Easter is...

...coloring eggs with Eric & Emily
feasting on baked salmon

eating sticky buns for Easter breakfast

...being with family




eating lots of chocolate!!!

It's Time to Color Eggs with my Grandkids

CHOCOLATE EGG CHAMPION!

Ever see this many chocolate eggs?? Brazil is a champion at producing them. It's fun to walk under a ceiling of chocolate!!!! A bite, anyone??

Vive chocolate!!

SIGNS OF EASTER

After living 20 years in the mideastern part of Brazil, we moved to the far south and a new reality. One of the happy surprises was Easter. This part of the country had been settled by German immigrants, and I discovered we had some things in common--hiding Easter baskets, for instance (which my husband says is what his Mom always did). Here people talked about "making a nest" and stores actually sold Easter baskets. Some families color eggs, but more common is the tradition (in other parts of Brazil as well) of filling the empty egg shell with candied peanuts. I somehow felt like I had come home!

In the USA, with Easter always falling in the spring, Christ's ressurrection was a perfect fit with nature bursting with new life: baby chicks and rabbits, the first robins, tender green grass, baby leaves to dress dry, bare branches, snow melting, crocuses and tulips blooming. The whole earth is an orchestra of color and song shouting "Christ is risen!" Well, in the southern hemisphere, the analogy isn't so perfect. Easter comes in the fall of the year. Ah! but I have found nature's thrilling signs of Easter in this country as well. First of all, the kapok trees bloom. The pink petals fall softly to the ground, making a beautiful carpet. How many times did my kids look for eggs on grass covered by kapok petals?? Then there is the uncultivated maricá bush that grows in ditches alongside the road and in town. It is native to only the southern part of Brazil as well as to Paraguay, Argentina and Uruaguay, and the southern part of the US. The maricá's white bloosoms resemble miniature snow balls and paint a landscape of white. Last, but not least, is marcela, a medicinal plant, ie. (achyrocline satureioides). The legend associated with this plant is that in order to obtain its therapeutic benefits one must gather it during holy week, preferably early in the morning on Good Friday before the dew disappears. A few days ago on one of my walks, I accidently came across a huge area covered with it. Since I don't believe in the legend, I happily gathered an armload of marcela to decorate my house for Easter--I love its fragrance--and for making tea. (They say it is good for tummy upsets.)

Although I still associate those beautiful white lilies with Easter I have found other symbols in my adopted country that give me the same happy feeling that Easter is just around the corner. Christ the Lord is risen today! Alleluia!

YESTERYEAR

Since my blogsite has a mind of its own and will not accept captions under the pictures, I will have to explain. 1. The church where we worshipped for many years and I attended my very first Easter service in Brazil. 2. Michael & Patricia looking for eggs inside the house. At this point in time, we lived in the big city and had no yard. 3. Cousin Sheri lived with us and taught school at the Bethany Academy.

EASTER YEARS AGO...

I left church that Easter Sunday feeling so let down. I hadn’t been expecting Easter to be the same in Brasil as it had been back in North Dakota, but to not even mention the word “Easter” was just too much. No Easter hymns were sung, no Easter lilies (of course!) and no Easter sermon. Nothing was said about Jesus dying and rising from the dead!!
(Maybe that’s when I resolved I would change that and little by little American customs began appearing….Easter hymns were sung in church, staff kids gathered around me every year to color eggs and hunting for Easter eggs became a tradition!! One year I even made Easter baskets for everyone. Old Easter cards were salvaged from a“missionary” care package and made into centerpieces for the dining room tables. One year I organized an Easter sunrise service and posted students on the terraces of our three high buildings to shout out the clarion call: Christ is risen!! I was thrilled--whether or not any one else was I couldn’t be sure.

I was proud of myself for all the "advances" I’d made to help the Brazilian culture along. (If you know an anthropologist, please don’t tell him/her what I did.) Missionaries are supposed to adapt to the host culture—not vice versa. I know. I know. I know that, but my deep yearnings for my own culture propelled me forward because my main motivation was giving my children an "American" Easter. The ironic twist in this is that as a child, I’m not certain I ever hunted for Easter eggs, much less colored them or owned an Easter basket.

Now all of that is years behind me and I am left with delightful memories of my kids, sleepy-eyed, looking for their Easter baskets and devouring chocolate Easter bunnies for breakfast. And looking through the pictures brings it all back again and again.

