it's monday...

i hope all you bloggers had a good weekend. i had a nice weekend. i went to a couple of halloween parties on saturday. i got to hangout with mr. k, HE called me to invite me out. i already had plans but decided to meet with mr. k for awhile before i headed out to my parties. He later met up with me at D's parties...which was not really happening so we decided to leave. I borrowed ms. j's car to take Mr. K home, he asked me to stay!!! SERIOUSLY!!!..another seriously moment...what kind of girl does he think i am!!?!?!?!? ok i spent the night...NOT!!!! i wanted to so bad and Ms. J was okay with me keeping the car until sunday morning but i kept telling myself "this is not the kind of relationship i want with Mr. K!!"and so i left. He called me last night to apologize for asking me to stay the night and he also told me that he respects me even more. he also told me that as much as he wanted me to stay he was glad i didn't....what the fuck does this mean?!?!? anywho, enough about mr. K!! okay just more thing, i really really like the guy!! ok enough!! i had fun on saturday, after i dropped of Mr. K i went back to pick Ms. J up and then we went to eat something because mr. j was really drunk and i wanted her to sober up before she headed down to her place. we went to eat and talked about all sorts of stuff...it's funny to talk to drunken individuals when your sober hehehehehe. at around 4 in the morning, yes 4!!, i decided that ms. j was ok to drive. i took myself home and then gave her the car...she only lives a few blocks away so i wasn't really worried. i slept 'til noon yesterday. i wanted to go visit the parents but i was still tired AND my daddy doesn't like me coming home alone so late...because it gets darker sooner with this whole daylight savings crap it appears to be later then it really is. Anyway, i stayed home and watched t.v., ate, slept some more, watched more t.v., argued with kachito, went to the store to get some milk to make myself some chocolate abuelita, argued some more with kachito, read, ate again, read, talked on the phone til 1 in the morning, read some more and then fell asleep. AND now i'm here at work trying to get these end of the month reports done. so there you have it...happy halloween bloggers!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! it's the bestest holiday ever!!!

sox win!!!!!!!!! sox win!!!

THE SOX ARE THE WORLD CHAMPIONS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HOLY MOTHER OF GOD!!!!!!!!
Kachi's and i decided to stay at home last night to watch the game. yes it would have been more exciting had i gone out with my friends to the bar but i wanted to be sober when the sox won...just incase they won of course which they did!!!! i wanted to remember the feeling!!! what an awsome game!!! stressful as hell but none the less awsome!! congratulations sox!!! great job!!

my list...

as i was walking to work this morning i started thinking about dcn and how he doesn't think it's fair that the chicago bloggers are meeting each other...sorry dude :-( that got me thinking about the people i would like to meet or would have liked to have met. so here it goes:

First and forthmost, FRIDA. really do i even have to explain why?!?!? i actually dreamt that i had met her at La Casa Azul. She was on her wheel chair, i was kneeling down while she held my hand. I was crying because i couldn't believe i was actually meeting her!!! i woke up crying, by the way i have never ever shared this anyone because my friends already think i'm a frida freak and me dreaming this would only prove them right. i can't help it!! she was an awsome woman!!! i mean she did things back in her days that women are now still hesitant in doing!!! Seriously...another seriously moment...who wouldn't want to meet her!!! ok i know a few people but that's why they are NOT my friends...heheheheh just kidding.

Second Che...i don't really have a great reason. i saw the movie motorcycle diaries and it just made me want to meet the man even more.

Emiliano Zapata is another person i would have loved to have met. i just want him to explain to me the whole mexican government. i've read so much on it and i still don't get it!!!

Sigmund Freud, yes him!!! even though he believed that women were hysterical!!! WHAT THE F...K IS HE TALKING ABOUT?!?!? US HYSTERICAL!?!?!? PINCHE VIEJITO!!! I'LL SHOW HIM HYSTERICAL!!...hehehehe that was me trying to be hyterical..get it? Hysterical? anywho, even though i don't agree with more than half of the crap he wrote and said the man did start people thinking about researching the mind. Thank my Frida...yeah frida is my goddess...for that because otherwise i would be without a job running all hysterical somewhere in this world.

