We are off!

We are headed out tomorrow morning, in about 10 hours, to Guatemala!  I'm so excited.  I'm a little nervous about the trip, but I am staying calm.  No need to worry about something that hasn't happened yet.  I'm wishing I had made more money last weekend so we could stay somewhere half-way decent, but being with Eduardo is all that matters.  I just want to relax, relax, relax!  I think all three of us deserve that :)

I rescheduled Eduardo's appointment at the embassy he was supposed to have tomorrow morning as well.  The next appt is now on November 9th.  Hopefully everything will be ready to go by then (crossing fingers).  

He will drive to Guatemala tomorrow and will get to Antigua to find us a hotel and then pick us up at the airport at 9pm, which is 11pm here.  Keep in mind we have to be at the airport here at 9am!  Oh boy.  I better go to bed :)  It will be a long day, but I just can't wait to see the look on Liliana's face when she sees him.  We need a paparazzi camera following us to get it all!  LOL.  

I will be back online next week.  We get back late Tuesday night.  We get 2 days of long travels and 5 days to recover and have fun :)  See ya!!

Pre-Packing

What is it about upcoming travels that always put a smile on my face?  I'm obviously a born traveler because just the thought of having to pack and go somewhere exciting, even if it does involve an insanely long airplane trip with a toddler, gets me feeling pretty high.  

Ask my hubby and my mom and they will confirm that I prepare for trips weeks ahead of time.  I'm not like a lot of people who wait until the day before or even a couple of days before the big departure to start packing.  I put a lot of thought into my packing.  

I think about what I will wear, about shoes, accessories and jackets.  I research the weather in the destination.  I consider what activities we might do and how that affects what I will need to take.  I always tend to over-pack, so on each trip now I try to plan things carefully as to not end up with way too much.  But on trips like this when I know there will be nowhere to do laundry for a week, it's hard not to want to take more than necessary.  

And then there's Liliana!  Oh boy.  She's a little bit easier and a little bit harder to pack for.  I can easily take several outfits for each day for her because her clothes are so much smaller.  But I find I mostly over-pack her clothes for sure.  It's hard to know because of the weather being so unpredictable and because she is a toddler that could make a complete mess of herself in any given moment and require another change of clothes.  

I started planning my wardrobe several days ago and just tonight put all Liliana's and my clothes into our suitcase.  Maybe a bit premature as we leave 1 week from tomorrow, but I know my schedule is pretty packed until then and I don't want to be left in a panic the day before.  Now I can relax and have time to think about my options and if I want to add anything to the pile.  

The night before is when I will pack all the toiletries and all of my accessories.  I will try not to take anything out of the suitcase until then so I don't accidentally leave something behind or have something not be clean.  

I know you might be thinking I'm a nutcase for doing an entire blog post on packing, but I don't know what it is, I just get so excited about it and find it so much fun!  I'm sure you will hear about it again within the next week ;)

P.S.  All the pics of the luggage I posted are of my special luggage that I actually own :)  I just LOVE it!!

Baby Liliana

I don't know why, but the past week I find myself looking back at Liliana's old baby pictures A LOT.  I find myself reminiscing on the first few months of her life and at times wishing I could just go back to that time just for a day.  

Liliana Cristina Tepas was born on December 2nd, 2008 at 1:50pm.  She was 6 lbs 12 oz and 18 inches long.  She was born into a birthing tub in the living room of our home after 17 hours of labor.  Giving birth was the single most profound experience of my life and I will never forget it.  Laboring and giving birth at home was the most beautiful thing.  It was harder than I ever imagined, but in the end worth any pain I could have felt.  

Not one person could have prepared me for the emotions that came with having a baby girl.  Having a girl was something I wished for and didn't know if it would be until she came out.  I have never experienced the degree of love as I did those first few days of her life.  I found myself crying endlessly completely overwhelmed by love and emotion.  It was so intense.  

Maybe I am remembering all this now as she is getting a little older.  I know she will only be 3 in December, but she is growing by leaps and bounds every day.  Eduardo will hardly believe how much she has changed in 4 months when he sees her soon.  She has always been her own little person with her moods and personality, but now it's 10-fold.  

