Loopdy Loop

Today I had another deep scale gum treatment and it was as pleasant as I remembered it from the last time (did you note my sarcasm there?). Last week I had smashed up my upper lip and nose on my marble dresser (and nothing was broken thankfully) in the middle of the night, so now I get to have pain in the top and bottom of my mouth. I took something for the pain and have slept some off and on and am feeling slightly loopy. I did, however, work some on my black and white tulip drawing and have pretty well decided to call it quits. I will have my prof take a look-see and correct anything she thinks is major. I like it a lot, but then the important thing is the composition and I stole that from a picture I found on the internet. I don’t know what I did before the internet when I needed to research things.

Speaking of pictures and research, I recently ordered about nine new books from Amazon.com (yeah internet again!) to take on vacation. Yip, the month of May is arriving and around the 20th or so our vacation starts. We are planning on vacationing in Curitiba, about 12 hours south of here. The photo to the left is of the cystal palace in Curitiba. It's a greenhouse. We both have always liked the city and as we begin to think of retiring, we want to explore places where we might like to live. Definitely not Rio de Janeiro! Too many people, too much traffic, too much crime, too much heat and not enough quality of life. Through friends we have found a nice house just outside of Curitiba, where we can read and write and I can paint to my heart’s content. There will be a lot of churches we can visit and even friends to see. Fun, fun, fun vacation is coming!!! I love having some time with my husband just for “me” and being able to just be quiet. I know that’s not most people’s idea of fun, but it is for us.

Well I hope I made sense and tomorrow I don’t have to edit out this entry. Have a good night and I hope tomorrow I can open my mouth and talk and most importantly eat again.

Just for fun

I am going to assume that you, my readers, are, for the most part, not under the age of 20, so perhaps you haven't seen this YouTube Video. The guy in it is just hysterical in his use of "beatboxing". My kids in Canada did beat boxing with such talent. It is making percussions sounds with your mouth or voice. It's surprisingly hard. Anyway, take a break and have a laugh while you watch this video. Just couldn't resist sharing it with you.

Just Stuff

First of all Mia says she wants to say something so here goes her “say-so”:

See how tired I be? I have to be workin’ hard to take care of Mommy while Daddy is away. Is really tiring. I have to sleep on Daddy’s side of the bed so Mommy doesn’t miss him so much. BIG SACRIFICE for me. But I do it for love. I be so glad he come home early tonight instead of tomorrow morning. I think he do it ‘cause he miss me SOOOOOOOOOOOOO much.

So as you read from her, João has been away for a couple of days preaching in Espírito Santo. He left on Friday and is due in this evening. I have missed him, but Mia kept me good company. She has really “stuck” to my side. In addition she has had several litter box accidents, so I suspect that although she is very much my cat she has missed João as much as I have.

Sunday morning I preached at our church, for the first time since we have been here. I preached at the church many many years ago, but I don’t think most folks would remember that. Our church is a challenging church for preachers, as not only are our members demanding (and not afraid to criticize or tell you exactly what they think about your message or the way you delivered it), but we also have a huge radio and internet audience. Makes even the most experienced of pastors shiver in their boots. I worked really hard on my message content and practiced a lot, trying to keep the time down, as I tend to like to preach about 45 minutes. I felt like it was pretty simple and maybe not enough content, but since we also had the Lord’s supper, I didn’t want the service to go on forever. Anyway I did manage to keep it down to about 15 minutes (a small miracle for me) and people were nice enough to tell me they liked it (and those who didn’t were nice enough to keep quiet). The funny thing was how surprised everyone was. Being at this church has been a good experience for me as I have learned about being less instead of more, meaning I have been no “shining” star and in the background as much as possible. So when I do something, like teach or preach it is always a surprise to the members that I can! I know so many were praying because I was so at ease. I do love to preach/teach, although I  wouldn’t want to preach twice every Sunday. I am thoroughly enjoying my Bible study group in English on Sunday morning. I have a pretty steady group of 7, but sometimes there are 10 or so. I have a couple of more people who tell me they are going to attend soon.

I am also enjoying my storytelling/oral culture class with missionaries. Last week I told a relatively obscure Bible story 3 times and then they had to retell it then retell again from another point of view. Suddenly they were very into the story and its meaning and we all realized how very effective story telling can be. I intend to do more of that. Sunday night during the children’s message, I told a story from my childhood and you should have seen how the kids had their ears glued to every word. I just have to get better at my expression and work harder at being “good” , not just natural at story telling.

Speaking of stories, I saw an HBO movie this week called “Taking Chance”. You won’t see me do this often, but I highly recommend that you find a way to see this. It is one of the best and most moving stories I have seen in just forever. Whatever you think about the war in Iraq, this story will move you. It is about honor and dignity and caring about life. Now you will cry probably, but they are “redeeming” tears. Do yourself a favor, find it and see it because no matter what you politics, you will be a richer person for having seen this.

So that is my this, that and the other for today.

No April’s Fool

The repercussions from last year were not positive, so this year there will be no April Fool’s joke. I am just finally getting around to adding something to my blog. I have been busy and tired, plus my tendonitis kicked in on my right hand, so I just haven’t felt like writing. I broke down and bought a keyboard and mouse for my laptop and within days I can report that my pain in my hand is gone. I am impressed. I am still not back to drawing, however, but today may be the day, if I can find a couple of hours. I haven’t even gone to class lately, so that lets you know a generalized lethargy has set in. But I am glad we are back and can share a virtual cup of coffee. (By the way, isn’t that a great looking cup of coffee I had with some friends? I just couldn’t resist taking a cell phone photo. It tasted as good as it looked).

One of our big events recently as been shopping for a wedding dress. Although we took lots of photos, you’ll see none here, as that is not MY story to tell. But it has been fun. The selection has been made and the dress ordered. Since it comes from Spain, it will take 6 months and I will pick it up in the US to save more than half the price. That was very much a “girl” event. “No boys allowed”.

I have begun teaching my oral cultures class for the missionary “radicals”. These young people go and live among the culture in places where there are no Christians, in a radical lifestyle to reach the unreached. I have had two classes and tomorrow I begin to really work on the practical part of learning to tell the Bible stories, not analyze/preach. They seem a pretty agreeable group, but still I hope to see more fire from them.

