Saturday, June 23, 2018

Hello June!

I glanced over at my calendar this morning and gasped as I realized that June is almost gone.  It seems like we just finished school and here we are almost half way through our summer break.  Slow down time!  I am going to need a few more lazy mornings before I'm back to spelling tests, math drills, and science experiments.  Although, who am I kidding.  Lazy mornings do not exist in my world with two very active, early rising boys.  I can dream though, right.

Anyway, here is a little glance at some of the things we have done over the past few weeks since I flipped the calendar over to a new month. 

Between the time that we finished school and hosted our first team we had a little less than two weeks.  During that time we made several house visits in various villages that we are targeting.  On days that we have not had anything going on it has been fun to load up in the car and ride the mountain roads.  The boys enjoy getting to hang out the windows and feel the breeze blowing in their hair.  It is a childhood memory that we both have and love that our boys can experience it too.  We enjoy stopping and passing some time just sitting and talking with folks.  Much of our work success depends on relationship building.  We find that this is best done just hanging out on porches sharing our lives with one another. We are often asked "when are you coming back to visit" which leaves us walking away with a smile knowing that we are breaking ground.

David and the boys hiking to make a house visit

On one of those visits we were able to gift this lady with a large print Bible.  She does a lot of teaching in her village but struggles to read normal print.  She teared up and held it close to her heart.  Pray for the work that she is doing in her village to teach the gospel to others.

Frozen treats after a hot day of visiting. 

Our first team of the summer arrived earlier this month.  Here are the boys helping us buy food supplies for them.  They love this part of our job.  I, on the other hand, can think of numerous things I enjoy more than taking my two boys to the grocery store.  It can be tortuous I tell you. Tortuous!

On the day that the team arrived David rode into Guatemala City with Miguel to pick them up.  That left me at home with both boys.  By mid-afternoon we headed out to the local mall so they could play and I could sit down in silence.  On days like this I really miss city parks.  We lived at them while on Stateside Assignment.  


There is a new ball pit at our mall for the months of June and July.  It costs $2.00 for 30 minutes of play.  It was the best four dollars I have spent all month.

Add that to the cost of this frappe that I enjoyed sipping on while they played and you will know that it turned out to be a pretty good afternoon.

Our team arrived that night and we spent the next several days working together in the mountain villages.  It was a great week.  If you missed that post you can read about it here.

They left early on a Thursday morning and then later that day we had a luncheon with our IMB mission family in Guatemala City. We met at one of my favorite restaurants, San Martin.   The occasion was to honor the Macumber family who will be leaving us next month.  After a Stateside Assignment they will be relocating to another country.  Our Guatemala mission family continues to get smaller and smaller.  We had over 25 families when we arrived almost 12 years ago.  It saddens our hearts to see it dwindle away. 

A fun time of food and fellowship with our mission family.  Pray for the Macumbers as they transition to life in the States for a while and then on to the plans that God has for them.  

Later that afternoon we had a team meeting with the Stones and Thomases.  We left the next morning making the drive back home.  Along the way we stopped at Hotel Longarone to celebrate Father's Day a little early.  Many of the former Guatemala missionary families spent time there over the years and we love hearing their stories about it.  We now go not only because we like it but also to keep the Baptist tradition.  You already know that I am just a little bit obsessive about traditions. 

a little fun in the sun for Father's Day

This past week has been mostly catching up on laundry.  How do we accumulate so many dirty clothes?  I mean most days my boys only run around in their underwear (can you even say that publicly these days?).  It is so hot here I do not really blame them.  But then I look outside and see the clothes basket spilling over and just scratch my head.  Laundry is an endless chore.  It is not my favorite but I'll take it over buying groceries any day.   