Jorge Ramos. why? because the man is sooo handsome!! ok and intelligent and speaks his mind and handsome and he seems to be genuinely (?) interested in immigration matters. and did i mention that he is handsome.

Angelina Jolie..why? because the woman is gorgeous and she seems to be a cool person. i know i know, she's a hollywood person but seriously she has done alot and she has gotten herself involved in alot of political matters...don't know how serious she is being taken but at least she is trying BECAUSE she wants to and not because she is going to get brownie points from her fans. Did you know that she gives 2% of her salary...may not see like much but keep in mind that the woman does make BILLIONS in a year...to cambodia. anywho, i would like to have a conversation with her to ask her "so what do you really look like when you wake up in the morning?" ok so that's not what i would ask her....

Virginia Wolfe...the woman is a whole mystery to me!!! if i ever got to meet her i would probably need a whole week to ask my massive amount of questions.

okay gotta go!! the list will continue another day though AND DCNational you are on this list too :-)

beautiful colors

i just got back from visiting two of my clients and on my way back i noticed the different colors on the trees. i love autumn!!! when i was younger i used to walk around the neighborhood and collect different types of leaves...all shapes and colors. my mom used get upset because i would bring a whole bunch of them and then just pick 2 or 3 to put on my bedroom wall...that i had to share with three of my sisters so my little leaves would only last two or three days on the wall porque nadamas traia basura al cuarto. I'm so glad i have my own place now!! Anywho, i saw two beautiful trees this afternoon. i wanted to get out of the car and pick some leaves but decided not to. damn!! now i regret it. i love those firey orange ones. i love that color!!! it reminds me so much of mexico, don't know why but it does. i also like the yellow ones. i love autumn!!

lets go sox!!! lets go!!!

HOLY MOTHER OF GOD!!!! is all i kept saying during last night's white sox game...and i'm not even religious!! what a freakin' game!!!! i thought the sox had it in the bag when pauly hit the grand slam but the "other" team caught up to them and i thought "ya perdieron :-(" but noooooo, pauly came back and hit another homerun!!!! HELL YEAH!!!! I LOVE MY SOX!!! AND don't get me started on saturday's game. how about that 8th inning? HOLY MOTHER OF GOD!!! my daddy was very upset when ozzie took out the pitcher and brought in the big guy. "no!!!! que estas haciendo!?!?!" my mom's response "el sabe lo que esta haciendo" HELL YEAH!!! I LOVE OZZIE!!! yeap two very exciting games!!! i hope they do just as good tomorrow!!!

Well aside from watching the games...lets go sox!! lets go!!... i went to cracked chancla's future bookstore. i got to meet her...and she is soo cool. !!!! i think you picked a perfect location!!! I wish you the best of luck cc. I got to meet another blogger as well too...this whole blog thing is soo cool. I would like to thank Santiago for introducing me to the world of bloggers. I have met...both in person and via internet...so many great individuals Thanks santiago ;-).

"and you are? hmmm? ok..."

