Bye Bye 2012, Welcome 2013!

My sincerest apologies for the ridiculously long silence since the last post.  As you can imagine, we have been busy settling into life back in the USA.  To recap the last three months.... Eléa did great on the flights back to Texas and seemed to make the adjustment quite smoothly.  We were lucky enough to be able to stay with Luke's parents for two months in Austin while I looked for work and we found a place to live.  Eléa started at an incredible daycare center where she gets to play and get messy everyday.  She is really loving it there and seems to be thriving.  I started work at an interfaith public policy organization, and am so happy to be working on criminal justice issues again.  We bought a station wagon (super fancy) and found a lovely rental house with a gigantic backyard and a beautiful study space for Luke.  We are now pretty settled into daily life and are, of course, open and eagerly hoping for visitors. 

Eléa is becoming so fun and funny!  She is talking up a storm and went from 1 word when we got to the USA to easily over 50 now (I've lost count).  She is even putting four words together, a real change.  She loves to play all kinds of games and definitely has a large,and fantastic, sense of humor.  We love that she is still super affectionate, loving to cuddle and kiss.  She remains fearless and will jump off of and climb anything she can find (though she has yet to attempt the crib).  She has even starting "peeing in the big girl potty", though we are holding off on full scale potty training for the moment.  We are super lucky to be among family and Eléa is enjoying her time with Tia, her abuelos and her grandparents, as we are also enjoying the free and generous babysitting and assistance. 

Enjoy the many, many, many pictures over the past few months! Sorry they are not in chronological order....

Making friends at Sea World

Let me at it....

So excited!

Peek-a-boo!

Made it!

I love playing with water...

Yeah!!!

Christmas lunch with family and friends (welcome Sujung, Catherine, Saski, Ryan, and baby G)!

Christmas morning before the opening of the presents!

Opening fun

First trip to the Zilker Christmas tree!

Train ride with mami!

First Halloween trick or treat....Eléa's a dinosaur!

Enjoying stories with grandma

"Decorating" tia!

Our little ladybug...

Brrr.....it got cold!