Week 26: Camarillo, CA

Dad and I have been sneezing our heads off and we have red eyes, and yes, we are loving spring! In fact, if you follow national headlines, you will see that in California, we are having a superbloom of flowers, poppies in particular. It is visible from space. So yes, this week Dad and I went in search of the huge fields of poppies and we took lots of pictures. We loved all the flowers that were blooming in the fields. 

We started the week by watching the field of brussel sprouts behind our duplex. At about 5:00 in the evening, about 20 workers came with a big tractor and some kind of processing machine, and they worked into the night using machetes to cut off the leaves, and with bright lights, machetes to chop down the plants (about 18 inches high). Then about 10 people sat on  a machine to process the brussel sprouts and load huge trucks with loads of brussel sprouts on a conveyor belt. We were absolutely amazed at the process. The workers finished the entire field in two nights, and now they are preparing to plow it under. So Dad and I ran over and filled four walmart bags with brussel sprouts that escaped the trucks. Some of the brussel sprouts were huge! I actually heard dad say, "We have so many delicious brussel sprouts." Can you believe it?  We now have enough healthy vegetables to last the rest of our mission. 

This week, we helped at a couple of English Connect classes. The classes are fun because they help me realize how ridiculous the English language can be. We taught our friends how to talk about their morning, with phrases like wake up, eat, shower, etc. Then we taught them that when they talk about she or he they should add an s to the end of the verb. Well, most of our friends had to drop out of school in the third grade to help their parents on the farm, so they did not understand the meaning of a verb. But they try so hard to learn English. So they say, "He showers. He get ups in the morning." And we smile.  We love them and we are reminded every day how incredible it is that we could go to school for 16 or more years and that we were born in the US to great parents. We also taught a few piano lessons, and again I felt so blessed to have had the opportunity to learn music. 

This week, our bishop made an emergency call to Dad because the Bishop didn't have a speaker for church. So Dad gave a beautiful and hopeful talk. It was very sweet! And the Bishop's wife gave me a stuffed animal that she crocheted to say thank you. We will always feel so much love from our time here.We're very glad that we came.