Sunflower Seeds

As I’ve written before, there are times we just crave snack food.  The boys continually ask for Goldfish crackers and I have found a recipe that I can make to help satisfy that craving – they are time intensive and only last about one day (Goldfish crackers sent to us are very welcomed).  I’ve made Wheat Thin crackers and they are time intensive too.  One of the doctor’s I saw when we were in the USA this past summer advised me to eat more foods containing selenium for extra thyroid support.  She’s from Ghana originally and shared that the diet in our region can make it hard to get the nutrients needed.  As I researched the foods containing selenium, I soon discovered I can’t get the majority of them here.  One of the items are sunflower seeds.  I was quite excited when I found a bag of imported sunflower seeds at a grocery store here.  It was in the pet food aisle and the package said for birds, but I thought isn’t a sunflower seed a sunflower seed, plus wheat bran here is sold packaged for livestock food and I buy that and eat it.  After opening the bag and starting to dig in, it soon dawned on me why they are packaged as bird food.  They are small, stale, limp and there is all kinds of extras (rocks, sticks, bugs) to sort out.  Now the extras don’t bother me too much because I have to sort the same things out of dry beans I buy or raw peanuts I buy.  Now, I’m going to try roasting the sunflower seeds after the sorting to see if that helps.  If it doesn’t I guess I have to feed them to the birds, however, they were expensive and I don’t like to waste money.

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Power On/Off

We are used to having electricity cuts (the average is about 24 hours without electricity a week), however, February was anything but average.  During the month of February we didn’t have a full 24 hours with electricity for the month.  It started with 12 hour cuts and some days 7 hours before there was a pattern of 3 hours daily established.  April was a month full of 24+ hours at a time power cuts due to a problem with a transformer for our neighborhood section.  Some people like power cuts, however, we appreciate electricity and appreciate refrigeration.  Although power cuts aren’t always welcome, we can experience things we wouldn’t otherwise.  Below is a list of the things we wouldn’t experience otherwise.

The moon and stars shine extra bright when there aren’t any lights to compete with.

Our neighbors stay outside on their porch singing.

We are ready for bed at an earlier hour.

We play silly games of storytelling or asking silly questions to one another, for example, would you rather have duck feet or antlers on your head and why?

We can appreciate the times when we have electricity and the hot water heater works.

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Recorder

This year we’ve been blessed with the offering of a Sport’s Club and Music Club.  Things like this can only be offered when someone arrives who is talented in and willing to lead these kinds of things – thank you Naomi and Marnie.  Joshua loves playing sports and has been enjoying that.  Jonah has enjoyed learning to play the recorder and learning how to play the bells.  The Music Club performed at the annual Music Night during our branch meetings for our organization.

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Amazing Race

As a family we have been watching Amazing Race for the last few months as we borrowed the DVD’s of various seasons from another family who is serving here.  Joshua wants to enter in the race when he’s old enough because he knows how to read a map and take a taxi. These two skills seem to cause the most problems with competing teams, not to mention communication problems between team members. He also thinks speaking French will give us an added advantage. We have been able to discuss with them time and time again how important it is to be kind to one another and how ugly it looks when brothers argue with one another.

Today I read about another race, and even a fellow blogger who is willing to sponsor a team if her blog post motivates you to join. CHECK IT OUT!  Her blog post also has a video from Wycliffe Canada’s adventure race last year thatraised funds to support 9 languages in Cameroon in the Ndop cluster.

RACE to 2025 – Join an adventure race with Eternal Impact

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Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we’d better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we’re in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever. And now he’s there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls! (Hebrews 12:1-3 MSG)

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Meeting

17 years ago today David and I met for the first time.  Now we are approaching our 14th wedding anniversary on May 21.  We’ve been blessed with two wonderful boys.  Time has flown by.  I love and respect you more each day David.

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Beauty

I love moments when God smacks me upside the head with His beauty!

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Clowning Around

We look forward to the annual RFIS Carnival.  The middle/high school puts on a carnival of fun activities from fishing for a prize to bobbing for Tampico’s (juice bags instead of juice boxes) to a small treasure hunt to a cake walk to a ring toss to a zip line and more.  There was a face painting booth and Jonah was transformed into a clown.

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Encouragement

I’ve never met anyone who has told me that he/she dislikes being encouraged.  Missionaries are human.  We struggle.  We have stress.  We have things that we can’t share with loved ones or friends back home because of living in another culture and there wouldn’t be any understanding.  I had the idea to create an encouragement wall in our home.  We attended a week long, debrief time in June and each member of our family received a Certificate that has encouraging things written on it.  We received encouraging cards, letters and notes from many of you.  These things are wonderful tokens of encouragement that we can look at, be reminded of and soak in after a day full of discouragement.  Thank you for encouraging us!

ImageI pray that your partnership with us in the faith may be effective in deepening your understanding of every good thing we share for the sake of Christ. Your love has given me great joy and encouragement, because you, brother, have refreshed the hearts of the Lord’s people. Philemon 1:6-7 NIV

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Nail Polish

David volunteered for a skit during the annual Fun Night.  He and two other men had to remove their shoes and socks to feel objects with their toes to determine what the items are while blindfolded.  The men weren’t doing so great at distinguishing the items with their feet, so the objects were transferred to their hands.  While the men were concentrating intently on the objects in their hands and one of the items was vinegar (to disguise another smell) the women doing the skit, painted the men’s toenails.  David ended up with blue toenails.

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Gravel Anyone?

There are sites all around Yaoundé where we can see people burning large boulders to weaken them enough to break them off and start chiseling it into gravel.  Hard work!  It reminds me of the cartoon the Flintstones.  I remember as a little girl being excited to ride in the ton truck to the rock quarry to get gravel for building projects or driveways.  I remember machines doing all the breaking.  I can’t imagine how labor intensive it would be to make gravel by hand.  You can purchase the gravel packaged in burlap type sacks on the side of the road by the work sites.

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