Before and After the Trip

I have a bunch of random pictures from right before our trip and right after that really have no logical connection, so I thought I'd throw them all together in one post.

A couple weeks before we went to El Salvador we were invited to Alexander's birthday party.  Alexander goes to the same school as Avery and is also the son of Michael, the partner in Marcus's office here in Madrid.  The girls were so thrilled that they were both invited, and they had a great time.  Alexander's mom, Laura, is so incredibly nice.  I really like her a lot.  It was kind of a funny feeling for me though, to be there socializing with them in their home, while Marcus was slaving away at work.  It was a super fun party though, so happy we could go.

 We survived this winter with lots of baked goods (as usual).  The girls favorite thing in the world is licking the beaters of the treats I make.  I haven't taken enough pictures of the cute messy faces that result from it.

I tried to celebrate Valentines day with the girls.  Hailey was able to take Valentines into her class, which she was super excited about.  Only one other kid did, which we thought would be the case, and because it wasn't quite the same celebration it would be in the States I did about the only fun holiday thing I do, which is to make sugar cookies.  It was fun and delicious though, and the girls were very serious about decorating their cookies perfectly.  Well, actually Hailey was a little more serious about that, Avery was very serious about getting the maximum amount of frosting possible on her cookie and then licking it off.  ;) 

 Winter here was really nothing, but after several rainy days in a row we were ready for a change of scene.  We tried to get outside whenever we could, but the warm weather of El Salvador was a nice break from our dreary winter.

 Of course a day and a half before our flight poor Hailey came home from school with Pink Eye.  This was also the day before her school's field trip to the Reina Sofia!  She had been so excited to go, and was so upset when I told her I didn't think it was a good idea.  Poor, sad little eyes.  Within a day it was looking a ton better, and we thought we were free of it by the time we got to El Salvador, but as luck would have it we must not have been because poor little Tyson came down with it a few days later, and then lucky Michelle was the next victim.  We came and infected the Barretts, and then left!  Haha, I feel so bad about that.  Anyway, luckily we made it home and have had no recurring issues since, but man pink eye is NO FUN!

 Honestly our trip home wasn't too bad.  We were able to fly through the night from Bogota to Madrid, and considering it went pretty well.  The next day Avery was spent.  She slept until 11 a.m. and I'm sure would have slept longer if I hadn't woken her.  Fortunately the time change was fine though and after just a day or two we were all back on schedule.