Hot Fun in the Summertime

Instead of yet another post filled with apologia for being so remiss, here is a quick and dirty pictorial account of summer '09 in the White-Sustaíta and Sustaíta family; the summer was and ever shall be bookended by Rosalía's and Lucero's birthdays. Naturally I have no pictures from either celebrations, as of yet, and those pics will come in another post.

First, my dear friend Jenny Doussan sent gifts for the girls, including some most excellent sunglasses for Rosalía. Rosie wore, and chewed on, these sunglasses every waking moment, until they were totally obliterated.

We also went on a wine tour, for the second year in a row. It was great for two reasons. First, we had some really nice red wines, much to my surprise. I've heard that the climate in Central Texas is not conducive to a thick skin, and therefore the red wines are weak. I'm out of my depth here, and I fear Sarah Vandendriessche, my wine afficianado, will scoff at my feeble attempts to talk wine. The other reason our jaunt was so fun was Mandola's Vineyard and restaurant. Their vineyard is beautiful and they have a lovely restaurant. Here are some pics taken by Tia Valerie.


Our next adventure was our trip to South Padre Island and the Treviño family reunion in Harlingen. For the reunion the girls were decked out in very cute traditional Mexican regalia. At South Padre we enjoyed the beach and dolphin-watching boat ride, the majority of which Rosie slept through.
We drove down in my jalopy of a car, the VW golf. The AC is still working, just barely. It blows out pieces of black styrofoam, whose provenance and original purpose is uncertain. I like this photo of Agapito and me- not bad for an i-Phone!


Finally, I went to the Summer Institute held by the Linguistic Society of America. It was a three week intensive course held in Berkeley in July. There are worse places to go during an Austin summer; the average temperature was a heavenly 72. Agapito and the girls came out for 9 days in the middle of my stay. We went to San Francisco and got the girls umbrellas in Chinatown.



(quite cute, in my humble opinion)

We also went to that super winding road in SF. I think I was more excited by it than the girls were. Oh well.


We also went to Yosemite with the girls' cousins. All of the kids played and swimmed in the icy cold water without flinching. Why do we lose this ability as we get older?




Pictured here are Elijah, Rosita, and Lucero. The resemblance between Rosita, who is the daughter of Agapito's sister, Rosie, and my Rosalía is remarkable. (Rosie and Rosita are both Rosalías as well, and there are yet two other Rosalías in Agapito's family.)

During Agapito and the girls' visit, we stayed at Enrique and Lily's place, where the girls had a great time with their cousins, Savannah and Alisa.



Pictures from the girls' birthdays and fourth of July to come!