Emma & Linda's Christmas Letter 2024
Happy holidays! First of all the doggies would like to sing you a carol;
The year started with Linda & Bosche (our cattle dog mix)going up to northern California to help her brother Charlie replace his kitchen & laundry room floors while Laurie went to Iceland for the New Year’s festivities.
Linda has long been a fan of the tv show the Amazing Race so she approached two friends who each said they’d be willing to go on the show with her since Emma can’t as she’s not a US citizen - also she thinks we would fight too much on the show. So, two application videos were started but only one was sent in as the other friend came to realize he didn't really want to be on tv.
No word from The Amazing Race - yet.
We have been working on the piece of land (the Grove) in Oceanside Linda bought from her siblings. Over the years working as landscapers a lot of 'supplies' left over from our construction projects ended up at the Grove so there was a lot of trash and green waste that needed to be cleaned up. We rented a huge skip and a Bobcat and went to work. There used to be a horse barn but now it has mostly been demolished and new sheds have now been erected to store tools & Linda’s handiwork supplies.
We decided to buy a vintage motorhome so we could camp at the Grove on holidays. Emma found a great deal on a 24 foot motorized 1976 Argosy Airstream that she found up near LA. It was quite an ordeal getting it down here as the radiator overflow box broke while we were looking at it and then it wouldn’t start again after running beautifully when we first showed up to look at it. The previous owner tried for over an hour to get it to start again and eventually was able to by going underneath the motorhome and using a screwdriver to turn the starter motor. After he got it started we just had to make sure we didn’t turn off the engine again until we got home so we had to refuel up there leaving the engine running. Oh and the registration wasn’t current so Emma had to tailgate behind the RV while Linda drove it the 2 hours to get home. It was well worth it as it is a great RV and a classic!
The Argosy parked at the Grove.
Emma’s mum started worrying about fire season and needed a way to transport her many dogs if she ever needed to evacuate. After looking at many inexpensive options Emma came across a 1972 Boler trailer. The Boler is a Canadian brand of fiberglass camping trailer that morphed into the modern day Scamp trailers. They are very hard to find in southern California but Emma was able to find one in Vista that was completely gutted and needed some serious welding on the frame. The woman we bought it from was originally asking $5,000 for it because it is a collectable camper and they are actually quite valuable fixed up but it was in such a terrible state that Emma offered her $1,500 for it. The lady wasn’t pleased and said no. After a couple more weeks she lowered the price on Facebook Marketplace to $3,000 and Emma sent her a message saying that our offer of $1,500 was still open. The lady reluctantly agreed and we towed it out to Emma’s mums house where she now sits. still but through our patience & Em’s bargaining skills we got it for $1,500. Em’s mom is super excited and started fixing it up right away. Linda worked on the frame and welded proper steel so that it won’t break apart while going down the road.
Linda doing some welding to the frame of the Boler;
Linda’s sister Nancy invited several people to go on a 4-day cruise from Vancouver to San Diego. Linda decided to go but Emma opted to stay home to take care of the animals so Linda invited her friend Tere to go with her. They flew a few days early to Vancouver to explore the city. Vancouver is so beautiful, clean, amazing and the food is fantastic! The cruise was great fun and Linda learned to play pickleball, played poker & explored the ship inside & out.
Linda is still doing handiwork in Oceana and the client she works for owns 18 of the Oceana units so she is kept quit busy.
Linda decided to start doing storage auctions again. We used to go to the auctions in the early 2000s and are familiar with the guys you see on tv's Storage Wars. It's a lot easier to buy a unit now as you can see them online but of course there is a lot more competition.
Linda managed to buy her first unit which was full of Star Trek memorabilia & gaming books which she sold on eBay for a sizable profit. She has bought and won 3 more units since then and all of them were profitable after selling the items from the units on eBay
and in garage sales. We had to take a LOT of stuff from the units to the DAV, Good Will & Salvation Army too has it was unsellable. It’s been fun! Here is Linda's eBay profile if you would like to see the kinds of things she is finding in the storage units https://www.ebay.com/usr/foxalmendarez
Last year in October, Linda decided to go full on ‘metal jacket’ and apply for her CCW (Concealed Carry Weapon permit) which involves a lot of hoops to jump through and a lot of time. While waiting, Linda decided to look for alternative forms of self defense and discovered Byrna Technologies. She purchased a Less Lethal Launcher and was so excited by it that she applied to become a Byrna dealer. She started a new side business called Linda’s Less Lethal- LindasLessLethal.com and has been selling less lethal launchers (hand guns powered by compressed air - not rocket launchers) to her family, friends and neighbors.
Emma has had a few more photography projects lately and also signed up with a couple of new clients. She photographs the clients landscape designs and construction projects for them to add to their websites and social media and sees some amazing gardens all over San Diego county.
Along with the photography she has also been creating designs for her Oceanside Merch online store where she sells clothing and accessories with Oceanside branding.
She has also been making music with Garage Band and FL Studio and has quite a few tracks she is hoping to release on a streaming service when they are finished.
Emma goes to help her mum in Fallbrook every week and helps me with handiwork when I need her.
We are still playing soccer with our friends every week which we have been doing for more than 8 years now. And starting in January Emma is going to try out playing on a local Oceanside women's team.
This year we also decided to do the Camp Pendleton Mud Run with some friends. We had a great time.
We adopted two animals this year from the Humane Society. Chinchi is a chinchilla that was more of a spur of the moment adoption while Linda was there picking up a pigeon (Gregor) that my mum found outside the door to one of her recently deceased tenants. My mum wasn't sure who he belonged to but he did have a tag on his leg so she had the Humane Society pick him up so they could locate his owner. After two weeks the Humane Society called us to say they couldn't find his owner so Linda and I went over there to pick him up as we said we would adopt him if the owner couldn't be found. While there Linda saw the Chinchilla looking miserable so we decided to give her a home too.
Linda's drone video;
Here is the tree service we had to hire - after unsuccessful trying ourselves - to get our drone out of a 70 foot palm tree near our house. Linda was flying it a little too close to the fronds and got it stuck.
That's about it until next year. Wishing everyone a very happy holidays, good health and happiness for 2025!
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Our Websites:
Linda's Less Lethal website - LindasLessLethal.com
Emma's website for Oceanside Merch - osidemerch.com
Linda's eBay profile - eBay FoxAlmendarez
Emma's Photography and web design website - emmaalmendarez.com