"May God's love be with you...

...always."

One of my favorite things about our town is the announcements.
"Mrs. So and So, you have a phone call"
You can hear the store that announces this from a half mile away, and everyone knows your business.
Well, not MY business, since I don't receive phone calls there.

It was a long week last week. and I began to act selfishly. I feel like a lot of people would think I'm doing a very "selfless thing", by moving down here. And while it's easy to do big gestures of selfless things, like go feed the homeless once a year, or help someone you don't know move, it's hard to do little selfless things every day. I didn't want to get to know new people, I didn't want to be last in the dinner line, I didn't want to stay out late so my girls could hang out with the young people, I didn't want to enforce the "you must have your chores done before you do anything fun" rule. I didn't want to wish them goodnight when I got tired, I just snuck right into bed.

anyways. it has since bit me in the butt. Today I'm fighting with C to get all her clothes washed. It wouldn't be a fight if I had some immediate incentive before her. She probably has like 4 laundry loads of dirty clothes! This is what happens...
Me: Why is your whole bathroom full of dirty laundry?
J and R: It's not ours!
C:It's not mine.
I look through it and notice they are the clothes C wears most often
Me: well, if it's nobodies I'm going to give it all away. C, would you check and see if you have a shirt or two in there?
C: It's not mine.
Me: ok I'm going to give it all away I start to put it in a giveaway bag
C: that's mine, that's mine..she grabs the clothes out of the giveaway bag, eventually ending up with almost all of it and then we wash it all

another conversation that probably happened before this is
C: I don't have pants.
Me: You don't have clean pants, or you don't have ANY pants?
C: I don't have ANY pants.

The funny thing is that we've done this twice now, and she still hasn't figured it out. I don't think I like teaching the same lesson over and over again. Although, to get her to wash her own laundry all I have to do is ask her and then follow her around while she does it. It's harder to expect my kids to get things done sometimes, when I realize what an inconvenience it is. This morning, for example, she had to use the hose in the washer b/c it wasn't drawing water.

(C is talking to me right now, and I'm having trouble thinking! I keep telling her that I'm writing, but she loves me. what can I do!)

Saturday night I went to a real Quinceanera (15th birthday party). This one was as elaborate as a wedding, as most are. It had a DJ, a Quintet (with an upright bass), dinner, planned dances, beautiful dress, 14 boys in white shirts and black pants, a giganto cake (with a white figurine), roses, floral arrangements, and more than 20 tables. I didn't know the birthday girl, but I went with someone who knew the "best girl/dance coordinator." As it turned out, I recognized a couple parents from the parent meetings, and even a couple missionaries that I work with. It was kinda fun being able to walk to a party, to dance "with" that many Mexicans. We danced b/c these two grandmas pulled us out on the dance floor, but in a big group of people, not partner danced as no boys asked us to dance! The party started at 5:30. We got there at 8, they were still serving dinner. When we left at 11, they hadn't cut the cake yet! Some of the people at the party were polygamists, and I started thinking, how does that work, do you take all your wives to the party? Do you marry one b/c she's a good dancer, and another b/c she's a good cook? There were a lot of "American" looking Mexicans there. Apparently, it's normal for a lot of these families to either live in America and visit this town a lot, or to live in this town and visit America a lot. A lot of people are from the state of Chihuahua as well. The way they pay for these parties is you have padrinos, or God parents. Someone buys the cake, someone pays to rent the tables, someone buys the dress, someone buys the flowers, etc. You get a LOT less presents this way, but a GIGANTO party sort of IS the present. AND if you are a padrino, you get a guaranteed dance with the birthday girl!

Starting today, I'm going to be helping out a family that has 8 Mexican children from age 2-12. They need to make a passport/visa run, and will be leaving the 10th and the mom is coming back the 19th hopefully. They have two Canadian women coming to help out, but I don't think they speak Spanish, so I'll be there part time as well. I plan to take one of my big girls with me at a time to read to the kids, play with them, be my helper, etc. I hope that goes well, b/c these kids could really use some individual academic attention, and that is hard to get in a big family. If it does go well, that will be a service project my girls will continue over the summer.

I covet your prayer's this week! Hope you had a safe 4th of July :)