Four-Act Play

Act I: Frenzied Husband

6: 40 p.m. Husband hurries out to car to drive into town to work out at the gym. Time is at a premium because we have a meeting at 8 p.m. Starts car.
6:41 p.m. Husband remembers he forgot to grab rented video to return to video store and gets out of running car, closes door and hollers to wife, "I forgot to get the video."
6:42 p.m. Wife comes out of house with video in hand and delivers it to hubby.
6:43 p.m. Husband goes back to get into the car, but the door is locked! (The car has a device which automatically locks doors if car is running--which it was.)

Act II: Stupified Husband

6:44 p.m. Both husband and wife stand unbelieving by running, locked car. They wish this were just a dream.
6:46 p.m. Husband decides there is nothing he can do to remedy the situation and decides to call the car insurance man.
6:47 p.m. Car insurance is activated and help is promised to arrive in 40 minutes!!

INTERMISSION

Act III: Demystified Husband

7:30 p.m. Motorcycle arrives from Porto Alegre--some 35 quilometers away-- carrying locksmith. A neat device is employed to force an opening in the door to then pump up the device. (My understanding is deficient at this point.)
7:35 p.m. Door is unlocked and car is still running.

Act IV: Intelligent Husband

He will never do this again!!
P.S. All times are estimated.

A TRIP BACK IN TIME

Fishing on a lazy summer afternoon...

Born and raised right here!

A rebuilt house-to-be-restaurant

Last Saturday we drove to a little German town called Ivoti. Our first stop was a well-stocked antique shop and one of the trivia that caught my eye was a View Master projector for kids that came with one slide card. Our kids had had a View Master, now broken, so I was happy to find this used one for sale. The price: $24! (I quickly decided I'd look for one at garage sales in the USA this summer!) I also found a candle holder exactly like mine (and I'm not antique) and a Blue Willow dessert plate for $24. Nah! I don't need that either. The friendly owner of the shop directed us to a new colonial village that was being inaugurated that weekend. The road took us through town and wound down a hill to an ancient bridge built for Don John VI. The one house that had been restored for public viewing was closed, but we did meet an interesting man who was born and raised in the house you see in the photo. It was a step back into time.

ON MY WALKS...

...I see beautiful flowering trees that make me wish you could enjoy them with me. I feel blessed to be living in a subtropical climate where we feast year round on a rich variety of flowering trees and plants. I once again stand amazed at my heavenly Father's creative hands and love of beauty.

MORE THAN

"How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them! If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand..." Psalm 139:17-18a

I ACCEPTED THE CHALLENGE!!!!

10 a.m. 5:40 p.m.

Victory at 12: 05 a.m.

Thanks for inspiring this, Linda!!

MAY I SUGGEST??

"A view from the hotel looking over the valley"

For your next vacation: The Wine Spa at Villa Europa in the Vineyard Valley. Because of the grape harvest, the hotel is offering special package deals, as in:

*2 nights with breakfast (taxes already included)
*straw hat, britola (?) and basket for picking grapes
*cold cuts & cheeses with music!
*1 typical Italian dinner including wine

You can choose between 3 different rooms:
Luxurious Apartment--$360 (single); $514 (double)
Prince Suite--$548 (single); $632 (double)
Master Suite--$817 (single); $901 (double)

And there's more--special package deals for one day with creams, massages, exfoliation, facial treatments--all with grape products. For instance, you can get a scalp massage for only $95.80. What could be better with a breathtaking view of Vineyard Valley?

On our trip through the vineyards last week, we stopped by this hotel without knowing about its fame. We read that before opening day there were already 300 reservations!

Check out their site at http://www.villaeuropa.com.br/

Choose your wine and take a trip into a new world of special treatments made with grape seed oil, honey, creams, perfumed oils and more!!!! Enjoy that vacation!!

