Winner of the crochet bag!

Let's celebrate with a bathtub full of fun! We have a winner for my very first giveaway. {Drum roll, please!}
Gladys from http://gladysspeaks.blogspot.com/ wins my crochet bag, cell phone case and a souvenir of Paraguay. Gladys has a really cool blog with hilarious posts. I just love her comments to news stories.

I baked a cuadruple batch of scandinavian almond bars, but in the maple/pecan variation. Just so that I could give some of these scrumptious goodies to the winner, if she was out of my area. But here's a little gift for all of my readers. I have the special permision of my very good friend, Shilo, to give the recipe to any one who wants it. Taste of Home also has this recipe but slightly different. I encourage you to surf through the TOH website, there are tons of great recipes waiting to be found.
Ok, so here's the recipe:

Scandinavian Almond Bars/Maple-Pecan Bars

1 ¾ cup flour
2 tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
½ cup butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg
½ tsp almond extract
½ cup sliced almonds
milk
almond icing
Stir together dry ingredients. Beat butter and sugar until fluffy. Add egg and almond extract. Add flour mixture and beat until mixed thoroughly. Divide into fourths. Form into 12 x 3 inch rolls (I like to pat the rolls down a bit, so they aren't quite that thick). Place two rolls on ungreased cookie sheet and brush with milk and sprinkle with almonds. Bake at 325 for 12-14 minutes. While warm, cut crosswise at diagonal into 1 inch strips. Cool.
Icing:
Stir 1 cup powdered sugar, ¼ tsp almond extract and enough milk to make a drizzling consistency. (I put the icing in a little bag, snip off one corner of the bag, and drizzle the icing on the bars)
To change them to Maple Walnut Bars:
Use ¼ tsp vanilla, ¼ tsp maple extract in the dough to replace almond extract and ¼ tsp maple extract in the glaze to replace almond extract then exchange walnuts/pecans for the almonds.

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and come back to read my blog again.

(Photos from: pixelio.com and tasteofhome.com)

Can't think of a title....

After last weeks excitement, this week started pretty tame.



We brought the baby and her mother home, and they are doing well. The baby girls's name is Ercelina.




I went to drink terere with my sister, C, this morning. Her boys are just hilarious! Check out the clip:

Jopi & Stiti's tricycle stunt.

( I don't know why this picture is showing double here, sorry 'bout that)

No one was harmed during the filming of this clip, nor were the any stunts done by profesional stuntmen. This is the real thing!!!

P.S. Just reminding you, that there is still time to enter in my blog-giveaway. Just comment on last weeks post.

An exciting morning and my first giveaway

Are you all curious yet?

First I want to tell you how my day began.

At 3 am our indian tractor driver knocked on our window and said that we had to take his daughter-in-law to the hospital. In their culture it's very common for 15 year olds to "get married" and live with either of the couples parents, until they find work somewhere else. So Marvin took Adriano and Susanna to the hospital. There he found out, that she hadn't had a single check-up since they got together, and the insurance would not pay for her to have her baby there.

They left her at the hospital and I called in at 7 am and asked how she was. The nurse said labor is very slow, so if we wanted to, we could pick her up again and take her to the goverment mother/child hospital at Villa Choferes, 20 km from town. I took my Mom along, just in case. I was so scared I would have to look for scissors and hot water along the way(thats what they always asked for in the old movies), but everything worked out ok till there. We left her in care of the doctor there and left him my cell number to call me when the baby came.

Marvin needed Adriano and his father to plant peanuts, they couldn't really stay there with her. Mom and I had just gotten back to town, when the nurse called and said, Susanna is trying to run away from the hospital, she doesn't understand a word of spanish and they couldn't keep her there (without a court order {did I understand that right?}). So I promised the nurse we would try to find the girls mother or we would send Adriano over. I called Marvin, and he drove to Villa and took the young papa-to-be there.

Juan (grandpa) called us a few minutes ago and told us the baby was born around noon.

