AFRICA! Overdue.

You guys.  I am terrible at this blogging thing.  I just realized that in 2015 I posted 5 times.  GAH.  I mean, there's a crapload of cute pictures in each post, but STILL.

So anyway.  I'm probably just going to keep on keeping on.  Regardless of how often I feel like I SHOULD post.  Because let's be real, who has time for blogging?

Sooooo... It's April.  And the last time I posted (with actual words in it) I was talking about Halloween.  I realize this may seem like a crazy-ass jump in time, but you know what?  Welcome to my world.  How in the CRAP is it April already?   Anyway.  I'll spare you my rant about how time is trying to screw me up by having all of its units get shorter and shorter every day on the sly.  Suffice to say, I feel like years are flying by.  Which is something that my grandmother used to tell me when I still thought a summer lasted as long as an entire school year (didn't it feel like it?).

Clearly I am a bit sleep deprived, since this post doesn't make much sense right now.

So, like a month ago, I got back from KENYA!  Holy crap it was an amazing trip.  2 weeks for work and another week for travel.  It was a total blast and a ridiculous amount of work all at the same time.  Essentially I was helping with a training of facilitators for Mercy Corps.  We did a week of training for a group of a little over 20 people, and then the following week they then practiced their newly acquired facilitation skills in a workshop with staff from our local office in Kenya.  And then Nicky came and joined me, and we took a week to travel around and see some sights.  And it was amazing.

At the Great Rift Valley overlook outside Nairobi

It was amazing for a lot of reasons, one of which was that i was ALONE a lot, which honestly felt decadent.  If you aren't a parent, you might think I'm crazy (if you aren't a parent and you're still reading and you HAVEN'T thought I was crazy up to this point, then DANG, thanks for sticking with me). 

It was also exhausting.  The first week we were working from 7:30 in the morning until 8:30 or so at night... and then I'd be up jetlagged again at 4am the next day, so I'd work until breakfast.  But the people that I was with were some of the most amazing people I've met.  We had 15 countries represented, did international dance parties, had family style dinners, played Ultimate Frisbee in the pool, went on a boat safari (turns out safari just means journey, you guys, so it was a boat ride)... we played cards and darts and I laughed more than I have in a long time.  It was phenomenal.  If you're reading this and you're one of the cohort members-- thanks for making my trip utterly unforgettable.

Getting ready for a boat safari!  Which was actually just a ride where we saw animals.

That's a HIPPO!

Hell's Gate National Park, inspiration for the setting of The Lion King.

Jump photo!  I'm terrible at vertical.

In case you couldn't tell, I made some really fantastic new friends, and I hope we are friends FOREVER because they are all so cool.  True facts.

It really reignited for me a lot of stuff that too easily gets swamped by the daily duties of working and being a mom and living life-- like the desire for MORE TRAVELS!!!  Turns out, Jason got pretty jealous too (though he probably wouldn't call it that) so he just bought us tickets to Italy in May.  YESSSSSSSS.

I think it was pretty great work-wise as well-- I made some really amazing contacts within the organization and got to build on and explore a skill set that I don't use that regularly... so here's to hoping that I will in the future!

We stayed for the first week at a place called Sawela Lodge, outside of Nairobi on the shores of Lake Naivasha.  It was a gorgeous place, but since we were out of town (and since hippos are DANGEROUS) the place was walled in, and there was no where else to go.  It really prompted some great bonding between all of the participants, seeing as how we had only each other for entertainment, really (the internet was pretty unreliable).  One of the participants called it "a beautiful prison".

Planning meeting, Day 1 in the beautiful prison

The second week we headed into Nairobi (after a day trip to Hell's Gate National Park, which was excellent) and stayed at the Jacaranda Hotel right in town.  This time there were places to go off campus, so we got to go check out some local restaurants and some local night life.  The night Nicky arrived at the end of the second week, I was already out with friends, so through some ridiculous phone tag involving way too many people, some of my friends picked her up (with the instructions, 'Find the girl who looks like me and bring her with you!') and brought her out to meet us.  Nicky had no idea this was going to happen, but apparently she must know me or something, because she wasn't even phased when some random people approached her with the whole, 'we know your sister' routine.  We proceeded to dance (even though Nicky hadn't really slept in her 20 hours on the plane) until about 2am.  Awesome.

