San Silvestre PopularOn December 30, we participated in San Silvestre Popular with Cristina, Erika, and Nuria. They told us - in Spanish - that it was in the city, people dressed up, and it was a lot of fun!! They told us more but, apparently, we didn't understand everything (stay tuned for our Spanish Language Acquisition blog).
San Silvestre started at 8 pm so Amy and Eugene decided not to go. Since there was no chance of me embarrassing Amy (more common than I'd like to admit) ... I decided to dress up!! I put on my swimming suit (over my running clothes), cap, goggles, and floaty. Cristina gave Matthew and orange wig to wear. We have no problem embarrassing our children.
As it turns out, it was an 8 km race through the city and past many of the historical monuments. Hee hee. Oooh. It wasn't as much "fun" as the kids were expecting - but we all got
free t-shirts (though, by the time we got to the finish line, there were only medium sizes left).
New Year's EveOn New Year's Eve (
Nochevieja), Amy made finger food ... food that we could eat with our fingers. We all loved it - less dishes.
The Engel family continued our corny New Year's tradition of having a family slumber party in the living room. This year, our fire consisted of tissue paper flames *crackling* in the breeze of the fan. We permit the kids to drink caffeinated pop ... taking the immense risk that the caffeine will stunt their growth ... so they can stay up for the countdown then watch movies all night long.
We also added a couple of Spanish New Year's Eve traditions. We wore red underwear for good luck. (Hmm. They are not very lucky if you wash them with your whites.) At midnight, everyone ate 12 grapes - one on each stroke of the clock. Remind me next year to de-seed the grapes first ... crunch, crunch!
New Year's Day - Haitian Independence DayWe slept late, ate, wrote our (realistic) New Year's Resolutions, and the kids snuck the remainder of the caffeinated pop when we weren't looking.
January 1 is also Haitian Independence Day. We made flags and then went out for a parade. The kids and I brought pans, bells, whistles, and anything else that made noise and marched through the rambla announcing Haitian Independence Day. We were a parade!! (The more mature adults stayed inside and denied our existence.) Aaah. The kids were having such a great time marching and making lots of noise ... until someone looked at us. Then, they all wanted to crawl under their own skin to hide.
More New Year's Pictures:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/abrownell/sets/72157603732989089/
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