Saturday Post -- 08/06/2013

For a good number of reasons, I, Amanda, am typing the blog this morning. And I don’t know what to say…I think I shall start with bagels. I made bagels…finally. I said I would months and months ago and I don’t think too many people had faith in me…but I did, I believed. It was about a week and a half ago, and although Craig seemed to enjoy the end product he obviously didn’t think it special enough to include in last week’s blog. He asked me what he should include in the blog last weekend and I said, “My bagels” and then he didn’t. It was sad.

If anyone were to ask me what my favourite breakfast is, my answer would be Tim Horton’s sesame seed bagels with herb and garlic cream cheese (especially from the drive-thru) with a large green tea. The green tea offsets the quantity of calories in the amazing amount of cream cheese that Tim Horton’s applies to its bagels (in my mind it does anyway). I also grew up eating bagels for lunch…I disliked home made sandwiches for lunch because by the time lunchtime at school arrived the tomatoes and mayonnaise had soaked into the bread and made it soggy…and I couldn’t eat soggy sandwiches. I still can’t eat soggy sandwiches. So, my mom switched to bagels and cream cheese for lunch…and later we learned that sandwiches on bagels didn’t get soggy like normal bread, because of their chewiness. So, yummm…bagel sandwiches.

When I moved to Scotland we didn’t buy bagels as often because Craig told me they were more fattening than normal bread (not true -- well, kind of true -- the bagel itself is not more fattening, it’s the shocking amount of cream cheese that goes with it). But in Scotland, when I felt like it, I had the ability to buy bagels. There are no bagels in Trinidad. Three-and-a-half years I have lived here and I have not seen bagels. They might be available in Santa Cruz, but I have not seen or bought any. I have gone three-and-a-half years without bagels. Sometimes I look at the Philadelphia cream cheese in the speciality store sadly and think, “You’re just not worth it without bagels”. And then the Great British Bake Off taught me that bagel-making is not that hard. So last week, when there was time and I could be bothered, I made bagels.

I looked up two separate recipes online and made them both to compare and contrast, trying to find the recipe I liked the best -- and I think I have a pretty good idea of how I would go about making the bagels next time. I made a batch of cinnamon raisin and a batch of plain (although I egg-washed half the plain and added chopped garlic) and they were good. The cinnamon raisin ones were boiled for too long, but the taste was still good. And we had bagels and cream cheese and the next day we had bagel sandwiches. At one point I was so nostalgic for home I almost cried. And that’s my bagel-making story.

Okay, so after four paragraphs of bagels I’ll talk about some ministry related events -- I don’t know, maybe people find that more interesting.  Last Saturday was the Wii Night with the Youth Group. They had earned enough points to have a night playing Wii, so we set up two Wiis and a ping-pong table: one Wii had Mari Kart and Just Dance on it, which the kids lined up for, while the other one had a tournament with Wii Play mini-games which all the kids entered into.  They all seemed to have a good time. The next thing they can earn with another 5000 points is a “food party”. At the beginning we wanted to call it a pizza party, but then someone told us that the youth here don’t like pizza. Okay?!?! So, we said “food” and told them they could tell us what they wanted when they earned it. That’s going to be months away though -- it took them four months to earn their first 5,000 and we calculated they could do it in two. But we are having to deal with that lack of motivation that is inherent in adolescence. At 20,000 points, Craig and Elias (the church pastor) were going to get their heads shaved...never going to happen.

Tonight at Youth Group we’re starting a new series on worship, which Craig has organised. He’s also taking the first session on it -- the history of worship through the Bible -- and next week will be about worship nowadays and why we do what we do. That will be followed by small groups looking at 1 Samuel 15 and a worship night in early July full of various ways and activities in which we can worship God. Please be praying that the youth really understand that how we worship God is not culturally dependent, but it’s in our actions and in our obedience that transcends culture.

Today is really busy -- Saturdays always are. It is not helped by the fact that we have to water our garden every morning, which takes about 35-40 minutes, and no we don’t have a sprinkler. But there does seem to be growth, although I can’t tell if it is grass or weeds (this is why I shouldn’t be involved in things like this). And we have a mango tree now (and what I think might be two crab apple trees), however, we will have wait at least two years before there will be fruit... minimum. So I will still have to go to the fruit stall and buy mangos (when they are in season), but I shall refrain from buying crab apples as I do not know what to do with them (sigh). But before that, I have grocery shopping, kitchen organising, lunch, discipleship, Bible Explorers' Club and then Youth Group to deal with, so better get moving.

Prayer

• Craig as he speaks tonight at Youth Group on worship.
• Craig tomorrow morning as he visits another church to speak about and distribute more Emmaus distance-learning books.
• The kids in the youth group with whom we’re working, that they would take their faith seriously and grow to be strong men and women for Christ.
• For the family of our friends, Jerry and Georgina, who are mourning the recent loss of Jerry’s grandmother.

Praise

• For bagels!
• For how well Elizabeth and Grecia’s Mom (see last week's post) seems to be doing post-caesarean.
• For a successful Wii Night.

¡Que Dios les bendiga!

Craig & Amanda