Thursday, January 29, 2009

A Bull Ride to Remember

So last year...I think it was actually Halloween...we were down in San Luis, MX, where my in-laws live. They have a cotton fair at that time (they think Halloween is eeevil in Mexico, some people...not everybody) with the usual fair stuff; rides, entertainment, booths, etc. We didn't get on any of the rides becuase we had a sleeping-Kathryn with us, but we did do a few things. Refugio did some rifle games, we watched a guy painted gold pretend to be a statue, we saw the three legged chicken, the hairless dog, the really cheesy spider lady, and then...we rode the bull. I'd never riden on a mechanical bull before, but Refugio had. We decided to do it even though we only saw children doing it. Here are the videos...and I would like to say that I stayed on the bull about 20sec. longer than the video shows, Refugio just couldn't get his act together with the video recording. And although my dismount looks as though I'm throwing myself off it really felt like it was going much faster than it looks like on the video. Anyway, Refugio and I enjoy watching these videos so hopefully you will too.


Sunday, January 18, 2009

Christmas 2008

We had a nice Holiday season this year. We spent Thanksgiving with my family in New Mexico and then Christmas in San Luis, Mexico with Refugio's family. At my parent's house I requested that we decorate for Christmas after Thanksgiving day, becuase I've missed Christmas with my family for the past three years. Some, I won't mention names, weren't so excited about the decorating for Christmas, but we all ended up having a fun time and it was so nice to see all the old Christmas decorations and to remember Christmases past.

Christmas in San Luis was nice. We put up a 12 foot tree that was missing the top part. I improvised with the top of a 5 foot tree, it looked a little funky, but it was better than without. Refugio played Santa, as he has for the last three years and gave out gifts to our nieces and nephews. Some of the kids try to figure out who Santa is and they'll say to Refugio, "I know it was you because you are wearing the same shoes as Santa." or "You have the same mole as Santa." Refugio always manages to make up some wild story and you can see the doubt in their faces that they're just not sure what to believe. But they are happy enough to just get a gift, so the debate about Santa's true identity doesn't last long.

We also collected some toys here in the US and took them down with us to give to kids in Mexico. It was nice to do some service at Christmas time. I was on the collecting end and one of my sister-in-laws was in charge of the distribution...so I didn't get to see that part of it. Happy kids at Christmas is always a good thing.

Here's a little slideshow of Christmas pictures and some videos I hope you'll enjoy.



Refugio helped my brother Ben to put up a Christmas tree at Ben's home.


We decorated for Christmas at my parent's house as well.


My mother and Kathryn share a common first name and always enjoy time together.


We gave my nephew a "luchador" mask for Christmas. I think it kind of scared him, becuase he didn't want to put it on. But Grandma wasn't scared...


I put an "extra layer" of clothing on Kathryn while we were playing outside in NM, becuase I thought it was cold, but my brother-in-law wouldn't let me hear the end of it.


Refugio wrestled with some of my nephews and they all had a good time.