Mechanics, English, and Two Awesome Opportunities

Technical English came to a close last week. This was the class I was teaching (along with Jeyson when I needed help with specific mechanics knowledge) to the incoming mechanic missionaries and quite a few from the community. It was a great group and an awesome opportunity to share our faith.
It was a very casual classroom setting, as you can see from the pictures. In these pictures they were working in groups on translating part of an article for airplane mechanics.

One of my favorite parts of teaching was having the young man on the right in this picture (Jonatas) as part of the class. He is a new missionary that just arrived in Brazil from Venezuela to be trained by our mission to return back to Venezuela in a few years. Why? A few years ago all foreigners in Venezuela were kicked out of the country by the government (Hugo Chavez), causing an active and very needed missionary flight program to be shut down because all of the pilots and mechanics were foreigners. Their plane and all of the ministries that depended on the flights were stopped suddenly. So, recently, many local Venezuelan pastors and ministries have rallied together to get it started....which means getting Venezuelan pilots and mechanics trained. The first one to start is Jonatas and he came to us in Brazil to do it since there wasn't a good training place available in Venezuela. We were so excited to have the privilege to have a tiny part in getting this ministry in Venezuela off the ground again literally, but teaching Jonatas this course that he is required to have.

Jonatas and Andres (left, who just arrived from Colombia and is gong to be serving in Brazil with Asas) did a great job translating, considering they had to go from English to Portuguese - neither of which languages do they speak fluently!

The other awesome opportunity was getting to pray and share a verse with the class each day before beginning. Since it was English class, each day I shared a verse in English and we translated it together into Portuguese. The classes were held at Asas de Socorro, so I had the freedom to be as open about the Gospel as I wanted to be (which of course I was!). One of the neatest things happened on a day that my co-teacher Grace was teaching class. She came into the class in a huge rush and frazzled from a crazy day. She began class right away without praying or a verse. Then, one of the students in the back who is not a believer raised his hand. "Aren't you going to begin with a verse and prayer?" he asked, "That has been my favorite part!" Of course Grace backtracked and began the class again with Him as the start. It is so exciting to see how God is working! Although the English requirement for the mechanics class is over, they will spend the next year+ learning at Asas and, Lord willing, will have many opportunities to hear the Gospel through the other missionaries who are teaching.

Baby Room Progress

So it's been requested/required that I post some pictures of the baby room progress. It's really too bad that I didn't take a before picture for you to see that the hardest part has been trying to figure out what to do with all of the stuff we used to keep in here. Here in Brazil almost no houses (including ours) have closets or basements or garages, and our house is just a little over 700 sq ft!! So, this little 9X7.5 foot room has been our storage room for everything from umbrellas and backpacks to Jeyson's tools. After getting that all cleared out (and finding some VERY interesting places to hide these items :) we were on to the decorating. We painted one wall green and Jeyson's SUPER talented sister came and painted a tree in the room on one wall. It came out WAY better than I had ever imagined. Isn't she incredible??? I found my inspiration here

Next, I found some paper lanterns at the dollar store (actually the 1 real store since that's our currency!) and Jeyson put together this little cluster that I saw here ...however much toned down for a boy and for the size room we have!

So this is what we have so far. We still need curtains (my mother-in-law is going to help me make those), bumpers and other bed stuff (in the works) and our rocking chair is coming in from southern Brazil. (They don't have the wooden ones here in central Brazil, but I found a store that can get us one from a southern state) Our carpet is a jeans type material, which is kind of fun...oh yeah and Jeyson is going to make us a cute bookshelf and there is one more much smaller art project I'm requesting Jeyson's sister paint us. Things are coming along!

We bought this little dresser which will double as a changing table surface. (This is on the wall that you can't see in the above picture) We didn't LOVE the dresser, but after LOTS of hunting this was the best we could find and it will do the job. The small baskets will go on a shelf above the dresser and one of the large ones will stay on the dresser with changing supplies. The last big one will probably hold toys somewhere.
Oh, and about the changing pad...I couldn't believe that here they don't have ones with wedge/raised sides. All of them here are just a totally flat cushion! I really wanted the American style for safety, so my mother-in-law had a great idea. She stopped by a store that sells that hard, sponge filling, and had the guy cut us one. It turned out great! Now her friend is covering with with cute fabric and then a layer of plastic/washable clear material for easy washing. Much easier to register for one at Target if we had it! But here you have to be a little more creative and make do. It's been quite a fun adventure dealing with each detail. Now, if only they had bouncy seats here....any ideas on how to make one??? (Just kidding...I think! :)

1 Hour (Semi-Freezer) Cooking

I've been so inspired by all of the blogs talking about 1 hour freezer cooking sessions lately. The idea is you take 1 hour and cook a bunch of little things to throw in your freezer. I thought I'd try it out, Brazilian style. Some items weren't actually for the freezer...instead they were for eating throughout the week - is that allowed? It was in my book anyway. Here's what I got done yesterday afternoon:

I had a big bunch of cashew fruit from my mother-in-law. I pulled off the end (that's the nut) and made the fruit into a concentrated pulp that I froze in cups. Then, we can pull them out and make them into juices whenever! I made 9 pulps - good for 9 pitchers of cashew juice!
I cooked chickpeas/garbanzo beans in the pressure cooker. I froze some in ziplock bags for salads and made some into humus. I froze half and kept half in the fridge.

