Granddaughter-palooza

Okay. Your more than weeklong vacation from the fractured prose offered in Frail Deeds is officially over. You can thank the time your sensibilities were able to rest at the feet of three precocious young ladies – the FBR, BRS, and BR3. There is no way I can capture all the fun and laughter over the past week with both of my kids’ families as well as a large percentage of my Favorite Panamanian’s family in residence. There will be a lot of pictures because, as any grandparent will tell you, that’s what happens when grandkids are around.

On the Show Pony Porch 
My Mom-in-law with her Great Granddaughters
my Daughter, Son, Wingman and Nephew

My Wife Decreed a Family Photo Day

With the Girls in Traditional Panamanian Dresses

Son's Family

Daughter's Family

When I last left you, my Favorite Son’s family had just arrived and we were awaiting my daughter’s arrival a couple days later. They spent a day in Panama City before their connecting flight to David on February 12^th. That just so happened to be my wife’s and, obviously, her twin sister’s, birthday. We marked that auspicious occasion with a family wide party here at the beach where we rented the community space for the day and imported the aforementioned elements of my wife’s family. My wife claimed the party was only to celebrate the BRS’ recent birthday and not hers but we still got in our birthday wishes for her as well.

One Very Happy Grandpa with FBR & BRS

Remembering Ceremony

Release

With Tia Loca's Kite - Complete with Beer Can Tail

FBR Engaging Pinata

Since my Favorite Panamanian was more than engaged in party prep, I was charged (safely removing me from her anger impact area) with driving back to David that morning to pick up the new arrivals. This marked my longest solo trip driving in Panama in the last forty years. It didn’t strike me as strange until I realized was the first time time I’ve driven here in this century without a co-pilot with flashing eyes next to me. I didn’t screw it up and arrived in time to greet the FBR as she bounded out of the arrival area and immediately questioned how long it would take to reunite her with her cousins.

FBR in Panama City Hotel Enroute to Las Lajas
Seizing Control of TV Remote

Soxfather Balloon

Beach Dogs Returned with Some Friends
We Fed them the Treats Great Aunt Left for them

Once Again my Mother-in-Law Dominated the Right/Left/Center Game

We arrived back in Las Lajas to find the party just starting to crank up. The three granddaughters were staying with us in the condo while the parental units were staying for the week in the nearby Show Pony hotel. My son had rented the huge 3-floor party suite at the Pony which included room for most of my wife’s family as well. That went well except for any early morning use of a blender that sounded like a 747 taxiing through the kitchen. That distance from their progeny may have been the best part for my kids and their spouses – the rare opportunity to sleep in while my wife and I served as the early morning wakeup target of three very determined young ladies. We loved it and granddaughters loved it and the parents were a little mystified by our enjoyment. We knew it would only last a week.

Tia Loca, BR3, and Wife's Mom

Granddaughter Surf Jumping

Grandpa Assisting

BR3 Went Native

The party was mermaid themed per BRS request. Tia Loca arrived from Panama City with burgeoning gift bags for each grand niece and a determination to firmly worm her way into each of the small hearts (she succeeded beyond all expectations). She also brought a huge mermaid tail piñata which was filled with candy and withstood some determined whacks. It was a fun, family filled day as we circulated around the beach. The granddaughter’s firmly established themselves as pool aficionados, a week long trend. Tia Loca had brought a kite for the kids which only she was interested in flying.

BRS Helping Grandpa Make Brownies

Tia Loca in the Pool

BR3 with Tia Loca

My Son and Nephew Sunset Time

My Favorite Panamanian arranged a special moment to remember all the close family members we lost over the past year. Each of us held a balloon and said a name of someone we lost and then we released the balloons. Soxfather and the Cousin with the Legendary Laugh were prominently called out. I know there are ardent environmentalists out here bemoaning the use of balloons but, well, deal with it. It was a very nice moment. As was the rest of the time spent with all the various family members who showed up to meet the granddaughters and honor the birthday girls.

Sunset with the Fam

Daughter's Family Arrives

Daughter, Wingman, ABFA

Birthday Party

The rest of the week dissolved into dedicated granddaughter enjoyment activities. After our daily pre-dawn wakeup calls from the granddaughter element, we would knock out breakfast and then walk over to the Show Pony to check in with the parental units. I thought the morning hours were better spent at the beach, an opinion shared by my granddaughters. We built drip sand castles, made some initial boogie boarding attempts (until they fell off which ended the session immediately), and enjoyed some of the usual spectacular Las Lajas sunsets.

Wife with FBR in Pool

BR3 Checking out Cake

Fighting Beach Breeze To Light Candles

February Birthdays

It was so fun seeing the granddaughters exploring the beach and pool together. BR3 was staunchly trying to do everything the older ones were doing. Tia Loca was an additional agent of chaos which the granddaughters tapped into at every turn. One sunset, BR3 came down in her pajamas, freshly washed up for bedtime. She walked onto the beach where we were sitting and my son sternly told her that she wasn’t to go into the surf and get wet. In an incredibly funny moment, you could see the wheels turning in her head along with a determination to do just that. She headed resolutely towards to surf and we yelled to Tia Loca, approaching from the water, not to allow her to get wet. Five minutes later they were both cavorting in the waves, soaking wet. Tia Loca was incapable of denying BR3 anything. I know how that feels as well. The rest of us were laughing uncontrollably, except, of course, BR3’s parents.