PEEKING THROUGH WINDOWS

I've always admired women who could tear up (as in cry) at a sad story, then seconds later act normal as if nothing had happened. Those kind of women exuded femininity, softness, tenderness-- qualities I admired but which I seemed to have in short supply. My tearful moments more closely resembled that of a dam bursting open producing long, drawn-out, blubbery boo-hoos with the red eyes, runny nose and a certain woebegone Eyore look. I'm an all or nothing person, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised that it shows up in this emotional area of my life as well. However, it has bothered me so much (like the fact that I never cried at my father's funeral) that I have actually prayed about it--and wondered if there was something wrong with me! Then a neat thing happened. After writing my blog about my grandfather, I had an insight. Certainly a child is influenced by his parents and grandparents, and in my case, a grandfather who didn't even hug me after a scary, choking incident sent me a message not to show emotion. Moments after writing that blog I remembered another incident when I was nine years old at my maternal grandfather's funeral. I never had any emotional attachment to him; in fact, my only recollection of him was of that day in his casket. I sat through the funeral service without feeling any reason to cry, but after the funeral as people were leaving the chapel, I began to cry. My father saw me, put his arms around me and said, "Don't cry! Don't cry!" So I stopped right on the spot! He didn't explain his reasons and I never asked for them, because asking was something I didn't do.

I have analyzed how I handle situations involving good-byes or moments for expressing emotion and I've discovered that I'm very good at stuffing those feelings so I don't have to face them. Could these two situations be windows God is allowing me to peek through to help me understand myself (and not condemn myself as well)? I think so. Human beings are a complex tangle of wires like a mother board on the computer and only God knows how we are wired up and how we got a blocked-up connection along our walk through life, yet his love for us is so great that he yearns to work with us to remove all the blockages to allow his love to flow out in its widest dimensions through us to the world.

And oh, I actually cried at a film we watched the other day and I didn't get blubbery or end up with red-rimmed eyelids and a runny nose. I'm making progress!

HOW MANY KINDS?

The end of our "Grape Day" was at the Grape Festival, held every two years in Caxias do Sul. Beautiful, suculent grapes of many different hues hung on display behind glass. Many had names of women. In one pavillion there were free grapes for everyone, the only rule being: "No grapes can leave this room!" For some reason, I couldn't eat very many. It was a wonderful, grapey day!!!!!!

A GENEROUS GRAPE LADY!

We stopped alongside the road to admire the grapes, then noticed a 51-yr.0ld lady with a plastic tub hanging from her neck We struck up a conversation. She told us this vineyard had been in the family for many years, now left to herself and her nephew. (She also took care of her 80-ish mother.) "Would you like some grapes?" she asked. We said yes as Pat started fishing in his pockets for some money. "No, no, no," she said, "Imagine! You don't have to pay for them!" After more insisting on our part, we decided she must be sincere and we each accepted great handfuls of purple "Isabel" grapes. We returned to our car feeling we had met a "grape" angel. I had just read that the grape seeds and skins contain most of what is "good for you"--the very things I have an aversion to eating--but, inspired by my reading and feeling inclined to health that day, I began to chomp on the seeds and swallow the skins like a deprived war prisoner. I felt soooo full when I finished.

BRING ON THE GRAPES!!

It's always nice to have a good excuse for making a trip to Vineyard Valley--and this year we had one--a visitor from Minas Gerais. We drove past miles and miles of vineyards, stopping occasionally to admire and take pictures. Enjoy!

EXOTIC FRUIT FROM BAHIA

I have just finished drinking some delicious umbu juice (the green fruit). On his latest trip, Pat stopped off in Salvador, Bahia, where friends took him to a market. He stuffed two new kinds of fruit in his suitcase: ciriguela and umbu (Sorry! I have no idea how that translates!) Ciriguela (orange fruit) is sweet and smells faintly of grapes. Umbu is tart--more of a lemony taste and reminded me of peaches and lemons. If you'd like to see a professional picture of ciriguela click here. http://flickr.com/photos/anapaulaphotos/390744275/in/pool-rare_tropical_fruits/

And here are my non-professional pictures. For yesterday's lunch I made some refreshing ciriguela juice . I'm a little reluctant, though, about biting into a sour fruit like the umbu. We were told to first cook the fruit just a little. I did that with both fruits, actually, then sieved them because of the rather large seed in the middle.

Oh, I feel so healthy now.

DEEP IN THE JUNGLE

Today Patricia and I and a visiting friend had a picnic in a new park in town, then decided to walk the trail. It was an adventure (of sorts). We encountered hundreds of wild beasts (some people call them mosquitoes), colorful, skittering butterflies and two scary-looking spiders! Our friend jumped out of a tree for a picture (and may have strained or sprained "something" (technical word) in his foot, but all in all, we feel we have grown through this back-to-nature experience.

