Estersita!

I can not tell you how many times I have been asked if this little girl (Estersita, Esther) is our daughter. With her blond hair, everyone thinks that she is ours. She is actually the daughter of Ramiro and Eugenia Claros, one of the pastors at the church. Our girls just love Ester. She is so sweet to our girls as well.

I want that, yes, that right there! Yesterday would be fine!

Have you ever wanted something so bad... (and as they say) that you could almost taste it! Maybe it's changing your spiritual condition, or maybe being out of debt, or maybe your body style. All of these things require being intentional and disciplined to change them. And they don't come overnight. Well, I feel this way about learning to speak spanish. I want it so bad. I want to be able to speak well right now!

Many other missionaries that have been on the field for many years have said that being able to speak well does not happen for about 4 years and fluency does not come for 10 to 15 years. Wowee!

I am in the process of learning how to be patient and content with where I am at. So as I wait, I am doing all things that I should be. I am being intentional to read, speak, write in Spanish. It will come... or the Lord will come back!!!! Then I'll be able to speak, or it will not matter anymore.

Our House,,, is a very fine house...."

We are so blessed to be finally in our house. I think I have gotten all but 2 suitcases unpacked and we are pretty much settled. There is still a lot of things that we need to buy, but we have to pace ourselves a little bit.

One thing that has been interesting, is that we had our dining table made and it was much cheaper than it would be to buy in the stores. In the states is is always more expensive to have something made by hand, but here usually it is the opposite. So we are actually going to have quite a bit of things made. We will end up spending much less doing it this way. It's actually kind of fun, because I'm going to have a headboard and bedside tables made and it will be just like I want it.

The girls are loving the house. There is a lot of area for them to play, not only inside but outside as well. They just play and play for hours. We have cows right behind our house and I think they have named a couple of them. They scream and wince every time the cows go to potty. Such city girls huh? Maybe that will wear off some day.

One down side to this area is scorpions! I have killed 2 so far, one in the girls room. Yikes! The bugs here are plentiful and interesting. There are lots of types of bugs that I have never seen before.

Overall, we are LOVING our new home. And now we are excited about getting out of the house to talk and build relationships.

Candy Land Anyone?

We have been playing a great deal of Candy Land in the last month. I'm so glad we brought it, it almost did make the cut. It was a last minute decision, actually as we were walking out the door for the airport I made the decision to stuff it in. We have certainly used it this last month. The kids here love it.

One day the girls and I were playing and Chester, one of the dogs here, was jealous, or wanted to play, but just laid down right in the middle of things. So needless to say that particular game was over. Chester won!