First a bit of background. We have lived in our area of Mexico, Guaymas, Sonora since October of 2005. We started out renting from our landlord who had built a couple of tiny apartments right onto his own home and that is where we still are. The first winter we lived in the one on the ground level and then the next summer moved into the one upstairs when they finished building it and changing a few walls around for us. We were the first people to live in both places which was nice.
We love the neighbourhood, it is fairly quiet; although dusty as we have gravel and cobblestone streets around us and we love our landlords and their family. Their grandchildren freely visit us and we are invited to a lot more parties than we actually attend. We have the usual free ranging chickens, roosters, dogs and cats that can be seen in any Mexican neighbourhood.
The only drawback to the apartment is that is it very small, which can be both good and bad. Good in that there is not much housecleaning to be done, which I like, bad in that we live in a pretty confined space of around 425 square feet in the apartment and a patio of the same size. If you are wondering about the very dark curtains hanging behind the regular curtains, there is a good reason for that. In the summer it is very hot here, so I made those to keep some of the heat out and they work well. We raise and lower them depending on where the sun is at the time. All of the artwork on the walls is my fault, what hasn't been sold yet or gifted ends up on our walls.
We have no desire whatsoever to own a house again.
So, onto the challenge.
First of all our laundry area. Our washer is located outside on the patio as most are where we live and naturally our clothes dryer is outside also.
Next up, our computer set ups, plural because we both have our own simple areas. We have high speed internet, cable TV and a landline phone through the cable company here called Megacable. We have had good service from them; although I know that in other areas of the country people really complain about their service. We use Skype for our long distance calls.
I have a PC, old style monitor, (which I am hoping dies soon as I want a bigger, flat screen; but am too cheap to buy one until this one dies), All in one scanner, printer, copier, modem, etc. at my desk. Roy has his laptop and various other things at his desk. As you will see we are both set up in a corner with our own recliners in between. Naturally, both desk areas have their own cups of coffee at them in the mornings.
First 2 photos of are my desk and the 3 rd is of Roys.
On to the next area, which is our kitchen area. We elected to buy movable counters rather than regular kitchen cupboards in case we ever decided to move as we can just pick them up and leave. The usual things reside in our kitchen, stove, sink (double one), frig., and a small microwave which I seldom use. The movable counters have shelves, baskets, water jug holder, etc. on them and we have a pantry cupboard and a few other shelves to put things on. I don't like a lot of stuff on my counter tops, frig. top, etc., so I try to put things away when I am done using them. So the empty counter top is normal, not cleaned up just for company.
I am not so paranoid about keeping my art table neat and tidy as you can see in the foreground. I do clean it off enough to eat at though. We do have bar chairs that we used to use at the back side of the counter to eat; but it was not that comfortable and we decided to stop using that and put the long table there instead and just wheel our office chairs over to it when we eat there.
Kitchen side view of the movable counters.
Pantry cupboard and assorted shelves. Door leads into the bedroom and bathroom.
So, that pretty much covers it. Hope you now have a sense of where we reside and how we live.
