris and Timmy Hickey...




Hanging out on Jon's roof in Philly with Eric ...