Cars, cars, and more cars!

Last week was busy and so much fun! On Saturday night after Kristen arrived we went to NoWhere Bar and Pink Kitty...new club in Cabo that some of our friends opened.

Me, Steve, Kristen, and Tal at NoWhere Bar

Tal, Modu, and Kristen taking a break from "Getting Jiggy With It" on the dance floor at Pink Kitty

Sunday afternoon we went to Dog Day Afternoon in San Jose which is a fundraiser for the Humane Society. Nancy Hinch, the Bruton's neighbor in Tulsa, lives in Cabo most of the year and she gave us tickets to sit at her table.

The Acura broke down on our way home from San Jose so on Monday we rented a Jeep and we officially adopted Lila!

Trying to decipher the problem

I'm so excited to meet my sisters!

Kristen wanted to take this little guy (Eduardo) home

We went to the center on Tuesday morning and that afternoon Kristen, Jen and I prepared 50 bags of food for an outreach we did in the barrios with Donna.

Kristen preparing to serve breakfast

Edylei...my bestfriend at the center

Food for care packages

Tal finally found her souvenir from Cabo...The Michelin tire baby

Distributing food and clothes

Kristen con todos los ninos monos en los barrios

Jen and I are taking lunch every Wednesday to the men building the church in San Jose. So on Wednesday we took the men lunch and that afternoon we went to Mango Deck and got Henna tattoos and had dinner at The Office.

Kristen and I on the beach at Mango Deck

My mom tried to rub Tal's sweet shooting stars off with spit!

My early birthday cake and shot at The Office

Can't forget the birthday hugs!

Thursday morning we walked the dogs, made ceviche, and Brenda (Jen's mom) arrived. We also found out on Thursday that the Acura needed a new engine! Bye Bye Acura! We had to turn the jeep in on Friday, and we rented a smaller car. We now have a Dodge Hyundai Attitude. We started out with a red one, but we are now on our 2nd gold one...we have had four rental cars in the last 10 days due to seat belts not working, check engine lights coming on, and taking off a bumper while driving through the barrios. We have decided we need a tank to drive around Cabo. I think we gave Brenda an Ulcer while she was here...with the Henna tattoos(she thought they were real) and the car ordeals!

Goodbye Jeep...

Hello Dodge Hyundai Attitude (Goldie)!

Jen has been wanting to go zip lining in the canyons since we got here so Friday morning Kristen and I surprised her for her birthday and we went. We went on 8 different lines and it was awesome, but also exhausting... a lot of hiking involved! We are still waiting on our pics from zip lining but we will post them as soon as we get them.  We also got a very cute fondant cupcake birthday cake. Well it was really cute when we picked it up, but by the time we got home it had melted and had a slight lean to it.

  My battle wound from zip lining thanks to Kristen!

Poor little cupcake

We took Kristen to the airport on Saturday and that night Brenda cooked a nice homemade meal for us. We also saw Will Smith...he stayed two nights at Capella with his brother and some friends.  Monday we took Brenda with us to the center to serve breakfast and then took candy to the children in the barrios. That night she took us out to eat dinner at a great Sushi place. We dropped Brenda off at the airport on Tuesday and we met Donna and Amelia to take food to a few families in the barrios. Yesterday we went back to San Jose to take the men lunch and then picked up a bunch of gifts from Donna to wrap for the children for Christmas. This morning we went to the center and then we walked the dogs at the Humane Society.  That is the last 12 days in a nutshell.

5 Hours and Counting.....

This last week was very busy. On Wednesday we distributed food with Donna to many different families in the barrios of San Lucas. A barrio is a spanish term for district or neighborhood. These neighborhoods are very poor, as you saw on the pics in our last blog, and they are all over. We had bags of candy in our car and as we drove along the dirt roads in these areas we would give it to the children that were playing outside. The smiles on their faces was priceless! A couple of men joined us that day to see what Donna was doing in these barrios. One being Ray Thomas. He is a man that has lived and volunteered in the Baja for the last 20 years. He founded the non-profit Grupo De Apoyo Ray Thomas(GART) in 1989 to provide sports equipment, clinics, coaching, and educational assistance to the children in these very low income areas. Over the years their efforts have extended to provide breakfast for the needy children. Most of his work has been in La Paz which is a couple of hours from Cabo San lucas. Since May '08 his efforts have been being focused on the Los Cabos area. It's amazing what this man has done and is doing. The soccer teams created through his organizations gives these children a sense of hope and allows them to belong to something. It also keeps them off the streets. In 2002 he founded the YES foundation (Youth Education Sports) another organization to help continue the efforts already establised by GART. Ray and his team of dedicated volunteers can not do any of this without support and donations. Each soccer team needs sponsors, and to sponsor a team it is only $2000 pesos, which is about $150 dollars...very cheap! For more information about Ray and his team they are on facebook...Grupo de Apoyo Ray Thomas A.C. / Y.E.S. If you go to the Info page and click on the link it gives more details about the soccer programs and the other things they do.