On the art scene, I have been watching the most interesting BBC documentaries on the private lives of masterpieces. I am just mesmerized. It is just so fascinating. If you ever get to see these documentaries, don’t miss them. I am showing you a couple of my current projects, that I hope to get back to and even finish. The Green Lady is in colored pencil and has oh so many details, but is actually fun to work on. It’s a picture my sister asked me to do. I am still struggling to master colored pencils. They are a slow, exacting and unforgiving medium. I have also returned to graphite (pencil) and am working on these tulips, as a part of a series. I am planning to also do two other versions of the tulips. Probably water color and pastel, perhaps acrylic and frame them all together. I have been working quite some time on the graphite version, but it will serve as my study for the others, so it is time well spent.

This weekend, João is leaving me to preach about 10 hours north of here, back in Espírito Santo (Colatina). I was also invited to go, but just couldn’t find the energy or will to travel that far especially by car, although now he is planning on going by bus. I don’t like travelling and my LEAST favorite mode is by car. I would enjoy accompanying him, but I still prefer to stay in my little corner of the world. I was going to attend a conference later this month for pastor’s wives, but also opted out of that as I hated the prospect of bus trip – and having to make a transfer and move about in unknown territory. I am getting old and fearful I suppose. I am certainly not adventuresome anymore. This Sunday morning I will be preaching, for the first time, in our church, so I am studying hard for that. It’s a great responsibility.

So there you have it. A couple of weeks wrapped up in a couple of paragraphs. It’s nice that things are fairly calm and I plan on keeping them that way!

A Full Report on Paraná

I am feeling much better today and starting to get caught up in my life, so I decided to take some time to reflect and write about this past weekend. My writing for the blog is as much about me, as it is you, the readers. It helps me process events!

I had a great plane trip down to Foz on last Friday morning, although I arrived hungry and tired. Even though it was almost a 4 hour trip, we got the famous cookie and coke routine on the plane. When we landed, I was surprised by the intensely blue sky and HOT, HOT sunshine. Arriving at the hotel, our rooms weren’t ready, so we walked around town, grabbing some lunch and once again, surprised by the heat. You figure going south it will be cooler. WRONG! I can’t describe the heat, except to say it felt like the rays of the sun were a weight on your head. It was different, that’s all I know to say.

The congress got started that evening and I spoke Friday night, Saturday night and Sunday morning. I did three messages based on the life of Esther. The first was about the purification/sanctification based on her one year of preparation to become the queen. The second was about being a fragile flower, used by a mighty God (because her name meant “Myrtle”) and the third message was about Purim Party, or her spiritual legacy of celebration. It took a while to get the folks warmed up to my style, but gradually we made contact and soon we were all old friends.

One of the rewards of the weekend was travelling and rooming with my friend Elza. She and I worked together before I went to Canada, and I have always held her in the highest regard. I admire her and respect her, as much for her talent as her integrity and very pure heart. She spoke as well and on Saturday night she did one of her famous chalk drawings. I love to watch her as she draws while the music plays, telling the story without speaking. At the end, as you see by the photo on the left, she turns on a black light and having used fluorescent chalk, the whole picture lights up. But it was not just her message that was special to me, as we had lots of time to share and talk and that was so meaningful. We worked together for 6 years, but I don’t believe we ever had so much time to really share. She is a blessing!

Although we were given free time on Saturday afternoon, I felt I needed to use that time to prepare myself to preach that night, so I chose not to sightsee, although that was a painful decision. I figured I had Sunday afternoon, but suddenly on Saturday night, they asked me to preach in a local church on Sunday night AND I needed to “new” sermon. I panicked, until I realized Elza had brought along the magazine she edits and I had written a Bible study that I could use as a basis for the message.

Consequently I took a risk and she and I went to the Falls on Sunday aft. I could hardly bear to be so close to one of the world’s natural wonders and not go to see it. I had been there twice before, but you never get enough of seeing God’s beautiful world. Since we were at a downtown hotel, it was a long trip out to the falls, but I still didn’t want to pay the $80 for a taxi. We set out on the adventure of discovering the local busses and took one for $2. It was HOT (not air) and we had to stand (it was FULL), but we were happy to save all that money and the bus only took about 40 minutes. When we got to the park, we rode a another bus for about 20 minutes out to the Falls. Lo and behold, on that park bus were many of the women from the congress. So it was a riot having them with us. We even had an impromptu worship service and choir when we actually got to the Falls themselves. Typically, the Japanese tourist filmed it all.

Although the walk along the path of the falls was only 1.2 kilometers, it was up and down steps and it was very hot. My clothes looked like I had been in the shower because I sweat so much. Surprisingly I didn’t get sunburned. Maybe because there was shade a lot of the way. You have seen the videos and pictures and know that the falls are magnificent, even though they are in a semi-drought and there was very little water. I was so glad we made the effort to go. It was a close call to make the two bus rides home and get back in time to shower, grab a bite to eat and finish preparing to preach (all this in about 45 minutes), but we managed.

I had planned, on Monday morning, to do some more sightseeing, but I was just washed out and ended up sleeping later than I planned and needed to pack and all, so I just gave in to tiredness and didn’t do it. I did manage to get out and buy some of João’s green tea (chimarrão) that is locally produced. He was ecstatic about that. We left the hotel around noon and had a very uneventful trip home. Our husbands met us at the airport and we even managed to get home quickly without tangling in the rush hour traffic.

Now you have a semi-full report on my weekend. It was great to see the women, get to share, make new friends and enjoy God’s beautiful world. I am glad, however, I don’t do this on a regular basis like I used to. Yesterday, I was just so tired all day and had so much to do to get caught up. As Mom always says, the old grey mare just ain’t what she used to be.

Time for Ice Packs

I really do know you have better things to do than watch my homemade videos of my trip to the Falls. So you can skip it, especially if it loads really slowly. But for those who are interested and have fast internet, I thought you might enjoy another video. By the way, I did survive my dental surgery, but I feel pretty crummy right now. So off to bed with an ice pack on the face! It hurts a lot and the worse part is she only did 1/4 of the gums. I have 3 more sessions. ARGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Video of the Falls

Today has been a rush of unpacking, cooking, doing laundry and in a bit dental surgery (bad gums) and an art class. So still no time to write about my Paraná trip. I put up photos yesterday and today I thought I'd let you look at one video I made of the falls. Hope you enjoy that! Oh and by the way, look at the poll on the left. I put it there a week or so ago and not many people responded! I gave you a couple of more days to respond, since it expired today!