I made a batch of homemade yogurt (it took all night, but I got it set up in the hour of cooking)

I hard boiled eggs and made deviled eggs (I'm doing the Bradley birth eating plan and you have to eat 2 eggs every day!)

Jeyson made us some strawberry/banana smoothies to eat on the spot.

Not a bad start! I think I'll try this more often! Thanks for the inspiration all you who do this!

Something to Chew On

I LOVE that as missionaries part of our "job description" is focusing on people and reaching out and making an impact. And of course naturally, spending time with people and food go so well together.

I LOVE bringing people food as a way to show we care and build a bridge. The other day our next door neighbor suddenly and unexpectedly passed away (he was only in his 50's too). We had the chance to reach out to the wife by stopping by with some apple cake a few days later. She insisted we come in and even allowed us to pray with her.

I also LOVE having people over: neighbors, people we know in the community, other missionaries or people from church, small groups, etc. But since we've been expecting, I've noticed that I have been dragging my feet a bit about having people over. It just seemed like so much work to entertain. But then, one day I was on Amazon.com and glanced through a book by one of my favorite cooks named Pam Anderson. I read one of her books (How to Cook Without a Book) before coming to Brazil and it completely changed my perspectives on cooking and allowed me be flexible to cook in a place where you never know what you're going to find or not find at the grocery store!

Anyway, I saw a book of hers that I had never seen before called Perfect Recipes for Having People Over. Although I knew I wasn't going to buy it (I would love to but shipping to Brazil is way too high!), I skimmed the first few pages of the book on Amazon.com

And it completely refreshed my thinking about cooking for others. The premise? Stop entertaining and start having people over to share a meal. I really can't do it justice though, so if you're needing some encouragement in this area of life, click here and read the intro from pages x-xii

Since then, I've had so much more fun and we've had so many more people over - neighbors for chili, groups of friends for blts and oven fries, and much more. This weekend we're planning to get together with some people for some very casual made-at-home fondue and a pile of things to dip in it. It should be fun!

Embassy Shock

The impression you get from movies of the US embassy being a welcoming place of refuge for US citizens is quite far from what I experienced last week. I'm sure that in times of crisis the embassy IS that place of refuge for it's citizens, but on a normal peaceful Saturday, I was left out in the cold (actually out in the heat!). Here's a picture of my view on Saturday. We headed over to the embassy in Brasilia for Jeyson to renew his visa to the US. Thankfully he was able to get it renewed for 10 years! But I was shocked that the embassy would not even allow me to come into the building. Now I understand that the embassy can't have tons of extra people in at the time of the visa interview etc...but I am a US citizen and his wife! And, in addition, I had a question about how to register our child overseas. But stuck out in the parking lot I was! Crazy! And the craziest part is that when I needed a document on another occasion from the embassy, they allowed Jeyson to come in with me! Meanwhile, Saturday I sat outside for almost 2 hours waiting for Jeyson and there wasn't even a bathroom to use! I wound up walking down the road and found a random closed building (on Saturdays in Brazil everything is closed pretty much) and begged the guard to allow me in to use the restroom. So crazy!



Oh well! I LOVE my country and all it represents as far as freedom and possibility. I am grateful that Jeyson got his visa so he can continue to visit along with me. And I really wasn't too inconvenienced by waiting outside. However, after the appointment we decided to stop at Pizza Hut (which they don't have near us) to at least get a little taste of the US for me. I'm so glad THEY let me in the door! ha!

Sourdough Failure

I have a love-hate relationship with sourdough bread. I LOVE everything about the taste and texture of a good loaf of sourdough. I HATE the fact that they don't have it here in Brazil and I am apparently completely incapable to making it!

Last week I gave it another shot and followed a youtube series called "follow the sourdough". Each day the chef preformed one step of the sourdough process, beginning with making the starter all the way through baking the dough. I studied each video and did the action precisely. Things were going along so well! I even prepared a post about my success and was just waiting to publish when I had a picture of the finished product. Note this scrumptious looking loaf below is from google images....because mine once again FLOPPED! When it came time to make the dough, it simply did not rise...bummer!


Grrr...what's a pregnant expatriate to do! Please go to your local grocery store and pick up a loaf of beautiful sourdough bread, slather it with butter, and enjoy it in my honor!

It's a...

Well if you haven't heard...It's a BOY! I'm now 24 weeks and getting bigger by the day.
I had mixed feelings about finding out the gender as part of me liked the suspense, but I'm liking even more knowing and mentally, emotionally, and logistically preparing for our baby boy. It's been a blast to officially be able to daydream in blue! I think there is no way we could NOT have known from such an obvious ultrasound, anyway!

Also, it's been super fun getting tons of boy hand-me-downs from my sister-in-law. Lucas is just 6 months, so someday they are going to be great friends too.

As far as a name goes, we still haven't 100% decided. We have a top runner but aren't closed off to others yet. Good thing we have 16 weeks left! One of the tribes that our mission serves has a cultural norm of never reusing a name...ever! This means the parents have to be VERY creative and each name is completely unique. Some of the people from the tribes have gone into the city and found interesting inspiration for names leading to children named things like "Pepsi" and "Colgate". I'm glad we're allowed to select from known names at least!