Away Too Long

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Sunday, May 5, 2013 – Denton, Texas

We arrived in Texas around 2:00PM.  Our flight was actually 25-minutes early and our bags were #1 and #3 off the belt – unheard of!  Nicole, Raymond, and Baby-B picked us up at the airport.  It was good to see them.  Bruce mistook Ray for Justin since he was with Nicole.  That gave us all a good laugh.  I wondered if we’d been away too long.

I sat in the back seat next to Baby-B.  He looked at me with a furrowed brow as to say “who are you?”. Bruce said he probably didn’t recognize me as a 3-D person.  He’s used to seeing me via the computer.  I wondered if we’d been away too long.

We stopped for lunch at La Madeleine’s in Lewisville.  I’ve always loved this place.  We had eaten on the airplane so Bruce and I just had pastry.  It was still worth the stop.  I wondered if we’d been away too long.

We saw Justin briefly later that evening.  He’s studying for finals but wanted to come by and say hello.  It was nice to see him and his big bold smile.  I wondered if we’d been away too long.

Truth is no matter how long we’re away, it seems like we can pickup where we left off in just a few short moments.  That’s how love works.  It fills in the gaps and makes every second count.

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May Flowers

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Tuesday, May 7, 2013 – Ball Ground, GA

Gibbs Gardens 2Betty suggested we head to Gibbs Gardens today and enjoy the beautiful spring day with a leisurely stroll through the gardens.  As soon as we walked through the entrance I knew we were in a very special place.  Jim Gibbs opened the grounds surrounding his private estate as a public Garden on March 1, 2012.  His talent is skillfully displayed in the many gardens that seamless meld together and with nature to form the over 220 acres of gardens.

Gibbs GardensI usually walk at a very fast pace, and have often been accused of running.  No one needed to ask me to slow down for this walk.  There was just so much to see.  I could literally feel my pulse slow with each turn of the path.

We spent 4-hours there.  If I lived in the area I would be a member for sure, as I know I would want to visit again and again.

Percussion

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Monday, May 6, 2013 – Jasper, GA

atlantapercussiontrioRay and Betty took us to a concert by The Atlanta Percussion Trio held at their church, New Lebanon Presbyterian.  The energetic trio put on a wonderful and informative performance.  They engaged the audience not only with their talent, but by involving the crowd with handheld instruments in several numbers.  Even ultra conservative Ray got into the beat!  It was a delightful world-tour of music.  If I lived in the Atlanta area I’d be looking for other performances of theirs.

The concert was hosted by Casual Classics  which is under the management of Jasper Muse, Inc. and the Creative and Performing Arts Academy.

After the concert we headed back to Ray and Betty’s for more of Betty’s delicious Queen Anne Cake.  A great end to an enjoyable evening.

And Then it Rained

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Sunday, May 5, 2013 – Atlanta, Georgia

We’d planned to head to the airport at 11:00 AM, but upon realizing that checkout time was 10:00 AM decided to just head out then.  We loaded up the car and set out to find Interstate 95 closed at Commercial Boulevard.  Both the highway and the ramps getting off were backed up.  The highway traffic was moving, slowly, but moving so we opted to stay put and work our way through.  It took 45-mintes to drive the few miles past Commercial.  I thanked God we left when we did.  The rest of the drive to Miami International Airport was a breeze.

to get to the rental car return area requires a drive to the far end of the terminal. As we got to the right area in the parking garage, there was a young woman who had parked her car at the entrance gate and was walking away.  There was a one-way tire puncture strip across the opening, you know the kind that let’s you drive in one direction, but flattens your tires if you try to back up or go the wrong way.  I opened my window and asked her if she was having a problem.  She was Latin and it was obvious she had never seen one of those strips before.  She pointed to it and tried to tell me in English that she could not drive over it.  I asked her if she spoke Spanish.  She said yes.  I then explained to her in Spanish that she could drive over it in the direction she was going, she just could not back up or try to take a car out of the lot that way.  She smiled, thanked me, got back in the car, and drove forward.  This only took a minute, but by the time she was on her way there were a few impatient people behind me honking their horns.  At the car drop off, she saw me again and again thanked me.  I just smiled and said “De nada” (you’re welcome).