Hot off the Computer

I had a great trip over the weekend to the Iguaçu Falls. The congress was just a great experience and I made a lot of new friends. I found a couple of hours to visit the waterfalls and thought I'd post a few photos. I just got in tonight and I am pretty tired, so I will share some of my thoughts on the experience, some more photos and also some videos of the waterfalls later this week. I thought, however, you might enjoy some of my photos.

Weirdness abounds around

Today my husband was declared an immortal. (I told you weirdness abounds). Let’s see if I can explain. He was inducted into the Brazilian Evangelical Academy of “Letters”, which is basically an honor for published writers. In this case, Christian writers. I have no idea if there is an equivalent in North America. The members are referred to as “immortals”, again I suppose since they are writers their words live on. But Sissy and I have been teasing him asking if we, by extension are also a little bit immortal. The certificate is too big for my scanner, but you get the idea.

I also finished a strange art project from my book on color theory. I thought I would enjoy the project, but turned out to kind of be a drudge and not all that pleased with the results, although I have to admit, I learned a lot. I know color is important and learning to match, blend and change hue and intensity is all important. So here is the weird project.  I bought a napkin and scanned it so it would be 8x10. then I painted it in 5 different sessions. I glued a strip of the original colors at the bottom right corner. Than I tried to match the colors. In the next section I painted the complimentary colors (according to a color wheel). That made me go a little bonkers, as I looked at the original and saw light violet and I painted it yellow green, light green and I painted it pinkish. Next I had to paint it in the opposite value, that it to say I painted the light blue, in navy blue, etc. Then I had to change the intensity. The light green became an olive green and lilac became a sickly purple. Finally I returned to the original colors. I suffered because I don’t have a tiny brush to use in the curves and leaves and so things got all goofy by the end. I have found a beautiful picture of a tulip in a vase and am thinking of doing a series of studies of it – graphite black and white, then with pastels and finally with acrylics and maybe watercolors. Hopefully they will all turn out nicely and I can do my wall in the dining room. I have class tomorrow and will make a consult with my teacher as to the sizes I should use as well as types of media. It is amazing how much there is to learn – even the kinds of materials you use make such a difference.

I actually won’t have too much time to paint as I am getting ready to preach at a women’s congress this weekend down on the border of Argentina and Paraguay, at the Iguaçu Falls. I have wrapped up two of the three messages, but have the challenge of the third ahead of me. I have outlined and put in my stories and Bible references. Now it is just drawing it all together, since I know where I am heading. I hope to have time to do some tourism and take some great photos while I am there. I think it is absolutely magnificent and you will enjoy the views if I get to take any photos.

Move Over Dewey

I suppose you have heard of the book “Dewey” that is a bestseller, about a library cat in Kansas. I haven’t read it, although I’ve given it as a gift. She (or is it he?) holds nothing over Mia. Ever since the severe heat wave of the month of February hit, she has gone into hibernation mode. She huddles behind the books. These are our “overflow” bookshelves of books not too frequently used. They are in the storage area of the apt. (what should be the maid’s miniscule bedroom). Her food and toys are kept in the room and she sleeps there at night. When it’s really hot, she sleeps behind the books on the shelves where no one can see her. When it cools down a little (today it’s 90 and we are thinking of breaking out hot chocolate), she functions as a very nice bookend. She will only come out if I take her in my arms and forcibly insist that she be sociable. She will sit with me and also play a while, but soon she stretches out as much as possible on the hardwood floors in the darkest, coolest place in the apt. She is definitely a “British” cat who suffers with the heat. She is also definitely our bibliophile. What else would you expect in a household with so many books. And we just keep buying books. Oh dear. Soon they will take over our lives.

Enjoying the Family

I haven’t written for a few days, because I have been busy entertaining João’s parents. Having “guests”, albeit family, in your home changes your whole schedule. It really makes a difference in your daily routine. We very much enjoyed having them here, but I didn’t find time to write on my blog or do any artwork.

Sunday we especially enjoyed family time as we all went out for lunch at Outback. It was a fun and delicious experience. It was nice to have this time all together, for usually Sundays are so hectic we hardly get any time to talk.

This morning they got away safely after their longest visit ever with us. Usually they are anxious to get away after about 2 days and this time they stayed a whole week. It has been stiflingly hot (a real challenge to my no complaining attempt), and I think they were happy to be in the air conditioning most of the time. Me too!

After they left, I got us moved back into our bedroom and bathroom, scrubbed down the bathrooms, did 4 loads of laundry and vacuumed the house. I am now sitting down in the air conditioned study and let the perspiration dry off a little before thinking of making lunch. Today it may not be rice and beans, etc. It may just be cold salad. We’ll enjoy it, whatever it is. Have a good week!

Sunflowers

It’s sort of a toss-up to say whether tulips or sunflowers are my very favorites. I do love them both. And neither lend themselves to having bouquets of them around the house. Although I told myself, yesterday, I just had to do something useful like scrub the refrigerator or clean drawers or vacuum or even write a sermon, I found it difficult to keep moving yesterday. I suspect the heat got to me. I turned on the air and that helped some, but I was still uncomfortable. Must have been a great day for the beach-goers!

I did manage to finish my ironing (I had let it go for months), while I watched a couple of movies. So that was at least productive. I re-read a book I love “Scent of Water” while listening to Diane Krall jazz with Mia cuddled on my lap. That was wonderful. I also painted. That finally brings me around to Sunflowers. I did a painting of Sunflowers from a book called “Acrylic Painting for Beginners”.  I found, however,  that I couldn’t stand to follow his suggestions and went off working on my own. I realized that all the practice mixing colors had made it possible for me to do my own color work without following his suggestions. I liked the final result. So much so that I put it in a frame and hung in on the wall. I just happened to have a frame for that size of canvas, so I wanted to see how it looked and then I just stuck it up on the wall. I like it. It’s small, so it wasn’t ambitious, and not all that hard.

In just a while João will arrive home together with his parents who are coming for a visit. A couple of people reacted with horror when they heard I was spending carnival alone. I was looking forward to it, for basically I am an introvert. When, however, everyone was finally gone on Friday morning (João left on Thursday) I had a brief sinking moment of “what will I do with myself?” That didn’t last long. I did whatever I wanted and it was a wonderful respite for me. I just did what I wanted when I wanted. It’s not like I was out of contact with people, as I talked on the cell phone, Skype and other chat groups every single day. But I especially liked my mornings, just sitting out on the veranda, reading and meditating with my cup of coffee. I thought I would do so many things, and the days rushed by while I crawled around. Now suddenly my alone time has evaporated and soon I will have a full house. It’s amazing how we adapt to our circumstances, isn’t it?

