A New Face in the Old Place

Well, We've been home for 48 hours and I know some of you are itching for some news.

Our trip home was uneventful. Lia blessed us with four hours of sleep during the five hour flight from Lima to Miami. She continued to behave well during the three hour flight to Chicago, as well. And Isa... well, behaved as expected. (Her Juicy Fruit gum was the highlight of the trip for her.)

Five weeks is longer than I realized. It is actually enough time to grow accustomed to many things. So I thought I would just share a few of our "goodbyes" and our "hello agains."

We had no idea when we bought this stroller for 98 soles how important it would become. It saved our backs and our time. It was not only transportation it doubled as "the bad chair." (Not very politically correct.) Err... uhh... I mean the "time out to contemplate how you could have handled that situation a little bit more appropriately chair" Unfortunately, it was too small for the adults in the relationship, who probably could have benefitted from it on more than one occasion.

Isabel made friends with these two young women at the market. She will miss them greatly. They even "babysat" while I walked the market finding goodies and buying things for Lia's benefit sale (Yeah, you heard right. Stay tuned for details...)

What can I say,... I know there are people out there who love the winter; skiing, ice hockey, walking outside in flipflops and shorts through a foot of snow to get the mail, etc.. That's not who we are though. Playing in the fountains in Lima in mid-March is more our style.

We spent more time with our lawyer, Juan Carlos than any other person in Peru. He helped us with anything and everything and never complained or even acted as if something was to much of a hassle. He has become a good friend, and has been invited to our home in Chicago. We hope he will take us up on this offer. (Of course, he will have to brave the U.S. embassy on his own behalf for his visa. Good luck, my friend.)

Oh... and El Enano, where you can get a pitcher of fresh juice of any kind, including things that have no English tanslation for a couple of bucks. I seiously almost had a breakdown when I got on the plane and asked what kinds of juices they had and the response was (you guessed it) orange and apple.

Our dinner at world famous Gaston Acurio's restaurant, Panchita for less than you pay for a meal at TGI Fridays.

On the other hand, we were so happy to come home to a clean house, a warm meal, and fresh flowers, and a monster pile of mail. (Ok, not so happy about the mail...) All reminders of the deep friendship that God has given to us. I snuck in and out of church on Sunday morning, and felt the hand of a close friend on my shoulder, which brought tears to my eyes.

Back to school. Isa sang and talked all the way to school about how much she missed her teacher and friends. She couldn't wait to take her treats to all of her classmates. Everyone walked out of school with a new keychain attached to their backpacks.