Happy Birthday Jacob Allen Houseman Colombian Style!

Today is one of my favorite days of the year...Jacob's birthday. Today he turned seven years old. Where has the time gone? His birthday wish this year is to have a Star Wars movie marathon. That means that he sits on his duff and watches all six of the Star Wars movies. That would be like a day at work. Anyway, before lunch he already watched the first Star Wars movie with Luciana attentive part of the time.

At 12:30 today we were picked up at the hotel by Julie. Julie is Paula Houseman-Saladino's Colombian friend's friend. Did you follow that? She lives about 10 to 15 minutes from the hotel up in the mountain in a beautiful condominium.

We enjoyed Ajiaco soup with cream, capers, and fresh avocado. Ajiaco soup has chicken, three types of potatoes, corn on the cob, and scallions I believe. Our beverage was a relative of the fruit granadia. Very tasty! For desert we had little meringues covered with another type of fruit. This was an interesting fruit that I have never heard of before. It took quite a while to chew one piece but had great flavor.

After lunch Jacob played the Wii and we had a nice time socializing with Julie. It is interesting to learn of the differences within the departments of Colombia and to hear her life experiences.

Our lunch ended too quickly. Dave had a haircut appointment back at the hotel at 4:30. On the way back to the hotel Julie stopped at a store to pick us up several loaves (if that is what you call it) of pan de bono and a small cup of avena oatmeal drink. Thank you Paula for recommending that we try pan de bono. It had a good sweet taste to it.

When we arrived back at the hotel Valeria's sister was waiting with her clippers to give Dave a Colombian haircut. He thought that it would be a good idea to have Luciana's hair trimmed slightly because she had some wild strands and the back of her head was slightly bald.

Well, much to our dismay and slight horror, she received a haircut like I have never seen or hopefully will never see again. Poor little thing didn't know what was coming.

Katya held Luciana while Valeria's sister proceeded to cut her bangs straight across and shave the back and side of her head. Jacob was horrified. He was very mad at us. He ran up to the room and he said "why did you make her look like a boy?"

After seeing Luciana's haircut, Dave was nervous to get his haircut. For your information, Dave's haircut turned out nice. We brought Luciana upstairs prior to dinner and Jacob's Colombian birthday party and contemplated what can we do to make her look better? Dave decided to pull her hair straight up into a ponytail on the top of her head.

For those of you who don't know, it is tradition to shave the baby's head when they are young. Supposedly it grows in thicker. We will wait and see.

After dinner the celebration of Jacob began. There was a Colombian pinata filled with various toys. All of the kids including Jacob were excited to tear into the pinata!

Jacob quickly gathered as many toys as he could.

Now it was time to cut the cake. It took Jacob two blows to put the fire on his cake out.

After we ate cake, Katya the owner asked us if we liked Luciana's haircut. We all stated that it wasn't what we would have done in the States. Katya told us that Valeria's sister could shave her head like she did to the Thompson's little girl. Dave agreed to have it done. I couldn't witness Luciana getting her hair buzzed off so I asked Dave to. He wasn't too thrilled with it but he took her into the kitchen where the rest of her hair came off. As you can see, she looks good bald too. Today she officially joined the bald is beautiful club with Uncle Tim and Uncle Kyle. You have to admit, she still looks good even without hair.

So overall Jacob had a good birthday and will more than likely remember this day for the rest of his life. He still hasn't forgiven us for cutting Luciana's hair. The good thing is that it will grow back!