Mystery Vegetable

We were at the market the other day when this rather odd vegetable caught my eye...

My sister and brother-in-law tell me it's probably what's known as a 'broccoflower', something I'd never heard of before! The vendors at the stand told us what they call it and we should have written it down because now we can't remember what they said. 

I did some research and it turns out that there are actually two different vegetables referred to as broccoflower...something that actually IS a cross between broccoli and cauliflower and then our mystery vegetable, which is actually Romanesco broccoli. Romanesco broccoli is known for its fractal patterns that look like miniature pine trees. Amazing.

Now that I know what the heck it is, I might be brave enough to buy one if I see it again! 

Odds and Ends

Check out this post for a few pictures of what I did yesterday evening with my friend Carrie! It was fun...in spite of having to drive in some pretty crazy traffic. Apparently I'm adjusting to driving like a local because I did some pretty interesting manouvers...LOL! I haven't been able to get out of the house much lately, so I really did enjoy our time.

This morning Miguel found a half-grown parakeet fluttering around in the yard and saved it from getting eaten by our black lab, Cora! We don't know where it came from because it can barely fly, but we put it in the cage with our other two parakeets where it promptly parked itself in the food container and ate for a looooong time...poor thing. Seems to be adjusting well to his new home, though...

Shilo over at My Place of Peace and her family arrived in Paraguay today after a very long trip including an unplanned overnight layover in Brazil. I am excited for them as they move into their new house and begin their new ministry at the MK school there in Paraguay!

In other news, Miguel is finalizing the plans for his upcoming trip to Venezuela! He is planning to fly to Venezuela on June 24th and return on July 4th...he would have liked to stay longer, but he doesn't want to leave me here with the kids alone for very long, bless him! :D It wasn't possible $-wise for the whole family to go this year, but maybe another time. The plan is to bring his mom and little brother for a visit. Delia (my MIL) will be returning to Venezuela in August, but we're hoping that it will work out for José David (little brother, age 16) to stay and live with us. Now that Miguel is a U.S. citizen, he can apply for JD's U.S. paperwork so that he can truly become part of our family and travel with us wherever we go. We are really looking forward to their visit...none of Miguel's family has met Jkaile yet!

Recently, Micah was moved to make a donation to this ministry in Paraguay so that five year old Rodrigo could get a soccer ball...we were happy to advance Micah this money because we're so proud that he would show this kind of compassion and generosity. He had originally wanted to just give Rodrigo one of our soccer balls, but it's kind of hard to get it from here to there, thus the donation route...anyway, so Micah has been working to earn money to pay us back. This morning he is "babysitting" Jkaile for me...and sure enough, there was even a poopy diaper to change! :o LOL!

Sweet!

I often see promotions on milk cartons or other products here in Mexico, such as buy 4 of "these", pay a little extra and get "this", usually kitchen utensils or something. But today I really hit the jackpot! I quickly ran into one of the local grocery stores on the way home from church to grab a few things, mainly milk and eggs (we were down to a can of evaporated milk this morning!). As I reached the dairy case, I noticed several ladies standing there and one of them rattled off some promotion they were having for buying Lala brand dairy products. I didn't quite catch everything she said, but did catch something about some sort of glass something...I picked up two gallons of Lala brand milk,a large container of Lala yoghurt, and some Lala sour cream (our favorite brand anyway) and she said she would meet me at the customer service desk. I figured I would have to pay a few extra pesos for whatever she was offering and maybe even have to decline, so imagine my surprise when she handed me this backpack and these two really awesome glass canisters...for FREE! :) It caused a stir...quite a few other customers stopped to admire my prize! Sweet!

Now I need to decide what to use them for...

It's a bit hard to see, but there's the LALA

inscribed on the side with the trademark butterfly. :)

I think I might decide I need two more gallons tomorrow...