Thank You!! :)

Jackie P and I would like to send a huge Thank You to all the Bloglanian friends that have kept her in your thoughts and prayers :) JP is home, we got the good to go light yesterday afternoon. Because she is alone at night I'll spend the next night or two with her. We are planning a Pajama Party :)

Actually JP was extremely happy with her medical care and I was really impressed with the care she received. They were able to place pins in to stabilize her shoulder, now it's up to her and her bones for the healing process.

We used a very small 20 bed hospital where JP had all the care from a staff that was not understaffed and overwhelmed!! Mexico is still a culture where family is depended on to assist in the patient's care. In fact all the rooms are equipped with day beds so that a family member can sleep comfortably during the night. Because Dr's must repay their medical education with 2 years of service there was a physician on site 24 hours!!!

I have always felt comfortable with the level of medical care here in Mazatlan and Mexico, now having experienced it first hand I would have no problem remaining in Mexico for any medical care :) I some cases Mexico is far more innovated the the US. One area is pain relief. Opium drugs are very seldom used so they have developed alternatives which actually work better without the side effects morphine, and codeines have.

I'm thinking a little seista is in order so I'll try to do a bit of a posting this evening. Please have a most audacious today or tomorrow depending on where in world you are ;)

PS. Please take the reports on the Swine Flu news about Mexico with a grain of salt. Remember that although 100 people have died with symptoms of the flu that is a very very small percentage of the population of Mexico City. Mexico City is the most populated city in the world, with 29+ million, people just in the metropolitan area. We are very comfortable with the precautions the government has and is taking. They are extremely prepared to handle many outbreaks that other countries US included are not. Actually WHO (the World Health Organisation) has been very impressed with the way the country was prepared and is handling this outbreak!!

International Charm Day, April 28th

So what could be more fun on April 28th then celebrating International Charm Day?? I Ask you?? Nothing... well unless it's your birthday maybe :)

Amber Dawn has put together a huge charm party to celebrate the day. How about heading over to her party blog to see what's up and what delightful plans she has put together?? Then sign on along with blogs from all over Bloglandia for a bit of fun!! Why you could even put together your own activity to help celebrate :) Ready? Set? Race you to the Blog button, what? where? oh for heaven sakes just open your eyes!!!

Jackie P is scheduled for surgery at O'Dark Thirty tomorrow. The surgeon isn't sure whether her bone can be pinned or will have to have a prosthesis to replace the head of the bone. So we will see when we see tomorrow. Depending on how much work is done will dictate how much her BFF will be playing nurse :) I know every one's plates are always spilling over but if you have a spare minute or two to think please send a bit of positive chi to a very exceptional example of a genuine good and caring person :)

Have a most audacious today or tomorrow depending on where in the world you are ;)

Happy Earth Day

Mexico can be a real dichotomy. Most of the nation is still very poor and for generations has lived with the "reuse, remake, recycle, make do" media phrases before they became the current catch phrases. You can't spend 5 minutes in this country before you see 100 examples of using what you have on hand to make something work :) Things that the advanced developed nations throw away because there is no way to fix it to work again are fixed here. Mexico has more then earned the title of being able to fix anything :) But the most amazing part is that they are able to fix things with literally nothing. I have mentioned often that second hand stores are not common, and finding second hand furniture is even more uncommon. Truly nothing goes to waste There are some of the most amazing & inspirational artists behind every mechanic, shoe repair, steel worker, plumbing, hardware, electrical, paint.... stores!! Steampunk is a way of life here!!! :)

On the other side of the coin many in Mexico have not had the time, money or energy to realise that all things are finite not infinite. It takes everything they have to survive and thoughts that future generations might not have clean air, etc is not something that is a reality to deal with. But even that is changing, slowly but it is changing. Mexico realises and accepts the responsibility of protecting their country's resources. This is, (and rightly so) a proud country of ageless beauty with a history of a people who have cared, protected and respected nature in all her forms :)

Have a most audacious today or tomorrow depending on where in the world you are ;)

What a Week & A Bit of Art Making

Yikes It's been one of those weeks where the days go by so fast if you stopped to take a look you got left behind!!

Today is the last day of Mazatlan International Moto Week.

This is the signal that business and tourism will slow way down. On one hand everyone looks forward to it :) On the other hand it also signals the beginning of the season of Economical starvation. :( Because we are in reality a resort town our economy relies heavily on the tourist income. Every year a number of businesses close because they can't make it till Oct. This year may prove to be an impossible one for more then the usual amount of business because of the US, & World economies.

Jackie P and I have pretty much got ourselves on a bit of a routine for her care. :) We more then likely have another week or two before they can do any kind of surgery. Then we will decide how to go from there.

I did manage to get a few things made last week. I don't know about you but I'm a much happier (& I'm sure easier to live with) girl if I can play in My Little Art Corner for even a few minutes every day :) I don't have to get a project done or even progress very far. It's that my imagination has a bit of time to come out and play.

