things I like about living in Mexico

I am not sure I will ever really enjoy living in Mexico. Although my feelings/attitude towards living here have drastically changed over the past 2 years.

But, even with the negatives that will always exists, there are things that are rather pleasant about living here.

I thought I would point out a few things that I enjoy about living here.

1. I like being able to be with the girls. As much as they drive me crazy sometimes, I know that I will look back on this time fondly. Plus, look how funny they can be.

2. I love that the weather is nice almost all the time. We can take the table outside and color pretty much any day of the week.

3. I get to be obsessive about things like sewing. Once I start it is hard for me to stop. I can't stop making these tote bags. I know, crazy!

4. Knowing that I will be able to teach the girls and have fun doing it.

5. Being able to potty train the girls at my own pace. We are now onto Emily. It's a work in progress, but I like that I can start it with her and get her up to speed.

6. Getting things repaired, due to the cost of living being very low, is very cheap! Our refrigerator went out this past weekend and we just got it repaired, something about the gas in it being out, for $570 pesos. That is roughly $43 USD. And let me tell you not only did they fix it but also picked it up, took it to the repair store and delivered back to us. Can't beat that! Now we get to go grocery shopping.

These are just a handful of things I like about it here. I could, in turn, create a list of "don't likes" but I think we have covered most of those in the past when I was whining about living here. Let's not go down that road.

a little bit of everything

I have been trying to keep busy lately. My house is always clean. The dishes are clean and put away. The beds are always made. This is due to lack of things to do. Not because I am a neat freak. Although in a small way I am.

I find myself sitting on the couch just itching to do something and other than reading the only thing that comes to mind is sewing/crafts. I do have a good amount of books (thanks Heather and Ms. D!) but I don't want to get through them all within a few months of being back. So, the sewing/crafts it is.

Sitting on the couch, looking around, I realize that the pillows on the couch are not very pretty and think that I should recover them. So I did. Looks pretty cute and a bit of a girly touch. Which I like. Jorge doesn't seem to mind.


Jorge brought out his feminine side the other day when I asked him to help me make some paper flowers. Let's just say he is a man's man. They were in a Martha Stewart kit that I bought. Good ol' Martha. Always making beautiful things especially hard for the everyday folk to make. Jorge was a good sport and tried a few and let me clean them up. I got a handful completed but decided that the rest could wait for another day.


Martha also makes some kits to make little accessories. Don't let the photographs fool you into thinking they will be so easy to make. I think Martha gets some sick pleasure from creating kits that are NOT easy to do but look super duper easy to do. EVIL! But, I managed to do a few. Take a look.


I only made the one hair accessory but Emily still wanted to pose for me. We can't leave her out now can we?

Speaking of Emily, real quick, the other morning I asked her what she wanted for breakfast and she said broccoli. Weird! But, I made it for her and surprisingly she ate it. (note the lovely morning hair)

When I was in the US I kept looking for a tote bag/purse. I had something in mind but could never find it. Well, today I decided to make what I had it mind. I have a link on the side of my blog to exactly what I wanted but I was being lazy and didn't want to make it. I wanted the easy route of buying. That didn't work out. What did work out was me making it. And it didn't even take that much time or effort.



Of course I don't leave the girls out of my crafty mood. We were coloring the other day and had an idea. Not an original one, but knew that what I was thinking would be a hit with them. Or so I thought.

The girls are always playing with little cars. I thought it would be fun to color them a mini track on paper that they could use to play with their cars. I did and here are the results.



I had to stage a car on there because this is what they ended up doing once I put this on the floor in their room.


I guess I planted the idea of a track in their mind and they found one elsewhere. Oh well. You win some and you lose some. But, when daddy got home he sure did enjoy the paper track.

So, after a mega long post, you can see I have been dabbling in a bit of everything trying to keep myself busy.

it's finished!

Well, Heather, you asked and you shall receive. Here is the finished blanket.

I got on a kick and just wanted to finish it. I cheated in a few ways. One, I was intending on making it a queen but just didn't feel up to it. So, it is sized for a twin.

AND, I cheated at the edge around the whole blanket. I should have hand sewed it but I went the sort of faster route and I sewed it with the machine. It looks decent.

Here it is on the girls' bed (which is a queen). It gives you some perspective of how big it is.

And, it wouldn't be complete without the girls modeling it. Bella is very excited about it and both girls walked by while I was making it saying, "I like it!".

It might not be perfect. And it was a lot more work than I thought it would be. But the outcome is exactly what I was looking for, the girls are happy with it.

progress

I am pretty proud of myself today. I started up again on the first quilt for the girls. Let's not get ahead of ourselves and say I got far on it, just proud that I am making progress.

Look it goes on forever!

I found a quilt online (can't remember where now) that I would attempt to do a similar pattern. I am sure the outcome will be really cute (very busy too with the fabric prints that I have chose), but let me tell you this is going to be a LOT of work. How do people find the patience to do quilts all the time. I am impressed.

Also, you might remember when we went white trash a while back. Well, we fixed that. With our new strict budget (I am no longer working so we only have Jorge's tiny income) we had to for go the *luxuries* which included our satellite. But, all those nice movies we watch we can once again feel like we are in a theater.

Yesterday our TV stand looked like this:

Today it looks like this:

We celebrated Emily's 2nd birthday on Saturday. I uploaded a few pics on my flickr site if you are interested. I also have a few videos that I need to download but they take forever. Hopefully I will do that soon.

***UPDATE*** (oh and such an exciting one): After posting this blog entry I did a bit more on the quilt. It is coming along. Take a look!

Emily's debut

Emily learned a little song in Spanish and she is always singing it to her baby. Of course she becomes shy the minute I bring out the video camera.
Even though this isn't the true style of how she sings it, it is still pretty darn cute.
Enjoy!

my little artists

Today I decided to have a go at the paints that I bought for the girls. This little activity, just as eating does, shows their personalities.

Emily is willing to get into her work, letting it become her.

Bella, on the other hand, doesn't want to let her hair loose and get dirty...just like her momma.

Emily's Work

Emily's Workspace after finished painting

Bella's Work

Bella's Workspace after finished painting

Here is each of them showing me how dirty they are. As you see Bella has one tiny spot of paint on her. Emily is only showing a small part of how much paint she got on herself.

I think they had fun.