I will miss St Louis...

Carlos and I have lived in St Louis since May 1979...that's 34 years. It's longer than I actually lived in my home state of New York....but I still consider myself a New Yorker! I think because we moved to St Louis as adults and do not have the roots of of growing up here and attending local schools, it has just never felt like our home. Don't get me wrong, I do like St Louis and love many things about it. St Louis has been good to us, we have had good careers, it's been good to bring up our son and we have met some fine people here who have become close friends. Recently I have come across two fine videos that really help me see what I will miss about St Louis. Take a look! The first one was done last year...It's called Here is St Louis and the second is more recent and called Here is St Louis Two. These were done by some excellent local filmakers and their firm is called Grain, Inc..
I have always considered St Louis to be part of the Midwest...like Iowa or Kansas. My sister who lives here also considers it the north South...like Kentucky or Tennessee. Soon we will be moving to Merida, Yucatan, Mexico and I have heard that many consider it closer to part of the Caribbean and others closer to Central Americas! Whatever it is, it has some of the finer attributes just like St Louis. It's easy to get around, it's a great place for families and I know there are many fine people looking for friends like us.

Casa de Huespedes

Original Plan

 Now, after much thought, we are back to building the casa de huespedes. As we do not have negative connotations about the title we are calling it the 'casita'. We were told by some that in the past, a 'casita' was the small house that was provided for a mistress by her provider, thus it's not used often here in the Yucatan.
But anyway, we have received some plans from Roger and they are good plans. However after much discussion, Carlos and I are thinking of making it our master suite and redesigning it as such. First we thought of just making it so we could convert it later. Than we discussed just going ahead and making it our 'dream' master suite. So after a week or more of discussion we have decided to go to Roger and friends for input and thought.We hope to skype with Roger this coming weekend and in the meantime I will continue to ask for thoughts from friends and family. So if you have any input, please comment!
Our reasoning:
There are no stairs to the casita..this may be important in the future
We can walk out in the morning and jump into the pool
It will be larger than our current designated master with another walk in closet
There is space for me to have small sitting area as well as desk...my own reasoning...remember Carlos has the huge study and music room upstairs
I can make the bathroom both spacious and add a bathtub as well as a washer hook up for the future

My primitive notes to Roger

Bathroom of my dreams!

What a Summer!

I have two weather bugs on my desktop, one of St Louis weather and one of Merida weather. Recently the temperature and humidity has been neck and neck. The last couple of days St Louis has pulled ahead! Of course we have central air and air conditioning in the car  It won't be so in Merida. But I have been talking up getting solar system so that we do not have the budget busting electric bills. So when we go to Merida in December we will be talking to whatever experts we can find. I may just have my brother-in-laws father visit us as he has installed it in his house in Puerto Rico and gone from a 750.00 dollar a month electric bill to receiving a check from selling power each month. Santiago Sr is an retired engineer and does major research before he buys anything. I know he would be a great resource for us. Now I know that CFE will not buy my excess power, but it sure would be great to have a zero bill! And you never know, perhaps that could change.... So if anyone out there has some experience with solar in Merida or the Yucatan I would love to hear about it!

How I am making time pass....until Carlos can retire....and we can go to Merida!

Added crown molding

Sometimes the days go by so fast and other times the days just crawl, but I have a year or more left to fill until Carlos retires. Now that our Merida house is mostly finished, I only have a little to do. Once we start on the pool and the (still undecided) casita, I will have more to watch and worry about. With excellent property managers (Arturo and his lovely wife Orelia) there is not much to worry about.

The property values here in St Louis are starting to recover and homes that have sat on the market for months are finally moving. This summer Carlos and I have decided that we will try to finish many of the projects here at our home and will cross as many off the list as we can. Some will be DIY, but others will be projects hired out. This past two years we have done a few of the larger and more costly projects. New flooring and french doors in the lower level, a new driveway, and a huge tree removed. A new roof and gutters were installed this past October, our insurance paid the most of it as it needed to be done because of hail damage. Other large projects that have been deferred really need to be done. Projects have mainly been chosen for our future sale of this house.

Huge tree removed!

Flooring and french doors installed

One such project is to have ceramic tile installed in the laundry room as well as some cabinets and a folding counter. We have the materials, but have not made enough effort to find a handy person to install. Most of our large projects in this house have been done by our good Danish friend, Mike, who we flew over from Denmark. (Kitchen and bathrooms done by Mike) He was our exchange student 30 years ago and our only cost for his services was his airfare and expenses! However Mike is caught up in his Danish life and is no longer available. 

So it seems that this summer will be a summer of projects...here in St Louis, though I really wish it could be projects in Merida! 

