Thankfully, things are rolling along smoothly this week. Enid is finally healthy again, and although she passed her cold along to Robin, Robin never got too sick and seems to be on the mend now. Hopefully we can at least enjoy a week or two of good health before Enid brings home the next virus from school. We all got our influenza vaccinations last week, so maybe that will help.

Also, we all seem to be sleeping well for a change. That's been a long time coming, and has made a big difference in our quality of life. Again, it will only last until Enid gets her next virus, but we are enjoying it while we can.

The weather has turned pleasantly cool these last few days. Tuesday morning was downright cold. No complaints here though. The days have been sunny and beautiful, and I will easily endure a little morning chill if it means relief from the heat and humidity.


Last Friday Robin had volunteered to help with Enid's class field trip to the Forum (a huge, 80-day, international festival of culture and the arts that is taking place in Monterrey this year). But since Robin felt sick I took the day off work and went in her place. It was a bit of a disaster because we were supposed to arrive at school early to carpool over to Parque Fundidora (where the Forum is taking place). But Enid slept in late, and we didn't want to wake her up since she was just getting over her cold. So when she finally woke up it was too late to carpool.

I could have driven us there, but I didn't want to deal with driving and parking, especially on a Friday, so we took the bus instead. The class was supposed to arrive at 9am and visit one of the exhibits until 10am, at which time they were supposed to go to the "Rincon de la Palabra" for a storytelling show. The bus didn't get us there until just before 10am, so I went straight to the Rincon de la Palabra. We had a good time listening to the stories, but Enid's class never showed up. We found them later, just by accident, at a picnic area where they were taking a snack break. Apparently they decided at the last minute to go to a puppet show instead of the storytelling. Enid and I joined them for the snack, after which they all went home.

So we didn't really end up doing the field trip with Enid's class, but we did have a good time. After the class left we went over to the Feria Internacional del Libro, a book fair that was happening at the nearby CinterMex convention center. I'd been there the weekend before to buy some new books for Enid, and I'd noticed there were activities for kids going on. Unfortunately it turned out that M-F most of the activities were reserved for school groups. But some of the coordinators let Enid sneak in anyway and do the activities in between school groups. So it worked out okay. And we had hot dogs and churros for lunch. You can't beat that!

The skies here are suddenly full of butterflys. I think a lot of them are monarch butterflys that have migrated down here for the winter. We were up at Parque Chipinque on Sunday and you could look up in the sky and see literally hundreds of them. Even in town they are plentiful.

The trip to Parque Chipinque was partly for fun and partly to do reconnaissance for Enid's birthday party, which is coming up soon. We decided to have it at Parque Chipinque because our apartment is too small and dumpy. So we're going to make it a picnic-type affair at the park. The people we'll be inviting are mostly Enid's classmates and their families. Enid was invited to a couple of their birthday parties, but couldn't go for one reason or another. Hopefully at least some of them will come to hers. Unfortunately we planned it for November 3rd, but November 2nd is Day of the Dead. We asked someone about that before we sent out the invitations and were assured that it would not be a problem. But now somebody else has told us that many people go out of town on that weekend. So we might have to change the date. Good grief! Just what we need!

But we've got to make this party happen, because Enid's pretty excited about it. Birthday parties for kids are a big deal here (or in Del Valle at least) and I think she's been getting a lot of pro-birthday-party propaganda at school. She knows she's supposed to have a party, that it's a big deal, and other kids are supposed to come. She's even chosen a theme, which is "Winnie the Pooh and Friends". We have dutifully attempted to find appropriate party paraphernalia, such as plates, cups, napkins, and even a Winnie the Pooh and Friends cake. We were planning to get a Winnie the Pooh piñata, but (even though they had one at the store) she fell in love with a giant pink butterfly piñata instead. Amusingly, she quickly decided that she loved it too much to see it get smashed, so now it will apparently become permanent decor in our apartment. Furthermore we will have to find another piñata to smash at her party, presumably something mean looking that she won't fall in love with. Do they even make mean looking piñatas?