At the airport we printed our boarding passes and were surprised to see we got 2-free checked bags, so we opted to check our bags before heading to the security gate.  The gate was backed up.  There was a new TSA employee at the scanner.  It was her first day on the job and she was slowly checking he x-ray image of each bag.  Suddenly the belt conveyor started going backwards.  Bags and bins were coming back out of the scanner and piling up on the table.  I was grabbing bins trying to keep them from spilling to the floor.  Another TSA employee ran up and started helping me while yelling back at the new recruit, “The other button.  Push the other button”.  I laughed.  She gave a sheepish look over the monitor and finally got the belt running in the right direction.

Our flight was uneventful.  Both Bruce and I fell asleep before the plane ever took off.

Upon landing we were picked up by Ray and Betty, Bruce’s brother and sister-in-law.  As Ray drove to their mountain home we chatted about the weather, which had been unusually wet lately.  The Good Lord, however, kept things dry for our drive to their home.

It was apparent Betty had been busy cooking and making the house just right for us.  She had a ham dinner with all the trimmings just waiting to be warmed.  The grand finale – a triple layer Queen Anne Cake. A moist chocolate cake with a candy bar infused icing.  She had filled a candy dish in the lower suite of their home and even bought me a little welcome gift.

While we were enjoying the fruits of her labor the rains returned accompanied by hail.  God is so good.  He takes care of the smallest details for His children.  I am constantly in awe of His love and grace.

EXTRA: Watch Your Tongue

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Tuesday, May 1, 2013 - An Excerpt from a email by Dan Delgado to the expat community in Cotacachi, Ecuador

There’s an interesting article going around the ex-pat communities from here to Cuenca suggesting that gringo residents should take responsibility for explaining to Obnoxious Gringos (OG’s) that that ugly-American attitude of loudly complaining is an unnecessary display of arrogance that will expose us all to repercussions sooner or later. Until that article finds its way to you I will leave you with a tidbit here. I hope that the rest of this OG’s letter will eventually be published openly by some blogs.
“…The majority of the OGs seem to be Unhappy Economic Refugees from the north who came to Ecuador because they thought they could live on the cheap in a facsimile of their own country and who are distressed with the cultural and economic realities. They blame the Ecuadorians themselves for their unhappiness instead of directing their vitriol at those individuals and organizations that misled them in the first place.”
“If you join the Behavior Modification Group (BMG’s), you agree to a zero tolerance policy when you hear the complaints of such gringos…”. 
“Ana Lucía Serrano of the Ministerio de Relaciones Externas reports that her office is receiving increasing numbers of complaints from Ecuadorians who want the government to “do something about the gringos…”
In Ecuadorian Spanish, the word used for something similar to this idea is “socializacion,” meaning – an effort to educate (your own) community. We could try to inspire this socialization more.

Flying the Friendly Sky’s

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Tuesday, April 30, 2013 – Quito, Ecuador

Bruce and I headed to The States today to visit family.  I was awake most of the night, worried that we wouldn’t make it to the plane on time.  One-eyed Bill can only drive during daylight hours and we were cutting it close.  Bill’s a very cautious driver, probably due  to that one-eye thing.  He picked us up on-time and the first quarter of our trip was smooth sailing, but no sooner had the words “at least we shouldn’t have any real traffic at this time of the morning” come out of his mouth the brake lights in front of us started to glow.  It seemed like every chicken truck in Ecuador was ahead of us on the mountainous roads heading to the airport and they just don’t go too fast when loaded down.  Then there were the school zones.  Hundreds of uniformed children heading off to school.  They are a precious sight, even today, but the delays just seemed to mount.

Bill may have only one eye, but he has a double-dose of calm.  As I prayed that God’s will be done, Bill’s soothing voice and amusing stories helped keep me relaxed.  During the last leg of our journey one of the chicken trucks Bill fought so hard to pass, passed us.  Bill sighed.  I laughed and blurted out “We just got passed by a chicken truck!”  Then Bill and Bruce both joined my laughter.

When we arrived at the new airport in Quito, Bill helped us unload our bags.  The new airport is big and gleaming, and well… new.  We needed to check two bags.  There was no one waiting at the American Airlines ticket counter.  The clerk informed us that we were too late to get our boarding passes.  We were just over an hour early, but you are supposed to arrive two hours before an international flight.  Thank God I had printed our boarding passes the night before.  I showed them to her.  She was relieved (but I’m sure not as much as I was).  She checked our bags and we were on our way.

