Winter Break

 Here are a few pictures from our trip to the Moray and the salt mines while the girls were on winter break.  Each year, they have a two week break the last week of July and the first week of August.  We took a few days when Chris arrived back from his visit to the States to enjoy a few days exploring.

 These stone circles in Moray are believed to be the remains of an Incan crop laboratory.

 We also visited Salineras de Maras or the salt mines.  These date back to pre-Columbian times.  The natural salty water is channeled into around 3,000 man-made wells and left to evaporate in the sun.

We spent the night in Pisac and this sign from dinner was too funny not to share.  It basically says to control your children or they will sell them as slaves.  Thankfully our girls didn't get kicked out.  

Hannah is checking out the cuy farm in Pisac.  Cuy are guinea pigs, and they are quite a popular meal here.  Don't worry, we didn't eat any, we just thought they were adorable in their little home.

The next day we went to the ruins in Pisac since they were part of our ticket we had paid for the day before at Moray.  The ticket had 4 or 5 different places to explore so we decided to take advantage.

Kids Corner: Katie's Cumpleaños

It's time to catch up on Katie.  She celebrated her 10th birthday during the two week winter break from school.  We took an overnight trip and enjoyed our night away.  We visited some nearby ruins and came home the afternoon of Katie's birthday in time to celebrate with cake and open presents.

Katie posing with the cuy farm below.  They are just too cute!

Since we were on break during Katie's actual birthday we waited to have her friend party until school was back in session.  We had lunch, played games and cracked a piñata!  Katie said it was the best birthday ever.  We are thankful she is so easy to please :)  

We are so proud of the young lady that Katie is growing into.  She loves school and is speaking Spanish fluently.  She is a great helper with baby Adeline and we even call her the baby whisperer.  Keep being a shining light for Jesus Katie!  We love you sweetie!

Family Pictures

We needed a new family picture that included Adeline for EMM's calendar.  We decided that going downtown would be a great place to take them. And we were blessed to have an MK (missionary kid) that likes to take pictures agree to take ours.  So here we are!

Kids Corner: Adeline is 6 months!

 Since we are a bit behind we will start with her five month pictures.

 As you can see from these pictures, she is quite active; hands and feet are always moving.

 She was still  happy baby even after getting her second round of vaccinations.

 The nurse apologized for having to use Batman bandaides, but I thought they were cute.

She loves her walker and sometimes when you like to move so much you just end up hanging out under the table!

And now she is 6 months.  How the time flies.  She is enjoying starting some rice cereal, avocados, bananas and sweet potatoes.  So far the bananas are her favorite.  She is working on getting her first teeth, causing her to be fussy and not sleep well at times but nothing has come through yet so we shall continue to patiently await those cute little pearly whites.

July in Review

Time just continues to march on and it amazes me that although it feels like I just updated the blog, it has been since June.  July was a busy month for us in the fact that Chris, along with 4 of the Peruvian pastors and one of the pastors wives went to the States for the Mennonite World Conference in Lancaster, PA.  Chris was gone for 20 days which was the longest time we have been apart as a couple.  It was difficult, but I was thankful that two of the English teachers at Promesa, Brook and Eleanor helped me with the girls.  My friend Gloria also came on Tuesdays while Chris was gone to help out.  I had many fellow missionary friends offering to help if I needed anything as well.

But before Chris left, we got to celebrate the fourth with other missionaries in a nearby town called Pisac.  It was a dreary, unusual day with rain most of the morning but it turned out to be a fun time of fellowship despite the weather. (And I say unusual because it is dry season here so normally it doesn't rain.)  Here are a few pictures of our day.....

 We made cupcakes and our sweet friend Shawna O'Kelley sent us these cute little flag toothpicks.

 Our four little fire crackers.  They were all dressed in red, white and blue for the special day!

Below is just a small part of the group that gathered to celebrate our Independence Day.  We prayed and said the Pledge of Allegiance followed by singing the National Anthem.  It is wild to think our children might know the Peruvian national anthem better than their own.  For that reason especially, we felt it was important to celebrate our home country's holiday.  To top off the day we had some really good cookout food that we miss like potato salad and grilled hot dogs along with watermelon and other yummy desserts.

Fast forward to the Friday before vacation time.  The girls all had programs at school the last Friday before the two week vacation.  Here they are:

 Katie and Hannah, along with their classmates both explained how to solve math problems.

 Danica did a jungle dance again.  Thankfully she was the only one that needed to rent a costume this year.  And God blessed me tremendously when my friend Sandy was able to rent the same costume for Danica that her daughter that goes to a different preschool needed as well.  She picked it up and returned it for me.  Just another reminder of how the Lord takes care of our needs!

Right after the program Katie left for a Christian camp for the weekend with some Peruvian friends.

 Finally July 28th came and we dropped Hannah off for the youth camp and went to the airport to get Chris!  The girls made a welcome home sign and a fruit pizza for him.  Oh and BDE stands for 

"Best Daddy Ever!"

We are thankful that Chris could take the pastors to the States, but we are even more thankful to have him back home with us!