VACATION!!

It's about time!
Josh and I took the week after Thanksgiving (Thanksgiving is not a holiday here in Mexico, so Josh had to work it) (Day 39) It was weird seeing everyone post pictures of their families celebrating, and Josh was at work and I was at home... our first American Holiday we didn't celebrate at all!!!

So afterwards, Josh and I headed to the US to have some fun,
we stopped by Disney

First Stop Hollywood Studios!

Stop two, Epcot!

Josh had not been to either Hollywood Studios or Epcot before, He said they were not his favorite, but we also did not watch that many of the shows that they had at Hollywood studios, mostly hit up the rides.

We found Donald Duck in Mexico!

Epcot that is! It had been a long time since I had been to epcot, I thought it would be cooler if they had like tapas style menus at the restaurants or booths, then you could sample a little of every country, and the big restaurants you had to have reservations for. We ended up eating in Germany... go figure!

Day 2 stop 1, Animal Kingdom

Day 2 stop 2, Magic Kingdom

We had a ton of fun at the Magic Kingdom!

Day 3, Universal Studios

The New Harry Potter Ride opened this year and I wanted to hit it up! So we did, it was good, but I think the original 2 were better! And I tried Butter Beer, it was Pure Heaven! GO GET SOME!

Days 41& 42

Josh went to work for part of the day,

Then we drove to Monterrey

The sights on the trip are so pretty!

We stayed in a hotel and flew out the next day to FLORIDA!!!!

Finally a vacation!

Day 40

Finished!

The I packed like a crazy person, 

And sat down and had a cup of tea! Phew! Packing for a month can be hard!

Day 39

I sewed the binding on the back

And I learned that my sewing machine like my mom's skips pins!

And I tried out not pinning but using binder clips!

It was ok... But I am a little OCD about pinning, and I wasn't sewing with my quilting foot, i tried it on the next quilt... But on is one I kept getting little puckers :(

Day 38

Other than lots of house work, I worked on the quilt I need to finish before I leave,

 Sewing the binding together

And ironing, repeatedly

Day 37

So much to do before the holidays!

Laundry laundry laundry, Rosetta Stone, and paying bills!

I dream someday we won't have to pay student loans!

Day 36

Another Lazy day,

Josh and I finished, watching the two seasons of criminal minds that are on Netflix, and started watching prison break, he deserved a lazy day after his long week.

Day 35

While Josh put in his 15 hour work day on a Saturday, I was at home.

It was Saturday, so it was a lazy day,

I finished the quilt top

And the. Cleaned up after it, one of the fabrics sure did leave a mess! Little fuzzies everywhere!

Then I binge watched Gossip Girl, 10 episodes to be honest, but I had never seen it before, I think it's my new guilty pleasure

Day 34

My drive to do much is slim lately,

But I put all the blocks together and did some dishes!

TMI Update

At Walmart I found a pack of 18 tampons, I did a little dance. :)

Day 33

Today I went on a trip to the immigration office to sign some paperwork for my visa!

It should be ready some time next week! I am happy that I will finally have that!

It has been a little warmer the past two days, in the low 70s, which means windows open! since the temp in the house tends to sit at 60 or so. But we also got a little space heater for the bathroom, it had been helping keep he condensation down when it's cold out there!

Days 30-32

Well our internet was down, so I'm a little behind!

 But don't worry friends, you did not miss anything exciting, trust me, the Internet brings me more joy than it should... 

I mostly have been doing house work, dishes, cooking, laundry, 

I also found some time to sew! 2 more blocks and the who'd,e top is done! (Except the boarder)

I made crockpot fried rice. Josh loved it more than I did

Then the next day I made black bean enchilada pie, it was amazing!!!!!!

And good news, our pool heater was fixed!!!! Yey!

Day 29

What a nice day!

We didn't leave the house at all, just worked on projects around here.

We spent most of our day building this beauty... Isn't it great?

And we made dinner,

These chicken nuggets are in a marinade for 2 hours

I also made homemade honey mustard sauce, it was pretty good.

Then we coated them in a batter and Josh fried them.

