Utah Mom in Mexico

2009-08-06T17:40:00.000-07:00

The trips home

In the opposite order of our arrival in Mexico, we left. The kids and I first flying to Utah on July 5th and Dave starting his drive on the 6th.

The flight was mostly uneventful (just as planned) with a few crying bits courtesy of Charlie. He has been so excited to go on a "big airplane". Whenever we'd see an airplane in the sky he'd say "I go in", and for a month I've told him he would get to soon. So at the airport, I showed him the airplanes and he couldn't wait to get in. But as soon as we were in it, he would see another out the window and whine to "go in". No amount of explaining would satisfy him that we were in an airplane already. He didn't like sitting in a seat and wouldn't take a nap at the proper time, so became pretty cranky. Then we had to rush out of the plane in Pheonix to catch our other flight. Jane pushed the luggage cart through customs and to our new gate like a trooper, but both Milli and Charlie wanted me to carry them. Not even close to possible. Hence more crying. But we made it to the gate with no time to spare and were very glad to see my mother when she picked us up at the airport in Salt Lake.

We stayed with my parents for the night and woke up early to go to the house. The kids ran around looking at everything. Every sentence was "Remember this..." , "This is the best day of my life" or "I love this house". We immediately started to unpack all of the boxes in Jane and Milli's room so they'd be able to sleep there that night.

Dave's trip was equally uneventful. He did choose a different route home though. Instead of heading for the Laredo, TX border crossing, he took the coast up to Arizona. This route is supposed to be faster, but you have to stay a night in Mexico, which now that we're old pros, we were willing to let Dave do. He said it was wonderful to be on cuotas (tollroads) almost the whole way. He stayed in Los Mochis, Sinaloa, MX the first night; Pheonix, the second; home by the third.

Tope (speed bump) warning sign. We won't miss these.

Hmmm... hard to decide which way to go.

We'll miss the old Pemex stations...back to pumping our own gas.
We're very glad to be home, especially the kids, but we will always treasure our memories of Mexico. And we hope to make it back in the near future, at least to visit.

2009-07-19T19:52:00.000-07:00

Our last Saturday night

Almost the whole year we've kept up a tradition for Saturday nights. We'd head to the Ajijic, San Antonio or San Juan Cosala plaza mejor and eat tacos at a taco stand.

My favorite are in San Antonio. Dave, Jane and I get the Tacos Adobada. Riley, Charlie and Milli get the Bistek. Adobada is Bistek with a spicy sauce on them.
Dave likes the Tacos al Pastor in Ajijic best, they are pork done on a spit.

San Antonio has lots of toppings which is pretty unusual in Mexico. Most tacos stands we've been to only have onion, cilantro and lime to put on them.

The kids always get soda with their tacos. Saturday is one of the few times we let them get soda. I usually get horchata, a rice and cinnamon drink that reminds me of watery rice pudding. Charlie often ends up drinking all of my first cup full.

Frequently after we get tacos, we go to the nearby heladeria (ice cream shop) and get ice cream or popsicles. My favorite is a lime popsicle or a Magnum bar. I know Dave will soon start having Magnum bar withdrawals. He ate a ton of these. We've had them before in Europe, but never seen them in the US. The ice cream and popsicles are usually made right in the store. (Except the Magnums).
I was glad we had our last Saturday night free to have our tradition one last time. We'll miss it.

2009-07-16T14:37:00.000-07:00

So about our car...

Over the past year our car had taken a real beating. The curbs in Mexico are uneven height, you have to parallel park almost everywhere and people will hit your car and drive away as a general rule. The bumpers on both ends are scratched up. The hubcaps (especially on the right side for some reason) are beyond description. But the overall body hadn't had much happen to it. Until one day when our neighbor started some work on the water system in the area directly in front of our house. In fact, on the afternoon in question, I exited my front gate to take a walk and I found a ditch in our driveway that completely blocked us from leaving our house by car. No notice. It even seemed a surprise that someone lived there. Luckily I had about 1 hour till I had to pick up the kids from school. They assured me "no problemo". But having heard that enough that I knew I needed to check again when I got back from my walk. The owner was there and again told me it would be ready in a half hour when I needed to leave.

So they filled in the ditch directly in front of the house with enough room for the car to exit on either side of a metal pipe sticking 3 feet out of the ground. I got out and back in safely. Dave was not so lucky. Later in day he left to run an errand and when he got back was driving through the gap when the car slipped on some rocks and slid backward toward the pipe. The pipe scratched a line across 2 panels of the car.

Dave was so upset that it had happened, he looked for a body shop and made an appointment almost immediately.

He wanted to get it fixed in Mexico, if possible, because he knew it would be loads cheaper. It was. The bid was for 1200 pesos, less than $100.

Shortly before the day of our appointment I was trying to parallel park at Milli's school and hit the bumper of another car directly below the scratch. Not our best driving week. Luckily the other driver said "esta bien" and I didn't have to worry about paying him off. And the painter didn't charge us any more because of the new damage.

We scheduled to take it in on a Friday afternoon and pick it up on Saturday afternoon.

As promised, it was done. But it was the wrong color.

So we scheduled again. The weather was too wet.

And again. Not sunny enough.The shop is very unprofessional and is exposed to the elements as you can see.

And again. Not finished. Sanded but not painted.

Keep in mind every time Dave has to take it 30 minutes away to the shop and take a bus back. And then take a bus there again to bring it back home.

Finally we took it in the next Friday afternoon to be finished by 6pm. Dave calls me from the shop says that it is not done but he will leave it overnight to be finished by morning. We had planned to attend the circus that evening. So Laura picked up me and the kids and Dave took the bus and we met at the circus. We were late but we got there. While we were there it started to rain. We were all going to take the bus home, but Laura crammed all 8 of us in her little car and took us home.

Now we get to the day we were going to go to Selva Magica and Guadalajara. We finally get the car back at 4pm after being promised it by morning. It looks good. The right color and cheap, but certainly not worth all the hassle.

2009-07-15T13:28:00.001-07:00

Now that we're home...

I guess I should catch up on the last month in Mexico.

The last place on my "places to visit" list that was left to visit was Guadalajara. Sure we've been there any number of times, but only to the airport, mall, and Costco. Not exactly historic. So on our last Saturday we planned to get going at about 10am and head up to Selva Magica and then take a tour of Guadalajara Centro. Unfortunately we had a holdup with some repair work on the car (I'll blog on that later) and didn't get off till about 4pm. No Selva Magica! But we did make it for a late tour of Guadalajara after first getting on the wrong bus, and squeezing in a KFC (yuk) dinner. Unfortunately most of the tour was in the dark and hence no good pictures but here's what we got.
We sat up on the top of the double-decker bus. The kids had fun bus surfing and grabbing leaves off the trees that barely missed our heads: 2 lawsuits waiting to happen in the U.S.

This is a side view of the Cathedral that is featured on almost everything Guadalajara. The 2 spires.

2009-06-18T20:01:00.000-07:00

Noisy Mexico

There are many little reasons that I haven't posted in a while. Just not feeling like it, tired, lazy, nothing really exciting going on, and just plain sad we'll be leaving here so soon.

I'm tired for a combination of reasons. Last week started a festival in San Juan Cosala, which means fireworks all hours of the day (the first one's were at 5:15 am right outside our house), parades, and music.

Also elections are on July 5th, which also means more fireworks, parades, and music.

For the past few months these have been common sights.

But lately these are also a daily sight.This is right outside our house.

I've been meaning to ask our mexican friends if mexicans as a whole are more politically involved than us Americans, or if it's just that they like fireworks, parades and music. My suspicion is the later.

It's also been unbearably hot. The kind of hot that zaps your strength and makes you go to bed at 8pm. But that seems to be getting better. That might mean that I'll feel like sitting at a computer to post, but since I have a lot of other excuses, I doubt it.

2009-06-03T17:53:00.000-07:00

Mexico City

We took a chance this weekend and went to Mexico City. The flu alert has been dropped and hotels were offering all kinds of deals so we decided to do it. And I'm so glad we did.

We decided a long time ago that if we ever did make it to "Mexico" (mexicans leave off the "City"), we didn't think we wanted to drive while we were there and we were right. The drivers are crazy! So we took an overnight bus on Friday night, arriving about 6am to our hotel downtown near the Zocalo (central plaza). The first class buses here are very nice, with seats that almost fully recline, movies and snacks, almost like an airplane. I can't say I got a full night's sleep, but better than some red-eye flights I've taken.

At about 9am, after breakfast and a little nap, our driver and tour guide met us at the hotel and took us to the pyramids north of the city. These are the most amazing ruins we've seen here, so well worth the trip. There are 2 major pyramids, the pyramid of the moon and the pyramid of the sun. You can't go to the very top of the moon one, but we all (except Charlie) made it up the 268 steps of the sun pyramid. Dave sprinted up it.

I'm loath to show these pictures because they reveal my terrible haircut, but maybe it will help me avoid the same mistake in the future.At the top of the sun pyramid. The pyramid of the moon is in the background.

While Dave waited for the kids and I to return from the top of the sun pyramid, groups of Mexican high school students accosted him to practice thier English for an assignment.

After much souvenior shopping, we headed to the Basilica of the Virgin Guadalupe in downtown Mexico. This is a complex similiar to the Vatican. Or that's what they are going for. It's biggest draw is a piece of the garment of a peasant on which a painting miraculously appeared after he had a visitation from Guadalupe (another name for the Virgin Mary). The garment has also miraculously lasted for almost 500 years.

We returned to the hotel, rested, ate, and then attended a dinosaur exhibit in the Zocolo before an early bedtime.These are the government buildings on the Zocalo where the president of Mexico calls out El Grito on Independance Day.

Our second day started early, the driver picking us up at 8am so we could drive a few hours south to some caves (grutas) in the state of Morelos. They were really amazing. Huge and so beautiful. We walked over a mile into them and weren't even close to the back end. Riley was so impressed by them, he said over and over how cool they were.

We also happened to be able to attend a performance of the Acapulco Symphony in the cave. The sound was unbelievable.

Next our tour guide took us to a nearby town called Taxco. It used to be a silver mining town. No more silver mines now, but hundreds of silversmiths and jewelry stores.These were the cobblestone streets in Taxco. I can't imagine how much work these were.

We walked around a while, ate lunch and looked through the church before setting out on the road again.

Unfortunately we hit end-of-weekend traffic going back into Mexico. It took us 4 hours instead of 2 to get back. But even though our driver was really crazy, I was sure glad Dave and I weren't trying to navigate ourselves through the traffic.

We could have stayed another day in the city to see the more of the historic sites, but it turned out that most of them are closed on Mondays, so we decided to cut our visit short and go home Sunday night on the bus. We let the kids still have Monday off school and they took 4 hour naps to catch up.

This was our last weekend trip here in Mexico and I think it was a good one to end on. I have loved having these experiences with the kids. I hope they remember them thier whole lives, I know I will.

2009-05-28T19:12:00.000-07:00

It finally happened...

Our first (and hopefully last) scorpion sting. Riley came down last night at about 9:30pm to inform us he had just been stung by a scorpion that had gotten in his bed. He said it felt like a thorn went into his leg and he looked down and saw it scamper away. (There is probably a better word to describe the way a scorpion quickly crawls, but scamper is all I can think of). He said it didn't hurt any worse than a bee sting and after about an hour it didn't hurt at all. We kept him up for a while to watch him and make sure he didn't have any reaction to it. He seemed fine. He had a hard time going back to bed, though. I don't blame him. Dave and I were a little freaked out ourselves. We're getting the house sprayed ASAP.

2009-05-21T18:49:00.000-07:00

Street sign Rehab

Before we left our old house, we did a little service project for our neighborhood. A median nearby had been set on fire to control the weeds, but they didn't bother to protect the street sign. It was uprooted and burned, therefore useless. Dave decided we should leave our mark on our little Riberas community.

We sanded.

Painted.

And re-stenciled the street names.

Then the Dave and kids went took it down the street for reinsertion. A nearby construction worker noticed their project, helped them out and promised to fill the base with concrete the next day, which he did. Another testament to the kindness of the Mexican people.

If you're ever in this part of Ajijic, you can find "The Reeds" on the back of this beautiful, "new" street sign.

2009-05-17T09:10:00.000-07:00

Jane's 9th Birthday!

I love how excited my kids get on their birthdays...and Jane was no exception. She was happy the whole day, nice to everyone and even cleared her place after every meal. I don't overly spoil my kids on their birthdays. They only get a few presents, always a pinata and their choice of foods and cake, but I do try to make it their special day. But Jane's choices even got taken away some, since we have no oven. She wanted German Pancakes for breakfast, but had to pick crepes instead. No homemade key lime pie, not-so-good cheesecake and popsicles instead.
She couldn't even find the penguin pinata she wanted, so picked a Pooh Bear one. But instead of whining or being sad she hugged it and everyone in sight.

That is until she knocked the head off her pinata!

Dave and I couldn't find anything really good to get her here, so she got a gift certificate. I thought that was boring, so I made a scavenger hunt to lead her to her email where she would find her present.

I think it's funny that she's all sweaty in this picture from doing her scavenger hunt.

Happy Birthday Jane, we love you! You're a great 9 year old!

2009-05-16T15:33:00.000-07:00

What we did this week...

This week was much more enjoyable compared to the last few. Thanks to Dave. I did some much needed relaxing and got some chores and errands out of the way too. I read, suntanned, shopped, went to a doctor's appointment, got a pedicure and a crazy-short haircut. I will not be posting any pictures of myself, but this is what I was going for.

Turns out, not the best cut for me. Good thing hair grows.

The kids and I did some other fun things in the house including...

Playing games.

Picking flowers and finding bugs in the yard.

Making cakes and other sweets. This cake was made by Dave on the BBQ since our oven still doesn't work.

We also swam a lot, played video games and watched movies (so what else is new?).

We also made an activity jar, full of things we don't normally think of doing, for those bored moments.

I could slowly feel my sanity return and I was much more patient with the kids even when they wanted to watch more SpongeBob.

But I won't volunteer to keep them home another week, that is a promise.

2009-05-11T19:35:00.001-07:00

Happy Mother's Day

After having an unbelievably bad Friday and Saturday (of my own making, by the way), Dave and the kids gave me a great, relaxing Mother's Day.

It didn't start quite as well as it ended. I woke up at 2:30 a.m., not to breakfast in bed, but a mariachi band literally next door blasting some song in Spanish. I don't know if this was a serenade to a mother or just a band practicing. But again at 6:30 a.m.-- still not breakfast, but more loud music. Again at 8am....this time to breakfast and homemade Mother's Day cards. This is the first year that I slept in till it was brought to me. Usually 5 people making breakfast wakes me up. That's when my good day started. And I thought Dave had forgotten.

We had no church, due to the flu, so I lazed in bed reading till 10:30.

For a while the kids and I made a mess doing paper mache flowers like these. (Ours aren't finished yet). Dave cleaned it up.

For lunch I ate leftover ceviche, my favorite.

More reading and lazing.

I made dinner, but only because I wanted to. Dave and the kids did dishes.

Presents from Dave. Including Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream all for myself, that costs about $10 for a pint here.

The best thing of all was Dave made me a schedule for the coming week that included 3 or 4 hours of me-time every day. It changed the week I was dreading into a week to look forward to. My bad Friday and Saturday had mostly consisted of me losing it because I've been taking care of kids nonstop for almost a month, and I couldn't handle the thought of another week.

I am so lucky to have such a thoughtful husband and sweet kids that forgive me for my many bad days. I feel like I can do it now.

2009-05-02T19:57:00.000-07:00

What a week!...

