Gardening, Swimming, and Salmonella

This blog is going to be very short this week. Not much has happened in these past two weeks other than a few things that I will share about. I have been doing lots of gardening as usual. We have enjoyed having the kids plant their own personal plants to take care of as they grow. We had them plant a tiny kind of cherry tomato and they have thoroughly enjoyed the whole process.

Above: The younger girls right after planting their tomatoes.

Above: The older girls right after planting their tomato seeds.

Above: The younger boys right after planting their personal tomato plants.

Above: The girls got distracted from weeding by making crowns from the bean leaves and flowers.

Above: Planting sunflowers!

Hope and I also enjoyed the adventure of harvesting our first cassava of the year. This cassava grew from a cutting that I brought when I came in August. It was less than a foot long then, but when we harvested it, the pieces of the plant were all much taller than me as you’ll see in a photo below. It was a very special reminder to me of God’s amazing creative power to be able to make something so big, beautiful and useful, from nothing more than a stick. It is also encouraging because it reminds me that God has been faithful in helping my garden grow every step of the way. I have worked to do my best and He has faithfully taken care of the rest, constantly reminding me of my need to rely on Him and His power since, ultimately, I can’t make anything grow by myself.

Above: You can see how large this cassava plant grew from just one stick less to an a foot long.

Above: Hope and I with the Cassava root that is surprisingly heavy!

Above: Digging out the cassava was a bit of a challenge.

Above: Lots of new cassava cuttings from the plant we harvested. Hoping to have a lot more cassava next year.

Above: Started harvesting Zucchini this week!

Above: Transplanted lots of peppers this week.

Above: One of our sweet potato flowers.

We had many visitors this past week on campus, including a mission team from Andrew’s University. It was amazing for we SM’s to see young people our age and be able to speak to them in English. The kids enjoyed the VBS they put on, and we also enjoyed having several former SM’s visit at the same time and love on us.

Above: Santi helping me plant starts.

Two Sabbaths ago, I enjoyed doing a special music with my Flores girls. They requested to sing Awesome God in English which has been their new favorite song. It was a lot of fun and they sounded beautiful.

Above: Singing special music with my girls in church.

On Tuesday this week, I was assigned to watched the little Guerreros boys for a couple hours in the afternoon. They loved playing in the creek while I watched them and prepped for my Baptismal studies that I lead on Sabbaths. Once I called them in to change, two of them wanted to shower. However, as often happens, the water was shut off for some reason and they resorted to the pump in the backyard. Then they decided to take baths in the laundry sinks in their swimming clothes. I’ll attach some cute pictures of that below.

Above: Otto in the river.

Above: The boys loved jumping into the river and this boy caught some air!

Above: This one loved his bath in the sink.

One reason that I do not have much to write about is that I unfortunately tested positive for Salmonella last Thursday as well as a GI bleed. Because of that, I spent much of last weekend resting and eating easily digestible food. I got very exhausted easily and had some pain and nausea, but thankfully it was not too bad. I am thankful for antibiotics that have once again saved me from getting sicker. I am now recovered from Salmonella and my GI bleed after finishing antibiotics yesterday.

Above: Carlie and I with the receptionist at the lab that does all of our medical tests. He has helped me through Dengue and now through Salmonella and 2 GI bleeds.

Today I am enjoying a relaxing day off with a beautiful view of Bolivia. These two weeks have been pretty slow and average but have had little joys, happy moments, and reminders of God’s faithfulness throughout. I hope you all have wonderful Sabbaths. I will post a more thorough update in two weeks when I hopefully have more to share.

Below: My beautiful view while writing this blog.