The week of travelling with Nicky was just as amazing as the first two weeks.  I was sad to say goodbye to my new friends of course (I'm STILL sad and it's weeks later!), but we headed off to go on safari in Amboseli National Park.

Getting there was a bit of an adventure in which I thought I might die a time a or two.  We hired a driver from the bed and breakfast where we were staying.  He had real issues with traffic (which is terrible in Nairobi).  Essentially we spent the entire time speeding around cars, forcing oncoming traffic to let us through (or else we would crash), or driving on what would be the sidewalk in the States, except there was no sidewalk.  One plus was that I did see a person moving an entire full-sized dresser strapped to the back of their tiny motorcycle on the drive.  So that was fun.

Once we arrived, though, it was amazing.  I felt like I was in a National Geographic documentary.  We stayed at a place called Kili Springs-- if you ever go to this part of the world, you should totally stay there.  We were the only three tourists there, and they treated us like family.  It was tranquil and gorgeous and amazing.

We did a couple games drives and saw a ton of animals.  Here are some cheesy photos:

That's a giraffe back there, I swear.

Elephants!

Elephant selfie.  So many elephies.

AHHHHH!

Yup.  Handstand/sunrise/landrover/acacia tree.

Dunbars and Kilimanjaro sunrise.  Which explains the sleepy faces.  Also, inside my cup is Nescafe, which also explains the sleepy faces.

Safari 'tent'.

Tea under the trees.

Bush baby!  A tiny nocturnal monkey that we pestered until it woke up.

Masaai village welcome.

SO MANY PICTURES OF ELEPHANTS

Lunch in the bush!

I think I took roughly 400 pictures of elephants.  This post makes my photo taking look positively RESTRAINED.  I feel like I just needed to clarify that with you all.  I could have made this ENTIRE post pictures of elephants.  And baby elephants.  Holy smokes, the elephants.

We didn't get to see any predators on our trip, which was the only sad part.  And really it wasn't even sad to me until we were out there and we saw everything else, and then I was like, 'C'mon cats, what is the deal?'  Did I mention we did get to see elephants, though?

It was a bit of a thing getting back to Nairobi (like a 5 hour drive), but eventually we made it via public transportation (super duper sweaty, but we made it).  And then we headed off to the coast.

We had debated back and forth about whether to do more safari-ing and game drives, or if we wanted to go to the coast.  I'm so glad we did-- it was phenomenal.  Probably the hottest and most humid place I've ever visited (definitely the farthest south and the farthest east, so that was neat).  As soon as we stepped off the plane, I realized I had completely overdressed (and definitely wasn't prepared for the next few days).

We didn't exactly get a lot accomplished, but we had a total blast.  Laura got sick the 2nd morning we arrived, which really sucked, since we were staying in a backpacker place with no air conditioning and only saltwater showers (rather a crappy setup for puking your guts out in 95 degree humid weather).  Nicky and I basically just hung out at either the beach or the bar the entire time, and it was completely worth it.

A glorious Nicky beach selfie.

The water was a fantastic green, and probably like 80 degrees itself, and super salty.

I'm sweaty and lookin' at you, kid.

Zach!  Our one friend we made at the backpacker place.

Sea urchin!

Dunbars in a tuktuk!

Fresh coconuts.

We did get a couple offers of marriage on the beach, which I wasn't expecting.  On guy just wanted cappuccino babies.  Another offered to buy me from my sister.  I was also told by that guy that I look like a fresh piece of spaghetti, which really warmed my heart.  Even if I'm really not sure if that meant a cooked piece, so like, ready to eat?  Or an uncooked piece?  So like, very tall and thin?  Neither of which really make any sense, but you know.  Maybe I'm missing something in the translation.

And then, sadly, back to Nairobi for my final day of touring and then my flight home.  We hung out with our favorite driver Peter from Holly Cab (I'm sure he was tired of us by the time we were done). Shopping, giraffes, baby elephants, more shopping, airports... it was a hectic last day.  But I did get to kiss a giraffe, which might seriously have been the highlight of the entire trip. 

Baby elephant orphanage in Nairobi.

And then home.  

The night before I got back, Evelyn got pretty sick.  It was a rough first week back-- she was sick enough, with a pretty high fever, that she wasn't really sleeping.  She was up and down every 2 hours or so, sleeping in our bed or on the couch, and she was pretty miserable.  I didn't have time for jetlag, which was the only positive side effect.  At one point about three days after I got home, during one of her wake ups in the middle of the night, she looked over at me and said, "Mommy, are you back?"  And I said, yes, I'm back.  Her response was: "You're not in the computer?"

