While Pete Is Away

Pete has been gone for almost two weeks now with another to go. He is visiting family before he attends an annual meeting of Renewal Ministries in Ann Arbor Michigan. If Pete continues with this Mission organization, he will be traveling three to six weeks a year.  I am determined to keep busy and have some “fun” while he is gone, so we don’t miss him so much. So here are a few highlights.

We harvested our farm.  We had planted zucchini, broccoli, carrots, cabbage, and some spices. Our result was five carrots.  Based on all our costs (including seeds mailed from US), these carrots are worth over $6 each. I don’t think gardening is my calling.

Polishing nails in the market is always a treat. Everyone always asks if the girls are twins.

Jessica made bagels.  I made English muffins and we had them with melted cheese (brought by family from Germany) for lunch.

Here, Josh is doing a science project. He is doing great with homeschooling. Our read aloud is Out of Many Waters and is great.

We got a tent and were testing it out.  Unfortunately it leaked from every side and we had to abort by 8pm and carry in all the soaking wet bedding. Guess we will wait for the dry season. It drew quite a bit of attention. One guy explained to his friend that these were used by the army when they were sleeping in the bush.  I thought I heard one boy call it a big bolo bolo (balloon in pigeon).  Therese, the young girl next door said “you people are interesting”. First a sky houses now an outside sleeping house. I am sure we are an enigma to some here. We even build outside fires without cooking anything.

Ruthie is a dream.  She never bleats even the day we left her out in the blazing sun without water or the night we left her out in the torrential rain without cover. The kids have been very responsible about caring for her.

The girls have been doing homeschooling after school and I am so proud of their progress. Josh’s radio show has been going very well.  He even did the show alone one week when his co-host didn’t show.

We have also been able to squeeze in some horseback riding.

It has been nice to have all the school kids back at Sunday Mass.  The St Joseph’s pupils (where I teach) were the choir this week and I was so proud of them.  These 5^th and 6^th graders were just 2^nd and 3^rd graders when I got here. How time flies.

-Joy