And then it was BACK TO SCHOOL. (RUN... save yourself!!) 1 of 5

So school hit and I disappeared. Well kind of, I've still been out and about, but the planning and grading took precidence over the documenting of our day to day. Anyway here is a synopsis of the last 4.5 months :). Part 1 of 5.

August...
Goodbye Mazatlan. We made our way back from Mazatlan. We stayed at a rental house called Casa Bonita and we're thankful for air conditioned rooms and pool! The house was located in the historic part of town just 1 block from the beach and boardwalk (malecon) and walking distance to the open air market, cathedral (aka Sauna - not air conditioned), and bus stops.  Despite reports that travel in Mexico is not advised, we went and experienced not a single dangerous hiccup. Don't do crap you wouldn't try to pull at home and you should be fine. COMMON SENSE people!! It was incredibly HOT there, but with back-to-school looming I was not ready to come back to reality. Here are some shots of the house...I'm happy to pass on contact information if you should wish to check it out in person.

Pool

Kitchen/Dining/Living Area

Entry to Casa Bonita

Cathedral

Quilting: I was interested in learning to make a quilt, so I signed up for Quilting 101 at JoAnn's. Here is my project.

And I got a sewing machine in November... so maybe in the next year I will finish a quilt and share it.

Tree Removal: Those of you that have been to our house may remember we had three large trees in the front yard. YES, I said HAD! August and September brought the removal of these trees. Why? Because we are the anti-tree huggers, hate pine needles, and want to kill the planet. RIGHT... The trees were in bad shape and constantly dropping branches... of which two caused damage to vehicles. We had an Arborist (tree scienentist) come take a look and he said they would be goners in the next 5 years or so. Aparently the tree roots were not well protected during the construction of our house and driveway. We were able to get the builder to agree to cover half the cost of removal, which was nice because our 1 year warranty on all things house was long expired. Thank you New Traditions! Sorry trees! My dad, uncle, a family friend and Aaron's cousin all came and helped in the effort.

They took down two of three trees. Then chooped away at the tree rounds which were sold as firewood. The third tree enormous tree was removed in September by a pro as the guys were a little wary of it's size and a mistake would have been VERY costly.

Timbers Soccer that is... Portland now has a major league team and it was fun to go watch them and listen to the Timbers' Army chant. They won the game!