Today I woke up and I was so tired that I wanted to go to sleep again. I tried something new it was… cereal with almond milk and I liked it. I did my normal routine and we walked to escuela español.

When we got there, we took a picture in front of the school.

When we walked in, I reunited with my favorite teacher Lucia ❤️. 2 hours later… it was pausa that means break time for 30 minutes, we went to a cafe and I got a chocolate chip cookie and Kayla and Kianna got a ham and cheese croissant and Elissa I forgot what she had but she had something. Then we walked back to school. 3 hours later… me and Lucia had to say goodbye 👋🏼 and all of us walked back to our mansion house and me and Elissa and Kianna were playing stickball and that is baseball but the bat is a stick with a ball and I won 2 to 1 because both of them were tired from just 1 inning 🤯. Then I played stickball by myself by just swinging the stick. I lifted rocks and guess what I found? 3 blind snakes but I only caught 1 and Elissa and Kianna touched the snake.

I snuggled mom in the bed.

Guess what I think we’re having for dinner… Chipotle!!!!!!!!! Mi favorito!! So we’re probably going to have that and it’s gonna be the best food ive ever eaten in Guatemala! 🇬🇹.

That’s the end

“Are you sitting down? I have bad news” -Michele

The farthest thing from my mind when she uttered those words was… a dryer.

“The owner let me know that she bought a dryer the last time she was there. Are you going to be ok? You can still hang clothes on the line” -Michele

“But what kind of psychopath hangs clothes when there’s a dryer! “ -Me

😂😂😂😂

Anyone who has heard me talk about trips to Guatemala knows that one of my favorite things about being here is the simplicity. Walking the kids to school, drinking coffee in the park, grocery shopping, playing cards by the fire, and my favorite…hanging the laundry on the line.

It’s a form of meditation for me, rotating the clothes into the light as the sun charts its course in the sky.

So to hear that we now have a dryer in the home was, to say the least, devastating.

I’ve done my best to cope, have put things into perspective, and realize that no, it does not make me a psychopath if I choose to hang the clothes whilst the dryer sits idly by watching me slip back in time, refusing to utilize modern technology 😆

We are surrounded by modern advances, but being here allows me to take pleasure in the little things.

So, if you’re looking for me girls…I’ll be in the garden, finding my peace.

“Luca how are you feeling? Are your allergies bothering you ?” -Me

“ I have a little boogies but I’m okay” -Luca

“ Anything else you’re feeling?” (Me forever triaging if he’s getting sick 😆)

“ A lot of excitement !” -Luca

❤️❤️❤️

I blog to you today from the road while we journey from Atitlan to Antigua as the “kids” play I spy.  Oddly leaving the lake feels much like you do after you’ve had a really great trip but you can’t wait to be home in your own bed.  To me Antigua feels like going home.  My trips to Guatemala began with the duo (Kianna and Michael) and they have evolved over the years with different people and combinations of people joining in.  It’s always fun to see how the combination of people will meld not just in the easy fun times, but even more so during the bumps that can happen along the way with international travel (luckily we haven’t had many). This year we have Elissa (Kianna’s roommate) joining our story in our travels and she couldn’t be a better fit.  I am grateful for kind girls who exemplify what it means to just be good people. A highlight for me so far on our journey (aside from “I spy”) happened our first night at the lake. Nicole and I were upstairs getting settled into the house and the kids were all downstairs, and I hear them say to each other “what were your peaks and valleys of the day.” This truly touched my heart that they not only thought to do it (something we’ve done on all our trips) but that they chose to reflect on the day on their own without having to be prompted. More gratitude is something I want to ensure we all walk away from our trips with, not just of the big things like being able take this trip, but for the effort of others that goes into making our food, or carrying our bags up the hill,  or driving us safely. The mindset that we get to do things and try things not that we have to.  Acknowledging our privilege and being gracious in how we receive or experience things from others along our journey is a lesson for us all. 

