Sacrifices

It's a quiet Monday morning here. After a busy weekend as well as a time change and loosing an hours sleep, it's nice to have a a couple hours of peace and quiet. ESL classes and discipleship will get us working again this afternoon and evening.

Signs that it is getting to be time to make a stateside trip are showing up. I'm willing to make sacrifices while serving overseas, but there are two things that I don't want to sacrifice - and have to bring from the states - white kernel popcorn (much tastier than yellow kernel, but not available in Brazil) and Jif peanut butter. Sunday nights after church, I always fix pop corn and have an apple and a Snickers candy bar with it. Well, I popped, and ate, the last of that white kernel last Sunday night. Plus we are now going through our last jar of Jif. This all means four months of sacrifice before stateside furlough time.

Sue celebrated another birthday in Brazil. She's spent over half her life here. No big party this year. The day before, she got a manicure. Then on the day, I got her flowers and fixed her breakfast - scrambled eggs, chocolate chip muffins (went out early and bought them) and roasted almond coffee - and then later, we went out for lunch and she shopped and picked out the presents she wanted. Of course calls from her kids, as well as friends, really made her day. Besides some new jewelry and sunglasses, she found some cool fancy jeweled chinelos - or flipflops - in her favorite color, to use on our upcoming cruise.

That evening, at our teens' meeting at church, we had cake and they sang Happy Birthday. And she got lots of hugs from them and their folks (when they picked up kids at the end of the meeting).

It's almost time for lunch, and the accountant who handles church accounts is stopping by so better say "tchau".