I made a flower!

Yeah, right, I know I didn’t “make” a flower. Still I was pretty excited when I noticed an orchid,  that I stuck outside months ago, had buds on it. I had received this flower either for my birthday or for Christmas. I am not sure which, since there is a second one out there. Gabi told me, when they quit flowering to keep on caring for them and they would put out a “pup” and flower again. I didn’t really do much with them other than stick them beside the cactus and water them occasionally. When I arrived from vacation, there were the buds. Last week, they started to open up, one flower about every other day. Right now there are four gorgeous orchids. I am so excited. I love flowers and somehow I feel so good seeing them growing naturally on my balcony. Just thought I’d share that little tidbit!

Maybe because of the flowers or other reasons, who knows, I felt like Suzy Homemaker today and so I busied myself washing, cooking and cleaning. It is amazingly hard work and I was even too tired to hit the gym. I tend to clean drawers and organize closets on a VERY irregular basis. Basically when I can’t get the doors or drawers closed anymore. Ok, maybe not that bad, but close.

When I finally got around to trying to do something fun and creative, like baking muffins, an almost tragedy struck. My oven door didn’t want to open. I shook and rattled the door, with my usual “patient” persistence (in other words I yanked as hard as I could) and things started falling. The door came open alright… the glass fell off the door, all the insulation came out and the baking racks collapsed in a heap around my feet. I stood there stunned trying to figure what happened. I can only figure that the cleaning lady cleaned the oven and put the racks in wrong. This crazy awful oven that I HATE passionately, has this nutty system where the racks pull out together with lowering the door. That often means my casseroles tip out and have sometimes even fallen out onto the oven door. Other times, it means I have burned my arms as I have to reach in to pull out something on the lower rack (there is no way to pull out the lower rack separately). I did the only thing I knew to do and yelled for João to come and help me. Together we actually managed to put the whole thing back together again. I was hot and sweaty and aggravated and not exactly remembering “Count it all joy” that I admonished by Bible study class to do this week. I wish I could say that I did. I didn’t, but I’ll keep trying to do that.

Despite the trials and tribulations of a very old decrepit oven, I was able to make some delicious quinoa muffins. My next trial was not to gobble the whole dozen all at once. They are so good. They have to be somewhat healthy with all the quinoa. Just don’t ask about the molasses, raisins and flour! Enjoy your own. Here’s the recipe:

• 1 cup quinoa, rinsed
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil  (I used olive oil)
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup packed dark-brown sugar  (I substituted molasses and used less oil)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup raisins
• 3/4 cup whole milk (I used 0%)
• 1 large egg
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1. 1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a medium saucepan, bring quinoa and 1 cup water to a boil. Reduce to a simmer; cover, and cook until water has been absorbed and quinoa is tender, 11 to 13 minutes.
2. 2. Meanwhile, brush a standard 12-cup muffin pan with oil; dust with flour, tapping out excess. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, raisins, and 2 cups cooked quinoa.
3. 3. In a small bowl, whisk together oil, milk, egg, and vanilla. Add milk mixture to flour mixture, and stir just until combined; divide batter among prepared muffin cups.
4. 4. Bake until toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Cool muffins in pans.

Where in the World Have I Been?

Uninspired. That’s where I’ve been. I think I have a hard time reporting on what is “old” news for me. Knowing I needed to write about our vacation, that is long over and done with has kept me from wanting to write on my blog at all. So once again, I’ve decided to “move” on. I may eventually go back and fill you in on a few things from our participation in the Baptist World Alliance in Hawaii, but today, at least, I want to share more current events. If I don’t, I’ll never get going again, right?

This past week as been really good, as our church has celebrated its 126th anniversary.  Both Sunday morning and evening we had great services. Sunday night was different, as we had a “big band”, and jazz presentation of the hymns. The church was pretty full. As you can see the “youth” or “young adult” choir filled the stage. The theme for the month of August is “Be Involved”, with an emphasis on every member getting involved with the ministries of the church.

