Our last group of new missionaries for 2010

These four young men were very excited as we picked them up at the airport. They are so enthusiastic and eager to start serving their mission. We feel it a blessing to serve with them.

Another year and another birthday.

Many of our missionaries sent me a personal note for my birthday. Sister Boulter from our office, took the notes and make a huge birthday card for me. It was a pleasant surprise and a nice keepsake.

Our returning missionaries.

Time is going by so fast, and we realize it every time we say good bye to more missionaries. We had five North American missionaries return home and two Latin missionaries. One from Bolivia, and one from Peru. We wish them well.

Cooking on the grill.

We have never used this grill before, but tonight we enjoyed the end results. This grill is in the garden behind our building. It looked pretty old and falling apart, but it worked just find for this meal. Elder Soria from Bolivia, wanted to cook this parilla for his fellow missionaries that were going home. It was very, very tasty.

What a fiest.

We were all very grateful to Elder Soria for his talent of cooking. This was a fiest for a king.

The last supper.

The final result was very tasty. All the missionaries ended their mission with a delicious meal thanks to Elder Soria.

The waiting game.

We are always waiting for something. We sometimes are waiting for missionaries, sometimes for airplanes, but we are getting good at it. I think we have it perfected.

A beautiful Colombian flower.

Just could not pass up a Kodak moment with this beautiful flower. Colombia has so many beautiful flowers that we have never seen before.

A good friend here.

Quijote is a special friend in our household. I guess he is hearing all about our church here.

The beautiful Colombian flag.

We saw this display of many flags and had to take a picture. We will always have good memories of this flag of Colombia . We see it in many locations.

What is tagua?

We have some palm trees here in Colombia that grow these big pods about the size of a soccer ball that are called tagua. We have heard that they are often found around Yopal. We hope to find someone that can show us where these trees are.

Looking inside the pod to find the tagua seeds.

This is what the pod of the tagua looks like when you get inside. Many things are made from the tagua. It is very hard, but they are called seeds. It is a big business to make jewelry out of it as well as Christmas nativities. I have a little nativity made from tagua on the blog.

An old colonial pueblo.

Villa de Leyva is one of the many old colonial pueblos. The buildings are always painted white with green wood trim. Here there were many beautiful flowers hanging from the balcony. The streets usually are cobble stone and they are very old. We were here for my birthday. At night, they had a wonderful fire works display. One of the best I have ever seen.

Gardens among the stone streets.

Villa de Leyve is an interesting pueblo. The streets are all large stones, but there were many beautiful gardens near the streams that went through the middle of the pueblo.

The path for the nobility.

These old and big stones have been in this pueblo for around 500 years. You can see in the middle a pathway. This path was for the nobility to walk on. We don't think we were nobility, but we liked walking on them because they were bigger and smoother than the other stones.

An old flour mill in Villa de Leyve.

This old pueblo was the center for milling the grains that were raised in the area. Today this old mill is a unique hotel. The gardens are beautiful.

The mall in Chia.

Some of the malls, or centro comercials, have life size nativities. This mall had an exceptional display and won many awards. It is so nice to be able to see nativities in public places.

The Christmas helpers.

Even Papa Noel has Christmas helpers. Elder and Sister Boulter's children sent a tie for each of our Elders. Papa Noel found some beautiful scarfs for the Sisters.

Papa Noel's gift for each missionary.

This was a busy time of the year getting ready for a visit from Papa Noel.

The nativities in the mission home.

A Christmas cookie exchange.

We hosted at the mission home, a Christmas brunch and cookie exchange for the Senior missionary sisters and the North American women in the Nogal ward. Most of the women had gone home before we remembered to take the photo.

Presenting the flag of Colomblia.

On our way through Boyaca, we stopped to watch the military in action, but on a friendly way.

El Puente Boyaca.

This was the bridge where Colombia's last battle for independence took place. The military was planning for a big program in two days. We saw the performance without the thousands of people.

Green houses for the beautiful flowers.

Colombia has many beautiful flowers and to protect the growing delicate flowrs, the country is full of many hundreds of green houses. When traveling to Duitama, we pass many of these covered green houses.

A fun way to travel.

This is a tour bus that we sometimes see around Bogota, but more often in the outer pueblos. The people sometimes sing and dance while traveling on these buses.

The cooking of the Colombia areapas.

When we travel through Boyaca, we pass many little shops or tiendas that make and sell arepas. These are made from flour, water, salt, and not much more. Sometimes it is corn meal.

Arepas are a staple in Colombia

The people of Colombia eat these arepas like we in the US eat toast in the morning.

So good on a cold Boyaca morning.

Our new arrivals.