They were okay as chicken nuggets go, they were supposed to be chick-fil-a copycat nuggets... But alas they were not as good...

I don't think we will make them again, not because they were bad, but because they weren't as good as we had hoped...

Also over the night, as we do other nights we had heard a pack of coyotes, when we're woke up in the morning, Josh actually saw one in the field next to our house, he was sleeping in the shade! Crazy!

And I forgot to mention that yesterday I was again mistaken for being quite young, when we met a lady from Washington, she asked if while I was here If I would be going to college, because I looked so young, I had to tell her that no, I received my degree 8.5 years ago! (Can you believe it's been that long??!?!?!) and that I am now a house wife... I suddenly felt old,  the happy to be young looking :) thank you good genes.

Day 28

Today we ventured out to some place new.

We went to a park, it looks like they turned an abandoned factory into a park and library. There was a nice baseball field with stands, 2 soccer fields, a skate park, bathrooms, a large picnic area where people were playing chess and a library.

Hard to see, but a small book selection, this seemed to be the non-fiction, some English and some spanish. There was an upstairs that had a computer lab, a few children's books, and some fiction books, a ton in English. But I couldn't figure out if you could check them out or not, there were not barcodes on any of the fiction.

There was this car too...

 We also visited a small local market that was at the park.

There were not as many crafts as I had thought there would be,

But we did eat lunch, they made blue corn quesadilla with potatoes and cheese, and a salad, it was good!

Squishing the ball of corn meal

Putting the fillings in

Yum

Day 27

Freezing! And I didn't sleep well. The heater was making so much noise, I woke up every cycle. Ugh, so I was relatively unproductive.

Only finished one more row of the quilt.

But I did see this interesting sale on the side of the road,

Mattresses anyone?

It was the Black Friday of Mexico yesterday, and we actually ventured to the mall, because we needed a few things, 

What is this? (Sorry it's a little blurry)

Then we made honey mustard pretzel chicken,

Dip in flour, honey mustard sauce that we made, and a mix of breadcrumbs and pretzel crumbs, then bake. (That is Josh touching the chicken, although I did touch it later)

It was pretty good.

Day 26

Another foggy day, and chilly, I had the heat on wherever I went (you have to turn each room on when you are in it, and turn it off when you leave) but it never quite makes the room warm, we even turned the heat on in our bedroom for the night.

See how foggy it was?

I finished my daily chores pretty early, then chatted with my sister, and finally got to work on my sewing!  I need to bind one quilt and finish this top.

I cut all of my strips

And sewed my first two together, I couldn't wait any longer,

When I sewed the third strip on , I had to make blocks, which then led to a row of blocks getting sewed together, 

2 of 6 rows done!

Day 25

Today was overcast, foggy, and depressing, I felt like it was 6pm all

I cleaned up the house, and waited for someone to come over and help fix the cable,

Phew! All better and I found CNN in English! Yey!

The I Skyped with my sister ironed and scrubbed some floors... Another exciting day!

Then when Josh got home, I went for a run, I finally ran 3 miles woot woot, and in a decent time, I am so happy!

Also I fell in love with strawberry Gatorade!

Also, I called my parents for some information on my sewing machine, I was having a problem winding bobbins, but I finally got it fixed, when I was talking to them, my Mom mentioned that her sister had heard from a long lost relative that they would be in town, and would love to meet up with her, but unfortunately she was too busy and wouldn't be able to make it.

Recently, well really the past year or two I have gotten into genealogy with my sister and Dad, so I was pretty interested to hear about this!

As the story goes, my great Aunt moved to Mexico as a Baptist missionary to work in an orphanage, she met and married her husband and they had 6 kids, a couple of those kids moved to California and Texas, but beyond that we knew nothing, this long lost relative is in that family! I hope she can fill in some of the gaps! I can not wait to meet up with her!

Also there were stories about how my Great Uncle was a cab driver and had to have someone sleep in his car so no one stole it and that they didn't really live together, and there were a lot of questions.

I think because of this story there were a lot of reservations in my family for me to move to Mexico. 

