Progressive Dinner

As mentioned in a previous post, we have had some busy weekends.  The next two weekends are no exception.  But first,  I will go back share a little about last weekend.

The progressive dinner went well, praise God!  For appetizers, I had three girls help me prepare a starter food.  We took green platanos (plantines), shredded them, packed the shredded fruit into a golf ball sized sphere (flattened some of them) and then fried them.  We added a little salt and they were ready to eat, either dipping it into ketchup, mayo, or sprinkle with cheese.  They taste similar to hash browns. It was a simple but yummy treat.  Another great aspect of preparing this appetizer is that it gave us time to talk. As we shredded, packed and fried the fruit, I was able to talk with each of the girls, Laura, Natalie, and Camie. I learned a bit about their home life, school life, things they are excited about with the school year, and some of the struggles of being a junior.  From past experience, I have found some of the sweetest times of fellowship and discipleship have come in the kitchen.  I thank God for those times of encouragement and growth in my life and I pray that I may be used in a similar way (as Titus 2 explains).

After the rest of the Junior girls came over and inhaled our starter, we headed off to the main meal (pasta) with some amazing local fruit made into juice.  I love all the fruit here and variety of juice that can be made.  While talking with one of the girls about all the fruit for juice, she seemed rather impartial about the variety. I suppose it is something she has grown up with and doesn’t know much different compared to the idea of ‘seasonal fruit’ I am used to from the States.

Then we were off to dessert, we had a layered cake with pudding, ‘cool whip’,  ‘gram crackers’, and chocolate… very tasty.  I learned that Colombians have a sweet  tooth, but it is not for sweet, sweet things, only a soft, or mild sweet treat (sweet intensity of jell-o, or pudding). Plus, they always eat their dessert with a spoon.  We also started to discuss our end of the year service project, which is a long weekend we will take in May to “high- need” community to work in a school or orphanage.

Over all, the evening was a sweet time of fellowship as we kicked off the new school year!  Please continue to pray for us as we interact with this class and that discipleship will be fruitful.