Hola Amigos, y Feliz Navidad!
We wish you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from beautiful Baja California Sur, Mexico!
Those are a few photos of my meager Christmas decorations!
Don't forget the reason for the season!
We have no family close by this year, so we will celebrate with friends down here, and hopefully have some video phone calls with our wide spread family! We did enjoy chatting with Rebecca and Tim the other day, making plans for our summer, but the kids were already in bed so didn't get to chat with them. Ryan has a job in Shanghai now, but probably doesn't get the Christmas Holiday off. Hope to see baby Olivia in video or still photos....hard to believe she is 5 months old already!
Our "at home" projects are moving along. The '30 Model A still hasn't been started due to shorting problems with the ignition switch and the distributor. Ben spent a lot of time trying to figure that one out, and now, he really needs to send that unit back to the manufacturer and get it fixed....in the US! In the meantime we've been working on upholstery and getting the seats in. We got the front seat in, as well as some side panels behind the door and panels in the rumble seat area, when Ben decided those back panels needed to come out to put in some wood slats to stiffen the area. So, back into the rumble seat area to unscrew multiple screws to get the things out. Here's a 2 for 1 shot of the Model A and the Jeep out front!
That was discouraging enough to start working on the Jeep again. First effort to put the Jeep tail lights in and he discovers that the holes where the tail lights go are a lot bigger than the light fixtures. Grumble, grumble! (It had some diamond plating metal in that area previously). Not sure what to do there! Ahh... work on cleaning up and putting the windshield on. (He just started that project, so not sure how long that one will last until he runs into a problem that can't be easily resolved!
Another ongoing project is moving our phone line. When we first built our house in 2002, the phone line was to the east of us about 50 yards. They then changed the line to follow the road that curves around our house to the west and south. They hooked our line to a pole way to the southeast of our casa. That line goes UNDER the road in a PVC pipe that has been exposed for about 6 months on part of the road. I keep piling rocks up around it, and piling dirt, but it won't be long before some big old truck drives over it and cracks it, thus compromising the lines (ours, Ryan's, and our neighbor Peter's house). So, we had a trench dug from the closest pole to our monument in front of the house. We can do that now since we bought the neighboring lot! It's much shorter distance, no roads go over it (other than our minor use of it to get to our new lot) and is nice and deep! By the way, it cost $40 to have that trench dug, and a few trees pulled out, by the backhoe. It would have taken Ben a couple weeks to dig that much, if he'd survived. That is HARD dirt, and there was a BIG chunk of concrete that the construction workers used to bend rebar when they built our carport, directly in the middle of the trench!! It took the backhoe a while to get it out. You can see it sitting there to the left of Ben.
Our favorite plumber / electrician, Carlitos, came and attached proper conduit piping to the monument, and laid the pipe in the trench for us. We're waiting for the back hoe to come back and fill it in. Then the Telmex guy should be here any day (hope hope hope!) to move our phone lines to our new conduit. Picture below shows Ben working with Carlitos in the trench. Our monument is the pink thing there on the right.
The garden is doing OK. We did have an invasion of cutworms and other nasty critters that ate the maturing lettuce, so we pulled what was left, replanted, and will try again. The garden area on the new lot is fenced in to keep the bunnies out, and so far I've got two rows of 1" to 2" high corn, a couple tomato plants and some cucumbers planted in there as well. My bush beans did produce, but not a lot... this was an experiment to see if I could get some beans before I plant the pole beans a bit later. Yeah, I could, but not very many! More compost / fertilizer / good dirt? Who knows. Maybe less wind would help!
Yes, it has been windy, and the kite-boarders are loving it. We just hope that it calms down enough in the evenings so we can go out and enjoy a fire in our little fire pit. The ambiance is nice, and we've also got a lot of trees pruned and areas cleared on the new lot. Ben has been using the pitchfork inherited from his Dad a lot on this project!
We had company! Chrys and Gary were here for a long weekend to celebrate Gary's birthday. They had a great time and wished it could have been longer. Sam was thrilled with Chrys, because she picked him up and held him at the table, just like Ryan does. Chin on the table, and all is well in Sam's world! (He doesn't get up there during meals, by the way. Just before or after.) Chrys also joined me on my morning walks, which was nice. She was amazed at how fast Zoey can move on the way home!
The big waves in this picture are due to the strong winds.
Well, on that cheery note...
More photos have been added to the 2018 December album.
We hope you have a lovely Christmas and a prosperous New Year. And maybe you'll think about coming to visit us in beautiful Baja in 2019!