Skype must be really confusing for tiny children.  Nope, I'm not in the computer.

So yeah.  Back to normal work, trying to assimilate all the happenings.

Easter happened-- check out these cute child photos:

My grandma also came down to visit, as she is thinking of relocating to the Portland area to hang out with us.  Our good buddies Rachel and Eddie were in town for a day from Kentucky, and it was FANTASTIC to see them.  Also, I got to check out Labyrinth here in Portland with some old friends of Jason's-- I thought it would be stupid, you guys.  I thought I would hate it.  Turns out, it was SO FUN!  One of the fastest hours of my life.  You should totally go do something like this.  It was a blast.

And, to conclude, a couple hilarious Evelyn videos.

Whew.  What a blog.

Videos of Evelyn

Since I am feeling rather behind and I feel like I owe you guys some pictures of Christmas and Evelyn's second birthday... I am instead going to post some videos.  And then one of these days I'll actually get around to writing an actual post. 

WORD!

Singing a holiday song for you all (seriously, it's never ending around here, we've been singing Christmas songs since October and she's still not done...)

It's a rather long video but I think it's hilarious!

Clearly she can read.  Right?  Isn't that what she's doing here?

And BTW, she says Little WITCH, in case that was confusing.  :)

Halloween Special!

We got really really close to actually having two blogs posts in one month, guys.  Ah well.  I'm just excited I'm not writing about something that happened six months ago anymore.  :)  You probably are too!

So I know that we just had Thanksgiving and Evelyn's birthday party, and those are very exciting events with lots of pictures that I should share, but first you get pictures of Halloween and pumpkin patches.  Very seasonally late over here.  :)

OK, so here goes the photo dump:

In the airport coming home from Kansas.

Mikey's bench is installed!

My brother's bench is up on the waterfront now-- it's beautiful.  We had a tiny dedication ceremony once it was finished, which was nice.  We didn't do anything (except wallow) to recognize the 5th anniversary of his passing this last month, though.  It almost seems like a gory day to remember together... but we all do something of our own on that day, I think.

Visiting Grandma Evelyn, and insisting on driving.

We had a crazy month of October weather-wise.  One moment it was rainy and 40, typical Portland weather, and the next it was almost 80 and sunny.  It was crazy.  Evelyn doesn't really care what the weather is doing-- GF is an outside baby.

With the Source Climbing Center Mural in the background.

She is now constantly talking about 'rock climbing last Sunday'-- it's one of few days she knows, and definitely has nothing to do with actual dates, except that we do often take her to the gym on Sundays, so she's accurate.  I don't even think it's the climbing: of course she likes that, but I think it's that most of her favorite people in the world work at the climbing gym and live in Vancouver!

We did two pumpkin patch trips this year.  She loved it so much I couldn't help it.  :)  These are pictures from the first trip, with all of our friends: Michael, Crystal and Aden; and Shane, Julia, Eliza and Emory.  Evelyn is obsessed with Eliza.  She basically just runs around calling her name all the time, trying to get as close to Eliza as humanly possible, including sitting in her lap without asking.  It's pretty dang adorable, and Eliza is such a great kid, she just goes with it and lets Evelyn follow her around everywhere, and includes her in all her games.  We have some pretty great friends with some pretty amazing kids.

Evelyn refused to smile in every version of this photo.

One of Evelyn's favorite things to do.

It's a TIIIINY pumpkin!

Emory, Eliza, Julia and Shane.

Um, of course I put her on a pony.

I mean, how could I NOT?

Definitely a Dunbar.  I'm holding her shirt to attempt to keep her still for a single dang picture.

She decorated her own pumpkin!

A sneak peek at her costume...

The second time we went to the pumpkin patch was with my sister, who loves doing cheesy community and holiday events as much as I do.  And also loves doing them with Evelyn as much as I do.  So, pumpkin patch plus petting zoo:

So I'm a sucker for pony rides.

She LOVES IT!

Thank you Mamaw, for the tea set!  Evelyn is now completely obsessed with drinking tea and having tea parties.  In this one Frosty got in on the fun (I'm fairly certain Evelyn thinks of Frosty as her best friend).  Tea parties are now a daily thing.  With fake tea, of course.  But also fake crumpets.  It's hilarious to hear her ask for crumpets.  Also, I totally thought crumpets were like, delicious, flaky buttery pastries.  They aren't.  They're like English muffins with a fancier name.  TOTAL LETDOWN.