Exciting and utterly boring at the same time. As most of you know there is a severe swine flu outbreak in Mexico. Luckily there is not a single confirmed case in the whole state of Jalisco (our state). But the federal government has closed school until May 6th, so far, and most public events, activities are closed. Movie theaters, gyms, sporting events, some restaurants, etc. This leaves next to nothing for bored kids to do, except watch t.v. and play video games and boy, have we worn those out. Bought a new board game, new movies and even moved to a new house, but none of that has alleviated the boredom. We've let the kids take the occasional walk to a nearby 7-11 and get some ice cream, but other than that they have not left the house (or houses) for almost a week.

We moved on Wednesday to a house about 20 minutes away from our previous one. It's in a small town called San Juan Cosala. The house is not outstanding, but does have some endearing features. We'll miss the park in our front yard and how close we were to school and church, but we like some of these differences:

Whole-house purified water. No brushing our teeth from a cup.
Big room for Riley and Charlie.
Normal sized refrigerator.
New town to get to know.
Within walking distance of the plaza and small abarrote (grocery).
Nice office for Dave, far away from kid noise.

Some pics of the new house.

Hope we have something more exciting to report next week.

2009-04-27T21:07:00.000-07:00

Update on Riley's Science Fair project

As part of Riley's project, he used a device made by Steve Spangler, a professional speaker, and one of Dave's clients. After the Fair, Dave sent Steve some pictures of the results and he posted them to his blog here.

As you can imagine, Riley was over the moon.

2009-04-27T20:13:00.000-07:00

Manzanillo, Cuyutlan, and our 12th Anniversary

I recently made a list of the places I still want to go before I leave Mexico. It looks something like this:

Guatalajara Centro
Mexico City ruins
Beach one more time
Patzcuaro (try again)
Tonala
Tapalpa (check)
Ruins near Tequila (check)

Keep in mind there are many more I would love to see but these are within driving distance.

So this last weekend we debated between going to Mexico City and the Beach. I leaned more toward the beach (I always do and always will) and Dave relented. But I worried that the more we put off Mexico City the harder it would be to get there. (It's an 8 hour drive and only barely within our kid's car-tolerance-parameters.) And I was right. The now-famous Swine Flu is going strong in the D.F. and we probably won't make it there. But I'm also glad we didn't go because we might have caught it and that wouldn't be good either....especially if we died.

So we had a swine flu-free 4 days at the beach in and around Manzanillo. I picked this beach because there is a town to the south, Cuyutlan, that is supposed to have an Ola Verde (green wave) in April and May. It's a wave at dusk that glows green. Sounded cool. Well as is our luck on road trips, it is really only in May. We only found this out after we had settled in for a long stay at a beach side restaurant.

It's also famous for black sand. I'd call it dark brown, but look at that sand, it's not wet.

Luckily Dave thought to ask the waiter if we would be able to see the wave. No, solo en Mayo.

Also luckily we had already had a great experience nearby at a turtle sanctuary. After looking at full-grown rescued sea turtles in their tanks, the kids got to each release a baby turtle into the sea.

I thought it was one of the coolest things I'd ever done, while the kids acted as though this was something they did everyday. Charlie, although, would have nothing to do with it. After handing me the turtle, with a "mom. do. it," he wandered back toward the sanctuary.

The rest of the weekend was spent swimming in a great pool at a cool hotel in Manzanillo, eating lots of food and playing card games. All the kids were crazy for the pool, especially Charlie.

On Sunday, on our way home through Colima, we stopped to see a cave that we missed last time we were in Colima. It was not what I was expecting. This was how we got down to the cave.

I was so nervous. 87 steps with huge spaces between the railings that any one of my children could have fallen through to their deaths. Ok, a little dramatic, but I'm terrified of heights. It was really cool in the cave. And I did much better going back up.

And to make it even better, Sunday was our 12th wedding anniversary. Great weekend.

2009-04-19T18:47:00.000-07:00

Mexicans love their dead...

Although you can't tell from the state of their cemeteries. A cemetery in Mexico is a Panteon. This one is near a little village called Mezcala. It looks a mess, but it just because every tomb is different, individual and special. And as with all publicly owned areas, hard to keep tidy.
But what a gorgeous setting!

2009-04-12T19:26:00.000-07:00

Easter and Guachimontones

The kids have this week and last week off of school for Easter and thus far have been pretty bored.

We tried to prepare for Easter by making our own baskets. I'm no weaver so I thought this easy fabric and paper one would be just right for us from Family Fun:

Cute, right? A lot harder than they look when you have no printer, no fabric and like I said no weaving skills. We used some old T-shirts for the fabric and tried to copy the pattern from the website. Ours didn't look quite the same. After Riley saw how Jane's and Amelia's turned out, he chose an old ice cream container for his basket. I let Charlie follow suit.

But even though Milli allowed hers to be thrown away after Easter morning, Jane said she wanted to use hers next year. Who would have thunk? The power of doing it yourself.

During the last week we also did some cleaning, swam, went to Tobolandia for half a day and relaxed.

As a last minute trip, Saturday, we drove up to an archeological site near Tequila called Guachimontones. Round structures used for sports, performances and worship ceremonies.

Then ate at a seafood restaurant near the Lake. Laura bought some sugar cane fishing poles and the kids fished in a little, dirty pond at the restaurant.

Next week promises to be just as exciting with dentist and doctor appointments, more swimming (it's getting very hot), and a church party at our house. Maybe we'll have to take another trip to Selva Magica to add at least a little fun.

2009-04-05T13:39:00.000-07:00

I'm going to miss this place...

Last night Dave and I went out to dinner. We got a babysitter, Martha, we know her from church. She doesn't speak English, but she does a good job anyway. And boy you can't beat 35 pesos an hour. About $2.50. That's the first thing I started to miss last night. #2 We went to a restaurant high on a hill in San Juan Cosala. You could see the mountains, the lake and the town lights. The weather was awesome, some wind since we were so high, but so nice. At least once a week, it hits me how relaxing this place is. So much like a year long vacation, sometimes. #3 We ate a wonderful meal. There are so many great restaurants here, some holes-in-the-wall but others, like this one, 4 and 5 star restaurants. We ate crazily good food for about the equivalent of $30. Valet parking and live music. And no special occasion needed because it was sooo cheap. Just Saturday night. Oh, am I going to miss that.

I know it's still 3 months till we go home, but I already miss it here and am going to soak it up as much as I can.

2009-04-01T20:33:00.000-07:00

Day trip to Tapalpa

Tapalpa is a little mountain town similar to Mazamitla, a town we visited last fall. The thing that made me want to go to Tapalpa are these flowers.

They are made by kids at a school for the underprivileged and are made from recycled 2 liter bottles. I just think they are so cool and you can only buy them in Tapalpa.

Tapalpa had some other things going for it too. This church is pretty cool.

There are supposedly some cool rock formations to the north of the town and a waterfall to the south, but the kids opted to go to "Ecopark". One of those adventure parks where you zipline through the canopy of trees. Dave, Riley and Jane enjoyed that experience while Milli, Charlie and I enjoyed some slides and overpriced snacks.

I was really proud of Jane. She usually gets pretty nervous about things like this, but she was a pro. I mean, look how high she was. I wouldn't have been so brave.

2009-03-31T19:36:00.000-07:00

La Feria de Ciencias

Last week was the Science Fair for Riley and Jane. They were both assigned to groups of 3 or 4 to complete a science project. Neither of their groups were very ambitious, which was O.K. by me. I actually lucked out quite a bit. A mother from each of the groups took over the project and I had to do almost nothing.

Jane's group grew stalactites and stalagmites with baking soda.

Riley's did the old Mentos and Coke experiment, determining which soda caused the biggest explosions.

Riley's exhibit became very popular when it came time for the explosions.

I wish I had taken pictures of the Junior High and High School projects, they were pretty cool. The Jr. H. built bridges out of toothpicks glued end-to-end with Elmer's glue. The H.S. did chain reactions with dominoes and other objects. Riley and Jane liked those the best.

2009-03-25T19:57:00.000-07:00

Hoops anyone?

This is by Chapala Lake. Obviously someone thought the lake couldn't get any fuller.

2009-03-20T20:36:00.000-07:00

Mr Pebbles and Jr.

I'm finally going to blog about our new pets. We've had them for a few months now. They are red-eared slider turtles. Babies, I think. We only got them on the condition that Jocie would be willing to take them when we leave. Turtles this size are illegal in the US. Too small. Kind of like those toys that get outlawed because of their small parts. Kids put them in their mouths. And these toys will give you salmonella poisoning.

These were Jane's idea, but all the kids like them. They don't do much. Eat, poop, scamper around a little when you try to catch them. They kinda remind me of Charlie.

They came with some pellets of food that they haven't touched. I found out on the internet that they are supposed to eat vegetables and feeder fish. We just do broccoli. Seems to be the only thing ours like.

They also love these fake turtles we put in the container. And doing yoga in the sun. See that foot, stays like that for hours.

2009-03-18T20:37:00.000-07:00

I will miss Grandma Browne

On Sunday, Dave's grandma Edna Smith Browne passed away after battling cancer for over a year. Her children all surrounded her in her last hour. I will miss most dinners at her house on Sunday, always seeing a quilt being tied in her living room, her homemade gift tags, and especially going to the Utah County Symphony with her the last 6 years.

Dave is in Utah. The funeral is tomorrow. Wish I could be there to say goodbye. Bye Grandma.

2009-03-14T13:36:00.000-07:00

Mexican Food Part 2

Wow! It's been 5 months since my last (and only) food installment. Time flies. But I have been taking lots of yummy food pictures, so I've got some of my favorites ready for you.

First, we have come into berry season, believe it or not. A few miles down the road is a Driscoll's berry farm. We've been seeing the plants growing for months, and now the berries are here. I can get a kilo (2.2 lbs) of strawberries for about $1 at a fruit stall in the tianguis (street market). The raspberries and black berries are about twice that. We love it. We eat berries in or on something 2 or 3 times a week. The only pain is washing them. We wash all our produce in iodine, just in case. Berries start to go bad soon after washing so we have to eat them fast.

We also have been having a huge lime harvest. Every morning 10-20 on the ground. We've made tons of limeade and frozen lime juice ice cubes. Can't get enough. These were from 3 nights.

Milli's and Charlie's new favorite drink is this soy based, guanabana flavored drink. You say it like the Sesame Street song Mahnamahna. We just love when Charlie asks for it. It's hilarious. We sing the name whenever we drink it.

My new favorite thing to order at a restaurant is ceviche. It is typically an appetizer. It is a kind of salsa made with fish or shrimp and put on a tostada. But the meat is not cooked with heat, only with lime juice. Obviously, you should trust the maker, because it can make you sick if not fully marinated. I find I am always safe getting the shrimp kind, because the fish kind sometimes has too much lime. This one is from a stand at the Ajijic tianguis, it is fish and exactly the way I like it.

Another Mexican delicacy is this corn on the cob. It's usually sold in the plaza mayor or at other places where there may be a crowd. You take your chances with it, because it may be tender or it may be tough. You can also have it cut off the cob and put in a cup. Various toppings are offered; lime, salt, cheese (not sure what kind it is), cream, and of course chili. Dave likes cream and cheese. If your lucky, it will be sold out of a wheelbarrow. This one was not.

Last, one of the kids favorite things to order at a restaurant is Chocomilk (don't say the k). Yes, it's just chocolate milk, but they put lots of chocolate and blend it, I think. Whatever they do, we think it's tasty.

I hope you've enjoyed part 2 in our tour of Mexican foods. I promise to be more timely on the next one.

2009-03-09T20:25:00.000-07:00

Birthday present

I finally got all the details worked out for the much-anticipated Ultra-light plane ride. I was referred to a guy in Chapala that organizes adventures for tourists and he kindly arranged (for a small part of the fee, I'm sure) an Ultra-light flight for us even though it wasn't on his usual list of "adventures". Unfortunately, he didn't really know what an Ultra-light plane was so he booked Dave on this:

It turned out for the best though, because even on this bigger plane, Dave got horribly airsick. He said he felt fine until they turned around to come back and his stomach flipped. He didn't hurl, but spent some time wondering where he would do it if it got any worse.

The kids and I stayed at the airfield and watched his take-off and landing. As soon as he got back, Charlie said "my turn". And was only placated when he got to sit in the cockpit. He loved watching those planes.

2009-03-04T19:06:00.000-08:00

I've been tagged

My sister tagged me with the 4th folder, 4th pic thing. The picture turned out to be very applicable for a post right now.

This is of our Browne family reunion 3 years ago. I was pregnant with Charlie. I know it was three years ago because another is planned for this June and we won't be able to make it back for it. I knew it was this year, but had really hoped it would be later in the summer, after we were back. We just can't afford to fly everyone home in June and then again in July. I'm going to really miss it. It's Dave's family officially but I feel very close to them. This year's picture will probably be twice as big with all the marriages and births. I'll be wishing I was there. Miss y'all, Brownes.

If you haven't done this yet, you are officially tagged.

2009-03-03T19:20:00.000-08:00

Weekend in Guanajuato

We made another of our weekend trips again. We'd heard from all kinds of people about Guanajuato and how cool it is. So it was time to finally see for ourselves and we loved it. It is our favorite city in Mexico so far. (except Ajijic, of course)

On the way to Guanajuato, we stopped in Leon. This city makes most of the country's shoes and you are supposed to be able to get a great deal. It was all a bit overwhelming and so we only bought Charlie some shoes. He was growing out of his and wouldn't let me put any others on him. His old shoes were blue and he seemed taken with the color, so we looked for another pair of blue ones. We found some that were all leather and suede. Though I probably wouldn't have picked them out on my own, he seemed taken. I think they are pretty good quality and we spent less than $20.
Look behind the street performer and you'll see a bit of the large amounts of shoes we had to choose from. Blocks and blocks of these shops.

On to Guanajuato. It was truly amazing. The whole city is full of driving tunnels. I heard that they used to be rivers, but don't know if that's true. It reminded us a lot of Venice. Except that instead of canals you have tunnels and instead of gondolas, you have cars. Driving there was a little like trying to drive in Venice, too. Nerve-wracking with people everywhere and very narrow streets.

The town is also very hilly. We went up to a "panoramic" area to look at the town on a tour we took. They use very bright colors to paint the houses and shops. You can see them even from very far away.

In the center, was a great church and a beautiful plaza. This city hosts an internationally famous Cervantes art festival and supposedly is booked a year in advance. We ate dinner one night at a restaurant just outside the church. It felt like we were in Europe somewhere.

We went to a couple of museums while we were there too. Very morbid people, the Mexicanos. One was a museum that showed the torture devices of the Spanish priests during Colonial times. The other was the Mummy Museum. It was a museum of the bodies of people they found in a cemetary that were mummified because of the elements in soil here. Of course the kids loved both of these museums.

Riley thought this one had very clean teeth for a mummy.

We also went down into an old silver mine. Not as interesting to the kids.
I highly recommend Guanajuato to anyone. It was an awesome trip.

Before we left the area, I wanted to stop by another town that had been on my list of possible candidates for our "year of adventure." In my research, lots of people talked about a town called San Miguel de Allende, near Guanajuato. I wanted to see if I had made a good decision.
This very cool gothic church was in the plaza.

San Miguel was very different from Ajijic. Much bigger and more hip. Lots of interesting shops and nice restaurants. But also in the middle of the desert, an hour from Guanajuato. I have to admit that I really liked it. But I didn't feel at all like we were in the wrong place. Ajijic has been perfect for us this year and we'll miss it terribly when we go.