Passing through security was fast and easy, even though Bruce left his keys in his pocket and set off the metal detector.  Once at the gate we found two seats.  Bruce was then called to the gate desk.  He’d been selected for additional screening.  Since he was not in the area when I was called to board I grabbed all four of our carry-ons and got in line.  Thinking I would be stopped for sure, I began formulating my explanation in my head – “my husbands been called for additional screening”.  How do I say screening in Spanish?  I began to feel anxious.

No body stopped me, or even looked at me twice, as I fumbled down the corridor, a bag in each hand and one hanging from each shoulder.  I made my way through the plane, my bags hitting many a seated passenger, as I begged to be excused.  Finally in my seat I found a home for each of the bags.  Then a nice young man from England sat next to me.  He was on his way home after his week-long holiday in Ecuador.  We chatted.

Several minutes went by before Bruce reappeared.  It was good to see him coming down the aisle.  He didn’t think I’d make it on the plane with all four bags, and had gone back to the gate area to find me.

Our flight was uneventful until the pilot attempted to land at Miami International Airport (MIA).  He was within 500 feet of the runway when he suddenly aborted the landing stating that due to severe weather we were being diverted to Fort Meyers?  This was not a big deal for us, but it was huge for the young man sitting next to me.  This was just part 1 of his 3-part flight back home.  This would surely put a kink in his itinerary.  I reassured him, letting him know the airline would try to get him on a flight and if they couldn’t that day, they would give him a room and food vouchers and get him on his way the next day.  Then I whispered into Bruce’s ear, asking if we could take him to our hotel if he ends up stranded.  Bruce agreed.  We could not leave this kid alone with no money, no food, and no where to sleep.

The plane returned to MIA over 3-hours later.  We debarked, and headed to customs, losing track of our cabin mate.  The area for US citizens and visitors are at extreme ends of the customs area that looked to be the size of two football fields.

Bruce and I made made it through quickly and headed towards baggage claim.  I kept looking around, but never did see the kid again.  I pray he made it home all right.

Elvis Impersonator

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Monday, April 22, 2013 – Cotacachi, Ecuador

Micky called and asked if I was available to show properties to Pete, a realtor from Las Vegas.  Immediately I pictured an older, retired, man with his shirt unbuttoned to mid chest, thick gold chains and attitude – lots of attitude.  I wondered if he’d be wearing blue suede shoes.  I told Micky I was available, but I was not at all looking forward to it.  Micky was very complimentary of my fledgling skills.  She said she wanted me to take him because I was stronger.  I’m not sure if she thought I’d need to wrestle him or just keep him in line.

As I was sitting in the office waiting for my appointment with Pete, in walked a distinguished gentleman of East Indian decent, with his wife.  The couple introduced themselves.  It was Pete!  His wife presented Micky with a lovely gift.  We chatted for almost an hour about what they were looking for, then headed to lunch.  Pete treated.  Then we were off to see properties.  I had a great time showing them the area.  When we were done we went to Eddy’s off Parque San Francisco for Cappuccino.  Again Pete treated.  I was ashamed for having prejudged him.  He was nothing like an Elvis Impersonator!

Matthew 7:1 “Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2 For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”

I thank God daily for His grace and mercy.  I strive to do right, but often fail.

Lord teach me to love as you love, and not be judgmental.

Pay Day!

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Tuesday, April 16, 2013 – Cotacachi, Ecuador

Fused Glass ClassToday I held my first paid fused glass class at La Espinosa, a small boutique off Plaza San Francisco here in Cotacachi.  Seven lovely women gathered around to learn a little about how to fuse glass.  I gave a brief talk and then everybody went to work creating beautiful pieces.

I love to see the many different ways people will use the exact same materials and supplies.  Some quickly grabbed favorite pieces of glass.  Others seemed to settle for whatever, then found a way to make it all work together.

By the end of the brief session I was amazed to see the variety of the finished pieces.  From larger abstract works, to small delicate ones.  Most of all I loved to watch the different styles of work.  A few were very quiet and still.  Others asked a multitude of questions and needed more reassurance. Still others were there for the social aspect of gathering, more than the idea of creating.

After class Karina, the shop owner, helped me clean up the classroom.  Then we settled the money from the day.  As I walked out to head home it felt good to have put my talents to use.  I learned a lot from my students.  I hope they learned a little from me.

