Just a warning...I am collecting some photos and may try to resurrect this blog.  I have had so much fun reading others' blogs, decided I may give it another try.  First of all I wasn't sure I could remember how. . .
Erika is out of town, so may have to wait until she gets back to see how to add a photo!  Am not sure anyone is watching anymore.

Underconstruction

We start with Wayne putting the second coat of a lighter blue over the dark turquoise that was a little strong. 3 colors in the bathroom, he loved that.

Then the wrecking crew of one (Dean) arrived with crowbar, sledgehammer, hammer, etc. We're gonna change the stairs!

Personally, I think he has a strong destructive gene in his gene pool

Really began to open the living room up the living room.

I took a little break to go see if I could actually walk 3 miles for our 5k race coming up,and found a sore spot on my foot afterwards. You can see we have no stairs at all now.

I guess Wayne didn't notice "no stairs" he just came up anyway. Now he is settled in his supervisors vantage point.

I don't think I have ever made such a grand mess in a room. Wayne did a magnificent job of cleaning it up so Dean would have a nice clean working space the next day.

The real thinking begins.....

We have stairs - couldn't have done it without the tools of the trade....hammer, crowbar, and..... a Pepsi! Good job, guys.

The Big Race

He looks way to relaxed and like he is having fun.



dean crossing finish line

My personal escorts!

Dorleen entering the winners circle (round-about) with parade wave

And I finished in less than an hour

Happy campers, and the knees will be edited out for future viewing

Thanks guys for roping me into this.

A Pretty Good Thanksgiving After-all

About 11:30 a.m., Thanksgiving Day, this left-over cream of chicken soup was about to be my Thanksgiving Dinner.


Then Julio arrived with several boxes as a service project from a ward in Atlanta. Elder Seaton's mom and I had started putting this together a couple of months ago. Julio's wife is from Bogota, and when he heard what they were doing, he said that he would help us get the packages here because he is a pilot for American Airlines. Just what we needed!. Anyway he took his personal time to "deliver". Had some trouple with weather so couldn't leave Miami as scheduled, arrived in Bogota too late to make his connection to Bucaramanga, so spent about 6 hours in the B'ta airport waiting for the next flight to leave at about 6 a.m. Thanksgiving Day. He has just arrived at the house (from Bucaramanga, he had a 3 hour drive in a taxi to San Gil)
You will see that he is still in his pilot's uniform, I think his working flight was from Sao Paulo, Brazil, Then flew home to Atlanta, loaded our stuff, then to Miamia, etc. to here. His wife and daughter were spending Thanksgiving in Utah with her family (Bountiful, I think). He was very tired, so went to Esperanza's hotel for a "power nap". When we found out he was staying until Friday morning, we decided we would order our favorite chicken from El Scorpio (closest we could get to pavo (turkey). We ordered some more cream of chicken soup, cooked up some Granny Smith apples with cinnamon, nutmeg, and brown sugar for dessert. We then invited the Elders and Juan Carlos to come. This is from Elder Seaton's home ward, and Julio had moved in just before E. Seaton left for his mission, so E. Seaton didn't
recocnize Julio.
Here I am asking Elder Seaton to ask Julio about where he lives, and Julio is getting E. Seaton's dad's camera out to take pictures for the folks back home!
"OK, now I get it!" Elder S. realizes who this guy (that looked a little familiar) was. Wayne is in the background being chief cook and bottlewasher while I have been so sick. His is discovering new cooking talents!!!!

The guys and our dinner. What a nice feeling was there. Julio shared many experiences with us, and his testimony with us. It was special to know that he had sacrificed his Thanksgiving with his family to do this service mission for the folks here in the Rama San Gil.

The elders pitched in to help.

We have four big boxes, I will show the distribution next week. What a great day. I just kind of sat back and watched, cuz I didn't have much energy, but it turned out to be a very memorable Thanksgiving Day.

Sopa Patica

I'm not sure of the spelling, but everyone has said this sopa would be great for raising my body defenses. They have all been so concerned with my health and well-being, and I so appreciate their love and kindness. Esperanza and Rosa made this for me today, and it has a wonderful chicken broth flavor. Carrots, cilantro, and a ton of other unrecognizable things.