2009-02-24T19:15:00.001-08:00

Dave's birthday and Valentine's Day

Dave was in Orlando for a conference on the 14th (I'd like to thank the smarty pants that thought a conference over Valentine's every year would be a good idea), so we celebrated when he got back.

I was having a hard time thinking of a good present for Dave (so what else is new). There's not a lot here that he wants to buy and anything I could have had shipped from the states just means something else to drag back home. Dave has been wanting to go on a Ultra-light plane flight. We see them circling the lake every weekend. So I figured the best gift I might be able to give was to schedule one for him. We both put things off till the last minute, so I thought it would save us some rushing to fit it in before we left. Well, it turned out to be more of a job than I thought. No one seems to know exactly how to schedule one and I spent 4 hours during the weekend he was gone trying to find the airfield in Chapala where they supposedly take off.

So I'm still working on that.

To welcome Dave home, the kids and I decorated our bedroom with tons of valentine hearts.

I made some barbeque for dinner and a Chocoflan (of course) for dessert.

He got some great books from his parents. Always needed.

Dave also brought home some presents for the kids from Orlando. They are pretty cute, if also incredibly cheesy.

I hope he had a good day. He makes me laugh every day and I can't imagine my life without him. Love you Dave.

2009-02-18T19:29:00.000-08:00

Visit from Grandma and Grandpa Reed

This last week we were lucky enough to have Dave's parents come visit us for a few days. They got to see some of our favorite spots, eat lots of great food, celebrate Amelia's birthday, go to church with us, go to Tonala for some shopping and visit Mezcala Island. It was lots of fun and we were sad they couldn't stay longer.

As for the rest of you, we offer an open invitation to anyone that would like to visit. We have a few extra beds and the kids love to sleep on the furniture. If Guadalajara is too expensive a flight for you, we'd love to meet you in Puerto Vallerta and spend time at the beach. We are serious. We love to show everyone this great place we live.

2009-02-17T19:08:00.001-08:00

Random Mexico

I've decided I need to post more pictures of the random and unusual things we see here in Mexico....so here's the first one.

This afternoon a horse was grazing out our front door. We don't have a horse. It looks farther away than it really was. I was afraid it might graze me.

2009-02-12T11:18:00.000-08:00

Amelia's Birthday

Amelia is 5! And boy did we celebrate.

Dave's parents were here the 7th to the 11th, so we decided to celebrate early, On Sunday the 8th, while they were still here.

Amelia picked all the meals for the day. Breakfast: Cocoa Puffs and Berry Yogurt. Lunch: Steak, Baked Potatoes, and Cucumbers with salt and Lime. Dinner: Homemade Pizza. (Dinner got replaced with sandwiches on account of the fact I was too tired to make homemade pizza and noone was very hungry after such a big lunch).

Amelia opened oodles of presents. Very quickly. Hardly stopped to look at them. But has since made up for it by playing with them nonstop.

Amelia wanted a puppy cake. This is the best I could do in Mexico.

Today, her official day, we brought a cake for all the kids at school and she got to wear a dress instead of her uniform.

Tonight, we finally did her SpongeBob pinata.

I'm so glad she's 5. She's growing up so fast and she is such a fun and funny part of our family.

2009-01-27T13:58:00.000-08:00

Milli's in Preschool

First day of school
In her uniform.

I agonized over this decision for a while, but it seems to be working out great. We chose to send her to a school other than the one Riley and Jane go to, called Tohui. It is only a preschool. Ages 18mo to 6 years (Kindergarten is considered preschool here). She has a Spanish and an English teacher. Her English teacher is Brandy, a friend of ours from Colorado. She goes from 8:50am to 1:30pm every day. She's exhausted at the end of the day, but there is so much more peace in our lives. She was so bored at home and had actually regressed in learning her alphabet and other things we worked on last year. She still says she doesn't like it (something she learned from the other kids), but talks about it all the time and seems happy when she's there. I miss her at home, her constant crafts, and playing with Charlie, but this is good.

2009-01-23T13:52:00.000-08:00

Back up to around Christmas

I wanted to post about 3 Kings Day. I think it was on January 6th, or 5th. We did our stuff on the 5th, family night. First, there is this bread called Rosca that they sell in the stores. It has dolls of an infant Jesus hidden inside. You cut it open (the cutting is supposed to represent the danger that Jesus was in from King Herod) and whoever finds the dolls is supposed to make tamales in February for Candlemass Day. Not exactly sure what that is yet.

Here were our doll finders: (plus me)Not sure if we'll do the tamales, but you never know. I'd love to know how to make them.

We also read the part of the Christmas story about the wise men. I don't think the kids had ever heard that part before. Except maybe the "We three kings" song.

Also that night, the kids are supposed to put out a shoe for the 3 kings to leave a present in. In some places they do this in place of Santa. We were unprepared, so skipped this part. Hardly needed more presents.

I loved the focus on the Christmas story that this added and of course the extension of Christmas.

2009-01-18T07:12:00.000-08:00

The beach in Melanque

We decided to take my parents to the beach while they were here. We had heard good things about Barra de Navidad and Melanque and hadn't been there yet. They are about 1 hour north of Manzanillo. We were recommended another bungalow to stay in in Melanque, but were wary of the bungalows after our last experience. But this one turned out to be great. The rooms weren't new, but they were clean and included all the usual things, towels, TP, drinking water. But it was the grounds that were awesome. We weren't on the beach, but only 2 blocks away. There was a really nice and big pool, restaurant with a good singer at night, ping-pong table, basketball court, tennis courts, and the kids favorite, a playground with merry-go-round. Keep in mind, this is still Mexico so everything is old, but they tried to keep it all clean and nice. The kids slept in the living room on beds we made out of furniture. Milli especially loved her little nook.

We didn't spend as much time at the beach as last time, but it was still heaven for me. Love the sun, sand and water. Almost no waves at this beach. Riley was disappointed; he brought a boogie board this time.
We ate lots of great food.
We were so glad that my parents could come. It was fun to show them all around Ajijic and let them see how we're living. But we miss seeing them more often.

2009-01-18T06:54:00.000-08:00

Another Christmas

We had a great week with my parents. They brought with them more presents than the kids got on the real Christmas. :0 Of course the kids couldn't wait to open them. They all got things that they've played with all week long. And mom brought me and Dave tons of American food and spices. Plus our mail and packages we had sent to their house. I don't know how they fit any clothes in their suitcases. At least they had room for all the souvenirs they brought home.

2009-01-06T18:42:00.000-08:00

New Year and Puerto Vallarta

Puerto Vallarta is only a 5 hour drive from here, so we knew we wanted to go sometime while we were here and spend some time at the beach. Laura suggested New Year's Eve and that sounded great. We set off about 3pm. We planned to stay in a small village called Lo De Marcos in Nayarit, about 1 hour north of Vallarta. Laura promised it would be quieter than other beaches, especially Vallarta. We arrive around 7pm. Laura knew the owners of some bungalows, so we booked them. The price was a bit high for Mexico, but this is the most popular time for Mexicans to vacation, and it was a big place with 2 bedrooms and a kitchen, right on the beach. Unfortunately, we didn't realize when we booked it that bungalow is not a hotel, which means we had to provide our own towels, toilet paper and anything else we might be used to at a hotel. Disappointing, but would have been ok had the toilets worked. Also one of the 2 showers had no shower head and the hot water was only on if we bugged the manager to turn on the water heater. Dave wanted to change but being a smaller village there weren't a lot of other choices, much less any that were vacant. Laura promise of a quiet beach was great though. We visited a few other beaches and they were all so crowded.

We spent lots of time on the beach. Riley and Jocie loved playing in the surf which was thankfully very mild. Jane wasn't as brave, but enjoyed it too. We built sandcastles and searched the tide pools for fish. One day the local fisherman brought in a net that was full of 3-day-old fish that they couldn't sell so they let the kids throw them to the birds. Dave enjoyed himself reading a lot and taking pictures and video.

One day we went into Vallarta for lunch and a little shopping.

Another day we went to lunch in a nearby town called Sayulita. It was very touristy and crowded, but also looked like lots of fun. Maybe we'll come back and stay there.

Another afternoon we drove to San Blas and took a boat trip down a river to a crocodile nursery and a freshwater spring called La Tovara. Riley and Jocie were the only one's that swam, but they had fun jumping off the rope swing platform (both were too short to reach the actual swing).
It was very relaxing and fun. The kids loved it almost as much as me. I've always loved the beach. We're thinking of taking another beach trip when my parents get here next week. Maybe Manzanillo this time.

2009-01-06T18:39:00.000-08:00

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve is the focus of the Mexican Christmas celebration. We were lucky enough to be invited to a Christmas Eve dinner at Laura's mom house with some of her sisters and their families. She warned me that we would be eating very late and consequently be up late. I said "no problem, we'll stay as long as the kids hold out."

First, we went to the cathedral in Ajijic to see some nativity scenes that they set up there. Some with kids, others with statues and others with real animals, 5 or 6 in all. Laura said that it's been much better in other years.

Then we went to get set up for dinner, about 9pm. We talked and snacked til about 10:30pm and waited for one of the sisters to arrive. She owns a furniture store and keeps her store open late for last minute shoppers. Apparently there are a lot of those. At about 11pm, we sat down to eat. They had ordered in a turkey and sides from somewhere in Guadalajara and the turkey was a pre-cooked one. Very popular here. But it was still frozen inside so we nuked it and ate. I couldn't help but wonder if the sides were traditional or not. Laura said not. There was spaghetti noodles with ham and a white sauce. A cold, refried bean with some kind of fruit mixed in. Mashed potatoes, but no gravy and an apple salad with nuts. Interesting, though not bad. And fruitcake for dessert. None of the Mexicans ate that, so I wondered if it had been bought for our benefit. Yuk.

Then they exchanged gifts. All gifts are given on Christmas Eve, except of course Santa's and some they give later from the 3 wise men. It was fun to see the family exchange and hug and talk. They seemed very close. 6 sisters in the family, but only 4 there that night. 4 of the 6 married gringos, though 2 are divorced now. One of the sisters' husband was there. David, from New Hampshire. He told us a lot about his kids and watch ours a lot. I think he missed his, 4 all grown.

We were supposed to sing hymns, break a pinata and read the Christmas Story from the scriptures, but by now it was almost 1am and let me tell you, I was doing worse than the kids. They were having a blast. Even Charlie. I even tried to get him to cry, so I'd have an excuse to call it a night. Didn't work. But I think Laura could see that I was exhausted and let me know it was ok to go anytime. So we went. Fireworks were being let off outside and we realized we had not been prepared for a late night Mexican Christmas Eve.

2008-12-29T20:02:00.000-08:00

Our Homemade Christmas

Being away from home for Christmas has had its ups and downs but one thing I liked about this year is that we made all of our own decorations.

I copied an idea from a friend of mine that did an advent activity calendar with her kids this year. Thanks Claire! Instead of the 24 days, we just did 12. 24 seemed too much with Nutcracker practices and exams. For probably 6 of the 12 days we made some kind of Christmas decoration. We made Christmas ornaments for our itsy, bitsy tree, a wreath, stockings and a gingerbread house (from scratch).

For ornaments, we did cardboard gingerbread men, foam and wite-out candy canes (Riley's idea), foam Christmas lights, shrinky-dinks, and a popsicle stick star (also Riley's). A couple of my favorites are Amelia's Marge Simpson gingerbread lady and Jane's shrinky-dink manger scene.

The wreath I had started at Relief Society. It's made out of crepe paper.

We made stockings out of felt and Jocie joined us for that one.

The kids said they liked the gingerbread house the best but I thought it was an aweful failure. I've never made the house out of actual gingerbread. Usually graham crackers, but they are not available. I had a recipe for the house, but I think I didn't cook it long enough. It just crumbled under the pressure of dozens of m&ms. I even tried to prop it up with a cake mix and juice boxes to no avail.

2008-12-29T19:58:00.000-08:00

Teaching the kids about Charity

Most every Christmas, we set aside some money to do some sort of charity at Christmas. I had almost forgotten about it this year with everything going on, but Laura asked if I wanted to help her take some toys to an orphanage. It was very last minute, so at church we let the Relief Society know what we were doing and asked if anyone wanted to donate or go with us to deliver. Some donated and two others wanted to go with us. So this afternoon, one of the other women, Norah, and I took my kids to some stalls by the lake and the tianguis to look for some inexpensive toys. My kids were the best help in the "what would you want?" department, because they insisted they needed about half the toys themselves. I continually had to remind them that the toys and other things were not for us, but for some kids without any parents. I think they may have considered that a fair trade; parents for toys. After about 3 hours and 2500 pesos were spent, we felt like we were ready to go.
I was pretty excited. I have never been to an orphanage before and had no idea what to expect. This one has about 70 kids between the ages of 6 months and 16 years old.
When we arrived the kids gathered around and seemed very excited by the 2 pinatas we brought for Christmas Eve. We handed each of the kids a toy and I was pretty impressed with how polite and grateful they were. There was very little complaining about what they got, or even trading. We didn't spend very long there, but I hope my kids were impressed by how small and crowded it was. We asked them what they thought and Riley said it was kind of stinky. Amelia said she would not want to live there with all those kids and Jane said nothing.
How do you teach kids to be grateful for what they have and want to help others that aren't as fortunate? I just don't know. This was our stab in the dark.

2008-12-29T19:55:00.000-08:00

The Nutcracker

The kids have been practicing for a performance of the Nutcracker that their school does every year before Christmas. Both Jane and Riley were cast as candy dancers. Riley was very mad that he didn't get to be one of the candies on Heelies, because we left his at home.
I have to admit that it was much better than I had anticipated from a bunch of school kids. They go all out on the costumes and the dancing was uncomplicated, but kept the spirit of the ballet.
After the 2 performances, Jane, Riley and I attended the posada afterward, where we could buy food and socialize. They had my favorite, tamales, and some other simple foods. I was surprised to see them selling tequila alongside the sodas. Could you imagine that ever happening in the states? I noticed that they did check IDs.

Jane is still repeating her dance and teaches it to Amelia often (as per Amelia's request). Riley might have blocked it from his memory.

I'll post the video and some pictures as soon as I get them from Dave.

2008-12-29T19:40:00.000-08:00

Fireworks in Chapala

I'm going to try and catch up on my posts before we leave for Puerta Vallarta on Wednesday. Sorry to bombard you.

The second week in December, the city of Chapala decided they were going to start a new yearly event celebrating fireworks. Sounds like something weird to celebrate, but we were very excited because they were supposed to have fireworks every night for 4 nights at the church in Chapala and out on a barge in the middle of the lake. We looked up the schedule and every night the fireworks were supposed to start at 8pm. The first night, we had to study for exams so I sent Dave out to check out how crowded it was and what might be a good vantage point for attending on other nights. He have back about 9pm and said the fireworks hadn't start yet. Shortly after we could hear them start. So the next night we went out to dinner in Chapala and met some friends in front of the church. There was an English language choir and the fireworks started at about 8:30pm.

Reminded us a little of the fireworks over the Disney castle.

Milli with her friend Ella.

Not too bad. It was fun, but we heard the next night was supposed to be more impressive with the fireworks on the lake. So we headed out again, sat by the lake on the boardwalk and waited. And waited. Finally one or two went off. Then we waited some more. A few more. Finally at almost 10pm, we gave up and took tired kids home.

The next night we absolutely forgot about them until we heard them at about 10pm. They sounded great. Oh well.