Tuesday was the actually anniversary date and we had a day of prayer. As we ended the day of prayer in afternoon, João asked for the “oldest” church members to come to the front and the “oldest” would pray. We had a stand off of the four people over 90! Isn’t that fabulous? The lady closest to João is 95 and she closed our day of prayer. I love our Day of Prayer. I confess the first year I was leery and afraid it would be monotonous. It is not! We have different people leading every 30 minutes, so there are lots of styles. In addition, there is small group, large group prayer, silent, musical, directed, individual… just about any kind of prayer you can imagine. At the end of the prayer meeting, we had cake and refreshments for our “birthday” party.

This coming Sunday, we will be ending the month long celebration with 10 baptisms and the Lord’s Supper. What a great month!

I have also started back to my art lessons and am currently working on two very different projects. I am doing an iris in colored pencils. I have a new found fascination and joy in working with colored pencils, although the work is very slow and extremely tedious. From the left side drawing to the right side, are about 3 hours of work and you really don’t see that much progress, but I was working on the shading in of a couple of the blooms, as well as the curtain in the background.

I think gripping the pencils has caused my fingers to get really sore and my arthritis in my right hand has been really bad. One finger is quite red and swollen. That may also be because of the very chilly/humid weather we had for a couple of weeks. I am NOT complaining, as I LOVE the cooler weather. Unfortunately it didn’t last and today it was miserably hot for me. A couple of times I thought my body was just going to explode from the heat. Tonight I gave in and turned on the air conditioning full blast. I drove João out of the study as he was freezing, but it was the only way I could put out the fire under my skin. At least I am not beet red anymore! I worked on a painting (with acrylics) that I have been anxious to experiment with.  I haven’t done much with acrylics, although I enjoy them. They are a totally forgiving medium (if you make a mistake, it’s easy to cover it up) and the work goes quickly. This was only about 90 minutes of work. It’s in the very beginning stages, but you can already see Galileo taking form. (By the way, it is Elly’s cat.)

Speaking of cats, I have the sad task of telling you that my sweet little (BIG) Sadik, my cat I left in Canada, passed away this week. He was around 15-16 years old (he was a stray/rescue cat, so we were never sure of his age), but the last 9 years of his life were certainly wonderful. Sissy, João and I were all a little sad yesterday when we heard the news. Mia got lots of extra hugs today.  Sadik was a wonderful friend, the most intelligent cat I have ever met.  I am so thankful that he was a part of our family for five wonderful years.

Vacation – Part One

  In effect, our vacation can be divided into three parts. The first part of our vacation was the time we spent with my family. It was a time of rest and renewal. Probably due to a number of sick people on the plane, soon after arriving I had a cold/sinus infection, as you can see from my very red nose! It didn’t keep me down, though, and I was able to enjoy a good time shopping, eating, talking, and visiting.

Mom’s home is quiet and it gave both of us a chance to just “wind down” and read and sleep and just “be”.

Something that I enjoyed was being able to celebrate my mother’s and my nephew’s birthday with them. I can’t remember when I’ve been with Mom on her birthday and I don’t think I’ve ever been with my nephew on his. It was memorable as he turned 30!

There was lots of laughter and jokes, and we especially enjoyed the scene of João “fighting” with his “mother-in-law” over the proverbial broomstick that all mother-in-laws use to visit their daughters.

Although I had wanted to do sight-seeing and museum visits while there, it just seems like there was never enough time or energy. Somehow a kind of collective lethargy settled in over us. 

It didn’t help that it was SOOOO hot. Man, I don’t ever remember such a hot summer ever. It’s enough that I have to hot here in  Rio, I don’t want to go to the US and be hot too. We did make it over to the Creation Museum, mostly out of my curiosity. I found it somewhat disappointing, as with all the hype surrounding it, I thought it would be more creative. There were a few good things – like this door that represented the world after sin entered it and the beautiful outdoor gardens.

