2015 in Review

Sunday 31 January 2016Saturday 6 November 2021 kristychamoy, family, Madison, Mexico, moving, New York, Portland, San Francisco, vacation, year in review2 Comments

In 2015 I got a valentine named Leila (born February 14th)

…and a little firework named Nolan Antonio (born July 4th).

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Devin and I finally went to Mexico City to visit my cousin Carol’s family. Carlos Manuel and Devin became fast friends and spent hours playing rockets. I wish I had a video!

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Victoria told me her favorite hobby was “helping,” so we spent time folding clothes and writing letters. She also learned to whisper and told me secrets like “I love baby Leila” and “Will you please come visit me again?” (I’m positive this information has been declassified by now.)

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All four of my sobrin@s finally got to hang out together in November, and I realized just how little babies care about each other. Victoria was excited, but the rest of them were preoccupied with things like sleep, milk, and their mothers. I suppose the real lesson is that I know almost nothing about babies because I expected them to have so much fun and become BFFs, but I guess those types of interactions don’t happen until after you’ve mastered things like holding your head up and feeding yourself? IDK.

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This summer Devin and I said goodbye to New York and hello to a little city between two lakes. In between, we decided to see as many of our friends and family as possible. Our goal was to attend every wedding we were invited to and meet all the babies we hadn’t yet met, and somehow we were able to do it. Highlights from this summer vacation included

• going to Jill and Eric’s wedding in Portland (the first Portland wedding I went to was my own, and Jill and Eric came to our wedding, so it was like déjà vu + role reversal + our friend Tasha!)

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• sightseeing in San Francisco with my mom

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• sharing Chihuahua with the world via Enormous Eye

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• falling in love with Mexico City

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• packing up our apartment and saying goodbye to our friends in New York (that part was actually so hard and sad and why can’t you make everyone you love go everywhere you go?)

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• being welcomed to our new neighborhood in Madison by this incredible octopus sculpture (it’s gone now, but I will never forget it)

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Sometime in 2015 I decided I’d like to be the Ambassador for Mexican Snacks. I blogged about burritos and junk food, and at Christmas I got my very American suegra hooked on Valentina, Mexico’s top hot sauce. Though I’m not yet receiving a paycheck for my ambassadorial services, I am certain that my career is on track and look forward to living in a mansion with a giant chamoy fountain in the center where I can entertain dignitaries and elevate Mexican snacks to the level of fame they deserve. I expect all of this to happen within the next year, and you are all invited to the housewarming party. ; )

Oh, the Places I’ve Been: a Small Farm and a Big City in the Midwest

Saturday 7 June 2014Saturday 7 June 2014 kristyChicago, Devin, oh the places, vacation, Wisconsin1 Comment

‘The Midwest’ is such a broad geographic region that when someone says they went there, you have to ask where exactly they went. A cornfield in Nebraska? A football game in Indiana? Somewhere in Kansas? I always describe the part of this broad region that Devin is from as ‘practically Canada.’ (He’s from Wisconsin.)

We spent Easter on Devin’s family farm, and it was so wonderful. Every time I go, I learn more about life in almost-Canada and marvel at how different it is from anywhere I’ve ever lived. There’s no major airport near there, so we also had a one-night layover with our good friends Jackson and Caye in Chicago. There we made a new friend, Mila. She happens to be their baby, but I think we would have hit it off regardless!

Tapping trees — Here are Devin and his dad tapping their trees for maple syrup (technically, it’s box elder syrup, but my city-folk palate doth not detect a difference).

take out the recycling — One of my favorite parts of the weekend was taking out the garbage. You have to drive it to the dump. Fortunately, they collect recycling there, too. This is the metal recycling section. To me it looks like an exhibit at MoMA PS1. I was mesmerized.

Speaking of re-purposing, here is a house made entirely of salvaged materials. It belongs to one of their family friends.

Doesn't it seem like the perfect place to write a poem? — Doesn’t it seem like the perfect place to write a poem?

Clearly, I am not a family photographer, but I like this picture of Mila and Jackson anyway.

This one of Mila and her mami turned out a little better. I call it ‘Sleepy Zebra, Happy Zebra.’

feminist utopia — We had so few hours there, but they happen to live down the block from one of the oldest feminist bookstores in the country. (What are the chances?!) This picture sums up my feelings. Every spare space in our suitcases was taken up with new, wonderful books!

Lake MIchigan is this blue, and you can just jump in and swim! — They also made sure we saw some sights. Serendipitously, Caye’s sister was also in town from Quito. She studied architecture in Chicago and taught us all about the cool buildings, but I didn’t get any good pictures. I did take this one of Lake Michigan, and I can attest that it’s really this blue, and you can just jump in and swim! So cool!

Hey Upper Midwest (or whatever you’re called), you’re pretty rad!

Oh, the places I’ve been: Charleston, South Carolina and the Barrier Islands

Saturday 5 April 2014Saturday 5 April 2014 kristymami, South Carolina, vacation3 Comments

In August, when Devin and I got back to New York, I declared, ‘Hey! If I still have a job in December and I’ve managed to save up some money, I want to take my mom to the beach’, and Devin said, ‘Of course you will have a job’.

Spoiler alert: he was right about the job (phew!).

I’ve always wanted to take my mom to Carolina, Puerto Rico because her name is Karolina, but my meager savings were not enough to go there. I did, however, have enough reward miles for one roundtrip flight to Charleston, South Carolina. After I did some research and learned that there are islands there, I decided it was the perfect destination. Island setting? Check. Carolina in its name? Check. It’s practically Puerto Rico, you guys.

We went for a week in March and left completely smitten. Charleston is nice, but the first thing my mom, Devin, and I each noticed was how segregated it is. And how expensive it is for a city in the South. It’s hard to imagine that jobs in the area pay well enough to buy $9 juices and $30 dinners…

After a few days in Charleston, we left for a vacation rental on one of the tiny islands that dot the Carolina coast. Next time I’d skip the city altogether and go straight there.

Travel tip: the dolphins perform at 3 PM every day.

I fell in love with Spanish moss. — Spanish Moss Forever

This church is hundreds of years old. It was the first church on the island.

Not pictured: woodland friends including owls and baby deer, the summer camp that looked Wes Anderson meets It Takes Two, all the colorful wooden houses, more Spanish moss.