Thanks Columbus!

Welcome back to our adventures in Paraguay!

Tuesday was normal. When Kiersten attended the Temple she completed an entire session in Spanish. It really forced her to pay attention. It was a wonderful experience. Only 3 more weeks of the Temple being open! After Annie left the girls went to Casa Rica and loaded up on groceries for the week.

The weather on Wednesday was absolutely beautiful. There was a steady breeze and in the shade it was incredibly comfortable. Kiersten walked to the Embassy for her first Spanish lesson of the week. She has her lessons outside at the Cantina which is the cafeteria. Even in a few short weeks she is feeling more confidant and comfortable speaking Spanish. It took her three times this long in Hungary to feel like this! That afternoon, M&K went on a walk and met Scott on his way home. Tomato Soup and grilled cheese for dinner.

Her hair is getting longer!

Thursday was a slowish kind of day. In the afternoon, the girls walked to the market for some dinner supplies. Mackenzie walked almost the whole way and insisted on touching every wall and fence! On the way home Kiersten had a great Spanish moment. As already mentioned, people here love babies and they seem to really love our baby. Mackenzie was wearing her sun hat and holding Kiersten's hand while they walked home. Two women, probably in their 20's, were walking towards them. They began oohing and awwing over her and one said to Kiersten, "Que linda tu hija." which means, "Your daughter is cute." To which Kiersten happily replied, "Gracias!" Spanish language win!

Swimsuits aren't always needed.

For dinner that night, Kiersten created an Italian dinner without a recipe. This is a big deal for her. She loves to cook but always relies on recipes but wishes she didn't. She made a baked ziti with sun-dried tomatoes and fresh basil leaves and garlic bread (not homemade). She also paired it with a delicious strawberry mint limeade. Fresh herbs and limes are very common at the grocery store and they are very inexpensive. Dinner was delicious!

Friday this week was a little different. For the first time, Annie came to watch Mackenzie so Kiersten could attend her second Spanish lesson of the week. It was much hotter than on Wednesday but they still held the lesson outside. After the lesson, Scott and Kiersten walked home together around 12:15. So nice! Annie was only there for about 2.5 hours which will become the new normal for the week.

We quickly ran to the grocery store for some recipe items and ice cream for the weekend. When we got home, since the weather was so hot we all got in the pool. After swimming we tried to take showers but we had no water! All week there had been a leaking pipe right next to our house that caused a lot of water to spill out onto the street. They water people finally came out to fix it today and in the small window of wanting to shower, they shut the water off. Thankfully it came back on about 5 minutes later.

We love our little pool!

Hard at work fixing the leak.

Look at all that water!

Nice patch job, fellas.

That night we were hosting another small Pie & Game Night so Kiersten began work on the pie after the pool. The pie finished about 30 minutes before a storm came through the area and knocked out our power. We read scriptures by the fading light of the day, put Mackenzie to bed and waited for the power to come back on which luckily did around 7:20. 

Our neighbors came over at 7:35 for the evening where we ate too much pie and lost two games of Pandemic. We'll try to save the world another night. During our second game, the power went out again which kind of made the whole thing more realistic because we are trying to save the world from plagues and diseases so doing it by the light of a lantern just seemed right. The game ended and our neighbors returned to their dark home two doors down. Kiersten headed off to bed (it was almost 11) and Scott stayed awake to watch the BYU Homecoming football game which also ended in defeat. The power came back on and off two more times over the next four hours making it a total of four power outages in one day. We'll go into more detail about the storm below in our Paraguay section.

Saturday was full of excitement. Despite going to bed early, Kiersten woke up not feeling great. It came on slowly but eventually she felt achy like when you have the flu. It was weird. She decided to push through the aches for a Paraguayan adventure! We drove up to Lambare Cerro (hill) overlooking Asuncion and got a pretty good view of the city and the Paraguay River. Rain was in the forecast and we got up there right as it started. We braved the weather for a quick look around then drove back to our neck of the woods for some errands. 

It was only drizzling slightly.

Chief Lambare who resisted the Spanish for as long as he could.
Mackenzie was afraid of his statue.

But Scott wasn't! Nice job, Chief!

By 5 o'clock we decided to get some dinner. We went to the fanciest mall in Asuncion which we know has a good selection of restaurants. We decided on La Vienesa which was the most popular place there so we took that as a good sign. It is a bakery with breads and desserts but also has a full menu. It has a posh Panera feel to it. It took our waitress a very long time to get our order but once she did the food came quickly and it was pretty tasty. We've seen this same restaurant in other places so we know it's common enough to visit again.

Since it is a bakery they gave us a basket of lots of different delicious bread.

Potato gnocchi (Scott's), mini pizzas (Mackenzie's)
 and tacos (Kiersten's)

When we got home, M went to bed and S&K relaxed for the rest of the evening. After eating dinner Kiersten's mysterious flu-like symptoms vanished. It was very bizarre.

In the morning we woke up early to get to the Stake Center for choir rehearsal before Stake Conference. Even though we were there an hour and a half before the meeting started, Mackenzie handled the whole morning like a champ. The husband of our pianist (Embassy family) is really missing his grandkids and was more than happy to walk around with her. We sang three songs during the conference. Even though it was in Spanish we were able to understanding some of the talks or at least parts of some talks. Still working on those language skills.