That is what i was told last night at the training i went to. I went to a training about the effects that AIDS/HIV meds have on individuals. i normally don't go to trainings that are in the evening and set up in a restaurant because usually only doctors and nurses attend...i do not like working with doctors!!!! some are ok but for the most part they think they are the rulers of the world!! anyway, the only reason i went was because my supervisor asked me to go. "damn, do i have to go?!?!" So i really didn't have a choice. So i walk to the restuarant, Mia Francesca on Clark, and the lady at the door asks me "your name and where are you from?" i answer "sonrisa morena and i'm from the clinic" "are you a nurse or a doctor?" "neither, i'm a social worker" her response as she looks me up and down was "hmmm? i guess that's ok, you can have a sit wherever you'd like" pinche bruja!! i thought to myself. Soon after i sat down a co-worker comes and sits next to me and asks me "what is up with that lady?!?!" She apparently treated him the same way and to be honest with you i felt a little relieved because when i was sitting down i was thinking "pinche bruja i bet if i were white you wouldn't have reacted that way!!!" but when brian told me he got the same reaction i felt better...is that mean? anyway, the training was awsome!!! dr. b, whom is one of the cool doctors i like, gave the training. but lets talk about the food!!! holy crap!!! we had appetizers, brochetta (?) calamari and little pizza thingies. Then came the salads, and then the pastas..stuffed spinach ravioli and some other kind of pasta that was soo yummy. AND then the main course, talapia in lemon sauce, chicken in some kind of yummy sauce and fillet mignon(?) DAMN it was good. our wine glasses kept getting refilled by the wonderful waiters. Oh yeah we also got dessert, tarramizo. YUMMY!!!! it was good stuff. by the end of the training my co-worker and i were so full and buzzing it wasn't even funny!! We left thinking "we had such a good dinner for FREE!!" We headed out to southport to go bar hopping. if you haven't been bar hopping on southport, i really recommended. i had so much fun. some guy, i think his name was eric, started talking to me...that was nice. i think that's why i had fun because i was getting hit on..hey who doesn't like the attention. i got home at 2:30 in the morning and i so did not want to come to work today!! but i have responsibility and here i am.

HYPED UP!!!!

HEEEELLLLL YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! the sox play this weekend and it has become a huuuge thing for la familia. It's going to be too cold to take the t.v. outside and have a cookout like la familia did this summer for el capitulo final de la novela, so we have decided to just order some food and watch game inside. I'm thinking we are ordering pizza, daddy will be buying some beer and somebody is gotta make some dessert or something. I've decided to take chips and pico de gallo. I'm soooo excited!!!! it's been such a long time that the brothers and sisters get together for sports!! the brothers always get together to see a boxing match and they don't invite the girls, well actually they do but we don't go. and have i mentioned how excited i am about this weekend!!! i started thinking about how when we all lived with the parents. we all...all nine of us... used to watch the sox play in the living room...harold bains was all of our hero back then. another thing i just remember was all of us watching the super friends...i always thought that wonder woman and superman made a nice couple. oh how i miss those days. we use to have so much fun. know all of them are married with two or three kids each. how time goes by. i love all my nieces and nephews though!!! i wonder if they will feel the same once they grow up too. ALL of them are very close in age and so they get along very well and i hope the always will. They get a kick out of the stories i tell them about when their parents were young. "tia tell me how my dad was when he was is high school?" "tia was my mom always this mean?" "tia did my dad ever have hair?" "my dad used to run?!!?!?!?" "my daddy was not the first boyfriend my mommy had?!!" ooops i think i've said too much.... did i tell you how excited i am about this weekend?!!! go sox go!!!!

THAT'S IT!!!!

i have decided that i'm totally going to give up on guys!!!!! i think i WILL go on a date with the female therapist that keeps asking me out even though she knows i don't like girls!!!!

so last night i was talking to Mr. K and the whole relationship thing came up and i got the "it's not you it's me" speech. I AM THE QUEEN OF THAT SPEECH!!!!! pokey makes fun of me because he tells me that he has never met anyone that can give that speech in so many different versions. Anyway, right after i finished talking to mr. k i called pokey to talk to him about it and he laughed at me!!! "why are you laughing?!??!!? it's not funny!!!" i asked him, i was close to tears...very proud of myself because i didn't cry. his response was "sonrisa, i don't mean to be mean but this is the first time i see you on this side" ha? what? que? como? he goes on to tell me that ever since he has known me i have never ever given a guy a chance and that i'm the one giving the "it's not you it's me" speech and then he asks "so how does it feel?" it feels like crap!!! i say "welcome to my world" he tells me. you see i gave pokey "the speech" a few years ago and well know we've become really good friends. i'm glad that he didn't stop talking to me like most guys usually do. i was planning on never ever talking to mr. k but talking to pokey made me realize that i might missing out on a really good friendship. mr. k is a great guy and i think if i give myself some time i can get over this whole thing and just enjoy his friendship. hey, i've being doing that with mr. motorcycle so why not with mr. k...hmmm? i'm starting to see a pattern here. yeah don't want to get into that right now. i'm in pain people!!! PAIN I SAY!!! ok ya se me paso. i do like mr. k alot and i like hanging out with him..he is funny as hell!! have i mentioned that he is a stand up comedian. anyway, i get very upset when guys whom i have really enjoyed hanging out with stop talking to me because i don't feel a certain way about them. i don't want to do the same thing to mr. K. don't know when i will decide to call him up but i will keep you posted :-p

