moving to miami

 so we moved to miami two nights ago and i've been writing my first post in my head several times since we've been here.  once, first thing in the morning laying in bed yesterday hearing the cacophonous clanking and banging construction noises out our window starting at 8:00 a.m. - what a change from the gentle scrapes of rakes in the dirt, a little owl shuffling in its cage on the picnic table outside our window, and the silly brays of the donkeys in the mornings.  we were warned by the owner of the building the day before our arrival of the road construction going on outside our rental where we're staying for two weeks before moving into our long term rental in south beach.   this morning it wasn't as bad and ezra was able to sleep his usual 12 hours instead of being woken up at 8:00 a.m. after only falling asleep at 3:00 a.m. the night before!

 ezra is an amazing little traveler.  he was excited to go to miami and referred to it as miami, your - ami, mommy's ami, and daddy's ami, making us all giggle and smile for days.  he was so excited at LAX dancing in the lines at check in, security, and boarding.  on the plane he read his books from gigi and snuggled in the airplane blanket with pippi and ate graham crackers from bee.  how nice to have doting grannies!  we're going to miss them so much.  we arrived in miami at 10:20 p.m. and saw the city's skyline and high rise hotels along miami beach.  ezra noticed the long skinny island of miami beach and said "there's the island" and of the city lights and waterways "that looks awesome!"  it did and we were all excited to land at our new home for the next 5 and a half months.

at the airport we waited for our baggage for a long while and noticed a different energy in miami compared to the affected, uptight, rush of los angeles.  everyone seems happier and genuine.  there were some young college age kids with a guitar and they were playing and serenading the crowd waiting patiently for their bags - there was about a 30 minute delay - and people were clapping, laughing, and saying bravo!  you hear the beautiful sound of spanish being spoken all around you - ezra picked up on this too and asked me later in the car driving to south beach to teach him spanish.  he pulled his trunki suitcase the whole time everywhere by himself and i pulled him on it for rides as entertainment while waiting for the bags to start coming.  i paid double for that thing in st. maarten but it is turning out to be worth every penny.

here is where we are staying temporarily.  i found it on vrbo.com.  it was easy to find and to get in with the directions from the owner.  we have a safe and comfortable place to lie our heads at night and it was quiet all night long until.....

we heard this guy digging up the road next to us.  

we went outside to leave on our errands and saw that diver on the left walking with the city workman.  we saw the sewer spewing out a pipe down the road and smelled sulfur.  whatever they're doing, they were digging deep down yesterday.  it was LOUD.  this morning wasn't so bad though.  we got to bed earlier last night after a full day of driving around miami running errands while we have our rental car.  one of our missions is to find michael a car and it is turning out to be the most stressful part of our move.  when you're on a med student budget, it makes things like buying used cars a little shady.  the first one we test drove yesterday had michael climbing through the passenger door over the center console to get to the driver's seat.  as we drove around the car owner's neighborhood, i looked back at ezra to see a cockroach crawling on the seat next to him.  i stepped on a flea getting in and we saw another cockroach on the way back.  my skin was crawling for five minutes after that ride.  last night we went to see another, which turned out to be a great car, but we got lost on our way home and ended up more than half way to fort lauderdale instead of heading down to south beach.  we got home very late and very grumpy.  i am so happy now that we all had a good night's sleep.  we have another day or two of errands and then i will be able to take in my immediate surroundings.  we haven't even seen the ocean yet!  hopefully in the next two days we'll have a car for michael to get to work and a bike for me and ezra to get around on.