Settling In and Stranded!

With Amanda sick we have taken a break for 2 weeks from schoolwork. That is a shame because we really were on a great schedule which school had worked well in. Then we had a lot of company and Mandy got sick.. :( Sadly, the boys will have to work a bit into the Summer. But, we are grateful that we do have that flexibility. I cannot imagine having them do school work while running to the doctor, making phone calls, caring for Amanda etc. We plan to start back up again next Monday, Lord Willing! We are slowly getting used to day to day life here. On Saturdays we enjoy going to the market in San Ignatio. This is where we purchase our weekly produce and sometimes yogurt and eggs. In addition, our friends the Inions told us of a great meat market on the main road out toward San Ignatio which we did stop at this week to purchase reasonably priced fresh beef and pork. During the week we fill in with the other necessities at the local grocery store, Farmer's Trading Center here in Spanish Lookout. We really enjoy our Saturday outing.. and this week we decided that we would take Amanda along even though she doesn't have much energy. She rode the half hour to 'town' in the back of the hatchback where we had made up a little bed for her. Once we got to the market, we took her to the open food venders where we plopped her in a chair and she ate a yummy tortilla meal while Ash, the 'babies' and I shopped for the weekly fruits and veggies. We then joined the crew and enjoyed a delicious lunch which ended up costing us somewhere around $8 US.





There are so many dogs roaming the market. Last week, we witnessed a dog bite a child.. we have been a little more cautious about letting the children pet these strays since! This skeletal mama dog was scrounging all over the market place, snacking on this and that. The girls and I felt so sorry for her that we saved one half of a tortilla for her. We searched her out and when we finally found her and tossed her the tortilla, she looked at it distastefully and slunk off to find better pickings! Well! A picky starving dog! Whoever heard of such a thing?

Grant's treasure that he purchased for himself at the market. It is a little coin purse~

Ashley in the car on the ride home~

Mandy in the car on the ride home~ yes, we all agreed it ended up being too much for her. Although she did not do much walking around, she overdid it and paid for it later. She slept the whole rest of the day! :(



We stopped in here at this meat shop.

One more stop on the way home was to purchase a yummy watermelon from this Old Colony Mennonite. This is the intersection where we turn off to head out to Spanish Lookout~

And as we approach the bridge, this is what we saw.. Grady motioned to this car "no, you go first" we really didn't know if our very low-clearance van would make it through this. This is a bridge which links civilization to Spanish Lookout. As the photo shows, due to flooding the river is over the bridge by about 6 inches. As I write this post, the water level remains about 6 feet above this bridge.


Phew! We just made it! This is Ashley looking out the back window at where we had driven. Grady says that if it would have been an inch or two more we would have been stuck on the otherside..

More rain to come! Just how long will it take for the river to recede? No one can tell us for sure but we pray it does before Thurs.. as mentioned in the other post, we have to take Mandy in for her halter test with the heart moniter. We continue to rest in the LORD.