guaca-holy-mole!!

Kadogo (Tiny's kiswahili name) has been enjoying some crazy adventures lately!

She's enjoyed trips to many different parts of the big city of nairobi, learned how to navigate public transportation, sat in hours and hours of traffic, met some the most amazing and inspiring people in the world, and breathed in way too much we-need-rain-here dust for her tiny little lungs!

Last night Kadogo felt even tinier when this happened:




An avocado this size of my head (almost!)

Kadogo helped us enjoy this little taste of tejas home... yummy!
and yes, all of that awesome guac was from ONE avocado :)

Busy Blue

Tiny Blue Bear has had a very busy September! He made a lot of new friends, helped me celebrate my 23rd birthday and made his first trip to WACO!
Since I couldn't be with all my friends from Baylor, I stretched my birthday out to last a whole week! My family and I celebrated at Capital Grille in Houston (Blue had too much too drink that night and has requested that no pictures are posted). Then, Alise and Travis drove down for a night and we went to Chuy's with Leah and our new friends Bryan and Zach. Before they had to go back to Waco, we had enough time to gather round the piano for a sing-a-long!! Blue Bear is a tenor :)
Much like myself, Blue Bear LOVES chocolate. I had to pay him to get off my birthday cake. This year I turned two gold and three silver. Leah drove out to Clear Lake to deliver special birthday flowers! She's such a sweet friend. I had a great birthday. I was overwhelmed by the kindness and love of my friends near and far away.
Last weekend, Blue was finally old enough to visit Waco. Our first stop was Elite, of course (blue is taking the picture...). I forgot how awesome it is to visit a past employer...we got two rounds for free!!
On Saturday, Blue went to his first college football game!!! The only empty seats in the stadium were in the visitor section!! Bear was sad we lost...but so glad we won tonight's game!!
After the game, Blue Bear was overwhelmed with new friends. Here we are with the beautiful Lauren Beck at Marshall's birthday party...

And again, with Ben, Scott (congrats on the promotion), Ryan and the birthday boy, Marshall!
The boys wanted to make a tribute to Sarah Sat and Wade in Kenya, so they used these African figurines to depict a typical day in Kenya. Kenya guess which one is Wade? :)
All in all, September was packed with fun friends and great memories.

Next up with Blue..."Blue takes the GRE"

do you know the way to san jose?

hello!

a couple of weeks ago, r.franklin & i adventured to the west coast

to play in san jose, california!

my parents generously flew us out there & showed us their new home, 

freakishly cute city, and beautiful new state. 

{it's weird to think that they are under the leadership of the governator now}

it was our first time to travel since our honeymoon, and to stay with my parents

since the wedding. it wasn't even awkward sleeping on their pullout couch, thankfully.

{side note: they are building a murphy bed for the study for us to stay in- score!!}

anyway, we absolutely fell in love with northern california...and we're kind of hoping we can more there after med school. there and germany...

ross is applying to be in the air force :)

besides ross and i, tiny bear really fell in love with san jose. 

he came along on a lovely morning walk around my parents new

pleasantville-like neighborhood...

and then took off at a park, which had a ground that looked liked this:

we searched for a long time, and ross apologized profusely for allowing tiny bear to slip through his grasp... but the truth is, tiny bear is a free spirit.  like the rest of our friends, he took off on his own adventure. 

we are currently looking into adopting a new bear... perhaps a more brightly colored one... for the rest of our travels.

tiny bear goes to beantown!

This weekend Tiny Bear (name still pending) visited Cheryl in Boston! We met up with our other study abroad friend, Christine, and had a weekend filled with sightseeing, reminiscing, and eating.

Tiny Bear quickly discovered that Boston is one of America's most beautiful, pristine, and historical cities! A true gem!
Above, Tiny Bear took a break from all the sightseeing in Boston Common: The oldest park in the country!



On the way back from eating a gelato in Little Italy, Tiny Bear found a very colonial looking alley way.

Tiny Bear even got the spooks a couple of times... he went to Salem, Massachusetts {Witch hunts, anyone?} and even sat on a tombstone in the oldest cemetary in the U.S.A!

Tiny Bear and I {Smiller} think Boston made it pretty high on our list of favorite U.S. cities! The combination of European inspired architecture, crisp New England fall air, and the most delicious Dunkin' Donuts coffee I've ever tasted made this a trip we won't forget!

kenya believe it?

I feel like I should give this bear an African name, no? I'll pray about it...

So we arrived in Kenya a few days ago! What an adventure!

We endured almost 30 hours of travel, including a stop in London with she repped some green and gold with Wade:

We finally arrived in at the Nairobi airport where we were picked up and brought to our new home for the next 4 months. We have had no shortage of this stuff:

In fact, we are served it about 4 times a day. It's fantastic.

We've also met lots of other cool people, including this guy Alex, whose house we were welcomed into a few days ago.

We also went through Voluntary Counseling and Testing (VCT)- and guess what, we're both HIV negative! Good news...

More to come :)