…to me! Tuesday I turned the big 24! We had a fun little party at the house, and David even made me a cake! He bought me a pretty little plant holder with the plants. The first start to a garden that I will someday have.

Our lady’s class on Tuesday’s is going well. Carolina did a lesson about the different spiritual gifts. She encouraged us to look for our gifts and then put them into practice (don’t just wait to be asked). We also talked about not thinking you weren’t as good as another because you didn’t have a gift that they did, or couldn’t do something as well as they could.

We had three baptisms yesterday!!! What a great way to start the campaign. William and his wife, Maria, met us through cutting coffee on the farm during the harvest. They were some of our best cutters, and we asked William to stay on with us to help with other work for the farm. They are a really neat couple because they don’t fall into the normal traps of the poor people here. For example, when they had to move to another city, William saved up two months of pay because he knew it would take some time to find a job and get settled. Most would claim it is impossible to save because they live day to day, but he’s proof that where there’s a will, there’s a way! I also think they will be a great help through their example in parenting. Majuri was also baptized. She is the daughter of one of our coffee harvesters (also another man who stayed on to continue working with us). She has been coming to all the services, including the ladies class.

Please keep us in your prayers as we continue with the campaign.

Oops, forgot to mention that we had to do the baptisms in the river for lack of water, so we also got to have a fun time swimming and playing. I put up tons of pictures today!

Maria’s Baptism

Our car’s getting it’s oil changed again, so free internet! Yeah!!
David and I were able to do tons of things for our residential visas today. It turns out we have everything done that could be done in the states, so today we spent getting official copies and such. We had to go to the American Embassy to get official copies of our birth certificates and police records. Those four sheets cost us $90!! Rediculous. Then we had to go to the Nicaraguan Foreign Relations office to authenticate the authenticated copies. They only cost us about $3.60 though. Oh, plus we had to go pay to authenticate the authenticated copies at the bank, because the Foreign Relations office doesn’t take money. That equals a lot of cab fare (since our truck was in the shop). All that we lack is a health certificate and a letter from the “Church of Christ in Nicaragua”, and then the waiting begins. It really hasn’t been as hard as some people have made it out to be. But, we aren’t done yet…

Next Thursday we start our gospel meeting that will last until Sunday. Now members of the church will be helping us invite friends, family, and neighbors, as well as go door knocking with us. Please pray for this effort, that we will have a large response and many souls brought to Christ.

I put a picture up of a painting they have in the Managuan airport. It shows the whole coffee process, from the woman cutting the coffee, to measuring, to the background scenery. The only problem is that they are measuring, but with no sack to put the measured coffee in. Oh well, it can’t be perfect. I hope the picture turns out well online. Some day we hope to have a mural like that in our house.

We’re alive!! We have been so busy since we got home. That means I have lots to tell, and a little time to tell it.

We’ve been working on putting up a fence around the back stretch of the farm. It is the only area we didn’t get to before the harvest. It is working out great, because we had some areas with too much shade for the coffee, so we are eliminating the shade and using the wood for posts. The type of wood we use “sticks.” That’s to say that each post will take root and become it’s own tree. This gives us a real pretty tree line around the farm and makes the fence more secure.

We also have a group of workers who are cleaning up the farm (cutting the weeds basically). It got a little overgrown during the harvest and our weeks in the states. Once that is done, we start pruning. We hired a “coffee engineer” who comes out a few times a week to tell us what to do and how to do it. There is one area of old coffee that we are cutting back to about a foot or so tall. This will take a year to produce (no harvest next year), but will produce better in the years to come. It’s hard to decide exactly what to do, because the plants all need to be cut back, but there goes all the harvest! So for the areas that aren’t so old, we will cut off the new growth on top, so the plant grows out and not up, and get rid of all but 2 main vertical branches. This will let the plant spread out and each branch can produce more, because it doesn’t have to compete.

The ideal life of a coffee plant is this:
From the planting of the seed, the plant may produce the 2nd year, but it takes until the 3rd year to make full production.
About the 6th year, you want to cut the trunk to about 1 1/2 feet. It will take 1 year to reach full harvest again.
About the 12th year, you will cut the plant slightly above the last cut. 1 year for harvest again.
The 18th year you cut slightly below the first cut. The is the last successful cut you can make on a plant. It should have about 6 more years of good harvest.
During the inbetween years, you just prune the tips, and eliminate any vertical branches that may grow up, leaving only 2-3 main branches.

Hope you enjoyed that lesson!