Bowl number 167

Sunday Marlen and her whole family came over to visit. Keylor and Ronaldo, her two youngest kids are on vacation so Marlen and them are staying here for a week to visit (just like last year!). When they arrived, Luis, Ruben, Ronaldo, Keylor and I all played Frisbee in the front yard in the rain for a long time. It was a lot of fun. None of them had ever played Frisbee before so it was a total mess. It had been raining all day so the ground was really soft and we ended up falling and sliding all over the place while everyone else stayed inside and watched through the window. The rest of the evening we spent visiting and eating until Celimo and the rest of the family left to go home. It is so much fun having the little house filled with people, all talking and laughing. That night we had: Alicia, Otoniel, Lilian and I, plus Geovanny, Julio and Marlen, plus Celimo and Marlen’s five children all sitting around one little living room.
Monday morning, I slept in until after 8:00!!. Actually I woke up at 6:00 or so to help chop up onions and cilantro for breakfast but then I went back to bed until everyone else got up. When Otonile the whole house was still either sleeping or in pajamas. Ronaldo and I slept on a foam pad in the living room, Geovanny and Lilian in the outside bedroom and Marlen and Keylor in “my” room. After a lazy breakfast I threw on some clothes and went with Otoniel to repair the chiquero (pig stable). We filled and cemented wholes in the floors and we replaced and patched parts of the fence. Before going to herd the cows back to the pasture next to the station, we sat down and ate the cookies and juice boxes that Alicia packed for us. Hahaha. I ended up being thankful for those cookies because as it turned out, our bull, Rayo, was not with the rest of the cows and we had to hike up to the very top of the mountain to get him. It was a beautiful hike and I got to see all of the upper part of the farm that no one uses anymore except for cow pastures. It was gorgeous. The views were the best you get because we were above everything, plus all of the pastures and trees looked really pretty in the misty, light rain. Once we went to the very last, highest pasture, we found him there with another herd of cows. Once we found him, we had to attempt to chorale him away from the other cows and through the gate three or four times. We had to run back and forth, leaping through knee-high grass with sticks yelling and waving our arms. We eventually coaxed him through the gate and headed home. As usual, the afternoon rains gave me a chance to nap for a while and have my afternoon cake and coffee in order to recharge enough to play a muddy game of soccer in the front yard with Eduardito and Ronaldo.