Once again, we welcomed some new missionaries into our mission. They were excited and ready to go to work. We have them from Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru.

Greeting the troops.

Our area president, Elder Marcos B. Nash, came to Bogota and stayed in our house and conducted a meeting with out zone leaders in Bogota and ate dinner with all of them.

Friends saying good-bye.

These sisters were saying Good-bye to one of their sister missionaries. They love being together and giving support. It is a real sisterhood.

One rose among the thorns.

When the missionaries go home, we have a special dinner in our home to honor them. This month, Hermana Avendano was surprised to arrive at our home and find we had fourteen zone leaders in our house along with the area president to join in her going home dinner.

Hermana Avendano returned home.

Sister Avendano was our only missionary to return home this month to Peru. We will miss her cheerful personality. We loved working with her.

It looked good, and we were hungry.

Last week, I went with Sister Boulter to look for some Christmas supplies for our office, and we got hungry. We saw a little restaurant with this meat cooking over the coals. They often do this and it is delicious. This place had a strange name. It was called Chiguiro. We didn't think too much about the name, but when we went in I noticed all the little napkin holders had a wooden shape of a little rodent. The waiter brought a plate for us to try the meat. When we asked what it was, he said Chiguiro. I looked at the napkin holders and asked is it a rodent. He said, "si, pero muy grande." I wanted to run, but Sister Boulter took her piece and said it was good. Okay we ordered and tried the Chiguiro. It was a new experience. I don't know that I am excited to run back and try it again.

A rodent!!!

This is a photo of a Chiguiro (with 2 dots over the u). They say it is the largest rodent in the world. I can not believe that I ate a rodent. They live in the water a good part of their life, and are about the size of a small pig. In fact the meat tasted a lot like pork.

Ready for a hike anyone?

Last Monday was a holiday in Colombia, so we, along with the Elder and Sister Boulter, and Elder and Sister Peterson, set out to climb the trail to Guatavita lagoon. This is supposedly where the legend of El Dorado got started. We were prepared for the rain, but luckily it did not rain until we were all through with the hike and waiting for the bus to arrive to take us back to our car.

The beautiful flowers along the trail.

The trail was very pretty with all the colorful Colombian flowers. Notice the green rolling hills in the background. Colombia is a beautiful green country with spectacular scenery.

Now this is a beautiful mushroom.

This mushroom was growing along the side of our trail. It was so beautiful that it looked artificial.

A large slice in the mountain.

The Spaniards, in their attempt to drain the lagoon had two thousand slaves with cups working day and night to try to scoop out the water so the Spaniards could find the gold that had been thrown into the lagoon by the native Indians. With little success, they then took out a large slice of the side of the lagoon to try to drain the water to get to the gold. They took it down several feet, but there is still a lot of water in the lagoon.

Reaching the summit.

We had a lovely climb to the top and heard the story of the legend of El Dorado. There are many legends of El Dorado, but this sounds like it was the real thing. The guide told us the Spaniards took out about 10 ton of gold from this Guatavita lagoon. Some gold pre-Columbian figurines were found in the water and are now in the Gold Museum. The legend is that the Musca tribe felt this lagoon was sacred. Every year right before the harvest the people of the tribe would climb up to the lagoon with their gold offerings. The lagoon was sacred, so the common people could not look at it. They would stand around the edge of the lagoon but looking away from it. A man would be sellected and he would put honey all over his body and then they would put cold dust on him. He would jump in to the water and swim around while washing off the honey and gold. When he was clean, he would climb out and they would blow a horn and then the people would throw in their gold offerings into the water without looking at it. This went on for several hundreds of years. The story has it that some peple have died in the lagoon trying to get to the gold. It is now protected by the government and no one can get in the water.

Tis the season to decorate the Christmas tree.

Luckily, our two assistants came to help me set up the Christmas tree. As usual, there was problems with the lights. Bogota is coming alive with the Christmas decorations. We have ornaments with the photos of all of our 17 grandchildren. We love looking at their angelic faces. President Hacking is sitting in his chair directing the work.

Local Garbage collector.

We have the normal garbage collectors in the big trucks, but before they arrive, many people go through the garbage to see what they can use or sell. This man had his cart full of things he had scavaged. Many times they leave a very big mess all around the garbage bags.

Choir concert from Bucaramanga choir.

Two stakes from Bucaramanga join together to form a wonderful choir. Part of the choir came to Bogota to attend the temple, and while in Bogota they performed a concert in the Alhambra chapel. Alhambra is one of the oldest churches in Bogota.

Folkloric dancers from Bucaramanga.

After the choir concert, some of the group from Bucaramanga performed some forkloric dances. Of course we enjoyed being in the photo as well.