I'm not travelling light!

I usually travel light!

This trip I have lots of baggage, literally! We planned this cruise with my sister and her husband to take advantage of the 300.00 (each) personal allowance going into Mexico by sea. I have all the receipts. Plus the cruise was cheaper than flying and we do not have to deal with too much luggage.
Today we are off to Miami to start our trip. We are spending 2 days with Carlos sister before we leave on the cruise on Sunday. Our cruise is 7 days and than it's back to Miami for several days. I will return home (some surgery scheduled for the 19th)  but Carlos will stay in Florida to meet our exchange student of 20 years ago who is flying in with his significant other on Friday. Carlos has the month of December as his vacation.
This Danish boy was our favorite out of the 14 students we hosted over the years. Carlos, Morten and Tine will head to Merida via Cancun on the 13th of Dec. Carlos will bring some odds and ends (like garbage disposal) with him on that trip. Otherwise he will just show Merida and our house to our Danish friends who would love to move there too! (I hope they visit the Danish bakery!)
They will come back to St Louis on the 21st of December in time to celebrate the holidays! So it will be a whirlwind December.

Soon, somewhere on the high seas....

My plumbing supplies will be basking in the sunshine, snoozing in the fresh salty air and having buffet moments. Yes, my faucets and shower heads and valves will be travelling in style. And it was cheaper than a plane ticket. 

When we were in Merida we spent most of a day looking at faucets, toilets and showers. The faucets and showers we liked would have blown our budget to h***. 

CQ wants a multi spray shower (Merida)

I liked the rain shower heads (Merida)

CQ and I decided that we would buy the items in the USA. (utilizing overstock.com, faucetdirect.com and amazon.com) We could price shop and get exactly what we wanted. This would be a good trade off because we were over budget on the tile.

Kitchen faucet meets bathroom faucet, could this be luv on the high seas?

One suitcase is ready to go!

Carlos and I love cruising. We don't care where the ship is going, just get us on it. We have crossed the ocean, cruised north to Alaska, explored the Panama canal and the islands of the Caribbean. So when the tickets to Merida or Cancun seemed very expensive, I said to Carlos, let's look at going by ship. It helps having some free air tickets to Florida.
BINGO, I found a 7 day cruise stopping in a port in Mexico at a price very close to the plane ticket. Contacting Roger, our esteemed architect,  he was very amiable to meeting us at the Mexican port. Now we are taking our faucets on a cruise (along with my sister and her husband). I just hope the faucets will be able to settle into the world of housework after... I just don't want to spoil them too much.

Sometimes the views are a little strange..

Arturo has done a wonderful job of sending us photographs every couple of weeks. I think it gets difficult when the work that is being done is rather mundane and not mind shattering changes. CQ and I examine the photos by zooming in and discussing all the changes we notice, but frankly sometimes we wonder, why did he photograph this? So this past week we received some new photos and here are a few of them...

The stairwell gets a second coat... third to come before paint

Looking into the master bath planting area from above

The airshaft for bathroom ventilation

Eastern Wall.. looks massive!

Workers enjoy their morning break, they are really hard workers!

What about the roof space?

Our house has lots of rooftop. We have the first room with its really high ceiling, than the second room, a little less high and than all the new addition with the two stories. Between the new addition and the front room, the roof is very accessible and that will be my clothes drying area. As the roof dips there you will not be able to see it from the house area or the street. 

The clothes hanging roof

I love to hang clothes out. I love the scent of sheets dried in the sun. Towels fresh and rough from outside exfoliate without a lot of fuss. I do it here in Missouri. I have the only clothes pole in my neighborhood or among all my friends. I call it being ‘green’.

Now Carlos has been noticing all of that rooftop space and it’s driving him crazy! He now wants to have a conversation with Roger about adding a spiral staircase on the other side of my drying area to the upper roof over the new addition. He wants a rooftop terrace. Not sure why as we already have three terraces on the plans and if/when we build the casita and pool at the rear of the property there will be two more. I think it’s all that empty space and the romantic idea of rooftop and stars gazing… after all he did grow up in New York City where a rooftop terrace was something to aspire to.

Who uses their roof?

My favorite view to the east

Such a large expanse of space!