Merida via Google Maps

I used to spend alot of time walking the streets of Merida using Google maps, street version. However the views getting so old now, almost everything has changed. I've gone back today and looked at my house and it's still the old version, taken sometime after 2007 but before 2010. It was really easy to explore where friends had reported restuarants or coffee shops. I even traced some of the paths to newly owned home reported purchased to see what was happening! The streets views of Merida have changed so much in the past few years. More houses have been rehabbed. Business have gone in and out of business. It's not much fun to walk the streets via Google maps! I wish it would be updated! I feel like a walk....

2007-20011

Now

Nothing much is happening..... at least right now!

It's spring here in St Louis, but in Merida the 'hot' season is just starting. We had a skype meeting with Arturo yesterday and he forwarded us some photos he took last week. Since none of our new projects have started there was really not much new to see.
However, the property owner next door is building something in his backyard and has raised the wall between our property and his. It looks like he is building a one or two bedroom casita. Whatever it is he has just saved us a few thousand dollars on our wall! Yeah! Now it will be back to the drawing board for our architect as our wall was going to be a much different design.

Before

After wall height added

Architects Plans

I'm eager to get some things going. We have a list of items we want to add/modify in our original house and would like to finish those before we go on to the pool and the still undecided about casita. Our item list includes things like screen on all the window and doors, water softner unit, new kitchen sink...I hate the one installed, protectorants added to several window and the door out to the roof, and some drawers added to the kitchen and hanging bars added to the bedroom closets. In all I think there were about 85 additional items to tweak or add. 

Love the faucet...hate the sink!

Carlos has been able to schedule the entire month of December off, so we well be in Merida as we were last year...Maybe this time we will have some company!

Another Snow Storm!

We have had lots of snow this winter here in St Louis. Our usual cumulative total for a winter season is around 17.5 inches. This year we have had way more or maybe it just feels that way! Today we are expected to have anywhere  from 8 to 12 inches. It has been coming down at the rate of an inch or two per hour and we have had THUNDER snow! I just finished shoveling off the front stairs and porch and I took a couple of photos.

I brushed off the snow so I could feed the wildlife a little extra

View from the front door

side yard

back yard

Carlos is wondering how long he can hold out. He hates winter and he can't retire for at least another year and a half. He saves up all his days off so we can go to Merida for a month in December, so he can't even escape to Florida to visit his sister. 

But I can! So this Friday I am off to Florida where I will stay with his sister pre and post cruise (5 days) and will float around in the Caribbean for seven days on the Norwegian Epic. My friend Mary will be joining me on the cruise, along with 4,100 others...it's a huge ship. 

Norwegian Epic

So I will soak up a little sunshine, snorkel and float in the Caribbean and dance until dawn (not likely but it sounds good) for almost 12 days!

Filling up the suitcase(s)

My current list!

The last two times we've gone to Merida I have brought things down that I either treasure or was afraid I wouldn't find easily. A few items I've hauled down, I've found at one of thee many stores I've explored. This past December I made a list as I either could not find the item at one of the many stores I visited or did not like the brands or it was way overpriced. I keep a suitcase in the bedroom and as I shop around St Louis, I check out the clearance items and add to my suitcase. Today I checked out all the items I've purchased since our return in January.

I never could find deep woods off around Merida! (and only 1.00 each on clearance)

More clearance items..7.00 us for the mosquito racket.

100% cotton percale sheets! (and only 20.00 on clearance!)

From Thailand, a treasured gift from a friend!

And so it goes... recently I have been concentrating on pillows for the couch and beds. Yes I have bought some and I think I will make some. As soon as the curtain rods go up on the French doors in the bedrooms I will get the measurements and try my hand on making some curtains with the grommet tops. I'm glad it's too expensive to bring furniture with us....otherwise my garage would be filled too!

Two of the pillow 

This is the material for me to make more couch pillows!

Valentine's Day Special

"The EX

Knife Sets For The Heartbroken

Valentine’s Day isn’t all chocolates and roses. For some, it’s Regret, Remorse,REVENGE. If your love life is currently traversing the dark side of the crystal, time to wield the EX knife set. Featuring five blades and a sleek holder, it’s perfect for stabbing and slashing ahead to better days—like February 15th"

This is the description of the knife set as pictured. Remember this knife set that I blogged about in December when I was in Merida? Here is the link in case you have forgotten.  Looks like I was wrong what the name of it was! Got an e-mail today advertising this on special of just $69.00 and on Valentines day too! It's interesting how many colors it comes in.... Do you think anyone would actually buy this?

(colors not shown are white, and chrome)

To all my readers and fellow bloggers, Happy Valentine's Day!

My house looks so lonely!

We were there and stuff was all about!

Without fresh flowers, clutter on the counter and just the flotsam of daily life, out house looks lonely. Everything was put away to keep the dust and cleaning to the minimum. I even took some of the few pieces of art off the walls. I didn't notice how lonely it looked the morning we left as we were in a hurry, as usual. Now seeing the photos that Arturo took it looks lonely and I hope the house knows that we are lonely for it!

looking lonely!

empty

Clean!

Our comfy bed is waiting for us!