The Oscars

Were you shocked by the tone of the speeches at the Oscars last night? I felt deeply uncomfortable, almost sickened, with a sense of “wrongness”.  It was such a feeling of “no” as I heard those who would justify sin by pointing to God’s love and acceptance. God’s love does not imply acceptance of sin. He does not wink at wrongdoings, thinking they are kind of cute, like some cuddly little grandfather. I know we all long to be right, to be accepted just as we are. It just doesn’t work that way. God’s love does not cancel out his righteousness and as such all sin is disgustingly filthy to Him. Because I think we instinctively know that, we seek to “downgrade” sin and say the times have changed and what we thought was sin isn’t sin. Or we try to justify sin, saying that we were just made that way and there is nothing we can do about it. I see a consistent trend in our times to blame it all on DNA. I overeat because I have a thrifty gene. I am promiscuous because I have too many hormones. I drink too much because of my genetic structure and so forth and so on. The truth be told, all of us would like to be reassured we are basically good and in God’s eyes no matter how we are, we are “all okay”.

That just doesn’t match up with what I read in the Bible. Even if we have a proclivity to sin because of our physical make-up (we do live in a fallen world after all), that does not excuse us. Does that make the world seem unfair? Well welcome to a sinful world. Those are the consequences. Easy for me to say, right?

Wrong! Was I sickened by looking at the public display and self-seeking justification for their sins last night? I was. But the harder question is, am I equally sickened by my own sin and consequent justifications? Are not my sins in the same category? When I read Galatians 5:19-21 I feel sick when I see that sexual immorality is listed right next to idolatry (read my post on anger) and just shortlly before things like jealousy, selfishness, and envy. So while debauchery is condemned, so is hatred.

If I do not repent of my “pet” sins and yet find it easy to condemn others for those sins that don’t tempt me, there is something wrong. So, yes, the speeches at the Oscars bothered me a lot, not just because of the effort to make a wrong a right, but because I saw a reflection of myself in their attitudes. Strange that their darkness shone a light on my own sin. My prayer is that my disgust, nausea, sickness over sin, will continue to grow and lead me to constant repentance. 

Just Gotta Share This

After days of doing exercises in mixing paints, doing color wheels, learning how to make the color of mud (when you mix incorrectly that’s what you get!), and reading and reading about paints, techniques and colors, I decided I just wanted to get my feet wet (or in this case, my fingers dirty) and do a painting with acrylics. It resembles watercolors, but yet is very different. The paint doesn’t flow on water. It’s sticky. It also dries quickly. Like pastels you can easily correct mistakes. In fact, it is closer to the process of pastels than watercolors. The true challenge is mixing colors to get the right tones. As always, the real problem comes in drawing the picture to be painted. I followed the process of a book on painting. It’s called ten easy lessons. HA! Nothing easy about it. This painting was just part of lesson two. At any rate, after two days, I have finished my first still life in acrylics. In fact it’s sort of my only still life. It didn’t turn out too badly and I wasn’t terribly frustrated in the process. I am just glad no one else was home to see the mess I made! Just so you can compare, the original I painted from is on the right. Yes my colors are brighter. That’s because the scan of the book on slick paper didn’t come out the same as a the scan of the painted picture. It was fun anyway.

The bad news is that I didn’t make it through the day today without complaining! As I walked through the school yard on the way to church today, I was shocked at all the trash thrown on the ground. Not just a little. I mean tons of coke cans, potato chip packages, etc. When I finally met up with someone, I commented on the little “pigs” at the school. Oops! As soon as it was out of my mouth, I remembered: “No complaining”. So the rubber band goes on the other hand. I start over tomorrow. How are you doing?

WYSIWYG

Don’t sweat if you don’t get those letters. Back in the “old” days when the web was getting started, doing a web page was a real pain in the neck. You had to understand html and that meant writing the codes for everything. Every font, color, formating had it’s own code. When you tried to read what you wrote it was so full of code it was hard to make sense of it. Then there were the “WHAT YOU SEE IS WHAT YOU GET” programs. You just typed things as you wished and the program put in the “hidden” code. My blogspot is like that. I see the underlines, photos, colors, etc. as I type. It’s great. So those programs are abbreviated with the first letter of that phrase, thus WYSIWYG. Clever, eh?

Over the past couple of days, I have been thinking that abbreviation would be a great description of our spiritual life, except with a slight twist. Same letters, just different words. WHAT YOU SAY IS WHAT YOU’VE GOT (INSIDE). Since I am always struggling with the issue of “tongue control” , when I read Luke 6:45 – “ Out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks” , I was stopped dead in my tracks. I mean, most of the time I can put on a veneer of “christianity” and play nice, but when things get hard, or irritating then what’s inside comes out!

I read a “ Webzine”  the other day (if you are interested the address is: http://www.boundless.org) and the article on anger hit home. It’s called “Anger: the Image of Satan” , where he deals with the problem of sinful anger that transforms us into the image of Satan. It really hit home when he talked about anger expressed as complaining,  grumpiness, cutting remarks and ranting. Oops! I remembered my loud complaining in the grocery store about how slow the line moved. I remembered my muttering under my breath about the guy who cut us off in traffic. I remember WAY too many things. I was convicted. The author, Jonathan Dodson, attributed that to idolatry. Yip. I just plain love good ole me. I want things to go my way, on my time schedule. Yes, I am a control freak. When I grumble about how hot it is, I am, in fact saying, that I want to be comfortable and that God doesn’t know what He is doing as he controls the weather. I don’t really want God to be sovereign, but I want to the boss of the world. And that makes me into the image of Satan who fell from heaven for that very same reason.

That is a very tough lesson. But true. What comes out of my mouth, reveals what’s really in my heart. It’s not a pretty site, nor is it pretty listening. I have repented, I am repenting of my murmurs, grumbling and general negative attitudes and asking God to deal with my idolatry of ME!

I am even going to try the complaint-free challenge. Have you heard of it? It’s one the site http://www.acomplaintfreeworld.org. The idea is to stay complaint-free for 21 days. They have a bracelet you wear on either wrist. When you catch yourself complaining, gossiping or criticizing, you move the bracelet to the other arm and begin again. I don’t have the bracelet, but I figure a rubber band will do the job. Wanna join me????

