Burrr...it's cold!

Yes, I can't believe it, but it's cold. Two days in a row we woke to temps in the low 60's. We actually put blankets on the bed! I'm walking around at night in jeans and a fleece jacket, feeling like a local. It's a lovely change and so funny to think 8 weeks ago we were melting.

The ice cream man cometh.

In La Manzanilla there is a never ending stream of ice cream trucks and wagons. They take turns parking outside the school at 1:00, walking around town and driving down the beach. For 5 pesos a scoop, including sprinkles, we treat the neighbor kids to ice cream pretty often.

Here's Lyle and his compadres enjoying and ice cream treat.

School’s out…3 days early

We arrived to pick-up Lyle after school today and were informed that there will be a posada tomorrow from 8-10 and then school will be out until the 7^th of January.

I have the official school calendar and the last day of school is supposed to be Dec 21^st.

Not sure why we have this extended vacation but I am sure that Lyle’s class is supposed to have testing on the 2^nd block of work in Jalisco educational system issued school books and that they are only 2/3 of the way through the 2^nd block. I'm also sure that in the last 4 weeks we have not had one full week of school, either ending early of days completely off because the teachers have meetings they need to attend. I guess meetings after the 1:00 hour (when school gets out) is out of the question.

I’m completely baffled by the school system here in La Manzanilla. We will be working with Lyle over the holiday break to finish the block. I’m thinking this time next year we will be homeschooling.

Let’s make cookies!

It’s raining in La Manzanilla; the locals say it’s been at least 10 years since we’ve had rain in December. A couple of nights ago is poured so hard the streets were flooded up to the sidewalk.

Yesterday, Sunday, we decided since it was such an overcast and winter like day we should make cookies! I was all about sugar cookies, but Rick and Lyle turned up their noses and voted for chocolate chip. Ok, so we need 1 more stick of butter and some chocolate chips. Rick heads into town. He returns about 15 mins later with the news that there are no chocolate chips to be found in town. They still say, “no thanks” when I chime in about sugar cookies.

Not completely deterred the boys decide it would be fun to bake a cake, a cake from a box. Ok, so Rick and head down to our nearest corner store while Lyle is playing with the neighbor kids. No cake mixes. It’s now about 4:30 on Sunday afternoon and Rick is determined. He goes back into town. He returns 15 min later empty handed and bearing news that everything in the 3 block town is closed!

Guess baking wasn’t in the cards.