Prescription: Popsicles

Our son had surgery last week to remove an extra tooth growing in his upper gum.  If it hadn’t been causing trouble with its neighbors, I might have suggested we leave it in there just in case.  Isaiah might fall in that 30% of children that knock out, fracture or otherwise injure their hard-working chompers.  Always nice to have a spare, right?

Anyway, after the procedure, the surgeon sent him home with a prescription for a pain killer and lots of popsicles.  Fortunately, I was well prepared because our family consumes ice pops like a Ford Excursion guzzles petrol.  <That’s for you, Anthony>  And although, these frozen treats are great on a hot day, the store-bought kind consist mostly of sugar, food dyes and scary ingredients I don’t know how to pronounce.  Granted…I’m talking about the store-bought kind in my price range.

So we started making our own, and found out that if you have a blender, they’re really fun to make and eat.  You can freeze the pops in special molds, small plastic cups and sticks, or even ice cube trays and toothpicks.  Here are some of our favorite experiments…

“You Can’t Eat Strawberries Without Bananas”

(must say with a Swedish accent)

• 3 cups chopped strawberries
• 3 bananas
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1 to 2 tablespoons honey or raw agave nectar (to taste)

Blend strawberries and bananas together until smooth.  Add lemon juice and honey and blend for a few more seconds.  Pour into pop molds.

 

Peaches N’ Cream

• 3 cups chopped, peeled peaches
• 1 cup vanilla soy milk

Blend ingredients until smooth and pour into pop molds.

 

Chocolate Banana

• 3 bananas
• 2 cups dark chocolate almond milk

Blend ingredients until smooth and pour into pop molds.

 

Mango Mint

• 2 very ripe mangos chopped (or squished)
• 4 chopped, peeled peaches or nectarines (use that disappointing fruit you bought on sale at the grocery store)
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh mint leaves

Blend ingredients until smooth and pour into pop molds.

 

Summertime

• 2 cups chopped strawberries
• juice of 2-3 limes
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh mint leaves
• 4 tablespoons honey
• 1 cup water
• 1 cup ice

Blend ingredients until smooth and pour into pop molds.

This last recipe is our family’s favorite and is based on Anni Daulter’s “Pure Sunshine” recipe in her book, Ice Pop Joy.  I just like the lime juice better than the lemon she suggests.  Anni has lots of other great popsicle recipes.  I highly recommend, “Happiness”, “Heavenly”, and “Blackberry Swirl”.  Oh, and “Peanut Butter & Chocolate Classic” and….

Tok Sori

During 2010, the Ukarumpa center (where we live in Papua New Guinea) and neighboring village were under significant criminal activity—house break-ins and invasions on an almost nightly basis. Of course, it was a very stressful time for the local people and our colleagues alike, but God was at work nonetheless.

Over Easter 2011, one of the village pastors conducted an evangelistic crusade. As a result, the criminals wanted to apologize to the director of our organization in PNG. The village pastors recognized, however, that the young men would still need to make a public apology to all the people who were impacted by their former criminal activities. Praise God that public apology took place on July 2, 2011.

On that Saturday a number of our colleagues went to the neighboring village. The local pastors prayed and preached from God’s Word. The former criminals presented a drama that demonstrated how they had turned their lives over to Jesus, and they closed with a song that spoke of Jesus as being their only friend. Then each young man publicly apologized for his crimes and the hurt that he had caused. A few made a point to apologize directly to the owners of the houses they had broken into.

The village community then gave a tremendous gift of garden food—their traditional demonstration of love. It took two vehicles to bring the gift back to Ukarumpa center where it was presented to all our colleagues during the Sunday morning meeting.

The worship service that morning overflowed with testimonies of how God was at work in their own hearts! Some of our colleagues recognized and repented of their lack of faith and belief in how God works through prayer. Some commented on a lack of balance between justice and grace and forgiveness by the missionaries at the Ukarumpa center.

But as the director stated in his report of the recent events in PNG—”We are all on a journey” of spiritual growth—those serving in PNG, the Papua New Guineans themselves, and even those here at home who support the work of Bible translation through gifts, prayers and encouragement. Our prayer is that this story of revival in PNG will be an encouragement to you as you make that journey.

*Adapted story and photos taken from a report by Tim Lithgow, director of SIL-PNG.  The pidgin term “tok sori” means repentance, or an apology—literally “talk sorry”.

Cherishing the Ordinary

Thursday was just one of those days where I had to stop and thank God for making it ordinary.  Ordinary doesn’t happen often in our family.  We really don’t do normal around here much.  Probably because “here” changes so often.  Nothing very special happened yesterday….

In the morning Claire and Isaiah participated in the summer activities held for the missionary kids here at JAARS.  They meet with other kids to play games, do crafts, learn Bible verses and swim.  Now that Isaiah is riding a two-wheeler without training wheels, they go by bike.  I think that’s one of those “rites of passage” for a boy isn’t it?  Some pretty Big Stuff parked his bike in front of the activity building that morning!