random stuff...

i just got back from visiting two of my clients. one of them is trans, male to female, and the other one is schizophrenic, a different client then the one previously written about. one of the many reasons i love my job is because i get to really know my clients. they welcome me into their homes treating me like family. i have to keep reminding them that i am their social worker and that as much as i enjoy their company i'm there for a reason, it may sound mean but i have to say that not only for their sake but for mine as well. sometimes i wish i hadn't met my clients that way but oh well, i'm a strong believer that things happen for a reason. So anyway, my trans client has moved sooo many times within the last two years. She keeps getting harrassed (sp?) due to her "change". If there is one thing that really pisses me off is ignorant adults!!!! everybody has the right to their opinion and believes but to HARRASS someone like that!! anyway, she was telling me that she will be moving to boystown by the beginning of next month and that she hopes that will be her last move, "honey!!! if i get harrassed in boystown then i don't know what i will do!!" She was also telling me that she was having difficulty finding an apartment due to alot of apartments turning condo...

CONDOS!!! what the hell!!! what is going in chicago. everywhere i go there is a sign about selling or buying condos. Really every freakin' building in my neighborhood has turned condo. I guess it's a good thing but seriously i keep thinking about my clients. my clients can't afford to buy a condo!!! my clients want to continue living in boystown because they feel comfortable there. they are able to express themselves without the fear of being harrassed, battered or talked about. Most of my clients live in studios paying waaay too much for them!! like i told my client today, "you're not really paying to live in your apartmend, you're actually paying to live in the neighborhood" it really is a nice neighborhood but come on!!! anywho, that's my little issue with the condos....

my schizo client, seems to be doing alot better. his sister is doing a great job in taking care of him. making sure he is keeping up with the doctor's appointments, making sure that he takes his meds. Don't really know where he would be now had it not been for sister taking care of him. When i first got him, he was not taking his meds and therefore was constantly having episodes. At one point he got waaaay out of hand with his sister and myself that i suggested that he be admitted to a nursing home. The sister thought it was a good idea due to her having to deal with her own problems...she was on the verge of loosing her job and was also having marital problems due the amount of time being spent with the client. Anyway, she called me and told me "sonrisa, i need to see you right now!!! i can't handle my brother anymore!!" when i got to their place, client was smoking like there was no tomorrow...which is normal for schizophrenics, smoking helps them calm down, chemicals in the brain and the nicotine apparently work very well with schizophrenics, researchers have not yet discovered why though. the poor sister was sitting on the couch crying. "what happened?" i asked. "he tried eating some broken glass last night and i had to call the ambulance, sonrisa i haven't slept all night because i'm so scared he might do something to hurt himself". i turned to client and i tried to explained to him what the sister was going through and why it was important for him to go to a nursing home...it took me a good 1 hour or so to try to get this through him. after the a while he looked at me like i was crazy and then tells me "will you excuse me, i need to consult this with my lord" walks away...only a few steps away so i could still see him and hear him. He looked upwards and starts mumbling to himself then turns to me and says "ok i'm ready to go, my lord told me that i can trust you and that i should do what you ask of me" you don't know how glad i was to hear that. anyway, he is doing so much better. he no longer is at the nursing home, he now has his own apartment but his sister constantly keeps going over "just to make sure he is ok".

