Boxes, Boxes everywhere!

Our things have finally arrived! Holy cow, I can't believe it! They actually came three days ago, but as you can imagine I have been a little busy. I really wanted to take a picture of all the mess in the house, but things have just been moving along so quickly, that I am about 3/4ths unpacked. I have a bedroom and the bathrooms left. I will try to post a picture of the disheveled bedroom, before it gets put together.

All in all I feel pretty darn good about how things are turning out. After almost a year of having our things stored I forgot what I actually had. It has been pleasant surprises in every box. There are a few things that I am tossing, but I don't feel like I am too much of a pack rat after all. My kitchen is prob the most loaded and I need to be careful about putting more in it. (Though, I secretly want another dish set, I know Ryan will kill me if I do!) My kitchen is my pride and joy! And I really LOVE all of my recipes! I can't even explain to you. I opened my personal recipe book last night and the page I opened to was a Banana crepe recipe. Let me just tell you, the first thing I did this morning was pull out the blender! I flippin love food! Ryan was in heaven and I told him this is just the beginning! The recipe was actually pretty good. It calls for rum, but as I don't normally carry that I just skipped it. I am sure it gives it a phenomonal taste and you lite it of course to get the alcohol out, but I am not sure on this recipe. I need to see how the alcohol cooks out with a sugar base. I know it varies according to the base. Nettie are you there? Do you know the answer to this? Or anybody else?
Anyways, would you like me to post it?

I am trying to be so much better about sharing my recipes, just nobody ask for the glorified choc chip recipe. I don't think I am that good yet. So, Laura, hush hush!:)

So, go figure this post started out about moving and ended with cooking. I am sure this will happen many more times. I have to go make dinner for Ryan, but I will post that recipe as soon as I can!
Much Love Everyone!

I posted this map so that you can see where we live. If you click on the map, it will enlarge and you can see the cities better. I also labeled a couple of the places that I have gone to since we moved here.

Ryan and I went to Cordoba within the first few days of moving here. He had a work trip and I would rather sit in a hotel near him, than 6 hours away.

I also went to Morelia (Just East of Queretaro) a week or two ago when my Dad was in town. It was a very entertaining town with many many Mexican guitars for sale in their markets. It is supposedly a more dangerous town, so I removed all my jewelry before I hit the markets. It was just me and a 19-year-old boy that toured together, while our father's had meetings. We felt completely safe, so don't picture anything too dangerous. I took a tour there to see the sites and ended up going to a candy museum. Well, I love sweets, so I was pretty excited about this. Interestingly enough, candy has been around for quite some time in Mexico (since the Europeans came to America). The candy here has a more natural taste as their candy is made from mixing sugar and the pulp of many different fruits. YUM! Also, did you know chocolate goes back to the Aztecs in Mexico; when the kings and rulers believed that chocolate water (literally chocolate with water) was the water of the Gods. If you drank it outside of a ceremony you were put to death. Just an FYI:)

So, anyways, if you are planning to visit me and have a request to a nearby town let me know. I'll try to talk about the cities as I go so you can get a feel for them.

February 12

Yesterday was Ryan and my anniversary. It was wonderful! We woke up and Ryan gave me flowers and chocolates. I made a complilation of our pictures from the past two years and reminisced with Ryan over breakfast. Then more surprises insued over the rest of the day. Each surpise was presented in a white envelope with a short rhyme on the front and a flower. There were eight envelopes. One of the evelopes included a list of hotels for me to pick from. He figured out a time to take our anniversary trip to the beach (we were originally going to go this weekend, but our lives are too chaotic and decided to wait until things settled down).
One of my favorite surprises was that he redownloaded all of our wedding music that was somehow deleted and we listened to them as we drove around yesterday. I don't know why that music matters so much... maybe it's because it reminds me so much of our wedding day and even though it was stressful, I still like to look back on it and smile.
Another surprise was that we went to one of my favorite nearby cities, San Miguel de Allende. There are dozens of booths loaded with silver jewelry and pewter housewares. Ryan gave me some play money and I picked out a silver necklace to remember the day by. We packed a sack lunch and ate in a park watching all the middle-aged American tourists bustling between the laid back Mexicans.
Ryan said we had a nearby appointment at 4 so we headed back to the car in the afternoon. Waiting in the glove compartment was another envelope and flower... Inside was a description of an incredible restaurant. I would really love to cut and paste the entire description that was printed from the internet and nestled in the envelope, but it's an entire page. To describe it with less words... Located 15 minutes from San Miguel de Allende is a 300 year-old hacienda, where an Italian Chef makes a different menu on a day to day basis based on what is in season and what produce will make the best meal. I have never tasted better food in my life, and you know that tasting foods is like a hobby to me. Ryan hit one out of the park that's for sure. When we sat at the outside tables the chef came out and asked what sounded good. He rattled off a list of different possibilities. We had a delicious meal with duck, pasta, tuna steak and garganzola ravioli that was made out back. The flavors that this chef came up with were so incredible, I can't properly describe the talent this man had! All his sea food is flown in from the coast on a continual basis. Even Ryan liked it!
After enjoying the pleasant meal in the gardens we headed back home where Ryan's final surprise was waiting. Yup, he did it again! A Thoughts on You Book. For those who don't know what this is, starting from the first day of our marriage Ryan has written letters to me each day without me knowing. Then he arranges them and creates a 300 page book of all of his sweet and honest thoughts about me and our relationship. On our one year anniversary he gave me the book with all the messages from our first year of marriage. This year were all the messages from our second year of our marriage. I feel so cherished as I read those letters and it is by far my favorite gift that anybody has given me.
To say the least, Ryan hit this anniversary out of the park. There isn't any beach that could have compared with all the thoughtfulness Ryan put into yesterday. It was one of the best days in my life. I think my anniversary has officially become my favorite "holiday":)

Hello Guys!

Okay, I am terrible at blogging so far. I am going to try to do better...

So, it is February 2 and we are here in Queretaro, Mexico. Ryan is busy with work and helping me get our lives in order. I feel like every time I try to get something checked off my list, a delay comes up or something gets in the way. We are currently waiting for our furniture and household items to arrive. We have had to go through the grueling process of getting a work visa here. We cannot have our items come through customs until that comes. Good news though, we are hopeful for Thursday or early next week.

There have been many odds and ends to do around here and I feel like dispite so many delays with things we have been able to make some headway. A great accomplishment for us was finding a home to live in. We were only alloted two weeks in a hotel before we would start needing to pay for it, so I quickly got on the ball and found a home in three days. That following Tuesday we moved in. We love it! It's looking pretty sparse, but hopefully in a couple of weeks it will be full. Keep your fingers crossed for us. I posted a picture for anyone who is curious!