OK, I'm going to do this, this patica means chicken legs, or something similar. This is what crawled up onto my spoon. The smile is because I know I am not really going to eat this foot!

Up close, it looks more like a human hand than a chicken foot, but the flavor is excellent! Wayne was a real coward and would not even take a sip of the broth. I think I will feel very strong tomorrow!!!! The RAID drink/can is because I am now paranoid about little flying creatures that can bring me great pain! I think I have developed a taste for RAID.

This picture merits a click so you can zoom in on the details. I will try to get our Thanksgiving Day on tomorrow. I feel like I just shared dinner with the Munsters, or the Adams family. This looks like the perfect Halloween Soup! The little red ball is a mini-cherry tomato from my finquita!

Pray for me!!!!!!!!

NOT for sissies - Dengue Fever

Let's start out on about the 13th or 14th of November, a few days before this picture was taken. I had felt extremely tired after our English class on Saturday, and then on Sunday, after Sacrament meeting, I felt like I was just going to fall asleep on my feet, so came home from church, and rested all day. Monday, I mustered enough energy to play tennis, but felt so tired, and afterwards all of my muscles ached. Not normal for me. Monday night I helped the elders with a presentation on Service, and just felt like I was hanging on by my toenails, and went home to collapse in bed. Tuesday I experienced the worst pain from my waist to my toes that I have ever had. Wednesday it was equally painful, so Esperanza called the doctor for me. He thought it was just a bad case of the flu, and I knew that my body defenses were low, so the combination probably made it so bad. A few pills, lots of liquids, and rest.....

Thursday, I received these nice roses from Pres. Bonza, and thought I was on my way to recovery, because the fever subsided some. But by Thurs night, and Friday morning, the pain, fever, were unbearable. Saturday we called Dr. Pinaloza again (he makes house calls!) and he said I should get a blood test taken for Dengue Fever. Yep, I had it. I absolutely could not roll over in bed without horrible pain. I said I would rather have another baby than experience this pain! Yes, the fever may have influenced my thinking!

The first blood test on Sat. revealed the Dengue Fever, and that my blood platelets (0r something) were supposed to be between 150 and 300 somethings, mine were at 101. The remedy was to stay absolutely quiet in bed, getting up only to go to the bathroom. OK, I can do that. Grounded to bed until Wednesday.


Well, Monday no noticeable improvement, so another blood test....this time my count was down to 95. Wrong direction! OK, now confined to bed until Friday (today)

Dr. Pinaloza made several house calls, charged only for the first one. He is so kind and patient. My whole skin looked like it had been sunburned, and he wanted to check this change out. There are two types of dengue, my was the "classic" not as dangerous as the kind that causes hemorrhaging from nose, mouth, ears, etc.

On Wednesday, another blood draw - I gave the Senora explicit directions that I wanted better results this time...why didn't I think of that sooner? My count went up to 118!!!! Yippee!!!! Apparently, once the count starts rising, it continues to improve.
However, if I am up for the shortest time, I break out in a cold sweat, that is where I am right now, so must bring this to a close and go back to rest.

Many visits from friends were great medicine. Juan Carlos had the hemorrhaging Dengue about 5 months ago, and he was come by or called every day. Yes, we are having a RAID cleansing attack here on the zancudos. That is how this is transmitted, by an infected itty-bitty gnat or mosquito.

Cecilia, our dear neighbor across the street, and Marina a student from the English class.

Pres. Amaya.

Others came, but I was so sick at the time, I didn't think to take pictures. Sorry.

This is Isaac at the window, Jonathan and Jose Ocampo on the chairs. Bro. Ocampo is the one who was in the moto accident in the summer, and had to have his left leg amputated just below the knee. I can't begin to tell you how I felt when I learned he was at the door. This hills are murder with good legs, and what an effort he made to come and visit. We have a nice history that I don't have time to explain here, but this was love in action. What a powerful pill to help me feel better.



Must go for now, don't worry, I am feeling stronger each day, we will be home in less than 3 weeks. We had a fun Thanksgiving, but it will have to wait for another day.

Take care,

the Jensons (I can't go back and check for errors, please excuse any!)