Exhausted

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Monday, April 15, 2013 – Cotacachi, Ecuador

It was my turn to host our women’s church group.  We share time and talents.  I was going to be teaching my friends a little about fused glass.  The plan was to make crosses.  Since they had to truck out to my end of town (usually the meetings are held at our Bible Study location) I also invited them to stay for lunch.  I love to cook and I love to serve others, so this was a great combination.

Jennifer's CrossI was very excited about them all coming out so I was hyper-organized.  Everything was in place for the 5-women I had anticipated.  I had extended a last minute invitation to one of our dear sisters who had not confirmed she was coming, but had recently lost her mother, but did not hear back.

I set the table with my good linens and silver.  My mom would have been proud.

As the women began gathering at my house I brewed a pot of fresh coffee and we chatted while waiting for the rest of our party to arrive.  Once we were all there (so we thought) we chatted a bit more.  As we were about to head to my studio to begin our project, I was surprised and delighted to see our dear sister and her visiting sister-in-law arrive by taxi.  Our little gathering was complete now!

It didn’t matter if I had to squeeze a few more plates around the table, and being of Puerto Rican descent, there is always plenty of food!

We all hugged before heading to the studio – all my preparation could not have orchestrated the day the way God did.  Having all these precious and dear friends in my home was such a blessing.

By the end of the day I was content and blessed, but exhausted.  It was a very good day!

Below is the recipe for Ginger Carrot Cake that I made for our dessert.

Ginger Carrot Cake

I love ginger and this little cake has just the right tang to make it stand out from other carrot cakes.  As an added bonus it smells like potpourri when it’s baking.

Ingredients

1 lemon
3/4 Cup Milk
Cups Self Rising Flour
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 1/2 Cups Raw Sugar
3 Eggs
3/4 Cup Sunflower Oil
2 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
1/4 Cup Honey
2 Cups Shredded Carrots
1/4 Cup Fresh Ginger, Diced Fine
1 Cup Flaked Coconut
1 Cup Chopped Walnuts
1 Cup Raisins

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C)
  2. Grease and Flour a 9 x 13 bake pan
  3. Zest the rind of the lemon and set aside
  4. Combine the milk and the juice from the lemon and let stand for 10 minutes
  5. Sift together the dry ingredients (including the lemon zest)
  6. In a large bowl beat the eggs, then add the milk, oil, vanilla, and Honey.
  7. Blend until well combined.
  8. Slowly add the dry ingredients blending until well combined and then blend for 2 minutes longer at medium speed.
  9. Stir in the carrots, ginger, coconut, walnuts and raisins.
  10. Pour into prepared pan.
  11. Bake for 1 hour or until instant read thermometer registers 190 degrees F (88 degrees C)
  12. Turn off oven and open oven door slightly and let cake rest for 40 minutes.
  13. Cool completely.

NOTE:  To make a special presentation I cut the cake into rounds using a biscuit cutter (my husband didn’t mind eating the crumbs).  Then I topped each piece with a dollop of freshly whipped cream and a piece of candied ginger.  The little cakes looked precious!

Flutterbyes

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Thursday, April 4, 2013 – Mindo, Ecuador

Cocoon

Cocoons

It was our last morning in Mindo.  We headed out for a quick trip to the Mariposario before the long bus ride home.  I was basically going along with the crowd.  I’ve loved butterflies since I was a little girl when I called them flutterbyes, because that is what they do.  I think they are one of God’s most beautiful creations.  I just wasn’t sure what to expect from a butterfly farm.  I was afraid it would be too man made.  It was, but it did not detract from their beauty

Newborn Butterfly

Newborn Butterfly

Upon arrival we were given a brief explanation of the farm, and it’s objective – to study the local butterfly population and catch and release the different species.  Butterflies have short life span.  Depending on the species it can be a mere week or up to a year.  At the farm you get to see them at every stage.

I was awed by the gleaming jewel-like cocoons of the butterflies who choose a waterside home, amused by a mating pair, and saddened at the sight of butterflies during their final few moments of life.  They have no qualms of landing every so lightly on your hand, head, or anywhere else they choose.

Twins

Twins

Once you see the beauty of each step of their existence it brings to life the scripture verse – “See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin.  Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.” Matthew 6:28-29  The same could be said of butterflies.

God is amazing.  His creation is awesome.  He is worthy of our praise.