A welcome holiday

Today is a holiday in Paraguay.  The majority of the population is catholic and this date is very holy to them. They celebrate the Virgin of Caacupe. If you´re interested in more you can read here.
For us who have an evangelical faith, it´s a day off work and we are enjoying it. I finally went to search for my Christmas tree and found it under some dust and cobwebs. I dusted it all off and have managed to put it up. Haven´t decorated it yet, but at least it´s standing.
I also made some fudge puddles, which the girls and hubby love.

Foto: Taste of Home

The day started off so nice. It was cloudy and at mid morning it started to rain and rained almost till noon. The weather stayed warm and we are enjoying this wonderful day. Finally it´s starting to feel a bit like Christmas.
The city is doing it´s part too. They decorated our main street lights with some beautiful angels and stars.

 And then there´s an old telephone tower that is not in use anymore. Someone had the idea to decorate it like a Christmas tree. This tower is 211 meters (692 feet)  high, so it´s visible from far away.

I have not seen it myself yet, but here´s a pic from someone´s fb page. I like that people here are finally getting into the spirit of decorating more with lights for Christmas.

This week has been really busy. It started off with our work Christmas dinner on Monday night. Then I had to go to Asuncion on Tuesday for a training course for my work. This was supposed to be held by the government. When we got there we went for some lunch and around 2 pm the course was supposed to start. When we arrived at the destination where the training was supposed to be held, there was some other event going on and they just informed us, that the date of our course had been changed to the 14th. We should come then!!! We saw other people arrive and leave and no one had received any notification!!
UN believable. But NOT surprising....
So we had to drive back home (4 1/2 hours one way).

In the evening when I got home I helped my sister get my parents clothes and things ready, because the next day (yesterday) my parents moved into the retirement home.
Since we are all members of a Coop we have private hospitals, schools and retirement homes. This means much better care for our elders, than is normal in this country. The employees all speak German and the people who live there are well taken care of. The only thing that would hold people off, from wanting to  live there is that they have to admit that they are not as strong as they think they are. My dad is ok with it now. (I think) He has given in and admitted that they can help him to become stronger better there. My mom was still not very happy, but had to concede, that if dad was living there she would move with him. We are doing everything for them to make the move easier and less stressful. We hope and pray that they will come to like it there.
To put their mind at ease, with what will happen to their house, Michelle will be living there in the mean time.
She will keep an eye on things and water their plants and so on. They were happy about that and we hope that after a few months they will be stronger and can move home again. Time will tell.

For now things should be a bit easier and we are thankful for that.
And we have an empty house again, at least for a little while.

This much for now. Hope you all have a great Thursday.