Snow

That's what welcomed us back today in New York. It's better than the fore-casted "Wintery Mix," which is the worst kind of weather. It's very cold and Cyra is devasted that her daddy had to go back to work (she calls him My daddy--she's quite possessive). Also, she keeps wanting to go outside and looking for lizards on our walls. The flight back was challenging and we stayed a night in a Hong Kong, which was nice. The last few hours of the flight, Cyra put her backpack on and kept saying: I'm ready for go. I want to get off the plane. She didn't care that we were flying over the north pole (literally), she just wanted to get off the plane. I told her it was cold, but she kept saying that she had a jacket and that she just wanted to get off. Anyway, we're back now. Usually, when we are away for a while, there comes a point in the trip when we are ready to come back home. Not this time. We were pretty sad to leave Bali. But we are excited to see our friends and family--but I guess it would be pretty cool if our friends and family were all in Bali.

Crazy hair.



Better. Jared had to put his hand on the back of my head to tame the beast.

Jared and I went out for a nice date on Valentine's day.





My two helmeted dare devils going out for a ride

I think this picture perfectly captures Cyra's newly acquired mischievous looks and Lucia's expression when Cyra approaches.

This is Chandra, Cyra's best friend in Bali. She was the daughter of our nanny/housekeeper there. They couldn't understand each-other, but they were always holding hands or chasing eachother and laughing. I am not sure if Cyra knew that Chandra (who Cyra called Sandra) did not understand her. She kept talking to her and was sometimes frustrated that Chandra didn't listen to her, but Chandra, who is 5 was a good sport and just humored Cyra.



We got the girls fun dress-up skirts and Cyra kept running away from me.

















This is Putu with Chandra and Cyra.

Cute kids doing traditional Balinese dancing:

Jared Kite-boarding

That's Jared out there with the orange kite.

Cyra grocery shopping

Needless to say, we had to take a bunch of things out of the cart before checkout. Good thing she was limited to only the junk food on the bottom row.

Cyra's hair kept getting in her face and she was getting annoyed so Jared made this thing for her head and she kept singing: "Yo, ho, ho, ho, we're doing the pirate dance!" (from Dora).

No fear in the water.



Sweatball was loving this. Finally, a relief from the heat.





But never a relief from big sister.

Sweat ball

Poor Lucia's nickname this trip was little sweatball. She was always drenched in sweat and SO stinky. I tried to keep her in the A/C in the house, but her hair was always wet with sweat and her back too. I hope this is not something that will plague sweatball her entire life. Cyra would get upset when we called her sweatball. "That's not Sweatball, that's Lulu."

Is anything better than eating pizza and watching Finding Nemo (with your shirt off)?

Brave girl. She wouldn't let go of Jared's hand, but she just wanted to sit on this boat by herself.





And then she just rowed out to the middle of the lake....

Lunch on the lake

We had lunch on a floating dock on the lake. It was so beautiful. They just caught a fish and cooked it up and we had some mango juice. Yum.







Jared and Cyra took this floating thing out to see some fish (the same ones they cook up)