At times it can be hard to handle, especially raising her on my own right now.  But in these last hours of the night when I see my baby girl laying in bed so peacefully, I get taken back to the pure space of love I have unconditionally for this little being.  She is my greatest gift and my greatest Teacher.  

Maybe I am at the time that a lot of women come to when they have another baby.  Maybe it fills that yearning inside.  I do not know if I will ever have another child.  I always say I won't and God knows Eduardo does not want to, but there's also that chance if it's meant to be.  It's not something I want really, especially not now, but we never know ;)

All I know now is that I love my Liliana more than I could ever put into words and that's the feeling I have to hold tight through the battles we seem to get into lately.  She really is my calm in the storm, even when she is the storm.  

Viva Guatemala!

We are headed to Guatemala in 9 days to see Eduardo!  I found tickets last week on sale and jumped at the possibility of us going.  It took several days to decide and book the tickets, but we are sooo excited.  I made a calendar for Liliana so we can check off the days until we go see papi :)  She's a bit confused because she thinks we are going to El Salvador and seeing Abuela, Maynor and Daniela (her grandma and sister and brother), but I keep explaining we are just going on vacation to visit only papi in Guatemala.  I think she understands most of the time ;)  Hopefully once she sees him, that will be all she needs!  

I had a friend of mine offer to work my Kelsey's Cultured Foods booth at the Farmer's Market on the Saturday I will be gone and it was such a surprise and relief.  That was my biggest hesitation because Saturday is my most profitable day of the week.  I'm so grateful to have such wonderful people in my life :)  

We are leaving on Wednesday, Sept 28th and will be back on Tuesday, October 4th.  Since the flights were so cheap, it also means about 14 hours of traveling with 2 layovers each way!!  Wish me luck with that one.  I had another friend offer to let us borrow her mini-dvd player for the trip and I'm hoping that will save the day.  At least I have flown enough with Liliana at this point to not really be surprised by anything that could happen.  I just pray for the best.

I'm not sure where we will stay yet while we are there.  We still need to hash out the details.  It also depends a lot on how much money I can make before we go.  I only have one more Saturday before we go so hopefully it's a highly profitable one so we can have a nice little vacay!!  God knows we need it.  I'm hoping this will give the 3 of us the little boost we all seem to need right now to get us through the next few months :)  

Truth Tuesday

I am joining in on Truth Tuesday!  After reading what it is, I felt really compelled to share my truths as well.  Check what Nina from www.ninaonthemoon.com has to say about creating Truth Tuesday as a way to "share a personal fact, a belief, a wish, a dream,an achievement/accomplishment, or even something I feel guilty about!"

My truth this week is this:

I am a way more spiritual being than I show or talk about.  I have shut that part out of my life for far too long now and I am ready to let it back in.  I no longer want my negative past experiences within a meditation community to let me run myself into the ground when I know I am capable of being bigger and better and more fulfilled than I am now.  

One Step Forward and Two Steps Back

...That is how this immigration process is feeling at the moment.  After 3 days of intense medical tests last week, the gastroentologist finally concluded that Eduardo's physical issues are not alchohol-related as we already knew.  The doctor was a very nice guy and even wrote Eduardo a long note to the psychiatrist explaining his condition and what the cause was.  His liver and kidney are no longer enlarged and he basically just needs to lose 20 lbs to get the extra fat away from his organs.  

We were so happy by that news and Eduardo went straight over the the psychiatrist's office with the note and medical records he had requested.  The doctor was not in and he explained everything to the secretary.  The secretary then called the psychiatrist and he said to have Eduardo call the next day and to get a note from the AA meetings he has been attending saying he has been going there every day.  

So he called the next day as instructed only to be told that his appointment is scheduled for October 25th and that's when he should go, despite the test results.  AND he has to continue to go to the AA meetings every single night.  Luckily my dear husband is actually finding some comfort in those meetings and it's helping to pass the days.  He tried to beg and plead with the psychiatrist, but he got transferred back to the secretary who then told him that it was a bad day to call because the doctor was in a really bad mood!  So this one guy's bad mood is basically screwing our lives?!  

