Merry Christmas From the Edvalsons

Dear Friends and Family,

We hope this finds you all safe and well. While we feel bad for the current plight of the U.S. Post Office --and we are aware of how much more fun it is to get the season’s greetings in the old fashioned way --time, sanity and our love for Mother Nature make the electronic version a practical choice this year. And what a year we are having! If you haven’t kept up with us, we started the first six months of the year in Guatemala. It was all blogged about here if you want to take a look back. But as a quick recap, the biggest event was that our little guy Noah John Edvalson was born May 5^th this year.

He was 8 lbs. 10 oz., and 21(Becky?) inches long. Noah’s the best baby so far (maintenance wise) or perhaps we have things down a little better with number three. Noah smiles and laughs a ton; he likes to eat paper, and loves 19^th century Russian literature. So far he’s the biggest baby we’ve had at this age, weighing in at 22 lbs. and only 6 months old! Noah might be our last one; three seems to be about all we can handle! But for a “surprise” baby, we couldn’t be happier how things turned out.

Levi is turning into the gentle and easy going little boy we always thought he would be. Good trait for the middle child! He likes many of the typical things little three year old boys do (cars, toy trains and trigonometry) and he gets along well with everyone. He likes his family alright, but as long as there are toys or cool places to go, Levi is up for anybody and anything. He likes play dates with his buddy Eli and watching any vehicle larger than a pick-up truck that makes cool noises or has flashing lights. 

Lucy started Pre-School this year. She is doing great! If you have been following our lives you may know she was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome a couple of years ago. After some mild developmental delays her first couple of years Lucy is coming into her own. She is going to a bilingual Spanish/English Preschool, and seems to like it for the most part but is ready to go home when class is done. We are pleased that she is becoming a spunky, funny, kind, and nurturing little girl. She loves all movies, impromptu dance parties and playing with her brothers. Lucy really enjoys being a big sister and we are really grateful that we have three children that are such good friends. We are keeping our fingers crossed that this continues into the tween and teenage years!

Becky is currently holding down the fort in Albany while John is in Guatemala. She is the definition of the “trooper  anthropology grad-student wife” and is enjoying the intense joys of being the mother of three young children. After her husband gets his act together and gets a real job at a used car lot, Becky is planning on going back to school to become a midwife. In the mean time she is looking into teaching child birthing classes and continuing her work as a lactation counselor for new mothers. Becky continues to pursue her hippy dippy mommy lifestyle, and would love nothing more than to fill you in on the wonders of composting, the benefits of raising your own chickens (a dream not realized yet!), and the joys of the local farmers market. And while John rolls his eyes at the chickens part, he is really grateful he married such a hip, fun and passionate gal. 

 As mentioned earlier, currently John is in Guatemala as of this moment writing this for his wife so she doesn’t have one more thing to do. He got a Fulbright Award this year (third times the charm!) and is still pursuing his PhD in cultural anthropology. He would like to remind you that he has been in grad school for 30 years now and he just loves questions like: "How's the dissertation coming?" “When are you going to get done?” “When do you think you’ll get a job?” and comments like: “Wow Guatemala huh?” So no he’s not quite done yet (looking like 2013). And for the record John plans on applying to Dairy Queen when he gets back because that’s what most of Anthropology PhD’s do  And yes, while  it is hard to be away from family, considering the flexibility of Grad School and all of the time he’s had with family these last 5 years, 10 months away shouldn’t be too bad. The miracle of Skype has kept us in contact regularly, which has been very nice. People here are very cool and patient with their awkward local Gringo, and enjoy poking fun at his difficulty pronouncing words and bushy terrorist beard.

Typical Guatemalans

 

John would like to remind you that Guatemala is in Central not South America, the people he works with speak K’iche’ (KEY-CHE), which is one of about 26 Maya languages (not a dialect) spoken in Guatemala, and that Mayas have not now or ever actually believed that the apocalypse would happen in 2012. In case the world does end, it has been nice knowing all of you wonderful people. We wish you all a Merry Christmas and a prosperous and safe 2012![i]  

                                                                    With Much Love,

                                                                             John, Becky, Lucy, Levi and Noah
 

  

   

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[i] In case you’re actually worried about earthquakes, tsunamis or your house being swallowed by a lava pit, my Maya friends say an offering of cigars or corn liquor to your local Maximon http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxim%C3%B3n(A Maya demigod popular with tourists) may prevent bad fortune this year and as an added bonus will keep “La Migra” from raiding any Korean owned sweat shop you might be working at.