Our 3rd Week In Review. Gettinga bit lazy about keeping up every day!

Okay, so we all knew that this time would come.  I had planned on trying to Blog every day, but as we all anticipated, life starts to happen and we get really busy.   So this weeks recap goes something like this… 

Monday back to Chapala walking the Malecon and exploring the city.  Tracy stumbled on the Market and we shopped the Open Tienda that is there on Tuesdays.  Andrew bought a really cool cross bow and Zach found a package of Power Rangers to play with.  Our friend Sarah turned us on to an incredible beverage called a “Yurba Buena”; it is a shot of Squirt soda, Jarabe (syrup), ice, water and a big handful of mint leaves.  They throw it all in a blender, it is the most refreshing drink to date.  Oh, and it looks really pretty too!  Relaxing evening at home.

Sarah with a "Yurba Buena"

Tuesday; we continued our search for the perfect house.  Off to look at a few houses for rent and we actually were stood up at the first one.  So, being the people we are and realizing that the Universe is always conspiring on our behalf, we went back to the house and walked to the second house on our list of appointments.  Upon walking in the front door, I was in love with it.  It has everything we were looking for.  Three Bedrooms (yes one for company), 2 bathrooms, the “boveda” ceilings and “copala” domes.  The fun colorful walls, nicely furnished, a tub for Tracy and the boys, small backyard with automatic sprinklers, and the frosting on the cake is a small community pool just outside the front door.  We didn’t want to appear to excited, but it was hard to hold back the feelings.  We decided not to jump on it and finish our tour of rentals for the next few days.  We spent another day just doing our due diligence and looking at a few more possibilities.  In the process we met a super nice family from Alaska.  They have three kids and have been living here for the past 2 years.  We hit it off immediately and have plans on Monday to hang out all together.  It’s so cool how easy it is to bond with others when you are all living a similar dream.   This was the reason we got stood up on the first house today.    Later that evening was “Circo Ayala”, wow was this an experience.  We went with Sarah, Lila and Ben to the touring circus in town.  They actually drive through the town in a brand new big red pickup truck with a huge sign in the bed and a loud speaker blaring about the circus.  The price was $20 Pesos of kids and $50 Pesos for adults.  That is just around $11 Dollars US.  The animals were amazing; they had mountain lions, camels, monkeys, horses of all sizes, pigs and more.  We walked into the tent at 8:45pm and the music was a bit loud, but appropriate.  Within about 10 minutes poor Lila just couldn’t take it.  Something scared her pretty bad and our three compadres had to leave and take her home.  It was most likely the announcers voice that got 10x louder then the music.  We four of us were a bit bummed, but decide to stick it out anyway.  The first half was like watching a small-scale version of Cirque de Sole.  Then came the second half.  It was rather depressing, because that is when the animals came out.  Well, not to get into to many details, we have decided as a family that the only circus we will attend form now on will be the human kind.

Circo Ayala

Getting ready for some fun

Wednesday:  “Sarah and Lila’s last day in Mexico”.    Well, we finally did it; we pulled the trigger and signed the lease for one year on the great house mentioned above.  Then, jus to solidify our decision, we went to the Mailbox Etc. and got copies of all our documents for the kids school.  With papers in hand, we headed over to the school that we have decided on for the kids and tried to sign them up.  They wouldn’t let us sign up until next week and invited us to come on Monday and drop them off from morning to early afternoon, so they can try it out, do a little testing and see how well they fit in, very cool!  Now with a house and a school lined up for the year, this truly means we are staying for at least one year, holy cow!  That night we headed to San Juan Cosala, back to “Viva Mexico” for dinner and then walked the downtown for their fiesta.  The kids rode on huge bouncy slides, rode on rides and played a few games.  We waited as long as we could for the fireworks, but left at around 11:00pm.  We heard from Fred the next day that they finally went off at around 11:20pm.  Oh well, guess we got to go back.

