Greetings from Ecuador, Mexico, and Peru!

Here is tonight's dinner, which turned out very well, if I do say so myself. :) It's all because I have a cooking addiction, which is difficult to shake, really. So, I just do my best to live with it. Luckily, I also have an eating addiction. They balance each other out quite nicely.

This is my dinner (please pardon my attempts at Espanol):

This is the whole meal. 

This is Green Rice (Peru). This is my own recipe, and it turned out. Hooray!
This is my attempt at Spanish: Arroz verde con pollo
(It sounds authentic, right?)

These are platanos, cooked Ecuadorian style.

These are platanos, served Mexican style.
Platanos con lechera. (A.k.a sweetened condensed milk :) )

So, everything went like clockwork, until I was peeling the avocado. There was a piece of the skin that was rock hard and stuck to the fruit, so I tried to get it off with the knife. Bad idea. I now have a cut on my thumb that is a good inch to inch-and-a-quarter long. Oh well. Such is life. At least I have my dinner to enjoy!

Chow! Hasta luego. 

A Week of Summer

Due to all of the crazy stuff going on in my life, I have been rather busy and summer has sometimes been put on the back burner. I am getting really good at squeezing some summer in with the crazy though, especially this week. So far this week I have done things every day that make it really feel like I am getting a summer vacation.

Monday: I played sand volleyball for FHE with my pink and white volleyball. GLORIOUS!

Tuesday: I got the keys to my classroom and got to start arranging things. I have a TON of stuff left from the previous teacher that I have to go through though. All I really want to do is decorate my room and get things like welcome letters, newsletter, a website, and lesson plans prepared, but I have to go through all of the stuff. It will save me a lot of money in the long run, though.

 I had the opportunity to play sand volleyball again--but with guys I didn't really know (a couple of them I recognized, and some of them recognized me, but they are in a different ward then me). They invited me to play as I was chatting with a couple of girls in my ward, but I needed to finish some visits first. None of the people I needed to visit were home, so I joined their game a couple minutes later. At that point, there were 5 guys playing and I joined, becoming the only girl playing. Their numbers grew throughout the night, eventually reaching a peak of 10 guys and me playing. We played 3 games, and I had a lot of fun! And then I went and ran a mile. 

Wednesday: I got my hair trimmed (seriously- just a trim. She said that she only took off about 1/4 inch.). Then, I saw Despicable Me 2 with Laura. We had these awesome seats that were just off by themselves. We laughed  for a good majority of the movie. It was kind of predictable, but very entertaining! Then we came back to our apartments and went swimming at the pool in the dark with our awesome seahorse and shark noodles (see picture below). Then, we went and got food at JCW's (YUM!). After that we "watched" Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. I slept through most of it, but the parts that I saw were just as good as ever.

(Please excuse the ridiculous look on my face)

Thursday: I was able to sleep in, which is actually pretty unusual. I generally can't sleep in even on the weekends because I work Saturday mornings, and I have meetings Sunday mornings. I was then able to go shopping for some Fourth of July appropriate attire. I did some productive things in the afternoon (like 3 science responses, my ESL observation paper, and lesson prep for my lesson that I'm teaching on Sunday). Then, I got ready for my date! Pretty much, the whole night was fantastic. It was a double/group date. We had dinner at their apartment around 7:00, and then walked over to the stadium around 7:50 for the Stadium of Fire. Stadium of Fire was amazing! There was a variety of entertainment. I knew most of the songs that were sung, so that was fun. And the fireworks were spectacular! (Even if I did get showered in ash-like particles from the fireworks. I may or may not have gotten some in my eye. Either that or I got emotional from the incredible bursting-light display in the sky and one of my eyes starting watering. You can be the judge.) After it was over, we walked back to their apartment to wait out the crazy traffic. We watched some funny YouTube videos and talked. We finally braved the traffic at about 12:15, because he had to work early the next morning, but it was still pretty bad. All-in-all, it was a very enjoyable evening. Hands down a million times better than my Fourth of July last year!

(This is one of my favorite videos that we watched. I've seen it before, but it makes me laugh!)

Friday: Well, that's today and nothing terribly exciting has happened yet. I'm sure something will though, because my Fridays always have elements of fun.

Happy summer, y'all!

Sunday Soliloquy (Not really, but I can pretend, right?)

This is how I spent my Sunday after church:

• Presidency meeting
• Coordinating for meetings later in the week/planning out my week
• 20 minute nap
• Watching some "I'm a Mormon" videos (There are some really cool ones out there!)
• Playing with bouncy balls outside with Laura
• Trying out my artistic skills with chalk on the sidewalk (see pictures below)
• Watching an episode of the Dick Van Dyke show
• Writing a letter with Laura to one of the girls we visit teach
• Going to ward prayer (Where I found out that my fhe group is playing sand volleyball for our activity tonight!- Can you say EXCITED!!!)
• Preparing food for class the next day (1 kiwi, 1 mango, 1 red pepper, 1/2 green pepper, 3/4 cucumber, 2 stalks celery, baby carrots, wheat thins, 2 cheese blocks, and pretsels)
• Getting ready for bed
• Sleep!

Here are some samples of our chalk art:

Here are a couple of jokes to leave you with:

What musical instrument is found in the bathroom?

A tuba toothpaste.

What is the best kind of thing to eat in the bathtub?

Sponge cake