Trabajo en La Chacra

The Skinned Sheep
Pineapple picking
Cooking Breakfast
Shooting the Gun
A Rainbow
Franky
Getting a Chainsaw Lesson

This past week has been filled with hard work, lots of fun experiences, and personal growth. At the end of last week we finished most of the clearing that needed to be done for the fruit orchards. It involved a lot of tree hauling and chainsawing which got extremely tiring. Many of the logs are close to 250 lbs and after lifting of few of them your body starts to rebel. Many times I would start to lift a log and then realize that I was barely going to be able to get it flipped over. It was during these moments that I employed a well known tactic used by men around the world which I like to refer to as the grunt. This tactic involves letting out a groan or grunt to get a large object moved. I have found that it works quite well and use it often. By the end of the week we had moved so many logs that David and I started wondering how many tons we were lifting per day. Also, the chainsaw was acting up which made it hard to get things done but God definitely gave me the strength to get through the week even though their were several times when I felt exhausted.
Sabbath was a very restful day from the work week. After going to church at Km. 38 we had choir practice in the afternoon. I played for it and ended up stretching my sightreading skills to the max. But it was a lot of fun and I really enjoyed playing. After choir we had Society de Jovenes which is a youth program in the afternoon. In typical Peru fashion we found out that we would be playing special music for the program. I got to accompany the girls as well as David who played his french horn. Sabbath always refreshes and energizes me and I always feel that I grow leaps and bounds musically as well as spiritually!
On sunday we spent the day picking three-hundred pineapples and transporting them to the house. It was a lot of work but we received the sweet reward of enjoying pineapples for breakfeast, lunch, and dinner. Another thing we learned was how to shoot the shotgun that we have at the house. Because I have never shot a real gun before I was surprised at the "kick" that it had. Another highlight of the week was learning how to skin a sheep. Unfortunately, one of our male sheep died for an unknown reason. We were initially going to bury it but Mauro decided that it would be a good supplement for the dogs to eat. So we took the sheep to the hanger, "disected" it, and brought the meat back to the house to boil. All in all it was a somewhat smelly but interesting experience and I am pretty sure that the dogs will love us forever. Please continue to pray for the project especially since we will be starting to fundraise for some major items such as a tracor and electricity. Thank you to all of you who send me emails and comments. Your messages of encouragment really mean a lot to me!