Bye September, hello October

Well, September came... September went... and now we're almost half way through October. September was a comparatively quite month... as I write this I'm really stretching to find something to write about. Joy just reminded me that Sara learned to walk. She also has developed quite the appetite for "real" food. Oh yeah, we had to let our gardner go. It was time for a change. We decided to bring Maribel's husband, Edy, on as a replacement. On his first day of work he cleared out twelve (12) bags of "trash". Our old gardner had let the garden grow up so much. It is so much clearer now. We're excited to be able to give Edy this chance. On his second day he was asked by three other families in our Colonia if he could do gardening-like work. When we checked for airfare back in August and September we were discouraged with what we found. But in the first week of October we acted on a tip from friends at CAG and checked again. Prices had dropped by about 25% making tickets possible. After much prayer we finally settled on buying tickets! We will arrive in New Hampshire in the wee hours of Sunday, 18 December. We will return to Guatemala on 8 January. We're all very excited to be back for Christmas! We Canadian Thanksgiving on 8 October! Much turkey was consumed by everyone. We're thankful to be able to share these sorts of holidays with close friends when we're not near our family. Now, in closing I'll write about the current weather situation - we're wet. Very wet. Tropical Depression 12-E has been soaking us for the past three days. The CONRED (Coordinadora Nacional para la Reducción de Desastres) has declared "condition RED" due to current conditions. There have been reports of numerous mudslides and flooding. A new sink-hole opened up in a highway down town - which has caused a lot of extra traffic. The government has closed all public schools for tomorrow (Thursday). But - we're fine. Just a bit wet. -knme