November 17-24 we were blessed with our first set of visitors: Ben's parents came and spent a week with us and it was an absolute blast to show them our life here in Monterrey!
Day 1:
Travel day for Jeff and Diane started out super early (around 4:30 am) at the Portland airport. They discovered that their flight had been delayed, then ultimately cancelled, because of a broken part on their plane. After some scrambling by Ben and Diane, they found another flight that would arrive in Monterrey at 11:00 pm, instead of the "perfect time" of 4:30 pm of the first flight. Ben happened to be traveling back from a business trip in Guadalajara that afternoon and his flight was scheduled to return at 4:00 pm, just before Dad and Mom's first arrival time. However, due to fog, his flight was delayed and arrived at 8:30 pm, so he decided to just wait it out at the airport for his parents. I received a text at 11:22 pm from Ben letting me know that he had connected with his parents and would be headed home shortly. It is important to note here that our SUV was still in San Antonio being repaired after our San Antonio road trip fiasco, so we didn't have a vehicle large enough to fit everyone. So, Ben and his parents were going to need to take an Uber or a taxi home. I had fallen back asleep on the couch when I heard a second "ding" of a text and assumed that they were in the parking garage, since it was now 12:45. Nope, it was Ben letting me know that they were still at the airport. Apparently Ubers are not legally able to pick-up passengers from the airport because of a contract that the taxi companies have with the airport (we have only ever taken Ubers from the airport, so we didn't know about this rule...apparently it is not often followed). Overall, there is a long story of taxi and Uber debacles, but the end result was that Mom and Deedo did not arrive at our apartment until almost 2 am. That was not the arrival any of us could have pictured. Welcome to Mexico: land of the unexpected.
Day 2:
It was so fun to have Dad and Mom at our apartment! Despite being tired, they woke up cheery and raving about the mountains and view from our apartment (they did that every morning, in fact). The week previous to their arrival, the smog had been terrible; however, the entire time they were in town, it was clear and beautiful. Thank the Lord!
Our first order of business was to take them up to Chipinque park to see our favorite hiking places and a view of the city.
It's always nice to get the lay of a city from above and the views from Chipinque are amazing!
Luckily, they arrived in the middle of a yellow butterfly migration, so the entire time we were up on the mountain one could see thousands of butterflies flying in the same direction. There were so many of them that when you looked down into a valley it looked like there was confetti sparkling in the sunlight. It was amazing! Ben was thankful that his parents were there to see the butterflies, because he had been growing weary of listening to me rave about how amazing all the butterflies flying by our apartment were.
Sammy trying to catch a yellow butterfly
The yellow butterflies weren't the only type out. Check out this beauty.
I have a picture of the kids in this "cleft of the rock"
Seth, Sam, and Josh
The whole group at a viewpoint.
After Chipinque, we were excited to bring them to one of our favorite restaurants: Frida Chilaquiles.
Day 3:
Sunday was a really full and fun day!
First we took Mom and Dad down to San Pedro de Pinta, the street fair. It's just a cool cultural thing to experience.
There are always new displays at the street fair and this particular week had cool play houses for the boys to explore.
Then, we were able to take Mom and Dad to church with us, which was so awesome. We were excited for them to experience our bilingual service. It's so special to worship in a different language. Then we had a few (we were 17 total) of our friends over to our house for a spaghetti lunch.
It's so fun to share with your parents your friends and your life, as well as introduce your parents to your new friends. It was just a special afternoon.
Friends gathered around our kitchen.
These ladies have all been such a blessing in my life: Ruth, Katie, Carol and Diane.
I had bought an enormous tub of Christmas crafts from Costco for the kids and let them loose to do whatever they wanted. It kept them quite busy.
We capped off the night with sharing our hot tub with the family!
Day 4:
Most days don't get to start with an epic fort made with your Grandma! How fun.
Can you find all four people?
Monday happened to be Mexican Revolution day, so we wanted to head downtown to find a parade.
However, on our drive we found blocked off streets and a parade just down the street from our house. We quickly parked the car to watch the end of the parade. How cool are these outfits?
There were many bands.
The boys absolutely loved it.
There was also some cool old vehicles.
So after viewing the remainder of parade number 1, we drove to Fundidora park to take the Santa Lucia river cruise to the central square (something that we'd been wanting to do since we moved here!).
The view from the start of the river cruise
Cruising
All along the river they were decorating for a Christmas lights show
Yes, Ben does have a burly beard. He was participating in "no shave November."
Josh loves getting his picture taken
Heading to central square to watch parade number 2
We arrived about an hour late to the parade and it was still going in full force!
It was fun to have another picture-taker in the group, so I'm actually in some pictures.
We watched the parade for about half an hour and left while it was still going. I cannot even imagine the amount of parade participants! I'm am also not sure that there were any police force left in the city because they were all in the parade!
Such a fun "Mexican Revolution Day" picture!
Also at the square was an extremely modern and funky Christmas tree.
Kids getting a selfie with Grandma
Sam's totally into the bunny ears
Quintessential Monterrey picture
Grandparents turn
After the river cruise, parade, and some lunch we walked the paths of Fundidora park.
It really is a beautiful and unique place
Day 5:
Diane and I got out for a morning walk. I was excited to show her the crazy big houses and views from the hills above our house.
This is my favorite door on my walking route
The structure I am standing in front of is all one house.
Late Monday night our car was delivered from San Antonio (we paid a driver to bring it to us instead of spending the time and money to fly up and get it ourselves). We were so thankful to have a vehicle where Diane and I didn't both have to have a child on our lap. With our new found transportation freedom, we decided to make the 45 minute drive out to the cool village of Santiago.
It's fun to go to Santiago as it has a more traditional Mexican feel.
We had lunch in a sweet little courtyard
Sam
Seth
Josh
I love this picture Diane took of Ben and I.
There is some really neat tile work in Santiago
Exploring
This is Josh "posing" with Grandma Didi. He didn't want to snuggle up close.
Since we were already out and about, we drove out to the Huesteca.
They loved the mountains out there as much as we knew they would.
We drove to the other side of the dam and Josh took a massive spill in some very fine dust and was covered with dirt and very unhappy.
Meanwhile Seth and Sam explored with their grandparents.
Joshy stayed pretty close to daddy after his spill
Day 6:
Wednesday the boys returned to school for the day and Ben headed to work. It was a nice built in "down day" and we were thankful for it because Jeff and Diane woke up with a bit of indigestion. So they just hung out at home.
Grandma still had enough energy to play games with Josh. I got the privilege of running some errands sans kids.
Day 7:
Thanksgiving! We started off Turkey Day with a hike in the Huesteca.
I don't know if we can ever get enough of that place. It's just spectacular.
Mom and Dad were game for any adventure
The view from the top of where Josh, Diane and I reached
Jeff, Ben and the twins made it well past the big tree line. It was really a fun and challenging hike.
That afternoon we had Thanksgiving dinner at our friends, Luke and Leah's house, with around 10 other people. We didn't hang out too terribly long, though, as we wanted to savor our final day with our parents. After turkey and ham dinner the boys wanted to show Deedo and DiDi their favorite football park and apparently both Diane and I were tired of taking pictures by this point in time, because neither of us have any from Thanksgiving. Whoops. But, overall, we got some great pictures of their time with us: what a special visit!
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