2008-12-24T12:33:00.000-08:00

We miss you all and hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
Love the Reeds

2008-12-13T20:37:00.000-08:00

New family pics

So I finally found a photographer here. My friend Laura did all kinds of research for me and found Enrique Mora in Guadalajara for me. His website isn't great, but the photos looked better than any I had seen so far and time was getting short. I wanted to have it done by Christmas. So we booked him. Enrique doesn't actually speak very much English, but his partner Raul did, so we were able to communicate pretty well. I think that some of my friends and family that are photographers could have done a better job, but they didn't turn out too bad. I'm not going to share my favorite, because it will be my Christmas Card, but here are some of the others. I am glad I was able to get a family picture while we were here. And don't you love our Mexican attire?

2008-12-11T11:53:00.000-08:00

Nothing exciting to report

Not your usual entry, but this last week has been so busy, though not very exciting. Jane and Riley have exams this week, so we've spent every evening studying. We were going to go out of town this weekend but canceled because we had so many other not exciting things going on. I made a crepe paper wreath at church and Milli has been making endless 4 year old Christmas decorations for the house. And I've spent way too much time on Facebook. Never thought I would get into that. A couple of friends from my mission invited me to join and friends from here told me how much fun it is. So I did it. And it's very addicting finding out about long lost friends and realizing how old we all are. Warning: don't do it unless you intend on neglecting something else. Like life.

2008-12-02T19:41:00.000-08:00

The everchanging world of Charlie

As is true for most 2 year olds, the things that Charlie does changes from week to week and almost day to day. But I'll try to fill you in on the things he's learned and his many, many obsessions.

Charlie has learned to walk much better than he did at home. Everything is tile here, no carpet, so his late-blooming walking has been perfected and he's moved on to running and even jumping. He's learning to go up and down stairs if he's got a good handhold. He is saying a few more words now, but rarely volunteers them. It's always a surprise when he says something that I didn't coach him to say. Mom (or mommymia) Up and Why are his favorite words right now. He also answers virtually every question a stranger asks him by putting up 2 fingers.

I think as a consequence of moving, Charlie has become a blanket-boy. He always wants his blanket when he gets out of bed in the morning and at various times during the day. If he's suddenly quiet, often I will find him on the ground laying on it. Luckily he's not obsessive about it, so we can leave it home when we leave.

Charlie had taken up various crafts as a result of Amelia's example. His first was pens and pencils, writing little marks on paper (and sometimes furniture). Those evolved to circles and then circles with marks inside which we think were his attempts at happy faces. After drawing, he became obsessed with cutting paper into little bits. We even had a few power struggles with him at dinner time when he wouldn't stop cutting to eat. I can't tell what his current one is yet. It may be folding paper. But he hasn't gotten obsessive about it yet. He would do the others for hours everyday.

He also enjoys swinging on the swing, kicking a ball around the yard, playing his own version of hide and seek, and riding on a scooter while someone pushes him (though that usually results in a fall). His "throwing every ball available" obsession ceased when we got here, but he still throws a mean ball when he's in the mood.

He has become a bit of a couch potato, too. Whenever he wants to watch, he says "Bob" which means anything on TV, though he like SpongeBob almost as much as Amelia.

The kids still adore him and are great helps with him, but even they have commented on his developing "twoness". Oh well, nothing lasts forever.

2008-12-02T06:05:00.000-08:00

Amelia Bedelia

As we know, Amelia is always full of energy, words and will. Still true, yet I have seen a bit of a calming occur since we've been here. And I'm grateful for it.

Maybe it's, in part, because she is addicted to TV. Mostly SpongeBob. She would watch it all day long over and over if I let her. We have about 50 episodes recorded and she has watched them all till they are almost memorized. She can even quote a couple word for word. I know I shouldn't let her watch it so much, but when I'm doing hours of homework with the kids everyday and Dave is still working, it's the only way I've found that keeps her out of our hair. We recently limited her to 1 episode of SpongeBob a day, but she can watch other PBS shows during homework time.

Or maybe it's because we have been doing a lot of crafts. She especially loves painting and has ruined at least 3 shirts. We use cornstarch to make goop, make homemade salt dough, play with playdough, popsicle stick crafts, foam crafts, beads, glitter, whatever we can find at the local Papeleria. There is no such thing as a craft store here, so we take what we can get.

As said in Jane's post, Jane and Amelia do lots of make-believe together, but Jane is usually busy from 7am to after 5pm or later when homework is finally done. So Amelia also has started to play with Charlie some. Right now in fact she's pretending to read a book to him. Usually their play consists of running around the kitchen table screaming.

Amelia had also been busy at piano. Every time we go to the church to practice, she insists on her 5 minute long practice too. She's learned where all of the C's are, how to say the notes from A and not say H, what a middle C note looks like and we're currently working on what a whole note looks like and how many counts it gets. That one is tougher than it sounds for a 4 year old.

Amelia is also animal crazy. And there are plenty of animals here to keep her on the subject of a pet pretty much every day. To give her an animal fix, every so often we head to the animal shelter and let her torment the kittens. We have been meaning to take one of the dogs for a walk, but haven't gotten around to it yet.

Right now we are trying to decide if we should send Amelia to preschool in January. The current improved exchange rate makes the tuition cheaper and she is so bored at home. But a part of me has liked to spend oodles of time with her. (And I mean oodles, she takes no naps). We get on a little better now and I sort of feel like I'm giving up on that. At first she wasn't too keen on the idea because "they speak Spanish", but then I told her she would get to take a lunch box to school and that clinched it.

We still have a lot of laughs and a lot of tears with Amelia, but I think she's growing up a bit.

2008-11-30T19:30:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving

I hadn't planned on doing Thanksgiving this year. The kids had school. Turkey is really expensive. It's hot. (not that I'm complaining). And with no family here it just didn't feel like Thanksgiving.

But some friends called us to see if we wanted to join them at the Lake Chapala Society's annual Thanksgiving dinner and we thought...why not? But plans changed when the LCS dinner was sold out.

So I invited our friends to come over here and enjoy a chicken dinner. They had also invited the missionaries to the LCS dinner, so we invited them too.

Then Dave said it just wouldn't be Thanksgiving without turkey, so he quickly ran to Walmart and found a $35 turkey and some fixings.

But I'm glad it turned out the way it did. We had a good dinner. Everything turned out except the apple crisp that I burned (still not used to a gas oven that has a temperature dial that reads 1,2,3,4,5 as the settings). Conversation was good and the kids had fun.

After dinner, we had an appointment with a photographer for my Birthday family picture. Haven't seen the pictures yet but will post some when they are available.

Now for the gratitude part. I'm so grateful to be here. I read once that the reason time seems to go so faster and faster when you get older is because every day gets to be more and more the same. Nothing happens that is memorable. In my experience this is totally true. I'm grateful for a year where time seems to have slowed down. Though the kids have grown and changed a lot here, their youth doesn't seem to be running away so fast. And though sometimes (usually grouchy afternoons with Amelia) I wish it would speed up again, I know I will always remember this year together.

2008-11-29T11:29:00.000-08:00

What's happening with Jane?

Jane has always had a very similar life to Riley. Because they are so close in age, they have some of the same friends, hobbies, views on life, etc. So most of what I have said about Riley also applies to Jane. But Jane differs in a few ways too.

Jane has become our resident Spanish expert. Many times Jane will correct Dave and I on our Spanish. And she's usually right. Her accent is awesome, too.

Jane has been very successful at making friends at school. She gets invited to play at someone's house about once a week. Her best friends are Jenita, Mayari, Alberto, Andres and Indigo.

Jane has found a love of lime juice and salt. She puts it on cucumber, guacamole, chips, and tacos. She is always the one pulling limes off our tree and leaving juiced limes in the kitchen. She'll even suck on a lime with salt by itself. She is also our bravest eater. There isn't anything that I would try that she wouldn't. She likes Mexican food more than any of the other kids.

Jane is also doing well in piano. She is currently learning to play a challenging song called "Trumpet Tune" that Riley did for a recital a few years ago. She's learned it in half the time.

The kids have seemed to adjust to Mexico pretty well, but there have still been some repercussions. One of which is that Jane has started sucking her thumb again. She quit about a year ago and earned money to buy a DS Lite. She really wants to get her ears pierced, so I told her that she can when she stops sucking her thumb for real. We'll see.

Jane is a member of the spy club too, but has less interest than the others and frequently opts out of meetings.

Jane has also been a great big sister to Amelia. Besides sharing a room, they have to shower together, because there are no bathtubs. Jane is usually a good sport about this. They also play house, animal shelter, doctor's office, the "spy on the spy club" club, and babysitter.

2008-11-24T19:44:00.000-08:00

Look what Riley has done.

I know that updates on the kids are what my readers have been waiting for, so here's the first. (Thanks for reading, mom and dad)

Riley has finally gotten hooked on Harry Potter books. Back when he was 6 or 7, I tried to get him to read the first one and I think it was a little too advanced for him and put him off the books. But beggars can't be choosers here, and since our selection is more limited he finally gave in and tried again. He read the first 3 books in about 1 week. Now #4 is already checked out at the library and he's dying for it. He's also watched each of the movies after finishing the book.

Speaking of books, some of his favorites (besides Harry Potter) that he's read here have been: Phantom Tollbooth, The City of Ember, Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing, Harriet the Spy, The Mysterious Benedict Society, Here Be Monsters, and Alaskan Adventure Series.

Amazingly, Riley hasn't been playing as many videogames since we've been here. In part because our Xbox broke on the way here; so sad. But he still spends a few hours a week on clubpenguin. He even runs into some of his friends from Utah on it occasionally.

Riley had started making these intricate mazes at school during his free time. I remember doing this during church when I was a kid, so I understand the appeal.

He has also started a collection of Tazos. These are little plastic or metal discs that come in bags of chips here. I think they call them Pogs at home. You play a game with them and try to win more. Very popular with the Mexican kids.

Riley, Jane and Jocie have started a spy club and even built a clubhouse out of scrap from the Walmart construction in the backyard. He spends endless time contemplating new rules, contraptions and merchandise for the club. Currently they are decorating for Christmas.

I still make the kids practice piano at the church a couple of times a week and Riley has learned a couple of new favorite songs and even started to write one of his own. I promise to record it when he says it's ready.

Riley still refuses to admit that he likes Mexico, but he already admits that he'll miss Jocie when we go. They have a lot of fun together.

2008-11-22T20:31:00.000-08:00

Carrie's Happy Moments

Everyone may be sick of hearing about me and the things I do, but I decided that there were aspects of my life here that I want to remember, so I'm going to blog myself anyway.

First, most of my routine is the same as at home. Cook, clean, drive, homework, grocery shop, read, exercise, church, and play. Those things will probably never change as long as I have the kids and Dave to take care of.

But some additions since moving to Mexico have brought me extra joy.

I love it on the days when after Charlie goes down for a nap, I get to take my book outside with Amelia and sit in the sun. As a teenager I used to love to take my homework out into the backyard and lay out while I studied. I remember Freshman Year in High School when I had honors Geometry and English, I got my best grades and my best tan ever. (Remember I lived in California.)

I love to try to perfect recipes from restaurants when I like one of their dishes. Mexican recipes add extra challenge. Currently I am trying to perfect a Chicken Tinga Tostada recipe. I usually try a few different recipes from the internet. This dish actually was served to me at a church activity, so I could break down and ask the chef for the recipe, but that would take some of the fun out of it, and I'd have to embarrass myself with my broken Spanish.

Here is my latest attempt. Not bad, but not the same as the one I love.

I have also been spending time the last month trying to track down a good photographer for a family picture. I asked Dave to give one to me for my Birthday, but have yet to find a photographer that I like that doesn't cost a fortune. It's very few times when I wish we were wealthy, but this is one of those times. If I had the money, I'd fly down one of my very talented friends to come shoot us. Looking for the photographer is not what brings me joy. It's picturing how wonderful the picture will be to look at in 10 years, when I remember how cute my kids used to be before they were teenagers and how much I loved Mexico.

Believe it or not, driving in Ajijic also brings me joy. But only when I'm doing the driving. First, it reminds me of driving in England as a missionary. There are one-way streets everywhere and streets too narrow for 2 cars to drive even though they are 2-way. I told this to a native Englishwomen, and she was slightly offended, because the drivers in England are very polite and follow all the rules, while Mexicans don't follow any rules except try not to get hit. But I love driving down a narrow road and having to pull way over to the side and wave another driver past. It challenges my peripheral vision and makes me feel like I did a good deed that day.

This brings me to walking around Ajijic. I also love to walk down a street and say Buenos Dias, or Buenas Tardes to everyone I pass. They always smile and say it back. I don't have to really talk in Spanish, but I feel like a local.

And on to running. Like Dave, I have been trying to run along the Ciclopista every so often. I'm not going to say that I don't prefer or miss the aerobics I used to do at home (Hi, aerobics girls), but I do feel pretty healthy after running a couple of miles (My record is 2) and coming home super sweaty.

I almost forgot to add blogging. I didn't think I'd like it as much as I do, but it replaces my scrapbooking hobby very well and I feel like it will help us remember this year even better.

As the song says, these are a few of my favorite things.

2008-11-21T19:18:00.000-08:00

What's Dave been up to?

First, I know that many of you have been reading my blog, waiting for Dave to make an appearance. Well, he informed me a while ago that even though he may have consented to comment on my blog in the beginning, he has now decided that it's my blog and he won't do it. If everyone wants to stop reading now, I'll understand. Or better yet, we could start a petition. Although, since Dave is usually for anything that's unpopular, might not work. If anyone has any ideas let me know. My usual methods haven't worked. ;)

As you know, Dave still has to work while we're here, so he spends most of his time (as most husbands do) working.

For a few months Dave did his 12 hours of work a day on this:
But he finally gave in and bought a nicer chair, and this is where he spends most of his day. Our life here may be simpler, but we still have got to have 2 monitors.
About 3 days a week, Dave gets some exercise by running about 4 miles on the Ciclopista alongside the highway.
On Fridays, he usually takes part of the afternoon off and either runs or drives to Ajijic and takes in a movie.
This last week he saw the 3:30 show of Traidor. HSM3 was sold out.

Dave goes out to lunch a couple times a week to get out of his cubicle and works on one of his lifetime goals. He wants to walk into a restaurant and have someone say to him "The usual?" There are two restaurants here that may help him achieve this goal. One I've never seen, so can't include a picture, but the other is Loncheria Brissi.
It's a nice little place owned and run by a man and his wife. It's named after their one-year-old daughter. Dave goes there so often, he is currently helping them with their advertising. We supply them with avocados from our tree from time to time, too.

Speaking of food, Dave's friends know that he is somewhat of an expert on chocolate cake. Don't think his quest for a good chocolate cake in Mexico has been fruitless. His current favorite is called Chocoflan. It is a layer of chocolate cake with chocolate flan on top. I thought about including this in my food series, but this cake really belongs to Dave.This is one that I made, it's not as pretty as one you'd get in a restaurant, though Dave thinks just as good.

Chocoflan recipe

Cake layer:
Devil's Food Cake Mix
3 eggs
3/4 cup oil
1 1/3 cups water

Flan layer:
6 eggs
2 (140z) cans of Sweetened Condensed Milk
2 (12oz) cans of Evaporated Milk
1 Tbs vanilla

Grease bundt cake pan (I make mine in a stainless steel bowl).
Mix cake layer ingredients and put in pan.
Mix flan layer ingredients in a blender and pour on top of the cake. It will mostly sink to the bottom of the pan.

Put in a 350 degree oven for about 45 minutes, or until cake doesn't jiggle anymore.

On the days when Dave doesn't go out to lunch, he usually grills something on the mini-gas grill that he picked up on one of his trips to the states. Turns out it is virtually impossible to find a gas grill for under $300 in Mexico. So he got this little one and we use it a ton. He'll grill a brat or some chicken for lunch and read a book outside in the terrace. What a life.