Thursday;  (sniff, sniff) Feeling a bit sad and bummed, we missed saying our goodbyes to Sarah and Lila.  They headed back to Colorado early and unfortunately, we were all so tired we slept right through our intended goodbye!  Hey you two, it was so awesome meeting you and we had such a wonderful time hanging out.  Please stay in touch and come back soon.  We miss you already  

Ran a few errands and then I took the boys over to Scot and David’s new place in El Dorado.  It’s super cute and the amenities (gym, pool, club house) are awesome.  The kids played video games until it was time for dinner.  We went out to “Hacienda Ajijic”, an amazing Argentinean Steak House.  Scott, the girls and his parents joined us and the food was great.  The best part of it all was that every steak was only $90 pesos and it was so good.   After dinner, we headed to our now favorite ice creamery ‘Blue Bell” and almost everyone got a single scoop cone.  Another day done, we headed home for bed.

Handmade on the Lake front

Friday;   went into tow today to get our CULP number.  This is the registration number like the Social Security number in the US.  It allows us to register the kids in school, we can get prepaid cell phones and a few other things that we are not yet aware of.  We tried to get a Mexico Cell Phone today, but the main location was closed, the other spoke no English and we couldn’t figure out what to do and how to do it, and the third was about $40 pesos more then the closed one.  Went to Café Grano, our favorite coffee shop right off the Plaza and had our traditional Carmel Frappacinno.  Oh, back to the coolest part of getting our CULP, we walked into what would be equivalent to the County Clerks Office/DMV office back in the States, it was a tiny, but functional office.  There was no line at all.  We walked in, asked where we get our CULP and within 15 minutes we all had our numbers and headed out the door.  Now back in the US, it would have taken at least 45 minutes to just wait in line.  It  was so smooth and easy!  We wandered a bit more, walked down to the lake and the Malecon and enjoyed the cool breeze coming off the lake.  Headed home, the kids watched a movie and Tracy and I read and did Spanish.  Then off to bed for some good sleep.

County Clerks office inside to the left

Hanging at Cafe Grano

Our Local better then Starbucks

Inside 60'ss in Paradise

Good food when your wanting something American

Saturday:  Got up and headed to the LCS Art Class for the kids.  Met a super cool family from Indiana.  Once the entire unit is here, it will be a grandmother, mom (Shannon) and young daughter.  They moved here about 2 months ago and are planning on living here indefinitely.  We also hung out with Scott and the girls and had a really nice visit with the two adults while the kids played and painted.  Scott and Shannon decided that they were going to caravan into Guadalajara to go to the Costco way downtown and the new Galleria Mall, we had plans at 5pm, so we chose not to go, but are looking forward to that as one of our next adventures.  Or lunch, we headed over to 60ss in Paradise, a really cool burger joint in Ajijic.  We met the new owner Laurie “Laura”, super cool woman who has been here 12 years and moved down from San Francisco.  We met her husband and stepdaughter also, such an incredibly kind family and the food was fantastic of course.  We had burgers, fries, onion rings, root beer float and funnel cake of course.   

Tracy, Anna and Brandi on top of the world.

After lunch, we headed home, took a siesta (read and did Spanish) then at 5:00 we took the boys to our new friends Brandie and Joe house.  They have two kids (boy and girl) and live just down from us.  We left the kids with a sitter and then off to a going away party for one of the ladies in Tracy’s yoga class.  They are doing a house trade with a family in Ireland for 6 months, so cool.  Their house was awesome, you walk up a few flights of stairs and up to the Mirador, where you can see the lake and everything around for 360 degrees.  We had a blast.  I met the Yoga teacher, a massage therapist and a handful of retirees from the US ad Canada.  Great group of people to hang out with and very helpful with information necessary for making life easier down here.  Then off to Tom’s Tavern and hung there just visiting with Joe and Brandi and a few others that they know.  Had a really nice time getting to know Joe and Brandi.  They are also from Denver originally and have been down here for 3 years now.  Well night is over and I am toast, more next week.