Gratitude

The past month or so I've been (very, very slowly) typing up my mission journal.  Missions are crazy!  Sometimes as I'm reading I just can't believe I volunteered to do these things.  Don't get me wrong, I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to serve God on a mission and I wouldn't trade it for anything.  But it has been funny to see some of the things that have made my mental Gratitude List this Thanksgiving as I've relived some of my mission.  Here are a few-

• I don't have to eat over processed food in a cafeteria every day. 
• I don't have to spend every day in a tiny room full of stinky 19 year old boys (all of whom just consumed massive amounts of that over processed cafeteria food...) and a window that will not open to let in fresh air. 
• I get to wear pants whenever I want.
• I get to walk barefoot in my own house.  On carpet.  
• Whenever I want to talk to my family I can just call them.
• Every 6 weeks I don't have to wait to see if someone else will decide if I'm going to move, drag every one of my possessions through hundreds of miles of dirt roads and city trains (praying all the while that no one will steal them from me), and then settle into a whole new city where every single person including my roommate is a stranger and speaks a language I hardly know.  
• I don't have to wash my clothes in a bucket.
• We live in a home with six rooms.  SIX.  Three of them have running water and none of them have dirt floors.  It is a mansion in comparison to my friends in Argentina.

Life is really pretty good.  I am grateful for Thanksgiving for giving us time to sit down and think about all of the reasons why.

Clase de Espanol

You know how everyone always says to hold your tongue.  As if that's going to rid the world of all its problems?  Well, I'm pretty convinced that's just a big lie.

The past couple months Doug and I have been taking a Community Ed Spanish class.  It was a good class, our teacher was a native Spanish speaker so we got to learn great pronunciation and had a good review of some basic Spanish rules.  However this week was our last class and I have to admit, I am SO relieved.

I'm a bit past the beginners Spanish stage seeing as how I've lived in South America and all.  Not too big of a deal, it was going to be fun to take a class with Doug and I figured the class would be a good grammar review.  The first couple classes I kept pretty quiet, I had no intention of keeping my Spanish skills secret or anything, but my fellow classmates were working hard to learn basic things and I didn't want to sound like some know it all.

So by about the third class our classmates were getting a little discouraged (as all language students do) and our teacher decided to do a little exercise to lift our spirits.  She told us how, while it seemed we weren't learning anything we had all picked up a lot already.  She explained that little kids who are learning to talk can understand words before they can say them.  She said we were the same way and that, while we were having a hard time expressing ourselves in Spanish, we'd picked up a lot that we could listen to and comprehend.  So, to prove this point she'd randomly pick one of us out of the class (there were about 30 of us) to go in front of the class and listen to directions given in Spanish.  It would amaze us how much was understood.

She looks into the class to pick her example of what 3 days of Spanish class can do.  She, of course, randomly points to me, the fluent Spanish speaker in the class, and begins spouting out directions in Spanish.  What was I suppose to do?!  She was telling me to 'Go open the door' or 'jump up and down' etc.  Super easy words for me, but vocabulary the class hadn't yet learned.  Everyone was amazed!  How did this girl know what to do?  She got everything the teacher said right away!  And I was standing there dying thinking, 'I'm fluent in Spanish but I didn't say anything because I didn't want all of you to feel bad!'  I couldn't say that NOW, everyone was feeling so much better about our progress.

After we were done she asked me in English in front of everyone- "See!?  How did you know how to do all those things?"  I stood there completely dumbfounded while Doug is cracking up in the back of the classroom.    There was no way in that situation that I could possibly have said, 'Well, actually, I'm a Spanish speaking return missionary'.  So I just stood there.  Luckily after a moment of awkward silence she answered for me. "See class, she doesn't even know how she knows them!  She's just picked them up during class!  You are all doing so great!"

How embarrassing!  Then for the rest of the classes I felt like I had to pretend I didn't know Spanish.  So awkward!  I'm so glad that we're done with that class!

Grass

Doug really, really likes to work on making our grass super nice.  And I very much appreciate his efforts.  I love a yard full of barefoot grass (shoes in the summer time are not my favorite thing).  When we first moved in we had a big dead spot in the front along with lots of weeds and broken sprinklers etc, etc, etc.  Not the best.  I just have to brag for a second about how far he's come with this stuff.

The other day Doug was out mowing the lawn (this was a few weeks ago, so imagine it a little warmer) just like any other Saturday.  I was working on something inside and looked out the window to see Doug on his hands and knees searching for something in the grass.  I figured he'd lost a contact so I went out to help him find it. (nothing quite as sad as seeing a practically blind person searching for something that's made to look invisible)

I went out, crouched down beside him and asked, 'Lost  your contact?'  He looked at me and laughed.  'Nope, the sprinkler box.'  Wait, what?  'You mean that huge green pipe thing over in the corner?'(my sprinkler system vocabulary is clearly very sophisticated)  'Yup.'

So there we were, crouched on our hands and knees fingering through every inch of grass to look for an 8 inch in diameter box (see above picture) that we both knew the location of!  The grass had grown so thick all summer it had completely covered it.  How cool is that?  I couldn't stop laughing, we seriously could not find that thing! Eventually Doug had to put the lawn mower down as low as it would go and keep mowing until we finally found a corner of it.  I'm so proud of our grass!

Now, because I just spent all that time bragging I feel like I need to equal things out a bit.  Here's is a picture of our peas.  The second time we planted them this summer.  That's right, completely dead.  Again.  Know why?  Because we were too lazy to stake anything for them to climb up.  All we had to do was shove a couple sticks in there and tie some string!  But nope, we were too lazy.  Both times!  So don't be thinking we have this amazing yard or anything, just funny grass stories.

Are We 6 Year Olds or What?

Ok, so I feel like a 6 year old asking this....but.... have you seen our coat?

Doug went to grab his coat out of the closet a week or so ago and realized it wasn't there.  I swear I thought it was impossible to lose something as big as a coat as an adult, but here we are.  We've looked everywhere with no luck.  It seems weird that we didn't find it was missing until now.  He got it in the middle of winter last year and used it a lot- it seems like a weird coincidence that he happened to forget it somewhere on the very last day he'd need it until Fall came.

We traveled a bit last winter and had a LOT of visitors over the summer so I'm wondering if it maybe got bundled up in someone else's stuff.  Have you happened to notice an extra coat lying around your home?  It's a men's gray wool coat, made by J.Crew, cut a little longer than normal but not super long (it hits between your waist and knees) and it's practically new.  Sigh.

Anyone?  Please?

I just know as soon as we buy him another one we'll find it hanging in the closet in plain site...

Happy Halloween!

They're lions.  And yes, they are still mad at us...

Worth it!