I don't know if Dave would agree with my assessment of his life and routines here in Mexico, but since he's declined to comment, he's lost all veto privileges too. So there.

2008-11-21T09:55:00.000-08:00

Coming Soon!

Dave is out of town this weekend and next weekend, so I decided to use the free computer time catch up on all the blogs I've been putting off. I also am going to do a post highlighting each of the family members and what they've been up to the last 4 months. I had planned to do this at our 6 month mark, but Dave doesn't have another trip planned till February, so a bird in the hand...

2008-11-19T17:25:00.000-08:00

Fastest Restaurant in the World

After the zoo on Saturday night we went to dinner at the restaurant that won the Guinness World Record for fastest service in the World in 1998. 13.5 seconds. Ours took a frustrating 50 seconds but who's counting?
The food was this steak cooked in a broth with beans and bacon. At first, I couldn't see the appeal, but by the end of the meal, I could tell I was going to be craving it. Also served a great bean dip with corn in it and fresh lemonade.

2008-11-19T17:23:00.000-08:00

Guadalajara Zoo

We've been meaning to make it to the Guadalajara Zoo and finally did on Saturday, although only for about 3 hours. Got a late start.

Our favorite part: Feeding and petting the giraffes on the safari.

2008-11-14T15:19:00.000-08:00

Wow! What a surprise!

After over two months of endless homework, internet translations and studying for exams that were at least as hard as one's I did in Junior High, if not High School, Jane and Riley got their grades for the first grading period and they got 8's, 9's and 10's out of 10 in all of their subjects, both English and Espanol! They even made the honor roll in both their classes! Wow! It makes it all worth it!

2008-11-11T16:29:00.000-08:00

Weekend trip #2: The butterflies of Michoacan

We decided our next trip here in Mexico would be to see the Monarch butterflies that migrate down to Mexico from the US every year. We had heard it was amazing, and the season was November - February or March. We want to go somewhere on the beach next month, so November seemed as good a time as any.

One book I had about Mexico said that Patzcuaro was a good jump off point for seeing butterflies and there seemed to be quite a few other things to see around there, so off we drove. It took us a little longer to get there than we anticipated, but we found the town center and the tourist office. They gave us pamphlets and Dave went to look for a hotel while I studied them. Much to my confusion, the pamphlet on the butterflies said the reserves we wanted to see were near a town called Zitacuaro about a 2 1/2 hour drive away. While we waited for Dave to return from getting a hotel, we were entertained by some dancers in the square.
(Above picture courtesy of the Patzcuaro tourist board)

When Dave got back, I told him my discovery. We decided that the butterflies were our main objective so we would set off in the morning and go to the closest reserve.

After settling into our hotel room we found some dinner and wandered around in Patzcuaro. I finally bought a Dia de la Muerte figurine that I've been wanting for a Halloween decoration. These dolls remind me so much of A Nightmare before Christmas, that I wonder if this is where Tim Burton got his inspiration.

When we got there, a car had gotten itself stuck in the entrance so Dave got out to help and one of the other good samaritans was a tour guide. He said that this reserve was still closed until November 19th, but one about 1 hour away was open. We had gone this far so....

By the time we got to the Rosario Butterfly Reserve it was about 1pm and we were really tired of driving and really hoping this was going to be worth it. As we drove up a group of boys tried to tell us in Spanish where to park. We didn't really understand and drove farther up the road to a dead end. After we turned around, the boys ran with the car till we found a spot. There were only about 5 other cars in the parking lot. An older man came over and told us that one boy would "watch" our car, and another would lead us up to the entrance. I'm not sure how much we needed the 10 year old security guard, but the tour guide was very helpful.

Watch and see.

After making it through a labyrinth of shantys and hornets, we said goodbye to our small guide, paid our entrance fee and were issued another guide, an older lady in her 60's or 70's.

She proceeded to lead us up approx. 715 stairs (thanks to Riley and Jane for the count) and then about another 1/2 mile of incline till we finally arrived at the famous butterflies. She was amazing as she carried Milli and held her hand at various times. Our guide said there were not so many butterflies right now, but see for yourself. What looks like leaves are not.Note: the butterflies the kids are holding were already dead. Promise.

We made our way back down, (uneventful except when Amelia had an "accident" in which she announced "I have some good news and some bad news, the good news is I'm done peeing, and bad news is my pants are all wet") and we were grateful to see that the hornets had gone to sleep. Now where to eat and sleep ourselves? It was about 5:30pm by now and getting dark fast. Dave wanted to find a hotel in Morelia, the capital of Michuacan. I wasn't too hip on driving in the dark. He won (since he was the one driving and I couldn't very well jump out of the car) and we drove to Morelia. Arrived 9:30 and settled in a Best Western at 11pm, exhausted.

Didn't want to leave for home too late, so we visited a Candy Museum and headed home.

The kids and their old-fashioned candy picks.

Three things I will especially remember on this trip.

Lots of driving
Millions of flying things, friendly and un-
Our first experience with being an attraction. At every little town or taco stand we stopped, we caused a stir. People would just stand around where we were and watch us. Especially this one little hamburger place, we were the only customers, and the owner's family just stood around our table and watched us eat. Kind of uncomfortable, but we hoped we left a good impression of Americans.

2008-11-11T16:17:00.000-08:00

Playing Hooky

On Wednesday, the kid's school had what they called a "Spiritual Retreat" where the kids spent all day with a Catholic nun doing reflection, team building games and other activities with their class. Not that we are against that kind of thing, but most of the kids in Jane's class were not going and some had invited Jane and Riley to play that day instead of go. We thought about it and though we think the retreat might have been of some benefit, we decided making friends here would be more beneficial, especially for Riley who hasn't made very many friends so far. So I arranged for 3 of Jane's classmates to come over and swim and play most of the day. I think it was good for them both.

Here the kids had just finished making a gross "secret potion" out of various foods and other unmentionable things.

2008-11-02T12:47:00.000-08:00

Halloween

My friend Laura talked me into hosting a Halloween party at our house for some of the kids friends. I usually get a little stressed out about kids parties but I thought it might be a good opportunity for the kids to see friends from school that they don't usually see. We planned a lot of games, but ended up only doing Pumpkin carving, a pinata and trick-or-treating due to it getting dark faster than we anticipated.

The kids had a blast and I'm glad we did it. Jane and Riley were both skeletons, Amelia was an angel and I bought a luchador mask for Charlie, but he never quite got it on.

Trick-or-treating was interesting. There is one neighborhood here with large amounts of Americans and Canadians, so we went there. Here when you get to the door of a house with lights on, the kids pound on the door and yell "Queremos Halloween"; we want Halloween. I mentioned to Dave that it seemed rather demanding, but he pointed out that ours is rather threatening. Even still, I have to admit when the group of about 30 Mexican kids came to our door and yelled it, I felt a bit threatened.

We ended up with a yard full of paper from the pinata, stomachs full of candy (minus the ones with chili) and a house full of happy kids. Not a bad Halloween.

2008-11-02T12:22:00.000-08:00

Dia de la Muerte

For the past few weeks the parents of the students at Jane and Riley's school have been meeting to discuss and plan for Pantheon Loyola, the Day of the Dead celebration at the school. This celebration is very important to some of the catholics in Mexico, for some more than Christmas. For others it's just a tradition. On November 2nd, people crowd the cemeteries (pantheons) to leave flowers, gifts and food for the deceased. The school plans this celebration every year and the students prepare a tumba (tomb or crypt) to represent a famous person. In the past they've done musicians, actors, etc. This year they focused on Mexican heroes, mostly from the Revolution.

Anyway, here is the tumba from Jane's group:

Riley's group:

Also the parents of each grade got together and did a stand to tell about various states in Northern Mexico.

3rd grade (tercero) did Nuevo Leon:

4th grade (cuarto) did Sonora:

We worked on each of these stands and tombs for many hours (mostly the parents) and on the day of the event (Thursday) lots of parents spent all day at the school getting ready. I was able to help only a little on each one, but was glad to get to know some other parents.

At the actual event, Jane's group was supposed to sit by the tomb and pretend to be the mourning family of the deceased. That lasted for about un momento. There was food and halloween junk for sale and I finally got one of my favorite Mexican foods, tamales.

Jane got her hair painted pink.

The high school students designed and made a picture out of colored sawdust for the ground in front of the stands. I saw them working on it and it was painstaking. They would get a handful of the sawdust and press it into a stencil they had made. Then when the stencil or section was done, they would spray it with water and put a board over it to stand on and press down. The finished artwork was probably 5 X 15 meters in size.

The whole festival was very labor intensive, but I gained an appreciation for Mexicans ability to work hard and talk a lot.

2008-10-26T13:59:00.000-07:00

Busy Sunday

Our congregation at church is very small, and being a unpaid clergy, all of the members have to pitch in to help. So Sundays are very busy for Dave and I.

Today, both Dave and I spoke in the main meeting. I spoke on Covenants and Dave spoke on Salvation vs. Exaltation. Before church Dave had to arrive early to help prepare the sacrament. He then blessed the sacrament. Then I said the opening prayer in Sunday School and Dave was given an assignment to help with the lesson. During the third hour, I taught a lesson from the Book of Mormon to the older kids in Primary.

It's been a long time since I have had such a busy Sunday. Probably since I was a missionary. But I love it. It makes me tired at the end of the day, and puts purpose in my prayers. I knew it would be like this when we came here and I don't regret it for a minute.

2008-10-26T13:46:00.000-07:00

The Mexican Circus

For a week or more we've been seeing trucks driving around from the circus that's in town. Not just trucks...trucks pulling cages with a lion, or tiger, or kangaroo inside. And with speakers blaring announcements and playing music. And the tickets were only 10 pesos each! How could we not go?

So Friday night we headed over to the circus grounds for the 6pm show. It was a one-ring circus. The big top only held about 500 people and we paid an extra 50 pesos (not each, that was for the family) to be seated in the 4th row.

Dave filmed some of the highlights with his new video camera.
He urges me to tell you that the shots aren't his best because technically video wasn't allowed and he had to film on the sly. :)

2008-10-19T19:07:00.000-07:00

Food in Mexico Part 1

I have some bad news. After my last photo shoot with the girls on the swings, I put the camera down on the kitchen table and Curious Charlie pulled it down onto the tile floor. We lucked out and only the lens cap was broken, but the edge of the lens was also dented, so we couldn't put a new cap on. So I've been pretty much banned from using the camera for the last week and thus, no new pictures or posts. Dave is in Denver right now and is going to try to get the lens fixed while he's there, so I might be allowed to use it again when he gets back.

But I have been meaning to do a post on some of the new food that we've tried thus far in Mexico and happen to already have a few pictures. I figure every few months I'll do a new food segment.

First, eating here has not been as hard as it might be for us in some other foreign countries, but we have had to make a few adjustments. The time schedule for Mexican eating is not like ours. Breakfast (Desayuno) is customarily at about 10am. Since kids go to school at about 8am, I don't really know how this works for them, but adults usually eat breakfast at work.

I haven't actually figured out the proper word for lunch, but on menus it usually says Comida (the word for food). This is the Mexican main meal and is eaten between 2-5pm. Some Mexicans still observe the siesta after lunch and I frequently see construction or landscaping crews napping under trees. During this time most small shops are also closed and it reminds me of BYU on Tuesdays during Devotional. I never did get the hang of it there and probably won't here. At about 5pm some of the shops reopen and work recommences.

Dinner or Cena is sometime after 7:30 or 8pm, later in the summer. It is a small meal or snack.

We have adopted a later lunch time, about 2:30, after the kids get home from school, but it's still a normal lunch. And our dinner we put off till about 7 or 7:30pm, but any later and bedtime gets messed up.

Here are a few of the foods we've tried and liked. Come to think of it, there hasn't been much we haven't liked, but these we especially do.

This is tamarindo. We first tried a tamarindo ice cream, and didn't care for it much, but picked up some of these pods at the grocery store and I like them. Only drawback; a lot of work. You have to take off the outer husk and then there is a thin layer of the fruit before you hit the seed pod inside. I think they taste like a sour apricot fruit leather.

This is a soup that they sell occasionally at various restaurants and taco stands. It's called pozole. It tastes somewhat like a tortilla soup, but no tortillas. There is pork (including bones) and bloated corn. Apparently they clean the corn with lye, and then soak it for days before cooking it in this soup for another day. Muy bueno!

This is a yogurt drink that the kids love. It comes in several brands, this one is Yakult (pronounce jakool). The kids favorite is LaLaKult. It tastes like key lime pie and supposedly has millions of yogurt cultures. Good for the tummy.

This is one of our newest finds. This is fresh squeezed naranja verde (green orange). It is very good and inexpensive. I get about 7 lbs of oranges for a little over $1 at the tianguis. Luckily the house we rented came with an electric juicer.

Well, I'll continue to take more pictures of the food we love here (provided I get my camera privileges back) and you can look forward to seeing Chocoflan, tacos pastaur, roast chicken and more in another post.

By the way, found a few more of the songs I like from the radio and put them on my playlist, take a listen.

2008-10-10T09:36:00.000-07:00

Hallelujah! Amelia has learned to pump a swing.

Thanks to Jane and a few thousand lessons, Amelia has finally learned how to pump her legs on a swing. It's a great day when mom doesn't have to stand behind a swing and push while the kid complains that it's not high enough, hard enough or long enough.
Amelia and Jane are both proud of themselves.

2008-10-06T19:27:00.000-07:00

Conference Weekend and Copa Loyola

This weekend had been a long one for us. Saturday was Copa Loyola, a daylong sports event at the kid's school. We dropped the kids off at 8am to start getting ready for the event and showed up at 9am for the kick-off. Various events were scheduled for the different ages. Their school is from ages 18 months to pre-college, so there is a wide range of ages. First the Kindergarten, three grades from age 3 to 5, competed first while everyone else watched. Then the older kids split up to compete on the nearby fields. The whole school was split in half between the blue and red teams. They even had t-shirts. Jane was Roja, Riley, Azul. Parents were all in attendance and we split up our family - boys, blue and girls, red - so they both would have a cheering section.

Here are some favorite pictures from the day.

Jane running a sprint:

Riley doing the shotput:

Azules won the most events in the school, so they got a gold medal to take home and Rojos got the silver. After the winner was announced the school director told everyone that school was canceled for Monday as a reward for all of their hard work. Needless to say, more cheering.

My kids are not very competitive in sports, but it turns out Mexicans are. All day long there were cheers and whistles for one team or another. The parents got more excited than the kids. But it was a happy, encouraging excited that I liked. We finished at about 3pm and we were all exhausted.

On Sunday, Riley and I traveled on a bus to Guadalajara to watch a broadcast of our church's leaders from Salt Lake City, called General Conference. This conference occurs every 6 months and it's something I look forward to. It used to be that, growing up in California, my family would watch the broadcast at a nearby church building, but after going to college in Utah and ending up staying there, I got lazy watching it on TV. I was glad that Riley was willing to go with me and Dave was willing to stay home with the younger children who make it hard to watch. Even though Riley didn't watch it all, it was the most he's ever paid attention, and I hope he got something out of it.

It's always overwhelming for me when I enter a room filled with members of the church and it made me doubly happy to be there with so many Mexican members. I didn't sit in the same room to watch, because there was a separate room with the conference in English for us Americans, but I loved being around them.

One of the talks I appreciated most was from Carlos A Godoy. He talked about testimony and the fact that a testimony of Jesus Christ does not always come from some spectacular event but usually by small and simple steps and little by little. I've always felt strongly about my testimony, but had a hard time expressing it and why. And sometimes let my testimony be unspoken because of this. I will try to share it more.