Day 24

I woke up early, way too early, 4:30 or so...

And I had a stabbing pain my my lower back, so after dealing with it for a few hours I decided a nap was the only thing that would make it better, I was right! When I woke up it was so much better!

So I did more laundry, Scrubbed more cupboards, and enjoyed the nice weather!

Day 23

Another day in the life of a house wife/maid :)

Laundry, and I scrubbed out more cupboards, and lined some since we picked up lining this weekend! I don't know what the last people did in this house, but there was some seriously gross stuff in the cupboards, and how do you not clean the out when there is a massive sticky mess? 

Then Josh came home, and cooked us dinner! (I am making no attempts to learn how to cook on a grill) 

It was delicious...

Day 22

It was a bright and beautiful day, we opened our windows and hoped to trap the warm air inside for the evening! It was a great relief after the chilly days we have been having, nothing like Michigan I know, but people in Michigan are better prepared!

So yesterday we bought a sewing table and some "storage" for the sewing room,  today we put them together.

We even moved the spare recliner to the sewing room, so I can sit in it to attach binding or when Mr. Comes he can enjoy hanging out in the sewing room.

And I moved all of the fabric I have here into these bins, to hopefully keep the dust off.

And my birthday present from my sister finally found a home.

After putting the storage cubes together there was a lot of saw dust in the entryway, so Josh swept and I moped, we did the stairs too, I'm happy to finally have that done!

Josh helped me with the box spring in the guest bedroom and I was able to make the bed.

Nice!

One problem...

Who sells king sized sheets with regular sized pillow cases?

And you can not find separate pillow cases anywhere here!!!!!

Day 21

3 weeks in!

So, Josh went into work, and I woke up, got ready for the day, and then the. I did a little sewing.

Sewed this row together, only 5 more to go and I'll have another top ready for Christmas, I don't have my batting roll with me, so I will have to quilt it at my Mom and Dad's house, when I get there for Christmas.

When Josh got home from we headed out to buy a few odds and ends, even my cutting table! Yey! So this week I can work on binding for the disappearing four patch, and finish the top to this quilt!

Day 20

I woke up in a good mood despite it being cold, I'm used to cold, but the heating systems In the US are different , and from what I understand, the electricity here is very expensive.

We had received our blankets in our box yesterday, so we used the "light" down blanket we bought from ikea,(after Josh spent time in Germany for work, all he wants are down blankets and pillows, I admit, they are super nice) With the sheet, it kept us pretty warm, but since it had been raining all night, it was chilly and damp outside of the covers.

Josh turned on the mini-split, and started to warm up the bedroom while he got ready for work. It warmed up considerably In the bedroom, but the closet and the bathroom which do not have their own heaters did not warm up at all.

Just as Josh was getting ready to go to work, he discovered his Debit card was missing! Yikes! So thankfully there were no charges that we did t make, and the card was cancelled, a new one is on its way to my parents house! Phew! Disaster averted!

But it was going to be Christmas again! We were expecting a furniture delivery! The furniture for the guest bedroom!

While I waited, I put away a few things from the box delivery the day before. And Icut the button off this sweater, and sewed the button hole closed.

I got this sweater from Salvation Army last time I was home to go with a dress I'm going to wear to the Christmas party for Josh's work. But the button didn't look right with it.

While I was sewing I turned on the electric fireplace 

It it not as cozy as a real fire.

The pool guys came and Josh came home for lunch.

Then I waited some more and worked on quilting my quilt.

Ugh, I must have pinned in a big fold! Because I had a huge crease sewed in the backing, and I know I should have flipped it over and looked before I stated quilting, I was just so excited! So I had to take out part of 3 lines, and redo them

Finally the furniture guys came!

We really wanted a queen sized bed for this room, but we couldn't find one we liked, so it's a tight squeeze with the night stands...

And then while I waited (and waited) for Josh to come home from work, I finished quilting!

I quilted squared, the first time I have quilted intersecting lines I think, I had a couple of folds on the top, but not bad. And I also quilted this one stitch in the ditch, or near the ditch as it happened sometimes, but I am happy with how it turned out overall!