Ladies' Luncheon, Island Style

 If you know me, you know that I love ladies' luncheons. I attended one this week at the far western end of the island. Getting there proved to be a bit challenging. I was glad that the rain stopped just before I left the house. It resumed while in route and then stopped again once I reached West Bay. I drove through the parking lot of Infinity Bay and was about to head up the hill to Lighthouse Point when I encountered this sight. Yes, an actual flagger! That's a novelty here. I kept waiting for that big truck hauling that even bigger earth moving machine. I soon realized that he was stuck in the mud. You can see the guys digging him out. Other women began to pile up behind me, all waiting to get up the hill. Finally, he was free and began to move down the hill. He was wider than his lane. By a lot. I had to back up. Which meant the other women had to back up. They managed to pull off to the side enough, but I had to back up more. And more. A little more, until I was finally back in Infinity's Bay parking lot. That became our ice breaker at the luncheon.

 We had about 20 women attended this monthly luncheon. It's been fun getting to know more people.
This luncheon was at Smugglers at the new Meridian development. It's in a fantastically beautiful spot with good swimming and snorkeling right off the beach. Unfortunately, the weather was not that cooperative. I do think this would be a wonderful place to take "our" girls to play.

This picture has been labeled the Roatan Betty Whites. Not sure I'm crazy about that title (although Betty White is one amazing woman). Last month's featured photo was of all the West Bay blondes who are a bit younger than the group above; we had to even it out. We all had a great time.

Monday Funday

 Yesterday we celebrated the 6th grade graduation of Hilda and Greicy. Don and I had decided to "gift" them with lunch and swimming when we couldn't think of another gift to take to their fiesta. I'm pretty sure they liked our gift best. They are part of the group of sponsored children that we and others support.  We invited Larry and Susan to join us. Susan tutors the girls and they are very comfortable around her.  I called Kent at Blue Bahia, told him what we wanted to do and asked if we could bring the girls to swim in his pool. He readily agreed. We had a great lunch and the girls put half of their lunches in boxes to take home (Kent gives large portions). Then they were ready to swim.

 Susan and I had picked up a couple of swimsuits from one of the second hand shops and she had a couple of others that had been donated by volunteers at the clinic. The girls took turns trying on the suits until they each found one that fit. They had such a good time in the water. We remembered that Hilda could swim and loved it, but were surprised to see Greicy take off swimming across the pool!
Hilda and Greicy are step-sisters and best friends. And very sweet girls.

 After awhile, they wanted to go out on the beach and sit in the sun and surf. I had to show them the outdoor shower where they could rinse off the sand before getting back in the pool. They liked that.

Miss Susan also got in the pool with them and managed to avoid most of the water fights. She did get a pretty good shower when a little four-year old girl dove into the pool right beside her and swam the length of the pool. We were all most impressed! The girls had a good time playing with the little girl and getting swimming tips from her. So funny.

When it was time to go, they wrapped the towels around them and with teeth chattering, climbed in the backseat of the car. Pretty soon they had their food boxes opened and were snacking on their leftovers. They had certainly burned a lot of calories in the pool and needed to refuel. We dropped them off at the road up to the colonia for their long climb up the hill to their house. Our car won't go up those terrible roads.

It was such a fun day. We'll have to print out some pictures to give them as a rememberance of a special time.

Love Letters

                                                                  Penny and Jeremy

Last night we got a bit of culture. Not the typical Honduran culture. The theatre kind of culture. We attended a dinner theatre performance of "Love Letters" starring our friend Jeremy Dyke (who is the pastor of the rChurch in West Bay) and Penny Leigh (owner of  Penelope's Island Emporium in West Bay and founder of Roatan Renegade Rescue). "Love Letters" is a two person play chronicling the lives of two long-time friends and the letters they exchanged. They simply read the letters they had received from one another from about third grade until middle-age when Melissa (Penny's character) dies but, boy! did they ever put feeling and expression into their readings. It was a bittersweet story very well acted by them both.

The dinner was fabulous as well. Kent Burnes of Blue Bahia hosted the event. He and his staff provided outstanding service and excellent food, as usual. Beef chursasco and garlic shrimp. Yum.

Penny told us that she and Jeremy will do another two person play after the holidays - a comedy. We can't wait to see it!!

