God really helped with our 3rd ladies meeting here in Colombia. I had wanted to have the meeting in my house, but since I had already started packing up my house, I knew that it would be better if we held it elsewhere. So, I prepared all of the food and hauled it to our church in a taxi. =D The devil is REALLY fighting in some of our homes and among our ladies so during these meeting I wanted to challenge our ladies to keep going forward, fighting the good fight, and to stay faithful to God and their husbands. God really helped us. Afterwards we went upstairs to the fellowship hall and I served my snack that Jesus, and my girls had helped me prepare! =)
~I LOVE this color of flowers and had seen a lot for sale here recently. (They just dye real flowers this color.) Since I had the same color tablecloth I thought it would be fun to have those flowers for my table for the ladies meeting. My sweetheart walked from florist to florist until he found these flowers for me. =)~
~I had forgotten that the walls were the same color. =)
~I made 4 batches (121) of my rolls!~
~I made a double batch of choc. chip cookies.~
~I served my rolls, apples and a creamy apple dip, my choc. chip cookies, and little Smokies in BBQ sauce (Brown the sausages for 10 mins. or so in the oven or in a skillet on top of the stove. Then for every container of BBQ sauce I use one container of jelly [I use grape, strawberry or blackberry] Serve these warm!...This makes a yummy quick snack that people LOVE).~
~Kimberly snapped this pic of Sis. Farly, and Sis. Joanna helping me serve the drinks. (I knew that it woud be nearly impossible to haul my pitchers of tea or juice in a taxi along with everything else, so I just served a yummy apple pop that they have here.)~
~The ladies enjoying my Gringa food.~ =)
~The ladies LOVED the food and wanted recipes (Which I plan to type out and give them soon.)~
~Sis. Joanna helped me by making the coffee. (Actually we served "Tinto" which means coffee with NO MILK. If you say coffee ("Cafe") that means it has milk in it. =) After we ate and exchanged our Secret sister gifts I showed them how to make Rice Krispy Treats. I had made those a couple weeks before that and they LOVED them. They were so glad to find out that they were so easy to make. =)
~Our ladies are really enjoying doing secret sisters. We exchange names each month, for it just works better that way in this culture. =) Some of our ladies are very poor, so I have told them that they only need to let their sister know that they are thinking of her with a note, a small choc., package of peanuts, some fruit (Which is yummy and cheap here), flowers (which are beautiful and cheap here) etc. We don't buy large gifts, but are having fun giving and receiving little "details" to encourage one another. At the end of our meeting last month, I found out that Sis. Farly had my name. She gave me these beautiful roses, a fun pen, and a cute notepad. Gracias, Hermana Farly!!
~Phillip kept Noah and Elijah for me that night. When I got home, I found Elijah asleep on this blanket. =)
Now, I would appreciate your prayers! This Saturday our family will be going to our church in Cartagena (a 23 hour bus ride away, but God provided cheap airplane tickets for our family) to help encourage our people there for a few days. (We were going to send Bro. Jimmy and Sis. Farly and family, but since he just had eye surgery he cannot travel for about a month or so!)
The ladies there have been begging me to come and have a ladies' meeting for them. I hear that there are some REALLY needy ladies there..So I would appreciate your prayers for me as I do a ladies' meeting for them. Also, They live on the coast and speak a lot different then the people of Bogota. (So...while you are praying, please pray that I can understand their Spanish, and that they can understand mine. =) Thanks!