Feeding Aunt Nicky's chickens.  Nicky's house is like Disneyland to Evelyn.

Pumpkin carving party!

Oops.  Random picture from our first pumpkin patch inserted here, and I'd rather caption it than move it.  Evelyn loved this tractor, despite the look on her face here.

Brad complained the most about carving his stupid pumpkin,and his is the most awesome!

Jason's sister Kari came to visit us right before Halloween.  It was an awesome visit.  Poor Kari, we basically made her babysit Evelyn while we were at work for three days, and then made her tag along to all the things we wanted to do over the weekend-- but she was a great sport, and I think she had fun.  :)  It was an excellent way to really show her bits and pieces of our life, and she got some great alone time with Evelyn too.

Evelyn and Aden.  Buddies.

Halloween!  We went up to Shane and Julia's house in Vancouver, because they are awesome and their neighborhood is awesome for trick or treating.  It was POURING, but we persevered.  And by that I mean that Evelyn thought it was amazing, because who wouldn't want to walk down streets that were total rivers?  Splashing around and going house to house and getting candy?  MIND. BLOWN.  She kept leaving people's houses and just saying, 'He put candy in my basket...' like she COULDN'T BELIEVE WHAT JUST HAPPENED.

And then we got back to Shane and Julia's and she promptly forgot candy even ever existed in favor of tiny oranges that looked like pumpkins.

Spider's eggs!

For weeks afterwards all Evelyn wanted was a banana ghost.

Our soggy troupe.

The gang's all here, before heading out!

Our court themed Halloween family.  Yes.  I'm a nerd.

Yeah, so what else?  She is completely and totally obsessed with Frosty the Snowman.  My fault, I let her watch the original animated movie one time... now every snowman is Frosty, and she talks and sings to all of them, and I've had to learn like 5 verses of the stupid song because she basically wants me to sing it to her like a hundred times a day... toddler life, friends.  Not for the faint of heart.  :)

She is CONSTANTLY TALKING.  We've tried to start getting her to understand that sometimes quiet is good to have... it's failing miserably.  The only thing I can imagine is that my mother had TWO children talking at her constantly.  WOW.

At 2 years old, everything can be done on one's own, friends.  Except for speak English correctly, although she is getting much better at that.  Everything is 'My' instead of 'I' though.  But generally girlfriend is talking in sentences, more or less... and she's hilarious.  She's also asking 'Why?' these days... but it's like she doesn't really know what it means, because half the time she just parrots something her babysitter says as a response before I can answer-- "Because Eddie's still sleeping."  Ha! 

She has recently started asking me to cuddle with her on the couch-- talk about adorableness.  Guys.  When your kid can ask you to squeeze them... or tell you they love you without prompting... and now she's saying, "Thank you Mommy" without prompting... it's pretty dang sweet.  If you don't have kids, please ignore the entire above paragraph, as it'll make you want to barf.  Also, you'll think I'm completely obsessed with my child, which I am, but here's the thing-- pretty sure every parent is.  It's some crazy mind control worked on us by babies so that we're excited to have them instead of viewing them like the never ending slave drivers they actually are.

Jason's work is pretty crazy these days-- good and bad on that front.  My work has offered me a cool opportunity-- in February they are sending me to Kenya for a couple weeks so that I can participate in a Program Management training-- woot!  I'm really excited.  Also totally nervous.  But mostly thrilled.

OK, some parting thoughts for you:

At the age of 1 1/2 Evelyn started blaming her farts on her dad.  I'm so proud I just can't contain it.

Evelyn thinks it's totally appropriate to cheers whenever 2 people are holding anything remotely similar-- so, two toothbrushes, for example.  Or two leaves.  Or two forks.

Also, I was trying to explain to her about her birthday so that she would be prepared and know what the crap we were doing when her birthday party came around.  In advance of her birthday, because of my explanation (which might have included references to both cake and presents, the magical items of childhood), I can hear her wake up in the middle of the night and shout, "My birthday coming up!", only to fall asleep again 2 minutes later.  You're welcome Evelyn.

Also, when you ask her what she wants for her birthday, her first response is cake.  Her second is usually grapes.

There you have it folks.  Wisdom from the mouths of babes.  The most important things in the world?  Cake and grapes.