That was my morning in a nutshell:)

Now for the surprise:

I'm giving away a crochet handbag with matching cellphone bag. I made this bag for the craftshow a few months ago, and would really like to give it to someone that appreciates the work that goes into crafting.

Eskimo was very willing to model the bag for us! He said he wanted his salary in cat food.

• Everyone that leaves me a comment on this post enters in the giveaway.
• Anyone who comments and also follows my blog gets two entries.
• If the winner is outside of Paraguay, I will send the bag in the mail with a little souvenir (recuerdo) of Paraguay along with it.
• If the winner lives in Paraguay, I will send the bag with some fresh baked goodies along with it.
• I will notify the winner and ask for the address then.
  

In one week, the 16. of October, I will put all the names in a hat and draw the lucky winner.

So now I wish you all a great weekend and good luck in my giveaway!

P.S. The baby in the picture is not Adriano and Susanna's baby. But cute anyway!

New look for my blog

Hello, dear friends following me!

Spring has arrived to the Chaco. We had a great little rain on Tuesday till Wednesday. 40 mm in all here, not much, but a great start!

And because I'm in a spring-mood, I transformed my blog layout to something more fresh and green. I know that the people up in the northern hemisphere might think I've gone crazy, but the seasons are opposite in the south, ok?


I would also like to announce my first giveaway. If everything works out right, I'll be posting about that tomorrow. And I will keep the gift a secret until then, too. So, whoever is reading this today, check in again tomorrow for details.


This is a Paratodo tree in full bloom a few weeks ago, somehow it knew it would receive rain soon. God is good to us!

Transchaco Rally 2009

Ok, everybody, I'm back to normal again, the rally fanatic has left the building.

Last weekend was one of the biggest sporting events of Paraguay (not counting soccer games). The Rally Transchaco is one of the most difficult races of the world. Over 1100 km on dirt roads little more than paths cut through the prickly brush that makes up most of the Chaco. Up to 100 cars start annually on the 3 day race and only a third of them make it over the finish line.

My husbands cousin, Thomas, has always had a thing about speed. He used to drive motocross races and plays in the Fernheimer Volleyball crew. Seven years ago, a little while after his dad died, he signed up for the Transchaco Rally for the first time. Up until now, he only once made it to the finish line in third place. This year, the whole racing team was working on a shoestring budget. There was no money to throw around, and the sponsors didn't trust him enough to put their money on him. The team helping him, all brought their own food along for the 3 days they spent in the open brush in tents or in the Tinglado in Mariscal Estigarribia. My husband and another of his cousins spent 2,5 days in Mariscal cooking for the whole team of helpers.

Monday morning, my best friend Linda (Thomas's sister-in-law), and her 3 boys, and our 3 girls and I all headed out at 6 am to see a part of the race 30 km from here. We were there and cheered Thomas on when he zipped past us in seventh place. Later we took all the kids out for lunch at the Chinese restaurant.

On Tuesday, I followed the race closely on the radio and prepared food for the next day.Early on Wednesday, Linda and her kids and Thomas's mom, Erica, all came to our house. We had coffee and cinnamon rolls waiting and we set up the lawn chairs on the driveway. At about 7:45 the first car zipped past our house, Thomas was leading the race! Afterwards they said, that he had made the best time on this part of the race, most likely because he knows this road like the back of his hand. (He lives right next door.) His average speed was 187 km/h on this etapa of the race.

Afterwards we all went to Pozo Colorado. I had called Marvin on the cell phone, to see if we could all go together, but he was still busy, and not going to be home for another hour or two. Pozo is 200 km from our house, what I didn't know, before I left home. I think, I would have stayed home, had I realized that I would be driving over 400 km in one day.

Around noon we got there and waited. Two hours later we were standing at the finish line, when Thomas drove through and won the Rally for the first time in his life. His mom was very moved and it was an emotional moment for many of us. If you look at the above picture closely, you can see Brianna (the little strawberry/blond head to the right hand side of Thomas), someone put her on their shoulders, so she could see him!

This the the proud Mom and son after the race.