Luca…

Me and mom went on a breakfast date at the restaurant in our walk way to our house. We went on another road-trip to Antigua which was 2hrs and 15 minutes. When we got here to our mansion house, we unloaded the car and brought our luggage to our house. Tia and Mommy went grocery shopping and the girls and I were staying home. Elissa taught all of us how to play songs on the piano and she was very good at piano, so good in fact I thought it was a piano video but nope😆. When mom and tia came back with a Uber car ride, there was so many things from the grocery store and all of us needed to carry something for my mom and tia. When we were done with unloading the car, we just had our own business but me, I was just playing with bugs all around the house and I was also focusing on baseball so I cut down bamboo and made it into a sort of shape of a baseball bat and I tried it and I was actually amazed of how good it was😲. Then the best part is coming soon but first we need to go to dinner 🍽️ so we went and there was hamburgers so I got a hamburger for dinner. Best part… that it was the copa mundial cup. It was Argentina vs Colombia but I didn’t finish it because it was too late. But at halftime show it was… Shakira!!!!!!!!😆😆 the music artist and she played the song called Hips don’t lie and 2 other amazing songs that I loved!!!

The end

Right now we’re at dinner, El Patio, waiting for our food and we’re watching the soccer game (Argentina vs. Colombia) so it’s delayeddddddd we found out why though… It’s from people getting arrested in the front of hard rock because they’re trying to get in but anyways today we traveled to Antigua where our house is, the same one we stayed in last year and I missed ittttt

Also me and Kianna were sitting in our room and i thought our room had ac which is crazy come to find out the door we have in our room that goes to outside is open so the wind is just coming in and out. I really thought we bougied up the place noooppeee that’s junk felt noiceeeee but the bugs coming in ain’t so nice

The drive wasn’t that bad I watching S.W.A.T on Netflix in the car

OMG I can’t believe I almost forgot this is so sad I had to say bye to the dogs on the lake like so so sad. This one black dog idk her name another black dog and Camila a blonde dog, they were actually the sweetest dogs every now and then joke. Camila followed us to breakfast and we thought she just left after but nope she waited for us the whole time and walked us all the way back to our hotel house thing. But when me and Kianna had to say goodbye I couldn’t they didn’t know what was happening so they followed us to the deck and it was so sad here so pictures I took of them

Earlier today (I started writing this yesterday but didn’t finish so it’s not actually today anymore it’s yesterday technically) we went to this women’s cooperative weaving place where you get to learn how to weave. My back hurt from leaning over so much but my lady was really nice she was. She was like a little nice old lady, she was trying to speak to me in Spanish but I had no clue what she was saying so I didn’t say anything I just looked and smiled. LOL I ended up telling her I didn’t speak Spanish but she was so cute. Also learning how the color the yarn and stuff was really cool

Okiiii byeeeeee #kaylasblogggsss

Michele and I are not the only Scorpions here….aside from our astrological signs, we had the real deal crawling on our wall!

Thanks to her ninja moves, the intruder was thrown off the balcony, all the while stabbing at the glass she captured him in.

Turns out Dora isn’t just good at exploring 😆

Luca…

Today me and Kayla jumped off the dock and it was freezing like it was water snow.

But other than that, we have a new guest named Elissa and she is Kianna’s roommate so I’m getting along with her.

All of us went on the bumpiest boat ride ever because we almost flew in the roof of the boat and we went to a weaving tour and we got to try weaving and everyone did amazing 🤩 and then we went to a bee tour/ farm and we saw different kinds of bees and some of them are tiny and that was interesting. Did you know that Mayan bees don’t have stingers?

We went on a tuk tuk to our boat ride and our captain was named Pedro. It was super bumpy but we survived the ride.

We had lunch and guess what I had? Spaghetti and meatballs! My favorite 😍.

Yesterday I tried something new and I liked it… broccoli soup!

After we ate lunch, me and Kayla jumped off the dock into the freezing lake🥶! And then we were so cold that we went in the hot tub and the sauna. Then we went to dinner with everyone and there was a bbq at la iguana and Chula, the dog that I met the first year I came was there. The BBQ had the best chicken Ive ever tasted! After dinner, we had dessert which was drum roll please 🛢️🛢️🛢️🛢️🛢️ brownies!! So we ate all of them and we walked back in our house in the dark so we had to Tia’s phone flashlight to get back to the house and we walked with three lake dogs that followed us the whole time we were walking but then we had to say goodbye to the dogs.

Tia saved our lives by a catching a scorpion that was in the house!!

That’s the end

🥳🥰🤩😊🤪🫨🤭😆

Emoji for emoji. This is what I sent to my mom to explain my emotions as we are waiting to takeoff.