30.8.13



We noticed seeds dropping off of our nasturtium  last month; we picked them up and held on to them for a couple of weeks until we finally got around to planting them.  I didn't know if it was really that easy - popping freshly picked seeds into dirt.  It worked (this time, at least) 

26.8.13


My mama has four girls, three daughters-in-law, lots and lots of grandkids, and a whole slew of friends across the world.

and my mama still finds time to email me;  I'm so thankful:

We are thinking about you today with company and school. Last night Papi and I watched the movie "The Way" about the father who walked the via de Santiago after his son died on the road . . . we liked the movie a lot and I'm still thinking about it today, thinking about worship, how we're created to be worshippers. . . thinking about how everybody has a story to tell and how sometimes we can know people but not really know their story, kind of like passing in the night with a polite hello.  Anyway, just a few thoughts for a Monday. Hope you're delighting in God's goodness today.


25.8.13


We welcomed Sam to Mexico City (and our team!) last week;  she is here to help churches think about how they can use English classes to love and serve the city, to partner with a safe house that cares for hurting girls, and to be all around pretty awesome.  

To say that we are excited about her arrival is a serious understatement.

(and I'm not just saying that because she keeps washing my dishes and providing delightful conversation while she chops any vegetables I pass her way during dinner prep)

See? I said she was awesome . . . and she's just getting going!

23.8.13
























Have you read The Gardener by Sarah Stewart?  Sheesh, I love this book.  It's about Lydia Grace, country girl who loves to garden with her Grandma. When her papa can't get work and no one is asking her mama to make dresses, is sent to the city to live with her grumpy uncle. When Lydia Grace finds a secret spot (the building's abandoned rooftop) she devises a plan to make her uncle smile, and fills the rooftop with a beautiful garden.

(sorry for the spoiler;  I could't help myself)

It's lovely:  the sort of book that makes me want to abandon all my responsibilities for the week, fill my windowsills with seedlings, and scour the streets for empty paint cans and buckets to fill my rooftop with a garden like Lydia Grace's.
So, I won't do all that, but we are scheming with our downstairs neighbor about planting some plants - -  maybe some flowers, maybe some herbs - - up on our rooftop to bring a little more beauty and life to this crazy city.  

here we go! 


19.8.13

hola!
























hey hey! Are you visiting today from A Cup of Jo? Welcome!  I wish you could all come over for a bowl of beans and rice so that I could tell you everything I know about my city;  after lunch I would take you to our favorite coffee shop down the street, and then we would visit at least three different parks, and on the way home I would show you the best place in our neighborhood to buy avocados.

Since you can't all come over (sigh), please enjoy peeking into our neighborhood through my blog!

p.s. the problem with cleaning dry black beans is that a black bean looks so much like a little rock, and a little rock look so much like a black bean. I'll get better at this; I know I will!

3.8.13


It's Saturday; I thought we would do pancakes this morning. I'm trying to establish some more constant family rhythms, and as cliche as saturday morning pancakes may be, it's a doable and pleasant rhythm, I think.   

however. I am a moaning, miserable mess this morning - - laid up in bed with some sort of stomach bug, so we are not doing pancakes.  Instead, I am sipping on carbonated water and the kids are eating tamales (thanks to a good husband who ran to the tamale stand down the street before he left for his day full of meetings) 

Yesterday marked the end of the kids three weeks at summer camp. I'm calling it a success because:
  • we had a great family conversation on the heart issues of modesty when Josu came home worried because his dance class teacher kept telling him to "walk sexy"
  • Selma's Spanish has definitely perked up. She's doing so much better at keeping up with our "speak spanish outside of the home" policy.
  • we hookity-hooked it up with a couple of the kids (and their mamas) before we left. We exchanged phone numbers and are already thinking about how to plan regular get-togethers during the school year.  
  • and this, of course. Of course.