back to work...

Our holiday was over weeks ago, and now we are fully back into our work-week routine.  The new term started on Tuesday, so the College is lively and full of people once more.  The students all traveled from near and far, having finished the maize harvest.  It is nice to have things bustling around here once again.

David has a much heavier lecturing schedule this term than he did last term, now that Cees has left and there are only two men -- David and Heinrich -- to do the bulk of the lecturing for 30 students.  (There are also two part-time lecturers from the local area who each teach one class to help with the load.)  David is teaching two classes: Homiletics (preaching) and Church History.

My days are filled to the brim with cooking, baking, washing dishes, washing laundry, and chasing a toddler and a puppy around the house trying to prevent total mayhem and destruction.  Jacomien and I have also been taking language classes once a week, learning to speak Nyanja (the local language).  It's difficult, but I am seeing progress and during a sermon or something I can pick out words that I know!  I made french bread loaves for the first time this week and will probably attempt them again sometime.  They didn't rise as high as I hoped (the yeast available in Petauke seems to be essentially worthless) and they were a bit dense for my liking, but the flavor was nice and that night my dinner guests all gave the bread a definite thumbs-up.  We always seem to have dinner guests at least once a week, and there are more to come!

This past week there was a team from South Africa visiting the College.  Heinrich's brother Dinant who is also a minister, was leading the team and brought a group of young people from his church.  They helped Phil at the Farm, visited schools with Marjanne, did a HUGE amount of work fixing up our run-down and very dirty library, set up a "computer room" for the students, taught computer classes so that the students could learn how to use Microsoft Word,  and basically helped out in every way they possibly could while they were here. Dinant opened the term as a guest lecturer, teaching on the work of the Holy Spirit.  It was nice to meet them and enjoy fellowship during their stay.

Elijah is walking and talking up a storm (but we can't understand what he's saying - the only recognizable words are "da" which he applies to everything including his daddy, and "mum yum" for food), and make us laugh every day.  His antics in the bathtub are especially funny. We think he is a bit confused about whether or not he is a puppy, since he likes to mimic our puppy Merry's actions -- if he sees Merry eating food, he eats Merry's food; if he sees Merry licking the floor, he licks the floor; if he sees Merry with a ball in his mouth, he puts a ball in his mouth, and the list goes on.  We daily remind Elijah, "You are not a puppy!  Merry is a puppy, but you are a little boy!"  Elijah has transitioned very smoothly into sleeping in his own room -- we are glad to have our room to ourselves for the first time since he was born!

A lot of exciting things have been happening with our families back in the States, which makes us miss them all the more and really feel the distance that separates us.  One of my brothers got married two weeks ago, and of course we couldn't be at the wedding.  Another of my brothers just finished school and graduated last weekend. He is heading off for further training hoping to seek a career in law enforcement.  David's sister and brother-in-law just welcomed their first child on Wednesday -- Elijah's first boy cousin!  We are so excited for them!  It is really difficult to be away from family during these times, but we are thankful for email and Skype and Facebook so that we can even see photos of our new nephew!

This week I managed to get lettuce and broccoli planted -- the very humble beginnings of my vegetable garden.  I will plant more after we return to the College in February, but right now it doesn't make sense to plant a huge plot of vegetables which won't be ready to eat until after we've already left on our end-of-the-year furlough.  The lettuce and broccoli should be ready to eat in 6 weeks!  I'm looking forward to having more leafy greens to enjoy.  :-)  We can't get them here in Petauke.  We also have a plot of strawberries which are just beginning to produce a few ripe berries here and there... so I'm keeping a close eye on them.  They were planted by the M family who lived here before us, and I'm grateful that we get to reap the rewards!  We also have several papaya trees with ripening fruit.  I'm investigating ideas for using fresh papayas, since I think we will be overwhelmed with more than we can eat if they all ripen at once!  I think I'm going to try making papaya smoothies (with strawberries, that will be especially nice!).

David and I celebrated our 2nd wedding anniversary on the 11th, and had the opportunity to enjoy a dinner date at Chimwemwe Lodge in the town!  The Z's kindly babysat Elijah for us so it was the first time we were able to go out without Elijah... we love our boy, but it was a real treat!  :)