Thanksgiving on Roatan

Photo credit: Debi Cowen

This is our first Thanksgiving on the island, but not the first without family. Our family is so far-flung across the U.S. that it is difficult to get together for many holidays. There are so many Americans and Canadians living on Roatan that we now have many people to celebrate with. (Canadians have their own Thanksgiving, but also love to share in ours.)

Our friends, Jeremy and Melissa, who pastor the rChurch in West Bay organized the 3rd annual community Thanksgiving Potluck attended by at least 150 people!! This year the dinner was held at the Beach Club at San Simeon, next to the Mayan Princess in West Bay. Beautiful place, open and airy, and plenty of room for everyone.

I volunteered to cook one of the 7 turkeys served and also made mashed potatoes and, of course, gravy. (By the way, the 12.3 pound Butterball turkey cost $25.00!! How does that compare to the U.S.?)  It was a fairly warm day, too, 86 ˚ in the kitchen, but the gable fans pulled in a good breeze all day.

The dinner started at 5:30. We were a bit late as the turkey wasn't quite done when I began to carve it. The tables were loaded with food, and the people were already lined up in a long line when we arrived. Our friend, Courtney, who takes several young island teenagers under her protective wing, brought 5 or 6 of them to the dinner and boy, did they feast!!

Amazingly, the bar was already out of wine when we arrived leaving many people disappointed. (There had been two cruise ships in that day, but I wouldn't think that they would have drunk much wine.) One of the employees ran out to the grocery store and grabbed several boxes of Almanden wine which they then served.

Photo by Don

It was a lovely evening. Met several "new" people and chatted with many acquaintances. The children had a grand time running around, chasing one another. They could run outside onto the beach and right back inside. The above photo shows the beach with the inside of the club lit up in the rear. Those strange looking beds on the beach, some with curtains, are for the guests to lounge upon. One of the beds with the curtains also sways, as the kids quickly discovered and took full advantage of.

We had two Thanksgiving dinners this year, the one above on Wednesday night, and a restaurant meal on Thursday. We really enjoyed the brined, smoked and roasted turkey with all the usual trimmings at Kent's Blue Bahia. And I finally got a piece of pumpkin pie. Delicious!!
Thursday was a challenging day is some ways. The power went out twice for 60-90 minutes at a time. Fortunately, most people cook with gas here. I was thankful that I wasn't cooking though as none of my electric appliances would have worked.

We'll be finishing up the leftovers today with turkey noodle soup made from the carcass. Hope your Thanksgiving was also wonderful.

Shopping, Island Style

The other day I enlisted the assistance of Susan and Tia to help me find some warmer clothing for some of the women up in the colonia who come to our church. We had noticed that the ladies are frequently cold on chilly, rainy days, and they don't have sweaters or jackets. My goal was to find some. This proved to be challenging! We drove around Coxen Hole checking out the little second-hand shops.

Tia knew of a nice, larger thrift shop down by the old ferry terminal. Not a single sweater to be found, but Susan and I did spot a few girls' swim suits, so we bought one for Leidi and one for Greicy. Don and I are planning to take the girls swimming again soon. On a warm day.

We checked out the shops along Back Street. No luck.

Tia suggested we try the little shops along Thicket, the road into Coxen Hole. We parked in a small lot across from the Roatan Hospital. The first shop was run by an old man who said "we don't need no sweaters here, lady. It don't get cold here!" Apparently not for him.

The little shops are everywhere, tucked into the strangest places. Often it is rather dark in these shops, but once they realized how serious we were, they would turn on the lights! We finally lucked out. We found 8 sweaters/jackets at one larger shop. They actually had more, but we rejected the wool and cashmere sweaters. They don't need that warm! And everything must be easy to wash. We also found 2 more in another little shop. That pretty much exhausted the sweater inventory in Coxen Hole. I was hoping to find more, but at least 10 women will now be a bit warmer during the next storm.

I may have to try crocheting some shawls!

Friends and Fiesta!

