Christmas Eating

Well, we ate our way through Christmas again this year and our tummies thanked us.
We spent Christmas Eve with our landlords family and had a lovely dinner with them.  She is an excellent cook and we had stuffed pork loin, breaded fish and shrimp, mashed potatoes, pasta salad, beans, ceviche, etc..  All excellent.  It was cold so she also had atole, which she told me she had made with pinole (sweetened toasted corn meal) for a change, along with other refrescos.  We waddled back upstairs to sleep it off until Christmas Day.
Christmas Day we went out to San Carlos to have late lunch/early dinner with our friends there.  One lady brought a flan for desert, we took the caramel sauce for the Christmas pudding and some gingersnap cookies and their company from up north helped her prepare the usual turkey dinner.  Again all was delicious and we vegged out and visited.
We haven't been doing much else since then other than eating the rest of the cookies that I have been making lately.  It has been chilly here so I have been baking to heat up the place.  Naturally once it is baked we eat it.
It has been cold and snowing up in the mountains in Arizona so we have been getting a lot of cold air here from that.  Thankfully the last few days it has begun to warm back up a bit.
I have a post to make about the despedida de soltera that I went to a few weeks ago; but have been lazy.
Happy New Year to all.

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR TO EVERYONE.

Merry Christmas, Feliz Navidad

Merry Christmas to everyone near and far.  We hope that you all have a wonderful holiday season.
I spent part of the day yesterday phoning relatives and friends and wishing them all a Merry Christmas.  Then I baked a couple of loaves of bread and some cinnamon buns.
We spent the evening at home quietly, well we were quiet, the fireworks of course were going on; but we are kind of used to them.
This morning I made some more phone calls and think I am done with that for the day.
Today we are going out for a walk on the beach and  dinner out with some friends.  I will make sure and take some photos of the beach for those of you up north.
The landlords daughter in law just came over with a neighbor and gave me an invitation to a birthday party for tomorrow, so I guess I will be shopping tomorrow morning.  Roy asked who the party is for, so I explained that it is the neighbors aunts granddaughter lol.  Should be fun.
My mom is still in the hospital, she has had several set backs due to infections; but will be moving to a stroke unit on Monday if all stays the same.  She still has the feeding tube in her stomach and is unable to speak, although she is now managing to get out a couple of words.  Her mind is sharp though.  Hopefully with some therapy she will get through this once again.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas to everyone. May your day be filled with joy and happiness.

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR (FELIZ NAVIDAD Y PROSPERO AÑO NUEVO)

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR (FELIZ NAVIDAD y PROSPERO AÑO NUEVO)

Christmas Lights

Christmas Lights

Right around Halloween we noticed that there were several homes with their Christmas lights hung and lit up already. We also noticed that these lights were up and alight. I don't know about you; but for me it is just a little bit early.

Christmas Day

Christmas Day

We were supposed to be out at the RV campground in San Carlos for Christmas dinner around 1 PM. We thought that we would show Gary some of the sights around San Carlos so we left home around 10:30 AM. We dropped off our food items at the campground and continued on. We stopped first at one of the marinas and took in the sights. It was a nice warm day and although the breeze was still blowing, it was nice to be outside
Tetakawi Peak behind the marina.

After that we went up to the Mirador Scenic Lookout and as always enjoyed the view from there.

We then went over to Pierdra Pintas.

This is the beach that we had snorkeled at in the summer. There were actually some people in the water today, swimming and snorkeling. Too cold for me.

We returned to the campground and enjoyed a wonderful meal and meet some other people from various parts of Alberta. A couple of hours of visiting and we were ready to be on our way home. We took the other road home through Miramar and showed Gary where the new Delphinario is located and the beach at Miramar. I was surprised to see people swimming there also.

We returned home to relax and later spent some time chatting with Ciro, Irene and Carlos.

At 4:30 PM it was 81 degrees F.(about 28 degrees Celcius) in the shade, not a bad temperature for Christmas Day. A great day.

There are more photos from today here:
http://travel.webshots.com/album/556224469YzzOJQ?vhost=travel&start=144

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve

Ciro and Irene had invited Gary and us to their home for Christmas Eve dinner. We arrived, (long trip-down the stairs and across their patio), shortly before 9 PM. Irene and Nancy were still at church, so we visited with Ciro and young Alan. Naturally, Alan was very excited about Christmas as he had been told that he could open his gifts after dinner. He kept a sharp eye out for the return of his mother and grandmother. He had to show us some of the dinner that was cooked, his favorite apparently. Gary told us some stories of where he had gone during the day on his bike and what he had seen. Alan, of course, spent some time goofing around with Roy. Ciro told us some more history of the area and of Mexico in general, in response to our many questions. The ladies returned and Alans enthusiasm to get dinner over with prompted him to assist by setting the table. His mother came out of the kitchen and shook her head when she saw that he had put tiny luncheon plates out for everyone.