2008-09-29T19:50:00.000-07:00

Weekend in Colima.

This weekend we decided to take our first multi-day trip to Colima City. Colima City is in the State of Colima, kind of like New York, New York. It is about a 3 1/2 hour drive from here. We left on Friday morning about 10:30am. To get there we traveled on toll roads which were well worth the 200 pesos we spent. On the way back we went on the free road half the time and it was much longer and windier, though I admit prettier. After looking for someplace to eat for about and hour (I have no idea why it took so long, but it did), we finally gave up and ate some fried chicken at the Sorriana (sort of like Walmart). Then we looked for a hotel. In doing research for the trip, I found a list of about 10 hotels in Colima, but none with online reservations, so I figured with our lack of Spanish skills we would probably be better off finding one once we got there. Just out of town we found a place labeled "Motel" called Quinta del Fuego. The prices were 300 pesos for a single, 400 for a single with jacuzzi and 700 for a double. They showed us to their biggest room which was like a suite with 2 seperate bedrooms and a huge jacuzzi in the living room for 700 pesos. It also had a private garage for the car. There was no key to the room or garage, it was all opened by remote control or a button. Dave's theory is that it was so cheap because it is a druglord's private home, but he lets out rooms for tax purposes. Tonight at home, the kids unanimously voted the hotel as the best part of the trip.

After settling in we went downtown to have a look around and visit the tourist office. I knew about a few things in the area to visit, but hadn't settled on an agenda. The kids didn't last long, but we walked around the city's three plazas and bought a new English/Spanish Dictionary, as we had forgotten ours at home.

After consulting brochures, we decided to visit some ruins, a small town nearby called Comala, and some stalagmite caves on Saturday.

The ruins were more impressive than I had heard. I know that they are nothing like some of the huge pyramids in Eastern Mexico, but they were still pretty cool.

Next off to Comala. Supposedly, you could see the 2 volcanoes that are nearby from this small town. It was too cloudy to see them, but we drove along a road that had a part called "La Zona Magica". On this part of the road, you could put your car in neutral, and your car would roll up the hill. An optical illusion, but Dave told the kids that the road was haunted and that ghosts were pushing us up the hill. Milli did not want us to roll down the windows. After doing this a few times, we decided we were hungry. We stopped at a large restaurant on the side of the road called a botana. We didn't know what this was but soon found out. We first ordered waters for everyone and the waiter brought those with some tostadas with ceviche and guacamole. They were very good and we figured this was like the chips and salsa at other restaurants. Then he brought out 2 different kinds of tacos. We wondered what was going on and asked for menus. The menu listed 5 different courses served with your drinks. Supposedly, in a botana, you order drinks and with each drink you were brought some predetermined courses. We were just on the appetizers course (with our 20 peso waters) and had 3 more appetizers to go. Dave tried to explain to the waiter that we didn't understand this when we came in and could we just have the appetizers course and then stop. After some time he understood and we finished and left, paying 100 pesos ($10) for our lunch for 6. Not a bad idea. And cheap for us Mormons.

After lunch, we started the 45 minute drive to the caves on the other side of Colima. It started to smell like rain as we got off the main highway, was sprinkling when we left the paved roads and started to really rain as we wound our way through the jungle up a steep, mountain dirt road. Probably about 5km from the caves, we decided that this was getting too dangerous and turned around and went back to our hotel. Needless to say we were disappointed and I started to have flashbacks of our Mazamitla trip.

The jacuzzi in the room cheered up the kids and a book cheered up me.

Sunday, we spent at leisurely morning in the room, drove closer to the volcanos that were still covered by clouds and drove home early to get a good nights rest before school on Monday.

We asked the kids what we should do better next time we plan a trip and Milli said "Let me do whatever I want. "
Jane said "Pick a restaurant where you can actually order."
Riley said "Check the weather before we go." Amen.

2008-09-25T19:16:00.000-07:00

Some days I forget I'm in Mexico...

Wednesday was not one of those days. A lot of days, it's easy to stay in our little compound of a house, take care of kids, clean, do homework and read. Almost everything is in English, except maybe homework, and it's very comfortable. Wednesday, I started out the day with a 3rd grade class parent's meeting. There is a chosen leader, vocales, that is our representative with the PTA. She held the meeting at her house. Luckily, she lived in California for a few years and speaks pretty good English, so she translated a little for me and the other mother that doesn't speak Spanish. She is very nice and even offered to help Jane and Riley with homework and sent me these pictures from Jane's class. Even so, I missed most of what was said and feel very uncomfortable trying to communicate with the mothers that don't speak any English.

Later, we took some banana bread over to some of the nieghbors here that we hadn't met yet. One was Mexican and I butchered my introduction in Spanish. I had practiced it and everything, but my tongue gets tied. It almost gives me a headache. Again luckily the father speaks English pretty well. I feel so bad to be relieved when the Mexicans here speak English, which is a surprising amount. I should be learning thiers.

Lastly, I was a driver for our congregation's temple trip in the evening. Dave stayed home with the kids so I could go, since he's been once already. Driving in Guadalajara is scary. Not so much during the day, but on the way home, it was dark and rainy. When you need to change lanes you just have to go for it, because noone lets you in, no matter how well you signal. The temple service was in Spanish, obviously, but they have translater headphones. I listened to most of the service in Spanish. It was peaceful inside, so my nerves were calmed before the ride home. I wanted to make more conversation with the other women that drove in my car, but of the 4, only one spoke English, so we were limited to short questions and responses. Come esta? Donde vive? Izquierda o derecha? Hopefully soon I will learn more how to phrase full sentences. My vocabulary grows every day, but not my grammer.

Me at the Guadalajara Temple.

If any of my Spanish speaking friends have any tricks they learned to help them with grammer, I would appreciate a comment or two.
And pray for me.

2008-09-18T17:37:00.001-07:00

Mexican Independence Day

This weekend was exciting. The 16th of September is Mexican Independence Day and the kids got Monday and Tuesday off of school.
On Saturday we went to a Regatta de Globos, which is when people make these tissue paper balloons that are inflated with hot air and let go into the sky. We had seen one of these balloons before, so we were very excited to see more. The hot air comes from some kind of fuel burning at the bottom of the balloon. Sometimes, in the case of smaller ones, it is toilet paper dipped in paraffin, but for larger ones it is cloth or something else soaked in gas mixed with oil. Being tissue paper, of course they are very flammable and often times burn up a few dozen meters above the ground and the fuel rockets flaming to the earth. This event would never happen in the US. Here are some of our favorite balloons. You can tell that some take hours and maybe days to assemble.

Dave calls this one "The Mexican Space Program"

On Monday, we attended a part of the celebration called El Grito. We went to the plaza in Ajijic at about 10pm, ate some tacos, bought some funny glasses and headgear and waited for the main ceremony to begin. It had been raining all day, so we found a good spot under the gazebo to watch. I didn't understand almost any of it, but at one point we started to chant "Viva" after which the announcer would follow with "Mexico". I was glad in the end that we went to see it even though it was raining and we had 4 grumpy, tired kids with us.

On Tuesday, we woke the kids up early to participate in a parade in Chapala that featured all the schools in the area. I didn't really understand the purpose, but then again, what is the purpose of any parade? Jane and Riley both got put in the front row so I was able to get these good pictures, one of the benefits of being short. Others that participated in the parade: military, police dogs, school bands, and children and old people in traditional costume.

I also took pictures of some of the more impressive school uniforms. My favorite is the one with high heels that (I think) for a secretarial training school.

After the parade, since it was a holiday for the kids, but not for Dave, Laura and I took the kids to a museum type place in Guadalajara. It was a lot like the children's museum at the Gateway in Salt Lake, or one that we went to in New Orleans a few years ago. Although much cheaper. Adults were 40 pesos and kids, 25 (about $4 and $2.50). I wish Disney would open a park here. It would be a steal.

The highlights:
Legos and plastic food

giant pin toy

zipline

and everyone's favorite, bungie bounce.

Overall, a fun weekend. Viva Mexico.

2008-09-11T19:37:00.000-07:00

Rewind to Riley's Birthday

I would feel terrible if I didn't blog about Riley's birthday. The poor guy had to tolerate a move the day before, and very hectic house on his special day, but he took it with unusual enthusiasm. He commented any number of times about how awesome the day was. I had been so worried that he'd be disappointed about not getting very many presents, being so far away from friends and family, the fact that I didn't make a cake (bought one), and being a Sunday (always hard on kids).
I have to admit, we did have a cool pinata. A women in Ajijic made it special for us for 65 pesos ($6.50!). It's Crash Bandicoot, by the way.

And Riley got his favorite dinner; shrimp.

The tres leche cake I bought.

And some of his presents. He was especially excited about his new basketball, Pokemon cards, and "The Mysterious Benedict Society" which he has already finished reading and highly recommends.
Thanks to all those that sent presents, cards and emails. I know it made his day even more "awesome".

2008-09-11T10:49:00.000-07:00

New home!

This past week has been really crazy with the move. Dave was out of town the whole week before the move and then it took us til yesterday to get internet again. So I'll try not to take too long getting caught up.

Here are some pics of the new house. Aren't we lucky. I love it.

Things I love about the new house:

pool (though scared to death whenever Charlie goes near it)
swingset
basketball court
gazebo for eating outside
2 beds for the girls
office for Dave
our own gardner/poolman
lime, avocado, and orange trees
walking distance to church

Things I'll miss about the old house:

the great neighbors
pool a little farther away
bigger refrigerator (though not very big)
laundry room in the house
fans all over
playroom for toys
walking distance to Ajijic and tianguis
closer to the kids school

The house is in a town called Riberas de Pilar. Only about 5 miles from Ajijic. Supposedly it's not the most desirable area to buy a house, but I don't know why yet except that the water system is old and has sand and dirt in it. We're in the process of convincing the owner of the house to buy a filter to get out the grime before it gets to the house. It stops up the showerheads, the dishwasher and the washing machine. Every few weeks you have to clean out the pipes and heads. Can't be good for appliances.

Anyway, fill you in on other house trivia later.

2008-09-03T20:33:00.001-07:00

Our Mexico Soundtrack

Maybe you noticed my new addition in the sidebar. Recently the construction workers outside our house have been bringing a radio to work and blasting music so close to our house you would think you were living next to Mariachis. A few of the songs have gotten into my head, so I thought I'd share them with you. Unfortunately, I don't know the names or artists, so I think it may take some time to find what I'm looking for. In the meantime, you can listen to the #1 hit song here and one that will always make me think of our construction worker friends.

Enjoy!

2008-08-31T19:07:00.000-07:00

Saturday night on the town!

We had a fun evening on Saturday with Laura and Jose. Laura found out about this free concert in Ajijic, and since we're all about free we went. It was a youth string orchestra. They seemed very good, in my uneducated opinion, and the kids weren't too bored. Afterward, we ate dinner at this great taco stand. It was a sit down tent that served pork and beef tacos. We've had these at a few different places, but these were the best so far. I like pork with cilantro, mild salsa and lime juice. We also tried a drink made out of rice, flavored with sugar and cinnamon. Not my favorite.

After dinner we watched some Salsa Dancers from a local dance studio. They were all middle aged couples that probably would have preferred to wear less revealing costumes, but they also looked like they were having so much fun. We couldn't help but wonder if we would be willing to do the same in front of a big crowd at their age.

The kids all sat on this rock in front of the dancers, watching, playing and laughing. It was fun to watch. The next day, Milli and Jane wanted me to show them how to hold their hands to dance like the dancers. Charlie and Riley even got in on the act after a while. I'm so glad for this opportunity for them to see and experience things that they wouldn't otherwise.

2008-08-28T19:57:00.000-07:00

1st day of the second week of school?

As promised, I took my camera to get the pictures I missed on the first day of school. There was also an assembly so I stayed for that and got some pictures.

Here is the road leading up to the school. The school is at the top. About 1/4th done with cobblestones and they say 2 more weeks. Of course they say that about almost everything.

Riley with his class waiting for the assembly to start. You can see from the other kids around what the uniform looks like.

The color guard; they were very impressive marchers. Ask me someday and I'll show it to you.

They introduced all the teachers to the students. The two in the right, middle of the frame are Riley and Jane's. Very nice.

Last they had all of the new students and faculty come to the middle of the group and get a balloon. Then they sang a very jazzy and inspirational (I assume) song and let go of the balloons. Riley and Jane agreed that was the best part.

This next picture is so typical of Riley. Not paying attention and slow to realize that everyone else had left the middle of the quad and joined their classes. But at least he's cool about it.
Wednesday, I attended a parents meeting for the whole school and this morning I went to a 3rd and 4th grade meeting. (Remember they have the same teachers.) I didn't understand very much of it, but I hope the teachers can see I'm involved if not knowledgable. Some of the Spanish homework had been hard and time consuming trying to translate stories well enough to answer questions. But we learn a few more words everyday. I hope they do better at school than we do at home.

2008-08-26T10:52:00.000-07:00

A special day is coming...September 7th, Riley's birthday

A few have asked how to get a card to Riley. Dave happens to be going on a trip the first few days in September, so an easy way to get a card to Riley is to send it to Dave in the hotel. Or just email Riley.

Dave's hotel address:

Courtyard Indianapolis Airport
c/o Dave Reed, guest arv 9/4
2602 Fortune Circle East
Indianapolis, IN 46241

I'd send it by August 29th.

Riley's email:

chauzer.reed@gmail.com

2008-08-24T13:42:00.000-07:00

After my walk, Dave picked me up and we went to an Amusement Park called Selva Magica in Guadalajara. It was about the size of Lagoon in Utah, but without the waterpark. It only cost 100 pesos each, plus we had coupons for 2-for-1, so it was very economical.

Here are some picture highlights:

These last pictures I thought were interesting because all over the amusement park, and in most places we've seen in Mexico, they sell fresh fruit and vegetables cut up into bite size pieces. Much more healthy than most amusement park snacks. Milli got watermelon and oranges.

2008-08-24T13:12:00.000-07:00

Walk with Milli on Saturday morning.

I set out to walk into Ajijic to check out some shops, by myself, for some alone time. As usually happens, it turned into something else, a 5 block walk with Milli. We walked through a nearby neighborhood called La Floresta and took some pictures of things we see all the time that I want to remember.

Next to our house is a futbol field. I like this sign.

A lot of gringos live in La Floresta. They have big houses with big walls around them with glass or barbed wire at the top.

The street signs in La Floresta are bright orange.

Many of the walls have vines growing on them with purple flowers.

Almost all the houses have a tile with the address and/or name of the house on it.

Farther down the road, you can hire horses to ride.

As you get closer to Ajijic, the houses get smaller, but still pretty.

Milli decided she couldn't walk another step, so we called Dave to pick us up.
Even though some window shopping would have been nice, it was peaceful to spend some quiet time with Milli. That's a rare thing.

2008-08-24T12:57:00.001-07:00

The first week of school is over and we've learned some things (as should be the goal in the first week of school).

Don't assume that just because they say school starts at 8am that it does. It might be 8:10, 8:20. It's Mexico.
Required uniforms are only suggested when the only source of uniform, the school, had no uniforms.
The English teacher is from Canada and speaks no Spanish.
Stock up on contact paper, everything is covered in it.
Wait till after the first day of school to buy the supplies on the list, they may change or require colors not specified on the list.
Take into consideration the work on the road leading up to the school when picking up kids. Instead of 2:15, pick up at 2:30.
One hour of piano practice every day after school at the church will take 2 hrs with 5 kids (we've adopted Joce in the afternoons).
Kids adapt quickly.
Teachers are angels.

2008-08-21T19:53:00.000-07:00

Telephone update!

