Luke giggles, taco salad, and random church and neighborhood news

Josh took 2 of his 3 exams this week for his (second) master's degree. Did I mention he already has a 4 year master's degree? Anyway, because he was studying so much, we brought lunch and a much-needed giggle break to him.

Evidently, Luke was not amused.

Luke loves having things on his head. He likes to balance them and then shake his head. I like to facilitate the activity.

I'd be lying if I didn't tell you how proud of myself I am. I have been looking at this recipe in Better Homes and Gardens for YEARS, thinking smugly to myself, that would never work. Well, alas, we find ourselves in a place that doesn't do Mexican food. So..here goes:

Step 1: Make taco meat and salsa.

Step 2: Fry the tortillas in 2 inches of cooking oil.

Step 3: Press down on the center of the tortilla while it fries, for maybe a minute.

Step 4: Let them drip on paper towels.

Step 5: Admire your handiwork and think how cool this will look on your blog.

Step 7: Make a taco salad with all your faves!

Yes, I know, I am amazing. I can hear Mike Malone saying, "Let another man's mouth praise you."

Anyway, today was amazing- 68 degrees!!!!! Hottest day of the year- by far!

It has been interesting in our complex recently. I kid you not when I say we live in the ghetto. It's not dangerous, just kind of a melting pot of Scottish, Polish, Muslim, and Malones. So, I don't mean to be anything other than informative, but this is a poor area. Probably no surprise, but that means a lot of broken homes and single moms. We definitely do not fit the profile of the average person living here. Having pretty much come from the lap of luxury, it was very strange to find ourselves here. Litter everywhere, language dripping from and cigarettes practically affixed to every mouth, regardless of age, and many, many parentless children, running around unsupervised. I have mentioned before that Josh takes our kids out most evenings as I finish up dinner. The nicer weather has drawn out the entire neighborhood, and I have been shocked to see how many kids want to talk to him/us. Once again, our own children- pale white, blonde, and blue-eyed, with funny accents- have attracted a lot of attention. Currently, our neighborhood friends are: Leah, Alisha, Jade, Fatima, Adam, Jessica, Callum, Cameron, and Lauren. We have started building relationships with their parents as we see them. Josh had a great talk with Fatima's dad (nominally Muslim, though his wife is covered, as are all the women) the other day about our church and its current issue-

side bar: the denomination (The Church of Scotland- Scottish Presbyterian) has a division (no actual divide has happened yet) because it just ordained and gave its blessing to an openly gay man (who I believe left his wife and children, allegedly amicably, as if that makes it better) that publicly shares the parish with his partner. The argument is that the plethora of Scripture against homosexuality does not apply because, at that time, they did not understand a committed, loving relationship between 2 adults. Ridiculous logic, in my opinion, and very patronizing to that culture, as if we could come up with something new (see Ecclesiastes). So, our church was 1 of 12 that filed a complaint against that decision- crazy week, but basically our complaint was not strong enough to overturn the ruling and the media has run with it out of excitement. Our church and others like it will have to decide how to proceed- whether or not to leave the denomination. We own our building, which is huge, but our poor pastor would lose his pension, I imagine, if we were to leave. Pray for us as our church proceeds.

So, Fatima's dad was curious what Christians thought about this issue and Josh was able to talk with him for a while. We now are more welcomed by the Muslim ladies in the area, who no longer avoid eye contact, wondering if we are racist, as many of the poor Scotsmen are. :( The Scottish girls seemed awed by the fact that we are married and have been married longer than our children have been alive.

Pray for us as we try to cultivate more relationships here in the Powis area.