Mexico Part 9: Pesos and River Sand

I have been so lazy when it comes to this blog.  I think often that I need to update the good old blog, but life happens and nothing gets posted.  Maybe this month will be better, but I won't hold my breath so neither should you.  In a lot of ways nothing really has changed around here.  Our routines are still the same.  The beginning of the term is always a little stressful because our financial aid check always comes late and then to top it all off they issue us a check in american dollars.  There are plenty of places that want to take your dollars but of course give you the worst deal possible.  To top it all off as well, the dollar isn't doing that well either.  When we first got here we could get the dollar for almost 13 pesos and now it is hovering around 12 pesos.  Pretty stinky if you ask me.  But none the less there is nothing we can do about it.  At least we are getting financial aid right?  People often think that it is cheap to live in Mexico and maybe it is in other areas but not so much here.  And for some crazy reason, everything seems to cost me double than the rest of my friends that live here.  I will give you some examples.  Everyone here fills there gas tank for about 1500 pesos and it will last then three months.  Me?  A month and a half, and that is if I am lucky.  I am in the process of trying to figure out if there is a gas leak in my house because according to what everyone else tells me my gas should last me longer.  Example II, my good friend got her water bill for the whole year and she was estimated that her water usage would be around 500 pesos this year, mine?  998 pesos.  Now we have discussed that I shower my kids every night and she doesn't but I can't imagine that that would double the cost of my water usage.  I don't even water the lawn, which isn't a good thing, but still, you would think that with the amount of water I am being charged for, the grass is bright green and my driveway sparkley clean.  But if you know me, this is not so.  And for example three, electricity.  I pay 1500 pesos every two months and that's with the government paying half of my bill but my friends all pay under 500 pesos.  I just might have to be a fly on my friend's wall to figure this all out.  Regardless, I know that if you were to do the math in dollars it isn't too bad, but when you don't have too much money every little bit counts.  Now, Matthew wants to try to get me to budget and I am trying my hardest, but I never seem to do that well.  For now I am just saving receipts for food and then I suppose it is something that I will just get better at over time.  What are your thoughts on budgeting?  What's worked for you guys?

Kids are doing well.  They spend a lot of their time outside playing in this used sand/water table that I bought them. They love it.  I went to a place here where they buy sand and people from Eva's dance class told me to ask for river sand, but the "river sand" is more like dirt.  Of course, the kids still love it but I am now on a quest to find real sand.  You should see how dirty the kids turn out when they are done playing.  And more so that they discovered they can add water to the "sand" and it turns into mud.  I could get super annoyed at the clean up, but, honestly, it is the only time they play semi decent together and I enjoy the "free" time I get to get things done around the house.  Elijah on the other hand, likes to drive me nuts by throwing the sand in the dryer ducts and inside the house.  He is going to drive me bonkers, I swear.

As for me, after we got back from Oregon, I discovered that my sewing machine lost its timing AGAIN.  My machine was a Singer 150th Anniversary edition, that had a game boy for a computer, that my parents bought me my senior year of high school.  It has been fun to learn on even though Matthew made fun of me all the time because it had a game boy.  But, the machine has not been strong enough for me.  I got it off its timer trying to sew bumpers for Elijah and it cost me $100 to fix back home.  So, when it happened again and I took it here it only cost me 250 pesos, way cheaper, but the guy didn't fix it all the way.  Technically it was my fault because I didn't give him the game boy to check the stitches but I was getting tired of the machine.  That's when I went on an adventure to buy one here.  Talk about super annoying.  It took me over two hours to purchase the machine, because they couldn't find all parts to the machine.  Apparently, they only carry one machine of its kind at a time, then they open the machine to display it, but in the meantime, they lose the boxes that the machines come in with all their parts.  I was extremely frustrated about it but I think I came out on top in the end because I made them give me an additional 10% off what it already had discounted and in the end I got the machine for 25% off of what they were asking.  I now have a new Janome and I love it.  I decided to go with a manual machine this time and I couldn't be happier, even if it doesn't have a game boy.  I can already tell how much stronger the machine is and I am off to making all the crafts I have been dying to make.  Plus, Matthew got me http://www.amazon.com/Stitch-Learning-Sew-Project-Time/dp/1440211612/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1296762995&sr=8-1 for Christmas and I am teaching myself the fundamentals of sewing.  It has been fun to be home because it gives me some time to do the stuff that I love.

Pictures:
1 and 2:  Kids in the sand
3:Elijah using his watermelon like a car.  That kid can eat watermelon.  Often his poo comes out pink!
4:One of two pillows that I made using this http://jessicapeck.blogspot.com/2011/01/valentine-candy-heart-pillows-tutorial.html tutorial.
5:Who does this kid look like?