Infinity Bay. This is where we typically spend our Sunday afternoons. We meet up with friends, sometimes eat lunch here, generally go for a snorkel, a swim or a walk on the white sand beach, and we visit. Don took this photo with his new camera of our usual Sunday group: Susan and Larry, Bob and Debi and Dee. We see lots of other friends coming and going while there, may watch the younger folks in a volleyball game or the wee ones digging in the sand. It's a very relaxing, enjoyable way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

Greicy, Hilda, Victor, Oscar

These four kids just graduated from the 6th grade. That's a big deal in Honduras where so many children never make it that far, or if they do, that's the end of their education. These are all sponsored kids who also attend our church. The school had a graduation ceremony for them on Saturday and unfortunately, Don and I somehow failed to fix the date and time in our brains and missed it. Susan, one of the sponsors, told us not to feel bad about it. It was supposed to start at 2 p.m., but true to Honduran ways, actually began at 4 p.m. and was a very short little ceremony. The boys had to have new long pants and long-sleeved shirts and the girls wore graduation gowns.

On Monday afternoon, our church sponsored a fiesta to celebrate the graduates. Everyone came dressed in their finest, the girls had curled their hair, and they all wore big smiles. Lots of little gifts arrived, even from the poorest families. A meal was served by the mothers of the graduates, adults first, then children, including the graduates! Our pastor's wife was afraid that the food would run out before everyone had been fed, but that didn't happen. There was even some Arroz con Pollo (rice with chicken) and slaw left over. The graduates were each allowed to invite 25 people, family and friends. We saw quite a few new faces and met another darling girl named Julette (Jew-layta). I'll tell you more about her another time.

Here's our girl, Leidi, looking mighty cute, and her grandmother, Concepción. Leidi proudly told us that she had passed 4th grade and would be moving up to 5th grade in February when classes resume after the winter break. Concepción looks so pleased, doesn't she?! Leidi is holding her report card, and she had pretty good grades, even in math. She's continuing to take ESL (English as a Second Language) lessons up in the colonia which are free. Concepción often cleans the school and earns credits which she can use to "purchase" donated clothing. That's a terrific program and much needed.

I'll have more to say later.

Photo credits to Don.

Sew Sew

Our Bible study was cancelled  the other night. God had other plans. One of the women in our study is a missionary who teaches English to the Spanish-speakers and also hosts a women's sewing group. The women in this group are island women, neighbor's of Deborah's who desperately need a way to make money. Deborah's church in the U.S. provided 3 brand new Janome sewing machines and gave the women basic sewing lessons. The women are using donated fabric to make small items to sell in the gift shops near the cruise ship pier, including the Made In Roatan shop. They make headbands and bows, eyeglass cases, small purses, etc. These sewing machines also allow them to do some fancy finishes. Unfortunately, two of the machines were not working properly. Deborah knew that I sewed and asked if I could come over and take a look at the machines, so off I went.

I worked on the one machine for about an hour, cleaning it, testing it and all the while chatting with Doris as she sewed on the one working machine. The tension was messed up (hate that! So hard to correct.) and the bobbin thread was wadding up and then the upper thread would break. And somehow, the thread was getting wrapped around a lever arm behind the thread guides. I didn't see how that was even possible.

The next day, I went back and took Don with me. We worked on both machines all morning. The second machine also had thread wrapped tightly around the lever arm. Don didn't see how that was possible either. We finally had to admit defeat. Both machines had serious, yet different, tension problems and these Janome machines weren't as simple to figure out as my Singer. I told Deborah that we needed to find someone on the island who was skilled in sewing machine repairs.

A couple of nights later, Don and I attended an art show given by a budding new artist, a self-taught island woman, who is a friend of Deborah's, and who is incredibly talented. Deborah came up to me and joyfully reported that she had found a tailor who was good at repairing sewing machines. We hope he can get these straightened out soon. Deborah wants me to come back and teach the women about basic machine maintenance. I'm also thinking about other simple things that I could teach them to sew. Should be fun.

This is one of Britteny's paintings and perhaps my favorite. She uses fabric for the dresses, giving it a unique, multi-dimensional effect. Deborah has this one hanging in her living room and I just fell in love with it. It reminds me of a small painting that we bought in Belize years ago.  I have asked Britteny to paint another for us and she has agreed. Bob and Debi have asked her to do some small paintings to sell in their Made In Roatan shop. I think Britteny will do well.

Bob and Debi have been blessed by one of their cruise ship customers who saw the good work they are doing here to help struggling families and created an online store for them so they can now sell internationally! It is already a success. There are bios on the various artists and photos of them as well as photos of the items available for purchase. Here's a link to the shop: www.made-in-roatan.com