Due to the graphic nature of this post parental guidance is advised

I knew there was a reason why I shouldnt be washing the dishes....

Yesterday I was making Ceci's food for the week and when I was washing the dishes and a glass broke while i was scrubbing the inside. I instantly knew it was bad and covered it with a dish towel before i got a good look. I showed Leto and there was a nice flap of skin and loads of blood. Leto packed up Ceci and we headed to the urgent care. We got there and i was taken directly to a procedure room. Leto and Ceci followed after he filled out my paper work. The doctor came to say hi, and look at what i had done to myself. Ceci was upset in the beginning, probably because she thought she was there to get more shots. After a while i think she realized something was wrong with me. She was crying and screaming and when the doctor finally came in to stitch me up, she was inconsolable. I told Leto to take her outside and the second the door closed she screamed bloody murder. So the doc stitched me up, and 7 stitches later he was prescribing antibiotics. From the time we left the apartment to the time we were back in the car was just about 2 hours. Not too bad!


So 2 lessons learned.... dont wash dishes, and only plastic in our house from now on ;-)

Tchau!!!

It is safe to say that Ceci has said her first word!! "Tchau." For those of you who do know, this is "bye" in Portuguese. She has said a couple of words before like "mama, dada" but not directly meaning me or Leto. About a week ago she started say "dow" and waving good-bye. Of course it is adorable! I cant wait to hear what her second word will be. I hope it is something in English. I have heard about the language delays of bilingual children, so we will see how Ceci progresses.

Ceci's Carnaval

 So as you can probably imagine a Carnaval for a kid is much different than Carnaval for an adult. We were invited to a kids Carnaval celebration at a Clube (kind of like a country club with pool, tennis, gym, club house, children's activities etc) by my new American friend, Laurie. (Yes, I finally have an American friend who, like me, married a Brazilian, lives in Sao Paulo and has kids!) It was great, and Ceci loved every second of it. Tons of kids, in costumes running around. Ceci didnt wear a costume because the only costume we have is a pumpkin from Halloween, and that is not a typical Carnaval costume. It was an exhausting afternoon running after Ceci, trying to stop her from eating confetti from the floor and balloons :-) But it was great fun! Here are some pics!

Carnaval!

So my New Year's resolution to blog more has failed. I have wanted and wanted to blog, but you know what, we really havent done anything blog worthy!
That is until Carnaval!
Ok we really didnt do anything exciting for Carnaval but I have to blog sometime, right??
This year, like every year, I vow to do fun and exciting things during Carnaval. But this year, like every year (except for my first year in Brazil, 2008) we didnt have the crazy Carnaval that I wanted. I think that Brazil is made up of two types of people. The people who love Carnaval and the people who hate, and I mean HATE Carnaval. Personally I dont know how people can "hate" a couple of days off of work and drinking in the streets, but these people swear up and down that they hate Carnaval.

 I can loosely compare Carnaval to Spring Break in the States. When you are a kid you like Spring Break because it is a week off of school in the middle of the semester, and usually includes Easter and all of the Easter festivities. Kids here in Brazil celebrate Carnaval with dressing up in costumes and having parties at their schools. When you get older in the US Spring Break means heavy drinking with your university buddies, and hooking up with random people. The same thing goes for Brazil. From the ages of about 17-25 Carnival means drinking heavily in the street and making out with as many random people as you can. Condoms are handed out freely at the street parties, and most partake. I have heard, "dont fall in love during Carnaval, because it never works out."  But it is good fun, as long as you are safe. Then from the ages of about 25 on, people in the US stop having Spring Break, and therefor dont like it anymore. The same thing goes for Brazil, but for different reasons, reasons that I experienced this Carnaval.

Two Friday's ago I went to a "bloco," (street party) with my friend Ligia. They usually start at about noon and last until pretty much "last man standing." We got there about 1 and it was already packed. We paid our $R5.00 for a beer (at the supermarket they are $R1.25) We tried to get as close as we could to the stage where a band was playing, but we didnt get far. We bought more beer, and did some people watching, which included looking for people kissing random people. We only found 1 couple and it was a pretty gross sigh to see!  Unfortunately after drinking a few beers I had to use the bathroom. So I got in line.... I waited for about 30 minutes under the brutal sun, and by the time I got to the front of the line I didnt really have to go anymore because the sun sucked all the moisture from my body! But i went anyway, and it was not pleasant to say the least. I got back to Ligia and we decided we had enough... By this time it was about 330. There was wall to wall people. It really reminded me of my concert festival days. It was hot and smelled like sweat, beer and pee. Once we broke free of the crowd we found a taxi and practically fell asleep on the metro home. So now i get it... People dont like Carnaval because they are old and cant hang like they used to. I have learned my lesson and will no longer look for the crazy Carnaval.... Until next year when I vow to have a crazy Carnaval!