Happy Valentine’s Day

For some reason, I got a chuckle this morning out of the name of the program I use to do my blog entries. It’s called “Live Writer”. I thought to myself, how good it is not to be a dead writer… dumb I know, but then I think the name of the program is pretty lame.

That is neither here nor there. I just wanted to wish you a Happy Valentine’s Day and thank you for reading my blog. I know there are lot of legends associated with today, but one thing that is certain, it is a day for writing notes expressing your affection or love for friends and family. Although we have often turned the day into a time of expressions of “eros” or erotic love, I have the impression that the day was more a time of “philia”, or fraternal love. We seemed to have lost that connotation  and that’s too bad, for the eroticizing of our culture is sick. They have taken Abraham Lincoln’s beautiful correspondence with his friends and said it is proof he was a homosexual. We can no longer say we love our friends or express this affection physically without someone pointing a finger of suspicion. I wish we could still buy our little punch out valentine’s and innocently distribute them among those we care for, just to say you are special!

On Valentine’s Day, we think of people
who have cheered and encouraged us,
who go out of their way
to be kind and caring,
who have enriched our lives
just by being themselves.
You are such a person.
I’m so happy you’re my friend
Happy Valentine’s Day!

By Joanna Fuchs

Since our weather has cooled down some (I actually was able to turn off the air conditioning), I have felt more like working on the pastel portrait of my favorite valentine, who is taking me out to the Outback for lunch today. I made some progress over the last two days, but still have a long way to go. Man, is this time consuming. Whatever any artist charges is not enough, trust me. It’s hard work! Enduring the critics is hard too. My “model” says he looks too old, his nose is too big (is not – I measured), his eyes are wrong (which is true, but I give up after 4 attempts to get them right), and his hair is the wrong color (haven’t finished yet). He did like his beard. Wow! Fortunately I don’t have to make my living doing portraits. I need to finish him up, as soon we are starting painting lessons, with acrylics, so I need to put my pastel “studio” away. Who knows, some day I may have a room just to be my studio. Wouldn’t that be great?

Far From the Home I Love

One of my favorite musicals is Fiddler on the Roof. One very hauntingly sad song that has always spoken to my heart is “Far From the Home I Love”, when one of the daughters leaves home in order to be with her husband, who has been exiled to Siberia. The melody and lyrics echo the anguish of one who wanted to be physically home, but also wanted to be close to the one she chose to love. I first heard the song while in high school and it spoke to my heart. I cried the first time and in fact every time I hear the song, or even read the lyrics. When I was 16, I had no idea that the song would be my heart’s cry!

Sunday, during our worship, I was suddenly flooded with a sense of “belonging” like I have not felt in almost three years. I had the deafening realization that I felt like I was “physically” home at my church, in my town. I was happy. I was joyful. I was at peace. Since we are studying the fruit of the Spirit in my Sunday School class and I have been praying over the fruit of the Spirit, I was very keenly attuned to the sensations of joy and peace. Not in the ephemeral way of a temporary happiness and feeling of calmness, but in a deep down soul kind of way. It was in a deep down in my bones sense of being where I wanted to be. If anyone saw the tears on my face, I am sure they didn’t understand, but I couldn’t stop the tears of joy as I finally saw the completion of three years of prayer.

Anyone who knows me, knows that I didn’t want to leave Canada in 2006. I was as  happy as I have ever been in my life and was returning to the one place on planet earth where I had suffered the most and had the least desire to live – Rio de Janeiro. (God does have a good sense of humor, doesn’t He? I have lived in this city longer than anywhere else). I was rather like the little girl who told her daddy she would sit down since he told her to, but that she was still standing up in her “heart”. So I came out of obedience, and prayed for joy and peace in my surroundings to eventually follow.  I felt a lot like the lyrics to the Neil Diamond song: “The road is long with many a winding turn; That lead us to who knows where, But I'm strong”.

I truly believed that the day would come when I would at peace again, but somehow I thought that would not delay so very long. I won’t linger on the details, but confess that the wait was long and not easy for me. I knew all would be okay someday, but was anxious for the day to come when waking up in the morning, feeling tropical heat,  knowing I was in Rio, wouldn’t be quite so painful. That pain of being “far from home” is what little “Hodel” sings about:

Once I was happily content to be
As I was, where I was,
Close to the people who are close to me,
Here in the home I love. …
Oh, what a melancholy choice this is,
Wanting home, wanting him,
Closing my heart to ev'ry hope but his,
Leaving the home I love,
There where my heart has settled long ago
I must go, I must go, I must go,
Who could imagine I'd be wand'ring so
Far from the home I love

So now you understand the tears of joy on Sunday morning when I realized that I AM home, as completely home as I will ever be in this lifetime. It has never taken me so long to adjust to a new home before. I realize some of that is my age, some of it is stubbornness, and some of it is circumstance. It’s been exciting to see how God has worked in my heart, giving me the faith to wait and the hope of knowing the day would come when everything would be all right. It has always been well with my soul, just hasn’t been so good with my heart. It is wonderful to feel my soul reunited with my heart and be at peace. I am still far from the ones I love. I still live in a very hot place. I still am part of a very large church community. I still have to speak my non-fluent Portuguese. None of that has changed. It just doesn’t matter anymore. I love where I am and what I do. I am not just being obedient, but I am joyful in where I am and what I am doing. That is victory!

Finished!

Just wanted to quickly post the photo of the pastel of Degas’ “Green Dancers”. I finished it tonight. I enjoyed working on the picture a lot, but I realized somewhere along the way that I bit off a little more than I wanted to chew. Surprisingly there were a lot more details than I realized. The tiny orange ballerinas were a lot harder to do and took a lot more time than the two skirts and the dancer in the foreground. The little details on the tutu were murderous as well.

We had a lovely day off today, entertaining Dione e Fausto (the pastor and his wife who preceeded us at First Baptist. They work at the Baptist World Alliance in DC, but were here for a wedding) for a brunch. It was nice to talk and share. So much to talk about!!!

I decided totally take the rest of the day off and finish the picture, so that’s just what a did. Some four hours later I was able to finish it.

Now I am reading “COLORS”, a book on color theory, in order to prepare myself for mixing colors and working in acrylic paints. That will come in March and I am excited about learning something new. My task for the rest of this month is finishing João’s portrait. I do love pastels. They just feel wonderful in your hands and the colors come off on the paper just like they look in your hand. It is such a sensation to see those vibrant, luminous colors flowing onto the paper. They are very forgiving as well, as you can just paint right over any mistake.