OLAF & GEORGE

As a child I always thought it cool that my dear Grandpa Olaf shared a February 22nd birthday with the first president of the United States, George Washington (It certainly made it easier to remember Grandpa's birthday!). If he had lived during the age of the ancient biblical patriarchs, he would still be a young man today at 122 years of age.

I was very fond of my Grandfather. He wasn't much for conversation, yet his natural reserve made me feel secure--like everything was under control. My siblings and I loved to run into his arms whenever we went to visit him, and he swept us off our feet with a warm smile and hearty embrace. I knew he loved us.

One fine day just we kids were having lunch with my grandparents. I was eating pan-fried potatoes when all of a sudden, a small piece of potato lodged in my windpipe. I panicked, jumped up from my chair straining to breathe. I'll never forget how my grandfather immediately dropped his fork and knife as his head jerked in my direction. He stood up and started whacking me on the back with his hand. As you can see, I didn't choke to death, because I am still here to tell this story. The potato was dislodged, thanks to God's mercy and my grandfather's heavy hand, and after the ordeal we all settled back at the table again. All Grandpa said was, "I was about to pick you up by your feet and shake you like I did to your aunt Vi when she was a little girl." We all laughed, but it was hard for me to swallow the rest of my food. Yet Grandpa didn't go on about it, didn't make over me or hug me as if he had almost lost me. It had just been another chapter in our lives.

Grandpa, Happy 122nd Birthday!

KINDNESS

"Kind words are like honey--sweet to the soul and healthy for the body." Proverbs 16: 24

ASLAN

I'm reveling in the Narnia series, reading all the books again, and loving them--again!

Some of my favorite lines from the books:

"He's wild, you know. Not like a tame lion."

"And Aslan stood up and when he opened his mouth to roar his face became so terrible that they did not dare to look at it. And they saw all the trees in front of him bend before the blast of his roaring as grass bends in a meadow before the wind."

"A mad chase began. Round and round the hill-top he led them, now hopelessly out of their reach, now letting them almost catch his tail, now diving between them, now tossing them in the air with his huge and beautifully velveted paws and catching them again, and now stopping unexpectedly so that all three of them rolled over together in a happy laughing heap of fur and arms and legs."

"I saw you all right. They wouldn't believe me. They're all so--" From somewhere deep inside Aslan's body there came the faintest suggestion of a growl.
"I'm sorry," said Lucy, ..."I didn't mean to start slanging the others..." The Lion looked straight into her eyes."

Oh, there's so much, much more...

LOVE'S AUDACITY

How can the infinite in finite find

contentment living in a human box?

The speaking Word a universe defined

now bound to earth, a welcome paradox!

Can he who wraps up water in the clouds,

names every star then listens to them sing
become a lamb before the rabid crowd

forgive them for not crowning him the King?

The answer rests in love's audacity--

to wash feet calloused and with Martha weep,

feed bread and fish to thousands modestly,
kiss babies, touch the leper, make lame leap.

To him who gives God-man the right to reign

will find that he has everything to gain.

A SHY VALENTINES DAY

The very first valentine I received from a boyfriend was from Mr. Pat himself. We had been dating only 86 days and we both felt a bit awkward and shy about giving valentines. My card to him said, "I've sent/ This friendly Valentine/In hopes that it will show/ How really grand (I underlined grand)/ I think you are/ How nice (I also underlined nice) you are to know."

In red ink I wrote, "Happy Valentines Day!" and simply signed it "Nedra"

HIS valentine to me said, "A Valentine wish straight from the heart...(turn page) 'Cause that's where all (here the card company underlined all) good wishes start! Happiness Always" (Always is underlined by the CARD COMPANY). It is signed, "Pat"

It was only signed, "Pat" but those three letters produced a series of bubbly, fizzy, happy feelings that bounced and swirled inside of me, and I couldn't explain them, but the realization that "he" was interested in me was truly awesome!!!!

My family always underlines appropriate words in greeting cards. Pat doesn't. When I first knew him I wanted him to underline, too, because underlining was a way our family communicated our feelings. It was somehow easier than saying the words. Pat says the words. And his words are so much more meaningful than any store-bought underlining (which has become kind of a joke between us now even though I still like to do it!)

Pat, you are my valentine and you are mine (underline, underline, underline!!)