Hasta la proxima vez,
Tus amigos en Baja,
Harriet, Ben, Sam & Zoey
We wish you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from beautiful Baja California Sur, Mexico!
Those are a few photos of my meager Christmas decorations!
Don't forget the reason for the season!
We have no family close by this year, so we will celebrate with friends down here, and hopefully have some video phone calls with our wide spread family! We did enjoy chatting with Rebecca and Tim the other day, making plans for our summer, but the kids were already in bed so didn't get to chat with them. Ryan has a job in Shanghai now, but probably doesn't get the Christmas Holiday off. Hope to see baby Olivia in video or still photos....hard to believe she is 5 months old already!
Our "at home" projects are moving along. The '30 Model A still hasn't been started due to shorting problems with the ignition switch and the distributor. Ben spent a lot of time trying to figure that one out, and now, he really needs to send that unit back to the manufacturer and get it fixed....in the US! In the meantime we've been working on upholstery and getting the seats in. We got the front seat in, as well as some side panels behind the door and panels in the rumble seat area, when Ben decided those back panels needed to come out to put in some wood slats to stiffen the area. So, back into the rumble seat area to unscrew multiple screws to get the things out. Here's a 2 for 1 shot of the Model A and the Jeep out front! That was discouraging enough to start working on the Jeep again. First effort to put the Jeep tail lights in and he discovers that the holes where the tail lights go are a lot bigger than the light fixtures. Grumble, grumble! (It had some diamond plating metal in that area previously). Not sure what to do there! Ahh... work on cleaning up and putting the windshield on. (He just started that project, so not sure how long that one will last until he runs into a problem that can't be easily resolved!
Another ongoing project is moving our phone line. When we first built our house in 2002, the phone line was to the east of us about 50 yards. They then changed the line to follow the road that curves around our house to the west and south. They hooked our line to a pole way to the southeast of our casa. That line goes UNDER the road in a PVC pipe that has been exposed for about 6 months on part of the road. I keep piling rocks up around it, and piling dirt, but it won't be long before some big old truck drives over it and cracks it, thus compromising the lines (ours, Ryan's, and our neighbor Peter's house). So, we had a trench dug from the closest pole to our monument in front of the house. We can do that now since we bought the neighboring lot! It's much shorter distance, no roads go over it (other than our minor use of it to get to our new lot) and is nice and deep! By the way, it cost $40 to have that trench dug, and a few trees pulled out, by the backhoe. It would have taken Ben a couple weeks to dig that much, if he'd survived. That is HARD dirt, and there was a BIG chunk of concrete that the construction workers used to bend rebar when they built our carport, directly in the middle of the trench!! It took the backhoe a while to get it out. You can see it sitting there to the left of Ben.
Our favorite plumber / electrician, Carlitos, came and attached proper conduit piping to the monument, and laid the pipe in the trench for us. We're waiting for the back hoe to come back and fill it in. Then the Telmex guy should be here any day (hope hope hope!) to move our phone lines to our new conduit. Picture below shows Ben working with Carlitos in the trench. Our monument is the pink thing there on the right.
The garden is doing OK. We did have an invasion of cutworms and other nasty critters that ate the maturing lettuce, so we pulled what was left, replanted, and will try again. The garden area on the new lot is fenced in to keep the bunnies out, and so far I've got two rows of 1" to 2" high corn, a couple tomato plants and some cucumbers planted in there as well. My bush beans did produce, but not a lot... this was an experiment to see if I could get some beans before I plant the pole beans a bit later. Yeah, I could, but not very many! More compost / fertilizer / good dirt? Who knows. Maybe less wind would help!
We had company! Chrys and Gary were here for a long weekend to celebrate Gary's birthday. They had a great time and wished it could have been longer. Sam was thrilled with Chrys, because she picked him up and held him at the table, just like Ryan does. Chin on the table, and all is well in Sam's world! (He doesn't get up there during meals, by the way. Just before or after.) Chrys also joined me on my morning walks, which was nice. She was amazed at how fast Zoey can move on the way home!
The big waves in this picture are due to the strong winds.
Chrys and I found this Moray Eel on the beach the other day. He had tried to eat a fish that was caught in a net. He couldn't swallow it, so they both died.
Well, on that cheery note...
More photos have been added to the 2018 December album.
We hope you have a lovely Christmas and a prosperous New Year. And maybe you'll think about coming to visit us in beautiful Baja in 2019!
Hasta la proxima vez,
Tus amigos en Baja,
Harriet, Ben, Sam & Zoey
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