While I feel confident that I am learning to deal with pastels and watercolors, I realize more and more that my drawing skills are very limited and I need to concentrate on improving in that area. There are only so many hours available for art, so I’ll just have to be patient and take any small improvements that I can.

FEVER!

I didn’t abandon you, but for two days I was kind of punk, with a fever. It has been really hot here in Rio, but my fever was from the inside not outside. I don’t know what it was, but I was miserable on Monday and recovering on Tuesday, and fine on Wednesday. One of those 24 hour virus’, I guess. It surely laid me low, as I didn’t even feel like lifting my head to drink water. My two favorite nurses took care of me. Mia stayed by my side for 8 hours straight and João waited on me hand and foot.

Today, Thursday, I took some time to work on my copy of Degas’ “Green Dancers”. It’s one of my favorites (which is saying something since I love most all of his work) and thought it would be interesting to see if I could reproduce a pastel. Well it’s been fun, but the short answer is that I can’t reproduce someone else’s art. I can imitate or make my own version of his work. I seem unable to bend my will to someone else, and I just have to interpret things my way.

I can tell you it is hot under that mask when it’s over 90 degrees, but it does cut down on the coughing and breathing difficulties. There comes a time, however, when I just have to take it off. It has been SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO hot. Even I, of the unlimited appetite, just don’t feel like eating. Yesterday I cooked a full lunch, but I ignored most of it to eat salad and fruit. I see the midwest caught up in snow and ice and I am not sure if I should feel sorry for them or envy them. Ah the ambivalence!

While I was drawing (or is the correct term painting) with the pastels today, João videoed me and I have put in the video link to you tube if you want to see the video. Thought you might want to see some live action.

A Quarter of a Century

Can you believe João’s daughter turned 25 yesterday? Neither can she! Wow. Just yesterday she was a cute little girl. Now she is a beautiful young woman. We had a small family celebration yesterday. She went out with her college friends on Thursday, and her work buddies at lunch on Friday and next week will get together with her mother’s family. Talk about stretching out a celebration! And that’s just as it should be. Birthdays are great commemorations of who we are and our purpose. Plus it’s fun to get presents and eat cake.

I am facing terrible temptation here…. While we waited for the meal to get ready, we commented how the living room was dark. We have two burned out bulbs. I joked that now that Bernardo was our son-in-law, he could be pressed into service to change the bulbs since he’s pretty tall. He is so good-natured, that of course he offered (no pressure here…) to do so. Out comes the ladder. Now remember both he and Elly are engineers. One can only remember the old joke: How many engineers does it take to change a light bulb? Three. One to hold the ladder, one to hold the light bulb, and the third to interpret the Japanese text.

Well the temptation is that I snapped a shot of them changing the light bulb and Elly immediately commented… not for the BLOG! Everyone in America will see us changing a light bulb. I promptly said, of course not. But then I thought better. It’s such a cute photo, because the light fixture was actually very complex and you needed four hands, so she gave him her two hands. And João kibitzed, while I photographed. Now come on, don’t you want to see it? I’ll size it really little so as not to make it stand out. Now isn't that worth it?

There is something so natural, so sweet about it. Maybe because as they plan their wedding and subsequent marriage, it’s nice to see them so comfortable together, working to do a “job” together. I wish for them, in their marriage, the chance to work companionably together in many, many projects. Sorry, Elly, just couldn’t resist. Happy, Happy Birthday.

Smudges

My art teacher says art is just a matter of making smudges in the right places. She doesn't like lines. We are never supposed to draw a "nose" for instance. We make smudges in the right shapes and the nose will suddenly appear. I try to do that, but it's a hard thing to NOT trust your instincts and draw a nose. But if you do try to concentrate and draw a nose, you'll get a stylized feature that just won't look right. So the midway process in any drawing looks pretty yucky.
In addition, the same thing applies to colors. You don't "paint" skin with flesh. You apply smudges of color, like blue and red and brown and yellow to make it look like it has depth. So once again, everything looks like a goey mess of weird colors that will never make skin.
Thought I'd share that process on my very first attempt at drawing a portrait with pastels. I sketched it in with light brown and then did the blue around the face (just so I could see the outline) and the black hair.
Since I don't know what I am really doing, I tried to see the colors in the skin and started adding in grey and blue and red and brown and even orange in various shades. I got all these weird combinations going, just to see what would work. In addition I had to pay attention to the smudges to make the various facial features. You can see why I would lose track of time doing this. It's an intricate procedure.
After about two hours of work, I knew I needed to stop. If I work too much longer than that, my shoulders ache and my hands hurt, so I try to give it a break and do something entirely different.
Take a look at the process. You can see the progress. I deliberately did not blend the orange in, as I plan to apply some red over it to tone it down. In pastels you always work dark to light, so try not to panic over the fact that it is all dark and ghoulish looking. By the way, isn't it creepy to see no eye?
Two hours of work and I am still blocking in shapes. I have not done the nose at all. If there appears to be a nose, it's because you know there is supposed to be a nose in the middle of the face. Because of smearing I tend to do the left side first and then move to the right side. Also I work on the top and then down to the bottom. I am having fun experimenting and seeing what happens. I don't really think you should experiment on a real drawing, but I find that a lot more interesting than doing squares of colors!
João hates this photo of himself, but I told him that I chose this photo because we are not fond of it and I knew I'd make a lot of mistakes and this way I wouldn't have a high emotional investment. For instance, I loved Bia's photo and I was a nervous wreck about ruining her watercolor. I know this will be no portrait to hang on a wall, but I want to learn in the process.
Wouldn't life be a lot more fun if we didn't get in a hurry to see flesh color immediately, or try to draw noses instead of smudges? Okay, that's not exactly what I wanted to say, but you get the drift. As we obey God, even when we can't see the "whole picture" or the final "portrait", we are becoming who He wants us to be. Cool, eh?

Transformed.com.br

First off, I wanted to share my final version of Bia’s portrait, because although you may not see much difference, I see a world of improvement in the details that make it “her”. That was the result of last night’s class. We also made the decision that I am going to go back and work with pastels, since I only did one project with them. I had such an allergic reaction, I stopped, but now I have masks to use while I work, so I think I should be okay.