Dinner was delicious as usual, Irene and Nancy are both excellent cooks. There was a rolled roast with olives and other things inside which was very tender and delicious, mashed potatoes, macaroni salad, and some vegetables. They served this to us on our plates, and then asked us to help ourselves off of the other plates in the center of the table. Our plates were already full and we also had a side dish of refried beans (seems to be a favorite of Garys) so it was difficult to find room to add more, either to the plate or our stomachs. Ciro kept explaining to us that it was buffet style and to help ourselves. The other dishes on offer were: fresh lobster, roasted chicken, and a seafood casserole and of course fancy bread. The buffet idea was different from last year and unfortunately I didn't have room to try everything. What I did have was very, very good. At the end of the meal, Irene brought out desert, which was one of her delicious pineapple desserts. We have had this with them before and as well as being delicious it is very pretty to look at.

We chatted about the differences in the everyday cuisine between here and Canada (or at least the area we were from). We explained that in Alberta, shrimp and lobster are not eaten as an everyday thing, that they are expensive and are served/eaten more on special occasions. They were amazed when I told them what a lobster dinner in a restaurant in Alberta would cost. We find that we are also eating more shrimp, etc. here as time goes by and it is not such a special thing to us anymore either.

We chatted about traveling and teased Ciro about his new job for the CFE in the new year. He is retired; but his old boss has been bugging him to come back in a different capacity. If I understood him correctly, he will be traveling about Mexico doing some training for the employees of CFE. We knew that he was going to be doing this; but had thought that it was only to be in the Guaymas, Hermosillo area or perhaps it has now evolved. I don't know. We told him that Irene should go with him and while he is working she could be shopping. Irene laughed and said that she prefers to shop with Nancy, as then they can take their time trying things on. Ciro doesn't care to shop much. It will be interesting to see how it goes, as Ciro is the one who likes to stay home and Irene is the one who likes to travel. Ciro did so much travelling at other times in his life, he likes to be at home now. It will not be a constant job though, so maybe it will be OK. Irene told us about some family members in other countries that she hopes to visit next year.

As we chatted, Alan opened his gifts. He was very excited and I had a very difficult time understanding him last night. It appeared that he got most of the things that he had hoped for and Santa Claus had not arrived yet. One difference here is that he is allowed to stay up until midnight when Santa arrives and then gets to open the rest of his gifts. I asked if he would then sleep in, in the morning and Nancy ruefully shook her head. Ciro explained to us that Christmas Eve is when the married children spend time with the wifes family and that tomorrow they will all be at his house for Christmas day. Carlos was at his girlfriends home in Obregon and young Ciro and his family were at his wifes family. I am not sure why Nancy, Alan and young Alan were not at Nancys mothers last night, as they were last year. Ciro is at his happiest when he has all his family around him, he says he is a traditionalist in this way. A young fellow, who lives just behind us and is a very good friend of the family, stopped in for a visit and of course had to have something to eat. We laughed as he attempted to carve some chicken and finally handed both the chicken and his plate to Irene to fix for him. She, laughingly, referred to him as her other son. When the stairs were finally in place for us here, he would bounce over the roof and down the stairs to visit. We noticed that he had stopped doing this and wondered why. One day Ciro laughingly told us that grandma had given him heck and told him not to do this anymore, as the upstairs was our home. We told Ciro that we didn't mind in the least; but grandmas word held as he still walks all the way around. We thought this was pretty funny. Grandma, according to Ciro watches out for us and our things.

Gary noticed that it was midnight, so we left so that Santa Claus could arrive for Alan. A lovely evening with good food and better company.

Today we head out for San Carlos for another meal and will also show Gary some of the sights around there.

Cena (dinner) At El Sauce Y Las Palmas

Cena (dinner) At El Sauce Y Las Palmas

Shortly after 8 PM last evening, we all got together again to go out for dinner. Gary had kindly invited us all out.

Ciro drove and we arrived at the restaurant and found very few empty tables. We were given the menus in spanish, funny as the last time, when we went in with english speaking friends, we were given the english menus. The menu distribution definately depends on who you are with. Roy and I knew what we wanted which was our usual, "Enchiladas Suiza". Gary and Ciro both decided on a combination plate with an enchilada, a taco, a gordita and something else on it. Irene chose a dish of menudo (tripe or cow tummy), when it arrived, it was a large bowl of soup with breads, tostados, cilantro and onion to go with it. The restaurant was busy and at one point there was a waiting line outside. A popular place. We enjoyed our meal and attempted conversation. I am sure that Ciro was exhausted with the effort of translating. He and I tried to keep the translation going; but I am afraid the bulk of it fell on his shoulders. Irene speaks no english, Roy and Gary speak very little spanish and my spanish is not much better.

Dinner finished we got back in the car and Ciro gave us a Christmas light tour of the downtown, we then went out to Miramar and saw some more lights, one area had the whole block lit up along with a small park area. Ciro showed us a very grand home, built and owned by a doctors son. I asked some questions about some old homes/buildings that I hadn't been able to find out anything about and got some answers. After our tour, we headed back into Guaymas, Irene needed to make a stop at the corner store as she had promised young Alan some chocolate. I guess he was upset that he couldn't come with us for dinner, so they had promised to bring him some chocolate back.

Irene has invited us all over to their home for dinner this evening. We had dinner with them last year on Christmas Eve. Irene is an excellent cook, so needless to say dinner was excellent and we are looking forward to the evening.

Tomorrow, Christmas Day, we are supposed to go out to San Carlos for turkey and trimmings with the couple from Saskatchewan and some other people. I need to get busy and get the dessert made that I said I would make.