Week #4, December 13 - 19, 2020

 Week #4, December 13 - 19, 2020

Sunday we were invited to  have lunch with friends and  we     listened to Robbie Shawana and his live band's                Christmas show on facebook live. What fun.

Claudia and her main squeeze, Mauricio - our imported Chef had a  lovely lunch prepared to share with us.

The grill was full to capacity with food.

Nothing went to waste in these lemons.

The meal consisted of BBQ Ribs,

Sausages, breads and yellow peppers with mozzarella cheese melted on them.    Delicious!

One of Claudia's cats came to the table                                           at the end of the meal looking for crumbs.

Monday was our first trip to the  port, we had lunch and then went to get our hair cut.

A much needed hair cut for both of us as you can see.

We had a lovely lunch of shrimp tacos at Don's (Don Ernesto's was the name last year I believe).

They have a very nice atmosphere.

           This is our hair dresser Conche - she does a great job                and speaks English well.

One of the few times we have seen debris still on the streets following the storms and hurricanes of this fall. They have done such an amazing job of cleaning up - such a large job done is so short a time frame.

We made a stop at the Super Chedraui on the portside before coming back home.

I like to go in and just look around at their displays of fruits, meats and seafood.

Their bakery is always mouth watering,

I try to convince myself that their desserts probably wont taste as good as they look,

so far that's working.

Mmmmmm!

We noticed there is work being done in the main square but the security fencing is disguising the work being done. It will be interesting to see the finished project.

            One day we helped Claudia with her mission of                 providing pantries/food baskets to those families in need.     Many families are still out of work or have a reduced amount of work as a result of the pandemic so need help.  

This days food has been provided by "Amor Ministries" here in Puerto Morelos,

who provide the food on a regular basis while Claudia and Mauricio package it for delivery.

Volunteers help her with the distribution.

This day the delivery team was made up of  Claudia 

herself, Keith Smith, Bruce Finkbone, Mauricio Aquirregaray along with  Allan and me.  The men

laughed when Claudia suggested three were

dressed in uniform - beige shorts and blue shirts.

On this day 15 families received pantries, Claudia stops to visit with each family as she passes through.  

The children are so happy to see the food arrive.

 

         One of the items in the pantry is sugar coated cereals,                        it was cute to see this little fellow take his and run into                    the house with it right straight. 

               He came back out to stand with his mom as she                      visited with Claudia.

This little fellow is wearing an interesting pair of shoes,

               here he is again within a few minutes wearing                                a completely different pair.

This little fellow we met last year, he was given the nickname "Tarzan" because he had long hair. The hair has been cut but he still holds the nickname. He has grown a lot over the past year as kids do. He too, was quick to accept  his box of cereal treat.

Following the storms and hurricanes this season many of the homes needed help to replace their rooves to stop the rains from coming in. Claudia again stepped up to the plate to be the collector of funds, materials and volunteers to help . A group of our friends contributed financially to her cause. This is one of the homes which received roofing to shelter it and its occupants from the elements.

Another home which received help from Claudia's assistance program for shelter repairs.

                         This little fellow was so happy with his cereal                           he was munching on his  gift on the street.

Everyone was so grateful for the items provided to them on this day of distribution.

Another home with a newly tarped roof.

                It was a wonderful experience for us to be a part                        of the food distribution and to meet the  grateful recipients and their families. It was also nice to see some of the homes our financial contributions aided after the storms and hurricanes caused so much damage.

A trip to Cancun was necessary this week, we needed house maintenance supplies from Home Depot, food from Costco and lunch.  One of our favourite lunch stops is "La Parrilla" which translates into "The Grill" and often as it did today has a large yellow bull out front.

      A trip to Cancun wouldn't feel right if we didn't go with Emilio in his taxi and our good friend Claudia, these two are great people to spend time with. Here we are posed in photo with Freda Kahol and her husband Diego Rivera - both done in a paper mache type material. For those of you who are not familiar with these two, they were famous artists here in Mexico and both have colourful histories. A research project you will enjoy if you choose to do so.

The waiters are always so kind and entertaining.

Lunch was delicious as usual.

The restaurant was nicely decorated for the Christmas season.

On our way back to Puerto Morelos we stopped in Bonfield for  our favourite deep fried chicken.

We love their chicken, it is a must stop every time we come back from Cancun if time allows. Today, time allowed.

This is the neighbour's cat "Piolin", which translates to "Tweety". He likes to hang out in our yard and wait for food scraps. 

Dwayne and Clinton check in on us regularly - it's always nice to spend time with them catching up on the news from home and visiting.

We do get time up on our roof top on cooler days, we currently don't have our sun tarp up as we  decided to have another made. The new one will be 100% sun and rain proof. We are looking forward to spending time up there during the light rains.

We visited with Louise and Gaston this week. Gaston is very proud of his coconut palm tree this year, it was suggested to him last year that he treat it with salt as these trees are  more common near beaches where they get salt naturally from the spray of the waves and salt in the air. He followed the recommendation and voila - the yellowness is gone leaving the tree  a beautiful green and loaded with huge coconuts.

Our garbage trucks have no concrete schedule this year but they do come by about 3 times a week, sometimes as late as 10:00 p.m.  We aren't complaining, there was a few years back they weren't coming at all. It is an event our whole street looks forward to, everyone is out of their house and on the street  to take part in the activity of depositing garbage - great fun is had and much visiting going on.

I love this place, seeing the livestock on the streets is just amazing to me as it brings back childhood memories. Here is a hen with her chicks, actually she has two but only one can be seen here in the photo.

Allan had a dentist appointment this week with Dr. Gina. This is her COVID free space uniform and her office  and waiting room  are completely  sanitized between patients, obviously he felt very safe in his surroundings while there.

On our way home from the Dentist Office I heard the whimper of puppies, sure enough they were close by.

Aren't they adorable? I love the smell of new puppy ears - yep, that is a fetish with me, sorry to say but that is back home,  not here  because they smell like puppy sweat, yuk!

 This one is identical to its mom.

This draws an end to another post, the next will be after Christmas of course, so we take this opportunity to wish each of you a very Merry Christmas.

Until my next post, stay healthy, stay happy, stay safe and keep smiling.