Project 365, Week 49 & 50

Finally home, sweet home, where we have internet. Such as it is :)  Better than none at all, though!

Since we were in Santa Rosa, sans internet, last weekend, I'm catching up by including two weeks of P365 photos.

We drove out there in our "new" car. We're so thankful for the Lord's provision in this area! We bought this 1994 Ford Galaxy from the same family that sold us our Fiat Uno :) 

It has the requisite power steering (main reason we sold the Fiat) and, as an added bonus, it had already been converted to run on GNC (natural gas). This is a HUGE blessing, as we can get about 150 km on a tank of GNC, at the cost of about $5.40 U.S.! Woot! Even with the big tank for GNC in the trunk, we still have more room back there than we had in the Fiat.

I sadly have no photos from our first few days in Sta. Rosa as we were busy with company (fellow missionaries). Both couples were getting ready to leave for furlough and we had a nice time together, catching up.

Toward the end of the week we decided to drive to Yacanto, a little town about 30 km from Sta. Rosa, and then continued on to the even smaller village of Durazno, and the scenery was breathtaking! I have several photos from our expedition to share with you:

Can you imagine living out there, with the high sierras in the background?

This llama was wandering around loose behind the little gas station in Yacanto

I thought this gate was so picturesque

We stopped for a picnic...

...beside this river.

It was an absolutely lovely, wonderfully relaxing day! One of two we had during our ten days in Sta. Rosa :)  The rest of the time we were busy working our way through a rather long list of repairs and maintenance issues that had to be addressed before summer renters begin arriving. We are praying for a sufficient number of renters to cover the annual expenses for the house, plus enough to pay for having the house re-wired. There were some problems while we were gone, and it's getting dangerous to leave it as is; we use a lot more electrical items today than when my in-laws built the house about 40 years ago.

But we did take time most days for a walk (when it wasn't raining, which it did a LOT). I like how the bark on a eucalyptus tree peels off like this:

The next photo is more for family members. This is the big new warehouse type store in Sta. Rosa!

It's on Route 5, toward Belgrano. It reminds us a bit of a Sam's Club (although not as big). They sell everything from dry goods to household items, cleaning supplies, dairy products and meat. 

I mentioned our car can run on GNC. Here's a picture of us filling up:

Gas stations require that everyone get out of the car before they start filling the tank. Although not every station sells GNC, quite a few of them do, so it's not usually a problem getting it. But sometimes the lines for GNC are really, REALLY long. Reminds me a bit of the lines back in the 70s during the oil embargo.

The day before we left Sta. Rosa, Sergio and Cristina came to visit. They're the young couple we allowed to use the back part of the house while we were gone, and here they are by their former "front" door:

We had a nice time catching up and sharing photos. They work with Word of Life Argentina, and had gone to a facility the organization owns down in Neuquen, to help clean up ash and they had lots of photos from that. The volcano that erupted is in Chile, but all the ash ended up in Argentina! There's an inch to several inches across a wide swath of the country. It's wreaking havoc on the tourism industry in that province, and as a result, we are seeing more tourists in our area.

This week we were able to get back into our house, arriving Wednesday evening. Surprised to find virtually the entire contents of our house (minus furniture) had been packed into boxes and stored in the garage, we have been busy unpacking, washing things, and putting them back where they belong. It's like moving, all over again.

I'm happy to report that after two days plus a few hours this morning, the kitchen is back in order! We took time out yesterday afternoon to go ahead and carry all the boxes in, figure out where they went, and then put them there. Here's a few photos of our house in the throes of unpacking...

living room

study/sewing room

spare room

No photos of the kitchen since I was too busy trying to find what I needed so I could prepare and serve something besides sandwiches.

While I've been busy unpacking, Ivan tackled the yard. Keep in mind that things always look worse before they look better...

The yard, especially around the walls, was/is an overgrown mess. And, as you can see, another branch of the peach tree broke; that makes a branch per year -- pretty soon there won't be any branches left :(  It's going to take him several days to get the yard back in shape.

While he was outside working he noticed a commotion next door. Next thing I knew he was running in to grab the camera:

Those men actually got that pool up and over the roof from the front of the house! And you can't tell from the photo, but it's a two-story structure. Remember the house that was built right next to us? It is actually two townhouses and the pool is going into the backyard of one of them.

I can't even tell you how good it is to be home! And I'm sure it will be even better when everything is back in order. Now, not to make anyone jealous or anything :)  but I thought I'd share what the banner on weather.com looked like when I checked it a short time ago. I have our old hometown and our current hometown in my "saved locations".

I much prefer hot to cold, so while y'all sip hot cocoa and warm yourself beside the fire (or heating vent), I'll just go get another glass of ice water.