Jon also went very eagerly off to play work at the aviation hangar.  A spankin’ brand-new Kodiak airplane sits in its shade while “Mr. Project Coordinator” happily oversees its preparations for Papua New Guinea.  It’s even got that “new car” smell.  I know.  I checked.  And we know what that smell does to the male species—suddenly the whole world is a much brighter place.  <grin>

Mommy meanwhile enjoyed the quiet alone with the Bible and a cup of Scottish Breakfast Tea.  Time for reflection on a chapter in Matthew turned out to be very helpful when a friend called later to chat.  (I love it when God arranges real life application of something I just read in his Word.)

I washed dishes, wrote e-mails, and fetched children.  We all ate lunch together.  The kids and I played games.  I refereed bickering matches, picked up dirty laundry, looked for missing toys, helped Claire make chocolate chip cookies, and ate too many.  We apologized to the neighbor boy, washed four very dirty feet, watched PBS Kids, read bedtime stories and listened to the thunder.

At the end of the day, (after kissing two watermelon-scented foreheads goodnight), I determined to record this day and save it under “Days I Want to Cherish”.  It wasn’t perfect.  It wasn’t all fun, and it definitely wasn’t spectacular.  It was, however, blissfully ordinary and for that I find I’m very thankful.

“You Would Never Make It”

Excerpt from our June 2011 newsletter

“Begin walking before first light, and walk hard all day long. Spend the night in a small village in the bush. Awake early to spend the second day walking up and down rough trails in the mountainous rainforest of Papua New Guinea. For an Onobasulu man in Walagu village, this is the only way to get to the nearest road. If he takes his family, it will take longer.

One such man looked Beverly Mosley in the eye and said, “You would never make it.” She smiled and answered, “That is right. That is why the JAARS airplane brings me and picks me up.”

The Onobasulu people are excited about working with Beverly to translate God’s Word into their language. But the only way she can get out to this remote village in the Southern Highlands Province is by mission aviation. She travels by plane with her work materials, food, and other personal supplies. “Believe me,” she says, “you would not want to try walking with your study Bible, or a stack of literacy materials, for a couple days through the rainforest.”*

The aircraft pictured above is one of two Kodiak aircraft that serves Bible translation programs like the one taking place among the Onobasulu people. The Kodiak’s specific design makes it very useful for mission work in rugged conditions.

You may remember that Jon helped install some modifications on the second Kodiak before it was ferried to PNG last October. Soon a third Kodiak will be arriving at JAARS to receive these same modifications. Jon has the opportunity to spend the next several weeks helping get this plane ready for Papua New Guinea. Working at JAARS is not our ministry assignment, but Jon will be helpful to both the JAARS and PNG aviation departments. This opportunity also provides Jon with some good experience working on the very aircraft he’ll be maintaining in PNG.

We’ve put thousands of miles on our van this past year visiting friends and churches to talk about our work with Wycliffe. God has given us a wonderful team of people who support us prayerfully and financially. We thank God for them every day. At the same time, we plead with God to complete our team. We had hoped to leave for Papua New Guinea by July, but we still need about $769 in monthly support. Our new goal is to leave by January and to reach this goal we need new opportunities to share about our ministry in the next months. Please pray that God will help us find these opportunities and bring in the needed support. That is our highest priority. In the meantime, we are grateful for the opportunity to support Bible translation by helping prepare this Kodiak aircraft for service in PNG.

*Photo and adapted story by Beverly Mosley. Reprinted with permission from JAARS.org.

He Rides 2

For months, Isaiah has wanted to cruise the parking lots on 2-wheels like the big boys.  We’ve attempted to take the training wheels off his bike, but he couldn’t get past the fear factor.  Then today I noticed that Isaiah was balancing really well on the neighbor boy’s scooter.  He was even turning corners without putting his feet down.  Jon decided to help him try once more, and this time Isaiah held his balance on the first attempt.  Yeah!  That scooter was the perfect stepping stone to 2-wheel independence!

S.S. Badger

On our way from Wisconsin to Michigan, we took a short cut across Lake Michigan on a real steamship.  The S.S. Badger is the lone survivor among coal-fired steamships in the US, and is the largest carferry to ever cross Lake Michigan.  She makes the 60 mile trek from Manitowoc, WI to Ludington, MI in about 4 hours.

That means you have 4 hours to explore the decks, watch movies, color the wall in the playroom, tour the ship’s museum, eat snacks, play bingo or all of the above.  So…drive through Chicago traffic or sip coffee on the lower deck of the S.S. Badger?  Hmmm.…

Last Day of School

Today Claire and Isaiah finished Grade 1 and Preschool respectively.  Our study theme for the year was “Exploring God’s World”.  We’re very proud of them for sticking to their studies despite all the traveling we’ve done this past year.  Isaiah’s accomplishments include learning to recognize the numbers 1-10 and practicing the sounds of the alphabet.  Claire continues to improve in her reading and writing skills.  She can now read several Dr. Seuss books all on her own, and authored several short stories.  They both successfully memorized 36 Bible verses, and probably know more about US geography than most kids their age. <smile>  But if you ask them what their favorite class is, more than likely they’ll answer--“PE”!  (Physical Education)  Of course, that’s the one Daddy teaches….