The update is that there is no update. If you had our phone # in Utah, it will now reach us in Mexico. Technology is amazing. But please only call after 5pm Central Time. Dave uses the line for business during the day.

2008-08-20T18:41:00.000-07:00

I apologize for not posting lately.
Not a lot had been happening, so I was waiting for the first day of school to have something of consequence to post. Monday, the first day came. In all the rush, I forgot to take my camera in the morning. Went to pick them up and wasn't allowed to go up to the school to get them because they are doing construction on the road that leads up to the school and the kids were brought down to meet me. Then later that day, I got a 103 degree fever, chills and a massive headache, so I went to bed till noon the next day. So I missed the second day of school. Third, felt better, but still couldn't get the pictures. So I'm going to try for Monday again and pretend it's the first Monday. The kids didn't have their full uniforms on the first day anyway, but I do have a picture of them at home before school in part. (Fully clothed just not all the right clothes.)
School seems to be hard for them so far. They actually have the same teachers for 3rd (Jane) and 4th (Riley) grades. Maestra Barbara for the English half and Maestra Angie for the Spanish half. They just trade classrooms at half day. Neither of the kids understand anything in the Spanish half and don't even understand the assignment they write in their homework notebook. It makes it hard to remember to bring home the right notebooks and textbooks. Both are too shy to ask, too. I guess they'll have to get over it.

2008-08-10T13:58:00.000-07:00

Our trip to Mazamitla.

Saturday, we took a roadtrip to a town on the other side of Chapala Lago called Mazamitla. It is a mountain tourist town. Every part of the trip was an adventure. And a show of our incredibly bad luck.

First, on the way there, the mirror of another car hit our mirror. Dave stopped to check it out and the man came over and demanded money to pay for it. His mirror had fallen off. But Dave said that the other man was in the wrong because he should have gotten over more on the crowded, narrow street. The man threatened to stand in front of our car so we couldn't leave while we waited for the police -- unless we give him 600 pesos (about $60). If the police come they will impound both cars and wait until an agreement can be made till we get it back. Dave thinks the other man was drinking, but in order for the police to test him, we would have to make a complaint and pay for the test. Laura was with us and just told us to pay him, because a ticket, impound fee and sobriety test would cost us more than $60 and mean our whole day would be taken with this stuff. She said we should have just driven away before he came over, after we knew everything was alright. So Dave paid him and we went on with our trip.

We finally made it to Mazamitla, about 2 hours later. We were starving so we stopped for tacos. We're trying to get over our fear of small taco shops and restaurants because we have heard so much about them making gringos sick. This one looked fairly clean. It was good but I didn't want to eat too much, just in case. So I was hungry most of the day after.

After lunch we went to a tianguis market and looked around. The souveniors all looked the same as the stuff you see in every Mexican market we have ever been to. I wonder where they get thier merchandise. Seems like the same places. Nothing too impressive.

Next we decided to take a tour of the mountain road and another town nearby. It was very pretty and actually got rather chilly as we climbed the mountain. We passed by a house that apparently had been owned by an American druglord before he got carted off to prison by the FBI. It sits empty and falling apart because the Mexican government aren't organized enough to sell it.

The other pretty town had a reservoir and cute plaza that we got to see for about 5 minutes because we spent the other 15 minutes of the stop in a line at the pay toilet.

Then we were off again on the bus back to Mazamitla. Our next activity was supposed to be to rent some 4-wheelers for a few hours but by the time we got back to the car and on our way to the rental place it had started to rain. Then it started to sleet. We had to pull off the road several times and wait for it to let off a bit.

Overall, I think the kids will remember the 4 movies they got to watch in the car, not getting to buy anything at the market, and not getting to ride 4-wheelers. Not our best trip, but we're not giving up. And Dave did take a few good pictures.

2008-08-08T19:36:00.000-07:00

I tried to exercise.

After more than a month with little or no exercise, I tried to run today. Dave's been very good, going 2 or 3 times a week for about 4 miles. I made maybe a mile. It was harder than I thought. Besides not really being a runner, it took me 4 blocks of walking to find a road with a sidewalk to actually run on. I wasn't about to run on the very uneven cobblestone streets for very long. Then, as I ran up the sidewalk to the main street, I was chased by a dog. There are thousands of stray and owned dogs roaming the streets here and most are harmless, but this one didn't want me in his territory. I stopped chasing me as soon as I stopped running. I finally made it to the carraterra, the main street through town that has a cyclopista that is fairly straight and safe on which to run. I went about 5 minutes before I realized I had used most of my allotted 30 minutes just to get there. (And I was already worn out!) So I went home. Although it wasn't what I had hoped, it did feel good to get out and move. Maybe I'll go again next week.

2008-08-08T19:28:00.000-07:00

Hike to a waterfall!

Forgot to post about a hike we did to a really cool waterfall up in the hills near where we live.
The kids thought it was great and it was some much needed exercise for me. Charlie loved it too. He wanted to walk the whole way and would have loved to do it in water the whole way too. Jane slipped on a rock and got scared of the waterfall area, but overall had a great time.

2008-08-05T07:09:00.000-07:00

Jane's views:

I like the pool and I don't like the rocky roads because I can't ride my scooter.

byebye

2008-08-04T20:06:00.001-07:00

Dave went to New York

Dave's been in New York since Thursday and though you'd think that would give me more time to blog, but I just haven't found a time away from the kids. Before he left he was constantly on the computer getting ready for a conference, so not much happened for me to blog about. I take that back, the night before he left, we decided to go into Guadalajara and do some shopping. There is a big mall there that is as good as any american mall and it's right by a Costco. So we left at about 3:30pm and shopped till about 8:30pm, but didn't get home till 12:30am. I think it was the worst traffic I've ever been in. We went about 15 miles in 3 hours. The main street that we needed to be on was backed up and we never did see an accident or any other cause. Just lots of cops and other cars. We didn't know enough about Guadalajara to find an alternate route, but we didn't see other cars peeling off to take other routes either. Anyway, made me not very excited to go to that mall again.

Thursday, didn't do much.

Friday went to a water park called Tobolandia within walking distance of our house. From far away, I was not too thrilled to go. It looked pretty shabby and not well maintained, but it was not bad. Sure the paint was peeling off most things and a few slides didn't have water, so we skipped those, but it wasn't very crowded on a Friday and the kids had lots of fun. Even nervous Jane went on all the slides.

Saturday, didn't do much.

Sunday, our friends from Utah, Clark and Juli, had a 7 hour layover in Guadalajara on their way to Acapulco. So I picked them up from the airport and took them to church with me. Clark was an LDS missionary in Ecuador, so he speaks Spanish and wanted to attend church here. They have another layover on Thursday, so we're going to pick them up again and go to dinner. Maybe they'll comment with an outsider's perspective of Ajijic and our crazy life.

Monday, laundry and cleaning day. Some things still have to be done.

Tuesday, Dave came home and I finally got a moment to blog.

2008-08-04T20:02:00.001-07:00

Another picture of the facial hair, courtesy of Joe Heaps.

2008-08-01T06:30:00.000-07:00

Riley's thoughts on Mexico so far:

mexico's cool. i have made one friend so far. she knows english.
i start school in one month. i won't understand most of it though.
there is a swimming pool right by our house so we swim a lot.
my favorite thing is the swimming pool. i don't like not understanding anything.

2008-07-31T19:25:00.000-07:00

Finally got a shot on the sly of Dave with his new facial hair. Well, half of it.

2008-07-28T05:53:00.000-07:00

This weekend's highlights:

Friday, Dave and I saw our first movie in Mexico. The movie theater plays a couple of movies a week in English with Spanish subtitles, so we saw Hancock. I liked it alot. It only cost about $4 per person and a big thing of popcorn was about $3. Laura watched our kids for us. I've been about 4 weeks straight with no break from the kids so it was a welcome couple of hours.

Saturday, we went to a party at the Lakeside Society. They were earning money for the art program they do. They had a clown for the kids and sold food from various restaurants in the area. The kids had hoped to sell some art they made at the art classes but we couldn't find it. Then we were invited to a birthday party for a kid turning six in our development, Diego. They swam in the pool, had a magician, 4 pinatas, and a huge cake. Birthday parties are apparently a huge deal here. They usually invite everyone's whole family, spend oodles of money, and it lasts hours. This one, the swimming started at about 2pm and though we left at about 8pm, we could see people still out til 10 or so. We had planned on going into Guadalajara for the day, but then remembered the birthday, so maybe next week.

Sunday was our third Sunday at church. The kids really like primary, it's so much smaller I think they feel more important. I got asked to be a teacher in the womens' organization. I'll teach once a month in English, of course. Dave got asked to set up the chairs and organize the sacrament every week, so we'll be arriving early every week. Apparently, this congregation has a bit of trouble, because they have to mix English and Spanish. It's very hard for the the nationalities to mix. While many of the Americans know some Spanish and the Mexicans know some English, it's not enough to truly integrate the congregation. It gets hard to concentrate in the main meeting, because all the speakers have to be translated. It kind of breaks the momentum of a talk. I have to admit that even though I've really never liked speaking in church, it will be doubling daunting here. I hope they ask Dave first.

After church, we took a drive around the lake. We saw a couple of villages and tried to impress upon the kids how poor they are and how lucky we are. I'm not sure they got it. Kids don't see a dirt backyard and hanging laundry and think poverty, they think mudpies and forts. I hope it sinks in somehow while we're here.

For dinner we cooked out with some nieghbors; Diego's parents, Fausto and Madeline and some Americans, Dion and Po. It was nice. We had to explain the whole no beer and coffee thing which is always fun. I bought some steaks for it on Saturday at a local butcher's. I explained in my broken Spanish that I wanted 6 steaks, but he gave me 5. And then later I realized he gave me back about $10 too little change. The steaks we pretty tough and we learned that almost all of the meat here has to be marinated for about 24 hours to be chewable. Everyone was polite and ate some anyway. Live and learn.

Monday: The kids found an abandoned kitty and played with it most of the day. Dave and I don't like pets, but it was nice to have the kids occupied. We'll probably take it to a shelter tomorrow.

2008-07-23T16:13:00.000-07:00

Just another day (or two) in paradise

Yesterday, we took the kids horseback riding in Ajijic with Joce and her mother, Laura. Laura had been such a great help to us since we've been here. She's our rental agent, the Primary President at church, and had helped us get settled with school, shopping, etc. The kids went riding for about 15 minutes but that was enough for my inexperienced kids. Cost 140 pesos, about $14 for all 4.

Today, went into the Ajijic outdoor market, tianguis, for some chicken and shrimp. Laura was there to help me, but I bought the chicken and shrimp all on my own. Luckily for me, the stall workers understand broken Spanish. Then it was a quiet day at home. While Charlie had a siesta, we went swimming. Then the kids set up a tent, borrowed from Joce, in the spare room while Amelia and I made apple cake.

2008-07-20T19:32:00.000-07:00

Here are a few pictures we took yesterday.

My kids and Joce in the car on the way to the park.

These are little bugs that come in everytime we open a door. They are called bobos.

This is the pool we use everyday in front of all the construction workers.
I'm a little offended there have been no cat-calls.

The kids at the Saturday art lesson (more like freeforall) at the Lake Chapala Society.

This is a car we saw on a drive, 12 Mexicans stuffed into a Suburban.

Lastly, our cute little Charlie. Just thought it was a good picture that Dave took.

Still working on a picture of Dave with facial hair.

2008-07-18T19:16:00.000-07:00

Been a few days since I updated. I can only use the computer in the evening when Dave is not and it's hard to motivate myself to move from the sofa. We've spent the last few days swimming alot, playing with Joce, going to the street market, looking at other rental properties, and visiting the school that the kids will attend. Dave tried to prepare me before we looked at a few of the rentals and the school. He said remember this is Mexico. To be honest, the houses have surprised me. Very old and though not dirty, just not updated at all. Usually great grounds though. Grass and trees, cobblestones. The school wasn't as bad as I had imagined. Nothing to brag about, but nice grounds and o.k. buildings. Met a few more people and practiced my Spanish. The problem with my spanish is that I think of everything in English, then Spanish, before I even try to say it, and by then it's usually too late. But I'm getting used to the accents and can pick out more words from a conversation than I could last week. The street market was cool. It's every Wednesday in Ajijic. They sold fruit, vegetables, meat, bags, shoes, art. Nothing great but the atmosphere is cool. It's only about 5 blocks from home, so we'll walk most weeks. Looked for a stroller for Charlie yesterday, about $45 for an umbrella stroller, so Dave has his first item to retrieve for me when he goes to the States next month.
I'll try to take some pictures tomorrow. Always feel so touristy.

2008-07-14T20:26:00.000-07:00

The bad and the good

Today had some bad moments that ended in good ways.
First, the kids were incredibly bored. We don't have a backyard, or any other kids around, and it rained most of the day, so no swimming. They played computer monopoly and complained. The good came when our rental agent, a member of our church, came by to check on the phone that was to be installed. She brought her daughter, Jocelyn or Jocie for short, and she, Riley and Jane played for about 3 hours. She is 10, speaks English very well and is supercute. A friend! Then we found out our house might have no wires for connecting a phone system, something Dave needs desperately for work. Though this is not entirely resolved, we called the owner of the house and he said he's willing to do whatever we need to to get it here. Lastly, I ended up being out on my very first "driving in Mexico" experience -- after dark. This is something everyone has told us not to do. I had gone grocery shopping (yes, again) and tried to hurry but the store was farther away than I had remembered and I missed a turn getting there that cost me some time. On the way back, in the dark, driving for the first time, I didn't miss a single turn to get home (and let me tell you there are some tricky places and not many street lights). Obviously I was praying hard, but I realized that I was being blessed extra because of all the people I know that our praying for me too. Thanks everyone.

2008-07-13T12:18:00.000-07:00

Our New Home

After driving to a Walmart in Guadalajara to stock up on some things, we drove to our new home in Ajijic. We've only leased it for a month and that was probably a good call. I've linked pictures that the rental agent put on the website. As always they show the best they can. The backyard actually looks like this now.

Yes, that is a construction worker, no zoom on the camara. He's building a new Walmart directly behind the house. There's about 6 houses identical to ours in the complex and a pool and rec area about 100 meters from our front door. We went swimming yesterday and the kids had fun, but I was worried most of the time about the noise. There is one other white, retired

couple in the complex. The rest are Mexican, but speak varying amounts of English. The groundskeeper speaks none. There is one other child, 6 year old Diego. He and Riley are about the same size, so maybe they'll play together.

Our first night was exciting. We ate macaroni and cheese, watermelon and yogurt. Not exactly local. We put the kids to bed. Riley and Charlie in one room. Milli and Jane in the other. The girls share a bed, so that's been a fun adjustment. After they went to bed, we had a visitor, our very first scorpion. It was smaller than I had imagined, so not as creepy, but probably a better hider. I don't worry too much, except Charlie would probably try to touch it if he found one. We understand that the stings are mostly like a bee sting, unpleasant, but not deadly unless your allergic. The neighbors said that the construction brings them out; they've found about 30. I tried to take a picture of it but Dave killed it too fast.

In the morning, I was awakened by the sound of Walmart construction, roosters and Dave working in his office (my room). While Dave worked, the kids and I unpacked, played and went for a walk. We couldn't get very far as there was a lot of water in the streets. Dave said that for over a week it had rained nonstop till the day we got there. This is the street in front of our complex. Supposedly much lower than it has been all week.

