Leonid Meteor Shower - closing out November

The grand-girls came down and shared an early Thanksgiving with Marty and Juanita.  This was the first time for Juanita to meet Kami and family.

To maintain social distance I fired up the grill for pollo asada tacos, while Juanita again made her now famous rice and beans.  The wine was the bottle from the Ventura Adventure provided by Doug.

Aj is not really addicted to her phone, she is actively seeking jobs to fund a trip to Washington DC to attend forensics summer camp!  While Kg chose to tour with Drum Corps last year, this is Aj’s choice.

And Juanita's first experience with Jenga, she has a steady hand and soon figured it out.

With just a few days left to visit with Marty and Juanita we did a few familiar tourist things around San Diego.

San Diego Waterfront

The beaches

In my last blog I mentioned the Covid restrictions for Dia de los Muertos gatherings.  Juanita has never seen a desert so we headed out for our own Day of the Dead at Font’s Point.

Like most Latinas, Juanita has strong feelings for her ancestors.  I practiced the introduction in Spanish as I showed Juanita where I distributed Dad’s ashes.  Cremation is not as common in Mexico and Marty had to explain again.  She was by far the most emotional!

Dad at Font's Point cerca 1998

None of my pictures of Borrego Springs survived, the SD card failed :(   We dry camped at Peg Leg Smith as one of the six units there - all with California tags.  No Snowbirds from Canada!  I would have expected more folks and certainly a few Canadians.  BS is always slow in summer and needs the winter season of Snowbirds to continue to thrive.  

Back home Fran made a full Thanksgiving spread.  While, son Michael, provided the Thanksgiving wine from the Monks at New Clairvaux.

With just the two of us again in the house.  We decided to bike around Mission Bay to work off the thanksgiving feast.  The construction of the Maruta Gardner Playground is complete in Bonita Cove.

Lots of fun play equipment to honor Maruta Gadner, the beloved Mission Bay High principal.  This is a fun playground for the kids.  

And Fran did learn to make really good beans and rice!  The secret is to use the right beans.  Mayocoba, Peruano or Canary are all the same.  Our local tienda mexicana has the Peruano beans in bulk.  Gringo Pinto beans just don’t cut it.

As for the rice, rinse it first and then dry it in the sun.  Tomato bullion adds the tomato flavor and color.  Fine chopped carrots and fresh corn kernels the texture.