After visiting my clients, i decided to stop by at the pet shop to buy kachito his food. So i went to the store and got him his food...AND yes i couldn't resist, i got him a toy!!! not really a toy but a halloween scratch mat. i saw it and i just had to to buy for him!!! it's the cutest little mat!! i can't wait 'til i get home to show him his new toy. Ms. J thinks kachito is the most spoiled cat in the world but i don't care!! She can say all she wants, kachis will always be number one in my heart!! and as long as i can provide him the luxury of toys i will!! AND if he meows to me that he wants his own condo than i shall get him his own condo!!! gosh darn it!!!

what a weekend!!!!!!

First let me start by saying "YOU CAN PUT IT ON THE BOOOOAAARD!!!YEEEESSS!!!!! hell yeah!!!! what a way to end my weekend!!! let's go sox!!! lets go!!!! holy mother of god!!!!! i just can't believe it!!! i am sooooo happy for ozzie!!! just so freakin' happy!!! i'm just...don't even know how to express myself right now.

ok thanks for allowing me the little outburst. So i had such an amazing and fun weekend. On Friday santiago and i went to go see the the play that mariposa recommended and has worked her butt off to make it happen..."Breakfast, lunch and dinner". And oh my god!!! it was such an incredible play. i cried, i laughed, the play was awsome!!! i called mr. k afterwards to let him know how deep the play was. i just couldn't get over it!!! AND i also got to meet mariposa!!! AND hang out with her!!! how cool is that!?!?! She invited Santiago and myself to a party after the play and boooy talk about a small world!!! i had a mentor who once told me that i was ALWAYS going to run into someone i knew because the world of educated latinos was a small one. Well mrs. p your theory was proved was again this past friday. i saw soooo many people at this party. so anyway, that was Friday. On Saturday, i hung out with mr. motorcycle in the morning and in the evening i went to a bachelorrete's party!!! woohooo!!! i had soooo much fun!!! damn!! we women can get wild!!! it was just crazy!!! After we saw the naked men we went out dancing. i got home at 2 in the morning, had a nice conversation with the cab driver who is from Russia and will be going back in 8 months to start his own business....i can get very chatty when i'm drunk, actually i wasn't that drunk i was just really really tired. on Sunday, the sox won!!!!! need i say more!!!! ok i will say more. i hung out with mr. K whom i am liking very very much. as i told one of my co-workers, i think i'm falling in like NOT love but like...it will be very difficult for me to fall in love again. Anyway, we at pizza and watched the sox game. he was very impressed that i actually was all into the game. I'll be honest this whole Mr. K is kind of scaring me. i have not felt this excited about someone in a looooong time. i'm trying to just enjoy myself and taking one day at a time.

so there you have it...now i'm back at work, not complaining because i am one of the many luck people to have a job to go to :-)

should we put it on the board?!?!?!?

before i go to visit my client i want to write about last night's game. So don't know what really happened but the sox won!!! was it a fair game? according to the umpires it was. do i care if i don't think it wasn't a fair game? hellooo? yes i do because if the sox win this whole thing, last night's game will definetly come up again!!! i'm confused about last night's win. i'm happy they won but seriously did they? anyway, i'm just rambling on and i need to get going cause i'm already late...my client just called me asking me if i was still going to visit him, ehhehehehhee. i'm trying to make myself feel better about last night's game so you baseball fans can you please tell me what you thought about last night's game. dcn? moe greene? hello? anybody?

what to do? what to do?

so i have a paranoid schizophrenic client that changes his phone number every three months due to "people and the government out to get him", don't know exactly that means but he always gets very anxious when he calls me to tell my why he decided to change his phone number. He also usually gives me his new number but this time he hasn't given to me. He, however, keeps calling me asking me to call him back. I have caller id but he doesn't know that and i don't want to tell him either because if he were to find out that i have caller id he would start wondering why i don't pick up when he is calling. He is very very paranoid, paranoid to the point where he doesn't even want to take his psyche meds because "he is sure the doctor is working for the government and she is working with them on killing him". Anyway, if i call him, he is going to ask me how i got his number...he is a very intelligent man and will remember if he gave it to me or not. the man is really something else, but a very sweet individual. he has memorized the ENTIRE bible!!! because "that is the only thing that keeps me sane". so anyway, if i call him and tell him that i have caller id, he will then be too paranoid to call me due to the possibility of me not answering because i wouldn't want to deal with him. if i tell him that he gave it to me and that he probably forgot about it, he will then tell me that it's not true and the government probably called to give it to me. don't know what to do...i guess i'll just have to wait and hope i'm at my desk when he calls next time.