HERE'S THE JELLY, WHERE'S THE...

peanut butter?? There's nothing like making jelly to give me the feeling that I'm a true old-fashioned homemaker, (but those inspirations come less frequently as the years go by). It's just so much easier to pick up a jar of jelly off the shelf, and so what if it doesn't taste as good? But yesterday at the BIG supermarket (a k a Walmart) I was overwhelmed by the boxes and boxes of luscious Niagara grapes staring me in the face and I suddenly felt twinges of "old-fashioned homemaker" and voilà! it produced five jars of jelly--just like that! (Now I must get my hubby to make the peanut butter--he's a good old-fashioned peanut butter maker!)

HOW MANY DAYS?

I was surprised yesterday when I opened a package from my Mom to find (among other things) a picture of myself at three months. It was taken almost exactly 60 years ago!! Ever try to identify with yourself at three months of age? It' s impossible! It was more like looking at a stranger's face. Yet as I looked, that baby represented to me a book of mostly empty pages--MY PAGES. Then I looked at myself with 60 years-full of pages filled in and it was scary!! I couldn't help but wonder if what I am today is what God had in mind for me when I was starting out in life. I do believe each of us has a calling of God on our lives, like the framework of a house. God determines the foundations, the structural beams--our giftings and abilities--but the filling-in of that frame he leaves up to us. I'm an open-ended person (the downside being I tend to leave things unresolved) so I like the idea of freedom of choice, of options, of having more than one "right way" to do things. I don't believe I am a marionette with God pulling the strings. I used to believe that God's perfect will was a terribly narrow line that was difficult to find and difficult to stay on. Today I believe it is more like broad band internet. There is space to move about within God's perfect will. I know I can't change the choices I've made, that's past, but I can decide how I will live today. I pray earnestly and humbly with the psalmist, "So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom." Psalm 90:12

THE DAY-AFTER PILL DURING CARNAVAL

The Catholic Church in northeastern Brazil did try to stop the free distribution of kits containing the "day-after pill" for Carnaval-goers, but to no avail. The judge overruled, stating the pills were to be distributed only to women who were raped or in the case of a faulty condom, and only after a doctor's consultation. Only 31 pills were distributed.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MICHELLE!

FAINT NOT!

"Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary, his understanding is unsearchable.

He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength.

Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint." Isaiah 40:28-31

GREAT IS THY FAITHFULNESS

( For some reason this photo came out upside down!)

My mind is like a suitcase packed full of memories of 34 years in Brazil. February 7th, 1974 is still fresh in my mind, especially those first years when everything was strange and different and we lived on a roller coaster of emotions and experiences. Here are a few memories:






*bare cement floors

*students singing while they worked

*the dark blue walls of my bedroom that I came to hate

*two fat, long cockroaches wiggling their antennae, clinging to the door of my wardrobe when I opened it to have a look--then slammed it shut very quickly!

*eating rice and beans almost every day

*smilely, friendly brown faces

*people in church shaking my hand and saying, "The peace of the Lord"

*seeing urine trickle down the slanted floor in the church during the service

*our low bed with little bedstands attached to the headboard

*trying corn meal mush

*the thrill of getting a letter from family

*lying in bed for two long months looking at those dark blue walls while recuperating from hepatitus

*beautiful children

That was just a peek in my memory suitcase...I am thankful to a loving heavenly Father who has been and continues to be faithful to us. To God be the glory!

EENSY, WEENSY SPIDER

went up the waterspout, so says the nursery rhyme, but what I saw in my bathroom was NOT eensy nor weensy! I was merrily sudsing myself in the shower when I happened to look up, which I don't normally do while showering, and shuddered at the size of the enormous spider that was getting restless by the steamy water that clouded his vision! Yikes! I hurried to finish, then ran for my camera. After the picture taking session, in which he cooperated nicely, I sprayed him with a letal poison, then waited for him to die--which he didn't immediately do. He fell to the floor, so I zapped him with more poison, then left the room. When I came back, he had advanced to the porcelain toilet bowl. That was too, too much, so I smacked him with my sandal and that was the end of that! Now, before you get hysterical and decide to never come visit me, let me just say this: I have found many, many big spiders in my house through the years, I have met up with many cockroaches in my life, I even lived for a short time where there were scorpions, but I have never, ever been bit or stung by any of these things. Just for the record. Just so you know. God takes care of us.

DID YOU KNOW...

that the word "crisscross" literally means "Christ's cross"? It is the cross at the head of an alphabet, for the symbol "X" , abbreviation of Christ. So says the New World Dictionary of American English.