Of Trials and Triumph

Lest you think that we just have fun down here... I decided to post what our week looked like last week and then about the great day we had today!

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so I will start with a picture of where we spent a lot of our time last week... No, we are not potty training, both of these girls are potty trained. However, both had Ameobas and DID NOT have bowel control night and day! Rudi joked that he had a "CaCa Factory" with two employees! We were up and cleaning up sometimes every fifteen minutes for three nights in a row...
Want to trade places????? 

Partners in....Crime!

 I decided to add both pictures because they are so cute... the little Potty masters!

My Amazing Cloth Diapers

These gals managed to soil ALL 32 of our cloth diapers in one night and then moved on to disposables. Our amazing Tia washed all of these by hand. They look downright beautiful on the line! I would like to add that my super generous cousin Clayton, and his wife Kim, donated 16 of these beautiful bumGenius diapers to us. I don't know what we would have done without them. THANK YOU AGAIN. You guys are awesome!

Paula "Just resting"

My Inside Dryer

 They say when it rains it pours and last week it did. I had a hard time drying the clothes because I would just get them on the line and it would start dumping rain. We are in our rainy season here, even though it is Summer. I have a backup dryer that runs on propane that I thought was broken. (Forgot to check and see if the propane was full or empty...hmm) So we ended up drying inside during the night! Not as fun as it sounds.... Truthfully it was just a long rough week in many ways. I think the sleepless nights played into it all!

TODAY was the wonderful day in which we got our passports back with our one year visas. We also completed the process for our Carnet, a national identification card that we all have to have.
We started out the morning by leaving the house at 6:15 to be at SEGIP (Don't know what it stands for sorry!) in time to meet with our lawyer. It was a perfect morning to be up and out. The picture below shows some of the zoo that outside SEGIP is before it opens. There are lines at least five people deep about 200 ft to the right and left of this door. See if you can find Rudi in this "Where's Waldo" type picture... can you spot the Extranjero. One clue, Rudi has on a white shirt with Paula on his shoulders. Okay, another clue...He is behind a Bolivian man and you can just see a corner of his shirt and Paula on top.

 Our fantastic lawyer, who has made this whole process a piece of cake for us, had an appointment and like Rudi said "it was like having a fast pass at Disneyland." We went straight into our appointment for pictures for our Carnet. Our lawyer will pick them up when they are ready and we will pick them up at her office. Most people get in line outside of SEGIP as early as 3 a.m. to be able to deal with Carnet stuff before they close at 5 p.m. 

The family with our Awesome Abogada, Janeth!

 After our appointment we walked to breakfast. Here we are waiting for our fresh squeezed orange juice. A favorite for all of us! For 3 bs. (Approx .45 cents) you can enjoy fresh squeezed juice. These carts are all over the city!

 It is very common for the street vendors to have a child with them. Sometimes on their back in a blanket or just playing at their feet. This is the child of or our orange juice lady. He was so cute I had to snap a picture!

The little boy of the Orange Juice Lady!

On the way to breakfast we stopped and visited the mechanic shop where "the Happy Mobile" has been staying for the past month. We were glad to hear that our car will soon be well enough for us to take for the next "safari" soon! 

 For breakfast we had a traditional Bolivian treat of Saltenya's (Bolivian Spanish buffs, I know that this is spelled wrong, but I cannot type the "Spanish n" on my keyboard and I want people to know how to pronounce them!) They are a mixture of sweet and savory. I think I would like them to be one or the other! They are very yummy and very Bolivian!

Pastry filled with meat and veggies!

Just because I know you wanted to see what was inside.....

 To really celebrate our Visas and Carnets being done, (I don't know if you know that getting a one year visa is a really big deal here for a North American?) we went to our favorite espresso place here in Cochabamba.

 Their outdoor sitting area is al fresco and was perfect today for waiting for our drinks.

 This picture is for our employees back home. They have the same machine that we have at Main Street Espresso!

Waiting for our Raspberry smoothies and Coffee drinks!

Myles and Clancy, "Happy Boys"

 This picture is not an announcement... I put all eight of our passports in my money belt for safe keeping. I was joking to Rudi that I looked at least three months prego and we decided to snap this picture for you all! Those passports are seriously thick... I promise!

With our Mocha Frappes! In any language....Yummy!

 It was a blissful beginning to a better (?) week ahead! If the picture below means anything I think it will be!

Beautiful Paula...feeling better!