Show Pony Bar After Hours
Wife Ended up Administering to Passed Out German Lady

Granddaughters Checking out Spare Hair

Amazing Nothing was Broken

FBR and BRS at Show Pony

Show Pony Roof Deck

Since the granddaughters were less entranced with the sunsets than their adult counterparts, especially when they heard there was a pizza place, alongside an ice cream place in the village of Las Lajas. It turned out there were two pizza places in the same building along with the Italian gelato place. We had a very fun, memorable pizza dinner followed by a gelato-thon. There will be more sunsets but very few opportunities to see all three granddaughters so obviously happy.

Outside Show Pony Bar

BRS and FBR in the Surf

BR3 and I Working on Drip Castle

FBR and BRS Working on Theirs

Connecting the Two

As the week went along many of the in-laws had to return to their lives which left us with the last couple days of just the American residents. That was fun in its own right, although with Tia Loca’s departure I was called upon for a decided increase in granddaughter pool entertainment activities.

Family Night in Condo

Time to Wake Up Abuela

Granddaughter Netflix Time

Breakfast Time

Horses on Beach

All too soon the week had wound down and we were staring their departures in the immediate future, something I refused to think about for most of the week. We had to leave early Friday morning to escort my son’s family back to the David airport while my daughter, Wingman and the FBR had another full day with us. It was so tough seeing the New Hampshirites walk through the gate and I pitied my son’s and the ABFA’s next twelve hours with their two young’uns making their way back home.

Best Buds

Outside Show Pony Room

Dinner at Show Pony Room

Son, Daughter, Wingman at Show Pony

The FBR was in full grandpa mode when we returned and I spent more time in the pool with her than I would in a good week in her absence. It was another bittersweet day as I thought about the traveling party was well as the requirement to do it all again the next day for the New Jerseyites. We returned to Las Lajas to sample the other pizza place and, of course, the gelato one more time. It was like our time in military when we would only tour the local area when we had visitors. We now have a dedicated ice cream and pizza place just a bumpy fifteen minute drive away.

Sunset

Beach Bonfire

Too Hot to Get Close

Pizza Dinner

Girls Wandering Away While we Await Pizza

Yesterday was the fell day where we had to drop off my daughter, Wingman, and the FBR at the airport after another early morning drive. They spent yesterday in Panama City where Wingman finally tracked down some sought after craft beer, although he did sample something called LambBull beer in Las Lajas. We returned to what now felt like a very empty condo with the predictable debris of having three energetic young ladies in weeklong residence. Our spirits were lifted later in the day when Tia Loca and her son returned to spend Carnivale with us. It will help but the feeling of loss remains gaping, but I’m going to focus on the past week and the lifelong memories made as the granddaughters continued to completely conquer my existence. A lot more happened but I will rely on the seemingly thousands of pictures to more adequately demonstrate how much fun was sent down range.

Bro-in -Law, Tia Loca and I

BR3 Supervising Grandpa

Boys Gather around Grill

Gelato Time

Happy with Gelato

Last Sunset Together

Grandpa Your Pants are Too Dry

And You Make a Great Stand

Departure Time

One Last Gelato Run

Saturday Departure

Friendly Cat at Bro in Law's House

FBR Exhausted in Panama City Hotel

Wingman Finds His Beer

Last Evening's Sunset

Tia Loca Dancing the Sun Away

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RECURRING CHARACTERS:                                     

ABFA – Amazing Best Family Athlete - my daughter in law; BR3 – Blog Reader #3 – granddaughter #3; BRS - Blog Reader the Sequel - second granddaughter; Cantankerous Friend – friend since grade school who likes to argue about everything, poses as radical leftist to attract women; CRC - Connecticut Riverboat Captain – another close friend from high school, renowned sailor of the big river; Curbside Girls – close friends of my daughter acquired during him her single days in Brooklyn; Deckzilla – our backyard deck which grew to monstrous dimensions once my wife got involved in planning; Favorite Panamanian - the wife (of course); FBR - First Blog Reader - first granddaughter; First Friday – celebrations to mark the First Friday of the Week; Great Aunt - my elder sister; Keene Friends 1 & 2 – friends since high school from my home town of Keene, NH; Kindergarten Friend – friend since kindergarten whom I reunited with after many years; Maine and Virginia Musqueteras – two close friends of my wife – her US sisters, my wife is the 3^rd Musquetera (musketeer); Namesake Nephew – son of Great Aunt and Soxfather named after me; Neighborhood Mafioso - wife's close friend and Panamanian mafia member; PanaGals – female relatives /friends of my wife from Panama; Panamanian/Latin Mafia – inevitable group of Latino friends my wife accumulates wherever we have lived & their spouses; PCR - Pittsburgh College Roommate– high school friend, also a “Minor Celebrity” in Pittsburgh; PCR+1 - Pittsburgh College Roommate’s wife; Riggins - also known as the Grandpuppy, son's dog; Soxfather - my brother in law; Tia Loca – wife’s younger sister; Wingman – my son in law; Wingmom – Wingman’s mom, of course