The barrios kitchen in Cabo

All of the children gathered around for lunch

Giving their new puppies a bath

Wednesday night we went and picked up Lila from the Humane Society. We are fostering her while we are here. It was not something I was thrilled about, but I am completely in love with this dog now. So if I am we know Jen is, and I doubt we will just be fostering her for much longer. She is a really really good dog. She got her first spa day on Thursday and when we picked her up from being groomed and de-ticked we didn't even recognize her.

Before

After

Thursday we were at the Center in the morning and spent the rest of the day by the pool. Yesterday we continued putting gifts together for the children for Christmas. All the items we have for the gifts have been donations people have shipped down here from the States to Donna. Most of the children will be getting a used piece of clothing and a beanie baby for Christmas this year since that is what the majority of the donations have been. There are some other toy items for the little children, but not much for the older ones. We are hoping to get soccer balls and more boys clothing before the end of the month.

Putting Christmas gifts together

5 hours and counting until Kristen arrives...we can't wait!!!

Que tengas lindo fin de semana....XOXO Jen and Tal

Do You Know The Way To San Jose?

The song "Do You Know the Way to San Jose" has been stuck in our heads since Thursday, so we thought it deserved nothing less than to be the title of today's blog. Thursday morning was the same as usual...serving breakfast and playing with the children. We took a bunch of new coloring books and crayons with us and the children were all very excited. The crayons were put to good use when they were not being stuck in mouths and up noses. We have decided to volunteer at the Humane Society only on Mondays and Fridays, so we did not go there on Thursday to walk the dogs, but we did stop in to check on Lila (Jen's dog) so she could fill out an adoption application. That night we went to San Jose for the Art Walk they have in the square. We decided to eat dinner there too, and went to a local taco joint that our friend Steve recommended. The tacos were awesome. We left dinner and headed to the square to look at all the local art. To our dismay there was no art. I told Jen and Steve that I could have sworn I read every Thursday they had art in the square...I guess I missed where it said starting in November the first time I read it. 

Lila

Taco Joint

At Shooters with some new friends

We have been anxious to get involved with other volunteer opportunities in Cabo and on Saturday we met with some people to make that happen. Our friend Barrett that lives in Cabo introduced us to his friend Modu. Modu is a personal trainer (http://www.moduvated.com/) and has been working with a nutritionist in San Jose to get a program going for women who have had cancer. He was meeting again with her on Saturday for brunch and asked us if we wanted to go with him. We went with him to San Jose to meet Isabel and two of her friends. I wish I could go into detail about all these people and how wonderful they are, but I will have to save that for another time. Isabel seems to know everyone in the Baja so she was the perfect person for us to meet, and she knew exactly who was in need of help. We set up a time to meet Isabel on Monday and left brunch very excited about all the new things we would be doing this week.


On Monday we met Isabel in San Jose. We were following her to another women's house and got pulled over on the way. The officer rambled on and on about something and we finally figured out he was saying we needed this and that on our license plate. Isabel turned around to help us, and talked him out of taking us to the station, but we did end up having to "pay him off" to drop the matter completely...$250 pesos...which is only about $19, but still! When we finally got to where we were going we met Donna and Elsa. We quickly learned that Donna is a women with a mission! She is originally from Bosnia, lived in the states for many years, and has lived in Cabo for the last five. Isabel told Donna as we were walking up that she had brought 2 angels with her. We both thought that was very sweet, but soon realized that these women were the angels...literally! 

Elsa's son...Enrique

There are endless things we saw yesterday that we could write about, but what we saw happening in the first barrio we went to brought us both to tears, and the story we want to share with you. Donna's main mission since being in Cabo has been to set up little kitchens in the barrios to feed the people (more information about exactly what the kitchens are and what Donna and others are doing is on this website http://www.cabobabies.com/). The first kitchen we saw is still a work in progress. It will be in a church that is in the process of being built. The church is being built by the pastor and other men who live in that barrio. These men do not have jobs and are not being paid to build this church. Donna was there visiting one day during their lunch break and realized that most of the men did not even have anything to eat. So she started taking them lunch three times a week and on Fridays giving them more food to take home to their families. We got to see the church that was being built and help serve these men their lunch. Some of the men there had started helping to build the church just so they could get a meal for the day. One of the pictures that you will see below show the men sitting under a tarp held up by poles eating their lunch...this was where they first starting having church on Sundays in that barrio. We got to talk to a few of them and hear their stories. We both stood there in awe of these men and what they were doing. As I looked over and saw the men praying before they ate it brought me to tears, not just because of the poverty that was right in front of us and all around us, but because of the faith that these men have. Pics from the barrios...

The new church

Some of the women made these for us...can someone please tell me what it is that we ate?

Today after leaving the Center we met with Donna again to start organizing clothes and toy donations she has received to give to the children in the barrios for christmas. It is a big task and will keep us very busy. 


Adios...XOXO...Jen and Tal