Big Differences

Beautiful Beach

St Pete Beach and Quito are worlds apart. I am struck here by the space, by the vastness of everything. There are huge lawns, the houses sit far back from the road, so very different from the tight streets of Quito where houses are hidden by high walls which abut on the street. Homes here are so large, generally the streets are cleaner and the houses more well kept on the outside. There are fewer cars on the road, and the cars that I see are larger and more powerful than the majority of cars in Quito. We are staying in a lovely home by the beach and it is quiet and peaceful in the house, it hardly feels as if we have any neighbours.

Vast Expanses

Food is so much more expensive than in Quito,especially in the airport with substandard quality. Eric went out armed with my list for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day dinner, and brought back a small a fraction of the items and spent our whole budget for the next week! We do have our turkey and our ham and our salmon, so we have the main ingredients for the main menu items; we may jsut decide to simplify our recipes, which is fine. I have been reading through recipe books all day searching on the right combination of dishes for each main meal.

We found another Christmas tree and the lights are up and we are ready to trim our second tree of the month. We started baking Christmas cookies and the house smells yummy. My parents arrived before dinner and we were all delighted to spend time with them drinking good wine and reminiscing. We were here in 2002 with the whole family, and that our last visit until today.

Quito feels very far away, but it feels like home and St Pete feels very much like a vacation. I love Christmas, and am making all sorts of plans to make the holiday as wonderful as possible.

Grandmothers and Joy

Grandfathers to Hug

Showing off Skills