As an incentive to work hard while our team was here (or bribery, however you want to look at it) I promised the boys a return trip to the mall play area if they did well.  I will not tell you what I promised them if they did not do well because I know you cannot say that publicly these days, ha.  Anyway, they got their reward this past Tuesday morning.  Local schools are not out here so we went early thinking it would be a somewhat quiet outing.  For the most part it was.  Or at least it was until my two showed up.  First off they were back in the ball pit-

The first 20 minutes of their 30 minute time slot was very peaceful and smooth.  The last ten minutes was anything but.  Something about Ben wanting to play in a certain area and his brother not wanting to move and give him his space did not turn out too well.  Needless to say by the time I dragged them out of the pit everyone in the area knew we were there.  As if we do not stick out enough let's be loud and draw extra attention to ourselves (insert long sigh).

We ate lunch, got them calmed down, and then continued on with our day.  I should have taken them home but I'll be honest.  The last thing I wanted to do was return home to a smoking hot house and be cooped up with two rowdy boys.  That is my life on most days and I was desperate for a little change. Instead we kept our original plans.  The boys had been collecting arcade tickets for a while and were eager to cash them in.  They both got tokens to play games and then at the end cashed in all 332 of their tickets for toys that they loved at the moment but only lasted less than a day.  They are learning early that you get what you pay for.  Although I realize that those tokens are not cheap so in reality we paid a lot for the little they got.  Maybe that is a lesson for another day.




Cruz's favorite game of all is this crazy ticket earning game.  He landed on 100 tickets one time in the past and is now hooked.  If I did not guide him he would put all his tokens into this one game.




Ben is obsessed with this game where the arm goes down and grabs things.  If he was not so good at it I might complain more.  That boy can come away with some candy!

Our favorite game of all is air hockey.  I go for blood!  They are also learning early that you cannot win them all and that their mama is a fierce competitor.  This sweet smiling photo was taken before the game started.  Trust me.  It went down hill from there.  Those parents that let their kids win on purpose.  I'm not one of them, ha.




Woo hoo!  Let's go get some prizes.

When I have had a little down time this past week it has mostly been spent curled up somewhere enjoying this book.  My friend, Malinda, sent me two books down with our last team that she thought I might enjoy.  I started with this one and let me just say I could not put it down.  I started Monday night and by Tuesday evening I had read 10 chapters.  It is so good and funny.  If you grew up in the 80's this book will make you laugh out loud and long for times that seemed much more simple. 

Something else I have been enjoying a lot lately is the new limited time only strawberry and creme pie from McDonald's.  The boys think we keep going back to the mall for their enjoyment.  It's really so that I can send them off to play and not have to share this little current favorite treat of mine.  If they would remove the "limited time only" stamp on it I might not be quite as obsessed.  It's just that I keep thinking I am going to return one day and they'll be gone.  I am trying to eat all of them I can while I can.  And if you call my phone at night and I do not answer it is because I'm out riding extra laps around the block on my bike to work them off.  The boys think those night outings are for their enjoyment too.  They have a lot to learn about their mama.

Friday rolled around and found us back at the grocery store buying supplies for our next team that arrives this Sunday.  Our grocery store is in the mall so when we finished shopping we headed upstairs to the play area (yet again) for a few minutes of play (and peace).  What we noticed when we walked up was that the TV screen was airing the College World Series game with Mississippi State and Oregon State.  We do not have home television service so we had not been able to watch any of the other games earlier in the week.  We were thrilled to see it airing.  We bought a few frappes, grabbed a table, and indulged.  It did not turn out well for the Bulldogs but we are hoping better luck in their game today.



Go Bulldogs!

Lastly, Friday night is pizza and movie night at our house.  The boys love it and look forward to it all week long.  We order pizza, pop popcorn, eat sweets, and enjoy a movie together.  Here they are last night eating and watching Inside Out.  We've seen it countless times but that is the movie they chose to watch this week.  They might work me over all week long but something about snuggling up on movie nights makes the week end on a good note. 

We are finalizing plans for our team today and counting down the hours until they arrive.  We love team weeks.  It is hard work but some of our favorite weeks of the year.  We anticipate the next few days to be fun filled and productive.  I will share all about it once they are gone.

 Happy Saturday y'all!

No comments:

Post a Comment

Related Posts with Thumbnails
Related Posts with Thumbnails