Let the baking begin....

last years goodness minus the chocolate chips... as divine as these were , I must say that chocolate makes "goodness" heavenly ... 

Living in a country where gift giving can be a little limited... there is only so much indigenous material one home can hold. Actually, I LOVE the material from here and as touristy as it can be at times my home is full of it too. And so.... with the holidays here ...what better gift to give than the inevitable gift of pounds ..( no one wants to come away from the holidays being the only dieters in January ) and so , as we did last year, we (I ) mostly , will commence to bake our 40+ loaves for gift giving. My absolute favorite topping is a combo of chocolate chip and roasted walnuts..... divine.... and so, let the baking begin !

Happy baking !
M

Pumpkins, fireplaces and travel .... beinvenido Novembre(welcome November)

I feel like I should start off saying... " Good morning America !"...why? I have NO idea. It just feels like it should be a chilly day, leaves on the ground, smell of a fire in the fireplace, pumpkins, fall festivals, oh...the list goes on and on and my "Fall feelings of home in America are pungent today. BUT today it's a sunny 80-ish day, no signs of pumpkins and for sure , NO leaves ! Too funny ! Therefore, I am demonstrating with my own protest to lack of fall weather and listening to Christmas music ALL day ! It's just Grace, myself and the "little guys" here anyway and they all love Christmas music as much as I do and so it won't be a violent protest, just my own to say that I 'm so thankful to be here but pumpkins and leaves and a little chilly weather will always have a place in the Southern girls heart at the first part of November..nothin' wrong with that right?

Speaking of those of us here in Guatemala listening to Christmas music... the rest of my crew , plus my father in law and (according to  Tyler's prayer the other night) the "grey headed people" (I'm sure they would love that..I'll leave their names out to protect the innocent. They ARE from our home town) ...anyway, they are headed home today from installing 50 homes with water filters. Some of the homes were as much as a 5 mile hike up into the woods of the mountain. I can't wait to hear their stories. For now and today I just wanted to see if while I am "protesting" with music celebrating Jesus's birthday (with GREAT JOY) I wanted to see if anyone who stops by here today would pray for travel safety for the team as they drive back. They are in our family car and while the brakes definetly work they are also definetly not the best . They ended up having to take our family car literally at the last minute and therefore, it had not been tuned up. Those of you who have made that trip are probably between shocked, fearful and cracking up......between animals, people, bicycles, motos, tuk-tuks all driving amongst each other ..and I do mean "amongst" in an each man for himself style unique to Latin America, they could use, and I would so love you standing in the gap with me for their safety today !

Muchas gracias de Guatemala !
Mel
* please graciously overlook my spelling ... my spell check is apparently on the fritz and possibly protesting with me today (smile) ...it doesn't appear to be clocking in for duty!