Despite our laziness, I was able to make it to the gym most days, with my Carol. While she did her aqua-fitness, I was able to work on the weights and treadmill. It was good for me to keep up a bit with my fitness. At least I didn’t turn to total mush. 

In the middle of our time at Mother’s and Carol’s we drove up to visit Jeri for a few days. If you look hard, you can find Jeri and I in the crowd where,  on our first night there we went to an outdoor concert, with a John Denver “songbook”. It was so much fun to hear the music, watch the crowds, eat and just “sing-along” with the songs of my youth. I was surprised at how many young people were there at the concert and actually singing along! While in Indy we had time to do some serious shopping as well and I was able to find some of the clothes I had been looking for. The too few days there flew by far too quickly, but I felt like we had quality time with Jeri and Megan.

It was interesting to celebrate the 4th of July in the US again. It’s been a long time (make that 18 years) and I had forgotten how much people get into that. I even got myself one of the flag tee shirts. Fireworks were everywhere and we set up our chairs outside, but I didn’t know where to crane my neck as there were so many it was hard to take them all in. The whole neighborhood was smoky by the end of the night. I guess there’s a kid in all of us, for I do so love fireworks.

Something I always look forward to while in the US is a visit to different churches. I must confess with my “traditional” view of worship, it’s not all that easy to find somewhere I might actually be able to worship, without having to put earplugs in. What is the deal with “monolithic” worship in the US? Does everyone have to be just alike? Is worship just for the 20-40 years old? I do like chorus’, but so many are just bad music and sloppy theology (and may I hasten to add the same is true of a great number of hymns). Why does it seem like worship is just thrown together to make us all happy, happy, happy? UGH! OK, all grumpiness set aside, I had some wonderful worship experiences. We usually visit 2nd Presbyterian in Indianapolis and their worship didn’t disappoint us. One Sunday we drove over to Walnut St. in Louisville. Although I lived so close when in seminary, I never attended there. I was thoroughly impressed with the beauty of the sanctuary (wow, stained glass windows in a Baptist church!) and well planned blended worship. They just don’t make churches like that anymore.  As a special treat, we were able to spend time with the music minister, who is a Brazilian and also drive out to see my Uncle Frank.

In addition to all else, while home I was able to do a little more work on the family genealogy. That can certainly be an all consuming task, so I do limit the time I spend working on that. I scanned in some photos and discovered this forgotten photo of Daddy as a child. Isn’t this a great shot? Can you see where my own gigantic forehead comes from?

My three weeks of rest and recreation rushed by. The last few days were colored by my upcoming commitment to get ready for travel to the Baptist World Alliance and my small presentation that I would make at the Women’s Department meeting. I had a hard time pulling the presentation together until my very last night, so that hung over me like a cloud. Finally, however, the first part of our vacation came to an end, when we left at dawn to head out to Honolulu. But that will be another installment on my essay on “What I did on my Summer Vacation”.

Do you feel neglected?

I usually don't abandon my blog for almost 2 months, but this year when I went on vacation, I decided to do it right. No blog! I rested and had fun. If you read my facebook, you've seen most of my pictures. Nevertheless, this week, I'll try to give you a couple of summaries of my wonderful and varied vacation in the US, as well as our plans for next year's vacation. Someone commented this week that João and I know how to do vacation. We plan all year and then we have a great time. I am back at the helm of my life and all things are organized and normal again. Today, after being back almost a week, all is in place and I am taking steps to getting back to my routine. Even Miss Mia is getting back to normal, as she seems over her tiff that I abandoned here for almost 6 weeks. She still runs to Sissy rather than to me when given the choice.
I have to get back to the gym, spend more time in Bible study, do some drawing and get busy preparing messages for our women's encounter and a September women's camp, so as time permits I'll post a few chronological entries on our vacation and then move on to my "real" life.
Suffice it to say we had a wonderful time and I am also glad to be back back home again in my apartment, with my family here and at my church. It's definitely a win-win situation.