Happy Birthday Dad

Today is my dads birthday. My family is coming later this week to visit us and I am hoping to get away and enjoy some trout fishing in the Andes Mountains with my dad. I just wanted to take this opportunity to wish him a very happy birthday.

Old Friends Come to Visit

The past couple weeks our friends Kim and Keith Collins have been here with their 2 daughters. This was a special time for many missionaries here in Lima and extra special for our kids who are great friends with the Collins girls. A couple years ago Keith brought a team of young people out to the Oasis to help with some landscaping. This year as well, they brought a group to help for one day. We have an upcoming family day at the Oasis, I took this opportunity to get some painting and cleaning done. The team painted the front gate and fences, the window protectors on the office and cleaned the rooftop storage area. They also sanded and varnished all of our park benches.

Shannon's Family Team

This past week we had Shannon's family's team here. Some of them had been here before but it was nice for them to be working at the Juniper Tree home, since they had only seen it as an empty lot the last time they were here. The team started the week by finishing the wood trim on the new shop and then painting it.

The last time the team was here they mixed and poured the cement pad for our guards house at the Oasis in Manchay. This time they got involved one step sooner in the process and cut and tied the rebar grid that goes inside the cement. This was the start of our sports court at the Juniper Tree Home.

In all the team got 1/4 of the terrain levelled for the sports court and mixed and poured 3 sections of concrete. This project will be ongoing as it is comprised of 16 sections for a total size of 18 meters by 25 meters. This will be considerably larger than the sports court we had at our old home and will serve for playing soccer, volleyball and basketball as well as things like jumping rope and bike riding.

The team took Friday off to go visit some pre-incan ruins that are north of Lima. That meant that they wanted to work on Saturday. It was decided that we would work hard in the morning and get another section of concrete done and then celebrate a great week by preparing Pachamanca. This is a Peruvian specialty which consists of heating rocks over a fire, then putting the rocks in the bottom of a pit with potatoes and sweet potatoes. Then meat is added ontop of the rocks, in our case chicken, then sweet corn mash wrapped in husks is added as well as beans still in the pod. The whole thing is then covered in some kind of leafy herb then paper sugar bags and covered up with soil. The whole thing stays buried for a few hours while being cooked from below by the hot rocks. It was a special Saturday lunch that was enjoyed by team members, staff and children alike.