Poor Eduardo was so devastated.  I have felt kind of numb to the news.  There have been times when I want to break down and cry, but I haven't allowed myself to quite yet.  There is so much anger and hurt and frustration that I can't even express any emotion about it.  Usually I am quite open and wanting to share our immigration experiences with anyone and everyone, but I just can't right now.  It's almost too much to bear to even think about.  

So we are now back to looking at November.  I had already called the embassy to reschedule his final appointment and being hopeful I scheduled it for September 28th.  Eduardo will still go and turn in all the documents that we have and explain what is going on with the medical so they don't start to question things.  Then in the end hopefully all we will need is the medical signed and he can get his visa.  I think my heart just might break in half if he is not here by Thanksgiving, so that is my prayer.  

Thank you to everyone who is supporting us through this time.  I'm doing what I can to keep Liliana feeling safe and secure without her papi.  I know she misses him dearly.  She even tells me all the time.  The thing she wants more than anything in the world is "to sit on papi's lap on the couch." :(

I know big things are awaiting us and each day new opportunities are opening up for me here.  I'm praying this is all for a bigger reason and that someday soon that reason will be revealed.  Until then, we welcome all prayers!!

My New Website!

I'm very excited to announce that my website for my Cultured Veggie business is up and running!  I have spent many hours late in to the night the past few weeks trying to get it ready.  It's not the fanciest of websites as I did it all myself and I'm no genius when it comes to those kinds of things.  But, I won't put myself down.  I think I have created exactly what I needed, which is a site people can go to learn all about the benefits of cultured foods and all my info.  I even have a section for my Esperanza Imports stuff, which is exciting.  Now I need to take some time to update this blog with all the new info!  You can check it out at www.kelseysculturedfood.com and I also have my facebook page at www.facebook.com/kelseysculturedfoods.  Now I must go to bed to get ready for the Farmers Market.  I have to get Liliana and myself up at 5:30am!  My mom has been out of town forever now it feels like and so I have to take the little one to my friend's house in the morning before the market.  Wish me luck :)

Acceptance

Today a mere comment on the weather got me thinking all day about this topic.  Acceptance.  So often I find that in general there are so many things about ourselves and our fellow humans that we do not accept.  For some reason over the past month or so I have been realizing how different, really different we all are.  That's what makes the human race so darn interesting.  We all have passions and interests that we share with others, but we are all individual and unique.  And that's exactly what we need to accept.  If we are constantly judging and expecting others to be like us and feel like us, then we will be constantly disappointed and frustrated with each other.  

When Liliana was just 5 months old, my mom and I took her and went by ourselves on a trip to El Salvador.  Eduardo's mom was sick at the time and since he couldn't go, I said I would go for him.  Now we spoke only a few words of Spanish at that time and nobody there spoke any English.  But we went and it was an experience that changed my life

You see until that trip, I constantly judged even my partner.  I did not understand why he did the things he did for his family, like sending the money every other week like every other good Spanish person does.  It frustrated me and there were things I just couldn't relate to, until I took that trip.  I had been to Mexico before and I lived in Canada for 4 years, but this was different.  I had immersed myself in a 3rd world country and I found a whole new appreciation for life in that experience.  I had a new-found appreciation for others I hadn't experienced before.  I've always been quite compassionate I believe, but this took it to a whole new level.  

My point is that you never know what someone else is feeling or experiencing or what they have been through in their lives.  The may be happy or sad or angry.  Who knows what got them feeling that way and if we really step back, their mood really doesn't need to affect us.  It may be little things like someone not liking the cold weather when someone else thinks it feels perfect outside.  There are so many little things like that we take for granted.  We don't realize how different someone else might be experiencing the world and that it's okay.  

I'm not saying I don't judge people or the ways they do things.  I have my parenting styles and do the things I do for a reason and for me it is the best choice.  I don't always understand why other people make the choices they do, but I have to accept the things I cannot change.  It doesn't mean I don't put my opinion out there and hope others will catch on, but if they don't, I have done my best.  And if someone thinks they are rockin with an old 80's hairdo, then power to them.  Who am I to judge?