Coming To A Close

Turkey, ham, sweet-potatoes casserole, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, paper clips, stuffing, bricks, pumpkin pie, apple pie, booger pie, we ate EVERYTHING for Thanksgiving.  Thursday morning we woke up and all came together as a family to share our Thanks.  Being away from home and being in an unfamiliar place was harder than I thought it was going to be for Thanksgiving.  It was unlike any other Thanksgiving that I’ve ever had, I suppose that goes without saying, but I was stunned by how thankful I was for things like this supporting family here in Peru and even very simple things i.e. hot water.  Thanksgiving, this year, was certainly the most meaningful of the other 22 I’ve had. 

Now, I’m following in the good American fashion of making everything Christmas-like right after Thanksgiving.  So, I’m on the couch writing you this update with earphones in listening to… oh must I say it, Celtic Woman Christmas music!  I’ve been stuffing my ears with other Christmas music too, of course.  I’ll let you in on a glimpse of what I’m listening to right now.

This Chloe Agnew (in the pink) has an absolutely beautiful voice!

Tomorrow is the last day of class as we get ready to move to Puno!!!!  WOW!  I can’t believe that these classes went so quickly.  It’s really amazing.  This last class that we are in is a instructional class about discipleing.  I’ll be quite honest, before this week I was really questioning the call.  I had a pit in my stomach about the work in Puno, the unknown.  This week I went to our cell group and I gave the lesson and it was so encouraging.  I don’t necessarily want each of our cell groups to be so “by the book” or stiff.  I want to people in our cell groups to be asking questions and learning about things that they are interested in or understanding hard concepts they don’t understand.  That’s exactly what our cell group was this week.  Ordinarily, I am the one who stays quiet and if there is any question I let Joel take it, but this time God had been preparing me for this discipleship.  I think even before I would have been unlikely to let ourselves get so off topic, but I was so content in just listening to these people ask these questions and I was so excited to have the answers!  It pushed me back up on the horse for sure.

Has it snowed yet there in the States?  I wish I could be there for the snow.  I want to stand out in the light snowfall and smell the chill in the air and make a snow angel.  Five minutes of that would suffice and then I’d be good for another year! HA!  I was talking to a friend the other day and told her that my favorite season wasn’t fall until I left for Costa Rica and had to miss it.  Having missed the fall made me appreciate it so much.  So, all you winter snow haters you might just have to leave your cold State and go to a place where you won’t have snow for a while so you can come to LOVE driving around town in your rear-wheel drive, squirrely, out-dated clunker in the snow.  You should be getting the hint of the experience I’ve had… my parent’s got rid of that thing so that’s done with!  When I get back I’m sure they are going to buuuuuuuy me something shiny with great MPG and smells like a new shoe inside… that’s another hint.

I want to delve into this a little more, but I want to get this post up ASAP and I’m about to head out the door.  We still have not found a house in Puno.  We are going this Sunday, the whole team, to look for a BIG house for all of us to live in.  Please pray that we can find the perfect house!

Lastly, I have started a new BLOG!  Woooooo!  It’s called The Handicapped Kitchen.  Check it out.  Bookmark it.  You’ll love it.  If I check my stats and see no one has visited it I will be very upset!  It’s a food blog.  Need I say more?  Now GO!