"That Would Be Nice"

Whenever I ask Marcelo if he wants me to make him a certain thing for breakfast or dinner, he always responds, "That would be nice." I don't know why, but it makes me laugh every time. I'll say "Do you want bacon, eggs and toast for breakfast?" and he says, "That would be nice." Why is that so funny to me?

Maybe because it's so unexpected. It's not just an outright "yes" or even a more casual "yeah." It's quite formal and almost thankful. It's like he's expressing gratitude before he even receives the food. Sometimes I wonder if he's translating something directly from Spanish and that's why it sounds so funny: Because it's so formal.

In Ecuador, when you would ask someone if they wanted you to help them, or give them something, they would respond, "No seas maldito" which LITERALLY translates to "Don't be damned." I am not kidding you!! That is the literal translation!! So you can understand why I didn't understand it the first time I heard it. I remember being with Judd and we went over to a new member's house. We were giving her reading lessons. (One day I'm going to write a blog about giving reading lessons in Ecuador. I promise I'll make you cry) Anyway, when she got to the door, we realized she didn't look too good, so we asked her what was wrong. She said her belly had been hurting her all day, and she didn't know why.

We asked her if we could do anything to help her, like the laundry or feeding her kids. And she says, "No seas maldito." Judd and I had NO IDEA WHAT THAT MEANT!! We just like stood there looking at her. Then she started talking about her belly again and we asked again if we could help and she said again, "No seas maldito." If memory serves me right, she had to say it one more time before one of us turned to the other one and said, "I think that means yes." I don't rememer who finally figured it out, but we were really glad we did. We felt like idiots for a while there. And even later on when we realized she had to say it THREE times to get us to understand.

Anyway, this post is about Marcelo and the funny things HE says. When he says, "That would be nice" it makes me smile and realize that I have a very polite husband. You'd better believe that he's going to teach our children to say, "Si, Senor" and "Si, Senora" to adults. So this post is a belated Father's Day homage.

See, I needed to wait until I had some good pictures of him and Evita. And here are some of them:

The first one is a little dark, but he didn't know I was taking it, so he's totally doing this naturally. And I love the serene look on Evita's face. She LOVES being held by her father.

And this look on Evi's face makes me love both of them so much. Notice the Boppy under Marcelo. He loves using it to hold her up. And she loves it too.

And here they are watching some more TV. Usually Marcelo holds her right when he comes home and is watching TV. Hence lots of couch shots.































My two favorite pictures are the one of her screaming and then seeing how Marcelo calmed her down by talking to her (as shown in the next frame). And the other favorite is of him holding her head by the sides. Like his hands are the bubble wrap around her precious melon head.

Marcelo is such a great dad. He HATES changing diapers, but he'll do it whenever I ask him. He'll also walk the floor with her for hours at a time singing to her and bouncing her around to put her to sleep or to just soothe her. Thursday night he actually walked around with her for 45 minutes while I went to sleep and slept soundly from 10 pm to 3 am. I had no idea he did this until the next morning he told me about it.

He claims that he "knows her" better than I do. And sometimes I think he might be right!! For some reason she'll scream her head off with me, but daddy can make her hush right up. I think it's because he sings hymns to her. Her favorite is "How Firm A Foundation" and "Lord Dismiss Us With Thy Blessing" (The latter is a VERY popular hymn in Ecuador. I knew both verses by heart so if given the opportunity to pick a song for district meeting, this was always my choice. Also, the song has my husband's name in it, so I would sing it when I was missing him). I love to hear him sing to her. He says I need to sing to her more. I think he might be right, but it's hard singing to her at 3 am when all I really want to be doing is sleeping. And I don't think my voice is as good as his for soothing purposes.

Marcelo is a great example of what I should be doing almost always. He's so strong, with such a strong will. He's a great example to me of hard work and dedication and just sheer desire. I work hard every day to make him proud of me. I love my husband. He's a great father, and a great man. Happy Father's Day Marcelo!