JANUARY RANDOMNESS

January 16th we had 3 guinea pigs born. Unfortunately one survived. His name is Mousy and he is really cute. From the first hour of birth, guinea pig babies have hair, open eyes, they eat solid food and they hop around. The kids have loved up that little guinea pig and, of course, do not want to give him away (as was planned). Mousy is now 3 weeks old and Jeff just told the kids that they could keep him (he does have a soft soft for our animals after all).  I’m still not convinced that we need 3 guinea pigs, but Joshua has been totally responsible for them, so it isn’t like they create more work for me. And I’ll have to admit, it would have been hard for me to say good-bye to the little fellow. However...Joshua promised me that the next babies, he will give away.....we’ll see....

Father Chewy, Mother Snowy and Baby Mousy (2 ½ weeks old) have been the hit of many “parties”. The kids love to show off the guinea pigs (and hamsters) to our Paraguayan friends. They have NEVER seen anything like it and are fascinated with them.

January 14-18th we had a couple come to visit us – Josh and Letti Berry. We had only met them briefly twice before and had fun getting to know them better. We first met them at a mutual friend’s wedding. Joshua (an American) was just back in the country to live and court his now wife (who is Paraguayan). They now have been married two years and have been living in the states. In December they came to visit her family in Asuncion and came all the way out and see us. We talked a lot about missions and are praying that God will clearly show them the how, when and wheres of future missions.

Have you all ever played washers?  Jeff and his dad made these boards after Jeff played in the states. We have gotten a lot of use out of them.

January 19 – 23rd we hosted another couple. Brendan and Erin are American missionaries in Peru. He is working with Wycliffe on bible translation and she is a dentist doing mobile clinic among other things). They were on their way from Peru to a dental conference in Bolivia and asked to stop in with us. We had never met them before, but quickly found many many many topic of conversation. Jeff said of himself after they left, “Wow, I didn’t know I could talk so much!”

 

January 27th Jeff woke up sick and unfortunately the following week Ryan, Ginny, Micah and Julia came down with the same thing...headache, fever, some barfing and extremely tiredness.

January 28th all of us SIM ladies on the field (minus one) helped teammate, Cherlynn celebrate her 49th birthday. We had a slumber party at her house in Caazapa. We talked and talked for hours (surprise, surprise), ate dinner at 8, played MadGab (thanks home group for sending that...it is really fun), ate cake and prayed over Cherlynn, and put in a movie around midnight.

I made the birthday cake and tried my hand at fondant frosting for the first time. Under the balloons I put scripture verses tied to ribbons. After singing to the birthday girl, we each pulled a ribbon and then prayed that scripture over Cherlynn.

Homeschooling - We ended our first homeschooling month. I am really enjoying the curriculum we are using and the schedule I created to help keep us all organized.

Mom (during homeschooling): It was good that their city was on the coast because it made it easier for them to trade.

Student (in all seriousness): Who would want to trade sea water?

We made 3 clay Venuses but the ducks ate them!

We may just have to let the punishment fit the crime as one friend recommended.

This week we worked on taking pictures with a "Flat Stanly" that was sent to us. That is why Ginny is hold a paper doll.

We start early around here with homeschooling