I've noticed that a number of Mexican jewelry artists have been creating wire wrapped crosses. Oh some are soooo beautiful and oh so costly :( I had an old chunky silver and red colored stone cross, that was in a bunch of "thangs" an Expat headed north left behind. That's what I used as the base. Then at the bead store I found these ever so cool freshwater pearls?? that were in the shape of crosses. With a bit of wire and dark brown faceted beads I wrapped the pearl cross on top of the silver/stone one. Then right in the center of both crosses I wrapped a little blue heart. I know I've mentioned before that sterling silver, (which by the way is always stamped 925 on the back instead of sterling here.) is such a time consuming pain in the as... toosh to take care of. Oye! especially in the humid rainy season!! Silver will tarnish while you are wearing it!! I've gotten to the point of finding other imaginative ways of wearing pendents, instead of using a silver chain. :) Soft double sided satin ribbon is so simple and dare I use the word... romantic looking. I take a little stroll up our street and at the end of the block is a little Papelaria (paper goods store) that sells tons of ribbon in different widths, sadly no velvet. I can't find velvet anywhere in town :( I now string my necklaces on a piece of ribbon that matches my mood that day :)

I'm slowly getting things made for my "Girly Girl" room. More about a "nother" time. Jackie D passed on to me ( no she didn't pass on it's the mirror she passed on!! ) one of those very inexpensive sorta wood framed mirrors, I beat it up a bit painted 2 coats of alternating crackle medium and white paint. I found that if I do more then one layer of crackled paint it looks tons more like it aged naturally instead of the out of a bottle yesterday look. Then topped it off with my secret antiquing formula (brown&natural shoe wax) and a good buffing with LW's shoe brush. I don't think confessing this will get me into to much hot water. The shoe shine kit is a very unused item here!! :) hmmm LW?? On the mirror I sanded off spots of the silvering and and glue copies of clip art to show through the front. Added some raw umber patina to the silver hooks so they would look a bit aged.

Four years ago on the 15th of April LW and I became room mates, I made a gift of a little tag book for him. I found a package of match boxes. They are about twice the size of the smaller wood kitchen match boxes. I printed out an open book cover piece of clip art I found on The Graphic Fairy blog. Then glued, aged, fluffed, and decoupaged it to the match box. I painted the sides to look like the pages in a closed book. Gave it the title "Love Letters"

EERRGGHH why did blogger turn this upside down????

I made my tags a size that would fit into the "book" Since I have never done any kind of scrapbooking the only exposure to "tags" I had was years ago the old Victoria Magazine did a feature on Sarah Lugg and her simple collages made with tags. I have always admired them and when left to my own choice those are the kind of tags I enjoy making the most. So for LW's book I spelled out the word love, one letter on each page/tag. The cover has another piece of clip art of a love letter I think it's also from the Graphics Fairy. I never miss her little daily offerings, she has the best clip art and we are lucky she shares her collection with us :) On the inside of the cover is a picture of a pewter heart. That little heart was in the first bouquet LW gave me. Funny how these simple expressions of love are cherished and mean more then expensive elaborate gifts.

L is dried Basil leaves

O is a piece of sea glass inside a drawn heart and has on O painted on it.

V is 2 small end branches of bamboo we have on the patio

E is black pepper corns.

I finished off the backs with copies of pictures that make my heart smile. then tied them together with a bit of old twine

That's pretty much what I've been up to lately. Gads I really didn't set out to write an epistle today but I have rambled a bit. So much for that Blog tip of sticking to 300 or less words. But then I've never been very good at following the should and must do rules. I figure that if you are tired of reading my post you are more then capable of hopping to the next one. Ya know some days you feel like a Chatty Cathy and some days not :)

So those of you that have hung out with me to the very end thanks for stopping by to see what I've been up to. :) And have a most audacious today or tomorrow depending on where in the world you are ;)

A Friend In Deed & Tid Bits

Things have been a bit hectic here. We have a very close friend who retired and moved here a few months before we did. We hadn't met before we all moved here but she and LW knew a number of the same people, because their respective professions overlapped. But as happens occasionally we have become great friends right from the start. Jackie and I try to have a girl's lunch every couple of weeks. One of the international companies that she worked for hired her for a short 3 month consulting job in Mali (Africa) So 5 weeks ago we put her on the plane for a 24+ hour trip to Mali. Last week I got a call from her daughter. Jackie had fallen and shattered her left shoulder could we pick her up at the air port the next day. Well Of course!! Next morning daughter calls and said Mom was air evacuated to Paris to stabilize her and would fly in on the red eye Friday night. Jackie is one of those amazing people that should have died at birth but has such a strong will to live that she has recovered from any number of illnesses that anyone else would have died from. And she just did it again. She has diabetes and because of the trauma her glucose levels were all over the place. Thus the trip to Paris. Well she is home now and waiting until the swelling goes down enough to do surgery on her shoulder. In the mean time she needs to keep her arm immobile. That's where I come in. "Have Nurse Friend will Travel" :) So we have been making trips back and forth across town. Well a girl needs to clean up and fru fru a bit once a day you know ;) I'm not minding a bit cuz her condo is on the eleventh floor over looking the beach. There aren't to many better views in Mazatlan!!

