Passion for Paraguay

Despite the heat and lack of rain (thank the Lord for the rain that just arrived) this month has brought a huge harvest! Here's a sampling:  green beans  black beans have been peeled and packaged and ready to sell  One of our many squash... cucumbers (from just one picking)...we've harvested over 50 lbs so far Our harvest has kept us busy canning pickles...  shelling nuts at lightning speed with the new nut sheller!! and making peanut products.  Here's the wonderful production team...  The more we can process our produce, the better the revenue for the institute. Our students have been harvesting and processing agro products this week so we can still have products to sell while they are on summer break.  This Saturday is our closing ceremony and Sunday is our last service and the students will go home for the summer, so they have been working hard to get everything harvested before they leave. We want to share with you about an immediate need we h...

The flowers are blooming!  (magnolias) (yucca flower) The garden is growing... The orchids are flowering...  This delicate orchid in our yard is called a "micro orchid" as the flowers that are blooming are best seen under a microscope. The puppies are playing... (.thank God that they all sold, but they're so cute who couldn't resist!) and her clothes are hanging!!.. in the anticipated arrival of our daughter.  We are expecting to be able to bring her home in the next 2-3 weeks. We rejoice at the signs of spring in our home and family.  God is so good!!  He makes all things beautiful in His time.  What are some signs of spring in your life right now?

We took a short trip to visit a region unfamiliar to us here in Paraguay.  This is the scenic drive west into the department of Ñeembucú.  It is characterized by swampy wetland, beautiful birds and wildlife.  Here are a few of our pics from our trip last week. This is a milanesa napolitana (breaded beef cutlet with white and red sauce).  It happens to be one of Norberto's favorite meals.  We enjoyed lots of fresh fish and great hospitality from the Paraguayans residing in Pilar and its surroundings. The yata'i palm is the one common in this region.  It's in the center and looks spikey. The hybiscus grows so well in this part of the world.  The flowers are vibrant and so big. Drinking mate in front of the yerba mate momument in Pilar.  Some vultures are feeding off a carcass. A garza blanca (white goose) in the wetlands. Timmy loves the camera and he took over 700 photos on this trip ...and that is not an exaggeration....

Let us give you a little background.  Ever since we learned that peanuts originate from Paraguay (and surrounding nations), we wanted to plant them.  This marks our fourth year planting peanuts. Our first year we were ecstatic to harvest about 28 lbs of nuts.  Here's little Timmy helping spreading our first nuts to dry in the sun.  In the early years, we shelled our own peanuts.  Later, we paid our neighbor children and teens to help us.  However, each year our production has steadily increased.  This year we are hoping to harvest over 1500 lbs (700 kilos) of peanuts.  We've discovered that on average, a person can shell 3.3 lbs (1.5 kilos) of peanuts per hour.  This is 1.5 kilo of peanuts that takes one hour to shell by hand. This would represent 466 hours of shelling.  At a minimum wage cost of $1.71/hour (6875 G using current exchange rate of 4,000) we will spend $800 on shelling alone. We quickly discovered how inefficient an...

Today we started harvesting our peanuts (almost an acre) that we planted 7 months ago.    Look at the soil, loaded with peanuts! Here is Sonia, one of our students with me during harvest.   Our plan is to process the peanuts into peanut butter and elaborate other peanut-based products for our institute, so that ICCI can be self-supporting and the students can learn about micro-enterprise. We'll be posting more on our mini-industry. Our next step is to dry and store the peanuts. If you have any suggestions of names for our peanut butter brand, we're looking for ideas!

We are so happy to have our camera back!  So, to show evidence of how excited we are to have a camera and to experience the beauty of the changing seasons....here are a few early signs from our yard that spring is on its way! Brazilian Walking Iris Cattleya Orchid We have had tons of rain lately, to Timmy's delight...it makes great mud for his trucks to plow through! Tomato plants Lilies Passion fruit flower An avocado tree that grew out from our compost pile Prickly pear after the rain Our garden Another bright-colored lily The eucalyptus sheds its winter bark A magnolia about ready to open The balsam tree and its fruit   Freesias welcome visitors with their fragrance at the front gate