After church we headed home where Mackenzie napped for almost 3 hours. Kiersten made chili for dinner and Scott and Kiersten watch an adorable 1967 movie with Jane Fonda and Robert Redford, "Barefoot in the Park". When Mackenzie awoke we discovered why she slept for so long...she pooped... a lot! We've discovered that she seems to sleep best after pooping or poops best while sleeping. Something like that. Anyway! We were forced to bath her and do a quick load of laundry.

We ate a delicious dinner of chili and Casa Rica rolls which after doing a little math discovered we bought 10 rolls for about $.50. We joked that we should buy a bunch for Thanksgiving on Thanksgiving because they will be open because it's an American Holiday! This made us realize we still aren't sure what we are doing that day or who we are spending it with etc. which then made us a little homesick. Here's to new memories! After dinner we went on a family walk since we didn't have choir practice. And then we FaceTimed with Kiersten's parents since Scott's parents were flying home from Utah.

Taking our walk. (That's the side of our house here.)

Monday, today, is Columbus Day which Scott had off work. Annie came like normal which allowed Scott and Kiersten to have a day date which was fabulous! They ran some errands, went to a mall and walked around, bought shoes for Mackenzie then ate lunch at Paulista Grill Churrasqueria. They are open for lunch (11am-3:30pm) and dinner (7pm-1am) so this is a place we couldn't normally go without a sitter. We've heard about it a lot from the senior couples and it did not disappoint. We took about 5 steps into the place when our eyes landed on a set of Elders having lunch. We chatted with them for a little bit and learned the junior companion is from the Oakton Ward of the Oakton VA Stake. What a small world. He's been out about as long as we have! When we got back to our table we hailed our waiter and told him we wanted to pay for them. Just trying to pay it forward.

This was some of the best chipa we've had yet!

So fancy! They served us water and Coke in their wine glasses.

What a handsome date!

Paulistas works like Tucanos in Provo which is our only other Churrasqeria experience. It's all you can eat for 94.000 PYG (roughly $16.54) per person and this includes the cold and hot food bar, salad bar, pasta bar, bread, MEAT and dessert. Everything was delicious. When we were getting our dessert we saw that a soccer team was coming in for lunch. After guessing it was either the Columbia or Ecuador National teams we asked and learned it was the Venezuelan National soccer team here to play Paraguay in a match tomorrow. We were both wrong but it was pretty cool nonetheless.

Tres leche cake, a chocolate something cake and a very disappointing creme brulee.

You bet we took a picture!

More of the team getting their food.

We got home around 1:40 and Annie left at 2. We all went to the grocery store a little while later and then after getting home, FaceTimed with Scott's parents who are completing the final cleaning processes on their home before their big move to London on Wednesday! The rest of the day was pretty low-key. Both Scott and Kiersten are recovering from the MEAT. This is not something we plan to do often.

She likes her new shoes. Yes they are Crocs.

Since it rains a lot here and floods, Crocs are very practical.

Misadventures in Baking:

• Here is the saga on the pie from our Pie & Game Night. It was a Toll House Pie which is a Hammond Family classic. Kiersten realized she really has only made it a handful of times but has consumed it much more than that at the hand of someone else's baking. After reading the recipe, mixing and pouring the filling into the pie shell she noted that it didn't look right and felt she forgot something. Sure enough, she forgot a critical ingredient: Brown sugar! She poured it back out, mixed in the brown sugar and poured it back in! Then the oven... grr. Long story short, it baked, it was fully cooked, the crust was delicious and everyone loved the pie enough to have seconds. We also baked some frozen cookie dough just in case the pie was inedible.

  

  Looks like a pie. Tasted like a pie.

  
  

  

  So happy we finally figured out these cookies!

Quirks of Paraguay:

• Storms. When we say 'storm' what we mean is strong winds and rain. It might only rain hard for about 20-30 minutes but its the wind that gets ya. The rain did cause flooding in front of our house on Friday but the wind is what continued to blow and get our power on the fritz the rest of the night.

  

  View from out our front gate.

  
  

  

  Beware the rising river!

• The jury is back with the verdict on the fruit from our tree out front (and along the side)! They are pomelos which are like grapefruit. There are a ton.

  

  They are getting bigger outside! This was the first one we picked.

• Mango trees. They are EVERYWHERE! And from what we've been told, Paraguayans don't care for mangos so they'll just let them fall and rot. More for us! Kiersten discovered there are mango trees on the Temple grounds. And the GIANT mango tree on the Embassy compound looks like they are starting to get ripe. Mango season is soon upon us!!

  

  Mangos at the Temple! Hopefully we can access them when
  the Temple is closed....

• Celsa Speratti. We live off a road named Profesora Celsa Speratti who was a very important educator to the poor and illiterate girls in the late 1890's and early 1900's along with her sister, Adela. We discovered she and her sister are on the 2.000 PGY bill this week. Very cool.
  

The Mackenzie Update:

• She can now say, "wa-wa" which is her mix of water and agua. She'll tell you "wa-wa" when she wants something to drink and if you ask her, "Water/Agua?" she'll confirm it with a respond of "wa-wa".
• On Tuesday we caught her walking on her tip-toes. It was harder to catch a picture of it but just trust us on this one.
• She likes chocolate milk! We are ok with this fact since now she'll drink milk voluntarily. Still sneaking regular milk it into her smoothies though.
• She also likes pickles. And raw onions. Gross.
  
• Mackenzie is climbing our windows. There are bars in front of some of our windows and they are the perfect climbing wall for her. Don't worry, she always has adult supervision.

  

  Not great lighting but you can tell she's up there.

We hope you enjoy reading about our little adventures. Some weeks are more adventurous than others so thanks for sticking with us all the same. See you next week!