Secondly, I wanted to share my excitement over my current writing project, which is a three day Vacation Bible. I have tentatively given it the title of "Transformed.com.br”. I plan on using a “digital” or electronic (computers, video-games, digital cameras, MP3 players, TVs, etc.) kind of theme. The story room will be set up as a LAN HOUSE (perhaps known to you as a cyber-café). The recreation area (ELECTRON) will be like a video-game studio, except the games will be live. I am particularly excited about the live mazes and human tetris games! The craft room will be “Click-click”, like a digital photo album. The opening and closing activities (HOT ZONE) will be led by “Transfomer” Robots, so we will be thinking about the transformational power of the gospel. We’ll be doing stories like Philemon/Onesimus, Peter, the little Sorceress, to emphasize how people changed. In addition we’ll be looking at chameleons, bees, dragonflies, toads and other animals that change colors or metamorphosize. We’ll make robots, make Orkut profiles (like FACEBOOK, but more popular here), do masks and other fun crafts. The ideas are beginning to take shape. I am still researching, but I always get quite excited when things start to have a certain form and I know where I am going with my research. Our music is yet to be written, but I hope it will be very upbeat and “techno” sounding – perhaps led by a giant MP3 player. Doesn’t it all sound like fun? It is right now. This is the easiest part for me – the ideas. Next comes the dirt grinding work of writing it all out so leaders can make it happen. It’s all in my head and jotted down as ideas, but explaining it in details and with illustrations is SO much work. If you have any swell, or even not so swell ideas for activities, games, stories, dramas, skits, decorations, snacks, or crafts, PLEASE, PLEASE, pass them along to me. Through all these fun things, I hope the children really come to understand the total transformational power of the Holy Spirit in their OWN lives.

Checking in

I just couldn’t resist posting these photos of Mia. We had just dropped the phones on the couch (João doesn’t like to get up to answer and since we have three numbers at the house and two cell phones, there is quite a collection). So it looks a lot like she was waiting for quite an important call! Since it didn’t come, she stares down the phone, willing it to ring. When it finally does ring, she leans in heavily to the cell phone to hear what the person has to say to her. Cute, isn’t it? She, like all cats, seems to hate when I talk on the telephone and crawls all over me when I do, but I guess it's okay for her to talk on the phone.

Today I was looking over some of my resolutions. It didn’t seem so ambitious at the time, but it does now. So far, I am keeping up on the Bible reading. (#4) I have finished Ezra, Nehemiah, Matthew (almost) and am working my way through Genesis and Acts. Not doing too well in the exercise part(#1), as my foot still hurts and my knee has swollen from the fall or arthritis. I did try out weight lifting in Brasilia, (#2) at our hotel and I really liked it. João and I are dong the devotional book off and on, as we haven’t been too impressed with the content. (#3). We are still talking about our devotional book, but I need to get with real writing now that we have an outline. I have recently accepted writing another VBS, so that will be quite ambitious and may eventually take the devotional book’s place, as I actually have a deadline on it – JULY! (#5) My art classes are going well, and soon I’ll have another portrait to show you. (#6) I am already behind on inviting people to supper, but in my defense, this is a big vacation month and I was gone for two weeks and sick the other week (#8), so I do hope to catch up. I am enjoying my English Bible study class and had 5 students the other day. I hope it grows. (#7) I am working on the procrastination issue around the house and am pleased to say that I have made a little progress on that score. The house is much nicer without things junked up (well, except for the telephones!)#9. Haven’t started working on the mentoring yet (#10), but hope to get around to that after Carnival. I’ll try to check in with you once in a while on my resolutions, just to keep me honest. How are you doing?

Catching Up

I don’t think I mentioned that I wouldn’t be writing for a while because of our trip to Brasilia. Now I am home and we can get caught up! Last Tuesday we headed out to Brasilia, via plane, for the Brazilian Baptist Convention. The first few days were the preliminary meetings for pastors, pastor’s wives, musicians, youth, women, etc. I openly confess that after last’s year convention, I was deeply discouraged and thought twice before being willing to attend another one. This year, however, it was different. All of the meetings were thoughtfully planned, the music well executed and the speakers were inspiring. I am not always so generous in my evaluation, so you can be sure that it was meaningful for me. In addition, there was the joy of seeing so many old friends, ex-students and acquaintances. Since the government was in recess, the city was virtually empty and the traffic was light. Our hotel was very close to the convention center, so it was convenient. ( In the photo, you can see the convention center. Our hotel is to the left of the TV tower. It is the tall white building.) We stayed in a very upscale (by my standards anyway) apt-hotel, where we had a heated pool and a great workout room. The rates were reasonable, since it is off season in Brasilia. I am very glad that I decided to go this year, as I did return very edified.

Our plane ride was uneventful, although upon arriving in Rio we were unable to land due to very bad weather and we had to circle for awhile. When we finally did land, and got on our way home, we discovered that the weather really had been bad. The city was flooded and traffic was gridlocked. You just have to love a city where a rainstorm floods the streets and ties up traffic for hours… and where this happens regularly and nothing if done to resolve the issue. These photos were taken near our house. In the nearly three hours in the car (when we went to the airport it took 20-25 minutes, although it’s usually about 45-60 minutes in rush hour traffic), I tried to “enjoy the process”. I watched a wonderful video about the history of Renaissance art and João and I had time to debrief from the convention, so all in all, it was not a bad thing.

Ironically because of the heavy rains, some of our water mains were destroyed and we are without water in our building! Because this happens frequently in our “very well governed and maintained city” (NOT!), there is a system in place to buy water to fill huge holding tanks on the roof of the building. There is water for baths and the like, just no water for washing clothes, floors, etc (they turn off those water registers.) So although I am unpacked, I don’t have have everything under control, since I can’t wash our dirty clothes. That, however, can wait.

While at convention, there were five deaths in our congregation, so our hearts are heavy. In addition, our youth minister is suffering from chronically low blood pressure, and the origins of the problem are not yet discovered, so we are quite worried about him, as he cannot function with such low blood pressure.

Life is full of ups and downs and I know that’s just how it is. I guess that catches you up for now. Sorry to have ignored you these days, but I am back in the swing of things again.

Enjoying the Process

It’s been a challenge the past few days to enjoy the process, not of painting, but of “living”. Besides my sore toe, as I was returning from the dentist on Thursday I tripped in the street and took a full body spill. Nothing broken, but lots of scrapes, bruises and sore muscles. Definitely am not up to doing any exercise these days. Fortunately my appetite still isn’t fully up to par after the problems I had at Christmas. Still, I decided to “enjoy” the fact that I needed to stay  fairly quiet. So I starting drawing slowly from a photo. Then over the last three days I begin adding, layer by layer, watercolor paints. It was fun. I made one consult along the way with my teach (via e-chat). Tonight I finished off the painting until my next class when my teacher will help me figure out how to fix the mistakes.  I won’t point them out because you can see them yourself when you look at the photo, but I did have fun.

