Wedding Prep

Getting ready for a wedding is a lot of work!

This charm bracelet belonged to my great grandmother. I decided to make my own garter, so with the new material I had my something old, something new, and something blue all in one!  The item that I planned to borrow got forgotten, but due to the fact that I forgot to bring lipstick to my wedding, I borrowed that instead.

My finished garter!  I made another identical garter without the charm for the toss.

Taste testing food was pretty fun.  We decided on the pork (tradition for a Bolivian wedding) and the beef (to help fill up all my hungry boys) along with the vegetable salad, corn in cream sauce (I probably could have eaten just that all night), and the potato balls.  No rice (woo hoo!!)

My amazing friend Kirsten arrived a week early to help with wedding prep, so I had a band of traditional dancers waiting at the house.

Actually it was the anniversary of our neighborhood, so the dancers and band were walking up and down the streets stopping at every house that had set up a table like the one on the right in the above photo.  The priest walking with the group then put a statue of Virgin Mary on the table and blessed the house.  There was lots of flower petals to be thrown as well.  Both of these pictures were taken from my doorway.  Poor Kirsten was inside trying to sleep!

Trying out the veil I made!

Kirsten helping out by trying on the props for our photo booth :)

Angel hard at work coloring some signs to guide guests into the reception hall.

My helpers completely tuckered out.  Good thing I didn't try to do it all on my own!!

Spring Break PBAU

Palm Beach Atlantic University recently sent a team to the BLC for their spring break.  The majority of the group were theatre majors, so it was an excellent time to re-launch the Sidewalk Sunday School program focusing on the communities surrounding the BLC.  And the non-theatre major team members gave us some very good balance throughout the week!

After church on Sunday the team went to the Life House to have lunch with the BLC graduates.

Playing Uno during a visit to the Intermedios Dorm.

PBAU and the Intermedios!

Hanging out around the bonfire.

Uh oh.  Edwin killed another gringo.

Nice crowd at the last Sidewalk Sunday School.

The team looking down on the city of Cochabamba.

Carnaval Vacation

Last weekend we got 4 days off for the holiday of Carnaval.  More what Carnaval is later this week.  Angel and I wanted to go on a trip with his family, but with so much still to do in the house, we knew we needed to stay and work.  But on the last day we decided to sneak up the mountain a little ways and have a 2 hour escape.  Lovely!

We are only about 15 minutes from our house here!

Cold water!

View of all of the valley of Cochabamba below.  And at that little bridge just down the river, a couple of families washing their clothes in the river :)

I was happy to find a warm rock and be able to soak up some sun.  Angel thinks it looks like I fell off the boulder in this photo!

Valentine's Day

Angel and I both took Valentine's Day off from work for the extra romantic reason of needing to buy roofing materials because the rain keeps trickling into the living room, and kitchen, and office/closet of our house.  I was pretty excited when he decided at 10am that we should stop and eat cake!

Bathroom Joy

Yesterday I used the bathroom INSIDE my house.  Now that is a good feeling!  By Wednesday the water tank will be installed on the roof and there will be running water too!

The walls need to dry a bit more before we can paint and add a mirror, and once the kitchen counters are built we will bring in a carpenter to do all of the cabinets at once.  So much better than the out house!!

Photo taken from the living room!  I'm so excited that I don't have to walk through the rain to go to the bathroom!  And we won't have to bucket shower!  And we purposely made the shower bigger than what the mason said was standard size, so that my extra tall Bolivian man doesn't have to duck :)  We installed the curtain rod and inner shower curtain yesterday, and hopefully I will find the right fabric to sew the shower curtain on Thursday while I am in the city.  Who knew I could get so excited for a bathroom?

Angel and Freddy

 It all started with a serious discussion amongst the men folk. 

These have to be some of my favorite photos ever!

Freddy then proceeded to do this...

There wasn't anything there (I checked) and Angel didn't have any idea what Freddy was doing, but I nearly died laughing because Freddy did it so many times!

Rainbow

I was standing in the doorway of the bakery, smelling the fresh bread, watching the boys and staff play in the rain, and remembering how blessed I am when a rainbow appeared over the BLC (barely visible in the photo unfortunately).  Seems like God really does love me.

Freddy Fun

 Now that he doesn't cry just because somebody looked at him, I'm starting to like the littlest guy in our gang.

Climbing the doberman statue at the park.  He does pretty much the same thing to the real dogs at the BLC too.

We may have buried him in grass clippings.

I wonder who was responsible for burying him?

Giant Moth

So I saw this giant moth hanging out on my wall one night (that's what I get for leaving my window open) and decided just to leave it be.  I think they are pretty awesome and didn't want to risk killing it to shoo it out.  All was fine until I turned my light out.  The thoomp thoomp thoomp of it flying around in the dark was almost too much to handle.  And then I realized that the only light in the room was coming from my phone right next to my head as I sent my last text message and knowing that moths are attracted to light... well it was enough to make me throw the covers over my head!!

Sleeping

My boys, like most probably, are precious when they sleep.

Marcos fell asleep on Grover's shoulder.

Not only is Freddy asleep, but I love Edwin's face here!

Knocked out after Christmas on the movie room carpet.

Apparently this is a frequent occurrence, but I found Alejandro sleeping with his shoes on.

Upon closer inspection, Alejandro was also sleeping with his backpack on.

And Ramiro fell asleep in the front of the bus.  Cute, aren't they?