how much should we say?

so last night i was talking to pokey and he says "so i saw that you and mr. glass man were hitting it off, what's going on?" "What? mr. glass man was all over your cousin!!! what are you talking about?" According to Pokey, mr. glass man was putting the moves on me on Saturday. I didn't think so. i thought he was just being polite because that was first time we had met. i have heard about him but have never met the guy, he seems to be a nice dude. so anyway, pokey asked me if mr. glass man had told me that he had a girlfriend. i asked why he wanted to know. He tells me "because i think that there some things that should be said and some things that should not be mentioned and him having a girlfriend is definetly one of the things that he should have told you!" WHOA dude!!! Where that came from is beyond me but he went on to say "sonrisa, sometimes you can be so naive when it comes to men!!" so of course i started to get a little attitude and responded by saying "first of all i don't think it's any of your business who i talk to AND second of all I am not interested in mr. glass man so i don't care if he does or doesn't have a girlfriend!!" "ok i'm sorry but i just care about you and don't want you get hurt again" he tells me. pokey has suggested that i go to therapy but after last nights conversation i think he might be just projecting!! the dude totally freaked out on me and gave me a twenty minut lecture on how men really are and what they really want from women. i told him i appreciated him telling me all of this but that i was a grown woman and in knew what was good for me and what was not...ok so sometimes i make stupid mistakes but hey we all learn from our experiences, for instance i will never ever mix my wines again after lasts weeks experience...damn that was the nastiest hangover i have ever had!!! Anyway back to pokey, after that lecture i decided not to tell him about Mr. K. i think i'll keep him a secret i until i think something is actually happening betweent the two of us.

annual housewarming dinner...

It's that time of year again!!! I've been having housewarming dinner/parties for the past 7 years...there have been a few years in which i've moved twice within a year. You see i've moved 10 times within the last 7 years. I got kicked out of my parents because i spent a weekend with the boyfriend...yeah the same one that i can't seem to get over, the same one that i blame for me being so scared of relationships, the same one i blame for thinking every man is the same...y eso no se hace si no estas casada!!! I come from your traditional mexican family. Anyway, ever since, i'v been moving, trying to find MY home. I think i finally found it though. This is the first time i've stayed at a place for two years in a row!!! YAY!!!! for me!!! I mean what else can i ask for, i have kachito, i have a balcony, i live close to the beach and lakeshore dr., i WALK to work when i'm not riding my bike. Yeah i'll be staying at this place for a while.

So anyway, last year when i had my housewarming party, my friends were asking where i was going to be moving to next. I said "not anymore, this is it guys!!". They were dissappointed because according to them they were getting use to it. So i decided to have an annual housewarming dinner!! I sent out the e-vite a few weeks ago and got great responses. i love having my friends over for dinner!! nothing makes me happier than to see my friends enjoying themselves at my place. I grew up with a large family...four brothers and four sisters...so i will find any excuse to have people over. AND I love to cook...was brought up to be a housewife as one of friends tells me...and it makes me happy that my friends enjoy my cooking. I decided to take tomorrow off from work to get started on the cleaning and shopping for the food...ok plus i'm going out tonight to a poetry thingy and drinks are included all night which means i'll probably get drunk and i don't want to go to work with a hangover. i'll be having like 30 people over on saturday. Kachito is going to be in heaven. He loves people!!! i think he knows how adorable he is so he takes advantage of it. it will be a very busy saturday morning for me but it will be worth it!!! it ALWAYS is.