And while I was enjoying the process, last night we went out with Elly and Bernardo and they shared with us their plans to get married by the end of the year. Isn’t that exciting? That’s very fun news and gives us something to look forward to for the end of the year! Sorry no photo of us, as I forgot my camera. When we get together for dinner with Bernardo’s parents, we’ll be sure to take photos. Keep enjoying!

It’s All About the Process

First of all, thanks for the advice on my foot. I took it. It is still sore, but seems to be healing nicely. I thought of doing a water color of it since it is so many pretty shades of green, yellow, black, blue, purple and red, but I made another choice.

Last night I went back to my art classes. I decided to go back to something I enjoy – drawing people, so I did a watercolor study from one of my books, to learn something of the technique of working a portrait. Why I like doing people is beyond me, as it is the most demanding of all. I mean if you mess up a flower, it is creative, but if you get a nose one millimeter off, it doesn’t look like a person anymore. Anyway, I was happily painting away, working on learning how to make the colors right for a face, which is like a major challenge for me, and working on learning to shade the face, etc., when my teacher complimented me on my brushstrokes. I knew there was more she wanted to say, so I asked what was wrong. She pointed out that the mouth and eyes and nose were too big. I looked and I knew she was right. It was too late, as there is nothing you can do to correct a watercolor gone wrong. I still had fun and learned a lot in three hours. I commented to her, that I wouldn’t finish it, as I had learned the essential and she agreed. Then came the discussion that led to a huge breakthrough for my life (if not my art). She said the problem with the painting was not the painting, but the drawing. And I said that drawing takes so long, that I just sketched it out and filled in the rest with paints. She reminded me that colors don’t resolve something that is badly drawn. Again, I answered that I wanted to learn watercolor from this exercise and not take time with the drawing which takes hours, if properly done. Now here comes the important stuff: “You have to learn to enjoy every part of the whole process, not just the result”, she said. Stop the train and think about that.

That comment just reached out and grabbed me. She’s right! I have lived my life always in a hurry to see results. I can’t wait to finish the articles I write. As I do my Bible reading, I am anxious to finish the chapter. The same is reflected in my art. I want to see the finished work of art. I don’t like waiting. I don’t like ambiguity. I don’t like “in-between” stages. Even in my life, I am always anxious for the “next” thing. I definitely do not reflect patience in any aspect of my life. So what would happen if I could slow down and enjoy the journey, instead of worrying about the destination? Would I cease to be Peggy? Would it be earth-shattering? Effective change requires small steps. I am going to try to learn, with my artwork, to enjoy the process of creating and not the final product. Trust me, this is a BIG thing.

That being said, I must say I was happy with the result of last night’s class. I learned something about painting portraits and came out with a new way of working. Two for the price of one!!!

Mommy let me write today

Mommy give me helps, but today she do be sayin' that I can do the 'ritin'. I be sorry if I make mistakens, but I only has 9 years and I don' speak da English so good.
Today I be soooooooooooo sad, because she do take down my twee. She make me live in big old apartment and no have plants. I so happy when I see big twee in corner. I sleep there everyday. Now she pack it up and put it away. Do that be fair? Not very nice of her.
So today I sleep under rocking chair. She alway say she gonna go in garden an' eat worms when she frustrated. (Don't sound so bad to me.) But I be so saaaaaaaaaaaaad, that I sleep under rockin' chair. I no it be dangrous. But I real sad.
She be tryin' all day to get me to come out and play. Why I want play with her? She took my twee away. I hangin' on for dear life. She want sit in rocker, she has to sqwash me. I donna understand the hoomins, speshully my mommy. You sad too, when your mommy take away Christmas twee?
Now she be tellin' me I can write on the compooter, if I leave rockin' chair for Daddy to sit in. She always yells at me for eracing all her icons on laptop (why be called laptop if she be usin' it on the desk?), so I think it be fun to play with the keys today. You like my story?

Broken or jammed?

Hows about a long distance consult? Last night I jammed my baby toe and it hurt as it always does, but I noticed it felt funnier than usual. It was sort of stuck out at a right degree to the other toes and then it started to throb. I thought to myself, oh no... I think it's broken. Or maybe just dislocated. I put it on ice. This morning it was pretty black and blue. It hurts to walk on it, but not too bad. I decided not to ruin my weekend spending 8 hours waiting to be looked at. If it still hurts a lot and I can't walk right on Monday I may seek out an orthopedist. Since they so love casts here in Brazil, I figure whatever it might be they will put it in a cast. I don't do that heavy old fashioned plaster stuff they still use here. I figure I can tape it up myself. I kept it taped up for a while and the toe came back to the right angle at least. So what do you think? Is it just jammed up good or might it actually be broken? Is it really worth wasting a day to get it looked at? If you were me, would you do anything besides keep it propped up with ice on it? Ain't life grand when you are clumsy?

Happy New Year

In Brazil, at least, this New Year's Day is celebrated as International Day of Fellowship. So, people get together or call their friends most of the day. Our telephone was quite busy, from morning til night. In addition, we had a slightly modified traditional southern New Year's Day lunch. The traditional part was black-eyed peas (not a great hit - I think I was the only fan), cornbread, green beans and baked ham. I added in rice pilaf and barbequed ribs, in addition to lots of fruit and fresh juices. You will see a pitcher of watermelon juice that I made just before lunch. That was so good!
Our lack of sleep didn't seem to keep us from eating. I was glad to be able to eat again, after last week's prolonged semi-fast. There were seven of us, which is a good number for conversation and to fit comfortably around the table. After lunch we enjoyed a couple of rounds of UNO and I loved that, of course. Lots of talk and lots of laughter and lots of fun. It's quite a handsome group, as you can see. Just so you know who we are, if you look at the picture on the right and start with João and follow it around clockwise, you will see Juliana and Elio (our youth minister and wife), Sissy (her boyfriend couldn't make it), Elly and Bernardo (her boyfriend). We are all perky, as it was before we started eating! After the meal we ate chocolates, chocolate-chocolate chip cookies and expresso coffee with whipped cream. Ah... the good life! They say whatever you do on the first day of the year, you will continue doing the rest of the year. I think that means I'll eat lots of good food and have lots of fun.