Boundary stone

One day our neighbor Sebastián informed us that a boundary stone between our properties had moved due to the dirt becoming softened by the rain.  He said "a man" was coming to help reinstall the rock, and we could be there if we wanted.  So we showed up at the appointed time, on a back corner of our property, and found out that "the man" was another neighbor Tomás whose land border was also defined by this rock.  It is common here to be vague about who people are, probably since neighbors often get angry with each other over things like this.  The two men took turns digging with a heavy, pointed metal rod, inserted a new, bigger rock, asked us to measure and be sure we were content with its location, and then filled in around the rock with dirt again.  I (Heather-Erica) took the following photo surreptitiously, since they didn't seem to want the process documented!

Tomás is digging to reset a boundary stone.
Watching are Sebastián, his wife Micaela,
and their two sons José and Eduardo

The neighbor who had invited us to this event, Sebastián, had previously asked us for permission to concrete in that back corner of our land (outside our fence) with a short concrete path allowing him better access to his house, and we gave him permission.  During the rock-burying process, we pointed out that the new rock's height was too low, since the two men said they wanted it to show through the concrete.  They seemed content with its height though, so in the end we left them to figure it out.  Later we saw that a new small rock had been placed in the concrete pad above the rock they buried, so all turned out well. 

We have hired Sebastián and his family to be house-sitters and take care of our dog Lucy during our last two trips to the U.S.  Fortunately, it has gone well, and we are glad to have them as neighbors.  Tomás has also been a good neighbor, and we will always be grateful to him for being willing to sell us the edge of his land for our driveway.

Traditional religious events

We often see posts like this on Facebook.  On this occasion a few weeks ago, a road was blocked in town by a gathering of traditional Mayan religious worshipers celebrating a certain saint.

Burning candles to the idol they moved
from one priest's house to another
(looks like a dog)

Kneeling to honor the saint they were celebrating

Lighting a fire in the middle of the road

Swinging tin cans of smoking incense
and blaring very loud music from
multiple speakers

Visit to U.S.

We had a great visit to the U.S. for 5 weeks in May and June.  We enjoyed visiting Carolyn and Andrew, Elena, and Andrea, as well as Heather's parents, Richard and Karen, and Michael's dad, Charlie.

Michael with his dad Charlie in his
assisted living facility

With Elena, Andrew, and Carolyn

Picnic with our daughters and Heather's
parents, Richard and Karen

Michael speaking at Central Presbyterian
Church in Tellico Plains, Tennessee

Growing season

I was asked about our growing season here, and I'm happy to report that it is basically year-round since Guatemala is in the tropics!  I have grown flowers throughout my life in the different places we have lived, and I have gotten back into flower gardening this past year.

We don't have four seasons, but we do have a rainy season and a dry season.  This means the plants almost drown in the daily rain showers for half of the year, then face a drought the other half!  During the rainy season, I am learning which plants can't take that much water: for example, geraniums, which I replanted into pots and placed under roofs where they get the sun part of the day, but I can regulate their water.  During the dry season, I spend time watering everything once a week, including the St. Augustine grass, which is a thick vine.  

We had many rocks remaining from our builder's over-estimated purchase for using in our retaining walls, so I've been placing them around our yard to make garden areas around the grass.  I've recently planted different colors of hibiscus, hydrangeas, rose of Sharon, poinsettias, bouganvillea, and tropical azaleas, all of which bloom year-round here.  I've also tried planting spider plants outside, as well as mother-in-law tongues, which are doing well.  I'm enjoying it!

Plants at our local nursery are cheap, but they don't always live long, so I have to baby them and hope for the best!  I'm always fighting insects and fungus, but we recently found some products in town to treat them.  I even accidentally brought home some snails on my last purchase of plants!  Here are some pictures I took in our yard recently.

If you zoom in, you can see the hummingbird.

Geraniums hiding from the rain

Hibiscus on a young bush.  I have planted
7 varieties/colors and am waiting
to see how they do.

Rock garden on steep hillside

Training bougainvillea to grow up an old
swing set as an arch
(Our dog Lucy is in her favorite spot on the
bridge over our sand filter for kitchen sink
and shower drainage water.)

Another bougainvillea arch made of PVC pipes
(The small building houses our water pump
for drawing water out of the cistern
which is under the arch.)

Experimenting with color

Between carport and house

This anthurium was small when it was
first gifted to me by our builder,
and now it's several feet tall.

Discovering that some bougainvillea
prefer to be bushes instead of
climbers

Easter bread

In Chichicastenango, Semana Santa (Holy Week) is a very big deal.  Throughout the week, they close and decorate roads with "rugs" made of flower petals, and there are many processions carrying statues of saints through town at various times.  We mostly try to stay home that week, since getting anywhere in town is so complicated!  There is also a tradition here of all the bakeries making "Easter bread," which are large sweet rolls to be eaten with honey.  Our neighbors from the house you can see behind us in the video, William and Mercedes (probably in their upper 20s), brought us a gift of this bread!  It was indeed delicious!

Our dog Lucy followed me around,
smelling the sweet bread!

They are the size of my hand!

Thank you

To all of you who have supported us, both financially and in prayer, we say THANK YOU!!!

Another detour

Our neighborhood road is currently blocked due to the installation of paving bricks on a 60-meter stretch of road.  At that rate they will have to block it repeatedly about six times before arriving at our driveway!  They only do road improvements once a year when the municipality gives them money, so we are hoping they will do more at a time when they re-block the road in the future.  

Here is a map of our current "back way" detour in yellow.  It takes about 15 extra minutes of slow driving to navigate with some tricky maneuvering to pass oncoming vehicles.  It is mostly a single-car-width dirt road with various cornfields, steep dropoffs, and concrete walls lining the edges.  The blue line shows our normal drive out of our neighborhood, which is the part currently blocked.