YEEEEESSS!!!!

YOU CAN PUT IT ON BOOOOOARD!!! YEEESSSS!!! the white sox won last night!!!! the only team i will ever support. my brothers are huuuuge fans of the sox and so as long as i can remember i've been watching the sox. don't know much about baseball really, actually i only wait for the score. i have never seen a game in its entirety (?), accept when i go to the stadium but even then i'm too busy looking at people. i don't understand alot of things, for instance that wild card thing...what is that? i never understood that. last week that's all i heard. the wild card this and the wild card that...ha? are they playing poker or something like it? anyway, i watched last night's game and boooy was it exciting!!! i had kachito on my lap and when they won i threw him up on the air!!! my poor baby got so scared. i was going to put on my pink white sox cap today but then i rembered that i live in cubs town...big no no. these northsiders take their baseball very serious..too serious if you ask me. come on it's just a baseball game. sorry if i've offended anybody. anywho, i hope the sox win again!!!!! lets go sox!!! lets go!!!

apple heaven..

That's where i was on Saturday!!! Apple heaven. My lord!!! there are soooo many different types of apples...gala, fuji, grannie smith, mc intosh (i thought that a computer), golden red. I can't remember the rest but i have discovered that my favorite are the fuji apples. They are so yummy and crisp. I had a a nice time with la famalia. We left the parents home at 9:00 in the morning and drove for about an hour to a cracker barrel. That was so much fun!!! they have a store with just about everything and anything right next to the restaurant. We had breakfast and then we headed down to the apple orchards. There were soooo many people at the place. We were transported to the different orchards by trailer....don't know what else to call it. We also stopped at a pumpkin patch...picked out two beauties. I will be showing them off this weekend at my annual housewarming party. The kids kept eating the apples until the parents told them to stop "porque eso te va hacer dano". Then we went to the little shop next to the orchard. This place had so many yummy things made with apples. Apple cinnimon (?) doughnuts, apple cider, apple jam and jelly, sweet or spicy apple sauce, apple ice cream, apple spread, apple everything!!! i only got some apple doughnuts and apple cider. i wanted to buy the whole store though!! anyway, we left the place at about 5 and got back to the parents 7 or so. We were all so tired and exhausted. We talked about what a great time we all had and what we will do differently next year.

O.k. so it wasn't all that perfect. Helloooo? there was like 20 of us...three of my brothers and their families weren't able to go.... so of course there was going to be some friction. it started right before we left. my little nephew wanted to take his walkie talkies with him but his mom wouldn't let him "porque los vas a perder te estoy diciendo!!" he was crying like there is no tomorrow. "no vamos a ir si no te callas!!!" took him like 15 minutes to calm down. When we get to Cracker Barrel we had to wait for a good while because my sister wanted all of us to sit together. When they finally called her name we were told that we would have be in three different section of the restuarant because there were waaay too many of us to be sitted in just one place. my sister got sooo upset!!! so the familia was sitted in different sections with three different waitresses. i was cool with that but my sister...she's a perfectionist...was fuming!!! AND then to make things worse OUR waitress took forever to bring our food. We had just begun eating when the rest of our familia was on there way out so they had to wait for us. We finally left the restaurant and were on our way to the apple orchard, at least that's what we all thought. We got lost twice!!!! both times the drivers got out to discuss what had gone wrong ..."que no te estoy diciendo!!! es para aca!!" "no, yo digo que nos regresemos y empezemos otra vez!!!!" "yo nadamas los sigue!!!!" "daddy are we lost? are we going to be able to see tio L again? should we call the cops?" So they finally decided to stop at a gas station and ask. Turns out we were just 10 minutes to the apple orchards!!! The ride back home was waaay more smoothly. We got back to the parents and chilled...ok not chilled we were "discussing" where we went wrong and what needed to be done next year to make this more smoothly. "les digo que dejen a la sister guiar!!!" "pero si ella fue las que nos perdio hoy!!!" "YO NO les dije que me siguieran!!!!....