LW found this tid bit in the Mexico City news This is a Lenten tradition that has been done for years. Even if it means you have to spend a bit of your siesta time sitting in the corner. :)
"One of the weird Sábado de Gloria traditions, which are an excuse to break the Lenten solemnity a bit early, are water fights between housewives. With water rationing (both to recharge the dangerously low reservoirs and to repair the water system) in Mexico City, the police have been arresting people for wasting resources. While most arrests have been of people doing things like washing their cars over the three day water suspension, these Wet n’ Wild women went off to be “socially readapted” for a couple of hours… and dry out."

Hmmm makes you wonder what they gave up for Lent don't you think?? :)

Before I take off for bed, early shower call at the other end of town in the morning. No sleeping till noon and laying around eating bonbons :) I wanted to pass on the latest news about Liza's project Blogway that was scheduled for May 1st. Looks like there is a bit of a delay, which for me is a "good thing". If you haven't already joined in the fun head over and sign up to create an outfit out of recycled materials. If you have signed up the delay info is posted on the blog also.

Annalise can't wait to walk the catwalk in the creation I'm suppose to come up with.

Gads even with the reprieve that Divine Vision better hurry up and show it's self the clock is ticking as they say :) But I have been collecting some ever so chic materials, plastic grocery bags, bubble wrap, duct tape.... no way I'm not spilling any more. You'll just have to wait and see. In the mean time join the fun if you haven't already.

Have a most audacious today or tomorrow depending on where in the world you are ;)

Yikes Our Beach on Steroids

Pictures of Coney Island in the early 1920s

I hope your Easter Day was a delightful day filled with plenty of opportunities to make many wonderful memories.

We had a nice quiet day. We did our best to stay away from the beach side of town. This week is Samana Santa (Holy Week) This week is also Spring break week for the entire country of Mexico. Mazatlan is a resort town, and when people go on vacation they love to go to the BEACH. We are a quiet small city of 400,000 This weekend the population exploded to 800,000 :( We are absolutely sure that the extra 400,000 bodies were all packed along the beach side of town. I figure it's just a darn good thing we are not an island cuz we would have been in danger of flipping over if we were :)

Ha you think I'm exaggerating?? Well these are pictures of our beach (the one that's closest to us so of course it's ours) on most of the 345 days a year. So nice beautiful, calm relaxing a true slice of paradise.

This is the beach this weekend. Well at least I think it's our beach, but I couldn't swear that there is sand under all those bodies!!

Thus LW quip about our beach on Steroids ;) But you must admit that it's a perfect description ;)

This is the traffic on the Melacon (the sea wall) headed north to the resort area of the town!! No it's not a parking lot !! This is early afternoon headed north just reverse the picture come sundown when everyone heads back to change so that they can spend the rest of the night doing the promanade. Down one end around the sheild monument back up to the other end around Playa Bruja's turn around and down we go again :( Woo Hoo and Motor Cycle week (translate one of the largest cycle gatherings in Mexico) starts Thursday. Oye I can't hardly wait!! That is until we have our quiet little city back to ourselves!!

Have a most audacious today or tomorrow my Bloglandian friends depending on where in the world you are ;)

Sniffles

We have a good case of the sniffles here. LW woke up this past weekend with a silly cold. Because we tend to share things at our little casa, I woke up a couple of days ago with yep that silly cold. You know in a healthy human a viral infestation (cold) is not life threatening. There also is no cure for the common cold and it last 7-10 days. Knowing all that still doesn't make me any more willing to share my body with a bunch of rapidly multiplying ungrateful squatters!! :(

I'm sure this is rather a lame excuse for not accomplishing much this week but that's just the way it is. But since I have been sitting here at my little desk not making anything I have been doing a bit of site exploring. I love hopping over to the Scandinavian countries in Bloglandia. You can find a number of my favorites listed under Beautiful Visual Noise there on the right. I think there must be a rule that you must have the most beautifully decorated homes and you must be able to take amazing photos, in order to have a Scandinavian blog . Some of these gals blogs are nothing short of amazing!! Besides that they always seem to have the most wonderful simple, comfortable decorations. Old rusty crowns, rather beat up chalk boards, speckled eggs (we won't dwell on the fact that there are NO eggs other then the ones with chicks in them here in Mazatlan), tarnish, rusty bird cages, old linens, market baskets, well you get the idea. :)

So as I'm blissfully blog hopping I find a referral for the most AWESOME web site. This is soooooo amazingly cool, beautiful and I want that and that and that oh and that !! The name of my new found Nirvana is "Mothology" do you guys know about it?? Probably I'm usually the last one to find these little gems. Well if you don't you just have to fix yourself a nice cup of tea or pour a lovely glass of wine and sit down for a wonderful visit. I would recommend you leave your visa in the hands of a very responsible person who will not give in to all manners of begging, tears, promises or threats!! :)

All pictures courtesy of the Mothology Web Site.

Have a most audacious today or tomorrow my bloglandian friends depending on where in the world you are ;)