After he worked a half day, we went to the Sorriana supermarket, did some more shopping and went out to lunch/dinner at a really good seafood restaurant. Dave tried to order everything in Spanish, but luckily the waiter spoke English. Dave is really picking up Spanish quickly, and I think with a pretty good accent. I just can't get the words to come out of my mouth. The kids and I tried to order in Spanish too, with some success. Jane had been pretty cooperative about trying to say stuff, but Riley fought it pretty hard the first couple of days. He seems to have realized he's going to have to try in order to understand and communicate.

Saturday, we took the kids to the Lake Chapala Society for an art class. They got to paint, color, draw, cut and paste. And they get to try to sell the art. That got them pretty excited. There was a 15 year old Mexican boy that was amazing. We signed up to be members and looked through the English library they have. After lunch I took the kids swimming and met some more neighbors. They let us know they were happy to have some well behaved kids in this house. I hope they still feel that way at the end of the month. Saw another scorpion. Got burnt.

Today is Sunday. We went to the Ajijic congregation of the LDS church, and met many people. They've been so nice. Dave and I are the only gringo members between the ages of 18 and 60, but that o.k. A lot of the Mexicans spoke some English. There were about 10 kids in the Primary Sunday School including ours. They do the service in English and Spanish with translators and the bishop is from Idaho.

And now I'm caught up.

So far I miss Ziplock bags, an ironing board and the kids friends (I could always pawn off my kids when they got on my nerves), but I still think this will be a great experience.

2008-07-12T19:48:00.000-07:00

We're Here

The kids and I got up at about 6:30am on Thursday morning. ( I meant to get up at 6am, but fell asleep after I turned the alarm off.) We rushed around to finish packing and load the car. We opened presents with Charlie during breakfast (it was his birthday; good thing he doesn't understand) and tried to cram those into a bag somewhere. Somehow in the 4 days we spent at my parents, my stuff multiplied. Anyway, we drove to my friend Juli's to get a ride to the airport. We got there with plenty of time to drop our luggage with skycap and check-in. Unfortunately, Skycap doesn't do international flights and for a minute I panicked that I would have to lug 7 bags, 2 carseats and 4 children into the check-in line. The Skycap guy must have seen my panic and offered to help (with tip, of course). Getting onto the plane went smoothly and the flight was good until Charlie got tired. After 30 minutes of crying he finally fell asleep about 30 minutes before we landed. Milli did too. We got off the plane last and I dragged the very cranky and bladder-filled kids through the Visa line. No problems there. I didn't even have to show them the Notarized permission slip Dave worked up for me. Next was getting luggage and Customs. After a bathroom break, I again panicked a little when I couldn't see anymore luggage carts. Hoping she understood English, I asked someone that worked there about it and she got one for me. Everyone had been so nice to me. Customs was a breeze too. Being very last in line might have helped too. Finally we exited into the terminal and saw Dave waiting for us. I can't tell you how glad I was to see him. And he looked so handsome in his new mustache and goatee he was growing. (I'll somehow snap a pic for you). Dave got the car and we were officially in Mexico.
I'm going to try to catch up one of these days so I can actually write about something that happened that very day, but not today.
More later! Love and miss you all!

2008-07-09T15:10:00.000-07:00

Dave made it! He said the trip went smoothly and customs was a cinch. I think he took the Nothing to Declare option. He got to Ajijic in the evening and our rental agent met him to give him keys and show him the house. He said though sparsely decorated, it is fairly new and clean. Drawbacks are the backyard is made of cement and backs up to the construction site for the new Walmart. Oh, well. Finding a house to rent had not been as easy as we would have liked. With Ajijic being a sort of retirement community for expats, the norm in housing is 2 bed, 2 bath. So finding something with 3 bedrooms has been hard and most owners don't want to rent to a family with 4 kids. (I don't blame them, we were willing to lose money renting our house to a couple with no kids). So we found this place in a part of town called San Antonio that is close to town center and has 3 bedrooms. The kids like the fact that it has a pool we can use in the subdivision. We signed a contract for 2 months, and will look for a more permanent rental.

The kids and I gave up the keys to our house to the Brownes this morning and made a last trip to the community swimming pool. We'll miss Highland and all our friends, but look forward to this experience and the chance to show the kids that not everyone is as lucky as we are in Utah.

2008-07-08T06:50:00.000-07:00

Dave supposedly went over the border into Mexico early this morning. In my last post, I wrote that Dave arrived in New Mexico on Saturday night. Sunday he drove a long day and got almost to Laredo, TX; only 4 hours away before he had to stop. Monday, he drove to Laredo and finished most of his paperwork early so that the crossing into Mexico might be easier this morning. He had to get an FMT (tourist visa) and a sticker for importing the car. He said those two things took him 1 1/2 hours, so hopefully this morning was much faster. My only concern was for customs. We've read conflicting reports about how to go about customs with the stuff Dave has in his car. As I understand there are two lines, To Declare or Not to Declare. Officially you are supposed to declare anything new you bought in the U.S. over $1000 (I think) or any goods you have for sale. We have only our personal items, but unofficially we have heard they will tax any desktop computers or items that seem unneeded on a tourist trip to Mexico. Dave, of course, has a desktop and two screens. Checking is also random, so he might not get checked at all. But if he does get checked, and he's in the Nothing to Declare line, they might hit him with an extra fine. But if he is in the Something to Declare line, they will tax him for sure. In Laredo, Dave got the oil changed on the car and happened to sit by a U.S. Customs worker, so he asked him what he thought. The guy said if it were him, he'd take a chance in the Nothing to Declare line. We'll see how lucky we get.
As for me, I've got a few more hours of cleaning on the house and some last minute errands to run and we're ready. The kids spent yesterday with some good friends, and I got a lot done. Thanks Deb!

2008-07-05T20:55:00.000-07:00

Dave left this morning to start his 4 day roadtrip to Ajijic. We had a fun week visiting with friends and family and packing up the house. In fact I'm still packing it up. I kind of thought that it wouldn't take me very long since we're not taking very much and we're storing most of our stuff in the house, but I was wrong. Besides the fact that I haven't cleaned almost anything but dishes for 2 weeks, so the house is a disaster. We are renting the house to Dave's cousin Cam and his new wife, Sarah, and they'll be using all of our furniture. We're packing all the other stuff into the unused bedrooms. I suppose I'll spend most of Monday and Tuesday cleaning.
Dave had made it this first day to New Mexico. He says the Sienna is taking the trip well. By the way, the car has been another part of our story. We decided that since we could only take one car to Mexico that we'd trade in the Grand Caravan and the Infiniti at the same time (and save some sales tax) for a new van. We did this about a month ago, so we've been a one car family for that long. It actually hasn't been too bad and we expect it to be even easier in Mexico.
The kids and I are now at my parents house in Alpine till we fly out on Thursday. Boy I'm glad we decided to fly everyone but Dave. 4 days in the car with 4 kids, not my idea of fun. But I am nervous for Dave. He is usually the primary driver on our family roadtrips, but he has a tendency to get drowsy after lunch. I'm usually there to keep him awake. So pray for him, please.
Look for Dave's comment after this post.

Getting a Visa

2008-06-22T15:00:00.000-07:00

So we found out that school starts the middle of August in Mexico and Dave has a business trip the beginning of August, so in order to be settled and ready for school on time, we decided it would be good to leave the beginning of July. We knew that we could live in Mexico on a Tourist Visa for 6 months, but we wanted a year. An FM3 Visa is what we want. So I went to the Mexican Consulate in Salt Lake to find out about getting this Visa. After waiting behind only two other people for almost 1 hour in a hot, very crowded room with two toddlers, I explained what we wanted to do. The lady at the window called in another person, made a 15-minute phone call and then told us to come back another day, because she was only filling in for the regular person. I went back a few weeks later and the regular employee gave me a list of requirements for a Business or Technical FM3 Visa. This was only for Dave; the rest of us were supposed to enter on a Tourist Visa and upgrade after we got there. The requirements included an application, Passport, letter from the US company employing Dave (his own company), a letter from the Mexico-based company (there was none), proof from our bank that we had an income of at least $1000 per month so we would not be a burden on the Mexican government, 2 passport pictures and cash to pay the fee. So we gather most of these, except of course the letter from the Mexican company, and I take them up to make sure they are right before I send Dave up to apply. The consulate employee looks at the stuff and asks if I have the aforementioned letter. I explain again that we aren't being sent by a company, but just want to live there. She says she can't help us. We'll have to go in on a Tourist Visa and apply for the FM3 once we get there. This is disappointing, because you can bring a lot more stuff in on an FM3 than on the Tourist Visa. Plus, what if they won't give us an FM3 after we get there? With a bit of research, we learn it is possible, though not guaranteed and only as a last resort, to drive to the border (about 12 hours), exit Mexico and reenter to get another 6 month Visa. I would not be very thrilled about this scenario. But, prayer has been a part of our decision-making all along and we still feel good about going. But at least I won't have to go back to the consulate in SL again.

Dave's visit to Ajijic

2008-06-20T09:13:00.000-07:00

After more research on Lake Chapala, we determined that a little town called Ajijic would be a good place for us. So now Dave needed to visit. I would have gone too, but we had just used about every available babysitter (ie: Grandmas and Grandpas, Cousins, Aunts and Uncles) for our various other trips this year. Besides, Dave is a little more picky than I am when it comes to where we live, so I trust him. So we booked him a flight for the beginning of May to have a look. We arranged for him to stay at the Hotel Casa Blanca. Here is a video Dave made of the room while he was there. He's going to hate that I put this on here.

Turned out that the owner of the hotel picked Dave up at the airport, and Dave learned he had moved to Ajijic from California. They talked a lot about Mexico, the schools and raising kids there. Dave really liked him.
We also arranged for Dave to have a tour of Ajijic with Judy King, a resident expert. She took him for 4 hours to see various neighborhoods, the schools, the marketplace, the Chapala Society Headquarters and to meet some rental agents. She and her assistant Pam have been extremely helpful with our follow-up questions and the newsletter is great.
Dave was also there over a Sunday so that he could attend the LDS church service there, meet some of the members, and get their input. The congregation is pretty small, but in a nice building. There were about 40 people there and they did a bilingual service. The first meeting, Sacrament Meeting, was translated and the other classes were split up into English and Spanish. About 1/2 the members are Mexican, the other 1/2 white. Dave recognized one of the men there and they figured out that Dave's Grandfather Arthur Browne served in the church with him in Arkansas. Small World! Another member of the congregation was a Rental Agent and she has been really helpful in finding us a place to live. (Though we haven't found one as of yet)
Another day Dave toured some of the schools and looked at rentals. Of the three schools, Terranova was the nicest, but also the most expensive. Roosevelt and Loyola were fine, and Loyola was the cheapest, so we picked it. We haven't registered yet but will when we get there. There is an entrance fee of $200 per family and $700 per student, then the tuition is $200 per student per month. Much more expensive than we had heard, but they've got to go to school and it would defeat part of our purpose in going if I home schooled. (plus we might not survive)
Dave took some pictures with his iPhone while there but they weren't very good representations of the town, so we'll take some when we get there and post them.
Overall Dave really like it there and felt like we could do it without too much stress or hassle. Ajijic here we come!

Mexico research

2008-06-19T11:58:00.000-07:00

After finding we were leaning toward Mexico, I started research on the different parts of Mexico. First, I gave Puerto Escondido a look. Dave's client touted it as the best place to live in Mexico. He loved that it's on the beach, out of the hurricane zone and cheap. As I did my own research, I realized cheap is relative and with 4 kids, we would have to be in a house right on the beach in order for that to be a real benefit to me. Plus although it was out of the hurricane zone, it was also quite secluded. 3 hours from anywhere else, Oaxaca and Acapulco the closest big cities or recognizable places. It was also secluded by a mountain pass to Oaxaca and hundreds of speed bumps to Acapulco. It was important to me to be pretty close to an LDS Temple and the closest was in Oaxaca. The more I thought about it, I didn't feel like this was the right place for us. So I started looking on blogs and forums about other places in Mexico that gringos like us might like to live. Fairly quickly I came up with a list including Monterrey, San Miguel de Allende, Baja California, Lake Chapala, Puerto Vallerta. Lake Chapala and its northern shore towns were praised on many forums. I could find lots of information on it, it was close to Guadalajara (a large city), one hour from an LDS temple, 1/2 hour from an international airport, 3 1/2 hours from Puerto Vallerta, had 3 bilingual private schools, a society for expats, and rent seemed much more reasonable than the beach towns. It seemed pretty perfect for us. But I wanted Dave to visit before we made any decisions.

Researching our Short Term Home

2008-06-09T21:16:00.000-07:00

So after we decided to take a year away, we had to decide where to go. In considering Dave's work we determined that he would need to stay in a similar time zone to the U.S. in order to keep his work schedule mostly the same. I didn't really want him working in the middle of the night. So this kept us mostly in the Americas. Next, we compared states that we were interested in for cost-of-living. We looked at North Carolina, Oregon, Washington, Mississippi, Hawaii, Alaska and few others. We ruled out quite a few because the cost-of-living was too high. Then I started googleing rental property in a few other countries to see what rent might be there. I looked at Mexico, Quebec, Australia, Costa Rica, Brazil, Puerto Rico. I also checked out a few sites that offer house exchanges for educator sabbaticals. In the meantime, Dave emailed a client of his from Canada that lives in Puerto Escondido, Oaxaca, Mexico part of the year to get his take on Mexico. As I made a list of all of the many arrangements that would need to be made, it seemed almost just as much work to go to North Carolina as another country and not as much fun. So we were leaning toward foreign fields. As I looked at sites, Mexico kept coming up. Immigration laws seemed to be more flexible than some other countries. Most countries were much too expensive for us. We wanted to keep our house and rent it while we were gone, but didn't want to figure the rent into our budget, just in case. A dim hope was the opportunity to trade houses with someone, but we never did find anyone from France or Hawaii with a need to be in Utah for a year. Although we did get our hopes up when I found a family of 6 from Australia that wanted to take their family somewhere for a year, but when I contacted them, they had decided to get a pool instead. Gotta have priorities!
So after months of research, we had mostly settled on Mexico.

How it all started

2008-06-08T07:10:00.000-07:00

Many of you may be wondering where the Reeds got this crazy idea to go to Mexico. Well I'll explain our thought process here. First of all, good or bad I have to take credit for the idea. Dave and I, since we got married, have wanted to spend time outside of Utah. We love Utah for many reasons, but its homogeneous, almost all Mormon, sterile environment sometimes makes us crazy. We always thought (and this may still be true in the future) that we would move out of Utah for good, but in the couple of instances that we had the opportunity to leave, we just didn't know where to go. Where do you go when you can go anywhere? We've been drawn to Oregon, Washington and North Carolina at various times, but just couldn't actually leave.
So last year, Dave's company, eSpeakers, seemed to be coming to a point where we might be able to make a move if we wanted to. So where do we go? This time I felt like we had other factors keeping us in Utah. My parents are in Alpine, the kids have good friends here and I love my house. In contemplating a move, I wondered to myself "Why can't we just go somewhere for a little while?" I remembered a friend I had in D.C. whose family, the Eyres, lived in London for 6 months when she was young. But 6 months seemed too fast and too disrupting, so why not a year. A year would be a full school year, long enough to get to know the place, but short enough that the kids friends would most likely still be here when we got back and we could rent the house more easily. The more I thought about it, the better it sounded. So now to tell Dave. Dave thought it was a good idea too!
Immediately, we started researching. Where could we afford to rent and still keep our house? Where could Dave still do the work he needed to do without a weird schedule? Why not another country? Did we want seasons, cold weather, hot weather? What were the immigration laws for Canada, Mexico or South America? Could we drive, or would we have to fly? Where would we be safe? So many questions, so little time? Wait for my next post for some of the info we found.